Magic Strikes

by Ilona Andrews

  “Are those for us?”

  The woman eyed me with open suspicion. “Name?”

  “Kate Daniels.”

  “Then they’re for you. This is Marcus and that over there is Bathsheba.”

  “I’ll take the mare,” Raphael said.

  “Be careful with my babies.”

  “We’re riding two miles down to the school and coming right back,” I promised. “I’ll have them back to you in an hour.”

  “Whole.”

  “In perfect health.”

  We mounted. The woman looked me over, studied Raphael, and snorted. “I should’ve brought a camera. A picture would’ve been a hell of a promotion.”

  Except it wouldn’t have worked during magic, but I was too polite to point that out.

  We trotted down to the path. Marcus proved ridiculously easy to handle, attuned to the most minute cues almost as if he was anticipating me. If I ever lost my mind and purchased a horse, I knew which one I would be getting.

  In a few minutes we sighted the school. From horse-back, the complex resembled a fortress, an octagon enclosed by an eight-foot wall complete with an arched entrance and a portcullis. A couple of guards patrolled the wall, and they didn’t hesitate to level hunting bows at us. A sentry at the gates checked out my ID for a good twenty seconds—being dressed in black, riding black horses, and carrying black weapons had its drawbacks. Finally he nodded. “We’re expecting you. Your girl is at the far end of the yard, to the left.” He waved us through.

  I urged Marcus on and he obliged, building to a thunderous canter. We pounded around the main building, my cloak dramatically flaring. A group of about twenty children stood a respectable distance from the striped disks of archery targets propped up near the wall. Four aimed their bows at the targets, while the rest waited in somewhat orderly fashion around an enormous elm tree under the gaze of a large man in chain mail and a small dark woman. Citlalli, the counselor. Perfect.

  The kids sighted us and went very still. I scanned the crowd and saw a blond-haired girl, still too small and too thin for her thirteen years. There was my kiddo. Standing off by herself in the back.

  We drew even with the group. Marcus danced under me, unhappy his run was brought short. I tried to look suitably lethal. Raphael glowered next to me. A hungry ruby sheen rolled over his eyes. The boys went pale. The girl-children valiantly tried to keep from swooning.

  Julie finally woke up out of her stupor and elbowed her way to me.

  I fixed her with my hard stare. She flinched.

  “Knife,” I ordered.

  She reached into her clothes and produced one of my black throwing daggers. God damn it. I had counted them the other day and I could’ve sworn they were all there. I prayed for Marcus to stand still, took the dagger from her fingers, whipped about in the saddle, and threw it, all in a single quick motion. The dagger sliced into the elm’s bark, sinking halfway in. Somebody gasped.

  “You can have it back when you graduate.”

  Julie caught on. “Yes, ma’am.”

  She called me “ma’am.” I waited for the sky to split and belch forth the four horsemen of the Apocalypse, but for some reason they failed to appear.

  “It has come to my attention that you’re talking.”

  “I’m sorry, ma’am.”

  “Do I have to remind you that you signed a nondisclosure agreement with the Order?”

  Julie’s face was the definition of remorse.

  “It was your choice to attend this school. If I find out that you’re divulging classified information again, I will pull you out and stick you into the Order’s Academy faster than you can blink. Am I clear?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” Julie snapped to attention.

  “You’re coming with me.”

  “Should I get my things?”

  “No, we have no time. The Pack requires immediate assistance.” Derek required immediate assistance.

  This was Raphael’s cue to swing down from his saddle, which he accomplished with breathtaking grace. He came up to Julie and inclined his head in a nod that felt more like a shallow bow. “Julie. The Beast Lord inquires if you’re well.”

  Julie favored him with a very polite bow. “I am. Please give His Lordship my thanks for his consideration.”

  “You can thank him yourself. He will be most pleased to see you.”

  Raphael leaned down, offering her his palm. Julie didn’t miss a beat. She stepped onto his hand and let him hoist her up onto Marcus behind me. Her skinny arms locked around my waist.

  Raphael took a short running start and leapt onto his horse, hands-free. We swung our mounts and took off. We cleared the gates, roared down the path and around the bend, out of sight of the walls, and slowed to a brisk walk.

  “That was the coolest thing ever,” Julie said breathlessly.

  “It should up your street cred. But you’re on your own from now on. I can’t magically appear and overwhelm your classmates with toughness every time somebody is being a jerk. Now if somebody asks you about what happened, you very seriously tell them that you can’t speak about it. People can’t stand it when someone knows something they don’t. It will drive them nuts.”

  She hugged me. “Thanks.”

  “I really do need your help.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Derek is in trouble.”

  “No,” Julie whispered and hugged me tighter.

  CHAPTER 23

  JULIE CRIED. SHE KNELT BY DEREK ’S MANGLED body and cried, silent tears rolling down her cheeks. I waited next to her. She needed to cry it out. It hurt to look at him and she had to get through it, or she wouldn’t be able to help.

  After about five minutes Julie stirred and swiped the back of her hand under her nose. I handed her a handkerchief. She wiped her eyes, blew her nose, and nodded. “Okay.”

  Jim and Doolittle approached from the doorway. I sensed others in the gloom, watching, Raphael being one of them. I had explained to him that aiding and abetting my sorry butt would land him into scalding water, but he’d just grinned and followed me and Julie all the way to the house. He and Jim had spoken for a couple of minutes and then he’d been allowed inside.

  Jim crouched next to Julie and opened a small cookie tin. Two pale yellow shards lay inside on white gauze, one from the four-armed corpse which Dali had stumbled on, and the other from Saiman’s victim. Doolittle had found the second shard during the autopsy, stuck in the Reaper’s arm. He and Jim tried to explain to me what the body reverted to after they took it out, but I couldn’t quite wrap my mind around it. Apparently, neither could they, because they stuck it into a body bag, locked it in some room in the basement, and strongly discouraged me from going to see it.

  Julie picked up the shard and concentrated, her gaze fixed on the sharp sliver of yellow stone. She looked at it for a long moment, dropped it into the tin, and looked at the body.

  “Here.” Her slender finger pointed at Derek’s mangled thigh.

  A scalpel flashed in Doolittle’s dark fingers. He made a neat incision, pulled it open with his fingers, and dipped artery forceps into the cut. I held my breath.

  He pulled the forceps free. A bloody shard gleamed under the harsh light of the lamp.

  “Thank you, Jesus.” Doolittle dropped the shard into the tin.

  It’s over. Finally.

  “Here.” Julie pointed to Derek’s left side.

  Doolittle hesitated.

  “Cut here.” The pale finger touched Derek’s ribs.

  The doctor cut again. Another shard joined the first.

  “Here.” The finger pointed to the center of Derek’s chest, where the black burn scar crossed his pectorals.

  Fuck, how many of those things did they stick into him?

  Doolittle cut. “Nothing.”

  “Deeper,” Julie said.

  Dark blood gushed from the cut.

  I flinched.

  An eternity later Doolittle said, “Here it is.” I heard the quiet sound
of the shard falling into the tin.

  “Are there more?” Doolittle asked.

  “No,” Julie answered.

  I looked up. Nothing had changed. Derek lay unmoving. “What now?”

  “Now we wait,” Doolittle said.

  I SAT IN DARKNESS, IN A LOW CHAIR, WATCHING Derek’s body. It had been three hours since Doolittle had removed the shards. Derek hadn’t moved. His body showed no change.

  In the room across the hallway Doolittle slept in a La-Z-Boy, his face haggard and worn-out even in his sleep. He’d stayed awake for two days straight, trying to keep Derek alive, but it was feeling helpless that finally did him in. For the first hour after Julie had found the shards, we waited on the edges of our seats. Then hope slowly turned into depression. I watched it take its toll on Doolittle until finally he abandoned his vigil and retreated into the room. I had checked on him on the way to the bathroom: he was slumped in his chair, sunken deep into a dream.

  Julie appeared in the doorway, carrying two mugs. She approached, handed one cup to me, and sat by my feet. I sipped from the mug. Hot tea, with lemon. I had taught her how to make it properly. Apparently, it stuck.

  “Why the cage?” she said, pointing to the hole in the floor, where the silver and steel bars glinted weakly. “I almost walked into it.”

  “It’s a loup cage. Every shapeshifter safe house has one, just in case.” If Derek went loup, Jim and Doolittle wanted to contain him quickly. It wasn’t a thought I cared to contemplate. And certainly not a thought I cared to discuss with Julie.

  “How did you meet?” she asked softly.

  “Hm?”

  “Derek and you. How did you meet?”

  I didn’t really want to talk about it. Still, it was better than wallowing in my despair. “I was looking for Greg’s killer. The Order had given me the last file my guardian was working on, and I had retraced his steps, trying to find out why he was killed. The file led me to the Pack. I didn’t realize this at the time, but Greg had worked very closely with the Pack. There was a feeling of mutual trust between him and the shapeshifters. But they didn’t know anything about me and I didn’t know anything about them. I only knew that Greg had been torn to pieces by somebody’s claws.”

  I took a swallow of my tea. “I had access to Jim—we had worked together in the Guild—and Jim told Curran about my investigation. Curran decided to find out what I knew and had Jim arrange to meet me. In Unicorn Lane of all places. It didn’t go well.”

  Julie snorted quietly. “Big surprise.”

  “Yeah. Now when I look back at it, I realize it was a test. His Furry Majesty was trying to gauge what I was made of and I showed him.” I shrugged. “Live and learn.” So many problems could’ve been avoided if I hadn’t crouched down in the darkness and called out, “Here, kitty, kitty, kitty.”

  “What happened next?”

  “Eventually the Pack invited me to one of their gatherings to discuss things in greater detail. You’ve seen how they treat outsiders. Bite first, apologize later. They brought me to their Keep in the middle of the night and led me underground to this huge room. I stepped inside and found half a thousand shapeshifters and they weren’t happy to see me.”

  “Were you scared?”

  “I was scared I’d blow it. I realized by this point that if I couldn’t get the Pack to work with me, I’d make things a lot harder for myself. I had gone from a no-name merc to making arrangements with the head of the People and the Beast Lord, and I was seriously outclassed. I wasn’t used to that.”

  “I know what you mean,” Julie murmured. “You try your best and only make yourself feel stupid. Everybody seems to know some sort of secret that you don’t and that makes them better than you.”

  I reached over and petted her wispy hair. “The school’s that bad, huh?”

  “Sometimes. It’s okay usually. But there are mean people and they do nasty things, and if you call them on it, they make it seem like you just don’t get it.” She squeezed her hands into tight fists and said through clenched teeth, “They make me so mad. If we were on the street, I’d punch them. But if I do punch them, that will just mean I can’t win by their dumb rules.”

  “Well, then you know exactly how I felt.” I could do the punching. Punching was easy. It was the clever banter and dealing in convoluted half-truths and almost-lies that made me want to jump out of my skin.

  “So what did you do?”

  “I made my way down through the room, and this group of young shapeshifters barred my way and started making lots of noise. I knew Curran had put them up to it to see what I would do. One of them reached out and touched me, and I took him over with a power word and made him guard me against the rest.”

  “Derek,” Julie guessed.

  “Yep. And then it turned into this huge complicated deal, because Curran thought I was challenging him by taking his wolf . . .” I waved my hand. “In the end, Derek swore a blood oath to protect me so Curran wouldn’t have to kill him. He’s released from the oath now, but you remember how he is. He decided he’s responsible for me and I feel responsible for his ass—”

  With a hoarse scream, Derek jerked upright and ripped the IV tubes from his arms.

  “Get Doolittle!” I lunged to the tank.

  Gnarled hands gripped me. Deranged eyes flared white from the mangled face. He clawed at me, crushing my arms, agonizing screams ripping from him.

  “Safe,” I yelled into his ear. “It’s okay, it’s okay . . .”

  His skin bulged, ready to rip. The dark slash of his mouth gaped open. “Hurrrts! Hurts, it hurts!”

  And then Doolittle was there with a syringe and Raphael’s long fingers clenched Derek’s wrists, pushing pressure points to make him let go, but Derek hung on to me with desperate ferocity. The pull of his arms jerked me off my feet and dragged me into the vat. He clung to my shoulders, gouging my skin.

  “Hurts!”

  “Get her out!” Doolittle sank the needle into Derek’s arm with no effect. “The pain’s too much! He’s going loup!”

  Raphael wrestled Derek’s arms, trying to separate him from me, but Derek just held on tighter. Doolittle dropped the syringe and grabbed Derek’s left wrist. Fangs cut through Derek’s disfigured lips.

  “Get her out!” Doolittle screamed.

  Someone thrust a piece of bloody meat into Derek’s mouth. He released me and clutched on to the meat, shredding it. Bloody juice and flesh flew everywhere. I got the hell out of the vat.

  On the other side of the tank, Jim dangled another raw rib eye before Derek. Derek snapped it from his fingers and ripped into it in a frenzy.

  Jim’s melodious voice was sweet like a lullaby. “Eat, wolf. Eat. Safe now. That’s it. Eat. Leave the madness behind.”

  The terrible battered thing that was Derek snarled and stabbed the meat into its mouth. The eerie, juicy sounds of a predator feeding filled the room. I shook the green crap off my arms and caught sight of Julie in the doorway, pale like a wraith, eyes fixed on Derek.

  Jim pushed her out of the way, stepped out of the room, and carried in a trough filled with hamburger meat. He set the trough on the floor. Derek went down on all fours. His broken legs gave out and he crashed face-first into the meat. I marched to the door and took Julie by the shoulder.

  She tugged my hand off. “No.”

  “We don’t need to see this.”

  In the corner Doolittle swung a heavy leather case onto the table and popped it open. Metal blades gleamed in a neat row.

  “But . . .”

  “No.”

  I pushed her out of the room. Raphael closed the door behind us and helped me carry screaming Julie away.

  THE KITCHEN CABINETS CONTAINED WOODEN jars identified by handwritten adhesive labels. The jar labeled SUGAR had flour in it. The jar labeled FLOUR held an enormous amount of chili powder, which made me sneeze. The jar labeled CHILI PEPPER contained a Smith & Wesson M&P 45. I growled. I had fallen asleep next to Julie on the couch and woken up five
hours later, unable to form rational thoughts because my head pounded.