by Faith Hunter
My heart clenched with remembered pain. But no new pain. No desire. No nothing. I said, “I already knew about your unfinished tattoos. Paka spelled your werecat and bound you with some kind of weird cat magic. You had no choice except to follow her off the dance floor. She spent the next months biting and clawing you on the full moon to bring about the shift into your wereleopard, all the time eating pieces of your soul and your magic. Torturing you. And then when you turned, she did something else, something magical to that tattooed spell, to keep you in werecat form.”
“Who told—” He stopped. “Nell.” It was a growled, angry syllable. Nell worked for him. Nell and I were friends of a sort.
“Yeah.” I narrowed my eyes at him, wondering if he was being mean to the little gardener. “The same Nell who fixed the damage Paka left spelled into your tat, your werecat-problem. You owe her.” I enunciated the last three words in case he was still as stupid about women as I remembered.
Rick frowned at me as if thinking that one over.
I smiled, or thought I did. My lower face didn’t seem to be working properly. “And she’s my friend, so you will not be mad at her.”
Friend. That was interesting. With the exception of Molly Everhart, I’d been a total loner until I came to New Orleans. Now I had friends and family everywhere. “We talk every now and then,” I added. “Mostly when she needs info she can’t get through PsyLED databases.”
Nell seemed to think I needed to be told how Rick was doing. Everyone seemed to think I needed to be told about him. I got that. Our parting was public and humiliating. It hurt.
Rick put my comments together and one side of his mouth went up in a broken smile. “I’m sorry, Jane. I can’t fix what I was or what I did. But I can use my gifts to help you rescue your people.”
Behind me, Alex said, “We might need him, Janie.”
I wanted to snarl. Instead, I said, “Follow orders. Do what you’re told. Stay out of my way.” I gave him my back in a catty insult and went to my room. Shut the door and leaned against it, eyes closed in the dark. I wasn’t grieving for losing him. I wasn’t angry, not even at the public betrayal. I was more, just, empty. There was some tiny dark hole in my soul home, a place where Rick LaFleur had taken root, and that small dark place was still empty. Empty where those roots had been ripped away. I had healed around it, but the soil there hadn’t regrown. Bruiser . . . he was rooted down inside me someplace else, had filled a different empty place. Bigger, stronger. Better. But Rick’s empty place was still a void.
Time doesn’t heal all emotional wounds. Often they scar over, leaving abnormal psychic tissue, faulty emotional patterns, sometimes with an absence of sensation at all. That was how I felt about Rick. Scarred and empty.
My soul home wasn’t a green growing place, but a dark empty cavern where roots might grow. Roots, but nothing green. Nothing living. I wasn’t sure what that might mean.
I took a deep breath and paused, taking in the scent of . . . werewolf. I flipped on the lights.
Brute was lying on my new bed. “You know better than to get on my bed,” I growled. “This your way of telling me I haven’t bought your fancy bed yet?”
Brute snapped at me, a doggie grin that said he had one-upped me. A glint of steel appeared between the white wolf’s ears and Pea, or maybe Bean, pulled herself up to the crest of his head, her little nose wrinkled and sniffing. The neon green grindylow chittered in irritation, showing teeth.
I grunted. “I take it this isn’t a coincidence. You’re here to help hunt down the missing vamps.” Brute just stared at me, though I knew he understood every word. I sighed and snapped my fingers, pointed at the floor. “Get off my new bed. Those sheets were clean.” When neither moved, I raised my voice. “Now.”
Brute rose to a crouch and stepped to the floor, Pea-or-Bean holding on with her steel claws. I opened the door. “There’s a wereleopard in here,” I said to the grindylow. “Don’t bloody up my newly clean floors. If y’all decide to kill each other, take it outside.” Brute trotted past and into the living space. I closed my door, stripped off the wolf-ie sheets, made the bed up with fresh ones, and took out both sets of my remaining Enforcer garb. I had gold and scarlet. I opted for the scarlet because it had been worn and would squeak less. Simple decisions. Easy to make. Not like letting Ricky-Bo LaFleur into my house. That one had been hard. I laid out the clothes and weapons and when I was calmer, I went back out into the living area.
The crew was bigger than I was used to. We had Eli, Edmund, Gee, Derek, Rick, Brute, a grindy, and now Bruiser. My honeybunch had arrived while I was hiding in my room. The guys were all sitting around the table drinking coffee. Gee had his wings out, which was new. The brilliant sapphire plumage with the band of scarlet at the shoulder was folded at his back, with the tips of flight feathers bent and splayed on the floor. Eli saw me first; he got up and poured hot tea into my soup mug and set it before my place. Chairs scooted back and away, leaving me a spot. I stood behind the chair, not sitting, not yet. Eli added Cool Whip from a tub on the table. Stirred. He’d been waiting for me with comfort food. I caught his eyes and gave him a head-tilt thank-you. He gave me one back. This was family.
The tension that had gathered across my shoulders at the first sight of Rick eased. Eli glanced at Gee’s wings and raised his brows. I returned a minuscule agreement. The sight of the wings was an indication of how things had changed recently. Of the secrets that had been revealed for all of us.
Bruiser watched the exchange with a soft smile on his face, as if he knew how I felt about family, though we had never talked about the subject. That was a discussion for after the three-magical-words conversation. He crossed his legs and I realized he was wearing Enforcer garb, but his wasn’t leather. It was some kind of water-wicking poly-nylon-plastic-something material.
I caught a fold of cloth between my finger and thumb and rubbed it. The crackle of magic snapped between the pads of my fingers. “Nice,” I said.
Bruiser’s smile widened. “Then you’ll be happy with the package beneath your chair.”
Trying not to grab it like a kid with a present, I reached under and pulled a brown grocery bag out. Inside was a folded block of charcoal-and-black cloth. I grinned at him. He laughed softly at me. I did not look at Rick. Not once. Until Bruiser said, “PsyLED provided us with their newest gear. Spelled and top of the line.”
I remembered what Rick had said when I let him in. I set the uniform back into the bag and took my chair. To Rick I said, “Thank you.” If my voice was a little cold, well, I forgave myself. The mug filled with comfort tea said, ME? CRAZY? I SHOULD GET DOWN OFF THIS UNICORN AND SLAP YOU. I hadn’t seen it before. I liked. I said, “The warehouse on the videos. Is it in the circled section of the city provided by the local witches?”
Alex spun a tablet to me. “Here.” He pointed. “Building was bought and paid for by the Marchands when they were consolidating their power base. It comes with a lightning rod, like a nice pretty bow.”
I studied the maps, seeing the rod and the surrounding area. It was within two miles of the place where the car transporting Grégoire had been ditched. For the first time, a small flame of excitement blazed up in me. All the pieces had come together. “What do we know about the inside of the building?” I asked as I took my mug and drank.
Alex said, “Nothing on file anywhere since original construction. Building was designed and erected with the ability to move walls around and add drop ceilings, and it’s been owned by seven companies since it was built, so the inside floor plans could look like anything.” He pointed to the sat map of the block. The warehouse and its property took up most of the space, with a high metal gate around the parking area. One corner of the grounds was planted with dying banana trees and lemon trees. The lot was mostly broken pavement with weeds growing through. School buses and bread-truck-sized trucks were parked there.
“The building
itself is U-shaped,” he continued, “with the wider, longer body on the side street. The arm of the U on St. Louis Street seems to be the front, with a public entrance, connected with a metal-roofed, unwalled passageway to this other building at the side”—Alex tapped the screen—“which turns out to be a taqueria called Pepe’s that sends food trucks into the city.” He tapped still shots of the bread trucks and showed us photos of the restaurant’s employees taken from security cameras along the nearby streets. They were all dressed in black jeans and black long-sleeved tees, with black hats with Pepe’s logo: a bunch of red and green peppers. “The addresses are owned by the same privately held property company but are under different rental and lease agreements, with a shared parking area. Also, there’s nothing to stop them from sharing internal space or entrances, though we only see the shared parking.”
“So collateral damage concerns may have gone up,” Eli said. On the other tablet was a floor plan schematic with electrical and HVAC diagrams, showing the original plans for the warehouse site when it was built in the sixties. “Roof supports are here, here, here, and here.” Eli tapped the screen. “Walls could be up anywhere between, in any configuration.”
Derek pointed, indicating the arms and body of the U. “Front arm on St. Louis is alpha, side is beta, back is gamma. St. Louis entrance is six. This door”—he pointed to a narrow door off the parking area, one on the entrance arm of the U that faced the front of the building—“is five. Probably was originally an employee entrance and check-in office.” He was assigning Greek alphabet names to the parts of the building and clock-face numbers to entrances. Even I could follow that. “Side entrance near the taco joint and parking lot is three.” He pointed to a garage door inside the parking area on the small, back side of the U-arm. “Let’s call it two o’clock. Odd location. Can’t see a reason for it to be here. No way for trucks to back up to it easily for offloading. Along the back side of the property.” He pointed. “Gated entrance for the trucks. Twelve.”
Rick said, “These are old plans, but they seem to line up with the sat maps, except the garage door entrance at two. Entrances may be compromised or relocated. Brute and I could jog around the block and see how many scents we pick up.”
“Yeah, that’s real stealthy,” Eli said. “Like no one’s going to get suspicious of a man and a white wolf out jogging at night. In a winter storm.” His voice added, You idiot, but he didn’t say it.
I finished off my tea with a final slurp. “If a couple goes in together in the middle of a fight, they can make a scene, a big one, in the corner away from the door. Rick can get in and scoot around back.”
Rick blinked once, almost methodically. Eli’s eyes lit up with laughter. He said, “I get to insult you.”
“When insulted, some women hit first and ask questions later,” Bruiser said, a teasing glint in his eyes.
“So, typecasting,” Alex said, tapping on a tablet.
“Ha-ha,” I said. “Not.”
“Once before I used simple radio communication signals,” Gee said. “I can fly above the site and provide overhead camera angles. I can also receive orders and suggestions. I’ll need a waterproof and magicproof system.”
Eli said, “I’m guessing your magic would short out anything ultra-high-tech.”
“It is always possible. Now would not be the time to test it.”
“Okay.” Eli opened the weapons room, studying his gear. The guys all followed him, the lure of toys too much to pass up. I stayed at my place, sipping tea, watching. Eli gave out communications gear consisting of earbuds and tiny mics, all attached to small boxes via curly wires that went down the back of the neck. The box went on a belt at the back. It wasn’t military or Secret Service quality, but it was okay. While they checked the devices, I took the new armor back to my room and gathered my weapons into a gear bag big enough to hold them and towels and a change of street clothes. I repacked my gobag and added three oversized plastic bags with zippered closures for wet gear.
I tried on the new armor. The two-piece armored uniform was unpleasant on my skin even with silk-knit long underwear. The magic was crackly-feeling, but it would breathe, it would shed water, it had built-in armor, it was spelled to resist attack spells, it was warm, and it was dry. Mostly that. I peeled it and the long underwear off, rolled them up together, and tossed them into the gobag. Once I stomped into the expandable boots made of similar water-wicking material, I reassessed my wardrobe looking for something eye-catching. I pulled on a dancing skirt and rolled the waistband down, making it into a short hoochie-coochie skirt; pulled on a thin top; then added a belt and a beat-up leather moto jacket. I looked at myself in a mirror. Only the boots were a practical fashion choice in the winter storm. The rest of me looked trashy, which was sorta the goal. Score! I smeared on scarlet lipstick, braided my hair, and went into the foyer, where I could hear the boys chatting about weapons and gear. No one gave a wolf whistle or made a comment about the outfit, though I had to admit their reticence might be due to the nine-mil I was carrying, and my glare.
The rain had eased and we headed out. I was almost in the SUV when I remembered one more important thing. I tossed the oversized gobag to Eli and raced back inside, where I grabbed the cooler from the laundry room. It was starting to stink, even with the excellent rubber seals. Two rotting vamp heads and a rotten rev head might come in handy. Who knew what the night would bring.
I stopped at the living room entrance, watching the Kid. “Your guards will be here in a bit. Keep the shotgun handy until they check in and prove to be ours.”
“Yes, Mooooom,” he said, without looking up. But there was a gun on the floor at his feet.
“While we’re gone see if you can find a link between Adrianna, Titus, Louis, Bethany, Katie, and Bâtard, or any combination of the above. Something that would tie them all together for hundreds of years.” I thought about the painting in Leo’s office. Yeah. There could be something in historical records.
Alex looked up at that one, his young face pulled tight in thought. “Adrianna is British. Maybe Celtic? The Romans conquered the British Isles before the first Mithran was created. If a Roman took servants and slaves back to Rome, Adrianna could have been one. Then when Titus came back from the holy lands a vamp, he might have bought her. Ended up with her somehow. Turned her himself?” He shrugged. “Too many variables.”
“She didn’t have Celtic or tribal tattoos that I noticed. But if you’re right, then that would make her as old as the priestesses. A first- or second-generation vamp.” I remembered the first time I saw her, as she attacked me at a party. Cold power had flowed from her like icy air from a glacier; her red hair, curly and wild, fanned out around her; and her blue eyes were not quite sane. Adrianna was powerful enough to be a master of a blood family, but in New Orleans she had only risen to the position of first scion of St. Martin. If she was a sleeper agent, planted in Clan Pellissier decades, even centuries before . . .
“And you killed her.” Alex’s eyes held mine. “And Immanuel.”
Both of us were thinking about how that might affect everything relating to all that was going on. None of it felt good. I’d been trying to kill Adrianna from the first moment I saw her. Now I had succeeded. And I had to wonder if I had messed up monumentally.
“I’ll see what I can find out,” he said into the silence. “You should take some of your magical stuff. Just in case. Lock it into the weapons cache in the back of the SUV.”
“Are you worried they’ll attack here and take it?”
“I’m worried that you need more weapons than we think. Take a few of them. Keep my brother alive.”
I stepped into my room and picked up le breloque. It vibrated against my fingertips as I slipped my arm through the circle to carry it. A shock of power rammed up my arm and I nearly dropped it. “Stop that!” I said to it.
Alex laughed in the other room. “You talking to inanimate
objects?”
“Maybe. Maybe not,” I muttered, too low to hear. I left the small box of magical trinkets, except for the former blood diamond, now called the Glob, a weapon designed with my blood, body, lightning, and magic. A weapon I had no idea how to use. I wasn’t worried about it falling into the wrong hands. The only hands that could use it were mine. And I had a bad feeling that an angel had plans for it.
At the thought, my cell rang. Molly’s number. Molly, who should be at the bottom of a gorge with no cell reception, camping. I answered, knowing who it was, who it had to be. “Angie?”
“Aunt Jane. My angel is watching over you.”
My eyes teared up. I found it hard to speak for a moment. “Thank you, Angie Baby,” I managed. The call ended. I had a feeling that if I called back, the call wouldn’t go through, to the bottom of a gorge. I was pretty sure that Angie’s magic had made the call happen. I looked around the room for Hayyel, who wasn’t there. “Okay. I’ll take any help you might want to give.”
I carried out the cooler and the magical stuff. The former blood diamond I tucked into my gobag when I got to the SUV. The others went into the weapons cache as the Kid suggested. Ordered. Whatever. I did as I was told.
• • •
New Orleans was old. Like hundreds of years old, one of the first port cities, back when the land was colonial and run by the . . . European monarchs. Right. There were parts of New Orleans that had burned and not been restored, where buildings had been demolished or had fallen down and hadn’t been rebuilt. Other sections hadn’t been fully restored from Katrina. Still other areas had been upgraded and spiffed up to look pretty nifty. The Greenway fell into both categories. Currently, parts of it were muddy, weedy, eroded chunks of real estate, surrounded and segmented by walkways and ill-kept streets, sections of which hadn’t been paved since the days of the Kingfish, Huey Long, and his huge modernization and reform of Louisiana. Long had possibly been a demagogue, but he had built roads and bridges and infrastructure and he had believed in and worked for the people. Not much good had happened in the state since he was assassinated at age forty-two. The greenway upgrades were an attempt to correct that.