“You can trust me.”
She pulled away, smiling at me, then her eyes turned to my outfit. “That… is a seriously sexy get-up, but it needs a few tears, a little character. Don’t you think?”
“Do you even own an item of clothes that isn’t ripped up?”
“Nope!” she yelled, smiling, “And I love it. I just love ripping up clothes, it makes them a million times better.” Bastet bounded over to her couch and sprang onto it, sitting on the back of it and planting her feet on the cushions. “So, what brings you to this little giggle I call home?”
“I have a favor to ask of you.”
“A favor? That’s interesting, because I don’t remember you cashing in the last favor I did.”
“Yeah, I know. I guess I’m asking for a little credit.”
“Sweetie, you know that’s not how this works.” She put on her best formal voice. “Only once a favor has been repaid, may a new one be sought.”
“I know, trust me. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t urgent. It’s about the stone.”
Bastet scrambled off the couch and scurried to the corner of the room. “Don’t talk to me about the stone,” she said, a low rumble in her throat.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to…”
“I still hear it, you know. Its infernal song, over, and over, and over, sending my mind to places it doesn’t want to go.” She slapped the side of her head. “I don’t want to hear its song ever again. My people were never meant to hear the music of the aranke.”
“The what?”
“The rifts! The rifts that sing, always singing, always spitting your kind out to this place.” Bastet took a breath and seemed to compose herself. “Sweetie, I want to help you, but I don’t know what we can do here. Are you supposed to owe me two favors?”
“Yeah? I mean, why not?”
“Because. Because. That upsets the balance of things, doesn’t it? There must be balance, otherwise there is no harmony, and if there is no harmony, there can be no love, and without love life itself dies.”
“But that’s why I’m here,” I said, taking a step toward her. “Abvat has the stone now, and… look, I’m not sure about this, but I’m told it has the power to really fuck everything up. I’m talking cataclysmically. All I’m asking is that you scratch my back one more time, and I’ll scratch yours twice. Wouldn’t that be nice?”
Bastet’s already sharp eyes narrowed further. “That would be nice,” she agreed. “I’d like getting scratched, especially from a pretty little kitty like you.” She pretended to bite me from where she stood. Then her eyes shot over to the kitchen counter, and she pointed. “You… I don’t know you.”
Rey, who had been chowing down on a can of tuna, turned his head up and licked his lips. “Me?” I heard it ask.
“You can talk?” Bastet squealed.
“Don’t be stupid. Cats can’t talk,” Rey said… totally talking.
Bastet rushed over to him, shrieking with excitement. “You can talk! How can you talk? Where do you come from? You must have so many stories. Tell me some!”
“That’s… a lot to process, even for me,” Rey said.
I walked over to the kitchen. “You know what, I think this could work,” I said. “How would you like it if Rey kept you company for a little while?”
“Would I?” Bastet agreed, “It’ll be great! I’ll rub your belly, scratch your chin, feed you, all you have to do is use that cute little mouth of yours and give me all your stories. Anyone told you, you kinda sound like Humphrey Bogart?”
“Listen here,” Rey said, “I’m not someone’s property to be bartered off—I’m the king.”
“That’s the spirit, Rey,” I said, scratching him behind the ear, “Take one for the team.”
Rey grumbled, and Bastet squealed again. He didn’t like the idea at first, but once she started scratching him under the chin with those nails of hers, he was purring like a kitten.
“So?” I asked, “Will you help me now?”
“Consider your first favor repaid, only…” Bastet turned to me and sniffed the air. Then she got a little closer, way closer, and sniffed my neck. “Who is he?” she asked.
“He? He who?”
“Don’t play coy with me, sweetie. I want to meet him.”
“There is no him, Bastet. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh… well, then there’s no magic, either.”
“What? I thought we had a deal.”
“Bring him over and we do. He’s up there, isn’t he? On the rooftop?”
She was talking about Draven, because she couldn’t possibly be talking about Crag. The man looked like a boulder with legs, which wasn’t to say he wasn’t without his charm, but he wasn’t exactly my type. To be honest, neither was Draven. He had black hair, he preferred the dark—preferred—and he was terrifying. He was also, however, incredibly beautiful; that I couldn’t escape.
I shut my eyes and nodded. “Alright,” I sighed, “I’ll call him down here, but let’s get started now.”
“Yes. Let’s pick out some new clothes, because you’re going to attract the wrong kind of attention wearing that tight little number. Meow.”
By the time Draven arrived, making his entrance via the same window I’d used, Bastet was already in the magic part of my transformation. I was wearing a ripped-up Sex Pistols t-shirt, a pair of black denim hot pants worn over ripped fishnet tights, and big, studded, black boots that Fate would’ve approved of. I was lucky Bastet and I shared a similar figure, otherwise I’d have had to go and find clothes, and I just didn’t know we had the time for that.
The whole room was filled with whooshing wind, Bastet had her fingers in my hair, her eyes were glowing with mesmerizing green light, and she was whispering in the language of her kind—a language I only knew because of her magic. Already I could feel it working through me; a prickling sensation like when your leg falls asleep, only all over. Bastet shook my head as she whispered, and then she grabbed the sides of my face and shoved me with so much force I staggered and started to fall, but Draven caught me in his arms before I could hit the floor.
I looked up at him, my body limp in his arms. “Oh, hey,” I said, “Fancy meeting you here.”
“Are you alright?” he asked.
“My, uh, legs don’t work, or my arms… what did you do to me?”
“You’re just a little numb,” Bastet said, smiling widely. “Who’s your friend?” she purred.
“You know who he is. You asked me to bring him.”
Draven took a whiff of my hair, and I froze. My heart kicked into overdrive, fluttering wildly inside of me. He took another deep breath of my neck, burying his nose against my skin to do so. I felt my hand clamp around his shoulder, the feeling returning to my fingers, to my toes, the adrenaline surge giving me back control over my body.
“Uh… Draven?” I asked.
Draven pulled his nose away from my neck, though I could still feel his hot breath on my skin as he spoke. “I… I’m sorry, I don’t know what…” He helped me stand, then stepped away entirely. “I’m not sure what happened.”
“I should’ve warned you two that my magic is a natural aphrodisiac,” Bastet said, “So, if you guys wanna bang one out before you do what you’ve gotta do tonight, feel free to use my room; and don’t worry about cleaning it up after.” She finished with a wink.
“Bang one out? What are you talking about?” I asked. “And what did you do to me, anyway? I don’t feel any different.”
“See for yourself,” she said, opening her bathroom door and gesturing inside.
I walked past her and stared at myself in the mirror. My white hair was gone, and I wasn’t sure how I felt about it. Instead of white, my hair was now deep red—blood red—although under the awful lighting of the buzzing light bulb overhead, it looked more orange than red. My lips were fuller, and red. I had a little tattoo of a cartoon cat on the side of my neck, and my eyes weren’t as blue as they usually were
; they’d turned almost grey. I also had a mole just above the left corner of my mouth.
“I look like… someone else,” I said.
“Isn’t that what you wanted?” Bastet asked. She tossed a black beanie hat for me to wear. “Put that on too.”
“Well, yeah, I wanted to look different, but now I’m trying not to freak out about it. The mole is a nice touch… how long will the magic last?”
“Until the stroke of midnight, my dear Seline.”
“Midnight? What are we, fairy tale characters?”
“What can I say? I like faeries.”
I was going to point out to her that faeries and fairy tales weren’t the same things, but arguing with Bastet was an exercise in futility. It was difficult to debate with someone who talked to cats. “Well, thanks. I owe you another one.”
“You sure do. Now, if you don’t mind, I have to get acquainted with my new friend. Please make sure not to die tonight? I wouldn’t want to have to eat your ghost… although, if you did die that would mean I get to keep Rey, right?”
I walked toward her, then past her. “As long as you don’t actually stage my demise? Sure.”
“I will! We’re gonna have so much fun, aren’t we? Aren’t we?”
Draven left the apartment before I did, but he waited on the gantry for me to emerge with a hand stretched and ready to help me out. For a moment, I could’ve sworn I heard him sharply inhale immediately as I stepped into New York’s natural light, even if it was a little grey out today. If I’m honest, and if he was paying attention, he would’ve seen me take a beat too, simply because this was the first time I’d really seen him in the daylight.
We’d crossed paths a few times already, sure, but most of the time we’d been indoors or in poor light at best. Earlier, while were on the rooftop across the street, I’d been too busy thinking about the plan to really consider him. I had also just been blasted with magic that apparently had the power to turn people on, so there was that, too.
Gods, he really was something to look at. It wasn’t just the shape of his jaw, or his strong lips, or his hair, just long enough that the wind could move it around but short enough that it wouldn’t go everywhere. It wasn’t his strong, broad shoulders, or the muscular physique I now knew he had under that shirt. It also wasn’t his eyes, which I could see weren’t totally black—not really—but more like deep, deep indigo pools with what looked like the tiniest white flecks scattered through them like stars.
It was everything. He was everything. Exquisite.
“You look…” he started to say.
“Different… yeah… heh.”
“Yes, different…”
“Thank you. I hope it fools Abvat and… everyone else.”
“It will.” He swallowed hard. “But, I look forward to midnight.”
“Midnight?”
Frustratingly, Draven turned around and started heading down the gantry without answering. “We should hurry before Abvat has his way with the stone.”
“Oh, right, the mission…” I breathed deep and followed him down. It was time to find Abvat and the stone.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
I warned Aaryn against the use of another portal to deliver us closer to Niko’s place, and luckily, she agreed. If Bastet had sentries watching for signs of magical intrusion into her domain, then Niko would too. Walking would let us slip under whatever magic radars were in place as we got closer to the hood we needed to be in, but it would also make us a lot slower since we needed to take backstreets and alleys if we didn’t want to attract attention, and every second that passed was another second Abvat had the stone.
Another piece of good luck was that the area where all the local strange liked to hang out in Brooklyn happened to be right in the heart of it—Downtown. The alleys and backstreets were plenty here, and as long as we were careful, there was nowhere we couldn’t go without being spotted. Except maybe by the homeless and the disenfranchised, although mostly they kept to themselves.
Draven was carrying a large sword strapped to a sheath on his back. Aaryn had her own sword attached to her waist. Aisling had a small dagger strapped to her ankle, while Crag… this was a man who didn’t need to carry weapons because he was a weapon, if no one went for his neck. He looked more excited to fight than the rest of us, the smile on his face not fading once during our quiet move through the city. I was also carrying my own weapon—a dagger Aaryn had given me. It was all I’d ever used during our physical training sessions, I’d always found a sword to be too large and clumsy for me, but a dagger fit nicely in my hand.
Too nicely… I was too good with it.
“This would’ve been much easier under cover of darkness,” Aisling said, “I really hope the clouds don’t clear.”
“They won’t,” Aaryn said.
We reached the edge of the small street we had taken. The road beyond it was busy, plenty of foot and car traffic, but Niko’s was on the other side, nestled inside of the alley directly across from us. I took a deep breath and steeled myself. “This is where I have to leave you,” I said. “It’s best if you all go and take your positions.”
“Where is Niko’s exactly?” Draven asked.
“There’s a metal door in the alley. It’s unmarked, but there’s probably going to be someone standing guard. I don’t suppose you’ll want the secret code to get in?”
Draven shook his head. “If we’re going in, we’re going in fast and hard.”
“I should warn you, you probably won’t just find our kind in there—there will be witches, warlocks, and… other… things. Maybe not vampires.”
“We have experience fighting the natives,” Aaryn said. “Just go in there, and when you find Abvat, give us the signal. Aisling, take to the skies; fly like the night and as silent as the owl.”
Aisling nodded, turned around, and took four running steps before leaping into the sky. Two large black wings then unfurled from her back and started beating, carrying her higher and higher at an incredible speed. I watched her sail into the clouds, until finally they swallowed her up and she was gone.
“That’s… just so fucking cool,” I said.
“You can do it too,” Aaryn said, “If you’d only try.”
I scowled at her, but otherwise ignored the dig. “I’m going in,” I said, “Stay here and… don’t cause any trouble that may attract the cops… okay?”
“Trouble? Us?” Crag asked, “I think you have us confused with other people.”
“Go,” Draven said, his patience clearly having run out.
I nodded, took a deep breath, and stepped into the street. I had my dagger tucked into the seat of my pants, so assuming no one was looking at my ass, it shouldn’t cause any alarm bells to start ringing. When I reached the mouth of the alley, I ran my fingers through my hair, shook it out, and turned on my sexiest walk. It took less than three seconds for the tree-trunk of a man standing by the door to spot me, and less than one more second for him to start undressing me with his eyes.
Good. Drop your focus.
“Hey stranger,” I said, drawing the words out so they’d almost sigh from my lips. I’d done this before, if no one could tell.
“What do you want?” he asked, which was more than he would’ve said to any other supernatural who decided to stroll through this particular alley in the middle of the day. Niko’s was mostly active at night, vampires loved doing business here, but the doors were still open during the day.
“I thought you’d wanna hear the good news about our lord and savior.”
“Get lost.”
“I’m here to get inside. I have a little business to take care of.”
“Oh yeah? With who?”
“A little snake.”
“No snakes in here.”
I could see his eyes roaming down my midriff and going lower still. “People are strange when you’re a stranger, aren’t they?” I asked, quoting the lyrics from an 80’s song which Niko’s used as a passcode.
Th
e doorman narrowed his eyes. His formidable neck muscles pulsed as his jaw clenched. When he folded his arms across his chest, every single one of his tattoos moved and rippled as if they were alive. He wasn’t going to let me in. Already our plan had failed, which meant I’d need to put him out of action fast and get inside before anyone knew what was going on, but just how I was supposed to take him out with only my dagger was yet to be seen. Would my dagger even do anything to his skin? He looked like a slightly darker skinned version of Crag.
His throat!
I took a breath and prepared to strike at the soft part just underneath his jaw, hoping it would have the same effect on him as it did on Crag, but the doorman relaxed and went for the handle, turning it and opening the large metal door set into the brick wall. “Alright,” he said, “Come on in.”
I smiled brightly, my anxiety levels returning to normal, then walked past him without saying another word.
Immediately beyond the door was a poorly lit stub of a hallway with a set of stairs that led sharply down. The door behind me shut, killing the ambient light and making it even harder for me to see. Already my heart was pounding like a jackhammer, my breathing short. Acting on instinct, my fingers reached for a strand of my hair, which had once lit up on command, only this time my hair had no light to lend me. Bastet’s magic had killed that, though hopefully not for good.
Crap.
Taking a series of deep breaths to help calm myself, I proceeded down the stairs and into Niko’s place, from which music was playing at a low volume. The smell of cigar smoke was light right now, but that was only because the place was relatively empty. The main floor of Niko’s was a huge basement filled with brown tables, chairs, and dotted with columns stone columns that served as the building’s foundations.
Many of the tables were covered in green felt, some were craps tables, others blackjack, though the main game here was poker, and in the center of the room was where that game was played. Two poker tables were set side by side, cordoned off by velvet ropes. One of those tables was active now, with four players, all wearing shades, taking in turns to call or raise. Along the edges of the room there were many dark, quiet booths, some which were occupied, but most of which were free.
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