Magic Without Mercy (30 page)

“I see where you’re going with this,” Shame said. “Interesting. Don’t know if it would work, or how long it would work. I think magic, and the poison, would find its way across the line eventually.”

“The best plan is still for Stone to have some kind of hint for the cure,” Terric said. “Though I’m a little fuzzy on how we plan to distribute the cure, if we actually do stumble on how to create a cure.”

“One disaster at a time, Terric,” I said. “We’ll figure it out.”

“So how long are we going to squat in the bushes?” Shame asked. “Because my ass is numb.”

“You can go back and check on Zay,” I suggested sweetly.

“Zay’s fine,” Shame said. “You’d know if he weren’t. Soul Complements.” He rolled his eyes.

“Don’t start with me about Soul Complements, Flynn,” I said. “You don’t want to go down that road.”

Shame couldn’t help it—he glanced at Terric. To Terric’s credit, he just scanned the street, as if he hadn’t heard us.

“I thought you were looking for a Hound,” Shame said.

“Was,” I said, standing up. “Not anymore.”

I strode around the bushes, doing what I could to stick to the shadows and stay silent. Since I was good at both those things, I did a damn fine job.

“Jack,” I whispered.

Jack Quinn stopped, and made it look like he was throwing a cigarette to the sidewalk and rubbing it out with his boot. He did not turn and look at me. “There’s
trouble coming,” he said. “Police. Ten units. On my heels. Make yourself scarce.”

And then he was walking again, not hurrying, but I could tell in the brace of his shoulders that he was planning to make it somewhere, probably back to his car, in the shortest amount of time possible.

“That’s what you wanted to know?” Shame said quietly next to me as we walked the opposite way from Jack down the street. “Bloody hells, Beckstrom, I told you that an hour ago.”

“That’s not all I wanted to know,” I said. “I wanted to know if it’s the police or the Authority after us, and how many. It’s police—there’s ten cars. Now I want to throw them off our trail.”

“Are they even on our trail yet?” Shame asked.

“If they’re any good, they are already at Mama’s questioning her.”

“So how?” Terric asked.

“That’s what the police do,” I said.

“No, how do we throw them off our trail?”

“They’re looking for me. We want them away from the park. I’m going to bet Mama didn’t finger us, so that means I just need to call in a favor. Either of you have a phone?”

Terric pulled one of those pay-as-you-go phones out of his pocket.

“Who are you calling?” he asked.

“Grant.” I just hoped my friend was at the coffee shop. I dialed his number. It rang twice, then picked up.

“Get Mugged,” Grant said.

“You have my credit card number, right?” I asked.

“I do,” he said.

“I’d like a large cup of coffee. Black. Run it on my card,” I said. “And when the police show up, tell them I took it and walked west.”

“Everything okay?”

“It’s going to be soon. The stuff you’ve heard—it isn’t true.”

“I know.”

The knot in my chest loosened a little. Grant was a good guy, and he’d stuck by me through a lot of things, even back in my Hounding days before I tangled with the Authority. If it weren’t for him, I’d probably be in jail right now. Or worse.

I hated that he might have thought I really had embezzled from my dad’s corporation. And whatever other things the news might be saying about me.

“Thank you,” I said. “Be careful. I owe you for this.”

“There’s a play coming to town. Buy me tickets?”

“For opening night.”

And then we hung up.

“That’s pretty smart,” Shame said. “Think it will do any good?”

“My card was frozen. They’ll be watching for me to try to access my accounts. And now I just did. Kind of.”

“Do you think Grant can handle it?”

“Without a doubt.” Even though I was worried he’d get in trouble lying to the police, he was already in on this with us. He might not know exactly what we were trying to do, but he had let us escape through the Shanghai Tunnels beneath his building.

The sound of sirens started up. We kept walking down the street and were just about to take the corner around the bushes when a police cruiser rolled down the street.

Shame lifted his hand to cast something—probably an Illusion.

“Don’t,” I said. “No one uses magic out here.”

He shifted his motion so that he was digging in his shirt pocket for a cigarette, pulled it out.

“Look happy, children,” he said as he lit the cigarette.

“Bar,” Terric said. “Casey’s. Thought we should walk to the bus stop. Been there since eleven. Headed home.”

“You’re out of your head,” Shame said loudly. “The day the indie music scene is over in Portland is the day the world ends.”

“You just can’t appreciate the change the Internet has brought about,” Terric said without missing a beat. “One, there’s a lot more people sitting in front of their screens than there are venues for musicians, and two, nobody wants to see groups live anymore anyway.”

“Horseshit.” Shame actually sounded offended.

“And we’re still arguing about this because?” I asked.

I knew why we were arguing about it. Because if that cruiser rolled down the windows, or decided to check us out, we needed to be acting like three friends out for the night, not three silent, light-avoiding people trying not to be seen by the cops.

Hiding in plain sight. An old Hound trick. Made my palms sweat every time.

“Because,” Shame said, “Ter here has some kind of stick up his ass—not that
that’s
news—but now he thinks the digital revolution has killed live music.”

“Oh, go cry on your grandpa’s Gibson,” Terric said. “I didn’t say it killed live music; it’s revolutionized it.”

“It—,” Shame started.

“Which is a good thing, you idiot,” Terric said louder. “Times have changed and they’ve changed for the better. Grow up and take a look around you at the real world for once. At how real people are living. For that matter, how about you give this ‘living’ thing a try? Blinding yourself with angst doesn’t make you mysterious or broody or strong. It just makes you blind.”

“I’m… living,” Shame said, something like hurt in his eyes.

“No, you’re not,” Terric said calmly. “Not like you used to, Shame. Not like you used to.”

The hurt in Shame’s eyes shifted to something else. Looked a little like a moment of clarity.

“Enough,” I said so that this didn’t go any further. “If you two don’t drop this, I swear I’m going to tie your wrists together and make you fight it out.”

They both paused, and turned to look at me.

“Do we get weapons?” Shame asked.

I nodded. “Bowling balls.”

They both started laughing. I couldn’t help it. So did I.

Yes, even though we were in the middle of trying not to get caught, jailed, killed. There had been more than a little truth in Terric’s “pretend” outburst. Shame knew it. I knew it. Terric knew it. I think it was something Terric had needed to say to Shame for a long time. Funny how those sorts of things showed up when the end of the world was near.

“Is there a weight limit?” Terric finally asked, wiping at his face.

“Oh, hell, no,” Shame said. “If I’m going to bludgeon you to death with a bowling ball, I’m taking a sixteen-pounder into the ring. Get it over with fast.”

“Humane of you,” Terric noted.

“Straight from my heart.” Shame tapped his chest.

The car was almost alongside us now.

We were walking again.

“So it’s settled?” I said. “No more arguing… over music,” I added. “We move on to something more important.”

“What’s more important than music?” Terric asked.

“Well,” Shame said, pointing with his cigarette, “there’s sex.”

Terric grinned. “I’ll give you that. So there’s one thing
more important than music. Want to talk about your sex life, girlfriend?”

“No,” I said, “I do not.”

“Saw you smooching up your man,” he pressed. “Hot.”

“He means your man,” Shame said, “not you. You aren’t his… type.”

“He does have a pair of shoulders on him,” Terric mused.

Shame shook his head. “He’d never.”

“Oh, I know it,” Terric said. “I wouldn’t either. Still, gotta appreciate the workmanship.”

“It’s all gym.”

“Are you jealous?” Terric looked Shame up and down. “Would a workout kill you?”

Shame sighed dramatically. “Yes. Deadly allergic to the things.”

“Well, no need to worry,” Terric said. “I’m sure there are plenty of girls who like scrawny Irishmen.”

“Oh, you did not just go there,” Shame said.

“And now we are changing
that
subject,” I said a little louder. “Let’s go back to music.”

The car slowed, and we all looked over at it, just like any normal people who were out on the street would do if a cop car pulled up next to them.

I thought, for a brief second, that the car would just keep driving. Instead it stopped.

So did we.

The window lowered. Shame stepped forward, and leaned down toward the policeman.

“Evening,” Shame said, keeping his cigarette out to one side so the smoke didn’t waft into the car.

“What are you folks doing out tonight?” The officer had a wide, flat mouth, a nose that had been broken
more than once, and a buzz cut that left nothing but a dusting of black over his skull. The bags under his eyes were carrying their own luggage.

“Walking home,” Shame said. “Thought we’d catch the bus.”

“You been in the park?”

Shame glanced over his shoulder at the park as if just noticing it was there. “No. We just closed out Casey’s. Why? Is there a problem?”

“We’re looking for someone. Woman, about the height of your friend there, about her age.”

Shame shrugged. “What’s her name?”

“Allison Beckstrom.” The cop unbuckled his seat belt and stepped out of the car.

“She’s that rich girl, on the news, right?” Shame asked.

“That’s right,” the policeman said as he walked past Shame. “Miss? Can I have a word with you?”

“Sure.” I had both my hands in my jacket pocket and put on my best confused smile. I walked over to him but stopped short of putting my face in the brighter light from the electric lamppost. I squinted at him through my glasses. “What’s going on?”

“What’s your name?” he asked.

“Amy Smith,” I said without hesitation. I wasn’t usually any good at lying. But in the dark, this late at night, with, oh, my life and pretty much everyone else’s lives on the line, it came easily. Go figure.

“Can I see your ID, please?”

“Sure.” I took my hands out of my pocket, and made a show of checking my back pockets and front pockets. “I had it,” I said, thinking furiously, trying to come up with a way out of this that wouldn’t involve any of us—including the police officer—getting hurt.

“I had it in my hand, and I put it in my pocket.” I paused, like I just realized I didn’t have it on me. “God, I
must have left it back at the bar.” I looked up at the police officer. “I could—we could go back and get it. I’m sure someone is still there.”

“That won’t be necessary,” he said. “You are under arrest, Ms. Beckstrom.”

This was not the first time in my life I regretted my father being a well-known and very public figure who lived his life in the spotlight. That cop had known all along it was me; he was just stringing me along, and had nicely gotten me to perjure myself.

Damn it all.

“What?” I asked. “I don’t understand.” Think, Beckstrom, think. Or the nice police officer who was just doing his job might end up dead.

There was no way I was going to let him drag me off to jail.

“Hold on, Officer,” Terric said. “I think you made a mistake. Her name’s Amy.”

He wasn’t listening. “You two keep your hands where I can see them. I’m going to take her down to the department and ask her a few questions, that’s all.” The police officer reached for the handcuffs at his belt.

Terric and Shame kept their hands out in the open, but exchanged a look.

Yes,
that
kind of look. The one that Zay and I probably tossed at each other when we were reading the other’s thoughts. Another advantage to being a Soul Complement, though I didn’t think I’d ever seen Shame and Terric use it.

I didn’t know what they were planning, but would lay money it involved a lot of hurt to the man.

“Wait,” I said.

Too late. Terric and Shame both said one guttural word and the cop froze.

“Nice night, isn’t it?” Terric said.

The honey overtones of Influence covered those words. I hadn’t even seen him draw the glyph for it. Maybe he didn’t have to. The Authority had a lot of spells that were triggered off words, though I hadn’t had a chance to learn many of them.

What I did know was that Shame was pulling on magic in a hard, even stream, the fingers of his left hand splayed toward the ground where red and black light lifted up out of the soil to his fingertips, and turned pure black as it arced to the hand Terric held behind his back.

Terric’s fingers were pointed at the ground, and the black magic he accepted from Shame turned white, then white gold, as it rained like water off his fingers back into the earth where Shame drew it up again.

They were recycling magic, looping it. I’d never seen anyone do that before.

And that was because there were damn few Soul Complements in the world. And the few I had known were dead.

Shame and Terric were using magic together unconsciously, effortlessly. Both of them were outstanding magic users. But together they became something more, something transcendent.

They were beautiful to watch.

Terric traced another spell. I knew that spell. It was Close.

Shame’s right hand still held the cigarette, but he was also drawing a spell. Some kind of Illusion or Diversion. Not that it would help. Any Hound worth a paycheck would know who cast these spells. If the cops figured out Shame and Terric were with me, or if the Authority got nosy in the neighborhood, we were leaving a big ol’ neon sign announcing we had been here.