by Nazri Noor
Ugh.
“Don’t look now,” Herald said. “Here comes Bastion.”
It was anyone’s guess, really, how he could find us so easily, but Sebastion Brandt had worked at the Lorica long enough to establish a sort of clout. That meant that he had a little influence over the Eyes, enough to ask them for small favors about locating a certain extremely handsome shadow mage. As big of a douche as he was, Bastion had just enough charm to get his way. Shame that it was offset by such a terrible personality.
He leapt off his bike then ripped off his helmet, the one with the blue flames on the side, shaking his blond hair loose like he thought he was in some perfume commercial. But there was something slightly different about Bastion that day. Normally he would have taken his time to saunter, savoring the opportunity to taunt me. But this time he was walking towards me briskly. A little too briskly. And his hands were both in fists.
“Oh,” Asher said. “He looks super pissed, dude.”
“Really? What tipped you off?” I fingered my jacket and picked it up off the bench, ready to shadowstep in case this meant real trouble.
“I think he wants to rip your head off.”
My ass had barely left the bench when Bastion grabbed me by the collar. He pulled me uncomfortably close, eyes piercing, cheeks red as he stared me down.
“The fuck were you thinking, Graves?”
I held my hands up. “Wow. Okay. Nice to see you too, Brandt.”
The last time we saw each other was at a getting-to-know-you dinner hosted by Carver, one that was meant to forge slightly friendlier ties between the Boneyard and the few members of the Lorica I considered my closer friends.
Nothing about Bastion was very friendly in that moment.
“Bastion, put him down.”
I knew that voice. I stood on my toes and stretched my neck as far as it could go, watching as Prudence Leung hopped out of a car and hurried towards us. Her hair sailed in the breeze as she ran, and I watched her fists for the telltale blue mantle of fire that meant she was about to punch shit and break it apart. Nothing there today, fortunately.
“What the hell is going on?” Herald said. Asher only watched, transfixed.
Bastion, as if he would ever let anyone forget, was among the Lorica’s most powerful Hands. Prudence was one of them, too. He was telekinetic, able to lift and tear things apart with just the force of his mind, while Prudence could wreathe her fists and her feet in mystic flame, then use her martial arts expertise to utterly crush and break things, from bricks to bones. Both, incidentally, were also fairly skilled magic users, which only complicated matters.
“I said put him down, Bastion.” Prudence stood with her hands at her hips, breathing heavily, winded from her run. “There’s got to be a logical explanation for this. We’re not sure that Dust did it.”
“Did what?” I pulled a finger under my collar, wondering when Bastion was going to finally let go of me.
“I thought we agreed to stay out of each other’s hair,” he said. “You stick to your business, and we stick to ours. That includes not breaking into my family’s mansion to steal heirlooms.” He stabbed a finger at my chest, way too close to the scar Thea left above my heart. Bad move.
“I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.” I shoved Bastion in the chest with both hands, something he clearly didn’t expect – or appreciate. His face reddened even further as he stumbled away from me. And did he say mansion? “Prudence. What’s he talking about? You’ve got your head on straight. I’m sure you can explain without acting like a complete gorilla.”
Bastion seethed.
Prudence rolled her eyes. “The two of you, settle. Someone broke into Brandt Manor. They riffled around the place. It seemed like they were looking for magical objects. According to the security gargoyles and the camera footage, it was someone who looked like you.”
“It didn’t just look like him,” Bastion growled, thrusting a finger bare inches from my face. “It was him.”
I swatted his hand away. “I’m sick and fucking tired of people accusing me of being places I wasn’t.” I laughed, though it was totally humorless, the kind of chuckle that spills out of you from disbelief and exasperation. “And Brandt Manor? Is that some kind of joke?”
Prudence shook her head. Bastion looked like he was about to burst into flames. Herald shrugged. Asher looked between us, eyes wide.
“Wait.” I said, my voice softer. “Your family has a manor?” I was curious. I mean, aren’t you?
“Not the point, Graves. Now tell me why you broke in, and tell me what you wanted. No one endangers my family like that.”
Bastion waved his hand across his face, palm outward, and slivers of shimmering energy trailed in the motion. Around us, the air gleamed, as if it had been turned into glass. Prudence groaned, and I followed suit.
This was Bastion’s favorite thing as of late. He specialized in two things. The first was using his ability to pick up and throw things as projectiles, turning something as innocent as loose pebbles into a hail of gunfire. The second – and he was good at this part, too – was erecting invisible shields, which made him both an offensive and defensive asset to the Lorica.
The problem was that he’d also learned to create much larger shields. They were domes, in fact, that cloaked their occupants from the world outside, casting a magical glamour in a large area. Bastion had gotten quite proficient in camouflaging territory in this way, allowing arcane grudges to be settled in relative privacy by disguising the blasts of energy and brilliant fire that typically marked a mage’s duel.
He wanted to fight, is what I’m saying. Bastion casting a dome was the equivalent of a frat boy pressing his face up against yours and grunting “Let’s take this outside, bruh.”
“Let’s do this,” Bastion said. Ah, close enough.
“Listen,” I said. “I’m not going to fight you because I have nothing to fight about. I didn’t break into your ridiculous mansion.”
Bastion threw his hands out, then clenched his fingers. The sound of wood warping and cracking broke the silence. Asher yelped as Herald tugged him off the park bench, and just in time. The bench flew apart, beams, bolts, all its component pieces bursting into splinters under Bastion’s power.
Typical Bastion. Shoot first, ask questions later. No, let me be more specific. Bastion’s style is to shoot something full of holes, then shoot some more. If it’s still alive, maybe ask it some questions. Then whether or not it answers: shoot it dead.
“Move back,” I heard Herald mutter to Asher, somewhere behind me. “Brandt’s power has a functional limit to its range. We move out of the way, we’ll be fine.”
“Bastion, stop,” Prudence shouted, her hands already emanating their signature blue flames. It was likely only a threat to get her partner to stand down, but I never thought I’d see the day the two would possibly, maybe butt heads.
Bastion cried out in frustration, then lowered his hands. The sharp, horrible pieces of broken bench fell to the ground in a crash of splinters and sawdust.
I huffed, brushing at my clothes. “So are you gonna pay for that bench, or were you going to put it back together?”
Sometimes – not often – I wish I could remember that shutting the fuck up was the best option.
Bastion socked me in the chin. It’s hazy now, but I vaguely recall exclaiming “Ack” in a clipped voice, because a blinding, bone-deep pain immediately began radiating from my jaw. I clutched at my face, stumbling away, my feet tangling in bits of broken park bench. Instinctively, I was already seeking out the nearest shadow.
Prudence shoved Bastion, grabbing at his jacket, but he kept advancing.
“Bastion, will you stop?” He wouldn’t, shrugging Prudence off – no small feat, considering she was basically the equal of a werewolf in a fistfight. Bastion lifted his fist and stalked straight for me.
I kind of hated that my magic really only had two settings: run, or kill. Carver could put people to sleep, disi
ntegrate their weapons to disarm them, or, in a really tight pinch, break half the bones in their body. I wanted that kind of defensive magic, the stuff I could use to neuter someone, but not necessarily kill them dead.
But before I could react, Herald snapped his fingers. The purple mist around his hand blew away in the sudden, freezing gust of wind that sheared through Heinsite Park. The chill left as quickly as it came, but I realized that Herald wasn’t just literally trying to cool things down. Bastion was grunting, struggling to pull his legs out of the huge chunks of ice encasing his feet and fusing him to the ground.
Yeah. That kind of magic. That was what I wanted.
“Get this shit off me,” Bastion shouted. “Prue. Break this and let me – ”
“No,” Prudence said. “Frankly speaking, you’re being a brat. We have no hard evidence that Dust was behind this. Give him the benefit of the doubt. It could have been a glamour. And if you’re just going to lash out by beating up on him you can – ”
“You’re only saying that because you’re dating his roommate.”
A sharp chill, colder even than Herald’s spell, blew through the park. Maybe the sky even darkened a little. For the first time that afternoon, I saw something cowed in Bastion’s expression, like he realized he’d royally fucked up.
Prudence’s voice cut like ice. “You quit this bullshit, Sebastion Brandt. Here and now. Or I report this to the Lorica.”
In a tiny, meek voice, Bastion answered. “You wouldn’t dare.”
“You destroyed public property. You attacked another arcane person unprovoked. Do you think that being a Hand means you’re above the law? Lower the field, or I swear, Bastion. I’ll do it.”
He gestured at his feet, helpless, struggling, throwing Herald the occasional threatening glance. Herald only smirked back.
“You wait for it to melt,” Prudence said. “Sun’s out. I don’t care. Give you some time to think about what you did.”
I clutched my jaw, letting it unhinge, not even sure how angry I was. Maybe I was shocked. I just felt numb. I knew that Bastion and I had always butted heads, but it had never come to blows like this. Two break-ins by someone who looked like me. First that Salimah woman, and now some mansion? What the hell was going on?
The air shimmered, proof that Bastion had lowered his field. A stray dog yowled at us, surprised that five people had just blinked into existence. It turned tail, then ran off.
Herald tugged on my jacket, hauling me away from the park. Asher followed quietly.
“Yeah,” Bastion said. “You better run. This isn’t over.”
“Sure isn’t,” I said. “See you, Bastion. Watch your back.”
The problem with Bastion was how much he liked to hit.
My problem was that I was learning to like hitting back.
Chapter 5
I sighed as verdant green energy rushed from Asher’s fingers, seeping into my skin. I could feel tendrils curling into my cells, sinking through my muscle and down into my bones. My nerves began to numb, or perhaps the pain began to vanish as his magic cleared away whatever damage Bastion had done to my jaw.
I didn’t know why the Lorica looked down on necromancy and considered it so dangerous. If this was necromancy, then it was awesome as far as I was concerned.
Asher leaned back, his eyes narrowing. “Question. And stop me if it’s a stupid one, but – why didn’t you tell those Lorica people that it was Thea behind it?”
I rubbed at my jaw, still surprised at how quickly Asher’s treatment had taken effect. “Honestly? As much as I know that it’s a possibility, we don’t really know that it’s her modus operandi to go around impersonating me now. I mean, to what end? I don’t know that we should be causing a panic without knowing a hundred percent.”
Asher rubbed his nose. “I mean, I do.”
“You think so?”
“If there’s any chance that it was Thea? Sure. Knowing what she’s capable of, I would have spoken up.”
I bit my lip and stared at the ground. “I guess it’s hard to think straight when someone’s clocked you in the jaw, you know? Can’t lie, that probably jarred my brains around a little.”
“You should give them a call, the Lorica people. Text them. Keep them updated. Can’t hurt to have everyone on alert, you know?”
I honestly couldn’t think why I hadn’t considered to do exactly what Asher was recommending. He patted me on the shoulder, as if sensing my thoughts.
“Maybe your brains were jerked around more than you thought. It’s not a problem. Just call as soon as you can.”
“Right,” I said, still somewhat mystified. “Right.”
I reached for my phone as Asher strode out. I managed to mutter a belated “Thanks” just as he was shutting my bedroom door. My fingers moved on autopilot, typing out a message to Herald that roughly conveyed what Asher had suggested. “Should we tell them about Thea?” Send.
Don’t know about you, but that’s always the part I hate the most: waiting for a damn reply. I stared at my phone’s screen for a minute too long, willing Herald to respond, waiting for that little checkmark under my message to turn green so I knew that he’d read it. But nothing. Ugh.
I tossed my phone onto my bed, my head craning in the direction of my shelves as I did. Man. It always happened this way. I’d be alone in my room, and I’d do everything I could to pretend that he wasn’t there, but without fail my mind and my eyes would always wander to that one shelf in the corner by the standing lamp.
Once, when he was alive, that shelf was Vanitas’s place of honor. His own bed, to put it in different terms. It bothered me knowing that his body still sat broken on the stone shelf, a mess of shards and twisted, tarnished bronze, just shattered garnets mingled with bent bits of green-gold metal. It haunted me knowing I couldn’t do anything, that Herald and I hadn’t found some way we could bring him back.
But we still talked. It’s still considered a conversation when only one person does all the talking, right? Sad, I know, just a boy and his broken sword, going slowly crazy over the extended silence. Sometimes I wondered if it was easiest to pretend that Vanitas was never enchanted, that the talking had all been in my head.
“I dunno what to do, V.” I folded my arms behind my head and flopped down onto my pillow. “I mean, surely Thea isn’t that stupid. She wouldn’t be that bold about wearing my face and going around attracting attention to herself, right? That’s just ridiculous.”
In the silences, my mind filled in the blanks. What would Vanitas say? Probably something about how I was a dumb idiot, and he wouldn’t be wrong.
I chuckled, staring at a spot on the ceiling. “I talk about this whole doppelganger deal but I think we both know I’ve got something else on my mind.” I reached inside my jacket pocket, feeling around for the little scroll of paper I’d cracked out of Arachne’s gift.
Was it the right time? It’d been so long, and now that I had a lead – no, not just any lead, but my father’s actual, new home address – something was in the way. All those concerns from months back, from when I’d just been murdered came rushing in again. How would he react? What would he say? Would he even want to talk to his son’s walking corpse?
My phone vibrated, and my hand flew quickly to pick it up, but it wasn’t a text from Herald. It was a phone call from – Prudence? I frowned at my phone. Knowing her, she could have put the pieces of the puzzle together on her own without any prompting from Herald whatsoever. I swiped and picked up.
Not one word had left my mouth before her voice was already crackling out of my earpiece. “You’d better not be involved in this, Graves.”
“I – I’m sorry?”
“I don’t know what’s going on here, but this is just too creepy. I’m at my grandma’s antique shop, out in Little China, and her surveillance footage shows that you were just here.”
“That’s impossible. I’m – ” I stopped. What the hell was I supposed to say? No one outside of my roommates was supposed
to know about the Boneyard. “I’m far, far away from Little China right now.”
“Then get your ass here right now. We need to figure this out, and fast. Something funky is going on.”
“It’s Thea,” I said. “It has to be. Remember how she masqueraded as someone else last time we saw her?”
The line was silent. Thea had disguised herself as the assistant to Enrietta Boules, an agriculture magnate and a dryad businesswoman hiding in plain sight in the normal world. After weeks, maybe months of impersonating the dryad’s PA, Thea revealed herself and murdered her in cold blood, right in front of us.
“If that’s true,” Prudence said, slowly, “then this is bigger than we thought. In any case, come over. We need to talk. And you – you should really see the footage.” Another pause. “I’ll text you the address. Come quickly.”
I shoved my phone back in my pocket and practically vaulted off my bed, reaching for the stone shelf before stopping myself. That’s right. Vanitas was gone. I sighed, then rushed out of my room, down the corridor to the portal leading back into Valero.
Mama Rosa’s Finest Filipino Food was completely dark, the way it was supposed to be after closing time. Mama Rosa herself had gone home. The others had to deal with the triple-padlock system she had in place to protect the establishment, but I could simply shadowstep out.
And that was exactly what I did, shifting through the ethers and emerging almost instantly on the sidewalk outside the restaurant. I bit my tongue to stop the yelp from escaping my throat when a slender white hand landed square in the middle of my chest.
“And exactly where do you think you’re going?” Sterling asked.
“Somewhere. Out.” I tried to push my way past, but he stood firmly in my path. I frowned. Sterling was as solid as a brick wall, and just as dense and as stubborn.
“Don’t think so.”
“Dude. Out of my way. You know I can just shadowstep past you, right?”
Sterling sucked at his teeth, his eyes rolling. “Like I couldn’t catch you if you tried. I’m faster than you.” He loomed closer, eyes glinting with feral curiosity. “Where are you going, anyway? Tell me. I’m bored.”