“Um, maybe?” I tried to remember Val’s exact wording.
“Check it again.” He turned to Rose, dismissing me. “Did she—”
“Pamela hasn’t allocated any portion of Isabel’s region to anyone,” Rose said.
“Who did you put to inquisition today?”
“Who didn’t we?” Rose tugged her pea coat tighter around her ample frame, popping the collar to shield her neck from a sharp breeze. Fanning silver nails through her long black hair, she pulled the thick mass over her shoulder to drape down her chest like a scarf.
“Did you get any strong impression from her reactions?” Brad asked.
“She liked a few people better than others, but I couldn’t tell if she’s planning on setting anyone up as a new warden.”
“What’d she feel about me during my inquisition?”
Rose stopped fussing with her coat and pinned my boss with a reproving stare. Brad flushed and grimaced.
“Never mind,” he said.
Rose nodded, as if he’d apologized. When they looked my way, I busied myself pulling Val from his strap and opening him across my palm.
In normal sight, every page in the handbook looked blank, like a journal waiting to be filled. Val’s true, quasi-animate nature only became apparent when viewed in Primordium. There, he glowed as bright as I did, his text as dark as normal ink. Black on a living creature meant atrum in every other instance, but on Val, it just made it easier to read his words. I wasn’t sure how that worked, but after I had accepted that a book could be sentient and talk—or write—for itself, I’d stopped worrying too much about the how.
“Hey, Val.”
Four words blasted across the page in an excited scrawl: THAT WAS PAMELA HENNESSEY!
“You know her?”
We met once. It was years ago, when she was a mere enforcer, and she told me a story about another handbook she’d known in England. She looks amazing now. Still sharp as a paper cut and strong enough in lux lucis to match even your pooka.
Having seen how much power Jamie could wield, I doubted it, but I didn’t contradict Val. I also didn’t correct his use of “your pooka” rather than Jamie’s name. The relationship between Val and Jamie existed only because both were tied to me. Otherwise my pure lux lucis handbook would never have deigned to associate with a half-atrum pooka.
Words continued to scrawl across Val’s page. Did you know Pamela’s worked on every continent but Antarctica? She speaks three languages and can read hieroglyphics. I think she’s the only person alive to have talked to every handbook.
I eyed the flourishes and curlicues on the fading text. “Does someone have a crush on our inspector?”
Grow up. It’s called respect.
Respect. Right.
I checked on Jamie, a trickle of unease ruining the delight I took in teasing Val. How long was the inspector going to keep Jamie sequestered down there? Would she put him to an inquisition? If she signaled Rose to join them, I vowed to tag along, too, no matter what Brad said.
I monitored Jamie long enough to be reassured by his calm energy; if he’d been upset, I’d have seen it in the fluid lux lucis and atrum lines of his soul.
“What can you tell me about pooka prophecies?” I asked Val.
Check under “pooka.”
Great, I’d tweaked his pride.
Hoping he wouldn’t pout too long, I flipped through his pages. While most remained blank even in Primordium—to be revealed as Val deemed me worthy of the information—a few held text and sketches. I skimmed past facts on citos, hounds, and imps, stopping when I reached the entry on pookas and rereading the last paragraph:
Pookas are always born in November. In some cultures, they are revered for their ability to bestow prophecies upon others regarding the next year’s events. Other cultures kill them outright.
The first time I’d read the entry, I’d been in shock, overwhelmed by witnessing the birth of a literally magical creature, and I’d skimmed right past Val’s information on prophecies. By the time I’d wrapped my head around Jamie’s ability to transform—at his discretion and seemingly without effort—from a mammoth to a Great Dane to human, I’d completely forgotten the sentence about prophecies. Rereading it now, I found myself less awed than puzzled: How did his ability to shift shapes relate to precognition? Those seemed like two separate types of magic.
I flipped back to Val’s first page.
“What sort of prophecies?”
The kind that foretell the future.
“But why can pookas see the future at all?” I asked, ignoring his sarcasm.
It has to do with their dual natures. Your pooka won’t always have the gift of foresight, but while he’s essentially balanced between good and evil, he’s tuned in to some of the turning points of the future. Val’s uptight handwriting loosened, the spacing between the words increasing. Not a lot is known about how a pooka can see the future, though. Maybe you should ask him about it.
Translation: Val wanted to know, but he didn’t want to talk to Jamie.
“Stay sharp,” Brad barked. “There’s a frost moth headed this way.”
Rose squeezed into the narrow space between me and Brad, eyes darting. “Where? How close? Is it on me?”
“You’re safe,” Brad said, patting Rose awkwardly on the arm. Despite working for the CIA alongside us, her skills as an empath made Rose no more able than a norm to see in Primordium.
“Maybe I should wait in the car.”
“You’re fine. Madison and I both have lighters. We won’t let it feed off you—or us.”
“I’d be more reassured if Madison looked prepared to do more than catch flies.”
I snapped my mouth shut, but I couldn’t tear my gaze from the approaching frost moth. With clumsy gloved fingers, I fumbled in my pocket for the lighter.
“It’s . . . blue,” I said. “Really, really blue.” In the monochromatic spectrum of Primordium, the frost moth’s ten-inch ice-blue wings glowed like twin neon signs as it coasted above a truck five cars away.
I’d seen color in Primordium before. I’d spent a good portion of last week stuck at the mall killing red and green emotion-manipulating spiderlike citos that existed exclusively in Primordium. However, every other creature I had encountered had been black, white, or a mottled combination thereof. I’d assumed citos were the singular exception.
I needed to stop making assumptions about Primordium.
“I don’t care what color it is,” Rose said. “You need to kill it dead before it touches me. Or you.” She prodded me in the ribs.
“That little creature is responsible for freezing Roseville?” I asked, batting her hand aside.
“That one, plus a couple thousand others,” Brad said.
“There are thousands? Where did they come from?”
“Empath hell,” Rose grumbled, rubbing her arms.
“They were already here,” Brad said. “As caterpillars, they burrow into the soil and trees where they’re undetectable to you and me. They can live for decades, maybe centuries in their cocoons, dormant until fire triggers their metamorphosis.”
“The salamanders did this?” We’d had a rash of blazes ignite across our region and the neighboring territories when Isabel had disseminated fire-breathing salamanders among our allies as part of her deranged master plan. They’d burned parkland and a Christmas tree stand in Roseville, and the blazes had escalated to wildfires in the foothills.
Brad nodded, his mouth twisting. “In a typical year, we’ll see a few dozen come out of firewood, and those die quickly once the temperature rises above forty degrees or so. With all the recent fires, we’re up to our fruity gumballs in frost moths, and they’ve shackled us with this fudgesicle weather just in time for an inspection.” He gave the hem of his coat a vicious yank but otherwise kept his expression serene and his tone mild.
It was unnerving, to say the least.
The moth fluttered its wings, twining upward before drifting back down in a l
azy circle that carried it away from us.
“I think we’re safe,” I said for Rose’s benefit.
Shuddering, she muttered, “Damn it, Niko. Hurry your scrumptious butt up.”
Brad coughed.
“You said there are thousands. Where are the rest?” If any other neon-winged moths lurked among the cars, they would have been impossible to miss.
“They’re everywhere it’s cold, from the Sierra Nevada to Sacramento and all across our region.” Brad took in my distraught expression and added, “I don’t expect you to kill them all—just enough to warm up our region a few degrees.”
Well, so long as he wasn’t asking for the impossible. I eyed the miniature blowtorch in my palm. “If flames cause them to hatch, how is a lighter supposed to kill them? Won’t it make them stronger?”
“It’s the heat that kills them,” Pamela said, coming up behind us. “That’s why you have to net a moth.”
I did a double take on the inspector. Her soul didn’t fit within the confines of her body, like mine, and it didn’t have a shape, like a warden’s—her steely white energy bulged from her body in ill-defined protrusions. Beside her, Brad’s angular soul looked crisp and neat. Like all wardens’ souls, his jutted from his body in distinct angles, outlining the precise shape of his region. I noted the extra chunk of land we received when I had bonded Jamie, and the much larger projection of territory temporarily bequeathed to us until Pamela decided how to officially allocate Isabel’s old region. The entirety of Brad’s wonky soul glowed strong and steady, reassuring me that he’d fully acclimated to our larger territory.
In comparison, Pamela’s robust soul looked uncomfortable and lumpy. Maybe she simply had too much power to contain within the confines of her body.
Jamie squeezed in next to me, looking no worse for our separation. We shared reassuring smiles, though mine slid off my face under Pamela’s scrutiny. I tried to read her, but if she’d gotten good or bad news from Jamie, I couldn’t tell.
“Niko’s here,” Brad announced.
“He hasn’t left your region much in the last few weeks,” Pamela said.
I couldn’t help but read censure in her statement. Tucking my hands in my pockets, I shrugged deeper into my coat, sneaking a peek at Brad. The criticism slid right off my boss’s smooth composure, and when Pamela gave him a pointed look, he simply smiled and said, “Mmm,” the sound a perfect imitation of the inspector.
Pamela narrowed her eyes at him, but Brad’s poker face remained unchanged. Smiling to myself, I turned away.
The optivus aegis was easy to pick out among the gray cars, his soul gleaming pure white—and completely contained within the confines of his body, like mine and every other enforcer’s. He veered toward the frost moth when it descended on two teen girls loitering next to a sedan. Coasting on silent icy wings, the moth landed on the taller of the two girls and began to feed, its wings growing incrementally larger with each swallow.
Niko brushed past the girls, his hand darting out and capturing the moth in a maneuver blocked from sight by the car. When he stepped into the aisle, the moth had disappeared, dispatched out of sight.
Dang it.
Looking no worse for being fed upon, the girl turned to her companion, pulling her into a lusty kiss. The shorter teen returned her affection with equal passion, wrapping the taller woman in her arms. Both were oblivious to Niko.
“It’s been years,” Pamela said, offering Niko her hand when he reached us.
“It’s good to see you again, Inspector.”
Niko greeted the rest of us, his sharp eyes lingering on Jamie in an obvious assessment of the pooka’s soul. I received a far more impartial glance, and I strove to project an air of nonchalance, pretending my entire body hadn’t gone on high alert at first sight of him. Over six feet of sculpted, lean muscle tempered by confidence born of years of experience, Niko looked every inch an elite enforcer.
Not that I’d seen every inch of him.
Not that I would say no if he offered.
I shook my head, slamming the door on my imagination, which filled in pictures of his smooth naked chest, the rolling lines of his six-pack abs, the defined obliques guiding the eye straight down to his—
Gnaaah! Get ahold of yourself, Dice! The flush I’d been fighting crested my cheeks, and when I jerked my eyes from the fly of Niko’s jeans, my gaze collided with Rose’s. She grinned at me, fanning her face. I blushed all the harder, knowing she’d felt every nuance of my lust.
“You won’t be joining us, will you?” Pamela asked Niko, her tone indicating his answer better be no.
“You shouldn’t have tyver this low tonight. I’m on my way to Pollock Pines.”
“Good. Both of us in the same small region would be redundant.” She smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Ah, here’s Summer.”
Summer Potts, my counterpart in the neighboring region to the south, stood at my elbow, close enough to pinch me, and it took all my self-control not to jump. With my attention laser-locked on Niko, I hadn’t noticed her approach, and Summer’s smirk told me she knew it.
“Madison doesn’t know how to make a lux lucis net. Will you teach her, Summer?” Not waiting for a response, Pamela turned to the others. “Let’s give them space.”
Niko, Rose, Brad, and Pamela tromped down the muddy strip a few feet to give us the illusion of privacy. Shoulders tight, Summer clamped her mouth shut and pivoted to face me. Anger lent definition to her prominent cheekbones, giving her naturally tan skin an attractive glow. Of course it did. Summer was everything I wasn’t, including vastly more experienced as an enforcer; why shouldn’t she also be beautiful when irritated? I’d once harbored a hope of becoming friends with her, but Summer’s expression said she’d rather crush me beneath her heel than talk to me.
Unfortunately, that had been my doing.
4
No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
“I feel really bad about the way it fell out last week,” I said, guilt worming through my gut at the memory. There hadn’t been time to apologize earlier, and I hoped it wasn’t too late. “I never intended to—”
“Save it, Madison.”
“I was trying to prevent the wardens from—”
“Don’t. Don’t make excuses. You gouged as much as you could from my region and my paycheck. Don’t try to sugarcoat it.”
From her paycheck? Had her warden docked her pay in some form of petty retribution? If so, that was between her and her boss.
“I’m sorry. I wasn’t—” I cut myself off this time, stopping before I said, I wasn’t thinking about you. Those weren’t the words of an apology, even if they were true. It’d been at my urging that Brad and I had expanded our region into Summer’s. At the time, I’d been too wrapped up in defending my position, my region, and my boss from the greedy manipulations of Summer’s warden to consider her reaction or her feelings.
Meeting her hard stare, I realized I would do it again, and the rest of my apology died on my tongue.
Summer tossed her long, ebony braid over her shoulder and grimaced. “Right. That’s what I thought. Take off your glove and hold out your hand.” She did as she instructed, extending her arm toward me, palm up.
Blinking to Primordium, I mirrored her, the cold air licking around my fingers and stealing their warmth. Summer flinched when Jamie copied us but kept her eyes fastened on me.
“When you’re first learning, it’s easiest to make a net in your hand. Focus on your palm and push lux lucis straight up, but not so hard that it loses its sticky.”
“Loses its sticky?” I echoed.
Without acknowledging she’d heard me, Summer gathered lux lucis in her hand until it flared twice as bright as the rest of her soul. Then a small bubble formed in the energy, lifting from her palm until it looked like she cloaked a tennis ball beneath her soul.
“Lux lucis wants to cling to your body or be released; it doesn’t want to be in limbo. The key is to use enough force to push the l
ux lucis away from your body while staying relaxed enough to keep it attached to you. The bubble shape happens naturally.”
Okay. Seemed simple enough.
I collected lux lucis in my raised palm, then projected it toward the sky. My hand flared like a miniature white sun, but the energy remained glued to my body.
“You have to use control,” Summer admonished. “Watch Niko.”
Surprised, I pivoted toward the other group. They stood in a loose square, Pamela facing Niko. Abruptly, Niko’s soul bubbled over his chest, swelling above his puffy coat in a uniform dome. My jaw dropped when Pamela raised her hands and thrust them into Niko’s soul.
In Primordium, both Niko and Pamela glowed with equal brightness. Yet the weird laws of this spectrum made it easy to distinguish the shape of Pamela’s small, ivory hands inside the white net protruding from Niko’s chest. Niko stood immobile, not even breathing. He didn’t look at Pamela, instead focusing his gaze over the inspector’s head, at the fence. When she cycled lux lucis around the misshapen outline of her soul, then up her right arm and into Niko, his jaw clenched, but otherwise he didn’t react. Lux lucis flowed down Pamela’s left arm, swirling around her soul again. I rubbed my breastbone to soothe a sympathetic unease, and the thick leather cord of the soul breaker tangled in my fingers.
The inspector stepped back, brushed her hands together, and declared Niko to be clean. He took a deep breath, his stiff expression slow to relax.
“What was that all about?” I whispered.
“That was a purity test. Brad should have taught you a net days ago and tested you.”
“But Niko isn’t bonded to a pooka. Why did Pamela test his purity?”
“Doesn’t Brad tell you anything? Everyone who came in contact with Isabel is undergoing a purity test and inquisition.” Summer tapped my outstretched palm. “Try again.”
Pamela recited her inquisition speech and began interrogating Niko, her crisp words carrying across the intervening distance. “Have you ever assisted anyone or any creature in moving, using, growing, or cultivating atrum of any kind in your life?”
A Fistful of Frost: An Urban Fantasy Novel (Madison Fox Adventure Book 3) Page 4