Like the last time we’d chatted, Tildrum began to unwind into ribbons, a precursor to a disappearing act. The fact he was about to leave while I was still standing in the middle of a temporarily paused explosion strong enough to render me an ash pile tore me out of my stupor.
I sputtered, “Wait, what about the blast?”
“What about it?” Tildrum asked, with a mouth that had become detached from his head.
“It’ll kill me if you let it resume.”
He rolled his eyes, then snapped his fingers. A green-tinted shield flickered into existence around me. “There. That will outlast the blast. You will not be harmed.”
“You’re just going to let Abarta blow up my house?”
His multicolored eyebrow arched. “You have the wrong impression, Vincent Whelan. Check again.”
At my confused frown, Tildrum pointed to the ward on the floor. I stared at it for several seconds, still lost, until my brain finally clicked back into full gear. The ward was glowing blue. But Abarta’s aura was gold, dark elves had an aura like black mist, redcaps didn’t cast wards, the banshee was dead, and the only other minion I knew of, Bismarck, had no magic of her own. “Are you telling me Abarta isn’t responsible for the ward?”
Tildrum didn’t answer. He just stared at me with those creepy cat eyes.
“Okay, then who is? Who destroyed my freaking house?”
“You’re the detective,” said the King of the Cats. “Figure it out.”
Then he was gone. And time remembered it was supposed to flow forward.
Fire roared around me as if I’d dropped straight into hell. Debris pelted the green shield from all sides, flaming shrapnel that could’ve taken my head clean off my shoulders. I had the urge to drop and cover my head, like that would do any good, but I forced myself to stand there and watch six years of my life go down the drain. All the work I’d put into this place. All the comfort I’d gotten from having a cozy home to return to at the end of a long and tedious job. All the safety I’d been convinced this house could provide, simply because I’d warded it myself. All the trust I’d had in my magic, my conviction that it was strong enough to bump heads with anyone in this realm. All my goddamn dignity. All of that, and more, evaporated in a cloud of smoke.
At the whim of some enemy whose identity I didn’t even know.
When the fire finally stopped roaring, and the heat finally gave way to the winter air, and the smoke finally cleared enough for me to bear witness to the extent of the devastation—total and demoralizing—and Tom Tildrum’s shield finally disintegrated, allowing me to smell the acrid stench of defeat and taste the soot of humiliation, there was absolutely nothing I could do, nothing I could say, nothing I could even think to make this situation better.
So I gazed at the second ruin of a place I’d once called home and said, “Now what?”
To Be Continued
IN WHAT GODS INCITE
Coming August 2018
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Books by Clara Coulson
CITY OF CROWS
Soul Breaker
Shade Chaser
Wraith Hunter
Doom Sayer
Day Killer
Spell Caster (upcoming)
TALES FROM THE CITY OF CROWS
Dream Snatcher
THE FROST ARCANA
What Fate Portends
What Man Defies
What Gods Incite (upcoming)
LARK NATION
Hunter of the Night
Speaker of the Lost
Watcher of the Dead (upcoming)
KING & CROWN
Lock & Key
Ask & Answer (upcoming)
About Clara Coulson
Clara Coulson was born and raised in backwoods Virginia, USA. Currently in her mid-twenties, Clara holds a degree in English and Finance from the College of William & Mary and recently retired from the hustle and bustle of Washington, DC to return to the homeland and pick up the quiet writing life.
Clara spends most of her time (when she's not writing) dreaming up new story ideas, studying Japanese, and slowly reading through the several-hundred-book backlog in her budding home library. If she's not occupied with any of those things, then you can probably find her playing with her two cats or lurking in the shadows of various social media websites.
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What Man Defies Page 23