by Lisa Plumley
“Housing is available for transitory witches.” Emme consulted her clipboard. “We’ve anticipated your needs in that regard and arranged for a place for you to live while you’re here. You will have to contend with roommates, however. And all cusping witches have been assigned IAB chaperones, too.”
Dayna opened her mouth to object. Garmin spoke first.
“The chaperones are strictly precautionary.” He took in Dayna’s fisted hands. A faint line creased his otherwise perfect forehead. “For your protection and the good of the community. Well-behaved witches will have nothing to worry about.”
“That leaves me out then.”
“Not as much as you might think.” With evident certainty, Leo Garmin gave her a smile. “You might enjoy yourself.”
Ha. Dayna stifled a derisive snort. “So…I move into IAB student housing, I go to cusping-witch night school, I get tested and licensed in three weeks.” She performed a few mental calculations. “The graduation ceremony is on Hallowe’en?”
“We prefer Samhain,” Luis told her. “In keeping with the ancient traditions. Everyone in town is gearing up for the festivities. You must have seen the banners? The flyers?”
Distractedly, Dayna shook her head. She didn’t care what they called it. It was still the holiday she avoided most.
Humans made observing All Hallows’ Eve a ridiculous affair, with their costumes standing in for transmogrifications and their trick-or-treat candies serving as crude charms. Besides, coming face to face with a wart-nosed, cackling “witch” dressed all in black with an ugly pointy hat was just awkward. Humans had seriously missed the boat with that cliché.
More than likely, warlocks had floated the rumor that witches were hideous in order to keep them all to themselves.
Selfish, sexy, irresistible bastards.
“What if I don’t pass the licensing test?” she asked.
“That’s not an option.”
“For other witches, maybe not. But when it comes to me and magic? Trust me…failing to pass is definitely a possibility.”
The trio of agents smiled tranquilly at her, secure in their own magic and—evidently—in hers.
Dayna still had her doubts.
“What if I don’t finish classes?” she asked.
“You’re thinking of running away again.” Garmin gave her a hard look—one that reminded her he was in charge here. The InterAllied Bureau was his domain. “I don’t recommend it.”
“What’s the matter?” She raised her eyebrow. “Don’t want to pay for another witchfolk bounty hunter to come after me?”
“Cost is not the issue. Keeping tabs on our own kind is part of the IAB mission. It’s a necessary evil, I’m afraid. At least until humankind wakes up to our existence.” Garmin transferred his gaze to Luis. The other warlock agent had magiked a stack of paperwork and what appeared to be the witching equivalent of an iPhone. “When someone goes a little farther afield than usual”—Garmin’s gaze returned meaningfully to Dayna—“our tracers can be very helpful.”
“Helpful.” She scoffed. “Is that what you’re calling it?”
“What would you call it?”
“Intrusive. Invasive. Scary.”
“Really?” Appearing mildly surprised, Garmin pulled out his own pocket-size electronic device. He swirled his finger over its smooth black surface, making notes. “Anything else?”
Yes. Exciting. Intense. Hot. “No, that about sums it up.”
“Thank you for your input, Ms. Sterling. We’ll keep your comments in mind for future tracer deployments. We value our constituents’ input here at the IAB.” With an efficient air, Garmin put away his device, then gave her an interested look. “Are you ready to get started?”
With a rush of relief—now that she’d fully committed herself—Dayna straightened. Her chair perked up, too, almost chirping. “Is there any way I could have done this yesterday?”
Garmin frowned. “Actually, according to The Old Ways, with the proper spells we could reverse time. But here at the IAB—”
“You disapprove of time reversal.” Evidently, Emme wasn’t the only one who was immune to sarcasm. “It’s inconvenient and messy, and it leaves gaps in your employee time sheets. Right?”
He gave her a long look. Then a trace of real humor sparked in his eyes. Leo Garmin was, it occurred to Dayna, a very attractive warlock—virile, smart, and skilled at magic. It was too bad his talents were wasted here in witchy civil service.
“For the first time, I actually feel sorry for Agent McAllister. It couldn’t have been easy to bring you in.”
“They tell me it wasn’t.”
“Also, for the record, time reversal is messy.”
Dayna laughed. “What do I have to do first?”
At Garmin’s nod, Luis stepped forward. He took the time to give Dayna a flirtatious wink, then dropped a stack of paperwork heavy enough to make the table shudder beneath its impact.
“First, you’ll need to complete these forms in triplicate.”
“Wow.” She’d left Covenhaven at nineteen, barely old enough to register her dubious magical “abilities.” Since then, she hadn’t given much thought to how things worked among witchfolk. “I guess policy and procedures have invaded the witching world.”
“Remedial magic training is a grave business.” Leaning back in his chair, Garmin folded his hands across his lean middle. His gaze followed Dayna’s movements as she sorted through the paperwork, giving it a preliminary examination. “It’s important for our agents and teachers to adhere to protocol. We wouldn’t want to, say, accidentally train a human by mistake.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that.” Reluctant to tackle the pile, Dayna searched her backpack for a pen. Luis conjured one and handed it to her, blowing her excuse for procrastinating. “It might be handy if humans recognized their fundamental natures.”
“As witches, you mean?”
She nodded. She might be terrible at practicing magic, but she still remembered a little witchfolk theory and witchstory. “We were all magical beings once, right? I mean, humans might be stuck with lowly vestigial magic like intuition, déjà vu, and good luck charms, but they could have been witches, too, if they hadn’t been scared out of it eons ago.”
An eerie silence fell in the room. Not even the leaves on the captive green plants rustled. Frowning, Dayna glanced up.
“There’s no pleasing you people, is there? First you think it’s hilarious that I can’t find this place, then you lecture me almost nonstop about how awesome remedial witch school is going to be, then you clam up when I show a little cultural insight. What does it take to—”
Garmin lifted his hand, cutting her off in midsentence. “Yours is an interesting perspective, Ms. Sterling. But I’ll thank you to keep it to yourself. Witchfolk are witchfolk. Humans are humans. I think you’ll see that we’re getting farther apart from one another, not closer.”
Perplexed, Dayna stared at him. She didn’t remember it being particularly taboo to discuss humans’ magical origins.
“I think it’s time you left us,” the lead agent added.
The impulse to disagree nagged at Dayna. So did a yearning to get the hell out of there. Getting out won.
“All right. Later. If you’re ever in Phoenix, look me up.” Dayna stuffed her paperwork in her backpack, shouldered her duffel bag, then aimed her most acerbic glance at Emme. She flicked her hair over her shoulder—not easy when her dark locks were still lank from the rainstorm. The intent was there. That was what mattered. “No wait. Don’t.”
Without looking back, Dayna headed for the door.
Chapter Seven
Caught in the stark glare of a single outdoor floodlight, T.J. examined the target before him.
Many times he’d struck that target; a few times he’d missed. Tonight, with the desert cicadas stirring around him and his mind crowded with thoughts of his unwelcome bonding with the runaway witch Dayna Sterling, T.J. lifted his arms to shoot…and missed. His bas
ketball struck the rim and bounced into the darkness outside the floodlight’s reach.
“Yeah! I win!” Jesse Obijuwa, the fifteen-year-old son of his good—and deeply missed—friend Henry, bounded off the court. His long dark legs flashed as he chased the basketball. When he returned to the light, his face shone. “Thanks for the game, old man. You can come back and let me beat you anytime.”
“You got lucky.” Unbothered by his defeat, T.J. slung his arm around Jesse’s shoulders. “Next time I’ll whup you good.”
The boy crowed. “I’d like to see you try.”
“Same time next week?”
“I guess.” Not looking at him, Jesse flung the ball from hand to hand with practiced ease. He sniffed. “If you’ve got nothing better to do than hang out here on the res, I mean.”
“Hey.” T.J. shot him a stern look. “Don’t badmouth this place. I was born here, remember?”
T.J. had been happy living on the reservation, too—at least until his parents had died, and everything had fallen apart. He still liked being there. Unlike humans, Covenhaven’s Native American population understood the importance of their magical counterparts. They lived in harmony with the Patayan, both groups benefitting from and sharing their unique abilities.
Such peaceful coexistence was important, especially in a world fraught with dangers. Even the traditional legacy witches understood that. Long ago, they’d enacted a truce with the Patayan, partly to keep their ancient battles from endangering humankind and partly to preserve their own dwindling numbers.
But the legacy witches had never found the same accord with their human complements. They still lived apart from each other. Some traditional witches—myrmidon, or Followers of The Old Ways—resented humankind’s freedom. They worked against integration and everything it stood for, preferring to preserve their witchy purity. Their purposeful detachment was almost as bad as humankind’s constant competition and self-interest.
Those were attitudes T.J. didn’t understand. As a compound—born of a warlock father and a Patayan wisewoman mother—he’d been caught between worlds from the start. But he’d never felt apart from either one. Instead, he’d kept footholds in each.
He hadn’t sensed the same ease in Dayna Sterling. Despite running away to live among humans, she’d seemed distant from their world—hindered, like the ocotillo and cactus in her apartment’s front yard, from the growth and connectedness that all beings needed. He wished, for her sake, that—
No. He refused to think about her. He turned to Jesse.
“Yeah. What I don’t get is why you keep coming back.” Jesse flashed him a rare grin. “Probably you like a girl out here.”
“I like women everywhere.”
“Me, too.” Jesse aimed a shy glance in his direction. “So, uh, do girls like it when you do magic? I’ll bet that totally reels ’em in. Or maybe you don’t have to show off for them at all. You can just look at them and they go crazy for you.”
Technically that was true. As a warlock, T.J. did possess certain…aptitudes where the opposite sex was concerned. A talent for seduction was ingrained in him. So was a hunger for pleasure. More often than not, though, T.J.’s inborn skills only got him into trouble. Or at least they had, during his wilder days—before he’d discovered the IAB and the discipline it conferred.
That discipline had probably saved his life…or at least his soul. Without it, T.J. didn’t know how dark his life might have become, as he searched for release in all the wrong places.
“Women who are that easy aren’t worth the effort,” he told Jesse. “There’s more magic to be found between equals.”
“Right. Equal witchfolk, you mean. Doing magic must be totally sweet.” The boy spun the basketball on his fingers, slapping it with his opposite hand to make it spin. His young face showed the effort of concentration. “My pops was doing magic. You know…before he…” He cleared his throat and tried again. “He was doing tons of magic.”
T.J. frowned at him. All kinds of emotions caromed from the boy—anger, hopefulness, pride. None of those were easy to deal with, especially alone. T.J. had been the same vulnerable age when his parents had been killed. He hadn’t handled it well. He didn’t want Jesse to go down the same shadowy paths he had.
“Jesse, you know humans can’t practice magic.” He was careful to keep his tone gentle, his expression matter of fact. He remained steadfastly beside the boy. “I know you want that to be true, but as great as your father was, he couldn’t—”
“He could! He did. I saw it.” Stubbornly, Jesse thrust out his chest. His jaw tightened, hinting at the manliness that had begun to emerge in his face. “I saw my pops do magic. Not that earth-sun-water-wind Patayan bullshit either, but real magic.”
“Legacy magic? Like the witches and warlocks practice?”
“Yeah. He didn’t show my mom, because he knew she’d yell at him. But he showed me.” Pride filled Jesse’s voice. “He magiked a stone into a dollar coin. He transformed a rabbit to look just like our dog. You should have seen the look on Jumper’s face when he saw that rabbit dog. He started barking like crazy.”
Animals held intuitive insight. Troubled even further by that telling detail, T.J. deepened his frown. “Jumper could sense the existence of your father’s magic?”
“When it came to that freaky rabbit, he sure could.” Jesse caught a glimpse of T.J.’s face and laughed. “Don’t worry, he changed that rabbit back. It was like the magic couldn’t stick or something. Rabbit parts kept popping out of the dog bits, like bunny ears on top of its head. I was trippin’ to see that shit.” He spun the basketball faster, then shrugged. “I found that rabbit a few days later. Dead. I guess maybe it wasn’t the same one. Or maybe it was. I don’t know.”
“Did your father do any more magic tricks?”
“They weren’t tricks!” With an abrupt motion, Jesse stopped the basketball from spinning. He gave T.J. a fierce glare. “It was real magic he was doing. Just like all those witches and warlocks in town. They might have looked down on him sometimes, but if they knew about his magic, they wouldn’t have.”
“Your father was a talented gardener. There’s no shame in doing the work he did, no matter what anybody says.”
“Hell, I know that.” Jesse twisted his mouth in a disgusted frown. “It’s everybody else who needs to learn that lesson, bro. Look, I’ve got to go.”
The boy slammed the basketball onto the court in a savage imitation of dribbling. With a halfhearted wave—more of a fuck you that used his whole hand than anything else—he trotted toward the edge of the court. He vanished into the darkness that lay beyond the scope of the floodlight.
Left behind, T.J. swore under his breath. His heart still clenched with the impact of the emotions he’d absorbed from Jesse. Pain and loss were especially difficult to take in. Minds and bodies wanted to resist it, but T.J. was determined not to.
Henry Obijuwa had been a good friend of his. His death—from a brain aneurysm little more than two weeks ago—had been sudden and unexpected. His loss had been a blow to everyone. One day Henry had left for work…and had never returned. It was no wonder Jesse wanted to make up stories about his dad. He wanted to remember his pops as a hero—as a man who was extraordinary.
A man who was magical.
In time, Jesse would learn acceptance. Until then, T.J. would be there for him. It was what Henry would have wanted.
Squaring his shoulders, T.J. waited another few minutes to see if Jesse would return. When he didn’t, T.J. gritted his teeth and headed for his car. He hated driving the damned thing. It left him feeling out of control—at the mercy of machinery that refused to acknowledge his magic. But it was the only way to travel between Covenhaven and the reservation without spending an hour on the task—or recruiting Deuce to help him.
Fifteen fist-clenching minutes later, T.J. parked in front of what appeared to be an enormous dirt mound. Guided by the rising moon, he picked his way between spires of red rocks and the ruts of a d
ry wash, keeping his gaze fixed on his destination. As he neared it, the dirt mound arched higher. Its breath became audible. Its respiration became perceptible. The mound rhythmically rose and fell, as alive as he was.
A colony of bats winged its way overhead. A saguaro leaned nearer, its centuries-old vigilance evident in its many long arms. With a nod for its watchfulness, T.J. stopped. He waited.
Gradually, he became aware of the light emanating from within the mound. It splintered through minute cracks in the dirt and gaps in the crimson rock, casting a welcoming glow into the night.
T.J. smiled. She was here.
Chapter Eight
Inside the mound, T.J. sat across from his magus. As the spiritual leader of the Patayan people, she was both wise and patient. She was learned and articulate. She was hospitable.
She was not, however, a skilled baker.
T.J. accepted the slice of pie she offered him all the same. His magus had become almost like a mother to him. He refused to offend her by doing any less than forking up a big bite. The leathery piecrust resisted his chewing; the orangey filling inside tasted a little like pumpkin, but wasn’t.
“It’s butternut squash.” The magus curled into her favorite chair, surrounded by modernistic furnishings. A newcomer would not have expected to find them inside the “earth ship” she called home—an ecologically sound dwelling dug partway into the desert floor. Its interior felt both snug and protected. Above the magus’s head, skylights revealed slivers of stars and sky. To her side sat a gray wolfhound, her companion for many years. She stroked the creature as she went on talking. “Baking appeals to me. Its scientific aspects are a constant challenge.”
With effort, T.J. swallowed his first bite of pie. “I never thought I’d say this, but I miss your cookies.”
“When I served you cookies, you missed my cake.”