by Martha Carr
Six other magicals turned the corner to join him. The last one was twice the size of the biggest thug among them and his slicked-back hair and eyebrows were coated in a thick layer of glittering frost.
Great. They brought a Crystal too.
“You should be more careful where you throw spells,” Lisa said as she moved her hand slowly to the open zipper of her jacket.
“And you should be more careful where you go sniffin’ around in shit that don’t concern you.” The wizard sneered and summoned a bright, swirling ball of the same yellow magic. “’Cause now, you’re fucked.”
“I don’t know what you’ve heard—”
“And you don’t need to.” A man with long brown hair tied back in a ponytail and a well-groomed goatee examined her derisively and sniggered. “We heard you’re askin’ too many questions about Boneblade. If people do that, sweetheart, they don’t stick around long enough to find the answers.”
Johnny glanced at her with a somewhat smug expression. “Told you.”
“Yeah, I get it. Leave ʼem breathing, huh?”
He shrugged. “As long as they cooperate.”
Rex and Luther lowered their heads and snarled at the thugs.
“So you’re Boneblade,” Lisa said and inched her hand slowly into her open jacket to draw her firearm.
“The first and the last you’re gonna see.” The wizard launched his spell at her and she ducked before the yellow light careened into the wall of the alley.
She thrust her hand toward him and released a roaring fireball that caught him in the shoulder. He shouted and clapped a hand over the charred bomber jacket, and the rest of the Boneblade members charged.
Johnny yanked his knife from his belt and flicked it open. “Let ʼem have it, boys.”
“I never tasted wizard before.” Luther snarled and darted toward the oncoming thugs.
“Rip his throat out!” Rex howled and launched after his brother.
The goateed man with the ponytail shucked his jacket and shirt before he shifted in mid-run into a shaggy brown wolf to meet the hounds in the center of the alley.
The Crystal trundled forward with a dark chuckle and blasted a stream of tinkling ice shards at Johnny. The dwarf ducked the attack and brought his knife up to slice at the ribcage of another wizard who laughed wildly as he swung a heavy club toward him. The laugh cut short abruptly and the wizard stumbled sideways with a cry of pain and a shallow incision through his shirt and flesh.
A witch with bright green hair launched two red orbs of light toward Johnny. He snatched the lid of a trashcan by the handle and held it in front of his face before the red orbs exploded with crackling light and pelted the metal. As soon as it failed, he lowered the lid and tossed it at her like a frisbee. She didn’t have time to cast another spell before the spinning edge of the projectile caught her in the throat. With a gurgled protest, she choked and dropped to her knees, gasping for breath.
“Do you wanna play explosives? Fine.” The dwarf reached into the inside pocket of his leather jacket and retrieved a round black disk two inches thick. He punched the button on the top and lobbed it down the alley. A Boneblade Wood Elf who raised his gun toward him jerked his head to the side to avoid the spinning disk, then sniggered and aimed.
He shrugged at his would-be assailant and smirked seconds before the device he’d built himself detonated behind the elf. It launched the Boneblade member forward onto his face, and the gun lurched from his hand to clatter across the alley. Johnny ducked beneath the Crystal’s next icy attack, switched his blade from his right hand to his left, and picked the Wood Elf’s gun up. “That was fun, right?”
Lisa grunted as she grappled with another wizard’s firearm and disarmed him. She cracked the butt of his weapon across his head and leveled his weapon at him before he’d even landed. “Don’t move.”
The magical with the charred shoulder summoned another spell aimed at her, and she squeezed a shot off with the gang member’s weapon that struck him in the thigh. His spell snuffed out as he screamed and fell, clutching his leg. “The fireball wasn’t enough? Come on.”
With a roar, the Crystal stormed toward them, leaving a trail of frozen footsteps in his wake. A gusting, freezing wind kicked up in the alley, blocking Lisa’s view with the instantly materializing blizzard.
Another gunshot filled the alley. The large attacker roared and fell and the concrete trembled beneath him.
The blizzard faded, and Johnny looked at the wizard’s gun in distaste. “I guess that’ll do.”
“Thanks.” Lisa smoothed her hair away from her face and looked at the Boneblade thugs sprawled on the alley paving, groaning and clutching their non-lethal wounds. “I should call this in.”
On their left, Rex and Luther had cornered the shifter against the wall and snarled at him, snapping their jaws as the wolf bristled and growled.
“Good work, boys.” The dwarf strode toward them.
“If we take these assholes in,” Lisa said as she threw the weapon that didn’t belong to her across the alley behind her, “we can get far more information about who’s running the show.”
“I’m not gonna stop you.” Johnny glanced at the witch, who was still choking and holding her half-crushed throat. A dark-red light bloomed beneath her palms and he aimed the wizard’s gun at her. “Whatever you’re tryin’ to do, don’t.”
“Johnny.” Rex snapped at the shifter. “What do we do with this one?”
“I can take him,” Luther added. “He’s slow.”
“Keep him there for a sec.” He stepped toward the witch. “Can you talk?”
She sneered at him. “Boneblade’s gonna rip you apart!”
“That’s a yes. We’re looking for a kid—”
The woman responded with a dry, raspy chuckle. “Good luck.”
“Now, see, that’s not the kinda answer I’m lookin’ for—”
A quick scuffle, snarl, and yelp came from the hounds and the shifter.
“Johnny! Hey, let him go!” Luther leapt toward the shifter who now had his brother pinned to the ground. He snarled and snapped at the brown wolf who stood with his forepaw crushing Rex’s throat. “Get off!”
The wolf snapped at Luther, and Johnny forgot all about interrogating the witch.
The dwarf squeezed a shot off and struck the shifter in the hip. The wolf yelped but didn’t release his pressure on the hound’s neck.
“Off!” He leveled the gun at the wolf’s face. “You touched my dog. Now, you’re dead.”
The shifter snarled at him and pressed even harder. Rex bucked and squirmed under the pressure, and Luther darted forward to clamp his jaws around the wolf’s bleeding hip. The beast howled, and Johnny took the opening.
He dropped the gun, switched his knife into his right hand, and swept the blade into the wolf’s chest a little below the neck as he barreled into the shifter’s shaggy hide. Both wolf and dwarf thumped against the wall of the alley.
Rex scrambled to his feet with a whimper and turned to snarl at his assailant. “Fuck you, asshole!”
“You get him, Johnny?” Luther looked from his brother to their master. “You get him?”
The shifter melted into his naked human form as Johnny jerked his blade from the man’s chest. Staring at his assailant with wide eyes, the man coughed bubbles of blood that dribbled into his neat goatee and stopped moving.
“Johnny—” Lisa started.
“Hey!” The shot and burned wizard tried to get to his feet. “You’ll fucking pay for that, you—”
Johnny spun and threw his knife into the man’s neck. As the other maimed Boneblade members protested and tried to rise for another fight, the dwarf picked up the other wizard’s stolen gun and fired three more rounds. The Crystal and two other magicals fell with bullet holes in their heads, and he hurled the gun down the alley. “I can’t believe this still has decent aim.”
The Wood Elf and the witch scrambled to their feet and bolted away in the direction from whic
h they’d come. She tripped over the Crystal’s outstretched hand, uttered a croaked shout of surprise, and lurched against the alley wall before they vanished around the corner.
Johnny sniffed and knelt beside Rex. “How you doin’ buddy?”
“Like I got stepped on by a wolf.” The dog licked his muzzle and let his master examine him. “Thanks.”
“We’re a team. Luther?”
“I’m good. They’re getting away, Johnny.”
“Not fast enough.” He petted Rex’s head and stood to look at Lisa. “Shall we?”
“Shall we what?” She looked at the Boneblade bodies that littered the alley and shook her head. “Five bodies wasn’t enough? I said I was gonna call it in.”
“And then that fucker tried to choke my dog.”
“And now we don’t have anyone to question. What are you doing?”
“Lighten up, huh?” He nodded down the alley to where the two living gang members had disappeared. “I’m a Level Five and I have a license to take out the trash however I want.”
“That doesn’t explain why you let them go.”
“Huh.” He approached the dead wizard with his knife still in this throat and stepped on the guy’s chest to pull the blade out and wipe it on the side of his jeans. “I assumed you would have realized we need someone to trail.”
Narrowing her eyes, Lisa glanced at the hounds as they turned to face the end of the alley, then shrugged. “Lead the way.”
“You heard her, boys. Let’s go huntin’.”
Chapter Seven
Rex and Luther remained on the escaped Boneblade members’ scent across Manhattan to a mid-town West Side social club. From across the street on the other side of the back parking lot, the two watched the witch and the Wood Elf barrel through the back door of the Nightlights social club and disappear inside.
“We’ll go in quietly, boys. Understand?”
“Got it.”
Rex’s nose zig-zagged across the ground. “Still got the scent, Johnny.”
Lisa folded her arms and scanned the back of the building. “You want to follow them in there.”
“It’s not like they have anyone guarding the back door.” He looked challengingly at her and adjusted the long loops of coiled rope over his arm. “You handled yourself fine in that alley. You’ll be fine in there too.”
He pushed into a jog across the street toward the parking lot that could only fit a maximum of ten cars. His hounds trotted quickly at his side.
Lisa glanced up and down the street and hurried after them. “I was better than fine, Johnny. I know how to handle myself.”
“Yeah, that’s what I said.” He paused at the back door to let her catch up, grasped the handle, and found it unlocked. “They made this too damn easy.”
He held the door open for his dogs, gestured for her to step inside first, then followed and let the door bang shut behind him. No one heard it over the constant drone of conversation, laughter, and clinking glasses in the front of the club. The hallway was dark there, and the wounded Boneblade members hadn’t lingered to see if they were followed.
“Johnny, up here.” Rex panted and stopped at the bottom of a narrow stairwell on the left.
“Ooh, yeah. That’s blood.” Luther sniffed at the second step. “The elf’s.”
“Head on up.” He strode after them and made no effort to hide the clomp of his boots on the stairs beneath the noise of the crowded club.
Lisa glanced at the front of the establishment, then headed grudgingly up the stairwell. “So you randomly choose the stairs, huh?”
“Hounds don’t do random, darlin’. Not even in the city.” He turned and pointed at a smear of blood barely visible on the dark wall. “Plus, I reckon you’d call that evidence, yeah?”
Her eyes widened at the blood smear and she didn’t say anything else.
They reached the second floor, and Rex and Luther continued down the hall with their noses to the floor. It wasn’t that hard to find the room where the wounded members had taken refuge. The doorknob was covered in blood too. Johnny gestured toward the door and stepped back to let the agent take the honors if she wanted.
She drew her service weapon and stepped forward to jerk the door open. Before she could even identify herself in the dimly lit room, the witch jumped from behind the open door and another red orb materialized in her hand. Lisa raised her elbow and swung it into the witch’s throat. The other woman staggered, dragged a gasped breath, and her eyes rolled back in her head.
Johnny and the dogs thrust in after the agent, and the Wood Elf seated in a desk chair while he tried to wrap a tourniquet around his leg scrambled to stand.
“Don’t move.” The dwarf whipped his blade out again and pointed it at their quarry, who snarled despite how pale he’d grown.
The elf lunged forward, and Rex leapt at him and thrust him against the rolling chair and to the floor. “Get it off me!”
The hound snapped at him and pressed a paw on the magical’s throat. A string of saliva dripped onto his captive’s forehead. “Not so fun, is it?”
Luther skidded to a stop behind the elf and snarled at his head. “Wood Elf. That tastes like squirrel, I bet.”
Johnny stepped around Rex and placed his boot on the captive’s chest as Lisa closed the door and locked it. Both hounds backed away with low growls. The dwarf’s glinting blade-tip pressed against their prisoner’s neck, and the dwarf leaned forward with a grimace of distaste. “It looks like someone will be demoted, asshole.”
“Fuck you.”
“Sorry. I’m not into Wood Elves. But you have bigger problems on your hands right now, so don’t feel bad.”
The Boneblade member sneered and tried to shake the puddle of dog drool off his forehead. “You’re dead.”
“No, your buddies in that alley are dead. Whoever sent you thought you could eliminate me, Agent Breyer over here, and two coonhounds. But you failed. And now, the Feds know where you and the chokey witch hang out. There are probably many more of you who frequent the establishment too. Do you think your boss is gonna be happy about that?”
The Wood Elf grimaced beneath the blade pressed against his throat and it drew a small bead of blood. “What do you want?”
“Start talking about the girl.”
The prisoner started to chuckle but stopped when his Adam’s apple bobbed against the knifepoint. “Which one?”
“Amanda Coulier.” Lisa moved toward the desk where the elf had been seated and the three computer monitors on it. “Your gang killed her family and took her two days ago.”
“You mean the one with the twin? I knew we should have taken ʼem both.” The man sniggered.
“Keep laughing and it’ll be the last time you think anything is funny.” Johnny leaned over his knee and his boot remained planted on the magical’s chest. “Where’s the girl?”
“The little bitch is waiting for auction, asshole.”
“What auction?”
“Fuck you.”
The dwarf sighed. “I thought we covered this.” He drove the handle of his blade into the elf’s temple, and the magical’s eyes rolled in his head.
Lisa scowled at the groaning, mostly unconscious Wood Elf. “What are you doing?”
“Getting a better angle.” He slid his knife onto his belt and hauled the Boneblade member up by the front of his shirt. Almost carelessly, he dropped him forward again to thump face-first onto the floor. “If he tries anything, boys, feel free to take the softest pieces.”
“Nice.” Luther licked his muzzle. “Wait, what parts are those?”
“Any parts when he’s flopping around on the floor like that, huh?” Rex’s low chuckle filled Johnny’s mind. “You can bite his ass this time. I’ve had enough after the last guy.”
The dwarf pulled the coils of rope off his shoulder and got to work securing the Wood Elf. When he had finished, he dragged the magical to the other side of the room and propped him halfway up against the wall. “Like a trussed pi
g. It’s a good look on you, dipshit.”
The prisoner’s eyelids fluttered and he uttered a small moan.
“Look alive, son.” He smacked the elf’s cheek and squatted in front of him. “We’re only getting started.”
Lisa glanced at the witch, who lay in a crumpled heap. The woman was still breathing, at least, but that was the only sign she was still alive.
“What…” The Wood Elf groaned, realized he’d been bound, and struggled against the ropes. “Fuck. My head.”
“That’s nothin’. If you can talk, you can think.” Johnny slapped him again. “What auction?”
The elf’s head rocked back against the wall. “Quit hittin’ me.”
“Quit being a fucking moron. What auction?”
“Okay, okay. Jesus.” The magical blinked heavily and licked the split corner of his mouth and the blood that trickled toward his chin. “All the merchandise gets put up for auction. The girl you want will go to the highest bidder.”
“Where do we find whoever that is?”
“You don’t. Not yet. It’s all done on the dark web. The bidding’s already started.” He grunted. “Come on. I can’t feel my hands.”
“Good.” The dwarf stood, snapped his fingers, and pointed at the prisoner. “Keep an eye on him, boys.”
“Yeah, I’ll watch him all night.” Luther trotted toward the elf and growled as he stood over the trussed magical.
“Move. I dare you.” When the prisoner looked at Rex, the hound snapped in his face.
The elf lurched away and slid too far to the side to right himself before he fell sideways against the wall. “Shit.”
Johnny stalked toward the computers on the table. “Dark web.”
“So I heard.” With a small smile, Lisa conceded his effectiveness. “And I didn’t even have to flash my badge.”
“So now we’re on the same page.” He studied the monitors on the table, which displayed an order page for cases of liquor, a guest list for the club, and someone’s last Google search for how to cut out an ingrown hair. “We need to find this auction.”
“I’m very sure I can get us in.” She raised her eyebrows when the dwarf stared at her in disbelief. “So if you don’t mind…”