Gambit: An Urban Fantasy Novel (The Solumancer Cycle Book 1)

by J. C. Staudt

“You gave yourself plenty of credit, if I recall.”

  “You’re confusing evil with mischief, Quim. Two different things.”

  “Two closely related things.” He pauses, studies me. “You look terrible. You tried it again, didn’t you?”

  “I get closer every time. I feel like I’m on the verge of a breakthrough.”

  “Same spell? The magical security camera that’s supposed to find your dad and let you see and hear what he’s doing?”

  “It’s called scrying.”

  Quim gives me an impatient shrug. “I care about magic as much as you care about computers.”

  “Hey, I respect technology. I just choose not to participate in it.”

  “I feel the same way about magic. Except for the respect part.”

  “Diss it all you want. You’re still a magical creature.”

  “Lucky me. Aren’t you tired of getting wrecked by the same spell over and over again?”

  “I don’t think it’s the spell. I think it’s my dad. If his mind is as hard to penetrate as Ersatz claims, he must be resisting me. That’s the only explanation.”

  “How does Ersatz know how hard your dad’s mind is to penetrate?”

  “Apparently they did a bunch of experiments back in the day, trying to unlock his memories from his life on the otherside. Ersatz is vague about it.”

  “Ersatz is vague about a lot of stuff.”

  “Preaching to the choir, my friend. I’ve decided I need stronger fuel if I’m going to get through to my dad. Don’t be mad at me, but I’m stopping by Durlan’s on my way home to pick up a vial of blood.”

  Quim grimaces as if the idea smells like a dead skunk. “Will you stay away from that snake oil salesman? Please. The guy’s a conman.”

  “Con-dwarf. And he’s really not. Sure, he’s sold me a bad batch or two, but that wasn’t his fault.”

  “So he’d have you believe. Don’t start messing around with blood magic, dude. Pace yourself.”

  “That’s what Ersatz says.”

  “He’s going to be pissed if you start bringing blood vials home.”

  “Exactly. He’s the one who’s holding me back. Sometimes I get the feeling he doesn’t want me to find my dad.”

  “That dragon is the only reason you haven’t blown your own head off in a spectacular magical fireworks display.”

  “Whatever. I’m close. It’s going to work this time.”

  Quim’s stare is blank, disbelieving. “You’re going to hurt yourself. There’s a cost for dredging up all those old emotions and using them to close a gap like this.”

  “Dredging them up is better than bottling them inside. Better than staying cooped up all day every day because you’re scared to go out and live.”

  Quim warns me with a look. “Don’t go there, man.”

  “What if I want to go there?”

  “Cade. I’m not in the mood.”

  “When was the last time you were?” I ask. “When’s the last time you went outside?”

  “I was outside… uh—” he scratches his head, “—a few days ago. Wednesday. To get the groceries.”

  “That doesn’t count.”

  “Yeah-huh.”

  “You get your groceries delivered to your doorstep.”

  Quim waves me off as if swatting a stubborn fly. He retreats to the spare bedroom, an office for his work-at-home job. I’ve never known exactly what he does or who he works for, just that he’s badass at computer stuff.

  I follow him into the room. Three floating glass monitors glow side-by-side, an abstract motion graphic twisting between them as though they’re connected. Quim sits in a black ergonomic armchair ribbed with red nylon inlays and crowned with a high headrest. When he touches the center screen, the motion graphic fades into a vibrant blue interface.

  “You can’t make me go away by pretending I’m not here,” I tell him. “I’m trying to help you.”

  He swivels around in his chair to face me like the villain in an old spy movie. “What do you think I’m trying to do? You’re playing around with magic you don’t understand. There are going to be costs. There’s always a cost. You won’t like the consequences if you’re not careful. And before you claim you’re being careful… no, you’re not. You’re being obsessive.”

  He knows me too well. I was about to tell him I’m being careful. “Fine. You win. I’m obsessing over this. Now that I’m getting close, yes, maybe I’m jumping the gun a little bit. I’ve been wondering what happened to my dad since I was seven years old. Can you blame me?”

  “I’d blame you if you hurt yourself because you were too impatient. You’ve waited this long; give yourself a few days to clear your head before you try it again.”

  “Okay. I’ll wait.”

  “Promise?”

  I nod.

  “Say it.”

  “I promise. Geez.”

  “I’m going to hold you to that.”

  I look away. “Whatever. Can we drop it now?”

  “I don’t know, can we? Can you drop this whole Quim’s scared of going outside thing? Because I’m not.”

  I sigh. He is, and it’s only gotten worse since I met him in our ninth grade Biology class. He’ll admit he doesn’t get out much, but he says it’s because he works all the time.

  Quim usually changes into a bird before he ventures outside so he can touch the ground as little as possible. They call it agoraphobia, I think, but you can’t tell Quim he has a phobia of any kind because he’s afraid of being sick. And I don’t mean he’s a hypochondriac, like he thinks he’s got cancer every time he sneezes. I mean whenever he gets sick or injured, he refuses to believe it.

  He goes into deep denial every time he runs a fever. He once skinned his knees playing touch football on the blacktop and walked around all day with dried blood and little gray pebbles in his skin, pretending nothing was wrong. I don’t know if there’s a clinical diagnosis for that.

  Personally, I blame his parents. Growing up, Mom and Dad Takkanopoulis were distant, neglectful, lazy, and gullible. The mindset Quim lives with now—fear of the outside world, fear of change, fear of everything—can be directly linked, in my opinion, to their inept handling of their son’s formative years.

  Keep in mind, both Mr. Roum and Mrs. Laan Takkanopoulis are cambions. She’s the offspring of an incubus and a human female. He was born of the reverse pairing, a succubus and a human male. Quim is a changeling only because his parents share the specific genetic requirements needed to produce offspring of his kind, and is thus an exceptionally rare species.

  They live in Florida now, his parents. That was what did it. I think his phobias kicked into high gear when they moved out from under him and forced his hand in the game of life.

  It’s not that Quim doesn’t take risks; it’s that he only takes calculated ones. Risks he feels he can control, like gambling on horse races and poker nights and baseball games, not to mention the random bets he tries to make with Ersatz all the time. He’s as guarded about his compulsivity as I am about my magic, so I usually don’t bother him about it.

  “Alright, I’ll drop it,” I say. “You can drop your disguise, while you’re at it.”

  “Good. I’m tired of keeping this up for you.” Quim has a specific appearance he always uses. It isn’t based on anyone in particular, it’s just his idea of how he wants to look.

  He lets it down, and like his computer displays, fades into something else. His true skin is milky-pale, his face and body slender and symmetrical. His eyes are purest white, dark-rimmed, with no trace of color or pupil. He is the only changeling in New Detroit, so far as I’m aware, and I’ve known it since the day we met in that ninth-grade Biology class—a class in which my two primary concerns were to identify my othersider classmates and to get in good with the girl whose best friend I had a crush on at the time.

  “I’ve told you it doesn’t bother me,” I tell him. “You shouldn’t feel like you need to be someone else around me.”

 
“Sometimes I feel like I need to be someone else around everyone.”

  “Not me, buddy. Not me.”

  Chapter 6

  When you were little, did you ever feel your imagination swelling to the size of a hot air balloon and wonder how it could possibly be contained in something as comparatively small as your skull? That’s what Durlan’s Pawn Shop does to me. It fills me with childlike wonder and sweeps me away to a fascinating world of discovery.

  I know I sort of promised Quim I wouldn’t stop by Durlan’s tonight, but my feet are taking me there anyway. The shop would be easier to resist if it weren’t on the way home. It’s in a strip mall behind an abandoned gas station a short six blocks from my apartment. Within lies a collection of novelties, trinkets, curiosities, and mystical whatnots to rival the contents of King Tut’s tomb.

  Durlan’s, like many othersider haunts, is nestled comfortably within a sliver of reality where few normals ever tread; a place we call the Between. The Between isn’t on the otherside, but it isn’t on this side either. It’s exactly where you’d expect it to be. You’ve got to know where it is if you want to find it, only the finding’s the hard part. One must often be given directions, yet the directions often change.

  The Between can be found in many places. They are the places everyone knows are there, but no one ever looks. The cranny beneath the cellar stairs; the back of the garden shed behind a tangle of rusted equipment; the hidden gully in the woods where fairies roam beyond the sight of men. Pockets dwell in mouse holes and bird’s nests and beneath the roots of ancient trees, in ramshackle barns deep in fields along forgotten roadsides, and in condemned houses at the end of lanes no one drives down anymore. I like to think of it as a network of secret tunnels through reality, though the size and shape of those tunnels is as varied as the creatures who inhabit them.

  Just as mundane pawn shops are catchbasins for the world’s quick-cash unwanteds, Durlan’s Pawn Shop collects, on dusty shelves, the remnants of life on the otherside. Many belongings become less useful to their owners after they cross over. A starving elvish noblewoman might hawk her family’s heirloom necklace for the money to buy her next few meals from a fast-food burger joint. Where swords and armor protect the warriors of faraway kingdoms, here blue jeans and smartphones are more suitable weapons.

  An electronic bell chimes as I enter Durlan’s Pawn Shop through the glass door, which sticks on the threshold and refuses to close all the way. Grenda is at the front desk, looking through a book containing a list of rare coins and their values. She’s humming to herself, her reddish-brown braids alternating up and down like church bell pull ropes as she wags her head. She looks up and greets me with a freckled smile. “Evening, Master Cadigan.”

  “Hey, Grenda. How’s business?”

  “Slow on this side. Faster on the other.”

  “Mind if I…?”

  “Go right ahead.”

  The shop’s dim rear shelves are stacked with ancient technology that looks as though it hasn’t seen polish—or a good dusting—in a century or more. I crouch and locate an inconspicuous black box at waist level, a power amplifier for a home-theater surround sound system. I turn it on.

  A rising hum alerts me that the unit is functional. The digital display blinks to life, showing me six disconnected speaker icons and a volume level of ten. I crank the volume knob to thirty-seven, then push the left Preset button.

  The shelf on which the amplifier is resting slides to the left with a dull rumble, parting from the one next to it. The other shelves slide independently of one another, each in their own unique jolting manner. Behind them stands a narrow bookcase less than two feet wide.

  I pass through the bookcase with a long sideways step. Purple steam clings to my clothes and trails off me like wisps of cloud. The shelves shift back into place behind me. I brush myself off and survey the windowless black room in which I now stand, whose walls are packed with the cluttered flair of an Americana restaurant.

  “Good morrow to you, young Master Cadigan.”

  “Durlan.” I acknowledge the dwarf with a nod.

  “With what may I help you, lad? Back to sell me more dirt?”

  “Not this time,” I say. “This time I’m buying, and I want blood.”

  He chuckles. “Moving up in the world, are we? What sort?”

  I dig into my pocket and pull out a wad of crumpled cash and a few coins. I drop all one hundred fifty-seven dollars and eighteen cents of it on the counter. “I’ll take a vial of the best stuff I can buy for this much.”

  Durlan scratches his thick red beard. “I’ve got troll blood for one-sixty. If you can pony up a few more dollars—”

  “That’s all I’ve got. I lost my job today.”

  He hems and haws, making a big show of the fact that he considers a discount of two dollars and seventy-two cents an act of charity. “I did get something new in yesterday. I’ve been debating over how much to charge for it. Why not give it a try?”

  “It has to be strong. Stronger than any dirt I’ve ever bought, sold, or traded here before.”

  “Big night planned, eh?”

  “You could say that. What’s the species?”

  “Here, let me—” He reaches under the counter and withdraws a rack of vials, but loses his grip and spills them across the countertop. I catch a few before they roll off the front edge, but not all of them. Luckily they’re plastic, not glass.

  I bend down to gather the vials on the floor while Durlan does the same behind the counter. One of the vials has rolled beneath the counter, so I draw it out and read the label. Demon. $1,299.99.

  I have so many questions right now. Like how in hell Durlan got his hands on a vial of demon blood. And why it costs thirteen hundred bucks. Obviously $666 wasn’t enough.

  I’ve got enough in my bank account to pay this month’s rent and buy groceries. I can’t splurge on something like this. And yet, I’m tempted. Hair and fur residue aren’t cutting it anymore. If I want to get through to my dad, I need blood.

  My next thought is one I should ignore. What if I took the vial now and paid for it later? I can reimburse Durlan once I get back to work and save up some money. That way it won’t be stealing; just borrowing in advance. Thirteen hundred bucks is a lot of money, but I’m good for it. Plus, when I find my dad, he’ll probably be rich. I’ll bet he’s been racking up a fortune over all these years.

  Half a second is all it takes to convince myself. I slide the vial of demon blood into my pocket and stand up with the rest of the vials in hand. My heart is pounding. I’ve stolen plenty before, but I’ve never stolen anything worth this much.

  Durlan thanks me for my help as we slide the vials onto the gridded rack again. They form a motley assortment, some stoppered, others with rubber caps or screw-on plastic tops. Their contents varies in color from bright red to near-black, with tinges of green, blue, and purple among them. Each vial is labeled by price and species.

  “Oh, bother. They’re all out of order now,” says Durlan, shuffling them around. He doesn’t seem to notice the missing vial. “Clumsy old me.”

  “Happens to the best of us,” I say empathetically. “No harm done. So what kind of blood did you have in mind?”

  Durlan wiggles his fingers above the rack until he finds the vial he’s looking for. “Ah. Here we are.” He draws it out and spins the label toward me. Imp, it reads. $299.99. The liquid inside is a tainted brownish color, thin and watery.

  I frown. “Is imp’s blood really more powerful than troll’s?”

  He leans in, as if to share a secret. “It can be, if you know what you’re doing. Imps are fiendish creatures. Little devils, they are. Capricious. Explosive. So’s their blood. A seasoned wizard like you should have no trouble with it. Under sway of an expert such as yourself, an imp’s blood can be twice as strong as a troll’s.”

  I’m aware Durlan is only stroking my ego. Too bad my ego is into that sort of thing. “This is priced at three hundred dollars. I can’t affor
d it.”

  “Dealer’s markup,” he assures me. “It’s from a new supplier. I haven’t released his stock yet, since I can’t be sure how effective it is. You’re a regular paying customer. I can trust you, and I can count on your opinion. Why don’t you take this sample at half price? In return, you come back when you’re done with it and let me know if you didn’t get your money’s worth. How does that sound?”

  I feel guilty now, seeing as Durlan is giving me such a great deal and all. I’m close to pulling out the vial of demon’s blood and admitting to him what I was about to do. But that would sour our relationship fast, and he might rescind his offer on the discounted imp’s blood. It’s not like Durlan has many competitors I can buy from if he bans me from his shop.

  Taking the offered vial of imp’s blood, I hold it aloft and tip it in a seesawing motion to watch the blood slosh from end to end. I don’t really know what I’m looking for. Just an attempt to appear as if I do. Given my current budget, I don’t have much choice but to accept the deal he’s offering. “Alright. I’ll take it.”

  Durlan smiles. “Right, then. I’ll bag this up for you.” He snips a short length of brown paper from a roll beneath the counter and folds it around the vial to form a little package, which he seals with scotch tape. Then he drops it into a small plastic bag and hands it to me, sweeping my money off the counter into his open palm. “Fortunate for you, my needing a guinea pig,” he says.

  “Sure is.” I try not to smile in a way that will make him feel like he’s been gypped.

  “Anything else you’ll be needing?”

  I look around, feigning deliberation. “Nope. I think that’ll do it.”

  He rings up the charge and deposits my money into the register, then hands me what appears to be a blank receipt. All his receipts appear this way. I’ve got a stack of them in my filing cabinet at home. A quick detection spell makes the enchanted ink visible.

  “Enjoy your evening,” Durlan says.

  “You do the same.”

  When I turn around, there’s a wooden door in place of the phantom bookcase through which I entered. I open the door and emerge beside the abandoned gas station at the front of the shopping center. It’s getting dark. Across the parking lot, the sign for Durlan’s Pawn Shop is lit in neon red and green, the letter W flickering against the evening sky.