Dirty Magic (30 page)

I didn’t have to think about my next move. On autopilot, I slammed my head back and punched my heel down into the soft instep of my attacker. The hands didn’t ease up and no yelps of pain escaped him. But my scalp stung as if I’d hit a couple of teeth, so I knew I’d clocked him good.

I threw my weight forward, going limp. Slid out of his arms and swiveled so I landed on my back. The instant I made contact with the floor, I pulled the trigger. The bullet ripped through his chest, just to the left of his breastbone. The fiend shrieked in rage and lunged toward me. The second bullet finally brought him down after it tore through his esophagus. His weight landed on top of me like a sack of anvils. I kicked him off me and rolled.

Other gunshots cracked off the walls and pounded against my eardrums. I squinted through the dim light and the smoke to take stock. Morales and Shadi were fighting back-to-back, picking off any wolves who even looked in their direction. I could see Mez, but occasionally the air sizzled with the static of spent magic from one of his party favors.

It was hard to get a head count through the chaos, but I managed to identify at least a dozen deformed shapes outlined in the shadows. The potion patch had worn off, but my adrenaline was pounding like lightning through my veins.

A new figure ran at me from the tunnel. She wore a dress over her furry body that tented her thin frame like a muumuu. The floral catastrophe screamed Goodwill donation box.

I raised the Glock, only then realizing I’d lost count of my bullets. The woman ran at me so fast I didn’t have the luxury of a tactical reload, so I just pointed the gun and prayed I had enough juice to bring her down.

The woman fell to her knees like a two-dollar whore. A dark-red splotch spread across the chest of the dress. Her hands clawed at the stain, as if she could scratch it away. When that didn’t work, she pacified herself by sucking the blood from her fingertips. She looked so happy that I could only watch in horror, mesmerized by the unsettling image.

“Kate!” Morales shouted. My head jerked up. “Behind you!”

I swiveled, bringing up my gun as I went. A flash of pale skin and lips red with blood.

Click. Click. Click.

It was on the last click of the empty magazine that I recognized the face.

I dropped the gun as if it had burned me. My mind reeled. The sharp claws of fear scratched down my spine.

The potion had begun its work transforming the face into the twisted mask of rage. But there was no denying that I knew my attacker.

“Danny?” I whispered.

A flurry of questions and panicked thoughts scrambled through my brain. How had this happened? Had Bane gotten him before he reached school? Or did he lure him away? Oh God! Did Pen know Danny was missing?

What the fuck was I going to do?

Danny growled. Spittle bubbled from his lips. His eyes flashed hot red with bloodlust. Bloodlust forced upon him by a psychopath.

Bane. I was going to tear that motherfucker limb from limb for this horror.

The sounds of fighting rushed into my shocked mind, pushing out all the questions and replacing them with a shot of adrenaline. It was fight-or-flight time. But I knew if I ran, he’d only chase and we’d both end up dead.

The kid who had happily eaten breakfast with me that morning snarled and lunged.

Out of instinct, my arm came up to block the blow. “Morales!”

Danny’s hands went for my neck.

“What?” Morales yelled.

“Fuck!” I ducked a punch and delivered a jab of my own to Danny’s ribs. He groaned and retaliated with a swipe to my neck with his claws. The skin there stung like acid and went cold as blood welled.

“Mez, go help Kate!” Morales called between grunts that indicated he had his hands full, too.

But the scent of blood was like lighting a match too close to gasoline. No longer content to try just to maim me, Danny went after my jugular like a shark attacking chum. He moved so fast I could barely keep up with defensive blows, much less cause any damage of my own.

“I’m coming, Prospero!” Mez called.

“Hurry!” I kicked at his shins and clawed at his face with my fingernails. Some horrified voice in my head whispered that I shouldn’t be hitting back. That I should figure out how to defend myself against Danny without hurting him. But the practical side—the one that liked being alive—reminded me that if I didn’t manage to fight him off I’d be dead and then the team would kill Danny.

The sound of running footsteps echoed from somewhere behind me. “Back off, asshole!” Mez shouted. I raised my head enough to glance at him. When I saw the Mundane gun in his hand, terror gripped my heart with a cold fist.

“No!” I screamed and swiveled to put myself between Danny and the gun.

“Prospero, get out of the way!”

Behind me, my brother realized I wasn’t fighting him anymore. As I opened my mouth to explain to Mez, the attack came. Canines slammed into my neck like a serpent’s strike.

I gasped and lurched forward.

“Goddamn it, Kate. I can’t get a clear shot.”

“No!” I yelled. “No bullets!”

The pain in my neck was indescribable—hot and sharp. Danny’s weight on my back. The terrible sucking noises. Tracers dancing in the edges of my vision. Ice coating my skin.

“Danny—it’s Danny.” I swallowed against the taste of copper on my tongue. “Knock … out,” I rasped. “Potion him.”

Mez either didn’t understand what I said or was too jacked up on adrenaline for it to register. “Drop to your knees.”

“Potion, potion,” I begged, my voice losing strength, “potion.”

Little sparks danced in the periphery of my vision. My knees were weakening. If I didn’t convince Mez to shoot Danny with the potion quickly, I was going to pass out and Lord help us all. “Morales!” I forced through my tight throat. “It’s Danny!” I screamed the name with every last ounce of energy and air left in my body. “Danny!”

Just before I passed out, I saw grim-faced Morales grab something from Mez. The last thing I heard before I slipped into the black was the sound of a gun firing.

R
ed and blue pulsed everywhere. A high-pitched drone whirred through my head, but I couldn’t tell if it was real or the result of the vacuum between my ears. For several minutes, the neon signs and buildings of the Cauldron blurred by, creating a dizzying kaleidoscope. After that, the scent of disinfectant and a wall of cold whiteness surrounded me.

The world passed in a blur of color and noise. Occasionally a familiar face would cross my field of vision, but my eyes couldn’t focus long enough to establish context. Electricity must have zapped between my neurons, but none of those little packets of information registered anywhere on my motherboard.

Stinging pain on my neck. Promises it would pass. Needles and thread, trying to sew my jagged edges back together. But all the king’s horses and all the king’s men couldn’t make me feel whole again.

Warm hand on my arm. A quiet voice whispering in my ear. My eyes burned. My ribs crushed my too-tight lungs. My heart a pulsing bruise inside my chest.

“Kate?” That voice again. I recognized it but didn’t. Some part of my fractured mind realized I’d heard it before, but the tone sounded … off. Too careful. Worried.

“She’s in shock.” A woman’s voice this time. “Anyone would be.”

“He was going to kill her.” A male voice, deep, shaken.

“Thank God you stepped in,” another shaky male voice said. “I almost—”

“Hush now, you didn’t.”

The words washed over me as if I didn’t exist at all.

The white void gave way to the shape of a man. He had dark hair and brown eyes. A leather jacket creaked as he knelt in front of me.

“Kate,” he said, “the doctor needs to talk to you.”

I heard the words. Each had a definition I understood. But it wasn’t worth the effort to analyze the collection of vowels and consonants and turn them into actions. I wanted to stew in the blissful numbness. That liminal space between what came before and what would be. The place where I could pretend this was all just some sort of horrible dream.

DannyDannyDannyDannyDannyDanny …

I squeezed my eyes to shut out the memories that threatened to rush forward. My body rocked back and forth to ward off the intrusion of reality.

The sharp scent of ammonia hit my nose like a punch. I reared back, shocked out of my haze. I blinked and saw Pen standing over me with a vial in her hand.

My eyes snapped open and my brain snapped back into the matrix of reality. “What the fuck, Pen?” I supposed I should have been glad she hadn’t slapped me, but the ammonia stench of
sal volatile
wasn’t much more pleasant.

She crossed her arms and the frown between her brows was so deep, soldiers could set up residence in the trenches. “Enough, Kate. Pull yourself together.” She raised a hand and pointed a finger toward the closed door next to the waiting area. “The doc needs your permission to provide treatment.” She leaned down and got in my face. “So you’re going to get off your skinny, white ass and make sure that boy gets the help he needs.”

I stared up at her but it was like looking through a plate glass window. Beyond Pen, Mez and Morales stared in open-mouthed shock. Shadi leaned against the far wall looking as if she couldn’t decide whether she was mad at Pen or respected the hell out of her. Gardner’s expression was unreadable, but she didn’t move to step in.

I witnessed all of these things as an observer more than as a participant. Which meant I also suddenly got this image of myself, slumped and surrendered on the chair, while my baby brother lay alone and broken in the next room.

“What’s it going to be?” Pen arched a brow in challenge. “You going to sit here and feel sorry for yourself, or are you going to get up and do the damned thing?”

I cleared my throat, sat up straighter, and looked her in the eye. “Were the smelling salts really necessary?”

My best friend smiled and held out her hand to help me up. “Nope.” She shot me a shit-eating grin that did little to disguise the dark circles under her eyes and worry brackets around her mouth.

The door to Danny’s room was ten feet away, but it felt more like miles. I glanced uneasily at Pen. “Will you come with me?” I whispered. Everyone else suddenly pretended they had more important things to do or talk about.

Pen put her arm around my shoulders. “Try and stop me.”

* * *

The next couple of hours were a blur of medical jargon, sympathetic looks, and endless forms. Luckily, I was still officially on the BPD health insurance plan. Unfortunately, I’d signed up for the plan that had a sky-high deductible for any medical care that required the assistance of a medical wizard. At the time I thought I was being smart since I kept Danny away from magic. Guess the joke was on me.

“Katie?” Pen stuck her head in the door. The incessant beep of the heart monitor and the
hush-thrush
of the breathing machine were momentarily drowned out by voices from the hallway. She’d exited earlier to take a call from the principal at her school. The entire administration was scrambling to find out what had happened and cover their asses. I didn’t blame the school. I didn’t blame Pen, either—even though she seemed determined to assume some of the guilt.

I blamed Bane. Period.

“Katie?”

I looked up, thankful for the interruption. For the last half hour I’d been alone in the room with Danny. He was too quiet, too still, too … absent from the shell that lay on the bed like a sacrifice to the gods of Big Magic. Tubes and wires jutted from his mouth and nose, arms and chest. His face was calmer in repose, but the Gray Wolf was still in his system, leaving his features mangled and deformed. Combined with the medical equipment, he looked like a modern-day version of Frankenstein’s monster.

Bane’s monster.

My teeth clenched and a hot rush of blood coursed through my veins at that thought.

“Kate?” Pen again, more insistent.

“Yes?” I said, rising. I assumed she’d come to tell me she needed yet another set of forms filled out.

“Your friends are asking if they can come in.”

“Which friends?”

She pursed her lips and cocked her head. “Your team. They’ve been here for hours.”

“Oh right.” I shook myself. “Yeah, okay.”

“I’ll give you a second to clean up.” She winked at me.

Thankful to have something to do other than stare at my brother, I went to the sink. The small mirror over it told a sad tale of a woman who’d been through the shock of her life. Blood smeared her cheeks and chin. The dark circles under her eyes were a combo of lack of sleep and mascara tracks. A bandage glared harshly white on her neck.

I wet a towel and scrubbed my face. The rough nap of the fabric felt like burlap and the water was cold as a slap. When I finished, the skin was flushed, but all the blood was gone.

Another knock.

“Come,” I called. The quick glance toward the bed was reflexive. I could have invited a brass band to play in the room and Danny wouldn’t have stirred.

The door opened to reveal a solemn crew. Gardner came in first, naturally. Morales followed. Pen came in after him and leaned against the counter with her arms crossed. Her expression resembled a bulldog’s, as if she was ready to kick their asses out if they upset me.