“You are?” Sulle asked.
“Caroline Black of Lusteer News Network.”
Sulle gave her a respectful nod. “Transkey is the perfect—”
“What about the rumors that the Transkey CEO is also the head of the criminal gang called the Whites,” Caroline interrupted.
“Well, if I had to address every rumor—”
“How come Ms. Ashley isn’t here now?”
“This man here,” he gestured toward Findley sitting behind him, “Findley Matthews will be in charge of operational matters. I think you’ll find—”
“It is known that the Whites are mainly all shades.” Caroline continued to interrupt Sulle. “Why would you trust shades to build their own prison?”
I mentally cheered Caroline for her questions. I had started to see why the mayor stepped back for Sulle. Mayor Maxwell wanted to take credit for the idea but have a buffer so that any blow back didn’t fall on him.
Sulle’s smile hadn’t completely died, but it was on life support. “Quite a narrative you have created based on rumors, Ms. Black, and it appears you have supplied your own answers, so you clearly don’t want to hear from me. Now if anyone has any questions not based on fabrication.” He turned to another reporter. “Yes, you sir. You have a question?”
I didn’t hear the other reporter’s question because I had spotted two men wearing the loose style of clothing that shifters wore. I jumped from one TV van to the next down to the last one in the row. A policeman shouted, but I didn’t hear his words.
I jumped off the last van and sprinted toward the two shifters. Before I reached them, however, I swerved away, seeing a man with a gray hoodie disappearing into an alleyway. He was carrying something in his hand. I redoubled my pace, dashing after him.
I almost collided straight into him because he had stopped only a few paces into the narrow alleyway. I skidded to a stop.
Heff stumbled away, turning to face me. “You,” he said.
He held a walkie-talkie, and I slapped it from his hand. “Just give up,” I told him. “I already beat your boss. You know you are no match for me.”
“You really think you beat him, don’t you?” Heff asked. The spiderweb tattoos on his face pulsed as his expression changed.
“He’s dead, I’m alive. He couldn’t be more beaten.”
“You understand sacrifice, don’t you?” Heff said. “You were willing to risk yourself for that girl, your friend. Yarley was never about personal glory. He wanted to help us rise up. And he did. You birthed an ally that will bring the shades to new heights.”
I shook my head. “I was there, you weren’t. He wanted to kill me.” Self-sacrifice was for the good guys, not the bad guys. Everyone knew that.
“You chose a good host. A weaker human wouldn’t have been able to contain the power of those three elementals inside him.”
“You met Duffy? Since it happened?”
“Yes. And I have felt his power, and told others about him.” Heff smiled. “He’s retreated to the mountains to gather his strength. He’ll be back. It might not be for a year. It might not be for two. It doesn’t matter. When he’s ready, we’ll be waiting to join our strength to his. We’ll have you to thank when that happens.”
“Maybe two years, eh?” I stomped the walkie-talkie on the ground into pieces. “Why don’t you take a vacation until then?”
“The battle is eternal,” Heff said. “We stop fighting when we die.” He raised his arms and flames sprung up around him.
My two fireswords sprang into being and I lowered myself into a crouch. “I’m ready for you,” I shouted.
“Your time will come. You don’t need to seek out your end.” The flames disappeared, and where a man had been a moment earlier was now a giant bird with red and yellow features. A warm wind blew into my face as he beat his wings rapidly and rose into the air.
I stepped forward, swinging my swords. He flew backwards, gaining altitude and staying out of my reach. I jumped at him, reaching up as high as I could, but he flew over my head, heading out of the alleyway and back toward City Hall.
I ran after him. Screams filled the air as Heff swooped low over the gathered reporters. Those diving to the ground below him didn’t distract Heff; his path was taking him directly toward the dais. Among the shouts of panic, I spotted Caroline Black screaming at her cameraman to keep recording. When he instead turned and ran, she picked up his camera from where he had dropped it and directed it at Heff.
I bumped and stumbled forward, my progress slowed by people fleeing the opposite way. Despite the obstructions, I moved faster than a normal man could run. Still, I couldn’t come close to matching the speed of Heff’s flight.
Behind the lectern, Konstance was dragging Sulle away, and a half dozen bodyguards had surrounded the mayor. Findley had fallen to the ground, and Alex was helping him back to his feet. I couldn’t tell where Jo was, I could only desperately hope she wasn’t in danger.
Heff dived toward the dais. He opened his beak, and flames shot out. I slowed, too far away to do anything, only able to look on in horror. On the dais, slipping past fleeing bodies, one person moved forward rather than backward. Sash. She charged forward to meet the flames. Her double bladed staff appeared in her hands, black against the red fire, and it turned the flames back.
Fire from a shade’s mouth met the solid black smoke of a sentinel’s multani, and the smoke won. The flames disappeared, and Heff changed direction, soaring back into the sky. Sash jumped into the air, her staff leaping for Heff. She missed just short, the blade of her multani cutting through the air just below the phoenix's underbelly.
I heard a shout to my left and turned. The fleeing crowd circled wide of two muscular men with smoke drifting off their skin—the two shifters I had seen earlier. I sprinted toward them.
Both were wavering, seemingly unsure of which direction to go, unsure even of whether to transform or not. One held a walkie-talkie in his hand, and both watched the fire phoenix rise higher into the sky. I must have broken the coordination of their attack when I’d interrupted Heff and smashed his walkie-talkie.
With my fireswords still in hand, I placed myself between the two shifters and the dais. “Don’t even think about it,” I told them. “It’s over.”
They took one final look skyward, then turned and ran, the smoke around them thickening as they changed. Once they were fully transformed into long legged gray-haired beasts, their speed increased. With squeals of surprise, people hurtled out of the path of the two fleeing shifters.
I didn’t bother pursuing, instead looking up in time to see Heff disappear behind the dome of City Hall. It was over.
“Drop your weapons!” came a shout from behind.
I twisted my head round. Three policemen had their guns aimed at my back. I recognized one who’d shouted at me earlier when I’d run on the TV vans. “Drop them,” he said. “Do it now. And hands on your head.”
I let the fireswords disappear and lifted my hands to the back of my head. Their bullets wouldn’t kill me, but I knew from experience that they would hurt like hell. And with Heff and the other shifters already having fled, I had no reason to risk a bullet.
“Get on the ground,” the cop shouted.
I fell to my knees, then eased myself onto the ground. Two cops jumped on me, wrenching my arms behind my back, and cuffing me.
The boys in blue to the rescue.
Chapter 15
Tuesday 14:20
Sash pulled into the parking lot at Gorlam’s and shut off the Porsche’s engine. Neither of us made an immediate move to get out, the morning’s events on both our minds.
“Thanks for helping me get released,” I said. “The cops wouldn’t listen to a word I said.”
“I didn’t have much to do with it,” Sash said. “It was mainly Sulle and Mayor Maxwell.”
I didn’t like having to be grateful to Sulle. We lapsed back into silence for a few moments.
“I thought you had him,”
I said finally. “Just after you blocked his fire. When you jumped into the air.”
“Next time.”
I looked at her. Her face was slightly flushed, her hair windswept. She looked as sexy as hell, and I felt a sudden urge to reach forward and kiss her.
Easy, tiger, Jerome thought.
He was probably right. Now wasn’t the time. “You did the most important part, saving everyone from injury and worse. No one ended up with so much as singed hair. I don’t dare to think what would have happened if you weren’t there.”
“It’s my job. I wouldn’t be much good if I couldn’t hold off a single shifter.”
Yet I hadn’t stopped him. “I ran into Heff before he transformed,” I said. “I shouldn’t have let him get as far as he did.”
She glanced across at me. “You have to be careful. When I saw you charging wildly through the crowd I was worried you’d do something stupid.”
It hadn’t even occurred to me to use magic. Could I have done anything at such a distance? I had no idea. Possibly it was a good thing that I didn’t know what my magic was capable of.
“Surely this is a time when using magic would have been called for,” I said. “Heff could have killed dozens if you hadn’t been there to stop him.”
“You don’t get to make that choice. What if you had stopped him but unleashed a fire elemental that killed hundreds?”
“That wouldn’t be good.” If Heff was to be believed, I could already have birthed a shade that was going to cause huge devastation. Best not to bring that up. “Do we have to fear that the rogue we are chasing will use magic on us?” I asked.
“Possibly. But it’s dangerous. Whenever he uses his magic, there’s a chance of an elemental passing through the rift. It will enter him. He can then try and expel it, but that’s not always easy. It helps if he’s expelling it into somewhere the elemental is willing to go.
“So you think the rogue is using the orphan as a magical release value? Whenever an elemental enters him, he expels it into a child.”
“Certainly seems that way,” Sash said. “Anyway, if we meet this rogue, don’t let him using magic induce you into doing the same.”
“Can I take it you’d regret having to kill me if it ever comes to that?” I asked with a smile.
“You do grow on one.”
“You don’t compliment much, so I’m happy with that.”
“I’m not sure it’s a compliment,” Sash said. “What kind of things grow on people. Toenails? Fungus?”
She compared you to a fungus, Jerome thought. What are you waiting for? Kiss her now.
“Other things grow on people too,” I said. “Friendship. Love.”
Sash opened the door of the Boxster and climbed out. “We better get started.”
I reached for the door handle, then stopped. Vaulting out of the car had failed previously, and this was a good a time as any to retry.
I put one hand on the side of the door and the other on the back of the seat and kicked upward with my legs. This time it went perfectly. I somersaulted backward out of the car and nailed the landing. I raised my arms in the air, seeking acknowledgment, but Sash wasn’t even looking.
Her gaze swept back and forth across Gorlam’s structure. “I didn’t realize how big it is,” she said.
“It used to be a convent,” I said. “Back in the days when being a nun was an actual thing.”
“We should do a loop,” Sash suggested. “It’ll allow me to get a lay of the land.”
“Sure thing. This way.” I led her to a small gravel path, and we started around the near side of the building. I wondered if wanting to explore the grounds meant Sash was thinking about the investigation beyond what Florence had referred to as Spanish Inquisition methods. “Are you okay with what Florence arranged?” I asked. “Doctor Kressan performing the test?”
“Of course,” Sash said. “As long as I’m there to observe.”
“What will you do if the test doesn’t show anything?” I asked. “I still think Wells has something to hide. Florence told me that both the director and doctor were on duty for each of the three possessions.”
“I like to do things in a methodical manner,” Sash said. “If this test shows nothing, then we’ll move on to other avenues. No point second guessing the results until then. Making assumptions that are not based on actual evidence isn’t the way to go about anything.”
“I guess.”
Sash gestured at the wide lawns that swept from the main building to the trees on the edge of the orphanage grounds. “Are the children allowed out here?”
I snorted. “Hardly.”
“Why not?”
“Half of them would churn the manicured lawns into mud. The other half would escape.”
“Are they allowed any fresh air?”
“If they deserved fresh air, then God wouldn’t have killed their parents.”
“That’s harsh.”
“I lie. There’s a small yard over the other side. It has a basketball rim, but no basketballs. We’d sometimes play soccer with a crushed can.”
“You sound bitter.”
“I am bitter. But I’m working on it.” I wasn’t one to dwell on the past, but Gorlam’s brought old feelings welling up.
We came around to the back end of the building, and Sash nodded at a circular hole in the top corner of one window. “That always like that?”
“This corner of the convent has always been derelict.” I shrugged. “I guess they ran out of money during refurbishment at some stage years ago. Orphans are usually small and malnourished; they don’t need much space.”
“And that road?” She pointed out the disused single lane track that curved into the trees at the back of the grounds.
“It comes out on Getties Street. Occasionally, vans and trucks use it for deliveries.”
“Not really visible from the front,” Sash said. A fold in the slope of hid the corner of the grounds from the parking lot.
“It’s not lit up at night either.” I smiled. “I’m not saying I escaped from here seven times or anything, but if I did, I would have jumped the gate out onto Getties Street each time.”
Sash smiled back.
Just then, a cloud drifted away from the sun and a ray of light spilled over us. It felt like a moment, and I decided to seize it. I pursed my lips, leaned close and...
Sash turned away, and my lips mashed against her cheek.
Noooo! Jerome thought. Not the cheek. Disaster.
My face heated. Typical Jerome. He had nothing to say when important things were happening like phoenix shifters attacking the city, but when I got stuck in a mildly embarrassing moment, he was all over it.
Mildly embarrassing. Jerome mentally chuckled. Keep telling yourself that.
“What do you think you are doing?” Sash asked.
She looked more hot and bothered than when she had been fighting off Heff. I didn’t know if it was bad or good.
“Maybe I misjudged the mood,” I said.
“We are investigating child possessions. And we are standing in the shadow of a building that clearly still gives you the heebie jeebies due to childhood trauma. What possible reason would you chose now to try to kiss me?”
Tell her only women need a reason, Jerome thought. Men just need a place.
Jerome’s joke made me smirk.
Her face flushed redder. “And you know I expect to have to kill you.”
“And the kiss makes that less likely or more likely?”
“More likely. Definitely more likely.”
“I’m going to have to work on my technique.”
“Technique? I thought you were trying to headbutt me.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Sounds like you are falling for my charm.”
“I’m not.”
I tilted my head to the side and grinned. “Did I specify goofy charm?”
Before she could reply, a shout yanked our attention away from each other.
“Hey, who’s
there?” Old man Travis jogged around the corner, moving sprightly despite his age. When he recognized us, he slowed. “Oh, it’s you. You shouldn’t be here.”
“We are meeting Doctor Kressan for some tests,” Sash said.
“I’m aware of that,” Travis said. “I still can’t have people wandering around the grounds without my knowing about it. It’s a huge insurance liability.”
“Don’t worry, I won’t sue if I stub my toe,” I told him.
“You scoff, but the amount we pay in insurance is insane,” Travis said. “And these kids don’t even have rich parents to sue the school. In my previous job, it was even worse.”
“Can we see in there?” Sash gestured at the derelict part of orphanage.
“Aren’t you listening to anything I’m saying?” He sighed. “Okay, fine. Wells will probably let you in if I don’t. And it’s cleared out right now. Safe enough. Can I bring you to Doctor Kressan’s office straight after?”
“Of course,” Sash said.
Travis led us to a pair of solid wooden doors with a thick chain wrapped around two steel handles. He unlocked a padlock, and the chain made a snick-snick sound as it unlooped, then fell to the ground. Travis kicked the chain aside, then pulled open the two doors.
We entered, and he switched on a light. Several bare bulbs hung from the ceiling high above. I remembered breaking into this part of the building once. At that time, it had been full of rubbish and bricks spilled from half-fallen walls.
It was completely different now, the rubbish and rubble all cleared out, turning it into a wide open warehouse-like space. Sash dragged her toe along the dust on the floor. “Looks like this place was cleared out not long ago.”
“It fills up with rubbish, and we try and clear it out at least once a year,” Travis said. “What are you expecting to find in here? What could it have to do with magical possessions?”
“Just getting a feel for the place,” Sash said. “Why don’t you take us to Doctor Kressan so we can get out of your hair?”
“That I can. Quickest way is through here.” Travis nodded toward a door in the corner. The hollow sound of our footsteps echoed faintly through the rafters as we walked across the wooden floorboards.
Fire Summoning (The Sentinels Book 2) Page 9