by Various
“A few weeks ago I was taking a nap when I was jolted awake by something. It was earth magic, but it was wrong. Amazingly powerful but completely uncontrolled. And it didn’t have a signature I knew.”
Alex looked at me quizzically. “Why would it?”
“I know most of the earth workers, and I know all the ones with that level of power. Seconds later, the earthquake hit Haiti.”
He nodded, signaling for me to continue as his fingers tapped furiously across the keys.
“I called Ana, my older sister, to see if she’d felt it. She had, and though she also didn’t know who was behind it, she was already gearing up her team to investigate and do disaster relief. I told her I wanted to go with her. We both felt that there was something wrong about the quake.”
“One of her apprentices, an air worker named Piotr, transported me to Ana’s camp outside of Port au Prince.” I paused, at a loss for words. It had been hell on earth. The smell of dust and blood; the air ringing with screams of pain, cries for help, and wails of mourning; the ground shifting beneath me as buildings creaked and groaned from strain, threatening to collapse.
And someone had caused that misery.
Deliberately.
In that moment, I’d hated with a holy passion. If I could’ve found the bastard who’d done it…well, I’m not sure what I would have done, but whatever it was, it wouldn’t have been bad enough. Not nearly bad enough to pay for the carnage I had witnessed.
“Ana and her apprentices were part of the relief effort. Ana, JoAnn, and Connie, the earth mages, were healing the injured; Robbie, the water mage, was purifying water for them and for people to drink. Piotr, the air mage, was transporting supplies. My job was to stabilize the ground beneath us. I couldn’t stop the aftershocks entirely. The tectonic plates were too damaged. But I could release the stress into unpopulated areas whenever possible. And while I worked I tried to find something, anything, that would tell me who had done this…this…evil.”
“Did you?”
“Not really. The magic was…strange…wrong. As if the power was being used by someone who shouldn’t be able to use it, and thus couldn’t control it.”
“What did you do?”
“What could I do? I contacted Roger.” Technically I could have reported my suspicions to any of the authorities, but I knew and respected my brother-in-law. He’d take me seriously and push others to look into it thoroughly.
“What then?”
“Then I did my best at earthworking until I was magically exhausted. After that I helped with the relief efforts any way I could. I’d still be there if Ana hadn’t had Piotr drag me back to New York. Where I learned that she’d called Nadya and told her to keep an eye on me.”
“So why were you meeting your sister and brother-in-law at the restaurant?”
“Nadya called just a few minutes after I arrived. She said she needed to talk to me. Katarina, my niece, was in trouble.” I blinked back tears, but my voice was steady. I wanted to mourn my sister, and avenge her. But to do either I needed to survive.
“What kind of trouble?”
“I don’t know. She was going to tell me over lunch.”
“Could Katarina have done the working that caused the earthquakes?”
I shook my head. “Not a chance. She’s still young enough to be clumsy, but not like that. And she wouldn’t have the power.” Unless…
He opened his mouth to ask the next question, but I waved him to silence. A terrible thought had occurred to me. I hoped I was wrong. Surely Kat wouldn’t have…Then again, she was sixteen, powerful, and rebellious as hell.
“What?”
I threw off the covers and climbed out of the bed. I wasn’t moving well. They’d only healed the worst of the injuries, and I didn’t have enough energy left to do much more than normal human healing on my own. It didn’t matter. If I was wrong, I’d have a longer recovery and look like a fool. If I was right…Dear God, don’t let me be right.
I yanked open one of a pair of drawers and pulled out my clothing. As I strode into the bathroom I said, “There’s a spell—a very old, evil spell. It uses murder to steal a mage’s power. Get Valentin. We need to go to Roger and Nadya’s loft. Now.”
3
“I do not like this,” Valentin grumbled. He’d been grumbling since Alex had dragged him out of bed at my behest. It had taken a couple of hours to get me released and obtain authorization to come here. After two hours of listening to Valentin’s complaints I was even more grateful than usual that we hadn’t wound up married.
Much of the delay had been Valentin’s fault. He had refused to let me leave the hospital until his assistants had checked out my story. Once they’d contacted Ana and Piotr and verified that I couldn’t possibly have had time to build and plant the bomb, I’d been released. Since I wasn’t technically under arrest, I didn’t have to include him in what I was about to do, but I wanted him there. First, he was an official with the Guard and could get us past any spells guarding the house. Second, he’d give our mission legitimacy if I was right.
That didn’t mean I was enjoying having him along. “Will you just stop?” I snarled. “It’s not like I’m enjoying this any more than you are. I need to make sure the grimoires are still protected. Nadya and Roger were guarding them for me.” I didn’t say what I feared, that one or both of the books were missing.
Valentin paled and began swearing under his breath in Russian. I hadn’t heard those particular phrases in a while, but they’re fairly memorable. I almost smiled.
“What’s so important about these grimoires?” Alex asked.
Valentin responded, saving me the trouble. Just as well, since I was busy taking down the wards. They were complex, and while they wouldn’t kill us, they’d put us back in the hospital if they weren’t properly disarmed. “They were our fathers’.” He turned to me. “Do you need help with that?”
“No. I’ve got it.” The wards fell as I spoke. I used my key to unlock the deadbolt.
I opened the door, but Valentin entered first, power at the ready. We were all nervous. Even Alex, who didn’t have any idea just what was in those grimoires, was tense, his breathing harsh in my ears.
“Stay here,” Valentin ordered. I obeyed. He knew what he was doing, and in my current state I wouldn’t be any use in a fight.
He moved silently, with speed and surprising grace, from one part of the loft space to another.
When he gave the all-clear I hurried into the bedroom area, to my sister’s jewel case. It was a moment’s work to find, in the top drawer, the charm bracelet she’d been given by our mother. Nadya, Ana, and I all had identical bracelets. Hidden among the shining silver kittens and stars was the key to my sister’s hope chest. I’d never completely understood why she chose to keep those dangerous books at the foot of her bed. If she’d used a safe, she’d said, any idiot burglar might stumble onto them. She wanted them close to hand, where she could keep an eye on them, but still hidden. Still locked up.
I muttered the words to drop Nadya’s wards as I slid the key into the lock. A deft twist of the wrist and the lock clicked free and I was able to lift the lid.
There was a flash of light, and I had an instant to regret my actions before the pain hit. My breath caught in my throat. I couldn’t swear. I couldn’t even breathe. I’d tripped a spell, but it wasn’t earth based. I didn’t know what it was, and I couldn’t have spoken words to counter it if my life depended on it. Which, in fact, it might.
Even as my sight dimmed and I struggled to cling to consciousness I saw Valentin grab one of my sister’s lipsticks from the dresser and use it to trace runes on the floor. He and Alex were both chanting. Seconds later, the pressure on my chest vanished.
I coughed and choked, sucking sweet, fresh, blessed air into my lungs in deep gasps. Somehow, Valentin had caught me as I fell. Now, with more gentleness than I would have expected, he steered me over to the bed, where I collapsed into a sitting position.
“W
hat should I be looking for?” Alex was staring into the hope chest.
“A pair of ancient grimoires, leather-bound, with symbols and Cyrillic lettering on the covers. One black, one red.”
“There’s only the black one here.”
It wasn’t that I doubted him, but I had to look. Had to. Because while I absolutely believed what he said, I wanted…needed him to be wrong. I peered over the open wooden lid and saw my father’s grimoire, exactly where it should be. And next to it? Nothing, just a void in the dust in the shape of a large rectangle. The grimoire of Vladamir Chrischenko, the book detailing some of the most evil spells and workings in the history of man, was gone.
“Maybe your sister Ana took it?” Alex put a reassuring arm around me. I needed it. I was shaking, shivering from a cold that had nothing to do with the ambient temperature and from a weakness not brought on by any spell. But while my body was apparently incapable of functioning, my mind wouldn’t stop.
“Ana would’ve taken both books. Besides, she couldn’t use either.” It made no sense. The grimoires were both incredibly valuable and hideously dangerous. There were protection spells woven into the fabric of the bindings themselves–spells keyed to the bloodlines…“Oh!”
“You’ve thought of something,” Alex announced. Both he and Valentin stared at me expectantly.
“Only I, my chosen heir, or the heir of your bloodline could touch that grimoire, Valentin.” I kept my voice carefully neutral. “Yours because it was originally your ancestor’s. Mine…”
“Because your father won it by killing mine in a duel,” he finished the sentence for me, his mind following swiftly along the same trail mine had traveled. “Who was your heir?”
“Until or unless I have a child, the Office of the Justice is my heir. He would not be able to use it, but it would at least be safe. It has to be someone from your bloodline, Valentin, or both books would be gone.”
“You are wrong.” He met my eyes, glaring at me as a flush crept up his cheeks. His expression practically dared me to argue.
“Your brother…” If looks could kill, Valentin would have cut me down. As it was, I couldn’t quite bring myself to complete the sentence.
“Has been dead for a decade,” Alex answered.
“Then who…?”
“Valentin’s son, Piotr, is an air mage. He could have set that trap. And triggering it let him know we are here.”
“No. No, he would not.” Valentin’s words were firm, the denial real. But his eyes held a pain that could only come from doubt.
I don’t know what we would have said, how much further the argument would have progressed, if his cell phone hadn’t begun vibrating. He pulled it from his pocket and answered, “Chrischenko.”
I couldn’t hear the other side of the conversation, but I didn’t need to. “Piotr.” All the color drained from Valentin’s face, and I feared for a moment that he might faint. “What have you done?”
Impossibly, he paled further and tears filled his eyes. Then something the boy said triggered more than sorrow. Valentin straightened, his tear-stained face hardening into rigid lines as he passed me the phone.
“You will give me the grimoire,” Piotr told me.
“I can’t.”
“I have your niece. I will kill her. In fact, I want to. Every death makes me more powerful. But not as powerful as that book.”
The man on the phone bore no resemblance at all to the boy I’d been with just the other day. That boy had been shy, nervous, almost awed. An excellent job of acting, since he now sounded utterly calm…and completely insane.
“Even if I wanted to, I can’t. There are spells worked into the book itself. The only way ownership can be transferred is by inheritance passing it through the bloodline, or by winning it in a duel to the death.”
“You lie.”
“Why would I lie? You have my niece. Based on what you’ve done thus far, I know you’re capable of murdering her. For all I know, you may already have killed her.”
There was a pause. I heard him say, “Scream for your aunt, Kat. Let her know you still live.”
She screamed the word “bastard,” in a voice hoarse with pain and rage.
“See, alive and still in one piece…more or less. I can send you a finger if you like. Or maybe an ear.”
“Not necessary.” I kept my voice bland and cold, though I was filled with burning rage. “You want the grimoire. The only way you can get it is by defeating me in a duel with all the formalities. The only way I will agree to a duel is if you release Katarina, alive and unharmed.”
“A duel, then.”
“With all the formalities, or it won’t work.”
“Very well, with all the formalities. Meet me at the foot of Old Woman Rock in Joshua Tree, noon tomorrow. Bring your witness.”
“And Kat?”
“She will be my witness. Last one standing gets both books.”
“And she goes unharmed.”
“Agreed.”
He hung up. I hit the end button and handed the phone to Valentin. He was as pale as a corpse, shaking, but there were no tears. I felt sorry for him. I really did. Piotr had turned against everything his father believed in, was a throwback to his grandfather, who had been a world-class villain. Vladamir had been terrifying as much for his lack of humanity as for his power.
“I need to go to my wife. I…don’t want her learning of this from someone else.”
“I’ll take you,” Alex offered. He reached out to take Valentin’s arm. Before they could leave I said, “Alex, when you’re done, I’ll need your help.”
“You’ll have it.”
I spent the time while Alex was gone gathering up everything I would need. What I was about to do was dangerous in the extreme, but the worst it could do was kill me—and it would give me the only chance I might have to defeat Piotr.
It was a ritual my father had known and Vladamir hadn’t. It was the secret that had enabled my father to defeat Vladamir. Although “defeat” was a bit of a misnomer, since both men had died. Father had just managed to hold on a couple of hours longer.
Not a happy prospect. I didn’t want to die. And Piotr had been very clever in choosing his location. If I pulled energy from the ground in Southern California, I might cause a quake that would make the one we’d been cleaning up after look like a baby.
So I couldn’t draw from the ground. Which meant I only had what energy my body could hold. And I was still drained to the dregs.
Yes, Piotr had been a clever, clever boy. Here’s hoping I was just as clever.
4
Eyjafjallajökull is a beautiful place. Then again, I’ve always liked Iceland, and volcanoes are as beautiful as they are deadly. Alex and I were close to the vent. Not in it, no. He’d flatly refused, stating he didn’t have enough knowledge or strength to keep the two of us shielded for the long hours of the ritual if we were actually inside the eruption. I had to take his word for it. Even where we were, a mile away, the power was awesome. Overhead a spray of lava, joined by a “dirty thunderstorm,” raged. Electrically charged particles were forced through the vent into the atmosphere, and I could sense the impact of chunks of ice, some as big as my head, against Alex’s shield. The shield muffled the noise as well, so I didn’t hear the cracks of thunder or the rumbling of the very earth itself.
It had been about 3:00 p.m. when we’d left New York: 12:00 noon LA time and 7:00 p.m. at the glacier. Alex swore he could keep track of the time. Good, because there was no way I would be able to. Then again, I had enough to think about.
I paced out a circle in the snow, marking each point of the interior pentacle with a spot of my blood before setting a brown candle onto the ground and lighting it. Brown for earth energy. If I’d been an air mage, I’d have used white; blue for water. But brown it was. I’d taken the candles from Nadya and Roger’s personal stash.
Tears stung my eyes that had nothing to do with smoke and ash. The prevailing winds were blowing away from us
.
Ritual magic has never been my favorite thing. I’m a restless, high-energy type. It’s hard for me to sit still and empty my mind of all emotions. But now I had no choice. I had to shed my grief and anger at my sister’s death, my fear. Having Alex there was an additional distraction, even though all he was doing was maintaining the shield. Utterly ridiculous, to be distracted by a handsome man at a time like this. But he had impressed me; he had courage and power, and he’d shown me a great deal of kindness and consideration. Stop it. Now is not the time, I admonished myself sternly. But it took longer than it should have to center myself and begin.
I sat in the lotus position, butt naked, in the middle of a power circle, on coarse ice, reciting a rhythmic chant in Russian. My throat was raw from the volcano’s fumes, and my butt was cold. In front of me was a wind-up alarm clock set to California time. It would ring two hours before the duel; I’d need half an hour to wind down the spell. Then I’d have an hour and a half to clean up, file the appropriate paperwork, and get to Old Woman Rock to make my preparations.
Not a lot of time, and all the time in the world.
It didn’t feel like I expected, tapping into the raw force of the mother earth. I expected to be overwhelmed, burned nearly to ash by its awesome power. And it was awesome. But it was also right…and gentle. Every living thing was a part of that wondrous whole, and I felt the flickering energy of life itself—birth, life, and death—like a symphony of magic playing across my sensitized nerves. The exhaustion of the past weeks faded to nothingness as the energy bathed me in warmth, making me feel reborn. When the alarm rang I didn’t want to let go. It was so tempting to stay there, in the earth’s embrace. But I thought of Nadya, of Roger; of mages murdered for their magic and of countless humans killed in the earthquakes.
Thinking of the earthquakes was a mistake. The earth felt pain, and this wasn’t the slow disease of pollution or global warning. This was the stab of a knife. The earth’s rage was a primal thing. Pain flattened me, crushed me like a gnat beneath a giant’s boot.