by Cate Lawley
The concept of witch-in-training eluded him. We were not getting into that right now.
“Shut it. I don’t have much time. I’m on the funeral home phone. I needed a part-time job after I moved out of your place, so here I am.” I inhaled and then, as quick as I could, said, “A golem showed up with his creation tattoos damaged. Robert Chalmers is the name we have for him.”
After a moment of complete silence, he said, “I’m heading out the door now. Kowalski’s, right? Give me directions so I don’t have to look it up.”
“Stop.” Panic hit me. Alex was going to get me fired. “You cannot show up here and ruin this for me. I need this job.”
He grumbled, because that was what Alex did. And no, he wasn’t all bark and no bite. Alex could back up his grumbles with fighting skills and magic, because he had an abundance of both. Despite all that, he had a heart of gold. I would never have dated such a grump if he didn’t.
I cut him off. “Stop complaining and tell me how to secure the body temporarily. When my boss leaves for the night, I’ll call you and you can come then to help me. If you even think about arguing with me, I will make your life a misery.”
I looked up when I finished my rant to find Ben in the doorway.
And I’d forgotten to magically seal the room.
He’d heard every word.
4
Beyond Epic Fail, or Could this Day Get Worse?
How could I be so colossally careless? Preventing exposure of magic wasn’t my top priority as a witch, but it was close.
Ben crossed his arms and moved to block the office door.
And I’d thought Alex was the problem. I’d just lost my job all on my own. I hadn’t even made it a day.
I closed my eyes and listened to Alex’s terse instructions then hung up the phone.
I opened my eyes, hoping my wild imagination had conjured Ben earlier. No such luck. He was very real and very much standing between me and the only exit.
“So, thanks for letting me use the phone.” It was a weak attempt at damage control. Pretend like nothing happened, and bluff my way to a resolution.
“So you can plan a break-in of my business? Sure. You know, we don’t keep cash here.”
I frowned at him. “You think I want to steal from you?”
That he believed me capable of that hurt my feelings.
Insane? Yes. Especially since I might be stealing from him—a body, not cash—but still.
“What’s a golem?” His arms were still crossed, and he didn’t look like he was budging.
That answered one question. He’d heard the entire conversation.
Maybe this job had been a terrible idea. Maybe Alex was right, and I should stick with shady Society gigs for my extra cash. I hated that he might be right. The idea that pimping my magic out to the Society was my only real option was more disheartening than losing a job after less than five minutes of employment.
But I had a here-and-now problem to solve. My future cash flow issues were a tomorrow problem.
I went with an old standard. “That wasn’t what it sounded like.”
“So you’re not planning to rob me or saying Mr. Chalmers is a golem—whatever that is.” His eyes narrowed. “Is that some type of gang?” He narrowed his eyes. “Are you in a gang? You don’t look like a gang member.”
I shook off the feeling of being examined like a bug under a magnifying glass and tried to think of some way to salvage the situation. “You seem like a really nice guy.”
In fact, I knew he was a really nice guy. Incredibly, amazingly nice.
He uncrossed his arms but remained firmly planted in front on the door. “I am, but nice doesn’t mean gullible.”
I sighed. The idea of sticking it to the man appealed—even when “the man” in question was a scary secret society—so I broke some Society laws and spilled the beans. “Mr. Chalmers is a golem, and it’s not a gang. How’s your Jewish folklore?”
“Good enough to know that if golems were real—which they clearly aren’t—the man on my prep table couldn’t be one because he’s not made of clay.”
“No, not clay, scavenged corpse parts.”
Ben choked. “I’m sorry, what? You’re telling me that the man on my prep table is some kind of Frankenstein creature, made of miscellaneous parts. A human being stitched together with fishing line or something?”
“More like stitched together with magic.”
When he heard the word magic, Ben relaxed. I could see him filing me straight into the crazy category. The way I dressed and the hair probably didn’t help.
“No,” he said, shaking his head with an apologetic look on his face. “I don’t think this is going to—”
He stuttered to a stop, his eyes riveted on the ball of bright pink light that hovered in the air between my hands.
I spread my hands farther apart and the ball of light grew, then I pushed my hands together, collapsing the ball until it was a dense little blob about the size of a softball. I tossed it gently in the air and held it there, suspended for several seconds, before letting it fall back down to my hand.
The really good stuff wasn’t visible. This was the witch equivalent of smoke and mirrors—lots of sparkle, but little magic. But as evidence of the existence of magic when attempting to persuade the magically uneducated, it worked better than more sophisticated magic.
Ben closed his mouth and finally looked away from the shining ball back at me. “And that’s supposed to be magic?”
I found it difficult to lie to him, so I said, “It’s pretty basic stuff, but yes.” I pushed my hands together until the ball of light collapsed inside them.
The look on his face changed, became tenser, and his fingers curled, not quite making a fist. “And what you did earlier when you first got here, when you came through the service door—was that some kind of magic?”
This really wasn’t my day.
I’d told Camille I shouldn’t go around prying into people’s innermost thoughts. People weren’t practice dummies.
“And if I say yes?”
“Then I ask what you did to me.”
“Nothing, I swear. I didn’t do anything to you at all.” I had to force myself to stop babbling. Ben stirred my conscience to new heights. I was not a fan. It wasn’t like I didn’t already have a strong moral compass. It didn’t exactly need amplifying.
“You did some kind of magic, but you didn’t do anything to me. If I believed in magic—shiny ball of light notwithstanding—I’d say that’s hard to believe.”
I sighed. “I peeked. Just a little peek.”
What else could I say? I’d violated the man’s privacy. Deeply and intimately, and I’d known it was wrong. I let Camille with her talk of needing practice and letting the universe guide me influence my ultimate decision. And if I was honest with myself, I’d been curious. Ben Kowalski intrigued me.
His jaw tensed. “You ‘peeked’ at what, exactly?”
He looked pissed. And suddenly very, very tall.
I got it. I’d be pissed, too.
On the positive side, he probably wouldn’t be so angry about my invasion of his privacy if he didn’t buy the idea of magic on some level.
“Inside your head, I guess?” I took a step back and quickly added, “But not like mind reading. I’m not telepathic or anything. All I got was a general sense of you.” I edited a little out when I added, “That you’re a trustworthy man.”
He rubbed his jaw with his knuckles and finally moved away from the door. “So what exactly did your boyfriend tell you to do?”
“My ex-boyfriend.” I gave him a cautiously hopeful look. “So you believe me?”
“Oh, no. I’m just curious what plans you have for poor Mr. Chalmers. No way I’m letting you disrespect a body placed in my care.”
I inched toward the door. When he moved to the side, I hoofed it out of the office before he could change his mind, lock me in there, and call the police. I had no desire to spend any time in th
e loony bin. And Cornelius would be pissed if he had to bail me out if it went a different direction.
Once I was in the hallway and had a clear path to an exterior door, I answered his question. “So, the first thing is to check that Mr. Chalmers is dead. Fully, not reversibly dead.”
5
How Dead Is Dead?
Ben looked at me like I was speaking in tongues. “You’re saying death is a question of degree.” He paused. “Partially dead seems problematic.”
“If you’re a golem, I guess it happens.” Not that I knew that much about golems…
Ben held open the swinging door to the prep room and motioned for me to go ahead. “And someone can be in Mr. Chalmers’ state and be partially not dead? Or—what did you call it?—reversibly dead?” He made an annoyed sound. “Can a person look dead but still be alive?”
“Not a person. But a golem? Yeah. That’s what Alex—my ex—just told me.”
Ben groaned. “This conversation is painful.”
I eyed the covered form of Mr. Chalmers. Ben must have stopped just long enough to pull the sheet back up before he’d followed me into the office. He followed my gaze and lifted an eyebrow.
“So…can I check that Mr. Chalmers is all the way dead?” I followed the question with a smile that was at least two parts grimace.
He looked at me for a few seconds then said, “Does it involve anything invasive?”
I shook my head. “But I do have to touch him. And I’d like a closer look at his creation tattoos.”
“If I say stop, you stop.”
I tried to contain my surprise. I didn’t think I’d been all that persuasive. “Is that a yes?”
“A very reserved one.”
“Fair enough.”
He folded the sheet back from Chalmers’ body. “What are you looking for?”
“Life, magic, a spark of something.” My hand hovered over the golem’s chest. “Alex said I’d know right away.”
Because Alex hadn’t been specific but had been sure I wouldn’t miss it, I was expecting something big. Hence my hesitation.
I glanced at Ben, worried he might change his mind if I didn’t find something in a hurry.
He looked calm enough, but that might just mean there was a mix of acceptance and denial swirling around in his head.
Right. I was the pro here. Time to see what was left of Chalmers, if anything, while Ben was still cooperative.
Alex said I should be able to use my magical sight via touch. He wasn’t wrong. Magical sight wasn’t about seeing with the eyes. A connection of some sort was required between the witch and the subject; I’d just been crutching off my eyesight. Camille had encouraged it as an intermediary stage of learning until I mastered the skill.
Given what had happened when I’d both touched and gazed into Ben’s eyes, I’d say that I was still far from mastery.
Since I could hardly gaze into the dead guy’s eyes, I went with Alex’s suggestion. I placed my left hand flat on Chalmers’ chest—and there it was. Not a spark of life. The opposite of life.
A sucking void.
Dark and endless. Cold.
“Stephanie.”
The more I looked, the less I found. Like falling into a hole without a bottom.
A bottomless hole.
A cold bottomless hole.
“Stephanie!”
The next thing I knew, Ben was yanking on my arm. Hard. My shoulder was tender where he’d jerked me.
That seemed awfully un-Ben-like of him.
“What the…” The world tilted under me.
Ben reached out a hand and steadied me. “You’re really cold. Is that normal for you?”
With his warm hand clasped around my upper arm, I felt more grounded.
And like I wasn’t about to keel over sideways.
And now that I wasn’t about to land on my rear, I had an idea what had happened. “Not normal. Not at all.”
I could feel the beginnings of a growl in my chest. Teach me to take magical advice from a wizard. I was going to kick him in his soft bits the next time I saw him.
Ben’s eyebrows lifted. “You want to sit?”
He let go of my arm and returned a few seconds later with a stool.
“Thanks.” I sat down, just in case. Passing out on the floor of the prep room was the last thing I wanted to do today.
I glanced at the irreversibly dead Chalmers and amended that to the second-to-last thing I wanted to do today. Touching that sucking void again topped the list. I wrapped my arms tight around my body.
“I’ve probably got a sweatshirt or a jacket somewhere, if you think that might help.”
Ben wasn’t just nice. Considerate, thoughtful, generous. Yeah, he went above and beyond nice by leaps and bounds. Too bad he wouldn’t remember anything about this evening.
There was a thought to keep me warm. Nothing like a solid dose of frustration topped by a dollop of righteous anger to keep a girl toasty.
Here he was, doing what was right by his client and his employee, and for his troubles he’d be getting his brain scrubbed with the equivalent of a magical toilet brush. Just about the opposite of fair and just.
I could say it was due to my lapse in judgment, and it really was. I should have sealed the room for sound before I made the call. Heck, I should have just watched the door. It wasn’t like Ben had been sneaky or actively tried to eavesdrop.
But I blamed the Society and its archaic stance on… Well, everything. Secrecy, humans, mind-wipes in general.
He looked at me expectantly, and I realized I hadn’t answered his question.
I rubbed my arms briskly and then uncrossed them. “No, I’m fine. Thanks.”
He nodded slowly, like he didn’t believe me. Smart man. “What did you find?”
“Oh, he’s dead,” I glanced again at the murdered man laid out on the table. “Completely, irreversibly, not-coming-back dead.”
A pained look crossed Ben’s face. “I feel like there’s a breakdown in communication here. Like you’re mostly speaking English, because I understand the words. But then when you stop talking it’s like I made a mistake and maybe you’re actually speaking Dutch.”
I choked on an inappropriate laugh. “Uh, yeah, you’re not far off, but only because you see death as black or white.”
“Death is binary.” He raised his eyebrows.
Poor guy. I felt bad messing with his worldview when he was just going to forget this all happened anyway. “Add magic, and suddenly everything isn’t quite so clear.”
I knew how confusing magic could be.
Witches were made, not born. That meant that I’d been as ignorant as Ben about ten years ago. Almost as ignorant as Ben. When that flicker of magic lived inside you, you couldn’t be completely unaware.
“All right. I’m sure I’ll regret asking, but what’s the difference between dead and super dead?”
The sucking, black-hole-like void that now existed in the place where the essence of Chalmers’ self used to be—that was the difference between dead and super dead. But I wasn’t sure how to explain that to someone who hadn’t felt the cold pull of that void.
Even thinking about it made goose bumps rise on my arms, and I rubbed them again. “If you see life as a switch that’s turned on or off, it’s hard to explain. Think about life as a warm ten and death as a cold zero. Chalmers is a stone-cold negative one. He’s sucking the heat from anything that gets close.”
Ben shifted away from the body. Only a few inches, but it was telling. “You’re telling me he’s so dead that he’s leaching life from people around him?”
The service door clicked shut, startling us both. Even before I turned I knew who it was, and I was going to bloody his pretty face.
My ex addressed a bewildered Ben. “Robert Chalmers can’t harm you.” Alex turned to me and said, “You, on the other hand, should be more careful.”
I didn’t think about it. Nothing to consider really.
I hurled a ball
of energy straight at the arrogant ass.
6
My Ex-Knight in Less-than-Shining Armor
Alex pulled his sword from thin air and blocked the attack. “Sloppy.” He shook his head. “You haven’t been practicing, have you?”
Ben touched my arm, which made me realize I’d raised it in an offensive position.
I lowered my hand. “Ben, Alex Valois. A guy I thought I could rely on despite his massive ego and the even bigger chip on his shoulder.” I turned to Alex and in a tone he couldn’t mistake for anything but deadly serious, said, “Touch a hair on this man’s head, and I will castrate you.”
Alex’s sword disappeared as he sheathed it.
He lifted his hands in a gesture of peace—but I’d believe that when Ben walked away from this meeting a free man.
Ben looked between the two of us and said, “That door locks automatically.”
“Magic,” Alex said, but he was looking at me. “I couldn’t leave you alone with a possibly half-dead golem. And since it seems you didn’t use appropriate protections, it looks like my concern was well founded.”
I glared at him. “Because I’m so fragile and unable to protect myself that you need to run to my rescue.” The man didn’t change, whether I was dating him or not. “You could have just warned me.”
Ben raised his hand. “If you two could take it down a notch, maybe one of you can tell me if Chalmers is an immediate hazard. Do we need to do anything to contain whatever it is that he’s got?”
I shot Alex a last warning look, and then assumed a more neutral expression and said to Ben, “He doesn’t have a communicable disease, so there’s not any concern about preventing the spread of infection.”
Alex snorted. “You know that, do you?”
“Well, that you would have said on the phone, wouldn’t you?”
Alex inclined his head. “Did you get a chance to investigate his creation tats?”