He shoved his hands into his front pockets. “We might have asked a question about the Awakened during the divination last night,” he said. “The cards might’ve told us that Faith had to be careful using her magic if she wanted to keep the Awakened, well, asleep. We’re all linked enough through our magic to know if something bad happens. I felt something bad.”
“So you were here to check on her?” I asked.
He nodded.
Behind us, the door to the shower room opened.
“Red?” Ben asked.
I nodded.
“Hey!” Ben called.
Red walked to the foot of the stairs and glanced up at us. He wore a fresh white T-shirt, a pair of faded blue jeans, and his dark blue sneakers. He’d draped his wet bath towel around his neck.
He marked Ben’s presence with narrowed eyes. “What now?”
“Fill you in on the way to Addie’s,” I said. “Faith, grab your stuff.”
She headed back down the stairs, into the office, her footfalls heavy. Red stepped out of her way and let her pass, then followed her. He had things to shut off or down. Best he get that done right now. We needed to be on our way.
I met Ben’s gaze and held it. I lowered my voice. “Where were you taking her?”
“My house,” he said.
Something was off about the way he said that. I couldn’t put my finger on it.
“You walk over?” I asked. He lived only a few blocks away.
He nodded.
“You’re riding with me to Addie’s,” I said. “Faith will go with Red.”
He shoved his hands deeper into his pockets. He didn’t like it at all, but he did what he was told.
He didn’t say a single word on the two-mile drive to Addie’s place. I kept the radio off, leaving us nothing except the intermittent swish of the windshield wipers and the weight of the uncomfortable silence as we headed south past restaurants and coffee shops to Stark, then east past expensive houses and Laurelhurst Park, where tall Douglas firs guarded the walking trails and the playground.
By the time I parked in front of the house, he held himself rigid in his seat. He reached to unbuckle his seatbelt, lifting his chin to point toward the white Mustang parked in front of us.
“Is that Sunday’s car?” he asked.
“Yeah,” I said. “You got a good reason for keeping whatever it is to yourself?”
“I do. I know it’s frustrating, Night.”
I laughed. “That’s not the word I’d use.”
“Promise not to kill me,” he said, as if he were joking. But the jest didn’t reach his eyes. “Also, promise that Sunday won’t kill me.”
I could only speak for myself. Sunday kept her own code. “Promise not to take it too far. We’re in deep shit again, Ben.”
The Awakened. The chameleon—my long-lost childhood crush, Miguel. It was a lot, and I didn’t know how to navigate it yet.
Ben let go of the buckle and allowed the seatbelt to roll back home. He reached out a hand for me to take. “I promise.”
We shook on it, making an old-fashioned deal. It struck me as ridiculous, given the stakes—or it would’ve, if Ben hadn’t been so serious.
The brakes on Red’s blue pickup squealed as he pulled up behind us. I checked the rearview mirror as Faith poured herself out of the truck, ankles wobbling as she caught her balance on the curb. Eyes downcast. Shoulders cranked up towards her ears.
Mist began to fall as we climbed the front steps, settling over the tall, steep slope of the yard, coating the bare stalks of lavender and the green, fragrant bushes of rosemary planted on either side. The herbs had been planted for more than one reason. Beauty, sure. But also to serve as magical protection, cleansing everyone who passed through the yard and frightening away anyone stupid enough to come here with bad intent.
People in the neighborhood ought to have known by now not to mess with Addie or her niece, Jess. They were kind enough, and friendly, and nothing about them screamed magic, but people with the kind of power they wielded radiated a sense of no-nonsense strength. That in and of itself formed a barrier between them and garden-variety miscreants.
The double-decker, buttercream-yellow house had its own, more serious protections inside.
Christmas lights framed the picture windows on either side of the door. The wide wooden porch sported high rails, and it held two oversized wicker chairs in cheerful red with white cushions and a matching wicker table in between. The big old tuxedo tomcat who usually occupied the place had wandered off, leaving a trail of muddy paw prints in his wake.
I peered in through the closest window. As usual, I saw no one in the living room to the right, or in the dining room to the left. Interior lights off—except for those twinkling on the Christmas tree behind the table. But the room beyond—the kitchen—glowed with light and life.
Addie poked her head through the kitchen door before I could raise my finger to the doorbell. Even from this distance, with wood and glass and magic between us, her halo shone. Like all Watchers, her halo held a piece of the night sky—black velvet tossed with stars. Every time I saw her, in the first moment it flashed blue fire so brightly it blinded. Then the flash faded, and I saw her. Or, in this case, her black hair, pulled into a bun, and her dark skin, dark brown eyes, and silver-rimmed glasses perched on her nose.
She waved to invite us in. The door was open, apparently. She ducked back into the kitchen after I nodded.
I took point, pushing open the door and kicking off my shoes, shoving them into the tangled pile of footwear on the right. There was a coat rack and a shoe stand, but both overflowed. I breathed in the gorgeous, evergreen perfume of the tree, and the mouthwatering scent of chocolate chip cookies fresh from the oven. I wondered who Addie had baked them for.
She had a knack for knowing when someone was on their way over, and just what sort of food spoke to the foundational part of them. The food she prepared touched that person deeply, bringing forth memories of childhood, of comfort, of love. Or if the person had never had those things, the dish Addie made conjured them.
It was a gift. It was also an excellent way to get a visitor to let their guard down and open up, to share things they otherwise might not.
Addie’s house was her home, and Jess’s, first.
It had its own magic, its own power, that took the form of a spirit. To my magical sight, it took the form of a faint, gold shimmer that brushed across my dark-as-midnight halo first before moving on to the others. It recognized me, and I knew it. Had I been a stranger, and unwanted, it would’ve thrown me out the door.
But I wasn’t a stranger. I was an official guest—as in, Addie had given me and mine guest rights in her home. Any insult or harm to me equaled insult or harm to her. That, along with the house’s defenses, made it a safe place, a kind of sacred ground. I still marked the exits I knew about and the sight lines, turning them over in my mind.
Addie called from the kitchen, her voice smoky like my abuela’s had been. “Hey!”
Red stepped up on my left, along with Faith. He rested a hand on her shoulder—whether for comfort or to prevent her from bolting, I couldn’t tell. Maybe a bit of both. He raised his voice to carry into the kitchen. “Hey, yourself.”
“Get yourself in here, Mr. Jennings,” Addie said. “All of you. We got a situation.”
Red glanced at me. “I’m afraid to go in there all of sudden.”
Faith shrugged off his hand. “Whatever it is, hanging back won’t change it.”
“Harsh,” he said.
She didn’t apologize, but she didn’t give him any more crap either. She marched into the kitchen like a condemned woman, as if convinced the situation had to do with her.
I moved to catch up, the guys on my heels, and entered the kitchen a couple of steps behind Faith. The hardwood transitioned to well-traveled tile.
Addie stood beside the stove, a bright yellow oven mitt on her right hand. She wore a flowing charcoal gray top printed with blac
k roses and a faded pair of black jeans. Her feet were bare. She pushed a button on the stovetop, turning off the oven. Two sheet pans lined with steaming-hot cookies rested on the burners. She’d bought a new knife block. It bristled with steel.
“Just in time,” she said.
Or last in line. The room was packed with more people than I expected. The kids huddled around the long, worn oak table on the other side of the space.
Jess occupied the seat at one end. She had the same Watcher halo as her Aunt Addie, like a night full of stars. She wore a long, plum T-shirt, black leggings, and pristine white sneakers. She’d twisted her dark, kinky curls into a loose bun on top of her head. Her favorite gold hoops dangled from her ears. All five feet of her seemed coiled, ready to spring. She looked at me as if I were her salvation.
From what? I asked the question with my eyes.
She pressed her lips into a thin line. She wasn’t telling. Not in her out-loud voice, anyway.
Corey perched on the edge of the chair beside Jess’s, her elbows planted on the tabletop as she studied her painted black fingernails. A fire-engine-red bob framed her heart-shaped face. She’d dressed in solidarity with Jess, in a purple-and-black-striped top and skirt set, with purple polka-dotted tights and chunky black Mary Janes. She wore black-and-white skull cameos everywhere—earrings, necklace, rings on every finger. Her halo shone bone-white. Her magic allowed her to speak with ghosts.
Faith made her way to where the girls sat and collapsed into the chair beside Corey’s.
Corey looked at Faith from the corner of her eye. Then she leaned in to whisper in Faith’s ear, the words too faint for me to pick up.
“Before you ask, Night,” Addie said, “Sunday and your prisoner are in my basement, in the temple space. It’s magically reinforced, so we’re all right for now.”
“Thanks,” I said.
“I’m all about the détente.” She turned an eye toward the back door, which was situated between the table where the girls sat and the sink with its garden window and riot of starter herbs in tiny clay pots. She looked at that door as if it were the door to Hell.
Footsteps behind me signaled that Ben and Red had caught up. Ben didn’t come in, though. He hovered on the other side of the threshold, pacing in three-step arcs as if he couldn’t make up his mind whether to stay or go.
Red went around him, moving to stand at my back. He rested his hands on my hips. “What’s the situation?” he asked.
Addie stripped the pot holder off of her hand and tossed it across the stovetop and onto the counter. “It—he—is outside making a phone call. He probably won’t be out there long. His name is Shadow.”
“What kind of name is that?” Red asked.
“A very old one,” Addie said. “It’s not even a name, really. It’s a title.”
I’d never heard of him, but that didn’t mean anything. There were plenty of big, bad things in the world I didn’t know about, and I was all right with that. The title thing, though—that gave me pause. Something we’d covered in passing during our early training in the Order. The old, pre-Christian gods often had names that were titles. They fulfilled a purpose in the world. That purpose was their end-all, be-all.
“How old is he?” I asked.
Addie turned her back toward the stove and leaned against the door handle. She met my gaze. She pursed her lips for a quick second, then papered over the gesture with a mask of tolerance. “He’s the oldest,” she said.
“The oldest what?” I asked.
“Watcher.”
Red pulled away from me, sidestepping to get a clearer look at Addie, and a better sight line on the backdoor. “Your boss?”
Her voice softened a little. She liked Red. “Well yes, he is, now you mention it. As if I like being reminded of that in my own home.”
Red held up his hands. “Sorry.”
“Just don’t lie to the man,” she said.
“Is he a man?” Red asked.
Good question. Addie and Jess were Watchers, but they looked human, and as far as I could tell, they mostly were. A Watcher that ancient, though?
Addie waved off the question. “You know what I mean.”
“Actually, no,” Red said.
The handle on the back door turned and the hinges complained. The sun was on its way down, the last rays pouring through pinholes in the clouds, backlighting the being who stood framed in the doorway. He had skin the color of alabaster, and mist-damp hair so blond it might as well have been white. He had thick, long lashes and deep blue eyes—but no pupils. They were just a solid, disturbing cobalt blue.
He wore a white button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up, tan hiking pants, and dark brown hikers—no coat or other concession to the weather. He smelled like ozone, as if lightning had just struck nearby. He had the Watcher halo, same as Jess and Addie, but his burned with the kind of explosive, starry fire that put me in mind of supernovas.
His voice dipped into baritone, with an undercurrent of thunder. “Night.”
“Shadow,” I said.
“Like cousins,” he said.
“Only I’m not descended from angels.”
“Really?” He came inside and shut the door behind him, hanging on to the knob. “Don’t those assholes at the Order teach you anything?”
I stared at him. I didn’t know whether it was the incongruity of someone like him spouting the word assholes, or what he’d actually said. “Come again?”
“Where do you think magic comes from?” he asked.
“I’ve never given it much thought. Never had the luxury.”
I hadn’t considered it at all—not since I’d been little and vulnerable, and hadn’t been able to understand how people who were supposed to love and protect me could hate me so much. Since then, magic had been a constant. A reality to deal with, to take advantage of, to use. Magic was a survival tool for me and the people I loved.
“All magic comes from angels,” Shadow said.
Maybe that was true. Maybe it was just self-serving. “The fallen angels in your bloodline?”
He shook his head. “All of them.”
Faith spoke softly from her seat at the table. “What does that mean?”
A hush settled over us as we waited for Shadow to choose his words.
“Your power is destiny. You were born to play a part in whether the world lives or dies,” he said. “Magic can save the world. Or destroy it.”
Chapter 5
SHADOW’S WORDS FELL like boulders into a still pool. For a moment, silence descended again. Everyone seemed to go still: Shadow in front of the back door, one hand still on the knob. The three girls at the long, worn table. Addie, leaning against the oven door handle. I couldn’t hear Red’s breathing even though he stood right beside me, but I did hear the lack of nervous footfalls outside the kitchen, because Ben had quit pacing.
In the time it took me to count to three, the stillness folded in on itself the way water seemed to compress before it exploded outward. When the spell broke, the ripples were violent and immediate.
Faith rose from her seat so fast, she upended the chair. It hit the wall behind her with a loud crack. She planted her palms on the kitchen table, fingertips digging into the wood. The gold streaks in her brown eyes—the light that reflected the presence of the Awakened—multiplied in the space of seconds.
Over by the stove, Addie stiffened.
I closed the distance to Faith in two long strides, but the table separated us, so I couldn’t stop her when she moved to stand toe-to-toe with Shadow. Her hands curled into fists at her sides. She stepped back with her right foot and put all of her weight behind a punch that clocked the oldest Watcher in the right cheekbone.
He didn’t react at all, his expression flat and hard.
I moved around the table, ready to pull Faith away from Shadow. Ready to step between them.
“Why are you here?” Faith asked. “Why now? You’re going off about all of this existential bullshit while we�
��ve got chameleons coming into our places, trying to kill us. You’re talking to my mom as if you know her. You don’t know her at all. What do you even want here?”
“I’m here now because right now it’s not too late,” he said. “The forces in the great apocalyptic fight are gathering, but the battle lines aren’t set. You, for instance, are still you. The god hasn’t yet taken over.”
Faith shoveled sarcasm at him. “Oh. So you’re here to help?”
“I’m here to make sure that everything happens as it has been foretold.”
“Oh, great,” she said. “Did you do a divination, too? Or is this bigger than that, like a prophecy?”
He nodded at the latter word.
Faith closed on him, nose-to-nose. “We don’t want your help.”
He smirked. “You don’t get a choice.”
At the far end of the table, Jess stood up from her seat.
Over by the stove, Addie stiffened. “Down.”
She started to argue. “Faith’s right. We don’t want him here. Why can’t you see that?”
“No,” Addie said, with a finality that I felt in my own bones, even though it hadn’t been directed at me.
Jess didn’t sit, but she didn’t move, either. She’d looked to me for help earlier. I hadn’t known what kind of help to give, or why she’d needed it.
Shadow cocked his head ever so slightly, studying her face. “Sleep now,” he said.
I stepped forward to catch her, thinking he’d cast some sort of spell that would knock her out. But she didn’t fall, and I understood that he hadn’t been talking to her at all. He’d been speaking to the Awakened.
“There,” he said. “That’s better.”
Faith backed away slowly, moving into my arms. She struggled when I wrapped them around her waist until she realized the person holding her was me.
“What did he do?” She tilted her head back.
He’d faded the gold streaks in her eyes. That left me equal parts relieved and angry. “Red, can you help me here?”
“Got, it. Red gathered Faith and took her out of the room.
Which was where I wanted her—anywhere but in front of Shadow. I glued my gaze to Shadow, so I heard more than saw the exodus from the room as the rest of the kids followed Red and Faith.
Night Rises: The Awakened Magic Saga (Soul Forge Book 2) Page 7