Faerie Magic (21 page)

Not enough…

“He has Avakis’s blood.” I stood, brushing grass from my knees. “Unless we have time for a chat, I probably won’t get answers. Guess he didn’t intend me to track him. I’ve no idea where the park I saw is, anyway.”

“I’ll send mages patrolling.”

Damn.
Should have figured he wouldn’t leave well enough alone. He’d as good as said most mages wouldn’t stand a chance against Calder.

“Vance.” I gave him a pointed look.

He met my stare, stony-eyed. “We’ll discuss this later,” he said. “I need to get back to the guild and check everything’s running smoothly. I’ll let you know if anything changes.”

I nodded. I couldn’t do anything else. Calder wasn’t naturally stronger than me, at all. He’d been artificially boosting his power all along. To have so many hellhounds required a summoning circle or a really good hiding place.

There was only one place in town where you could hide a powerful spell and not be detected: the Ley Line.

***

The following afternoon found Isabel and me on the wrong side of the law again.

Vance had been gone all day, after reassuring me he wouldn’t tell anyone outside of his immediate circle about Calder unless he struck again. Apparently, saying
I know who the killer is and I intend to catch him myself
was an appropriate alternative to letting the rest of the council know what was going on. Perks of being head mage.

He’d gone to the necromancers first, and sent me a message after Lord Evander had insisted none of his necromancers were involved this time. Worse, the half-faerie Chief had flat-out refused a meeting, again, arguing the Trials were perfectly legal. I’d have liked to have introduced him to my sword, but Vance had insisted on confronting him alone. I fully intended to go there later, but right now, Isabel and I had bigger problems.

We hovered in the corner of Edith’s Apothecary, waiting for the other customers to leave so we could talk to the owner alone. The middle-aged witch behind the counter glowered at us for hanging around near the glass cases containing expensive charms.

“We look suspicious,” I said out of the corner of my mouth.

“Not much choice.” Isabel pretended to examine a glittering pendant. I flipped through an ancient spellbook open on a pedestal between the shelves. This was for display—the witches kept their real magic hidden away in places only the covens could access. I’d never seen one myself.

“Maybe he ordered them,” I muttered, not daring to say Calder’s name in here. “Does this place do home deliveries?”

Isabel’s head snapped up. “To custom clients. Can’t hurt to ask.” She glanced over at the desk. The last customer had finally left, door swinging shut behind them. “I’ll do it,” she added. “She knows who I am.”

Isabel casually approached the witch at the desk, while I examined a shelf of luminous potions. Witch spells had different effects on half-faeries, and since the two groups didn’t mix, nobody knew what those effects might be. No wonder Calder had got away with his plan. Half the city’s problems would probably be solved if the different supernatural groups just
talked
to one another.

Isabel walked over, beckoning me behind a nearby display. “There was a bulk order of mandrake leaves, but she refused to tell me where.”

“Oh, no.” I knew that look. “I’ve sworn off breaking and entering,” I said as quietly as possible.

“Shadow spell.”

I groaned quietly. “Fine.” I glanced over my shoulder, but the old woman at the desk didn’t appear to be looking our way. “You didn’t bespell her, did you?”

“Minor diversion spell.”

“You’re evil.” I said this without malice, taking the shadow illusion spell. One click and I turned more or less transparent. With daylight streaming through the front windows, I had to edge around the shelves to find a clear route behind the desk, somewhat helped by the owner’s distraction.

Crouching down, I searched her desk for the document where she’d have recorded shipments. I paused as she glanced to the side, but the shadows kept me hidden. So this was why Isabel had spent yesterday evening making a new batch of illusion spells.

Several nerve-wracking seconds later, I’d snatched the right document out from the desk. I crouched awkwardly in the shadows, skimming through names and addresses. Only two mass orders of mandrake leaves had been put through in the last few weeks. I memorised both addresses, replaced the paper, and ran to join Isabel. We hurried out of there like hellhounds were on our tail.

Outside, the main shopping district was as crowded as usual on a weekday at late afternoon. Mostly humans, though some might have been witches or shifters. Here, the crowds mingled in the streets of the small shopping district, and the apothecary lay nestled between a grocer’s and a chemist’s. It did make sense. Witches used human shops, and it wasn’t unheard of for humans to seek out witch remedies and or hire someone to perform a spell.

One bumpy bus journey later and we’d reached the road near our flat. I checked out of habit to make sure nothing followed us, but the house was swamped in wards, iron, and Isabel’s instant-trigger magical tripwire spells.

“Warn me next time.” I led the way to the building. Then stopped. Several small bodies lay outside the gate, right next to the new layer of wards. “What the…?”

“Piskies,” said Isabel. “They must have flown into the tripwire spell.”

“Ouch.” They appeared unconscious, not dead. I counted at least ten of them. “Crap. It’s the ones who escaped from the shed.”

Isabel crouched to pick one up. Its arms flopped over her arm. “Why would they come here?”

“Very good question.” A suspicious chill went down my back.
He
hadn’t sent them, had he? No. If he knew my address, he’d have sent hellhounds. Even piskies couldn’t break our defences, at least.

I stepped over the boundary and approached the door. “How many new wards are there, anyway?”

“Seventeen,” said Isabel. “Anti-faerie spells, anti-undead…”

“Anti-undead?”

“The Cavanaughs figured out you were in trouble with the necromancers.

I sighed. “Yeah, if the necromancers and I were on speaking terms, I’d be able to find out if anyone’s messing with the veil.”

“Like I said, nobody in the coven’s noticed anything. I think he’s stuck on this side.”

“Well,
Calder—”
I pointedly used his name, determined not to shrink away from it anymore—“is an elusive pain in the ass. Hopefully one of these addresses will work.”

“More than one?”

“Two. No recorded names.” I turned the key in the lock and stepped into our flat, Isabel on my heels. Once inside, I rattled off the addresses.

Isabel checked her phone. “Abandoned,” she said. “Both of them. Maybe it’s a setup. Calder might have been too clever to leave a trail.”

I thought of the temper tantrum I’d witnessed through the hellhound’s eyes. “Perhaps.” I took out my own phone and messaged Vance. To my surprise, a reply came immediately. “He’s coming—”

The doorbell rang.

“—here,” I finished.

“He’s awfully quick to respond to your messages.” Isabel smirked, laying her own phone on the coffee table.

“Yeah, because I gave him grief about ignoring me for a week while the necromancers took all my cash.” I deflected her pointed stare. “Not now.”

“Later, then. You’re not off the hook. He likes you, Ivy Lane.”

“Enough,” I said, through gritted teeth. Yes, I knew I needed to make sense of the situation, fast, but Vance made it difficult to think clearly. As for telling him what I felt? Either he’d ditch me and leave me jobless, or he’d reciprocate and—what? Did we have a future, with the faeries stalking my every move?

“You didn’t give me the chance to reply to your message,” I said, opening the front door. “I might have been busy.”

“You aren’t.” He crossed the threshold into the flat, letting the door swing shut behind him.

I rolled my eyes. “No, but we found out where the orders for the drug ingredients came from. Two empty addresses.”

Vance ran a similar search on his own phone, frowning. “They’re both near half-blood district.”

“What happened back there, anyway?” I asked. “Have there been any more attacks?”

“No,” he said. “The Chief, however, is almost as irresponsible as Lord Evander.” Irritation rolled off his words.

“Well, they’re half-faeries,” I said. “By definition, they’re capricious and unreliable. The Sidhe lords rule on power and heritage alone, and like to put curses on people they disagree with rather than settling anything like responsible leaders. As for the half-faeries, they’re just as bad. Did I mention one of them transformed into a giant octopus and flooded the arena with slime yesterday?”

Vance looked at me. “I’m going with you tonight.”

I held up my hands. “Oh, no.”

“You rightly pointed out that I’m incapable of being in several places at once,” he said. “It stands to reason, however, that the one place where there’s trouble happening is where
you
are.”

A snicker came from behind me. I shot Isabel a glare.

“You can’t just walk in there.”

“I’ll wear a cloaking spell. You mentioned you had some spare ones.”

I groaned. “Fine. But for the love of hellhounds, stay out of the way of the fighting and don’t draw attention.”

“I planned nothing of the sort.”

“Vance, you knock the doors down, ask questions later. Don’t deny it.”

The hint of a smile touched his mouth. “Maybe.”

Isabel cleared her throat. “I’m going to a coven meeting tonight. Be careful.”

“Same to you,” I said, turning to Vance. “What about those addresses? You aren’t seriously sending your people there, are you? If Calder’s there… he doesn’t take prisoners.”

“No,” said Vance. “If nothing happens at the Trials tonight, we’ll make a new plan tomorrow.”

“If nothing happens tonight?” I raised an eyebrow. “Calder will invite me over for a friendly tea party first.”

I walked back to Isabel, ready to put on my half-faerie disguise again.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Knowing Vance watched somewhere in the audience did absolutely nothing to ease my jittery nerves. Eight of us remained in the game. Four of us would walk away.

The hobgoblin called my name, along with my opponent’s—Lilac. Yeah, I was up against crazy octopus girl. I narrowed my eyes at her.
She’d better not spit slime on the arena floor again.
Being poisoned would give me away as a human, because we didn’t respond to the same healing remedies as faeries did. Lucky Vance was here, really.

Lilac smiled benignly at me, but I wasn’t fooled for an instant. She had bubblegum-pink hair today, and wore a dress in an equally eye-watering shade. The crowd, however, had seen her fight more than once already. They knew she had no end of tricks up her sleeve.

Unfortunately, this made it impossible for me to tell her weakness upfront. I settled for pulling a magical shield around myself instead, preparing to dodge whatever she threw at me.

Lilac bounced on her feet, still smiling. Ugh. Her faerie parent was probably the sort who tore the limbs off humans for fun. With no attack forthcoming, I risked getting closer, readying for a strike of my own. She’d transform if I hit her directly, but maybe my magic could knock her down first.

I sent a blue stream of energy at her face. She didn’t move or dodge, and I stared in disbelief as the attack hit her dead on, sending her skidding several feet on her back. Laughter rippled through the crowd, though with a nervous undertone. Even the faeries were creeped out by her cute little-girl act.

Lilac stood up. I pressed my advantage and fired a second attack, knocking her down again. And again. I moved in closer, though I was pretty certain she was trying to lure me in so she’d be able to get at me. I didn’t have much choice, because my attacks from a distance weren’t strong enough to force a surrender. I drew on my growing frustration, feeding it into the magic building around me, but didn’t dare tap into the other contestants like I had last time. I threw another attack, half expecting her to let it hit her again.

Lilac launched into the air, limbs spread wide, like a puppet pulled up by the strings. Her limbs lengthened and widened, her body arching and stretching, and fur grew all over her body. Throwing her head back, she roared, landing on four padded feet with enough force to shake the ceiling.

Well, shit. She’d turned into a lion.

Okay… change of plans.
Hand-to-hand combat against a lion would likely involve
losing
a hand, so I’d need to rely on magic or force her back into her normal form.

The lion shook its head, waving a considerably scaly tail. Definitely not a regular lion.

I paced around, putting more distance between myself and the beast. It could probably move as fast as I could with my senses boosted, and I didn’t want to take any chances.
It’s just another stupid hellhound,
I told myself.