Shadow Walker

by Allyson James

  “I’d be afraid of me.” Coyote grinned. “You don’t know everything.”

  “I’ve learned. I’ve studied. God magic is a little different, but it can be done.”

  I saw the shadow detach from her, the strange, smoky piece of her aura that floated across the room and made for Coyote. The blue nimbus of Coyote’s own aura encircled him, but when the shadow touched it, the blue dimmed.

  “No!” I yelled.

  “Don’t worry, Janet,” Coyote said, but his face had lost color. “I always have a trick or two up my sleeve.”

  I swung to face Vonda, bringing my own magic to bear. I had to stop her.

  “Can we come in now?”

  My grandmother chose that moment to push her way into the room, Elena with her. Behind them came Mick.

  “Mick—crap—get them out of here!”

  Mick, his eyes firmly blue, closed the door and locked it. “It’s all right, Janet.”

  “No, it isn’t! Vonda’s stealing Coyote’s magic. Nash is down there.” I pointed at the vortex. And you’re still too weak to use any dragon magic. I kept that to myself.

  “And I have a god,” Vonda said, another shadow snaking out to surround Coyote. “Much better than a dragon.”

  Damn it, we had to stop her.

  “Don’t kill her,” Elena said.

  In her polyester yellow pants and bright top, her hair in a black bun, Elena could have been any of the RVers playing the slots in the casino downstairs. My grandmother still wore her more traditional skirts, but as she took a stance next to Elena, I saw the crow in her aura, the hint of black feathers, the dark eye, the anger.

  “I have to,” I babbled at them. “If she takes Coyote’s power, we’re done for. Everyone is done for.”

  “She won’t have it.” Elena unfolded her arms, hands at her sides. I’d watched those plump hands chop vegetables for stew with graceful competence, and now her fingers hung loose, relaxed.

  “You stole something from me, Shadow Walker,” Elena said to Vonda. “From my family.”

  I stared at her. “The Apache?”

  “He was my great-great-grandfather. My ancestor. His power should have passed down through the generations to me.”

  Vonda didn’t look concerned. “That’s the way it goes. He was gone long before you were born.”

  “We are always connected to the ancestors, ignorant witch. Family—past and present—all connected. That’s what you don’t understand. There is no break. You took from me. Now I will take from you.”

  “You can’t,” Vonda said. “You have no magic, old woman.”

  “I have a little,” Elena said. “I have the latent magic of my family, still there in spite of what my great-great-grandfather did.”

  “Liar.” Vonda sneered. “If you had even a spark of that old man’s magic, you would have already retrieved what he left at the hotel. I don’t see that you have, so you must not know how.”

  “I know how.” Elena’s voice was matter-of-fact. “But I know the magic is safe where it is. When I saw Janet and her dragon move in to the hotel, I knew my great-great-grandfather’s legacy would be protected. And now I look after it too.”

  “You can’t take it,” Vonda said with conviction. “You’re not powerful enough. You can’t work the spells.”

  “No power comes without a price,” my grandmother broke in. “You pay a price for anything you take in life. Even if you avoid the price as long as you can, it will someday find you.”

  Did her words make Vonda uneasy? If so, the woman hid it well. “You can’t take it either.”

  Grandmother shrugged, not looking worried.

  “For me, the price would be too great,” Elena said. “I have all I need. I have a family, and I have my friends. And my friends in this room are very, very strong.”

  Fear flickered across Vonda’s face, and she looked at Mick. Mick was grinning that wicked grin that turned me inside out, and I felt his aura flare. No more weakness; he was a full-strength, full-powered dragon.

  Mick ripped sudden fire through the shadows around Coyote, severing them from Vonda. Vonda gasped, and quickly, before the shadows faded, Elena stepped into them and grabbed them with both hands.

  Coyote’s blue nimbus burst out as strong as ever. It surrounded Elena and the shadows, and the shadows started swirling through Elena’s hands and into her body. Elena looked at Vonda, a smile on her face.

  I knew that smile. Elena used it when someone was foolish enough to bother her or, worse, tried to steal a morsel of food while she sliced up something with her wickedly long knife. The smile would be followed by choice words in the Apache language and her knife rising until the intruder whirled and ran.

  Vonda had stolen much more than mushrooms for the stew. She’d told me that she’d viewed the old Apache as little better than an animal, as though he didn’t matter. But every life mattered, because every life was connected to every other life in the world. A part of that old and powerful Apache man lived on in Elena, and he wanted his revenge.

  Elena started chanting words I didn’t understand. More shadows unwrapped from Vonda and streamed toward my cook, and Vonda started to scream. My grandmother, next to Elena, simply watched.

  As Vonda’s shadows left her, one by one, the vortex started to shrink. In alarm I grabbed Nash’s rope. “Nash!”

  I felt warmth at my side as Mick joined me. In spite of the craziness going on in this room, I felt the surging joy of working side by side with the man I loved, the two of us understanding each other so well that we didn’t have to speak or even signal. Mick started pulling up the rope, grunting with the effort of it, and I whirled in time to defend him from Vonda’s attack.

  She was losing the magic that kept her looking like a cool, successful forty-year-old woman. Vonda’s silk skirt and blouse began to hang on her body as she shrank, her limbs growing thin and wasted. Her face became pinched, skin receding to the skull, and still she fought with strength. The power she’d acquired was vast.

  I didn’t pity her. Vonda had stolen for years from the magical, siphoning what she wanted from them. She’d tried to steal Mick from me, taking the one person in my life who’d always believed in me. I wouldn’t forgive her for that.

  Elena kept chanting, her eyes closed, a look of vast concentration on her face.

  The next part happened so swiftly that for a long time afterward I puzzled over the exact sequence of events. Nash’s hand, blackened with soot, met Mick’s, and his face, just as blackened, appeared within the whirling madness of the vortex. Nash had his arm looped under Ted’s, dragging the man up and out. Ted was alive, but barely, his face as black with soot as Nash’s, and cut and bleeding.

  At the same time, the door burst off its hinges, sailed across the room, smacked into the again-whole window, shattered the glass, and tumbled out into the night.

  Gabrielle stormed in on a wave of Beneath magic, her hands full of white fire. I tried to get in her way, but she flew across the room, and her boot heels connected with Vonda’s chest.

  Gabrielle landed on her feet as Vonda went down, and smiled a wide, mad smile. “Die, bitch. That’s the last time you suck magic out of me.”

  “Gabrielle, no!”

  My shouting went unheeded. Gabrielle fired up her magic and flung it at Vonda, and the vortex went crazy.

  The whirlpool of it expanded, sending the rest of us slamming into the walls of the big room. Vonda screamed and screamed as Elena stole from her and the Beneath magic burned her, Vonda’s body dying as it should have done a hundred years past. Nash and Ted gained the floor, what was left of it. Mick smacked his fire at Gabrielle as she wound up to throw more Beneath magic at Vonda.

  All the while, Elena was chanting, chanting, Vonda’s shadows sliding into her hands. When Elena opened her eyes, they were white with power. She’d become the Shadow Walker, while Vonda slowly crumpled into ash.

  With the last of her strength, Vonda shoved Gabrielle toward the vortex. Gabrielle fla
iled on the edge, and I screamed and grabbed for her.

  Ted, lifting his head, seeing what was left of his wife, wailed in sudden grief. I saw his hand go to the pistol Vonda had dropped, and before I could draw breath to shout, he’d aimed it at Gabrielle and pulled the trigger.

  The gun exploded from the energy in the room, but the bullet sailed straight and true. Gabrielle didn’t notice, trying to keep herself—and me—out of the abyss, and the bullet shoved itself right into her side.

  Gabrielle fell to her knees as blood gushed from the wound. I clamped my hands around her wrist as she slid backward into the vortex, my feet braced on the floor where reality met Beneath. I felt Gabrielle go slack, and her weight started dragging me into the vortex with her.

  She looked at me in pathetic confusion, pain clouding her eyes. “I’m sorry, Janet.”

  “No!” I yelled at her. “I’ve got you. I’m not letting go. You’re not giving up.”

  But she was slipping, falling, and I either had to release her or be pulled down with her.

  And then Mick was there. Without a word, he laced his strong arm around my waist and wound a string of bright magic around Gabrielle. The two of us hauled her, inch by inch, bleeding and coughing, back to the carpet.

  Vonda was dead, and Elena had all the magic. Gabrielle was down, bleeding. And still the vortex was there.

  “Damn it,” I said, gritting my teeth. “Mick, help me. We have to close it.”

  He and I had closed a vortex before. But that had been in the middle of a raging storm, when I’d been supremely powerful. The storm outside had died, now when it would have been so helpful, and I couldn’t risk using my Beneath magic. The vortex rose like a vast drain, and in a few moments, we’d all be cascading down its pipes.

  “Janet,” Mick said, his voice so calm that it reached me even through the roar. “Give me a little of your magic.”

  I wasn’t sure what he meant, but I drew forth a spark of Beneath magic and fed it into his hand. Mick smiled, and I felt him wrap that spark of magic within a fireball of his own and fling it at the vortex.

  The vortex crackled with fire all along its edges, but other than that, nothing happened. Mick frowned, as though puzzled, that dragon curiosity again. I wanted to scream at him.

  Cassandra appeared in the doorway, Pamela behind her. Maya was with them, and neither stopped her running to Nash.

  Coyote joined me on my other side, watching the vortex, not bothering to help, damn him. Cassandra pressed her hands together and began to chant, magic flowing from her like a river of smoke. Still the vortex yawned, the power in it massive. It was hungry, and it wanted us.

  Gabrielle lay still on the carpet, with Nash pressing his hand to her side, trying to stop the bleeding. He’d taken the gun from Ted, who was now on his hands and knees, weeping over the pathetic remains of Vonda.

  Gabrielle opened her eyes and struggled away from Nash. He tried to stop her, but Gabrielle kicked away and lunged for Vonda’s body. She scraped it up, silk fabric and all, and hurled Vonda into the vortex.

  The vortex flared, the magic hitting the ceiling and tearing plaster from it. The automatic sprinklers engaged, pouring a sudden cascade of water over us.

  Mick and I smacked the vortex with magic, and Coyote, next to me, finally decided to help. My grandmother calmly walked to Coyote’s side, closed her eyes, and started to whisper in Navajo.

  It wasn’t going to close. I silently swore at whoever had decided to build the hotel on top of a damn vortex. Their fault we were all going to be sucked into hell. Would it stop with us? Or swallow the entire hotel?

  Wind whipped through the room, burning my still-healing skin. The water from the sprinklers became a deluge. We’d land in Beneath exhausted and soaked, and then have to face whatever demon master was down there.

  I thought I heard a rustle of wings, so many wings. The kachinas? I wondered. The Hopi gods, come to help us? Or to shove me and Gabrielle in for using too much Beneath magic?

  Through the middle of this tumult, Elena quietly approached the edge. She stood at Grandmother’s side, stretched out her hand and, without any noticeable effort, let one of the shadows drop from it.

  The vortex trembled. Whatever the hell kind of magic had been in that shadow, the vortex didn’t like it. Elena watched, unperturbed, as the vortex boiled and whirled, trying to belch out what she’d thrown into it.

  “Now!” Coyote shouted.

  He grabbed my hand and Grandmother’s on his other side. I caught on and seized Mick’s hand, who in turn caught Cassandra’s, who took Pamela’s, then Maya, who held on to Nash, and all around the circle. Elena stood next to my grandmother, both hands over the vortex.

  I felt us connect—Stormwalker, dragon, witch, god, crow, Changer, shaman, and the void that was Nash. It was heady, it was powerful, too powerful to contain. We fought the Beneath magic of the vortex, battling it back as it tried to reach for and obliterate Elena.

  The backlash was incredible. I gritted my teeth, trying to stay on my feet. Mick’s strong hand on mine kept me grounded, but I barely remained upright. His love for me and the music of his name flowed through the connection between us—it was wonderful but also seriously distracting right now. I kept wanting to stop to absorb more of the music. His name was part of me now, filling me with Mick and his magic. Earth magic, dragon magic, more than enough to ground me.

  The vortex yawned wider, and Gabrielle screamed. But Nash was there, standing in front of her, guarding her from the deadly pull. The vortex touched Nash and shank back.

  It was lessening. Under the combined power of our magic, the vortex started to give up. Elena held out her hand and dropped another shadow. She shouted in a high-pitched, wailing voice, blowing out every light in the room.

  The vortex swirled once, then with a rush and a roar, winked out of existence.

  The room went black but for the fingers of dawn that touched the broken window, and the pattering of water on the carpet was loud in the sudden silence.

  Twenty-nine

  The morning sun burnished the emergency vehicles filling the parking lot. Medics surrounded a frightened Gabrielle, and I stuck next to her in case she panicked and tried to kill the nice humans trying to help her. Grandmother and Elena planted themselves by the stretcher, once again looking like nothing more than two harmless older ladies who’d come to the casino for an exciting night out.

  The hotel manager, of course, wanted to know why we’d wrecked the room. The window was broken out, the lights were destroyed, the furniture was shattered against the walls, and everything had been soaked by the sprinklers. Plus the door to the room was now in the parking lot. Coyote walked off with the manager, talking rapidly. I wondered if Coyote would use his magic to make the man forget all about us, or whether one of us would be writing a large check.

  Nash turned over the handcuffed Ted to the New Mexico police, and I noticed Mick fading into the shadows while the police loaded up Ted and drove away with him. Nash did not look good—pale smudges of skin showed through the black on his face, and his clothes were soot-marked and torn, as though he’d fought his way through a fire. When I looked at him, wanting to ask what had happened to him, Nash put his arm around Maya and walked away from me.

  No sign of dragons in the powder blue sky. They’d obeyed Mick’s command not to attack, and Mick must have sent them away again. I loved a man who could keep everything straight.

  “Grandmother,” I said in a low voice as the paramedics loaded Gabrielle into the ambulance. “You and Elena knew all about Vonda and the Apache shaman in my basement, didn’t you? Any reason you didn’t bother telling me?”

  “We didn’t know all about it,” Grandmother said. “We suspected, once we discovered she was a Shadow Walker, but we didn’t know for certain until we heard Vonda tell the story.”

  I ground my teeth. “This is what you and Elena were conspiring about in the kitchen? And Coyote right along with you?”

  “I don’t ha
ve to share everything I do with you, Janet. I have my own friends, my own puzzles to solve.”

  “Coyote’s important errand was to discover all he could about Vonda?”

  “Yes.”

  “When I could have used his help figuring out Mick’s name,” I finished. “You still should have told me.”

  “I didn’t want you to try to stop us going after the Shadow Walker,” Grandmother said. “You were too worried about what would happen to Mick if she died, and rightly so. Besides, Coyote wasn’t able to find Mick’s name.”

  “Because Mick had to tell me the name himself.” My anger softened. “I get that now. Vonda’s shadows sucked Mick’s name from him, but when Mick gave it to me as a gift, it was stronger than Vonda’s pull.”

  “Because your emotional tie to Mick is powerful,” Grandmother said. “Very powerful.”

  Mick’s arms came around me from behind, his wonderful heat surrounding me. “Exactly.”

  Grandmother sniffed. “Firewalkers are always sentimental.” She gathered her skirts and started to climb into the ambulance, Elena after her.

  “Where are you going?” I asked them in surprise.

  “To the hospital. We’ve decided to look after Gabrielle. She needs us.”

  “She’s my sister and not your responsibility.”

  “I know she’s your sister,” Grandmother said. “Which means she’s trouble. I trained you; now Elena and I will train her. Go home, Janet, and leave us to it.”

  The ambulance doors slammed behind her before I could say good-bye, the med techs wanting to get Gabrielle to the hospital as quickly as possible. The lights went on, the siren wailed, and the ambulance hurried out of the parking lot and onto the highway.

  I leaned back against Mick and sighed happily. “Let’s go home.”

  He kissed my hair. “You don’t want to rest here awhile? Plenty of beds. Room service. Anything you want.”

  Tempting. We were a long way from home, and I didn’t relish the cold ride back. But no. “I don’t think I should stay in a hotel right on top of a vortex. Too dangerous. Let’s go to my nice, safe hotel with the magic sink in the basement, the nosy magic mirror, and Colby and Drake the irritated dragons.”