by Chloe Neill
“While the hurricane gets closer,” Darby said. “Maybe they don’t like the wind or rain.”
“They’re air spirits,” I said. “We’ve seen them manipulate air and water to create magical tornadoes, waterspouts, fog. Could they control an entire hurricane?”
“No,” Darby said, shaking her head. “There’s no way. Do you know how much energy is wrapped up in a hurricane? A nuclear bomb has nothing on it. So even if, what, all forty of them were involved, there’s no way they’d have the power to create an entire storm.”
“Seelies don’t create,” I said. “They manipulate. And what if they only needed to do a little manipulation to a storm that was already moving toward us?”
I saw understanding dawn on her face. “They’re not avoiding the rain,” she said. “They’re resting up for something big.”
“What’s the worst-case scenario with a hurricane?”
She pursed her lips as she considered. “A slow-moving category five? So you get all the wind, all the rain, all the storm surge, and it just camps out in place. It stalls, to use the terminology. It would be catastrophic.” Eyes wide, she looked back toward the Devil’s Snare. “We have to test this weapon.”
“Yeah, we do.” I gave myself another moment—potentially a last moment—with my magic, then nodded. “Let’s do this.”
Because we were running out of time.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
A few minutes later we stood in the courtyard, the wind and rain roaring around us.
The Devil’s Snare was on a table facing a former crab trap that held a pair of Moses’s torn and stained socks.
“I don’t want to do this inside,” she yelled, buttoned up in a bright yellow slicker. “Not when I’m not certain how it will react.”
“That’s very comforting!” I yelled. “Where do I go?”
Back to the store was the first idea that came to mind, but I kept that to myself. I didn’t want to puncture her confidence right before she experimented on me.
“Behind the socks, and to the right!”
I went where she directed me, which put me in the back corner of the courtyard, the wooden fence rattling behind me.
“That’s good! Don’t move!” She gave me a thumbs-up.
I did the same. Mine was much less heartfelt.
She fiddled with the Devil’s Snare, then looked up. “I just have to push the Inclusion Stone all the way in, and we’ll be good to go. It’ll make some noise, vibrate some, and, when it’s done, go still again.” She chuckled. “And that’s not a euphemism!”
I couldn’t even fake a laugh.
“Here we go,” she said, and completed the connection.
I squeezed my eyes closed.
And nothing happened.
“Huh,” she said. “That worked earlier. Maybe the battery’s dead, right?” She peered at it, then gave the side of the skillet a good knock with the palm of her hand.
It began to vibrate.
“Is this what it’s supposed to do?” I asked as the Inclusion Stone began to spin in the middle, sending a spray of light and—from what I could feel behind it—magic.
“Standard!” she yelled out.
To the right, Moses’s socks began to shake and bounce inside the trap like angry crabs.
I could feel a tingle in my hands, the pins-and-needles feeling of a limb waking up, and was momentarily afraid I was actually feeling the magic leaving my body. But two seconds later, the Inclusion Stone stopped spinning, and the socks stopped shaking.
Something cracked and crashed outside the courtyard wall, and I instinctively reached for magic, was relieved when I was still able to access it. But no squadron of Seelies peered over the wall at us, and there wasn’t a tingle in the air.
“What the hell was that?” Darby asked after we’d waited in silence for a long, tense moment.
“Just wind damage, right?”
Darby looked back at the Devil’s Snare, clearly not convinced by my explanation. I wasn’t entirely convinced, either.
“Check the socks,” she said, and began to adjust the stones.
I’d been prepared for disappointment. Shaking socks and tingling fingers weren’t exactly the effects of the intimidating weapon I hoped we’d created. But when I opened the trap and lifted them out . . . it was instantly obvious there wasn’t a single drop of magic in them. They were just . . . mundane.
The Devil’s Snare had actually worked.
“It worked!” I said, holding them up. “The socks are empty! They’re still disgusting, but no magic!”
“Perfect! How are you?”
I was done with rain and screaming over it, so I walked her way, signaled her back into the museum.
“I’m fine,” I said when we were inside, and dropped the damp socks onto a side table. “Still magical.” Which relieved me more than I’d have thought possible a year ago.
“So we can absolutely aim that thing,” she said. “Malachi is going to be very relieved.”
“Yeah, but socks are pretty minor. You really think it will work against a few dozen Seelies?”
“Sure,” she said. “As long as they’re within range.”
“Then we still have a problem. We have to get the Seelies in front of the weapon. We have to get them in range.”
“That is the downside of a narrow spread,” she agreed. “No accidental magic taking, but you really need to stick the landing. Maybe we could use the Devil’s Snare as bait? Aeryth may want the Inclusion Stone or the Abethyl, or the entire thing, especially if she thinks she could use it against the Consularis.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Or, we could use Callyth. Maybe we could promise Aeryth information. That might be a lure.”
Darby tapped fingers against her forehead. “In my scientific haze, I nearly forgot to tell you: Laura Blackwell didn’t kill Callyth. Or interrogate her.”
I snapped my gaze back to her. “What?”
“Gunnar asked me to look. He knew you were worried about it, so I did it fast. Blackwell kept really good records. There was no mention of a Seelie, and that seems like the kind of thing she’d have noted, recorded. So I started looking at other Containment records. With a little help from a friend.”
“Moses?”
“Of course.”
“So who did question her?” And kill her, I thought, but didn’t say it aloud.
“I’ve narrowed it down to two agents. Guy named Lawrence Pelletier. And Jack Broussard.”
My brows lifted. We knew Broussard. Or had known him. He’d been a Containment agent with a bad attitude and an eye toward magical conspiracies. He’d been murdered.
“Who’s Pelletier?”
“Very nasty character,” she said. “He’s got a long and complicated file, several complaints about aggression, use of force. But he seemed to be effective, because they kept him around and in play. Supposedly, he’s one of the officers who realized cold iron was effective against Paras.”
“No kidding.”
“None.” Her gaze went flat. “Learned it by bashing someone over the head with a bit of balcony railing.”
“Is he still alive?”
“Killed three years ago. Driving at night, flipped his jeep into a canal. Couldn’t swim.”
“So they’re both dead. I don’t know if Aeryth will buy that, or care.” That Seelies thought of us as fungible kept coming up. “It’s humans who are at fault, collectively. How did she die?”
Darby nodded. “Medical incident.”
“She went to the clinic?” I asked.
“No. Had a seizure while in custody, and didn’t survive treatment. They cremated her, buried her remains in St. Louis Number One. The plot is marked.”
That was specific information, at least. Ethically questionable not to tell Aeryth where her sister was buried until
we got what we wanted, but so was their destruction of our city.
But first we had to get the Seelies here. “We can discuss our options at the store. You’re coming over, right?”
“Instead of staying here alone in a hurricane? Yes. I like my privacy, but I’m not interested in floating alone down Chartres tomorrow.”
“Let’s take the Devil’s Snare,” I said. Just in case we needed it . . .
I’d barely finished the thought when the door slammed open. I shoved Darby behind me, held out a hand to the dark shadow in the doorway.
And my heart didn’t start beating again until Liam and Malachi stepped inside.
Liam strode toward me, took my arms, and hauled me up to my toes as he looked me over. “You’re all right?”
“I’m fine. Why?”
“We heard the explosion. And saw Napoleon House.”
“What about Napoleon House?” I asked.
They looked at each other. Liam went back to the door, beckoned us outside. I was already sick of rain, but darted out in it and checked the corner . . . and could see the interior walls of Napoleon House through a gaping hole in an exterior wall. The wall closest to the museum and our little magic trick.
“Not our fault,” we said together. Which just made us look guilty.
Liam’s gaze narrowed. “Why would it be your fault?” he asked when we’d hustled inside again.
“We’re just nervous because of the proximity,” Darby said. “It was nice of you to come check on us.”
“Mm-hmm. How’s the Devil’s Snare?”
“Pretty damn good,” I said. “Darby did good work.”
And that work couldn’t have brought down half of one of the most historic buildings in the French Quarter. That was just a really unlucky coincidence.
“We just have to use it on the Seelies,” Darby began, “before they use the power they’ve been saving up to manipulate the hurricane into, probably, stalling over New Orleans and destroying us completely.”
Liam and Malachi stared at her.
“I mean, it’s a theory,” she said.
“Shit,” Liam murmured. “They’re going to try to freeze the hurricane in place. It fits. And it’s the most complete way to wipe us out.”
“They take us out with pure magic,” I said, “and they ruin the soil, the water. Nothing will grow, so the ground isn’t useful to them.”
“Instead,” Malachi said, “they use a cleansing rain.”
“Yeah,” I said. “And since we aren’t going to let that happen, we better do some serious brainstorming tonight. Pun intended.”
* * *
• • •
Liam and I walked arm in arm back to the store. Not just because of our connection, but because the punishing wind and horizontal rain meant we needed the help to make it two blocks.
A flag flew past, followed by a palm frond ripped from some poor and unsuspecting tree. And it wasn’t a comforting sign that a canoe was tied to one of the balcony supports outside the door.
“In case we have to help someone,” Liam said, and I squeezed his hand, glad he’d had the thought.
And all that goodwill was wiped away when we walked inside to find a fight in progress.
Moses and his cousin Solomon stood in front of each other, both of them under four feet tall, fingers pointed in each other’s faces. Once the biggest kingpin in Devil’s Isle, Solomon was now a constant pain in Moses’s ass. I assumed he was sheltering here tonight. That was fine, but I was not in the mood for shenanigans.
“Break it up,” I said, stepping to them. “Hurricanes aren’t the time for squabbling.”
“We aren’t squabbling,” Moses said, and I belatedly realized he and Solomon weren’t pointing at each other, but at the chandelier that hung above them—and the small buzzing creature that was swinging from it, laughing hysterically as she pretended to hump one of the crystals. She had pale skin and blondish dreadlocks, iridescent wings at her back, and not a scrap of clothing.
I narrowed my gaze. “No. No Peskies in my store. I won’t allow it.”
“We can’t send her out in the storm,” Tadji said.
I swore between my teeth as the Peskie flew down, middle fingers raised, before turning around and sticking out her butt.
“You can blame Solomon,” Malachi said dourly. “He’s the one who told her she could stay.”
“They don’t even like me,” I said as she buzzed around my head and yanked my hair. I swatted at her, missed, and she landed on the chandelier again, stuck out her tongue. “So why would she want to come here?”
“Because it’s magically sheltered.”
I stopped, looked at Solomon. “What did you say?”
“It’s shielded, right?” He pointed to the brick wall. “Seelies can’t use their magic on it.”
I knew the building was shielded, but I thought that meant only that the monitors couldn’t detect magic through the walls. I didn’t know it also meant it would provide shelter from a magical attack.
“Seelies can’t use their magic on it,” I said, and a plan began to form. But while I worked out the details, I pointed a finger at Solomon.
“Handle her,” I said, “or I’ll lock her in an armoire and she won’t get out until Christmas.”
She was still screaming when I walked away.
* * *
• • •
The power failed before the sun went down. This time, not because of magic, but because of the storm.
We’d all gathered at the store, lit candles, gathered up food, and helped in a couple of soldiers who’d gotten stuck in the flooding, as well as a couple of residents who’d decided they were too nervous to stick it out in their own French Quarter homes. We installed them on the second floor with their own pile of water bottles, blankets, and lanterns.
Burke came in with a poncho and a damp messenger bag. “Have y’all looked outside? Half of Napoleon House came down. Wouldn’t have thought a hurricane would take it, considering how many it’s already seen.”
“Strange,” Liam said, and managed not to look at me. I guess there was no point in owning up to it now.
Tadji helped him with his poncho, his messenger bag.
He looked at me. “I’ve just come from the hospital, and Gunnar says hello.”
“How’s he doing?” Darby asked.
“Better, and he’s made everyone promise again they’ll stay inside until this is over. They think he’s going to be released in a couple of days, depending on how it goes.”
“Devil’s Isle locked down?” Liam asked.
“Sandbagged and boarded,” Burke said with a nod. “Generators are still running, but only for security of the remaining Court Paras. They’ve closed the big door. They’ll wait out the storm now. And speaking of which . . .”
He pulled color printouts, slightly damp at the edges, from the bag, spread them on the table.
The danger they showed was obvious, but beautiful. The crisp white spiral atop the deep blue of the Gulf. A nautilus of destruction.
“Everybody say hi to Frieda, the category five hurricane. What we’re seeing outside right now is the northern edge. It’s moving fast, which is something, at least. The eye will probably pass very late tonight, very early tomorrow. Depends.”
“How long until it moves off completely?” Gavin asked.
“Sixteen, eighteen hours? The storm begins to weaken the moment it crosses land, but it’s a big storm, and that’s going to take time.”
“And that’s without Seelie manipulation.”
They all looked at me. “Seelies can’t affect a hurricane,” Burke said. “It’s too big.”
“They don’t have to create it,” Liam reminded us. “They only have to help it along. Make it stall over New Orleans, dump wind and water for a few dozen hours, and they’re
set.”
“Well, shit,” Burke said. “There’s already flooding in Metairie, Algiers. Storm surge is coming in, and the pumps can’t handle it. Two feet of standing water in Mid-City. And the Seelies got in one final hit.”
“What?” Liam asked.
“They hit the Lake Borgne Surge Barrier yesterday, and it took us nearly ten hours to realize it. They killed the guards on duty, and the change of shift.”
Where Seabrook kept Lake Pontchartrain out of northern New Orleans, the surge barrier kept Lake Borgne—and the rest of the Gulf of Mexico—out of eastern New Orleans. It was largely that storm surge that had buried the city during Katrina.
“Merde,” Liam murmured, rising from his chair and walking to the door, then placing one hand on the jamb as he stared into the gray.
“We’re done for,” Gavin said, linking his hands atop his head. “There’s no point in taking the risk with the weapon, with fighting back. There’s going to be nothing left to save.”
I understood the discouragement, because I felt it, too. But we weren’t the only ones in trouble. And we weren’t going to give up.
I stood up, chair squeaking as I rose. That put the gazes in the room back on me.
“We aren’t going to do this,” I said. “We aren’t going to just hand them a victory. And we aren’t going to insult everyone who made it through Katrina, who made it through flooding and heat and death and misery. We have each other, we have resources”—I looked at Liam—“and we have magic.”
“But what’s the point?” Gavin said.
“The point is what’s left,” I said. “Maybe we’ll lose part of the city. Maybe New Orleans won’t be inhabitable in the way it was before. But we don’t stop fighting because we lose ground. That’s what this is—it’s losing ground. There are still people in this city trying to eke out an existence on what’s left. They aren’t going to walk away, and we aren’t, either.”
“Yeah,” Moses said, pounding a fist on the table. “What she said.”
“Thanks for that ringing endorsement, Mos.”