Harley Merlin 3: Harley Merlin and the Stolen Magicals

by Bella Forrest

  “Sounds good to me,” Astrid replied.

  “Oh, and don’t think you’re off the hook about the Family Gathering, Ms. Hepler. I want to hear all of your family woes later, entiendes? There have got to be some skeletons in your closet.”

  She flushed. “I’ve got nothing to tell!”

  “Sure you haven’t.” I flashed her a mischievous grin and hurried out into the hallway, leaving them to discuss the juicy details of Astrid’s hand-brush.

  Reaching the magnolia trees in the circular courtyard below the living quarters, I realized I had no idea where Harley had gone. I racked my brain for places she might be, in a state like that. An idea sprang into my mind—the banquet hall. Whenever I felt like crap about something, and Tobe was too busy doing his actual job, the banquet hall became my sanctuary, my confessional, my therapy, all rolled up into one. There was nothing that the Coven’s caramel apple pie couldn’t fix.

  Coming to a halt outside the doors to the banquet hall, I peered in to find it eerily empty. Channing and Stella were pretty much the only people inside, and they didn’t seem to be enjoying each other’s company. Stella was pushing tomato pasta around her plate, her head resting on her hand, while Channing wolfed down a stack of pretzel sliders that was almost as tall as him. Not a single word passed between them. Daydreaming about Crowley, are we, Stella? I liked the girl, for the most part, but she was barking up the wrong tree if she thought she could nab Wade for herself. The cringeworthy display of flirtation she’d put on during our search for Marjorie was still seared into my brain.

  Hate to burst your bubble, mi fresa, but Crowley isn’t for you.

  I ducked back out into the hallway before they could see me. This required a rethink.

  Figuring I’d eventually cross paths with her, even if it was back up in the living quarters once she’d blown off steam, I started my evening stroll around the coven. Along the way, I stopped at all the places I knew she liked to go. The courtyard with the dragon fountain, the Luis Paoletti Room, the library. I couldn’t find her anywhere.

  Well, this is freaking hopeless, I thought, coming almost full circle. I’d tried calling, but it kept going straight through to voicemail, and she hadn’t texted me back yet. Having ended up on the opposite side of the building, I walked toward the main doors of the Assembly Hall and pushed them open with an almighty heave. Pushing both at once gave me a childish cheap thrill; it made me feel like a warrior princess striding into her great hall after a victorious battle. Plus, the Hall was the quickest way through to the other side.

  I froze. Up ahead, standing in front of the travel mirrors, was the very person I’d been looking for. Harley stood on the raised platform, staring into the liquid-like pools of the event horizon. The scalloped bronze edging of the mirrors glinted in the low light of the chandeliers. Everything had been put back in its place since Harley’s pledge incident. Looking around, nobody would ever have known that anything had happened here—apart from the poor bastards who nearly got crushed to death by a falling lampshade, that is. My little Harley, already making a legacy for herself, like all the Merlins before her.

  Letting the doors swing slowly shut behind me, both of them whispering across the marble floor, I edged toward Harley. She seemed transfixed by the swirling matter that made up the mirrors. Either that, or she was contemplating what the hell she was going to do next. Frankly, I was wondering the same thing.

  “Going somewhere?” I asked, once I was close enough.

  She whirled around, her eyes wide in fear as she clutched her chest. “SANTANA! You nearly gave me a heart attack!”

  “I didn’t want you jumping through before you told me where you were off to,” I replied. “Having a little evening jaunt? Going to read Finch a bedtime story?”

  “No.”

  “Does Alton know where you’re going?”

  Her cheeks flushed. “I’ve already got clearance to use the mirrors. He doesn’t need to know.”

  “You had clearance to use the mirrors when you went to Purgatory. Does he know you’re using them for something else?”

  “He doesn’t need to, I already told you.”

  “Mi cuate, come on! This is ridiculous,” I said, aware of the hard edge to my tone. “I hate to say it, but you shouldn’t be going anywhere on your own. None of us should. I know it sucks, but it’s not safe for you to go rogue like this. You heard Finch—Katherine is coming for you. If you just wander off on your own, who’s to say she won’t snatch you the moment you set foot outside this building? At least tell someone what you’re doing before you do it, okay?”

  I realized I was being a little hard on her, but she’d scared me. She was one of us now, and the thought of her just disappearing into the night sent a shudder of fear up my spine. Katherine might have been keeping to the periphery of her master plan, but she was a very real threat. Just because she hadn’t ridden in on the back of a nuclear warhead or rolled through the front doors in a tank didn’t mean she wasn’t a danger. The woman was clearly patient, coiled up like a snake, ready to strike the moment we crept too close.

  I sighed. “Where are you going, anyway? Can you at least tell me that?”

  “The New York Coven.”

  “To get intel on your dad?”

  She nodded slowly. “Yeah, that and the Grimoire. I need to be a hundred-percent sure that my dad was under Sál Vinna when he killed those people. I don’t know why, but I’ve been having doubts. Part of me thinks Isadora might have been trying to protect me from the truth when she led us to that love spell.” She paused for breath. “It makes sense, right?”

  I shrugged. “I think you’ll have to find out for yourself.”

  “So, you understand why I can’t tell Alton what I’m doing.”

  “Now that you’ve told me it’s about your dad… I’d probably do the same thing in your position,” I replied reluctantly.

  “People keep saying we’ve got a lot in common.” She flashed me a nervous smile. She might’ve had her Empath powers, but I, too, could read her like a book right now. Clearly, she’d gotten it into her head that she could nip out to New York for a quick snoop around and get back before anyone noticed. Bold, but stupid. One false move, one minor delay, and she’d have had the coven in a panic, especially Alton.

  “I like to think that’s true, but there’s one thing I would’ve done that you didn’t,” I said.

  “What’s that?”

  “I’d have freaking told someone what I was up to. We’re your crew now! You can trust us.”

  She heaved out a sigh. “I just didn’t want to bother anyone during the investigation. There’s so much going on, and—”

  “Hold up, let me stop you there, before my BS meter blows a fuse,” I interjected. “What’s really going on here, huh? I know you’ve only been here less than two months, but I like to think I’ve got an idea what you’re like. You’d have at least whispered something to Wade about this, and since he isn’t here trying to stop you, I’m guessing he doesn’t know either. Why are you hiding this from us?”

  “I’m not ‘hiding’ anything,” she shot back, seeming genuinely wounded.

  “Then what’s the deal? Cuate, you can tell me anything. I won’t judge—I don’t know how to,” I promised. “Well, unless it’s Stella trying to flirt with Wade. Then, I have to judge. For a girl who looks as bomb as that, and goes out on covert missions for a living, you’d think she’d have mastered the art of subtlety. I was dying of cringe.”

  Harley laughed. “You saw that, huh?”

  “I think the space station saw it.”

  “Can I let you in on a little secret?”

  I leaned in. “Please do.”

  “From what I could feel coming off her, it was all for show. She’s totally in love with Channing, and she’s trying to make him jealous by flirting—and I use that word generously—with Wade.”

  “Oh God. I was kind of irritated with her before, on your behalf, but now I just feel sad,” I said. “
Poor Stella. Nobody should put themselves through that kind of humiliation for a guy. Nobody. Especially for one who’s not even interested.”

  “Right?”

  I cast a conspiratorial glance in Harley’s direction. “So, nice subterfuge there, trying to put me off the scent with a little Stella-related tidbit as a diversion. Not going to work, hermana. What’s the deal? Why the secrecy?”

  Harley scuffed her boot against the edge of the mirror. “Honestly… it’s because of what I said before. I’m terrified I might be wrong about my father’s innocence. I figured, if I found something in New York that, in the end, proved his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, I didn’t want any of you knowing about it—at least not yet. I mean, that would crush me, man. I’d need to figure out how to deal with that disappointment before I could breathe a word of it to any of you. Not because I don’t trust you, but because I… I don’t know. I’d want to be able to process that on my own first, if that makes any sense at all?”

  “Makes perfect sense to me.” I folded my arms across my chest, realizing I was in danger of striking up one of my mom’s poses. “But there’s no use worrying about it until you can find out for sure. I guess, in a way, he’s both innocent and guilty. Think of it as a Schrödinger’s Dad kind of situation.”

  She smiled. “Comforting.” Like the famous experiment, where the cat in the steel box was both dead and alive in the minds of observers, her dad was both innocent and guilty. Until she opened the proverbial box, that was.

  “I try. Anyway, what I’m trying to say is, you can deal with the outcome when it arrives, but not a moment sooner. Otherwise, it’ll drive you nuts. You’ll end up doing something stupid, like, I don’t know, venturing off without telling anyone and jumping through to New York even though there’s a terrifying über-witch out for your blood.”

  Harley lifted her hands in surrender. “Okay, okay, I’m sorry.”

  “Glad to hear it, but you’re still not going through that mirror without me, so there’s that.”

  “At least you’re entertaining,” she teased. “Plus, you’re fearless. Seriously, I don’t think you’re scared of anything. It’s one of the coolest things about you. Someone could say, ‘Hey, Santana, you wanna help me hunt a bunch of sixty-foot spiders that are gobbling up San Diego?’ and you wouldn’t even bat an eye. You’d have a word with your Orishas, and boom, it’d be game over for the creepy-crawly suckers.”

  I smiled at her. “Of course I get scared. To be honest with you, I’m scared most of the time. I just choose to let that fear ignite my fire, you know? Get my engines roaring, my fuel burning, my marshmallows toasting.” I paused, grinning. “It’s like anything—you’ve got to use the energy that something gives you, instead of fighting against it.”

  Without warning, my mind drifted back to my encounter with the djinn. That fiery demon was scary as all hell, but there was something intoxicating about him, too. I hated to admit it, but being around the djinn had given me one heck of a thrill. It was exciting, almost, to get that close to the weird manifestation of Raffe’s dark side. The power, the strength, the raw energy that had crackled from his reddened skin… I shivered just thinking about it. Not that I’d want it to come out when it’s not in that glass box. I’ll take Jekyll over Hyde any day of the week.

  “You’re a wise old soul, aren’t you?” Harley chuckled.

  “Runs in the family,” I replied, the two of us exchanging a knowing look. “I’ll provide the magical muscle while you’re at the New York Coven. You won’t even know I’m there. It’ll be like you did this on your own.”

  “Thanks for that,” she said.

  I frowned, a wave of solemnity washing over me. “Seriously, though, I’m here for you. Whatever you need, any time of day or night. I’m your backup, for every magical, emotional, or physical need… well, maybe not every physical need. Look, what I’m saying is, we’re pals, and that comes with the perk of always having someone around for you. You’ve got me for life, Harley. I’m not going to up and leave you, I promise. I hate to get all Woody and Buzz on you, but you’ve got a friend in me.”

  She laughed so hard that her cheeks turned red. “You can be the Woody to my Buzz any day, Santana.”

  “Glad you got it the right way around.”

  She wiped the tears from her eyes. “Seriously, I’m so happy to have you guys in my life. I never expected to have friends like you. I don’t exactly make them very easily.”

  “Gee, I wonder why that is?” I tapped my chin.

  “Hey, I’m working on my people skills, and that’s all thanks to you and the others.”

  “Well then, let’s go work some more on these people skills in New York, before Alton comes in here and finds us. What do you say?”

  Without another word, she turned and stepped through the mirror. I had permission to use them, too, and my girl needed some backup.

  Right, well, I guess that answers that question.

  Nineteen

  Harley

  Stepping through to the other side of the mirror, I stood for a moment and gaped at the sight before me. A towering hall of granite and chrome arched over us, with a painted frieze above us that would’ve put the Sistine Chapel to shame. It depicted witches and warlocks in the midst of a great battle, sparks and twists of color flashing, while a horde of shadowy monsters charged toward the powerful magicals. There was no scene of victory, presumably to remind us that the fight against evil was always ongoing. Nice. Really gives the place that warm and cozy feeling.

  Santana whistled. “Well, this is intense.”

  “Tell me about it,” I replied. “I feel like we’ve wandered onto a horror movie set. All we need is a bunch of vampires and zombies to complete the mood.”

  “You know, the undead get an unfair rap. They’re actually not that bad; they can just be a bit of a nuisance sometimes. Banging on family doors and stuff. Plus, the gravediggers don’t like it much—means twice as much work for them.”

  I stared at her. “You’ve seen the undead?”

  “They can get a bit frisky around Día de los Muertos. Happens every year, though it’s our job to make sure they stay six feet under. People think they want their dead loved ones back, but they’d run a mile if they actually saw the rotting corpse of their abuelos and abuelas crawling out of a grave. It’s not pretty, but they don’t mean any harm. They just get a little bit excited. It’s a national holiday for them. They can’t help it.”

  A stern figure with a sweep of black hair, gelled to within an inch of its life, stormed across the hall toward us. His eyes were a weird shade of gray, almost too light, and his thin, angular physique gave the impression of a hawk or a vulture. Either way, I sensed we were the prey.

  “Excuse me,” he barked, in a strange, transatlantic accent. “Might I ask who you are? No arrivals are scheduled for today.”

  My neck had somehow already started sweating. “I’m… Harley Merlin. And this is my associate, Santana Catemaco. We’re here to gather some information on Hiram Merlin and Katherine Shipton, on behalf of the San Diego Coven.” It was a risky move using my real name, but I figured the New York Coven knew about me by now. The only trouble was, I had a feeling he definitely wouldn’t let me near my mom and dad’s Grimoire.

  He whipped out his phone and scanned it for a moment. “No, no record of your arrival. No record of intel requests. Are you sure you’re supposed to be here?” He eyed us both curiously.

  “Director Waterhouse sent us,” Santana replied, without missing a beat. “We can’t leave empty-handed, or he’ll have our heads on a silver platter.”

  I nodded. “I guess we presumed he’d have sent word ahead that we were coming.”

  The man sighed. “Well, there’s no record of it here. Someone must have screwed up. I’m supposed to be clocking out shortly, but I suppose I can stay and guide you in whatever you require.” His hand shot out with such violence that Santana and I staggered back. “The name’s James Salinger. Preceptor of Interna
tional Cultures… and cleaning up other people’s messes, apparently. Now, you said something about Katherine Shipton? Popular name at the moment. Can’t turn a corner without hearing someone muttering ‘Shipton’ under their breath. I’m not particularly surprised that you of all people, Miss Merlin, would be sent to investigate the matter, given your…unfortunate…connections to the issue.”

  “We’re trying to gather as much information as possible,” I replied, putting my hand into Salinger’s. He grasped it with intense force, his grip as stiff as his demeanor.

  Santana nodded, avoiding his handshake altogether. “Better the devil you know, right?”

  “Better the devil indeed, Ms. Catemaco,” Salinger muttered.

  “We’re interested in learning more about Hiram Merlin, too,” I reiterated.

  Salinger pulled a face. “Well, there’s another devil right there. When he swanned in here like an overstuffed peacock, thinking himself the big ‘I am,’ I knew he’d come to no good. And I was right.” He paused, seeming to remember that Hiram’s daughter was literally standing right in front of him. “No offense.”

  Maybe if you sounded a little more genuine, I might believe you.

  “None taken,” I replied coolly. This guy was already starting to grind my gears. I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt—maybe he’d had a bad day—but that didn’t give him the right to start jamming insults down my throat about my dad. It was going to be a challenge to try and keep my cool around him, if he kept on like this. The thought of gathering information was just about the only thing that maintained my sense of calm.

  “Pride comes before a fall, and that man had it in spades. That’s all I’m saying.”