Wolf Magic (Wolves of Faerie Book 1)

by WB McKay

  "Are witches big fans of basements?" I asked her.

  "It's safer to assume everyone is."

  She had a point there.

  Next up, I got The Inventor on Skype. I sent her the Facebook profiles of the mother and father of the Miller family and the latest victim, Carol Smoot.

  "Fascinating." She raised her goggles to the top of her forehead. "You believe this means they're in the same coven?"

  "I'm hoping," I said. "Did you find out anything for me?"

  "I've been very busy with my latest innovation." She raised a brass gun to the screen. Clockwork gears and tiny brass bees adorned the sides. A spinning dial rattled on the butt of the gun. I'd seen it before. "It makes water now."

  "Really?"

  "Yes!"

  "How intense is the stream? Are we talking a garden hose?"

  "Watch this!" She adjusted the camera so I could see her testing station. She'd set weighted bags along a low table. "The big one is two hundred pounds." She turned the dial on the gun, aimed, and fired. I knew from experience that the gun worked like a mechanical witch, taking magic and changing it to serve a new purpose. The weapon sourced the magic from the person holding it, drawing it out of their hand. Previous versions of the weapon shot things like fire and wind, typical witch skills. The water was a breakthrough, and one that worked. The two hundred pound bag flew off the table into the wall three feet behind it. "That's the high setting for now, but I bet I can do better."

  "That's amazing."

  "It's too bad you don't have this modification. If you're hunting witches this time, it could be useful to put out fires."

  I didn't bother explaining that I was hunting vampires. We'd long ago agreed it was best not to tell each other too many details, lest we got caught.

  "Speaking of witches, I was telling you that I've been busy with this modification."

  "It's okay if you didn't have time."

  "Don't be so hasty. I've been busy, but I still made the calls. No one knew anything. I was on about my tenth phone call when I realized—I have the address for a coven in Redding, California."

  "What? You do?"

  "Yes, we exchanged intel two years back. All I have is an address for someone named Erickson. Would you like it?"

  "Yes."

  "Sent. Good luck."

  "I appreciate this. Good luck with your work."

  "I don't need luck," she said before she ended the call.

  "And I do?" I asked the empty screen. Rude.

  The address was halfway between Shingletown and Redding. Perfect. I went to my truck, got halfway down the driveway, and parked and ran back to the workshop. "Just in case." I put in the code and tucked The Inventor's weapon in my purse, where I saw my phone and remembered to text Tess. I wasn't even slightly concerned about ending up in a witch's basement, but I decided to humor her.

  When I got back to my truck, Nathaniel was sitting there.

  "Seriously?" I asked him. "Seriously!"

  "Seriously?" he asked nervously.

  "Seriously get the heck out of my truck right this second."

  "Graham said you're going to track the vampires," he said. "I've come to offer to help you. You shouldn't track vampires alone. I can call in the rest of the pack."

  "That won't be necessary. Get out of my truck. Now."

  He got out, but he kept talking. "I can help."

  "I'm not tracking the vampires right now," I decided to tell him. "Did you know there's a coven of witches around here?"

  He looked doubtful.

  "There is," I told him with certainty. "The dead humans are witches."

  "Oh." He took a step back.

  "Wait. What are you thinking?"

  "I don't know," he said. "This might change the pack's feelings on what's happening here. Are you sure that's true?"

  "You don't care if vampires are killing people if the people are witches?"

  "I didn't say that. I said I didn't know if it would affect the pack's decisions going forward."

  "Uh huh," I said. "Well I guess you should go ask your alpha if you'd prefer to wait for more dead witches before you take out the vampires. I got things to do. Goodbye." I drove away as quick as I could. This was good, I told myself. This is the Nathaniel I should always expect to be talking to. He was pushy, he doubted me, he possibly considered dead witches a good thing. That should be the end of my foggy decision making where Nathaniel Thatcher was concerned. That would put an end to it right there. Yes.

  I spent the twenty minute drive stewing. I was such a mess of emotion I couldn't pinpoint my feelings anymore, and that was fine by me. I parked my truck on a shoulder across the street and took a gander at the Erickson place. The house was mostly hidden by the trees. The driveway was about a quarter of a mile, a short distance for homes around there. It was newer construction. Big, like two families could comfortably live there. I hoped it was only one well-off witch. It would be easier to know I was talking to the right person that way. Knocking on a door and asking, "Are you a witch?" was always awkward.

  I marched confidently across the street, and that's when a call came through. Tess. I'd just talked to her, and she was off the job. I was busy. I hit ignore and dropped the phone in my purse.

  The property was quiet. I wondered what I would do if no one was home.

  Magic bloomed around me in a poisonous cloud. I dropped to the ground immediately, expecting fireballs. "I'm a friend!" I yelled. "I came to help! I'm a friend!"

  No one answered.

  I crawled forward, eyes and ears searching for the source of the magic. It felt like it was all around me, but it made no sense. I'm not on fire, I thought, there's barely a breeze—and that's when I hit the barrier.

  I'd never felt anything like it before. I saw nothing. I could sense the concentrations of magic though, and I ran my hands over it. I was contained in a perfect circle. I kicked the heel of my boot into the dirt to dig under it, eventually bending down to dig with my hand, but six inches deep I was still hitting the barrier and I sensed magic down below. I didn't think digging my way out was a preferable option. Could I jump it? Maybe. In wolf form. If I failed, I'd have an awful headache. For now, I dusted off my hands, crossed my arms, and stood in the center of the circle to wait out what would happen next.

  "I'm still a friend!" I tried yelling again. "I came to help! Did you know your coven members are being killed off by vampires?"

  And that's when I heard them walking up the driveway, fire hovering over their hands.

  "I'm trapped," I said. "And I'm your friend. You don't have to hurt me."

  Five witches continued up the drive without saying a word. It seemed like a good time to get my own words in.

  "I'm Julia Grayson. Google can confirm that. I design furniture. I came here alone. You know that the killer is a group, don't you? They're vampires. I'm not a vampire. And I'm alone. You set this trap to catch the murderer, right? Think about it. I came alone. I wanted to talk. I've been searching for the witches of Redding. I know there are vampires killing your coven members. I came to warn you and see if you know anything about how to stop them. I came to help."

  There. That was the best of what I could think to say. My other option was to use magic to defend myself, but exposing my secret to strangers while stuck in a vulnerable position hardly seemed the thing to do. For the same reason, I rejected the idea of telling them I knew The Inventor, though Erickson clearly had a connection there. It might not have mattered anyway, Erickson might not have even been there.

  The witches stopped only a few feet from the barrier.

  Again, I said, "I came to help."

  "You're a wolf," a tall woman with braids said.

  "Yes, I am. Not a vampire. I came in human form. You need my help."

  The tall woman who'd spoken furrowed her brow. "I don't know."

  A shorter woman with long hair said, "She is trapped. We could see if any of what she said is true. Does anyone recognize her as part of the pack?"
>
  "I'm a lone wolf," I said. "I only came to town about a week ago. If it helps with your decision, I hunt down monsters."

  "And design furniture?" the shorter woman asked.

  "Not at the same time."

  The taller one raised an eyebrow. "Does now really seem like the time to be a smart mouth?"

  "It doesn't seem like the time to have a dumb mouth."

  The shorter one laughed. "What?" she asked the tall one. "Just because she might be a murderer doesn't mean she can't be funny."

  "Look her up," said the tall one.

  The shorter woman must have had a difficult time with Google, or a slow connection on her phone, because she spent a lot of time looking things up and showing them to the others. They checked out my portfolio, they found pictures of me at furniture shows, they noticed I had an assistant's contact information on my webpage and discussed calling her. Luckily, without me having to say anything, one of the others pointed out that it might not be the best idea to contact someone who might be human to ask about whether a werewolf was likely to be a witch murderer.

  The whole conversation made me realize that if I was going to tell government officials—or witches who cage me—my name and that I was a werewolf, I might need to disclose that bit of information to Sandra in the near future. I added that to my mental to-do list for when I wasn't a prisoner anymore.

  "All right," said the taller one. "Julia Grayson, my name is Evelyn. I have come to a temporary decision." She cleared her throat. "We cannot let you go. Do not argue. You could come back with a whole pack and kill us all. Safety first."

  The short woman laughed. "Every good safety plan includes a hostage policy."

  "I'm a hostage?" I asked. "Doesn't that usually mean you plan on trading me for something?"

  "We'll see if that comes to pass," Evelyn said. "I'll need you to hand over your purse and cell phone."

  I pulled the strap from my shoulder. My phone was inside. I didn't want to fight the witches—if I managed to do the things I was confident I could, I'd have to hurt a group of human witches already being hunted by vampires—but I couldn't hand over my purse. I'd emptied my safe. The Inventor's weapon sat heavy in the bottom of my bag. I removed my phone and tossed it over to the short woman with her hands open and waiting. "This will have to do."

  "The bag," she said.

  "I gave you my phone. I'm not trying to make trouble. I did come to help you. As long as the temporary plan is not to kill me, and you just want to leave me trapped behind this barrier for an indefinite period of time, I'll be a good prisoner. I'm only asking to keep my own purse."

  "Fine," Evelyn agreed. "But you should know that this only raises more suspicions about you and your secrets."

  "I understand that." I also understood that they'd been unwilling to come into the cage to fight me, but my phone had flown through the barrier just fine.

  "Is there anything else we should know about you, Julia Grayson?"

  "Nothing's coming to me."

  Evelyn watched me expectantly, like I was supposed to make something up.

  "I like the cage." I took a look around at my surroundings. I was visible from the road, but few cars drove out this way. The ground was soft and outside of the tire tracks there was a bed of pine needles. "Definitely beats a basement," I muttered.

  "What was that?" Evelyn asked.

  "I said I'm good." I pushed the barrier with my hand. It felt like plexiglass. "So. Does anyone want to tell me about the magic cage?"

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  My parents would have loved it. They'd spent years attempting to make charms—which never proved fruitful—but the glyph I was trapped in was the same concept, only, in many ways, superior. They would have loved it. I loved it.

  "Are you trying to figure out how to escape? Because that's not going to work. It's keyed to wolves."

  "Really?" I asked. "This is a wolf trap. And it's built only with witch magic. I've never heard of such a thing."

  "Only someone not a wolf could deactivate it," the short woman assured me. The rest of the witches had left her to stand guard.

  "I understand. I'm pretty confident I can't break myself out."

  "You don't sound upset about that."

  "If I sounded upset would you let me go?"

  "No."

  "Did you mean it when you said you won't kill me?"

  "Yes."

  "Well, I've got time to kill," I said. "Plus if the vampires show up, you might be convinced to let me out to protect you. In the meantime, this is fascinating."

  "You are an odd duck."

  "Quack quack," I offered. "So let me make sure I understand this correctly. You drew specific lines on the ground, and then flooded those lines with magic, and that is a glyph. My cage."

  "Yup."

  "How did you 'key' it to only trap wolves?"

  "That has to do with the specific drawing and the points where we poured in the magic."

  "You won't be more specific than that?"

  "Nope, but nice try, wolfy."

  "Wolfy?" I asked.

  "Yes. You have a problem with that?"

  "You could come up with something more clever than that."

  The short woman laughed. She was pleasant company for a guard, even if she wasn't answering my specific questions about the glyph. "I'm Gail, by the way."

  "You don't want me to call you witchy?"

  "Yeah, okay, I'll stick to calling you Julia, I think."

  "If you drew the glyph differently, what could you do?"

  "I have no idea," Gail said. "All we know how to do is build traps. Experimenting with something like this is dangerous, and the woman who discovered it isn't contactable at this time."

  "Who discovered it?"

  "You have a lot of questions about witch magic for a fae."

  "I'm a wolf," I pointed out. "We're fae, but not. You should know that."

  "It's all the same to me," she said.

  I turned away so she wouldn't see me roll my eyes. Another witch who resented wolves for being fae when they couldn't be. I bet if faced with the choice to be mauled to a near death state by a werewolf, or stay a happy human, she'd pick mortality. Of course, what did I know? For all I loved magic, I never did understand my parents' willingness to tear their bodies up for it. I hated seeing my mama and papa in constant agony, most days struggling to move around. Though I'd always hate the wolves who killed my folks, I knew they wouldn't have lived to a ripe old age, not with the magic ripping them up like it was.

  "You can key the cages to any type of fae," I said.

  "Sure."

  "So why did you key these traps to wolves?" I asked, and then it was obvious. They resented wolves, so they clearly subscribed to the ongoing hatred between wolves and witches. Wolves were the only fae they likely knew about in the Redding area. Of course they believed the wolves were killing the witches. Hadn't I come to Redding because I believed wolves were the killers? "It was vampires, you know."

  "You said that," was her only response.

  "Do you all normally live here?" I asked. "Is this the whole coven?"

  "You haven't seen all our numbers, if that's what you're asking." Gail seemed relaxed, especially with the joking, but her tone told me she saw me as suspect number one.

  "You're all together for protection," I guessed. "You were expecting to be attacked. Is that only because of the murders, or does someone have a grudge against your coven? Do you know the motive for their deaths?"

  "You tell me."

  "I'm asking you."

  She spent a long time looking me up and down, so I looked right back at her. Her hair was long and sleek. She wore it straight down her back, and it slipped over her shoulders constantly. She flicked it back each time. Finally, she said, "They didn't deserve to be killed like that."

  "I don't expect anyone does," I said.

  She started watching me again, so I laid back in the pine needle bed and let her stare in silence. Eventually, she said, "
We don't know the motive for the murders. Some of us think it's that the pack only just discovered we're in their territory."

  That was a good guess. The pack members I'd talked to thus far had been surprised at the idea of witches in Redding. I wondered what the wolves would do about the coven when they found out. That made me think about Nathaniel telling me the pack might want to let the vampires kill the witches off, and I couldn't handle being stuck in a cage if I was picturing his face. I stood up, raked my fingers through my curls, and paced the circle of my cage. "Have you ever trapped someone in a glyph before?" I asked.

  She hesitated when she told me, "No."

  "Probably not a lot of reason to out here," I said. "When did you learn how to do this?"

  "Recently," she said.

  I nodded, watching my feet pace the cage, and that's when I saw it. In the line of the barrier, where I couldn't touch, black lines were painted onto the ground. The pine needles there were dropped in unnatural clumps, meant to cover the drawing. "Can you brush away the pine needles so I can see the glyph lines?" I asked.

  "What for?"

  "I'm trapped in a cage with nothing to do," I told her. Witches weren't good at telling lies from truth, but I stuck to mostly truth out of habit. She'd never believe me if I told her I had an interest in witch magic. She'd surmised as much from my previous queries and brushed it off as impossible. "Is Evelyn the only one who knows how the glyphs work?" I goaded her. "Is that why you can't talk about it? You don't understand it?"

  "I've told you more than enough," Gail said, but she stood up and walked over to me. "I'm not going to touch the wall. You can see plenty already. Look closer. See the triangles?"