by Devon Monk
“I know.” What I didn’t say was that Leander had dragged her around by the throat. It was just as possible that he had crushed her windpipe before he had unloaded three magic-worked bullets into her chest. It was just as possible she was already dead before Dad and I hit Greyson with everything we had.
But that was logic, and Zayvion Jones did not look like he was interested in logic at the moment.
“Since we’re putting it all on the table,” Shame said, “what in the hell did you do to me, Terric?”
“I Closed you.”
“What?” Shame suddenly looked far less interested in his food and far more interested in the sharp sticks in his hands.
“Leander possessed you,” Terric said. “I could … feel him. Hear him. He was going to use you for as long as the crystal held to support him. And before the crystal ran out, he was going to kill us; I mean you. Kill you. So I Closed you.” He reached over for another carton, glanced inside, put it back, and took a second choice.
“What did you take away from me when you Closed me?” Shame asked.
“Nothing.”
“Bullshit. Closing means you screwed with my head and took my memories or my abilities away. What did you do to me, Terric?”
Terric chewed, swallowed. “Listen to me tell you the truth, Flynn. I Closed you, hoping to trap Leander long enough that we could remove him from you. Maybe with Victor or your mother’s help. But since you were also tied to me, I think he knew what I was doing. Or at least knew what my intentions were.
“He bailed. Just before you were Closed. I reversed what I had done and Opened you. No hits, no fouls, no harm done.” He nodded once. “No permanent harm.”
Shame was staring at Terric like he had grown a second head. “You are fucking kidding me. You can’t be that arrogant. You don’t know that you didn’t leave permanent damage in my head.”
“Yes,” Zayvion said, “he can. He’s a Closer, Shame. We’re good at this.”
“You check,” Shame said, turning to Zay. “You tell me that he didn’t leave holes in my head.”
“Now you know how I feel,” I muttered.
“Stay out of this,” Shame said without heat. “Z. Tell me he didn’t do something to me.”
“Jesus, Flynn,” Terric said. “If I didn’t know you were honestly terrified about this, I’d take offense that you just told me I suck at my job.”
Zayvion wiped the napkin over his hands, then wadded it up and threw it on the table. “Do you really want me in your head right now, Shame?” he asked. Cool and calm. But there was a fire burning behind his words.
“You, I trust.”
Zay made a little huh sound. “This might hurt,” he said.
“I doubt that.”
Zayvion set a Disbursement, then traced a delicate spell in the air. It reminded me of morning glory vines, thin, corkscrew lines with bursts of magic flowering along it. He said a word and nudged the spell so that it settled against Shame’s face, then melted inside him.
Zay was very quiet. He didn’t move, didn’t touch Shame. His gaze did not search Shame’s face. But I knew he was assessing Shame’s mind, looking for pain, looking for wounds, looking for holes.
Terric had stopped eating and took a deep breath and exhaled, not so much enduring pain as just enduring someone else digging around in a mind he was connected to.
After a minute, Zay sat back and brushed his fingers through the air, negating the spell.
Shame slumped back. “Shit, Z. You’re in a mood.”
Terric shook his head and went back to picking at the food in the box, though he looked like he’d lost his appetite.
“So?” Shame asked.
“Terric did exactly what he told you. He Closed you, but before he could lock your mind down, he reversed the spell and let you go.” He looked over at Terric. “Nice work. That’s a hard spell to reverse under those circumstances. I think I would have just Closed him, then reopened him later when I had the time.”
Terric shrugged. “And listen to him bitch for the rest of my life, once he found out what I did? Seemed better just to get it done and over with at one go.”
“Where’d you learn that?” Zay asked.
“Have a couple good teachers up in the Seattle area. You ever met Flo Hill?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Amazing Closer. I’ll introduce you someday.”
“I’m all for talking shop,” Shame said, “but how about less shop and more about me. Are you sure, Zay?”
“Shamus, this is the last time I’m going to say this to you: Terric did his job, and he did it well. That level of magic use is equal to if not better than what I would have done to you.” He paused, rethinking that comment. “Better than what I would have done. Much finer touch. Even Victor would have been impressed. Now, shut the hell up.”
That, apparently, was the vote of confidence Shame was looking for. “Fine,” he said. “You could have just told me that to begin with. And Terric? Don’t ever do that again.”
“Don’t get possessed again, and I won’t do it again.”
I yawned. Not very tactful, but damn, it had been a long day. “I’m going to bed. You can stay if you want. Couch is open. Inflatable mattress in the bottom hall cupboard, linens in the top. Don’t wake me until morning.”
I stood and wandered off to my bed. Maybe not the best hostess in the world, but they were full-grown men. They could fight for the couch and make their own beds without me.
I shut the door behind me, a little surprised Zay hadn’t followed. Maybe he needed more time with Shame and Terric. Maybe he was too angry to sleep. Maybe too angry at me. I’d try to work it out with him when I had more energy. Right now, nothing was going to get between me and my sheets.
I stripped out of my shirt, toed off my boots, and stepped out of my jeans. I wanted a shower. I smelled of magic and blood. But I didn’t think I could stay standing for much longer.
I shuffled over to the bed, pulled back the covers, and crawled in. The blankets still smelled of Zayvion’s pine cologne, my perfume, and fabric softener. I had about a half second to groan over how soft the pillow was before I was out.
I don’t know how long it was until Zay crawled into bed beside me. I hadn’t moved, and there was drool on the pillow. I sleepily wiped at my mouth as Zay pulled up tight against me, fitting his body to the curve of my back and legs, wrapping his arm around me so tight, I almost couldn’t breathe for a second, before he eased off on the pressure just a bit.
Still, I knew he was worried I’d slip away, slip through his hands, through his arms, and wind up dead like Chase. That I could sense from him.
“Not gonna happen,” I mumbled. “You’re stuck with me for a long, long time.”
I didn’t hear his answer before I fell asleep again.
I woke up once more, in the middle of the night, before dawn stirred. Zay was still tucked up tight behind me. I didn’t know what had woken me. I lay there, listening to his breathing. Realized he was not asleep. His breathing was shallow and uneven. I heard him swallow, then blink hard enough that I could hear his lashes catching on tears. He sniffed once and held his breath, steadying it through shear will.
Then he was breathing normally again, peacefully. I felt his arms grow heavy as he relaxed and fell into sleep.
I lay there for some time, listening to the wind stir the trees outside my window, listening to Shame’s soft snore from the living room, waiting for sleep to reclaim me. And while I drifted a bit, I didn’t fall into a deep sleep. When someone, probably Terric, got up to brew coffee just before dawn, I slipped out of bed too and took a shower, scrubbing the blood and stink off of me methodically, careful of my hip, my arm, and my bruises while my mind wandered.
Where would Leander go with no body? Anywhere, I guessed. Maybe to find more of the disks that had been changed by the wild-magic storm?
I was surprised Leander had broken them. Maybe Dad was right and they didn’t know how to rechar
ge a disk. Or maybe Leander was too desperate, too hasty trying to break out of the prison to consider what he was doing. Maybe it had taken all of their magic combined just for him to open the gate and get free.
I finished showering and slipped back into the dark bedroom. Zay hadn’t moved. I dressed mostly by feel, finding a T-shirt, hoodie, and jeans. I left my bloody boots behind. Today would be a running-shoe day for sure.
I stepped out into the hall and saw Shame, who was sleeping on the inflatable mattress, the covers pulled so far up, all I could see of him was the top of his head. The blankets on the couch had already been folded neatly, one of my spare pillows perched on top.
So I was right. Terric had to be in the kitchen brewing coffee.
I walked into the kitchen. Terric was not only brewing coffee; he was making French toast.
“Morning,” he whispered. “Coffee’s fresh.”
I poured myself a cup and inhaled the nutmeg and vanilla scents of the toast on the griddle. My mouth watered, and I pulled a couple plates down for us.
“Get some sleep?” he asked.
“Yes. You?”
“Shame snores.” He rolled his eyes. “Thought I might as well make some food.”
I rested my hip against the counter and watched him cook. For all I had only met Terric a short time ago, he was someone whom I felt like I’d known for years. He had rebanded his hair back, but his silver-white bangs slid down to cover his eyes as he focused all his attention on lifting the corners of the toast so he could see how brown the slices were getting.
“How are you doing?” I asked.
He shrugged one shoulder, his mouth curving in a brief frown. “It’s been better.” He slid the spatula beneath the toast and flipped it. “And it’s been worse. Mostly, I’m worried for all of you.”
“All of us?”
“Since I’m from Seattle, the things that are happening around here aren’t really my concern.”
Oh, you could have fooled me. Out of everyone who had been called down to handle the wild-magic storm, only a few had stayed, most notably, Hayden and Terric. And even though I’d heard the others who lingered, Nik and Joshua and the Georgia sisters, talk about missing home, I’d never once heard either Hayden or Terric say they wanted to be anywhere else but here.
“If it’s not your concern, why are you still here?”
He looked up at me, smiled. “Let me rephrase. The blame won’t fall to me. Not for the breakup in the Authority. Not for the kidnapping. Not for the attacks. Not for what happened out there at the prison. I’ll take my share of responsibility, but the recent disasters the Portland branch has been going through will fall on someone else’s shoulders.”
“Zay’s?” I asked.
“Maybe. But he’s not a Voice. It’s not very often the guardian of the gate has to take all the responsibility of something going wrong. More likely it will fall to the Voices. And since your father is gone …”
I scoffed.
“Well, isn’t in control of his own body, and Liddy is dead, that leaves Victor, Maeve, and Sedra. Sedra is the logical one to blame. She is the one who made the plans and decided on the actions.”
“Or inactions,” I added.
“Yes. But anything that has happened since she’s been kidnapped will fall to the people acting in her place.”
“Victor and Maeve,” I said.
“A lot of hard hits to take.” He walked over to my cupboard and opened it. “Syrup?”
“I don’t think so. Jam, though. In the fridge.”
He pulled out the jar of homemade strawberry jam Nola had sent me for Christmas.
“That’s what Bartholomew is coming to deal with, right?” I asked.
He nodded. “He’ll want a recap of everything that’s happened. We will likely be called on to testify in the reckoning. After that”—he shrugged—“I can’t say. I’ve never been a part of a review. Probably won’t really be a part of this one.”
He slid two pieces of amber toast onto a plate and handed it to me, served himself the other two, then dropped four more egg-soaked slices on the griddle.
I used the jam—didn’t have any butter in the house, but didn’t need it with how sweet those berries were. I stood there; Terric did too, our backs to the counter, plates in one hand, forks cutting savory sweet bites out of the bread, scooping up ruby, spring-scented jam on our tines, and eating it all down without another word. The only time I paused was to wash my mouth with hot, richly bitter coffee.
Terric checked the griddle once, flipped toast, and went back to eating.
“So are you headed out of town soon?” I asked.
He put his plate in the sink and ran some water. “Not soon. I can’t leave … don’t want to leave all of you shorthanded. This used to be my home once.” He smiled, but his eyes were sad. “I never thought it’d end up like this. Chase, Greyson. Shame.” He shook his head. “We thought we were invincible. Now. Such a mess.”
“We’ll figure it out,” I said. Maybe I didn’t have any good reason to be hopeful, but hell, I’d walked into death and back for Zayvion. I figured we could weather this tough time too. At least none of us were in a coma.
“I smell pancakes,” Shame mumbled from the kitchen doorway.
Terric held my gaze a little longer, looking to see if my confidence was going to waver. Nope. I really did believe we could figure this out—find Dane, save Sedra, and send Leander back to death. So long as we worked together.
He finally looked away from me. “French toast,” he said. “No syrup, though.”
“Powdered sugar?” Shame asked hopefully. He scratched at the back of his head, messing up his already messed hair so that it stuck up like a porcupine’s quills.
“Better. Allie scored homemade jam. It’s homemade, right?”
“Nola made it. Strawberry.”
Shame yawned and shambled over for a plate and held it out for Terric to deposit the toast on. He took a plate, a cup of coffee—which he had not added milk or sugar to—and the entire jar of jam out into my living room and sat at the table.
I walked out with him.
“Zay up?” he asked me.
“I don’t think so. You won’t like that coffee. You forgot the milk and sugar.” I sat on the other chair so I could look out the window. The morning was gray and wet. It had rained last night but was clear now, the early light making the world look fresh and new.
He slurped his coffee. Made a face. “You’re right.” Then got busy eating.
Terric stayed in the kitchen, and after the first two pieces, Shame rambled off to refill his plate.
I didn’t know where Stone was. He hadn’t let himself in the house last night. That wasn’t all that unusual. With Cody in town, maybe he really had decided to sleep on Detective Stotts’ roof.
If that big rock wasn’t careful, he was going to get spotted in broad daylight, and then what would I do? Let someone put him on display at a museum? A zoo?
I wasn’t really all that worried about him. But thinking about Stone kept my mind off other things. Chase’s eyes, wide with shock and pain as the bullets and magic killed her. Greyson’s last whisper, his blood covering my hands. Leander’s eyes as he’d tried to kill me, my father in me, and Zayvion.
Zay’s anger, his pain, his sorrow, his guilt.
Sweet hells, I wished things would just go back to normal for a day or two.
I heard the shower turn on and knew Zay was awake. He came out in pretty short order, dressed in clean jeans, a black T-shirt cut so close to his body I could see the muscles beneath the fabric, and his boots.
He had the bandage in his hand again. “Do you mind?”
“No problem.” I stood, and he shrugged out of his T-shirt, painfully, I noticed. I rewrapped his ribs. He seemed less swollen than yesterday, and after I pulled the bandage tight, I held my palm out for the metal hook thingy. He dropped a safety pin in my hand.
“Hook got lost,” he said.
I nodded. I ha
ted those things. They never worked. I attached the safety pin to hold the wrap in place; then he twisted to see how much movement he had. Pretty good. Certainly improving.
Come to think of it, my arm was feeling a little better. It was still sore when I tried to raise it above my head, but so long as I didn’t try out for the rowing club, it felt almost normal.
Zay shrugged back into his shirt with a grunt, then caught my hands. “Thank you.” He leaned forward, gave me a kiss.
“What’s for breakfast?” he asked.
“Terric made French toast,” I said.
Terric walked out of the kitchen with a plate in his hand. “This is the last of it.” He put the plate down on the table, and Zay thanked him and sat, emptying out the last of my strawberry jam over his toast.
“Has anyone checked in yet?” Shame asked, looking much more awake than he had four slices of bread ago.
“No,” Terric said. “Thought I’d call Victor. See what he has to say.”
Shame groaned. “He is going to hand us our asses.”
“You,” Terric said. “He’s going to hand you your ass. And you should have thought about that before you went out there. What I still don’t understand is how Shame talked you into it, Zay. You know better than to listen to him.”
“We had a chance to take Leander down. We took it.” Zay shoveled the last half of the toast in his mouth and chewed, washing it down with coffee.
“That’s not how Victor saw it,” Terric said. “He saw Shame—who should not have even told you where the prison was, much less how to break into it—with both of you alongside him, putting himself and each other in danger and letting the Veiled and Leander free.”
“Mum knows?” Shame asked.
“I don’t know. I got the call from Victor and headed out. But I’m guessing, yes, she knows.”
“Bloody hell,” Shame said. “Start planning the wake. I’m dead for sure.”
“I’d argue that how Victor should see it,” Zay said calmly, “is that we stopped Leander from walking out of that place with a body, a disk, and a gun.”
“And how is that worse than letting him loose in the city?”