by K W Quinn
“Are all your contracts so vaguely worded?”
Min’s mouth opened in protest. “Look, I do what I need to, and things work out the way they will. There’s an art in what you can get a client to agree to, and agreement is critical, all right? Negotiation is a little more subtle than bounty hunting.” He shifted in his wheelchair and cracked his knuckles.
She blinked at him slowly, hands still resting on the counter. Did she not trust her legs to hold her? Did they get all glowy too?
“So, roughly sixteen hours ago, your client stole a Bonded from the Dome, and they ran.”
“They always run,” Min agreed. “I’m surprised Tarone didn’t supervise this little visit.”
Min watched Reyah pull herself up to her full height without hesitation. She might not be as spooked as he thought. Everyone looked tall from where he sat, but she did seem to fill the room.
“He knows I can handle it, or he wouldn’t have sent me. Don’t let this youthful glow deceive you. This isn’t my first job, and he’s got plenty of better things to do than supervise me.”
“Oh, sure. Sure. I just meant this was a special case. Not that I don’t trust you to do it right,” Min corrected. Her eyes narrowed, and she crossed her arms. He was hitting all the right buttons. The young ones were so easy to play. “I’m sure you’re very capable. Tarone has excellent judgment, but I would hate for him to miss out on the satisfaction of such a job. This one is a rare opportunity.”
Reyah huffed and tucked her hands in pockets. “I’ve got the signature now. I’m sure I’ll be plenty satisfied for the both of us when this is all finished.”
With that, she turned, tossing her head so that her braid swung behind her.
No tail or wings, Min noted sadly. Well, that would have been too much to ask for. Ancient dragonkin were a different breed than this modern kind.
“Thanks for stopping by, Ms. Doryu. Pleasure meeting you,” Min said to her retreating back. As soon as the door clicked shut, he wheeled himself to his office.
Sympathetic aura from only the blood signature? It was nearly unheard of. That kind of resonance was more than rare. No wonder his skin had been prickling since the kid had walked into his shop.
This was not the way he thought this thing was going to go, but this was better. Much better. He flipped through a box of books, mind racing. He pulled out a black, leather-bound journal and kissed the cover. This was a story worthy of keeping records.
Rebirth
“Luctor et emergo.” Charly’s voice reverberated in Andy’s head, sharp as sunlight. He blinked rapidly to adjust his eyes. The room was bright, full of light. Full of Light.
Andy wanted to laugh, but as he sucked in a breath, he grimaced. Everything hurt.
“Move slowly. You were dead a minute ago,” Charly said, placing a hand on Andy’s shoulder. He didn’t remember falling, but he was definitely on the floor now.
“Let me see him,” Cass growled from somewhere behind Andy.
“Patience. Charly needs time,” Amel grunted.
Andy lifted to his elbows. Charly began poking and prodding him along the ribs and legs.
“Amel, take that thing out back,” Charly said, nodding his head to where the collar lay. It didn’t look any different except for the fact that it wasn’t on his neck anymore.
“Want me to destroy it?”
“No. I want to study it first.”
“Was hoping you’d say that.” Amel was smiling, and Cass squirmed to get out of his grip.
Charly grabbed Andy’s chin so he could finish his examination by thumbing Andy’s eyelids open and shining a light in them. With a satisfied nod to Amel, Charly leaned back on his heels and moved aside. Cass came rushing in to what was left of the circle. He skidded to Andy’s side.
“Look at me,” he demanded. Andy blinked again, smiling at the stern look on Cass’s usually calm face.
“You’re so vain,” Andy whispered. He coughed and waved a hand to Cass to help him sit up all the way.
“That’s not what I meant, and you know it. But since you mentioned it, yes, I am so beautiful, and you deserve to see something extraordinary upon your resurrection.” Cass squeezed Andy’s arm and peered at his face from every angle, tracing the pale line where the collar had rested. “Looks like it worked, witches.”
“Of course it did,” Charly said with an eye roll.
“Now eat,” Amel said, turning to walk back to the kitchen.
“Yes, please,” Andy said with more enthusiasm. Dying on an empty stomach had given him something to live for. He rubbed his neck. It was gone. He could reach the Light. He wasn’t all hollowed out.
The bleakness from inside the Dome faded a little. He wiggled his fingers and toes. The scrapes from the escape were gone. He lifted his shirt and turned in a circle, trying to see all of his skin. His face felt fine too.
“You’ve started a brand-new life today. You get a bit of a new body too,” Charly said.
“Then why do I hurt?” Andy rolled his shoulders, and his face scrunched up at the uncomfortable pulling in all his joints.
“Because you died. Obviously,” Amel said. Charly puttered around the kitchen, making food. Amel stood in the corner and watched Andy. Cass pestered Andy with questions.
“Are you sure you’re all right?” Cass couldn’t stop touching him, rubbing his arm and back, poking him in the ribs.
“I’m fine.” Andy shook his hair out of his face and sighed.
“You’re moving slowly.” Cass was squinting and chewing on his bottom lip.
“I’m tired. And hungry. Dying is hard work.” Andy gave Cass a soft smile and leaned his elbows on the table.
Cass mirrored him, leaning in with a grin. “What was it like? Did you see a white light? Did your whole life flash before your eyes?”
“Not my whole life.”
“Only the good parts? Or the bad parts? Or the highlights? Or just stuff?”
“Sort of.”
“You have got to tell me more than that. Come on. You died, and you can’t spill the juicy details to me, your best friend in the entire universe?” Cass sighed dramatically, leaning back in his chair.
Andy scrubbed his scalp with his fingers. He did need a shower. And a nap. The reality of what they’d done was settling on him like a blanket. It was too much.
“It was weird. Just little moments. Memories of stuff. Not connected and nothing that seemed important. Just . . . moments. With you.”
“I was there?” Cass beamed.
“How could you not be? Have I ever gone a day without seeing you?”
“You and Mama Yana used to go on summer trips when we were first in school. Left me at home with only Karlos to play with.” Cass rolled his eyes. “Remember that?”
Andy’s eyes flew to Amel, who was smirking now. “Right. I’d honestly forgotten,” Andy said.
“Just as planned,” Amel said.
“What? You came here?”
Charly and Amel exchanged smug smiles. Charly nodded and smiled wistfully. “Every summer until Erick got too far in the hole and way too paranoid to let Miyana out of his sight. Jealous of everything. What a—”
“Good times,” Amel cut in. “Shame we had to bind your memories each time you left.”
“Come fuel yourselves and appreciate my culinary efforts.” Charly set down large bowls of rice, each with an egg and vegetables on top.
“Why did you do that?” Andy asked.
“Cook for you? Because Amel is a disaster in the kitchen.” Charly smiled with all of his teeth.
“No, my memories. Why did you have to do that? And what are you gonna do with the collar? What do we do now? Where do we go?”
“All very excellent questions, but we should discuss the answers once you have a full stomach and a rested head,” Charly said, following his own advice and shoveling a spoonful of egg into his mouth.
Andy slept like the recently dead, but Cass couldn’t quite settle in. He tossed a bit, tryi
ng to get comfortable, but the soft quilts and softer pillows weren’t able to settle his thoughts. He was warm and full of food, but he was jittery. It had been hours since Andy’s return to life. Even though he was still burnt out from everything else, Cass couldn’t sleep.
Amel poked his head into the room and caught Cass’s eye. He nodded toward the kitchen and disappeared. Cass sighed and wrapped a quilt around his shoulders before following the mysterious and terse witch.
A cup of tea was waiting at the table between Amel and Charly, who both watched him with unreadable faces. Must be a witch trick that made them look both ancient and youthful at the same time.
“Thank you,” Cass said and scooted the cup closer to him. The warm ceramic was comforting, and the tea smelled sweet and floral.
“Wanted to talk to you about your aura,” Amel said.
Cass tucked his chin and took a sip of his tea. He tried to figure out what to say to that.
“Amel is a Seer.” Charly beamed like a proud father. “He has dedicated much time and energy to understanding a lot of different divination methods, and while none of them are very clear or concise, when multiple disciplines all point to the same thing, it’s a strong indicator that there’s truth and power behind the message,” Charly explained.
“And he’s Seen something about my aura?” Cass asked carefully.
“Auras are unreliable. Too much interpretation. Want to read you a bit more clearly.”
“Read me how?”
“As many ways as I can,” Amel said seriously.
Cass set his cup down and leaned forward on his elbows. He only knew a little about this kind of magic. He hadn’t paid much attention in school because it didn’t apply to him. He was an Elemental and so was everyone he knew.
He was regretting being so narrow-minded and self-centered. He did take for granted how intrinsic his abilities were. He didn’t have to summon the Elements like a witch did, offering sacrifices or whatever for the privilege. He could command Air as easily as picking up his foot to walk. He forgot to think about what it must be like for other people.
“Is it gonna hurt?” Cass asked.
“Probably,” Amel answered. He smiled then, and it might have been sinister except the deep dimples and splattering of freckles on his witchy face made it silly enough to be comforting.
“Most of them aren’t invasive at all. The tea, your palm, the cards, a few different kinds of runes. We already did a full astrological workup, of course, but we’d like to try some scrying too.” Charly set a palm-sized knife on the table.
“More blood?” Cass sighed. “Well, at least Andy and I can have matching scars.”
Amel snorted. “As if I would leave a scar.”
Cards and runes, water and blood, tea and crystals. Cass saw it all but understood next to nothing.
“You afraid of heights?” Amel asked, frowning at the answers that he jotted down in a battered leather journal.
Cass nodded. “A little.”
Amel grabbed his hand and poked at his palm with a feathered quill. “Ever been stung by a bee?”
Amel was just paging through books and barking out questions. “You prefer sharks or cats?”
“How is that a question? Those things don’t match,” Cass protested.
“Just answer it.” Amel looked at him now, and Cass wished he’d turn back to his books.
“Cats,” he mumbled. Amel just grunted and flipped another page. “So, you really can’t feel the Elements at all? Not even a little?” It was a rude question, but if Amel was going to poke, Cass would prod.
“Not all of us are descendants of the myths. Some of us are just regular people,” Amel answered.
Cass nodded. The stale school lessons were true. He couldn’t imagine not feeling the Air. It was like trying to imagine life without the color blue. But color-blindness was a thing, so lack of Elemental magic was too.
“Be grateful,” Charly said. “Without us regular folk, you wouldn’t have the wonders of technology. Try getting Elemental magic to give you telephones and television.”
“Internal combustion,” Amel added.
“Wi-Fi,” Charly said with a sigh.
“Not convinced Wi-Fi isn’t actually magic,” Amel mumbled.
“On a molecular level, I suppose all science is really just repeatable and verified magic, but then if magic weren’t repeatable and reliable, what use would it be? I don’t know how to build a computer or even really explain how it works. Might as well be magic.”
“A microprocessor is really just like a tiny relic,” Amel agreed.
“See, you’re ordinary, but you use magic too.” Cass tilted his head and stared at the crystals on the table.
“The cost is different. You have to pull energy from within you. We can harness the untapped potential of the universe,” Charly said with a flourish.
“Makes it sound grand. It’s more practical. A boost to what already exists,” Amel added.
“Could you conjure a chair?” Cass asked.
Charly scowled at Cass and rolled his eyes. “We can’t create matter or energy. Only Fae magic has any kind of real creative properties.”
Cass nodded, reconsidering his interaction with Min.
Amel let out a long breath through puffed cheeks. His red hair stuck up in several directions from the many times he’d run his fingers through and tugged at the unruly curls.
He pinned Cass with a stern look. Cass felt exposed. None of the questions had seemed revealing, but now he was sure that Amel knew all his deepest secrets.
“Your mother was a Mistwalker,” Amel said finally.
Cass’s stomach dropped. He was used to people calling his mother all sorts of nasty names in their little town, but he had wanted these people to be different.
“Well, that’s a new one.” Cass bit his lip and folded his hands back in his lap. “What exactly is that?”
“A Mistwalker,” Amel repeated. Cass’s face must have shown his confusion because Amel continued. “Cloudshifter. Rainbringer. Skydancer. Weatherworker. Atmospheric attuner. Any of this ring a bell?”
Cass shook his head slightly. “No. She’s a fortune-teller like you. Not a real Seer, but she does some of these same things, though not at all like you do. What does my mom have to do with any of this?”
Charly pushed himself away from the table and began pacing. “I didn’t think Helori ever touched Water. After Miyana and—”
“She didn’t. At least not since then that I know of, but she had the ability,” Amel answered. “All this time, she had the ability.” He chewed on his thumb, eyebrows pulled down in concentration. Or maybe frustration.
Cass watched the witches stare at each other and do some sort of witchy mind-meld before his impatience got the better of him.
“Excuse me. Witches? Someone want to tell me why my mom is suddenly important? Isn’t Mama Yana the one you were all buddy-buddy with?”
“Well, Miyana and Helori are a matched set. No one gets one without the other. Like you and Andy. Now, you know that your mother can manipulate the weather?” Charly said with an accusatory glare.
“A little, yeah. She doesn’t do it much because she said it draws the wrong kind of attention, but sometimes she’d help our little vegetable garden along. Just a little rain to keep us going. Not enough to notice. Why is that a problem?”
“Rare talent,” Amel said and scribbled in his journal. “Need to do some more research.”
Charly sighed. “You should try to sleep. Amel will be working on this for a bit. He’s not a very good conversationalist when he’s like this. Trust me.”
“So, all of that was just to figure out that my mom had a rare talent?”
“Well, yes and no. Amel has been researching meteorological magic for decades and can’t wrap himself around it. To find out that someone so close had the talent? He’s going to stew on this a while. It’s nothing to worry about, Cass.” Charly wiped a hand down his face. “It’s a fascination of h
is. Sorry to keep you awake.”
Charly ushered Cass back to the nest of pillows and blankets in the living room.
Cass shook his head and snuggled down. Incense smoke clung to his hair and skin. The sun was creeping up again. He was finally sleepy now and couldn’t begin to fathom the quirks of witches.
Dungeon
“All this security, and he just slipped out the back door?” Reyah asked. She stood closer than she needed to just to make the witch crane her neck to meet her eyes. Another job, another set of incompetent underlings somewhere.
The witch gritted her teeth, looked anywhere but at Reyah, and answered.
“I made a mistake,” she said simply. Her hands were shackled behind her back. She knelt on the damp stone floor. This deep in the Dome’s dungeon, the ground was permanently wet. “I said this already. Why again?”
“Because unlike you, they like me here and think the more eyes looking for their precious cargo, the better. Especially after your mistakes caused so much trouble. My brother Sharks are on the trail, but you know they don’t call a Dragon unless they need to. It’s been almost twenty-four hours, and time is wasting. Now tell me how you let them escape.” Reyah crossed her arms and leaned against the back wall of the cell.
“This is temporary,” the witch squealed, eyes wild. “I’m not going to let this ruin my career. I can wait it out. I’ll be back on top before the next fight.”
“Aren’t you optimistic, Thana? I like that.” Reyah smiled and tilted her chin down. After her brief panic from reading the target’s soulprint, she was back in control, and this job was mundane again. “In the meantime, why don’t you tell me about the power surge?”
Thana flushed and lowered her eyes quickly. She chewed on her bottom lip, stalling. Reyah was fine waiting. She’d been down this path before. A penitent captive was more cooperative, but in being eager to please, they often said too much, embellishing the truth to gain favor. A stubborn captive was more honest, if more work. Tarone said hard work yielded better results.
“When I woke up—” Thana started.