Magic After Dark: A Collection of Urban Fantasy and Paranormal Romance Novels

by Margo Bond Collins

  Bleary-eyed she followed Quinn and Dawn across the field where they had set out stones to mark out various things. Quinn walked her through the meaning of the various stones while Dawn set up new crystals to collect new energy - that of the dead.

  “Yeah,” Becca said, going to stand where the road had started and remembering what she’d seen through the evil eye. “That’s about it. I don’t know what was in any of the shops, but I’d bet you got all of them right.”

  “Anything else?” Quinn asked. “Any detail.”

  Becca shook her head. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Dawn jerk to her feet and stagger backwards. Both women ran toward her, but she held up a hand, sharp, and they stopped short.

  Quinn hissed.

  “Get back in the truck,” she said.

  “What?” Becca asked.

  “Now,” Quinn said. “Get back in the truck and lay down on the seat.”

  Becca was on the verge of fighting with her, but Dawn’s face had gone sheet white and she motioned with a huge wave of her arm that Becca needed to be gone.

  Now.

  She ran for the truck, getting in and laying down, feeling very foolish after only a few seconds of silence. She sat up slowly, just letting her eyes get above the windshield wipers so she could see what was going on.

  Dawn and Quinn were circling a great white crystal like it was a wild animal.

  It was glowing.

  There were a few times in gypsy magic that a crystal was supposed to glow. If you were doing it on purpose, it was always a welcome thing to see. If a crystal was glowing that you didn’t mean for it to happen, though, it meant something had gone very, very wrong. Becca drifted a bit lower, looking between the windshield wiper and the hood of the truck.

  Dawn and Quinn were edging in closer, throwing dirt or something else at the crystal, underhanded, with a posture that neither of them really knew what was going to happen.

  They shouldn’t be doing that, Becca thought. They should go for help.

  Even as she thought it, she knew that the two women were the closest thing to help that there was out there.

  Normally a little sister wouldn’t be involved in something like this, but if anyone was going to know what was going on, it was Dawn, and if anyone was going to have the tools to fix it, it would be one of those two women.

  Becca’s cell phone rang, and she nearly fell out of the seat, scrambling to answer it.

  “Lay down,” Dawn said very softly but very angrily. “Now.”

  Becca looked at the phone for a moment, and then up at Dawn, who was glaring at her.

  She hadn’t known Dawn could glare like that.

  She lay down.

  There was a long, ominous silence, and then the door flew open.

  “Move,” Quinn said. The other door opened.

  “In the back, Becca,” Dawn said. Becca scrambled over the seats and Quinn started the engine, gunning it into reverse.

  “What happened?” Becca asked, looking over her shoulder at the field as Quinn pulled off an impressive J-turn and started back down the road.

  “Um,” Dawn said. Becca was looking for the glowing crystal, but she didn’t see it.

  “Did you bury it?” she asked. “Is it still going to go off?”

  “It’s up here, genius,” Quinn said. Becca turned and Dawn motioned to her leather knapsack with her head.

  “In there,” she said.

  “What?” Becca asked. “Why?”

  “Because I’ve got the kit to stabilize it at my trailer,” Quinn said, “and it’s going to take twice as long to get there and back as it is to just go once.”

  “So we’re driving along with a bomb in the car with us because we’d rather it go off with us here than with us not here?” Becca asked. Dawn swallowed hard.

  “Because that’s how we’re going to find the witch who did this,” Quinn said. “Something slipped in there through an awfully big crack in the spell, and as long as we’re holding onto it, we’ve got a clue.”

  “We just have to keep it from blowing up,” Dawn said quietly. Becca raised her eyebrows and Dawn shrugged.

  “The longer we waited to make another plan, the more likely it was it just blew up while we talked about it,” she said. “Decisive was better than right.”

  “This was your idea, wasn’t it?” Becca asked, turning to look at Quinn.

  “What if it was?” Quinn answered, taking a turn fast enough that the tail of the truck stepped out on her. For a second, Becca thought they were going to go all the way around, but Quinn pulled the truck straight and stepped on the gas again, kicking up gravel against the underside of the truck. Becca shook her head, sitting back into her seat and pulling the seatbelt tight.

  “All the way in to camp,” Quinn said. “I’m going to jump out to go get my stuff. You start walking away. Find a good place to segregate it.” She looked over her shoulder, making Becca stiffen. “You find Bella. Whatever we get out of this thing may not last very long, and I want her to be there for it.”

  “Unless it’s a bang,” Becca said wryly. Quinn grinned.

  “Eh. If it’s a bang and I’m going to be there, I may as well take her with me, too.”

  Becca shook her head. Admittedly, there was no way she was staying away once she’d tracked down Bella. The sense of excitement completely swamped any self-preservation she had, and she was grinning when Quinn wasn’t looking at her. The only real fear she had was Quinn wrecking the truck.

  They made another pair of turns, each more manic than the last, and then they were in sight of the camp. Quinn came to a sliding halt at the trailers and both women were out. Becca crawled back over the seat and set out in search of Bella, who was in her trailer.

  “What is it?” Bella asked at Becca’s urgent knock.

  “They found something,” Becca said, starting in the direction Dawn had taken. “But they’re afraid it might blow up.”

  “Walk faster,” Bella said, coming after her. Quinn went running by, and Becca and Bella hurried after her.

  Dawn had found an area of exposed stone and was cautiously drawing the white crystal out of her knapsack when the three women caught up with her. Becca heard Bella draw air through her teeth when she saw the light the crystal emitted, but Quinn was already setting up a complex pattern of green and black stones. Dawn scrambled away, taking her knapsack with her, and Quinn set fire to a pile of magnesium powder, causing a blinding flash. When it sputtered out moments later, the green and black crystals glowed demurely and the four women collectively sighed. Quinn nodded.

  “Right then,” she said. “Time to find out what we’ve got in there.”

  “What is it?” Bella asked. “I can’t see.”

  “Princess quartz,” Dawn said. “A lot of it.”

  Bella nodded.

  “It is that. And it lit up all at once?”

  Dawn began to speak, but there was a hiss, like a kettle on the verge of shrieking, and a white vapor came up off of the crystals.

  “Did that just in time,” Quinn muttered. Dawn was faster to realize what was happening.

  “Demon,” she said, rushing for her bag. “Demon, demon.”

  Becca took a step back as Quinn all but body slammed Dawn in the rush to help her find whatever it was she was looking for.

  “A moment,” Bella said, her voice the tone of authority she used only rarely. Both women hesitated, then turned to look. Over top of the white crystal, the vapor began to take shape.

  That would be the demon.

  “No harm,” it whispered, like an echo. “Please, no harm.”

  “Contain it,” Bella said firmly, “but don’t dismiss it.”

  “Are you sure?” Quinn asked as Dawn quickly set back to work.

  “The garnet is going to do most of the heavy lifting,” Dawn said. “Just don’t get it excited.”

  Bella nodded.

  “We aren’t going to destroy you, but you should know better than to try to use our magic t
o slip across from the other side,” Bella said. “I will send you back.”

  “I mean no harm,” the shade whispered, hair, arms, legs beginning to form separately from each other. Bella raised an eyebrow.

  “Not the story I would go with,” she said.

  The woman continued to take shape, her head spinning to look around and her hair drifting behind her like it was in a current of water.

  “Cold,” she said. “It’s so cold.”

  “What are you doing in my crystal?” Bella asked.

  “The light,” the woman said. “The light came to me.”

  Bella looked at Becca and then the other two women, all of whom shook their heads. No idea.

  “You have to stop her,” the woman said, her gaze landing firmly on Becca.

  “Who?” Becca asked. Again, the woman looked around, seeming confused.

  “The time,” she murmured. “All at once and then… where am I?”

  Dawn and Quinn were setting up new patterns of crystals. Quinn stood and they whispered for a moment, and then the older woman was running again. It didn’t have the sense of danger it had had before. Dawn was watching the wispy woman critically.

  “You need to prove to me that you are not a demon,” Bella said.

  “I’ve got that under control,” Dawn said quietly. “Quinn just went to get what we need.”

  Bella nodded. The woman howled, the sound of wind.

  “Bits and pieces, bits and pieces,” she said. She might have been crying.

  Becca felt for her. She hadn’t actually met a demon before, so it may have been that she was being taken by a good act, but she appeared to be confused, in pain, afraid. It was common knowledge that the odds of an un-summoned spirit being demonic were almost conclusive, and that most amateurs who successfully summoned a ghost actually ended up with a demon, so you had to be aware and be proactive, because once you let a summoned demon go, he was free to go on his merry way, whereas a spirit returned to where it had come from.

  The woman looked at Becca again, focused, intense.

  “You,” she said. “You have to help us.”

  “Why me?” Becca asked.

  “I saw you,” she said. “I saw you and you looked and you saw.”

  Becca looked at Bella, who shook her head. You don’t engage a spirit until you’re sure it isn’t a demon. The strategies are completely different.

  Quinn got back and Dawn took a step forward, into the circle. Bella’s head tipped back slightly, indicating that she didn’t completely approve of Dawn taking a risk like that, but Dawn didn’t see it and didn’t seem like she was concerned whether Bella approved or not.

  She held out a hand, tiny, granular crystals in her palm, and she swept them through the ghost, stepping back out of the circle and pouring the crystals onto a pane of blue glass. She and Quinn both looked at them closely.

  “Ghost,” Dawn said.

  “Undead human,” Quinn agreed.

  “Who are you?” Bella asked.

  “Name… name…” the woman said. “I had one. I was me. Am I. I am. Name. Self. I. Louise.”

  “Louise,” Bella said, coming to stand very close to Becca. Louise appeared to focus better when she was looking at Becca. “Where are you from?”

  “Air. Space. Time. Self.”

  Her arms wobbled, unfocusing and Bella held up a hand as Quinn and Dawn frantically worked at whatever they had to do next.

  “Louise,” Bella said. The ghost refocused and tipped her head, holding out a hand to Becca.

  “Please.”

  “Louise,” Bella said. “Why are you here?”

  Louise straightened, letting her arm fall.

  “We are condemned,” she said. “We can not go forward, nor can we go back.”

  It didn’t mean much to Becca, but Bella seemed satisfied at this.

  “Do you know who has you?” Bella asked.

  “Whispers the wind, dust in my eyes,” the ghost said, her head rolling to the side and away. Again, she went out of focus.

  “Louise,” Bella said. “There are a lot of you.”

  “Yes,” Louise whispered, coming back to them. “Yes. We are many.”

  “Who?” Bella asked. “Who are they?”

  “The whole town,” Louise said. “One by one by one by one by one.”

  “Do you know why?” Bella asked.

  Louise looked directly at Becca.

  “She knows. She knows.”

  Becca nodded.

  “I do.”

  “Set me free,” Louise said, her hand in front of her face, a sort of self-awareness opening up. “Please let me go.”

  “Yes,” Bella said.

  “And the others,” Louise said.

  “We will do what we can,” Bella said. “Be free and be at peace.”

  She looked at Dawn and Quinn and nodded, and Dawn turned a cup over, pouring out a faintly pink fluid that hissed when it hit crystal. Louise shuddered.

  “Finally,” she said, and then she was gone. Quinn started gathering up crystals and carrying them back to camp.

  “I don’t understand,” Becca said. Bella shook her head.

  “Neither did she,” she said. “But we got a lot from her, all the same.”

  “I’m going back to get another one,” Dawn said. Bella shook her head.

  “If that crystal had been at all flawed, it would have blown up and you know it. Even princess quartz isn’t made to hold a soul; you’d need ten times that much before it would even get close to being safe.”

  “They’re trapped,” Dawn said.

  “I know,” Bella told her. “But until we find the person who drew the evil eye, there’s no point freeing them.”

  “Yes, there is,” Dawn said. “They’d be free.”

  “But she’ll just move on,” Bella said. “Right now, she has all her focus on them. How much she hates them. If we let them go, she’s going to find someone else to be jealous of, and she’ll just do it again.”

  “Why?” Becca said.

  “You know the answer to that,” Bella answered. “It’s exactly what she said.”

  Becca shook her head.

  “I mean, I do, but holding a grudge against dead people? Who does that?”

  “We’ll find out soon enough, I expect.”

  “Do you think…” Becca started, cutting herself short. Bella inclined her head, prompting her to finish her thought. “Do you think it’s why someone is killing the queens, too?”

  “It does have parallels,” Bella said softly. “But I think that it’s simply because we’re watching. A lot of things are going to feel like a fit, for a while.”

  Becca looked away, nodding.

  “Hold on,” Dawn called. Both Becca and Bella turned back and Dawn pointed at Becca.

  “I didn’t ever get around to looking at you and Grant last night,” she said. “We’re doing that now before I forget again.”

  Becca sighed, hearing Bella’s soft laugh.

  “There’s nothing wrong,” Bella said gently. “Be grateful and let her do her work.”

  Becca nodded, and Bella went on without her.

  Dawn finished what she was doing and jogged to catch up.

  “How are you feeling?” she asked once she and Becca fell into step.

  “Fine,” Becca said.

  “Anything ache? Sharp pains when you move a certain way?”

  Becca checked her arms then shook her head. Dawn nodded.

  “I’ll just give you a good look-over anyway.”

  Becca wrinkled her nose. A good look-over could take an hour or more.

  “Oy!” Dawn called as Grant came into view from behind a trailer. “You, too.”

  “Me, too, what?” he called back, starting toward them. No, run, save yourself, Becca thought with a slight smile. Dawn elbowed her and for a moment Becca wasn’t certain she hadn’t said it out loud.

  “This way,” Dawn said, motioning toward her trailer. Grant shot Becca a silent question and
she laughed.

  “I landed on you yesterday,” she said. “This is what you get for being helpful.”

  “Ah,” he said. “I feel fine.”

  “You aren’t fine until I say you are,” Dawn said, opening the trailer door and waiting for both of them to go in.

  Becca hung back, just to have made the point, then went in and sat on Dawn’s bed. Grant sat on the bed that Bella shared with Jackson, probably because he hadn’t really thought about it. Becca felt sorry for him, for when he realized, and hoped it wasn’t until he left.

  Dawn went digging through a drawer and Becca and Grant sat facing each other without anything much to say.

  “Thanks again,” Becca finally said.

  “Sure,” Grant said. “Any time.”

  She grinned.

  “Bet you wish Jackson had come to check on me instead,” she said. He shook his head.

  “No, I mean it. I’m glad I was there when you needed me.”

  She laughed.

  “I actually believe you,” she said. He nodded.

  Dawn came back with a small box.

  “You first,” she said to Grant. Becca nodded. She already knew what was coming. Dawn would get away with more of it with Grant if he didn’t anticipate it.

  He shrugged, and Dawn pulled his palm flat to reveal the obsidian glass shard there. Becca reflected for a moment that they didn’t have more injuries than they did, that this was the first time Dawn was going to do this to Grant. Robbie and Billy and the rest of them really did do a good job taking care of them.

  Dawn took out a long shard of quartz, grayish in color, and put it to Grant’s hand.

  And pushed.

  He yelped, but Dawn was merciless and very used to this. She had his palm in a vice grip and her elbow locked against his side so when he tried to jerk away, nothing happened.

  It was impressive to watch, really.

  She found the obsidian with the quartz and held it there for about a ten-count, then pulled it back out of his skin and set it down on the bed next to her while Grant freed his hand and sucked on the pinprick of blood.

  “Ouch,” he said. Becca nodded.

  “I think she enjoys it.”

  “It’s the best way to know,” Dawn said, getting out the long row of vials full of various colors of fluid.

  “That’s not a denial,” Becca said.

  “I understand,” Grant said, and Becca gave him a mock-disgusted look.