“You’re going now?” Anders scowled. “That thing nearly tore me in half. You should wait till I can go with you.”
“We don’t have the luxury,” Curtis said. “My best shot is to pick up the trail right away, from nearby.”
“Last time you did that spell, you were in the basement,” Anders said.
“Last time I had Eli helping. This isn’t the same spell.” Curtis shrugged. “I can’t do it from here.”
Anders tried to sit up and swore again. “Fuck! Damnit. Fine. But be fucking careful. Don’t let that wolf get a jump on you. I like you better without fur and claws.”
Curtis leaned forward and rubbed the hair on the demon’s chest, careful not to touch the still angry-looking wounds. They were already scabbing. “I wouldn’t want to step on your turf. You’re the hairy beast in this family.”
“Damn right.”
Curtis rose, and he and Luc turned to leave. Luc felt a small tug from the bond they all shared. To his surprise, an equal mix of worry and frustration came from the bed behind them.
“Be careful,” Anders said.
“We will,” Luc said.
When the demon was worried, Luc knew better than to underestimate the risk.
*
The air was so cold even Luc felt discomfort. While Curtis wrapped his scarf around the bottom of his face and pulled up his hood, Luc slipped on a pair of gloves and lifted his collar.
They’d parked on George, far enough from the parking garage but still within sight. To Luc’s sharpened vision, it looked like things were breaking up.
“They’re starting to go their separate ways, I think,” he said.
Curtis looked around. “Do you feel that?”
Luc frowned. “Feel what?”
“Oh wow, look.” Curtis pointed.
Someone had traced small designs in the snow. Luc shook his head, turning back to Curtis.
“They’re basically ‘go away’ wards. Weak, but if someone was walking along, they wouldn’t head that way.” He nodded to where the parking garage lay in the distance. “They’ll die out by morning, but…” He shook his head. “Pretty slick. Why bother with police tape when you can just make people want to go a different way?”
“But you could feel them?”
“It wouldn’t be as effective on a wizard. Or a vampire, I guess, if you didn’t feel the suggestion.”
“I did not.”
“Bystanders, then,” Curtis said. “Regular folk.”
Luc regarded the pattern in the snow. He supposed the Families had all manner of standard procedures to keep those without an awareness of magic ignorant.
“Okay, given they expect people to just go the other way, let’s not get caught,” Curtis said. He partly unfolded a map and handed it to Luc. “Can you hold this?”
“Certainly,” Luc said. He held the map out flat. He recognized it as a street map of the downtown core, including everything from the Byward Market, across through Parliament, and as far as the Supreme Court.
Curtis pulled out the small stoppered bottle and a pendant on what looked to Luc to be a copper chain. The stone was a vibrant blue.
“Lapis?”
“Azurite,” Curtis said. “Generally good for divinations, and it doesn’t fight me like most stones. Mackenzie gave it to me.”
“You didn’t use a crystal last time,” Luc said.
“Last time I had Eli,” Curtis said. “He was way better than a pendant. This spell isn’t quite the same thing, though it should give us the same result, more or less. The law of constancy.” He opened the bottle and dropped the small blue stone through the opening. It came back wet, and Luc caught the scent of the blood again, rich and full of promise.
The law of constancy. Curtis had explained that part of magic to Luc before. As far as many magics were concerned, something that had once been a part of another always was. Hair, for example, or fingernails, could be used to work magic on the person they’d once belonged to. Blood, Curtis had said, was especially powerful in that regard. That was no surprise to Luc. Blood was, after all, blood.
“Invenire sanguinem.” Curtis’s voice was even and controlled.
The pendant began to swing in a small circle over the map. After a few seconds, it pulled at an obvious angle, the point a breath away from the paper. It moved slowly in a strange zig-zagging pattern, but given the scale of the map, Luc realized the person it was following was moving at a healthy pace. He peered at the map.
“Is this where the wolf was, or where the wolf is?”
“Is,” Curtis said. He bit his bottom lip. “Heading across Major’s Hill Park. But not in a straight line.”
“Perhaps trying to confuse potential followers.” Luc looked up. “We should hurry.”
“You’re faster,” Curtis said. “I’ll catch up.”
Luc glanced around, but between the cold and the late hour, no others were near enough to see him. The group breaking up at the parking lot weren’t heading their way. He fueled his vampire graces and broke into a run. The world blurred around him, and his speed ate the distance between the Market and the park. A single car passed him on Mackenzie, but he doubted they even saw him.
Major’s Hill Park was a collection of trees, sculptures, and pathways. One of the larger parks in the city, it bordered the river on one side as it met with the Rideau Canal, with steep-sloped paths leading down to the water. Though the paths were somewhat maintained in winter, no matter where their wolf friend had gone, he should be able to find tracks. Luc sharpened his eyesight and drew a deep breath into his lungs.
Is that brimstone?
He turned his head, trying to capture the scent more. It was possible, he supposed, the wounded wolf still carried the scent of Anders’s assault on it.
But no. Anders’s hellfire no longer smelled of brimstone. That had changed shortly after the creation of their triad.
Did Kavan or Burke manage to wound it?
He lost the scent. Frowning, he scanned the ground. There were tracks from the last of those who had walked through the park in the evening, and there hadn’t been snow today, it seemed. He was annoyed to find more than a few paw prints he assumed belonged to dogs of varying sizes but nothing large enough to be a werewolf. Not right away. Still, even a gentle wind made the tracks differ, dusting snow over the tracks of the dogs that had been walked earlier, and unless he was completely mistaken…
Luc moved to the large loop the paths made in the center of the park and walked slowly around it.
There. A large animal had walked off the path, directly into the deeper snow, toward the slope. And recently. Forcing another breath, he once again caught a hint of a demon, as well as something more animalistic.
And blood.
The noise of someone’s approach made him turn.
It was Curtis. He jogged up, joining Luc. He pulled the scarf down beneath his chin and exhaled. “Winter running is not my thing,” he said.
Luc pointed. “I think this is it. You’ll notice the tracks.”
Curtis pulled out the map again. Luc took it, and Curtis repeated his spell, dipping the pendant in the blood from the small bottle.
The azurite pendant pulled, reaching toward the map behind Parliament. It was moving slower now.
“He’s behind Parliament, but down by the river,” Curtis said. He looked up. The Parliamentary Library was visible from where they stood, atop a steep slope. Curtis looked down at the map again. “Wait. Do they even plow the paths behind Parliament?”
“I don’t think so,” Luc said. “Though I doubt the snow would bother the wolf much.”
Curtis exhaled. “Super.”
“We need to cross the canal,” Luc said.
Curtis put the bottle and pendant away. “I’m not sure we can catch up to him.”
“I might,” Luc said. He folded up the map and, once again, fueled his graces. He all but flew along the paths down to the Canal, leaving a wake of snow. Not for the first time, he marveled at
how much stronger and faster he felt having Curtis this close. He knew vampire coteries could draw upon each other’s strengths, but this was effortless. Just being near Curtis or Anders seemed to empower his graces. The drop-off of the boost was palpable as he put distance between Curtis and himself, but the strength he’d drawn was enough to cross the canal and streak past the small museum in as much time as it took to consider the sensations at play.
He slowed and hunted for tracks. It didn’t take long to see where the wolf had gone. As Curtis’s magic had suggested, the wolf had gone around behind Parliament, but the pathways were closed off and buried under snow. The beast’s passage had left the snow greatly disturbed, however. Luc’s fangs extended.
He did love the hunt.
Coming to the corner of the path, he looked into the darkness. The light from Parliament above barely reached down here, and even the moonlight wasn’t adding much. The hill was mostly in shadow. His eyes adjusted, and he strained to see farther. It wouldn’t do to have the wolf hear or see him coming. At least the wind was on his side, coming to him, rather than past him.
He heard something. A growl?
Luc tensed. He could feel the comforting presence of Curtis drawing ever closer, and the strength he brought with him. He fed his graces—eyesight, speed, strength, and hearing—and strained all his senses into the dark ahead of him.
There!
Ahead, almost around the first curve. The figure was a darker shape among shadows, but it was definitely there.
Luc burst forward, a blur of snow fanning out behind him as he ran. It was rough going, deep snow fighting him with every step, but he was strong enough to force his way through. Finally reaching the corner, he braced himself as he hooked around. Even with the strength of the triad, this burst of speed was reaching its limit, Luc knew. And with the snow growing higher as he struggled through the unplowed paths left closed for the winter, it became harder to maintain the pace.
Luc skidded to a halt as he finally broached the corner.
He saw the wolf.
And then he saw another.
*
The two wolves were mere paces apart from each other, both crouching despite the snow reaching almost to their chests. They were huge, the bodily weight of a human being transposed to the shape of a wolf, and as far as Luc could tell, neither had noticed his presence.
Yet.
Two wolves? That complicated things. He froze, unsure what the smartest move might be.
One of the wolves was much darker coated than the other, but otherwise they seemed more or less identical beasts to him. The paler of the two lifted one front paw in an achingly slow move to get a little closer to the other, but the other snapped, snarled, and moved back. The pale wolf was definitely trying to keep the darker from getting any farther down the snow-buried path.
They tested each other. The dark wolf would try to nudge to the left or right, but the paler wolf seemed faster, and less inhibited by the snow. A moment later, Luc began to see why. It occurred to him he should have seen two sets of tracks, but there had been only one. A glance at the paler wolf’s feet confirmed he hadn’t been mistaken. The snow itself seemed to shift and part around the wolf, almost as though it were trying to make passage easier, only to restore itself once the wolf had moved on.
Magic of some kind.
The thought made him think of Curtis, who would be following soon.
The pale wolf lunged, snapping for the other, which snarled and twisted, narrowly avoiding the teeth of the attacker. The two wolves pivoted, and Luc found himself looking right into the eyes of the paler wolf. He saw the wolf tense, eyes focusing on him, and something must have translated to the other wolf as well, as it also turned, saw him—
And bolted.
The paler wolf was too slow to recover from the surprise of seeing Luc to launch another attack. The darker beast slipped past, and was off, tearing down the path, heading straight for the shadows where the moon, low enough in the sky now, provided no light.
The pale wolf gave chase.
Luc turned and caught sight of Curtis. After a moment of hesitation, he turned back the way he came.
“He got away?” Curtis said. He was puffing. The snow was up to his knees in places.
“There were two of them,” Luc said. “They were not friends.”
“Oh crap,” Curtis said. He peered into the darkness ahead of him.
Luc held up his hand, and listened. With Curtis so close, his hearing sharpened quickly, and though he knew he was drawing deep on a well of strength he’d have to replace with blood before long, he could hear the distant sound of the wolves running, he thought. Two sets of paws were hitting the snow, though one set was much quieter.
One stopped.
Barely a second later, so did the other.
“Your map,” Luc said.
Curtis struggled to pull out the bottle, pendant and map quickly. Luc took the paper from him, holding it out, and Curtis dipped the pendant.
“Not a lot of blood left,” he said.
Luc nodded.
Curtis repeated the spell, but the pendant refused to settle. It circled, pulling the chain taut and spinning almost horizontally over the map.
“What does that mean?” Luc asked.
Curtis bit his lip. “Turn the map over.”
Luc lowered the map, and reversed it. Here was a much less detailed map of the city, zoomed out on a larger scale.
The pendant struck the map with force, leaving a small smear of blood behind. Curtis pulled the pendant away. He raised his eyebrows.
“There’s fast,” Curtis said. “And then there’s fast. Is that even possible?”
“He’s in the greenbelt,” Luc said. The swath of woods, wetlands, and even farms had at one time been a border around the city, but was now a crescent within it. Untouched by industry, they were a small piece of nature tucked inside Ottawa. But the little dot of blood was nowhere near where they were now.
“Apparently, that’s where he is,” Curtis said. He sounded doubtful. “Maybe I’m too tired for this?”
“If your magic says that’s where our wolf is,” Luc said. “Then I am unwilling to dismiss the idea.” He looked back the way they’d come. “I know you’re tired, but do you have more in you this evening? None of this feels right, and I don’t want to give either of these wolves more time than we have to. One was quite literally covering its tracks as it moved.”
Curtis put the cork back in the bottle, and wrapped a tissue around the pendant. He blew out a breath. “Okay.”
Luc smiled at him. “Thank you, lapin.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Back to the car, then,” Luc said.
“At least I can warm up.”
*
It was rough going. Some of the greenbelt paths had been traveled by cross-country skiers, but after drawing out the pendant and watching it swing obviously to one side, the two soon found themselves walking through a far less traveled path. The snow was deep and untouched, and Curtis shook his head.
“This makes no sense,” he said. His voice was muffled by his scarf. “There’s no tracks.”
“I would agree, but one of the wolves didn’t appear to leave tracks,” Luc said. “It’s possible we were following the tracks left by the other one, and the wolf Anders wounded is the one that doesn’t leave any.”
“Let me try again,” Curtis said. He drew out the pendant, and dipped it into the bottle. He’d warned Luc on the drive over they’d have perhaps two or three more tries to lock down a specific direction. Given the smudge of blood on the map, Luc was as sure as he could be they were close.
This time, when Curtis chanted, the pendant tugged sharply to the left, and barely wobbled at all.
“What does that mean?” Luc asked. He didn’t like the way the pendant seemed to quiver.
“It means we’re right on top of him,” Curtis said, holding up the pendant again. It pointed to the left, and the azurite strained aga
inst the silver chain. “But I don’t see anything.”
“Be careful,” Luc said. He took a step ahead, positioning the wizard behind him.
“According to the crystal? He’s right there,” Curtis said, pointing at a large drift of snow.
Luc tensed, expecting the snow to explode into a fury of fur, teeth, and claws.
Nothing happened.
“Ventus,” Curtis said, raising one hand. Wind, wild and cold, whipped up all around them. It seemed to twist around Curtis’s outstretched hand, and as it picked up flecks of snow from the ground and air, it became a barely visible spout that reached from Curtis’s wrist out toward the drift. The wizard stepped up beside Luc and flicked the rope of wind into the large drift ahead of them. It blew the snow aside in a fountain of white, collapsing the drift and blowing the layers of snow away until—
“Merde,” Luc said.
A body lay beneath the snow. Frozen to the ground and only revealed in places as Curtis’s magic blew the snow away from it, it appeared to be a wiry, athletic man with hair long enough to pull into a ponytail.
Also very, very dead.
Curtis lowered his hand.
“Another victim.” Luc pivoted, searching the nearby woods for any sign of movement. Nothing. Still, he hadn’t been able to perceive the second, paler wolf last time, either. He’d caught no scent or warning, had had no idea he was following more than one wolf right up until he’d seen them both. He frowned and glanced at Curtis. Curtis looked around, but shook his head.
He didn’t sense anything either, then.
“Now what?” Curtis said.
“He’s frozen solid,” Luc said, crouching in front of the body. “This isn’t fresh.” He looked up at Curtis. “Could you clear off more of the snow without disturbing the body?”
Curtis winced but nodded. He conjured more of the wind and knelt closer to concentrate the effect. As they watched, the man’s stomach became visible, Curtis gagged. Strips of flesh had been cut away.
“I am really ready to stop seeing this sort of thing,” Curtis said.
“He’s not chewed,” Luc said. “He’s not marked like the others.”
Triad Soul Page 14