Malachi nodded slowly, as if trying to assimilate the concept into his existing beliefs.
“We drew the soldiers’ attention in the tavern last night,” I said. “And later in the street. But I think the combo of Osgood’s glamours and us hiding our magic made whoever’s running the show decide we weren’t a threat. We didn’t create enough ripples. Otherwise, there would have been some sort of coordinated response.” I hoped the same still held following my run-in with the three soldiers that morning.
“So we have a demon master stashing his Strangers and their vics here,” Gorgantha said. “Ganking soldiers and turnin’ them into creeps. But then also playing with the energy here, like Seay saw?”
I snapped my fingers and pointed at her. “Bingo. Which leads me to think Demon X is doing a lot more than just hiding his cards in the time catch. I think he’s stacking the deck, planning a big move.”
“Like what?” Malachi asked.
“The answer’s probably in the energy configuration, but like Seay said, that would take time to map out. The blue-eyed man might be able to help—as a resident magic-user, he knows the energy better than anyone.” I glanced over at Malachi. “But I think the best course right now is to go ahead with the hunting spell. Whatever Demon X is planning, he’s doing it all through his proxies.”
“The Strangers,” Malachi said.
“That’s right. And I’m betting that taking out the Strangers will collapse his plans.” Hell, we wouldn’t even have to know what his plans were.
“Agreed,” Malachi said, pushing the word out like a block to keep me from changing my mind and talking about visiting my grandfather again.
Gorgantha nodded. “Sounds dope to me too.”
“When will the hunting spell be ready?” Seay asked.
“If all goes well, by early evening. So we’re going to need to be ready to move. The longer we stay in the time catch, the greater the chances of being detected. Lord knows, we’ve had some close calls already.”
“Plus, we lose our sanctuary in the morning,” Malachi pointed out.
Seay opened her mouth as if she were going to say something else, but her lips trembled and then her whole expression crumbled. She buried her face in her hands, her slender shoulders hitching with powerful sobs.
I sat beside her on the bed. “Hey, what’s wrong?” I asked, rubbing her back.
Gorgantha came to her other side and wrapped a giant arm around her. “We gotcha, hon. What’s up?”
Seay cried harder, as if whatever she’d been damming up was overwhelming the gates. I met the mermaid’s gaze over Seay’s bowed head and made a questioning face—they’d spent the morning together—but Gorgantha only shrugged. Malachi watched from the desk, seemingly uncertain whether to rise or stay where he was.
When Seay finally peered up, she was no longer glamoured. Sniffling, she brushed a swath of plain hair from her brow. Tears streaked her freckled face. She accepted my handkerchief with a burbled “thanks” and cleaned up. When she finished, she stared at the floor between her shoes and released a weary sigh.
“What is it?” Gorgantha asked with surprising gentleness.
“Listening to everyone talking just now…” She paused to sniffled. “It’s just … it’s the first time I’ve felt like I’m going to get my friends back.”
Given that ninety percent of what came out of Seay was either sharp or sarcastic, her show of vulnerability touched me. But it was clear now that she’d been leaning heavily on her fae half all this time to keep from having to confront her human fear and pain. I kissed the side of her head firmly.
“We’re going to do everything we can,” I said.
“You better, jerkoff.”
30
The grotto behind the chapel was set back in a copse of trees that had been blackened by fire. I sensed what the rector had meant as I approached it. A small fount of ley energy was coursing up through the fire-damaged brick structure, but it lacked the strength and focus to wrap the grotto in a protective field.
But will it conceal magic from the outside?
At the opening, I stepped through the weak fount. My powers remained intact. Crunching down a short, leaf-strewn tunnel, I arrived in a domed room that resembled a cave. With a softly spoken word, I sent up a ball of light and studied the hovering creation through my wizard’s senses. The flow of ley energy swept up the light’s magical discharge, effectively hiding it, before dispersing it into the sky.
The rector’s tip had been a good one. I would be able to cast safely in here.
As I arranged my ingredients and implements across a stone altar, I thought about Seay’s teary episode just now. Since joining the Upholders and becoming the de facto authority, I’d been doubting my ability to lead them. Jordan had obviously felt the same way in that regard, but I’d also picked up skeptical looks from Seay, even Gorgantha. They had a right to them. I wasn’t leading a cat, a goblin, and Mae Johnson through a sci-fi and fantasy convention. The Upholders were more powerful, the stakes more personal. So Seay’s vote of confidence was a welcome shot in the arm. And that confidence went both ways.
“While I’m working on the spell,” I’d told her, “I want you to mission-plan different scenarios. The hunting spell could lead to a house, a wharf, a wilderness. And where there’s a demon, you can bet there’ll be possessed hosts or minions.”
“What about our powers?” she asked.
“We keep them on the down low until we’ve located our Stranger,” I said. “But once we open up, we fucking open up.”
Seay had smiled at that, the sparkle returning to her eyes.
When I finished arranging everything on the stone altar, I started on the potions. The alchemy set I’d found in the market included a mortar and pestle, as well as tubes and beakers of various sizes and stands to hold them. The whole set had only cost me a pound. I ground different combinations of ingredients in turn, added absinthe, and poured the mixtures into beakers. The plan was to prepare several stealth potions—you could never have enough—a couple slick wizards, and a neutralizer.
With the potions cooking over candles, I began clearing the grotto floor for my casting circles. From a few hundred yards to the west came the brusque calls of British soldiers drilling. A good reminder that once this operation kicked off and we started opening up, as I’d put it, all hell could break loose.
I checked my pocket watch, then the bonding sigil.
Where was Jordan?
By the time night fell, I had an active hunting spell and a group of teammates ready to roll, but still no druid. I called the rest of the team to the grotto.
“Should we look for him?” Malachi asked, his face solemn in the light of my hovering ball. The same light crackled above my work of the last hours: stoppered potions on the altar, smoking casting circles on the floor.
“I tried to call him through our bond, but no response,” I said. “That could have more to do with me, though. I haven’t been here long enough to assimilate the greater networks of ley energy, and if he’s out of my range…”
Seay eyed the casting circle where my cane jiggled with the Stranger’s name, ready to hunt. “I believe Jordan would want us to go ahead,” she said.
“I think so too,” I said with a sigh. “Does anyone disagree?”
When Gorgantha and Malachi shook their heads, I grasped my primed cane. “All right, Seay and I are going to recon. You two stay here until we get back.” I turned to Seay. “You ready?”
Though she’d restored her glamour, she looked more human to me now.
“Hell, yeah,” she said.
With night fallen, the length of Broadway running past St. Marks Chapel had largely emptied. A few solitary carriages sped past, the horses’ hooves kicking up divots of road. After ensuring there were no soulless soldiers in sight, Seay and I stole from the shadows of the chapel yard down to the edge of the street.
She took my arm as she had the night before, only now it felt less flirty, more s
incere. I’d draped my greatcoat over my shoulders in order to conceal my cane against my thigh, and I was struggling now to restrain its tugs.
The spell’s strength suggested our Stranger was close.
My cane guided me along the same route I’d taken when I’d set out that morning, and we were soon passing the park that would one day house City Hall. Just a couple out for an evening stroll. After several blocks my cane began to pivot toward a familiar building on the opposite side of the street.
The sugar house turned prison.
“See those Redcoats?” I whispered. Seay glanced over. “Our target is inside.”
Though we were still more than a block from the prison, the British guards had already noticed us. I slowed to a stop, pretended to point out something to Seay farther down the street, then checked my watch and turned us around.
“Oy, there!” one of the soldiers called.
“Keep walking,” I whispered.
“Oy!” he repeated.
A scuff of running boots sounded. As they drew closer, I gathered energy around my casting prism. I felt Seay’s hands warm with fae magic. I released a harsh breath. Were we going to have to blow our damned cover on a soldier? In another few moments, he was in front of us, a bayoneted musket in hand.
“Didn’ ye hear me?” he panted.
“My apologies,” I said. “I thought you were calling someone else.”
He peered around the empty street, the confused face beneath his powdered hair and tricorn hat soft with youth. I glanced over a shoulder to find the other soldiers watching us and tightened my grip on my cane.
“Someone else?” the boy soldier repeated. “There’s no one else out tonight ’cept for those addled rebels.” He redirected himself to us. “Listen, the other soldiers an’ me was just wondering if you had some tobacco ye might spare.”
Seay’s hands cooled around my arm, and I released my gathering energy. Though I could feel the bulge of the tobacco tin in my coat’s breast pocket, I patted around my other pockets in a pretend search. The soldier’s eyes followed my hand expectantly.
“How are the prisoners tonight?” I asked, nodding toward the sugar house.
“Mostly quiet,” he said distractedly. “Not the rioting we ’ad last month.”
“How many are inside?”
“Only twenty or so now, but ye can bet they’ll be set out sooner than later.” He didn’t sound happy about that.
I reached into my breast pocket and drew out the packed tin. “Here,” I said. “You fellows enjoy.”
When the soldier felt its packed weight, he nodded appreciatively. “Many thanks, good sir. God save the King.”
“God save the King,” I echoed, sliding Seay a look that said, See?
She rabbit-punched me in the side, almost causing me to lose my grip on the jerking cane. Before the boy soldier could hustle back with his prize, I said, “Tell me, is anyone visiting the prisoners tonight?”
“Just the rector from St Mark’s, but he’s always about.”
Seay’s grip tightened around my arm.
“I see,” I said. “Well, good night then.”
“Night!” he called, already hurrying off.
Twenty minutes later, I was walking toward the same spot, only now wearing a black priest’s robe, white cravat, and powdered wig, all procured from Rector Harland’s room. My pockets bulged with stoppered potions as well as the mysterious pouch Osgood had given me. Malachi paced beside me, each step a tense hop.
“I still can’t believe it,” he whispered. “Harland?”
I was still puzzling over it myself. Why would a demon give us food, shelter, protection, and tips on where to safely cast? Hell, why would a demon be inhabiting a chapel in the first place? And how?
“It doesn’t make a lot of sense,” I agreed. “But we have to go where the magic takes us.”
Up the block, I could see smoke drifting from the front of the prison, where the four guards were enjoying Thomas Hanson’s tobacco. Malachi and I crossed Broadway at an angle. As we passed under an oil lamp on the far side, one of the guards set his pipe down. The others followed suit and stepped forward, bayoneted muskets in hand.
“Who’s there?” the lead one called in a husky voice.
“Visiting priests,” I called back, pushing power into my wizard’s voice.
Malachi and I arrived in front of two of the soldiers. The other two, which included the boy I’d talked with earlier, moved out to the sides, muskets in firing positions. I was concerned the boy would recognize me in spite of the dimness and my change of attire, but he wasn’t eyeing me any more than he was Malachi.
“I’m Father Dean,” I said. “And this is Father Sam. We come from Boston and are here by order of the Church to join Father Harland at St. Mark’s Chapel. We were told we could find him here?”
The two soldiers in front of us were older, and they looked between us skeptically. Priestly attire or not, they weren’t taking any chances. No doubt because someone had told them not to trust anyone.
At last the husky-voiced soldier grunted. “Do you have Church papers?”
“Of course.” I reached into a pocket in my robe and withdrew a folded parcel.
The soldier handed his musket to the soldier beside him. He frowned as he unfolded the parcel and tipped it so the lantern light at the front of the sugar house would catch it. I followed his gaze to the official-looking document complete with signature and ecclesiastic stamp. Seay had glamoured it well.
The soldier studied it for a long minute before refolding it. As he handed it back to me, he looked over at the boy. I tensed, ready to invoke a shield.
“Go tell Harland these two’re here,” he grunted.
“Wait,” I said quickly, pushing power into the word. “We’d prefer to surprise him.”
The boy stopped and turned toward Husky Voice, who remained staring at me, blades of suspicion in his eyes. This was someone under strict orders not to let anyone unknown in. Maybe even orders from the general himself.
I caught a nervous glance from Malachi.
“Harland loves surprises,” I said, chancing even more power.
At last something yielded in Husky Voice’s eyes, and he nodded. “Let ’em inside.”
He and the other older soldier moved aside while the boys returned to the doors, unlocking and opening them. I thanked them as we stepped into the prison’s murky interior.
The appalling odor I’d been getting drafts of outside hit me like a truck: a toxic brew of urine, excrement, and misery. I fought the urge to bring a forearm to my nose and breathe through the robe’s fabric and instead took thin breaths.
Single candles burned where soldiers were posted, four around the periphery of the open space that had once stored sugar and molasses. Dark brick walls climbed into darkness. In another moment, the prisoners began to take shape, shackled men strewn over scatterings of hay. Some groaned or garbled, but they all looked half dead. A few lay so still, I wondered if they’d completed the transition to full dead.
I wasn’t expecting the Four Seasons, I thought, but holy hell.
The doors behind us slammed closed, sending my heart into my throat. Malachi flinched as the bolts clunked home. I re-centered myself. My cane, which I’d affixed with a belt to the side of my leg, tugged toward the back of the building, where light barely reached. If the rector was there, though, I couldn’t see him.
But the ol’ magic’s insisting…
And I was learning to trust my magic.
I got Malachi’s attention and jerked my head toward the back of the prison. He nodded quickly, pupils huge. With shaky hands, he drew his Bible from his robe. The guards watched us with what seemed haunted eyes as we stole past them.
Malachi let out a breathless gasp. A stick-like arm had shot out and seized his robe. I stepped in and shoved it away with a foot. Like a grotesque animal, the arm retreated back under the hay to join the rest of the shackled prisoner.
I gave Malachi�
�s shoulder a reassuring squeeze, but I was starting to lose it a little myself. Though nothing had changed since we entered, I had the claustrophobic sense everything was closing in.
“Stay here,” I whispered to Malachi.
I caught the click of a dry swallow as he nodded.
I stepped beyond the light from the final candle, pausing to draw my cane and separate it into sword and staff. The guards didn’t react, suggesting they couldn’t see me now. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I made out a deeper darkness ahead in the shape of an alcove. My staff jerked toward it with such force, it almost shot from my hand.
Little by little, the rector took shape, his bowed back to me. He appeared to be kneeling over something. When my cane tugged again, I released the hunting spell. As the magic dissipated, the rector’s body shook with what sounded like soft laughter.
“So you’ve found me,” he said in a high, chilly voice that sounded nothing like him. “Everson Croft.”
I froze. How did he know my real name?
His stooped body began to straighten. “New York’s resident wizard.”
And how did he know that?
With nothing to hide now, I whispered a series of invocations. The first one gathered the darkness into a wall to obscure me from the guards. The next one drew light from the end of my staff and shaped it into a shield that conformed to my body. With the final invocation, the banishment rune on my blade pulsed to life.
The radiant light gave me a better look into the recess where the rector had come to a full stand, his back still to me.
“Your arrival here surprised us at first,” he said. “But that surprise didn’t last.”
“We appreciated your hospitality, Father,” I growled. “Or should I speak your true name?”
“My name wasn’t made for mortal lips. Why not ‘Mistral’ for short? And that wasn’t me hosting you, but our poor friend here.”
I’d been inching forward, but now I stopped. The rector’s head had begun to swivel. I saw immediately that there was something very wrong. Where his eyes should have been were bloody sockets.
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