Raven's Shade (Ravensblood Book 5)

by Shawna Reppert

  “Right you are,” the sheriff said. “Comes in useful sometimes. Should have tried it yourself.”

  “Yes. Well. I did apply when I was a fresh young thing right out of General Academy. I believe the results are a matter of record.”

  The sheriff winced. “Sorry. You’re right. Didn’t mean to touch on the sore spot.”

  Raven shook his head. “Water under the bridge at this point. And I will admit my response to rejection was less than exemplary.”

  “Mistakes were made all around. As you said, water under the bridge.” The sheriff crumpled up the antiseptic wipe and tossed it at the wastebasket, making the shot in one. Of course the man had good eye-hand coordination. Probably in school he’d played football in the spring and basketball in the summer. Or was it the other way around? Raven never kept track of those things.

  Raven had thought the subject dropped, but the sheriff continued on. “Guardian Academy is not the only path, though, especially for returning adult students. There might be other options.”

  Raven chuckled. “At this point in my life I think I am too used to being the master to return to the role of the pupil. It’s not an experience I would want to inflict on myself or any potential teachers.”

  “Well, something to think about, anyway,” Craig said. “Okay, let me give a try at healing. Since you asked for a warning, and all.”

  Raven shook his head. Smart ass.

  For a man who declared himself not very good at healing magic, the sheriff wasn’t half bad. First came the tingle, then the warmth, bright and clear as sunshine and just this side of too hot. Raven took a deep breath, relaxed into it, and tried not to wish for Cassandra.

  “Well, that’s as good as it’s going to get,” the sheriff said. Raven glanced down at his arm. How much of it was the cleaning, and how much of it was the magic, he couldn’t say. But the wound already looked smaller and less angry.

  “Have to do without stitches, obviously,” the sheriff said. “Personally, not too happy about that, but there’s some butterfly bandages in the kit that should hold it closed well enough. If you think you can handle the pain.”

  “There was a time when no one less powerful than William himself would dare to taunt me,” Raven said.

  “Yeah, well, there was also a time when your picture hung on the station wall with the words wanted dead or alive,” the sheriff said as he applied the butterfly bandage. “Things change.”

  Raven smiled. “Point taken.”

  Cassandra was a talented healer; good enough that she could have chosen it as a career had the Guardians not called more to her soul. It would be so easy to use this as an excuse to get her to come to him. To see her for even a little while. If he played it just right, she wouldn’t even be annoyed. But he and Cassandra had the sort of love that did not require constant proximity to keep the flame alive. She was busy with her job right now, and he had more respect for her work then to call her away for something so purely personal.

  The sheriff sat back, scrubbed his face with his hands. “I guess I should be more grateful that you’ve forgiven me for shooting you.”

  Raven expected this moment, the point where the adrenaline had worn off completely and the reality of the incident hit. “That wasn’t you. We both know it. It was the—” he waved a hand. “The whatever-the-hell is going on.”

  “I can’t believe it took me over so easily,” the sheriff said. “And here I’ve always prided myself on my strength of will. I thought my magic—oh, hell, I’ve never even aspired to be in your league, but I thought I was at least a reasonably strong practitioner for an old country sheriff. And here I was, just as weak as poor old Harvey.”

  “You are strong,” Raven said. “The thing controlled you for mere moments before you were able to shake it. And we were close to the heart of the phenomenon, where its power was strongest.” He picked up the sheriff’s empty glass and refilled it without asking.

  The sheriff accepted the glass with a shaking hand. “I really shouldn’t be drinking on duty.”

  “You’re taking the rest of the day off. Personal trauma, or whatever you want to call it.” Raven said decisively. “Drink.”

  The sheriff knocked the wine back with much less respect than the vintage deserved. Raven filled the glass with the dregs of the merlot, and opened the pinot noir to breathe.

  “What the hell was that? Back at Devil’s Boneyard?” He met Raven’s gaze with haunted eyes. “What the hell is going on in my town?”

  “I have no idea, and that’s the scariest thing of all.” Raven described what he had sensed in the cave. “If there were any practitioners strong enough to create something like that, I would know about them. GII would know about them. I can only guess that someone found some way to bring a darker power across. We can only hope they didn’t understand what they were doing.”

  “Across from where?”

  “Damned if I know. We know that there are other planes, other universes. The existence of soul stealers tells us that. This,” he waved his hand, “quantum mechanics that the Mundanes keep talking about tells us that. Whoever is behind this, whoever brought it across, they aren’t necessarily powerful in and of themselves. They could be just lucky. Or unlucky. At this point we don’t know who it was or what happened to them.”

  “So what now? What the hell now?”

  “To be honest, I don’t know,” Raven said “I’ve never seen or experienced anything like this before. Never even contemplated anything like this happening.”

  The message crystal flashed. Raven went to it, tapped it to activate it. “This is Raven.”

  Maybe it was Chuckie with some answers. Gods, let it be Chuckie with some answers. If they could find out who was behind this, maybe they could find out what they did, how they did it, find some way to undo it. At this point Raven was less concerned about punishing the guilty or getting Morgan off. He just wanted to stop the shadow before it grew.

  “Mr. Ravenscroft, this is Chad. Pardon, but you said this crystal was a possible contact while you’re in town. Do you know where Sheriff Schmidt is? He hasn’t come back. Last we heard he was with you.”

  At Raven’s nod of permission, the sheriff leaned in. “I’m here with Raven. Is there a problem?”

  “Sir. Sorry, sir, but there’s been incidents. Plural. Murder-suicide by the old Brooks place, that we can handle on our own. Unfortunately, no one is going anywhere on that one. But then there was a hit-and-run out on Arrowhead Road by the old lumber mill. No skid marks. Looks deliberate. And, okay, this is gonna sound weird, but there was a knife fight in drama club at the high school. For real knife fight, not props. They got the kids separated, but they’re not sure that they have everyone involved in custody, and they’re still trying to sort out what it was about and who started it. None of the incidents seem related only. . .” The deputy trailed off.

  Craig looked over at Raven, and Raven could see in his eyes the finish to the deputy’s frantic statement. Rare enough to have one of these things happening in Devil’s Crossing. Unheard of for two such incidents to happen in a week. For everything to happen on the same day, and only a day after the Jansens and Harvey. . .

  “Magic involved?” The sheriff asked the question that had been on Raven’s lips.

  “Not so far as we can tell, sir.” The deputy’s voice was frantic. Poor kid had probably never handled anything more exciting than a DUI. “At this point, who can tell?”

  “Right. I’ll take the high school. At least my sister’s kids aren’t involved in theater, so I don’t have to worry about any conflict of interest, and that sounds like the most volatile situation at the moment. Call out the posse to get Arrowhead Road cordoned off until we can process the scene. They’ve trained for things like this. And see if you can talk Buck into coming out of retirement temporarily. He’s got to be tired of fishing by now.”

  The message crystal went dark. Craig turned to Raven. “So much for the rest of the day off.”

  Raven he
sitated. “I’d offer support but. . .”

  “You’re not trained in this, you’re not here in an official capacity, and this certainly isn’t your area of expertise as a consultant. Got it. You’ve already been more help than I have any right to ask. Just one thing. Could you check in on Morgan, see how he’s doing? See if he needs anything. And should he happen to give you any information that helps—I’m not talking about anything that would help with the prosecution. Right now that’s the last thing on my mind. Anything he says you pass on to us would be hearsay anyway. But if you can help if you can find anything that will help us with the bigger picture, unofficially—”

  “Absolutely,” Raven said. “And then, well, I hate to feel like I’m leaving you in the lurch, but at this point research is possibly the most important thing I can offer. I’ve already exhausted your town’s archives. I have an extensive library at home, and access to the GII’ s archive as well. I promise I’ll be back in a day or two, and in the meantime if you need me for any reason, you can contact me through GII.”

  The sheriff smiled despite the grim situation. “Trust me, you’re the last person I would accuse of running from a fight. I appreciate all you’ve done, all you’re doing. Get some rest before you go anywhere. Getting shot is a shock to your system, and the hike back in the sun couldn’t have helped. Not to mention whatever you faced in the cave.” With that, he teleported, presumably to face the chaos ripping apart his town.

  Chapter Sixteen

  The shower in the AirBNB had a hand-held spray attachment, and so Raven was able to wash off without getting the bandage wet. It felt remarkably good to be clean of the dirt, sweat, and blood he’d accumulated on the day’s adventure. It also relaxed him enough that could acknowledge how tired he was. He’d intended to go directly to visit Morgan and then teleport home, but Craig had been right, damn him. They’d finished the cheese and crackers, so there was nothing to eat, but the cool, white sheets of the bed called to him. Whatever was in the cave, it wasn’t a problem he could solve immediately, and he’d be better for a rest. He stretched out on the bed, intending only a short nap, but it was nearly dinner-time by the time he woke and dressed.

  Raven teleported to the street outside of the saloon and walked in to get directions from the waitstaff. The sheriff had left instructions to feed him when he showed up, and so the waitress insisted that he sit down to a meal. He hadn’t fully realized how long it’d been since he’d eaten, nor how hungry he was, until the hot, housemade bowl of chicken soup found its way in front of him. Before he finished the soup, the waitress was back out with his French Dip sandwich. The sandwich was on thick-cut slices of toast, and the broth for dipping had just the right amount of seasoning. The meal came with something called curly fries on the side. Raven poked them with his fork in suspicion, but the sandwich and soup had left him still hungry enough to nibble at one tight-curled fried spiral. To his surprise, they weren’t half bad — thin cut spirals of potato that had been dipped in some spicy breaded concoction before being fried. He finished almost half the side serving before the heaviness of the grease left him feeling too full to continue.

  He offered to pay, was told again that his meal was on the house. He thanked the waitress and tucked a generous tip beneath the plate before heading out. The hotel was a block and a half behind the bar, a two-story Victorian affair that had seen better days. The gingerbread had been painted with blue and red accents that, when the paint had been fresh and new, must have contrasted brightly with the white of the building. Clearly, the hotel had once been someone’s entrepreneurial dream, lovingly planned and built, but the paint was now long faded. The wood of the front steps creaked just a little under his tread, but the porch itself had been recently swept and well-tended geraniums grew in pots along the railing. The chandelier in the main entryway gleamed with polish, and the worn Persian rug in front of the reception desk might have been genuine. The young woman behind the desk looked straight out of central casting —wholesome, fresh-faced country girl, blonde hair pulled back into a ponytail. Stacked beside her were a number of anatomy textbooks, and when Raven craned to see the screen of the laptop perched on the desk, it showed what appeared to be the map of the human central nervous system.

  She jumped when he cleared his throat to announce his presence, but recovered with a bright customer-service smile. He returned her polite greeting and asked for Morgan’s room number.

  “Ah, I’m not certain. . .” she trailed off. “That is, are you from. . .”

  It took him a moment to realize that she was concerned he might be a reporter or someone who had a grudge with her guest. “I’m Corwyn Ravenscroft. You’ll see that I’m the one being billed for the room. I just wanted to check on Mr. Jansen’s well-being before I left town for a while. Feel free to check with him, to see if he’s disposed to receive a visitor.”

  Her troubled face cleared. “Oh, Mr. Ravenscroft, of course. You can go ahead and knock yourself. He’s in room five. Just down the hall, turn the corner and it’ll be the first door on your left.”

  He followed her direction, and found himself standing in front of the door with a numeral five neatly painted in gilt.

  He tapped on the door. “Morgan? It’s Raven. I’m just stopping in to see how you’re doing. Do you have a moment?”

  The door opened. “Yes. C–come in.”

  The boy’s eyes were bloodshot and swollen, his hair uncombed. He still wore the same clothes he had on yesterday. Well, of course he did. Everything else he owned had been burned up in the fire that destroyed the only home he’d ever known.

  “Have you slept? Eaten?” Raven found himself asking. Found himself thinking that if this were his son, he’d want someone to take care of him.

  Morgan sat in one of the chairs at a little table that looked the same vintage as the hotel. He gestured Raven to the other chair across from him. “I slept some. Couple hours, I think. The deputy who took my statement last night brought food by earlier, but I wasn’t really hungry. Girl at the desk let me put it in the hotel fridge for later.”

  “Do you need anything?” Raven asked.

  Morgan choked on a laugh edged with hysteria. “Nothing. Everything. I—” he waved his hand. “It’s all gone. Everything, my family, my. . .everything.” He took a shaky breath. “I borrowed the phone at the desk, and got hold of the Armstrongs who live down the road from the farm. They’ll look after the horses, make sure that they’re fed and watered until I can. . .” He took a deep steadying breath. “I still have my parents’ truck. I mean, I guess I do. It must still be at the Heilman’s. Oh, God—” a few more breaths. “I don’t know if I can go there. I mean even if they don’t have it cordoned off. They probably have it cordoned off. But how can I. . . Man, I just. . . Mrs. Heilman, she used to feed me cookies and lemonade when I was a kid and came up with my Dad to get hay. She was just. . .blood everywhere and the three little boys, too. They say the girl lived. I didn’t see her.”

  “I haven’t been up to the scene,” Raven said. “They said she played dead that’s the only reason she made it. I’ll ask someone about the truck. Probably a deputy can drive it over here eventually. But no one expects you to go back to your parents’ farm until you’re ready.”

  “It’s my responsibility. My parents raised me to be responsible, or they tried to. But I don’t even know how this is supposed to work,” Morgan said. “I, I don’t even so much care for myself, but things have to be straightened out. For the horses. There will be, I guess there will be funeral arrangements, or something, to make when police release. . .And I, I don’t even know where I’m supposed to live.”

  The law said that Morgan was a man at nearly twenty, but the boy he had been was still close to the surface even as he struggled to be a real grown-up with responsibilities he should never have to face at this age.

  “Was there any other family?” Raven asked gently. “Anyone who can help with,” he hesitated just a moment. “Arrangements?”

  �
�No, no one. Mom and Dad were both only children. Dad’s parents died in a car crash when he was in his twenties. Blow out, bridge, they said it was no one’s fault. Mom’s family came from some weird religious group. They disowned her when she left the church. As far as I know they’re still alive down in South America somewhere, but she hasn’t spoken to them since before I was born. I don’t think they even know I exist. Mom and Dad just had me and, well, we know what a disappointment I turned out to be. I mean here I was with my test scores, and my grades, and everyone thought I was destined to have this bright, bright future. And I threw that all away. No scholarships for me now, and no college would ever want me. The only reason I had anything like work is my parents owned the farm. Nothing but failure as far as the eye can see. Even worse, I killed someone. A classmate, if not a friend.” He met Raven’s gaze with blood-shot eyes. “Do you have any idea what it’s like to have done something you can’t take back, something you can never forgive yourself for?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  Morgan looked down for a moment, flushing a little. Raven didn’t blame him for forgetting who he spoke to; grief drowned the young man’s usually quick mind.

  “I wanted to make it up to them somehow,” Morgan said after a moment. “Not that my parents ever made me feel like I needed to. They were nothing but supportive through everything with Matthew, the court case, everything. But I just felt like I had let them down. I swore I would spend the rest of my life making it up to them, only I never got the chance.”

  The boy’s voice choked off on that last word. He turned his face away, but not before Raven could see the tears. Raven felt totally out of his depth. This was a sort of thing Cassandra was good at, or Ana.

  He tried anyway. “You were their child. They weren’t going to stop loving you, stop being proud of you, just because you made a mistake.” He knew it was true, because he knew it would be true of him when Ransley got old enough to make mistakes of his own.