by Dora Blume
✭✭✭
Magnus waited until his wife had reached the top of the stairs then turned to Erik. “Follow me, us men get the lower floors. Wouldn’t want us staying on the same floor as the ladies. Damn, traditional southern values.” Magnus continues to grumble as he walked.
Erik couldn’t help but laugh, “Yeah, women, right?”
“Tell me about it, that woman has me so tied up, I can’t even take a shit without asking her permission.” He shrugged and continued down the hall.
Erik followed shaking his head; he couldn’t believe that someone as powerful as Magnus was taking orders from a woman. Magnus showed him the stairs to the basement.
“Wow, you weren’t kidding. We get the basement, huh?” Erik smirked toward Magnus.
“Yep, we get the basement. Don’t worry; it’s as nice down here as it is upstairs. She wanted to make sure I had a nice man cave. She’d never let a guest stay in anything but luxury.” Magnus grumbled, “I, on the other hand, get to sleep on the couch when she decides. Tons of rooms in this house and I get the couch.”
He showed Erik into the first room on the right. He wasn’t kidding about the man cave. He could see down the hall into a billiard room. “Is that a pool table down the hall?” Erik couldn’t help but ask.
“Yep,” Magnus responded quickly, then went back to showing him the room. He walked in and opened another door. “Here you have your bathroom.” He pointed to the other door, “and a closet if you need it.” He looked down at Erik’s bag. “Okay, that about covers it. I’ll be upstairs if you need me. We eat at six, sharp.” He moved out of the room quickly. Erik could tell he didn’t like having to be the host, especially with his wife around.
Erik grabbed up his bag and set it on the bed. He kicked his shoes in the corner and sat in the chair behind the large mahogany desk. He couldn’t believe the inlaid of the desk. It was beautiful; he knew there weren’t too many desks like this one. He pulled out his phone to message Jessie to see where they were, and when they would arrive. He finished and set the phone on the desk. He was relieved that Sloane asked for some alone time because he was beat. The flight wore him out, and he was going to catch a nap before they had to get back to work. He knew that once Bryant was here, they’d be on a mad dash to figure everything out. He wanted to rest before they were on the hunt again. He hoped Sloane was doing the same so that they could find out about the missing teens.
Chapter 2
After a few hours, Erik woke to a start. He heard something crash in the adjacent room. He got out of bed quickly and opened his door. Magnus was bent over in front of a bookshelf. Books lay scattered and opened at his feet. He bent to retrieve two, closed them and placed them back on the shelf. He muttered to himself, “Damn, stupid, god-forsaken shelf.”
“Do you need any help?” Erik asked.
“Oh no, I’m just a little clumsy sometimes.” Magnus waved his hand and went back to picking up the books. His short, sausage-like fingers couldn’t hold more than two books at a time.
Erik bent next to Magnus and picked up a pile of books, stacking them on his knee. “It’s alright; I needed to get up anyway.”
“Did you sleep well?” Magnus asked after he stacked the last novel on the shelf.
“Yes, I did, thank you.” Erik took a step toward the office door. “If you’ll excuse me, a second.” He headed back into the room to check his phone. He wanted to know how far away from Bryant and the rest were. Erik looked to his phone; there was a message from Jess. Hey, made it to Nebraska. Bryant is checking with a friend then we’ll be on the road again. Can’t wait to see you.
Erik knew that Bryant planned to talk with a few other members before getting to Colorado, but he couldn’t imagine who was living in Lincoln Nebraska.
Erik headed back to Magnus. He found him sitting at a desk with papers scattered across the top; some lay on the floor next to the desk. Magnus had one hand splayed over one stack while his other hand held another. He was frantically looking from one to the other. “So, it sounds like they’ve made it to Lincoln Nebraska where they’re stopping and talking to a few people, before continuing to us.”
“Ah yes, of course, they’re most likely stopping to talk with Alex before they head here. He’ll know anything going on in his area. It wouldn’t surprise me if some demons were hiding out in such an inconspicuous place. There’s also a lot of power hiding out in Lincoln.” Magnus nodded to himself “Very smart stop indeed,” he said again to himself as he grabbed another stack of papers and set it on top of the one directly in front of him.
These papers are a little chaotic, Erik thought.
“Yes, I work well with Chaos,” Magnus answered.
Erik's mouth dropped, and his eyes were wide. “What?”
“It can be annoying, I certainly didn’t want to know what my wife was thinking, but suddenly there it was.” He looked up to Erik. “I suppose I should explain; I can copy other powers from those who are near me. I can read minds right now because you can. I guess you could call it a sort of transference. I haven’t gotten anything from Sloane, but yours was pretty easy to pick up and copy.” He smiled.
“Oh, that’s interesting. Bryant said you were very powerful.” Erik sat in the chair in front of the desk. His father had been right, being able to copy anyone’s powers made Magnus powerful and interesting indeed.
“So, is Jolene powerful too, or is she normal, so to speak?” Erik was curious. Shikari marries other Shikari, always. Other people weren’t allowed to know about them. It was a rule; if you were to marry, you had to marry another Shikari hunter. Erik had never been serious enough with anyone to even think about it, but since he had Jess, he hadn’t needed to. Amy shouldn’t have even known about them, but that was on Sloane, not him. He wondered for a moment if Sloane had even talked to her since Minneapolis. She didn’t have a place in their life, but he thought it would be rude if she cut her out entirely.
“Yes, she’s one of us. She can blow shit up if she wants to. Don’t make her angry, trust me. She lit the damn couch on fire when she was angry with me.” Magnus shook his head remembering.
“So, if she can blow things up, can’t you do it too?” Erik was curious as to how far his power extended, and how it worked.
“Yes, I can copy her power. I haven’t needed to, and I sure as hell am not going to use it back on her. She’s fucking crazy.” His eyes darted to the door then back to Erik, then to the ceiling.
“So, what’s Sloane’s power? I haven’t gotten a read on her, yet.”
“She can see the future, but it doesn’t always work.” He knew firsthand how Sloane’s power wasn’t as helpful as Bryant and everyone thought.
“Ah, yes powers like that can be temperamental,” he smiled.
“Speaking of Sloane, I might go up and let her know what’s going on. We need to talk to the girl who was kidnapped by the demons.” He started for the door. “Ah, so where is she staying?” he asked.
“She’s up the stairs, in the third room on the left. She may be sleeping. You both seemed exhausted when you arrived.” Magnus shrugged.
He took two steps toward the door, turned, and said, “Thanks.” He bounded up the stairs and knocked on Sloane’s door.
“Come in,” she called.
He opened the door and popped his head in first.
“Hey, ah Jessie, Mike, and Bryant made it to Lincoln, and are stopping to talk to a few people before they continue here. Magnus said there’s someone there named Alex that’s head of the area.” Erik sat in the chair near the window. Sloane sat on her bed with her laptop opened in front of her.
“Yeah, they’ll probably stay the night before they head out. Alex, huh? I wonder who that is.” She looked up from her computer, staring into space then went right back to it.
“What are you doing exactly?” Erik asked.
“Checking the local scene. I want an idea of where we should start.” She looked up from her computer. “Do you have any idea where we sh
ould start?”
“Ah, not really I thought we should talk to the girl who was kidnapped, first.”
“Oh, Jolene gave me the report from her questioning, already. Not much there to help. She was out with some friends, the next thing she knew, she was in a strange house. Her father found her and dispossessed her. She didn’t have much to share. Here, see for yourself.” She handed the report to Erik.
“Were the friends Shikari members?”
“No, just some regular kids from school. Her father kept her in a public school in Denver, Mullen, I guess. The friends said she was meeting up with some guy. It wasn’t all that strange for her to meet up with new guys.” Sloane typed a few keys on the keyboard before focusing on the screen again.
“One friend said he was a college guy. They’d met near campus a week before her disappearance. She gave the description in the report, but she didn’t know much beyond that.”
“Yeah, I think the college may be a good place to start.”
“What’s the deal with college students?”
“No idea, I’m doing some research to see where we want to go.” She focused back on her computer.
“What have you discovered?” Erik asked. He perched behind her to see the computer screen.
“I think we should start tonight in Lodo. It seems to be the best spot for nightlife. Tomorrow we can head out to the U of Colorado and check out the campus.” She closed her computer.
“Sounds good to me. When do you want to start?”
She looked him up and down “Um, you need to go shower and change before you’re going to any club with me.” Her voice was filled with both annoyance and authority.
He glanced down at himself. “Oh yeah, okay, so, what maybe in an hour?”
“Do you even know what time it is?” she asked.
“Well, no, I don’t,” he admitted.
“We’ll be joining our hosts for dinner in about thirty minutes, so you should probably go get ready for that first. I don’t think it’s a good idea to show up at the club at seven We’ll do some more research and maybe check out any other reports before going to the club” She continued her authoritative tone which Erik found to be annoying. He’d forgotten his sister’s desire to be in charge of things. He’d always been the leader, making leadership decisions as his father had. Now, Sloane was leading him. It felt strange to him to be doing what someone else had planned.
“Oh yeah, I didn’t even realize. Alright, I’ll go get ready for dinner.” He turned and left the room.
Sloane stared at the blank screen on her phone. She was waiting for a text from Mike. She hit the messages app and saw her messages had been delivered. Why wasn’t he answering back? She thought as she stared at the screen. She clicked on his name and began typing. Where are you guys? Why aren’t you answering me? She stared at the words, Do I sound desperate? She wasn’t sure why Mike wasn’t answering her. It was obvious he’d read all her messages. Was a ninth message too many? She felt a knot settle into her stomach. The only reason he wouldn’t be answering, was if he was mad at her. Was he mad enough to end a relationship? She sighed and set her phone face down next to her laptop. She needed to focus. She took a deep breath.
She opened her laptop back up and began researching Denver. She typed into Google, hot spots in Denver for college students. Shit, there were over two million results. She needed to narrow that down. It seemed like lower Denver was popular so they would start there. She was hoping it would be as easy as last time, and they’d find them on a college campus. The only problem was there were like twenty-two colleges in the Denver area. Bryant’s informant said they were in Denver. She wasn’t one hundred percent sure about Bryant’s informant either since he wasn’t exactly giving up who the person was or anything. It was convenient to have Erik around.
She glanced to the clock in the corner of her screen. Shit, dinner was in five minutes. She needed to get downstairs. She reached the dining room, which had been elegantly set for a dinner of four. The pearl plates had gold rims, which matched the wine glasses. Cloth napkins were held by gold rings. In the center was a long glass vase with long-stemmed white lilies. Sloane ran her finger along the petal of a lily, caressing the soft silkiness. She sighed and went into the kitchen to find Jolene. She wanted to tell her how beautiful the table looked.
“Hello?” Sloane called before catching sight of the woman at the stove.
The woman was short and hunched over the stove. Her back looked as if she’d been hunched in that position, holding the weight of service on her shoulders for decades. She jumped when Sloane called and almost dropped the spoon she was holding onto the floor.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to frighten you.” Sloane couldn’t help but move toward the woman.
“Oh, It’s okay. You must be Jolene’s guest. Hi, I’m Penelope. I do the cooking and some of the cleaning here.” Her tone was warm and welcoming.
“Nice to meet you. I’m Sloane. Any idea where Jolene went?” Sloane looked to the other door in the kitchen. She wasn’t sure where everything was in the house.
“Um, I believe she went to go talk to Magnus downstairs, but I wouldn’t disturb them. You can take a seat in the main living quarters, and I can fetch you when dinner is served. It will only be a few minutes.” She smiled and turned back to the skillet. The aroma of garlic and onions wafted to her nostrils. She inhaled heavily, savoring in it before her stomach grumbled in answer.
“It smells so good, Penelope. I’ll be in the main room, thank you.” Sloane turned and headed back to the living room. She thought about heading back to her room but figured she could check her phone down here just as easily. She wished she would have asked where Erik’s room was so she could find him. She figured he was downstairs, but she was going to heed Penelope’s warning not to look for them. She figured there was a reason, or she would have told her where the room was located.
It wasn’t too long before Jolene had come to find her.
“Oh dear, I am so dreadfully sorry. I hope you haven’t been waiting long.” Jolene came right up to Sloane and stood in front of her. She was wearing a black pencil skirt and plum, ruffled blouse.
“Oh no, it’s fine,” Sloane said, standing quickly.
“Oh good, good, Dinner is ready in the dining room. Penelope said that you came looking for me. She is such an amazing cook; you’ll love her.” She waited for Sloane to stand, then walked into the dining room.
Erik and Magnus entered through the kitchen door just as we entered. Sloane gave Erik a look. He wore dark gray button-up collared shirt and black slacks. The silver belt buckle reflected in the light from the chandelier. Sloane smiled, nodding her head in approval. His hair was slicked back from his face, but a few strands fell over his forehead in rebellion. His bright blue eyes stood out in stark contrast to his dark clothing.
“I do hope you were able to rest well.” Jolene looked to both of them.
“Oh yes, your beds are amazing,” Sloane answered.
“Ah yes, I do enjoy my comforts. A good bed is one of them,” Jolene glanced momentarily toward Magnus, then twisted the wedding ring on her finger.
Magnus looked down to his lap, a sly smile spread across his face. Sloane looked to Erik, and one side of his mouth was lifted. Sloane wanted to ask but thought better of it.
“So, what’s the plan for you two this evening?” Magnus asked.
“Oh, we’re heading to lower Denver tonight to check out some clubs. Tomorrow we’ll head to the university campus to see if we can find anything out about the college guy who may be involved with luring our victim.” Sloane explained.
“Oh yes, that sounds like a good place to start.” Magnus nodded and turned to his wife. “Don’t you think so, dear?” Magnus focused on his wife, and for a moment, Sloane wondered if there was something more to that comment, something she may be missing.
“Yes, Magnus, it sounds like a good plan. These two are as beautiful as they are smart, I can see.” She held Magnus�
� gaze, then reached for her wine glass. Realizing a moment late, it was still empty she rose from her chair. “I’m going to see what’s taking Penelope. If you’ll excuse me a moment.”
Sloane looked to Magnus, “You know most of what goes on here correct? Has anything else happened that you would consider out of the ordinary, especially with demons or the order?”
“Well, since the legalization of Marijuana happened, weird is every day here.” He chuckled.
“Okay, besides that, anything with the Shikari? I mean, it’s not like they’re all getting stoned before hunting demons. Unless they have some kind of death wish.” Sloane was concerned with Magnus’ evasiveness. He was avoiding her question which she found suspicious.
“They better not be getting stoned before hunting,” Magnus grumbled.
Erik looked to Sloane and moved his finger to tap his temple twice. She narrowed one eye for a minute; then she looked to her plate as she inhaled sharply. Erik was letting her know that one of them could hear thoughts, too. Clearing her mind as best she could, she took another deep breath. It always felt like an intrusion when she knew someone could hear what she was thinking. She liked that her brother didn’t intrude on her thoughts. At least, he claimed he didn’t. She wouldn’t be able to control herself if she could hear everyone’s thoughts. On the other hand, there were some things you couldn’t unknow once you heard them. She figured his rule of not listening in on friends and family was probably for his sanity as much as anyone else’s privacy.