The Order of Shadows

by Tess Adair

  They sat in silence a few minutes more, both eating the sandwiches they’d prepared. Jude shifted anxiously, pushed the thoughts of Logan’s possible deception from her mind, and tried to think of anything at all that she could say.

  “So,” she tried at last, “how do you like, uh, living in San Francisco?”

  Alexei looked at her out of the corner of his eye as he finished chewing, his expression wary.

  “I like it just fine,” he answered, swallowing hard. “I prefer a cooler climate, generally. Better for the wardrobe, you know.”

  “Oh, right. Makes sense.” She nodded, taking another bite of her sandwich, which consisted of cheese, turkey, apparently homemade pesto, tomatoes, and banana peppers.

  “And, uh,” said Alexei hesitantly, “do you enjoy living in…Seattle, right? I mean, I assume you live near Logan.”

  “Uh, kinda,” said Jude. “I live at the estate, actually. It’s a little bit outside of the city. But I—I’m hoping to go there a bit more often in the future.”

  “Ah, I see. Well. Good for you.”

  Awkward silence descended upon them again, but this time, Jude didn’t fight it. Whatever energy that had been keeping her going throughout the night was starting to wane. She could feel exhaustion begin to take its hold.

  Just as she started contemplating the idea of taking a nap on one of Alexei’s richly upholstered couches, the door to the guest bedroom swung open.

  Logan walked out with her arms crossed and her eyes downcast, Knatt just behind her. She glanced up at the other two for only a moment before turning aside and drifting off toward the windows on the other end of the living room. Knatt, on the other hand, strode forward.

  “Miss Logan and I have decided there are a few things it might be pertinent to share with the two of you,” he said, hovering along the invisible barrier between Alexei’s living and dining area. “Perhaps you’d both like to join me—?”

  He motioned toward the perfectly upholstered furniture in the living room. Obediently, Jude followed Alexei over to one dark green couch, while Knatt settled himself across from them on a dark blue divan. He looked slightly uncomfortable as he glanced over at Logan, who stood staring out a crack in the window curtains, before he focused back on them.

  “I’m sure you both have questions, after tonight—”

  “That’s an understatement,” Alexei answered immediately, somewhat sharply. The antagonism Jude had expected him to direct toward her earlier seemed to bubble out of him. “How the hell did you know about my case, H.C.? How is it that you managed to show up just in time for this one, the only one I’ve had all summer with even the slightest hint of real danger? And who the fuck was that man in the mask? What the hell did we just stumble into?” He turned his head toward Logan, who still wasn’t looking at them. “And since when can you suck the life out of a man from twenty feet away?”

  Knatt cleared his throat.

  “Let’s deal with one at a time, shall we?” He gave them a patient, practiced smile. “I was thinking we would start with the man in the mask.”

  “Fine,” said Alexei. He crossed his arms and settled back into the couch, turning his almost accusatory gaze back on Knatt. “Do you know who he is?”

  “We call him the Wolf,” said Knatt. His voice was even but stern, as though he wanted to remain reassuring while still imparting the gravity of the situation in full. “Until tonight, we hadn’t encountered him in person. We weren’t even certain he was a person, so much as a pattern, a whisper of intent. Miss Logan first encountered him a few months ago in a small town.” He turned to Jude, his eyes deadly serious. “A small town called Wolf Creek.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Revelations

  Recognition hit her first, followed by understanding, then shock.

  “Wait,” she said slowly, unsure whether she actually wanted an answer, “the man in the mask…he was in my town? He had something to do with…what happened to Violet?”

  Knatt smiled mirthlessly.

  “Yes and no. We’re not sure if he was ever physically in Wolf Creek or not, and we don’t think he had a particular vendetta against the victim.” He glanced at Logan, but she still seemed largely uninterested in joining the discussion. “We think…we think he’s been acting indirectly, through other, less experienced casters. Spreading discord through manipulation, as it were.”

  Beside her, Alexei shook his head, his expression one of uncertainty, even slight disbelief.

  “What do you mean? What exactly do you think this guy does?”

  With another quick glance at his recalcitrant partner, Knatt sighed.

  “Logan believes he finds lonely souls, mostly young white men who already harbor at least an interest in casting. In particular, he seems drawn to young men with…unsavory opinions about certain groups of people, be they women, or minorities, or what have you. Any kind of hatred that can be fed and fueled. And then he cultivates them. Stokes their hatreds, develops their casting ability. Encourages them to act on their very darkest impulses, and then provides them with the means.” He turned to Jude. “Your classmate, Kurt Redmond—you said he had a difficult time with his female classmates, correct?”

  Jude shrugged; she felt an automatic reluctance to speak ill of the dead, even if the dead was a murderer.

  “He was a little creepy,” she said. “He said some nasty stuff about a couple of girls.”

  “Indeed,” said Knatt. “The Wolf likely sought him out for those beliefs, helped them grow, and then empowered him to act on them. And now…it seems likely the Wolf targeted Todd Phillips in the exact same way.”

  Slowly, Jude nodded. An awful knot of uncertainty and anxiety seemed to be forming in her stomach. Much as she didn’t want to, she still couldn’t help but wonder if she’d watched a replay of Kurt Redmond’s death earlier. Had Logan simply sucked the life out of him, too?

  Knatt continued.

  “It’s a pattern we’ve been investigating, and we have reason to believe that the Order is investigating it as well.”

  “What makes you think that?” asked Alexei, his tone suspicious.

  “Wait,” said Jude suddenly, comprehension dawning, “is this about that Order woman who came to the estate?”

  “The Order made a house call?” Alexei’s expression was petulant. “Who was it?”

  “This creepy witch woman showed up at the house to talk to Logan and Knatt,” explained Jude.

  “Well, that’s helpful. ‘Creepy witch woman’ could describe half the casters in the world, let alone all the Adepts in the Order.”

  “It was Zilla Ulric, one of the Twelve Seers,” said Knatt.

  “Oh,” said Alexei, his eyebrow slipping back down as he shrugged. “In that case…yeah, good description.”

  Jude bit back a scoff. We’re going to be friends, she told herself. We’re going to be friends.

  “As I was saying,” said Knatt, the subtlest hint of frustration in his voice, “we have reason to believe the Order is investigating this as well. It’s impossible to say how many cases they’ve tracked, of course, and it’s not like they’re about to share any information with us. All we can tell you is what we have seen.”

  “Your small town case in Wolf Creek,” said Alexei. He turned to Logan. “That wouldn’t be the one you called me about, would it? You never did explain to me why someone was paying you to investigate a high school.”

  “We weren’t paid,” said Knatt simply, if a touch too quickly. “The case was pro bono.”

  But how did you even know about it? Jude wondered, but before she could say anything out loud, Alexei had continued.

  “Is that what you were doing this time?” He was still looking at Logan, not Knatt. “You were taking me on pro bono?”

  Logan said nothing.

  “How did you even know to come here?” he continued, the frustration in his voice growing. “Is it just a coincidence that my case involves this Wolf guy, too? Or am I part of some bigger picture you n
eglected to tell me about?”

  Still, Logan said nothing. Knatt let out a sigh.

  “It is…possible that it’s a coincidence. It’s also possible that you were targeted.”

  “Targeted?” Alexei shook his head in disbelief and finally turned away from Logan to meet Knatt’s eye. “Why would I have been targeted, then? I’ve never heard of this guy.”

  At long last, Logan spoke, though she still didn’t face the room.

  “You were targeted because of me.”

  Alexei locked his eyes on her, eyebrows raised.

  “Well, look at that. She speaks.”

  Logan didn’t look back at him. “I’m here, aren’t I?”

  Jude couldn’t quite decipher the look that passed over Alexei’s face just then, but she could hazard a guess that he wasn’t happy. Nevertheless, within a moment, his face and posture had both returned to a perfect, smirking neutral.

  “So, tell us—why would he want to target you?” he asked.

  Logan turned from the window to face the room and crossed her arms defensively over her chest.

  “When I accosted Kurt Redmond,” she said, “he claimed that the Wolf had known I was coming, had warned him about me. I got the impression that the whole case was…kind of like a test. Like he wanted to see what I would, or could, do.”

  This piece of information was completely new to Jude, and she wasn’t quite sure how to take it. She had never liked Violet Buchanan, of course, but the idea that someone had orchestrated her death for the sake of some kind of macabre experiment…it made her feel sick.

  “Maybe we should make some tea?” she asked faintly.

  “Of course,” said Knatt, jumping to his feet. “Mr. Marin, may I—”

  “Go crazy,” said Alexei immediately, almost dismissively. His attention was now locked on Logan. “I still don’t get it.”

  “Don’t get what?”

  “Why did he want to test you? What makes you so special?”

  Halfway to the teakettle, Knatt stopped and turned, locking eyes with Logan. Something unspoken passed between them. The expression on Knatt’s face was one of caring and concern. It looked almost parental.

  “We’ve gone this far,” he said, so quietly that Jude could barely make the words out. Logan, on the other hand, seemed to hear him just fine. She scowled and tightened her crossed arms.

  “I don’t think I’m ready,” she said quietly, her eyes downcast.

  Jude had never heard Logan sound so plainly vulnerable, and she was taken aback by it. A part of her wanted to hug her, even though she was sure Logan would hate that. The rest of her didn’t know what to do.

  Alexei, on the other hand, was unimpressed.

  “Ready for what, H.C.? What aren’t you telling me?” He looked back and forth between the two of them, displeasure evident on his face once more. “Look, if ‘the Wolf’ is already targeting me, I think I have a right to know why.”

  Logan glanced back at Knatt, who held her gaze and nodded. Her uncertainty turned to reluctant resignation.

  “If I tell you the truth,” she said, carefully, “it might put you both in more danger. Are you prepared for that?”

  “Darling,” said Alexei, shaking his head, “you know me. Danger is half the fun.” Despite the lighthearted nature of his words, his tone was solemn.

  Jude cleared her throat.

  “Um,” she said, “I’m still here, and, uh, I acknowledge the danger, and I accept.”

  Logan let out a long, reluctant breath, her gaze falling to the floor.

  “Fine,” she said. “But if this somehow inadvertently causes all your deaths, just remember that I warned you.”

  With that, Logan pulled off her jacket and slung it over the back of a nearby chair. Then, to Jude’s immeasurable surprise, she grabbed the hem of her black T-shirt, and she pulled it over her head.

  For a moment, Jude didn’t notice anything unusual at all. Sure, Logan was perfectly toned and musculature, but Jude was well aware of that already.

  Then she took in the markings along Logan’s collar bone and the tops of her shoulders. They could easily have been tattoos, though Jude didn’t think they looked like any tattoos she’d ever seen before; they looked more like tiger stripes, or perhaps an unusually dark and symmetrical rash…

  She hadn’t quite decided either way when Logan turned away from them, unzipped her sports bra, and pulled that off, too.

  This time, Jude let out a soft gasp. What she was looking at had to be a tattoo, but it was such a deep red color that it might have been a scar, or even a fresh wound. Large and ornate, it covered the majority of Logan’s back.

  It looked like a maze, emblazoned onto Logan’s skin in dark red ink. Shaped like a teardrop, it featured twisting lines forming false starts and full pathways into the center. Jude immediately found herself entranced by it, nearly hypnotized. It was almost as if it called to her somehow—as if it wanted her to look, wanted her to know. She got the feeling that if she could just reach out and touch it, even for a moment, it would tell her such things—

  Logan cleared her throat, and Jude tumbled back into reality. She shook her head, trying to remind herself of where she was. One glance at Alexei told her that he had been drawn in, too.

  But drawn into what?

  Logan, apparently, wasn’t finished. Giving them only a few seconds to gawk at her, she pulled her bra back on and turned around. Looking for all the world like she’d rather do anything else, Logan raised her forearms in front of her in a familiar defensive stance, then gave them a shake.

  From each arm, four bony spikes pushed their way through her skin, spraying a few droplets of blood onto the hardwood floor. Each one came to a razor-fine point.

  Jude wasn’t sure what to say. This certainly wasn’t where she’d expected the night to end up.

  Again, Logan only gave them a moment. She shook her arms a second time, retracting the spikes back under her skin. Then she pulled her shirt back on and perched against the arm of the chair that held her jacket.

  “Questions?” she asked, looking at each of them in turn, her voice unusually flat. “Concerns?”

  At first, nobody spoke. For her part, Jude had no idea what any of this meant, but she didn’t want to admit that and risk coming off like…well, like the ignorant kid.

  Fortunately for her, Alexei broke the silence.

  “Are you…were you bound?” he asked, cocking his head in confusion, his tone incredulous.

  “Nope,” said Logan. “I’m a whole different kind of beast.”

  Knatt cleared his throat.

  “There isn’t much recorded evidence of other people like Miss Logan,” he said authoritatively. “As far as we know, she may be entirely unique.”

  “Unique how, exactly?”

  Logan sighed heavily and crossed her arms over her chest.

  “Isn’t it obvious?” Jude couldn’t immediately identify the emotion in her voice. “I’m a demon.”

  She spit out the word with no small amount of spite.

  Is that…shame? Jude wondered.

  “Part demon,” Knatt corrected.

  “Half,” said Logan.

  Behind Knatt, the kettle began to whistle. He shut off the stove before pouring a small amount of liquid into the three mugs waiting on the counter. Two of the mugs came with him as he made his way back to the others.

  “It’s exceedingly rare for a demon to breed with a human,” he said as he approached Jude to hand her a mug. His tone was matter-of-fact. “As you might imagine. One doesn’t generally find many naturally occurring half-demons.”

  With a cup of hot tea in hand, Jude found it in herself to say something. She turned to Logan.

  “So, that means…one of your parents was a demon?”

  Logan leaned back in her perch.

  “Charles never liked to talk about Mom much.” Her voice was cold and blank. “And lately, there hasn’t been much point in asking him anything at all.”

  Jude
thought about the man she’d met at the nursing home. Had that strange old man really…mated with a demon? The only demons she’d ever seen were ugly and monstrous, but she supposed that there might be other kinds out there…

  “What about the tattoo?” asked Alexei, who now gripped a mug all his own. “Is that a… a demon thing?”

  “No,” said Logan, shaking her head. She didn’t quite meet Alexei’s eyes when she spoke. “Well, I mean, it’s possible that it chose me because of the whole demon thing. I, uh…I have greater strength and agility than…well, every normal human I’ve ever met.”

  “What do you mean it chose you? Is it sentient?”

  Though Logan still didn’t meet his eyes, Alexei couldn’t seem to take his off her.

  “It’s a little hard to explain,” she said. Her voice sounded heavy, and her hands looked like they were gripping her arms with considerable strength. “I…I didn’t always have it. It came to me one night, when I was alone, out in the woods. I think…I think it was sizing me up then. After it showed itself to me, it lingered only a moment before disappearing again. I didn’t see it for another year after that, but when I did…that’s when it, uh, attached itself to me.”

  Jude could see it in her mind’s eye: a rough-and-tumble teenage Logan, camping out on her own, hanging out around a campfire, when some…thing showed up…

  “Wait,” she said, suddenly confused, “the first time you saw it, was it like…a floating tattoo?”

  A small smile formed on Logan’s lips.

  “It looked like it was made of bronze then,” she said. “Like an ancient artifact. Only glowing.”

  “Until it attached itself to you,” said Alexei. “Did it hurt?”

  At long last, Logan looked up at him. Jude had no idea what to make of her expression.

  “Burned like a motherfucker,” she said quietly. “Still does, every time it sends me a vision.”

  “It sends you visions?”

  “Oh, yeah,” she shrugged, her gaze falling back to the floor. “It’s, uh, it’s the psychic friend I told you about.”

  “Oh. I see.”

  Alexei’s tone was clipped and brusque, his expression dark. Jude supposed he didn’t like discovering he’d been lied to.