by Mia Marshall
“You got over it when I ran away,” I reminded her.
“You left because you were scared and in pain and had the emotional maturity of a caterpillar. She left because she was more interested in meeting that thing than in being a mother.”
“No matter what she did, you’re not going to forget about her, so maybe try to talk? Or glare at her, but be in the same room when you do? There’s still space on the plane. And caterpillar my ass. I was a beautiful fucking butterfly.”
Sera snorted and sent a shower of sparks toward me. “Keep telling yourself that. Even if you’re right—which is improbable, statistically speaking—now’s not the time. I don’t need the distraction. Let’s settle things with the council and then I’ll think about it. Will that get you to shut up?”
I took what I could get.
In the end, eight of us stepped onto the plane. A bear, a cat, and two hackers joined a water, a fire, and a couple of duals.
Hawaii to Northern California should have been a six-hour flight. Instead, we stopped in Los Angeles, where it was easier to get lost in the stream of private planes, then headed to Phoenix. After the sacrifices he’d made, it seemed polite to give Luke a day with his second element.
We skipped the small and easily tracked Tahoe airport and landed in Reno after midnight. No one knew we were coming, so no one was there to meet us. We arranged for two town cars to get us to Truckee.
We crossed the California state line an hour later. The streets were empty, just as they’d been when, months before, I arrived in the middle of the night with Sera, hurting and distant and with no idea what my life was about to become.
This time, I was returning home.
I woke early the next day, smiling before I even opened my eyes. I’d dreamt of this moment, but over the past months I’d doubted it would ever happen. But here I was, curled in Mac’s arms with my friends safe in the cabin behind us. I was going to savor every minute. Even knowing I’d need to face the council soon didn’t take away from my happiness.
After a while, my magic grew restless. I slipped out of bed and dressed. The night before, I’d grabbed a clean outfit from my room and, when she wasn’t looking, borrowed a couple items from Sera, as well. She was a lot shorter than I was, but that didn’t matter much with spandex.
I pulled on the sports bra and covered it with a t-shirt. I didn’t have any proper jogging shorts, but it was cool enough that sweatpants would work. My Converse weren’t great running shoes, but so long as I could heal myself, I didn’t need to worry about arch support.
I didn’t run. I flew. I raced down the driveway and across the road, then darted through the thin patches of forest until the lake appeared before me like an old friend. It was seventy miles around all of Lake Tahoe, and I almost wished I had time to make the trip. Instead, I ran several miles north. It was early enough that there weren’t any witnesses when I launched myself into the freezing lake and glided back toward the cabin without once coming up for air.
When I was done, I snuck through the trees. I still wasn’t ready to admit I was exercising after decades of condemning any activity more strenuous than lifting a forkful of pancakes. They’d find out some day, and then I’d need to reassure them of my sanity all over again.
The trailer was empty. I took a quick shower and walked to the cabin. I entered through the rear door and blinked.
“Brook!”
I barely had time to turn toward the booming voice before I was engulfed in an enormous hug.
Miriam squeezed hard enough to draw a squeak before she released me. “I hear we won’t be checking you into the nuthouse, after all.”
I was drawn into another set of arms right away, an embrace both familiar and strange. “We’re glad you’re safe, little water,” said Mac’s uncle.
I tilted my head to gaze up at Will. The man bore such a strong resemblance to Mac that I was predisposed to like him. He had a rougher version of Mac’s features, but they shared the same coloring and immense build. More than that, they were both protective and loyal to a fault. Will was a good man, though he made it a point not to take me seriously.
“You know I’m an all-powerful dual magic, right?”
He bopped my nose with his index finger and let me go.
A large banner hung across the far wall. It was decorated with storks and baby bottles and read “Congratulations, mom!” in large curving letters—except “mom” had been crossed out and rewritten in black Sharpie. The banner now read “Congratulations, sane person!”
The trellis dining table held a small feast, and the smell of maple syrup told me pancakes were hidden beneath one of the metal lids. There were more bagels and muffins for the carb-addicted elementals, but also some sausage, a plate of lox, and a bowl of apples and blackberries for the various shifters.
The cabin was full of them. Simon and Mac, Miriam and Will, even Carmen mingled with the elementals. The shifters might be used to me, Sera, and Vivian by now, but Luke and Grams were new.
Several months ago, they would have been on opposite sides of the room, preparing to reenact West Side Story. Now elementals and shifters milled about, chatting and sitting side by side on the floor pillows scattered throughout the living room—along with a couple of FBI agents and one human hacker.
Carmen greeted me with a smile that barely touched her eyes. While the rest of us hadn’t bothered to do anything more strenuous than brush our hair and change into clean clothes, she wore full makeup, tastefully applied, and designer jeans. The mountain lion’s coloring wasn’t far off a desert’s—amber eyes and sandy hair. She and Luke almost looked like they could be siblings—except a grin was never far from Luke’s face, while a scowl was never far from Carmen’s. We weren’t so much friends as allies, but it had been a while since I thought she wanted to disembowel me. I considered that progress.
Vivian and Jet sat cross-legged on the floor, their laptops between them like they were playing a high-tech game of Battleship. For the first time since we started running, Vivian wore her own clothes. Her t-shirt read “Have you tried turning it off and on again?”
“Everything okay?” I asked.
Vivian flashed me a small smile, then returned her attention to her screen. “No new disasters, but they’ll know we’re here soon if they don’t already. Even without tech, it’s easy to monitor cars coming in and out of the cabin, and there were a bunch of those this morning.”
“What are you working on now?” I peered over Jet’s shoulder like the scrolling numbers meant a single damn thing.
“Math,” they said in unison.
“Uh huh.” It was the only possible response an English major could make.
Sera sat next to Carmichael, who looked a lot better after a shave and a few square meals. She rose when I appeared.
“What is this?”
“It’s a welcome back to sanity party. We got you a cake.” She pointed to a white sheet cake with red piping that read “We’ll miss you.”
I raised my eyebrows, and Sera shrugged. “You expect more from the Safeway bakery at four a.m.? And, though I protested quite loudly, your favorite music.” I tilted my head toward the speakers, picking out Patsy Cline over the others’ voices. The song, of course, was “Crazy.”
“You know, based on this evidence, I might think you like me.”
“Family obligation. That’s all.”
“Don’t think I don’t appreciate it, but—”
Sera didn’t let me finish. “But we need a plan? We need to figure out how to get the council out of Tahoe before they burn something else? We need to put Deborah on a one-way rocket to Mars?”
It sounded like a good start.
She piled five pancakes on a plate and smothered them in maple syrup before thrusting the meal at me. “We’ll get to it, but we’ve earned this. We need a few hours when no one is hunting us or doing their best to destroy everything we love. It’s not asking for much. Besides, after the island, you’re skinnier than usual. Ea
t these before your ass actually becomes concave.”
She was right, and we did get a few hours before we were interrupted.
A tinny ring struggled to be heard above the music. Out of habit, we checked our pockets, but most of us didn’t have phones. We’d left them behind during our flight across the desert and hadn’t bothered to replace them yet.
The shifters held up blank screens. The ringing continued.
I followed the sound until I found an old flip phone tucked inside a planter. No one spoke as I held it up, but their apprehensive expressions told me they’d never seen the device before. I didn’t recognize the number on the screen.
The room was silent, waiting. I opened the phone and held it to my ear. I didn’t speak.
The caller didn’t need me to. She only wanted me to listen. “Have you visited Frank at the Rat Trap yet?”
Threat delivered, Deborah hung up.
CHAPTER 25
From the outside, everything appeared the same. We parked in the alley, then crept around the building, scanning for threats.
There was no electrical fire, no broken windows, not even another closure for health violations. The Rat Trap was already open, ready to welcome the dedicated drunks and the college students who believed hair of the dog was a valid lifestyle choice.
“So much for our plan to swoop in and save the day,” I said.
Mac peered through the windows, but they were dirty and covered with too many neon signs to see much. “It’s a bit late to mention this, but anyone else thinking this could be a trap?”
We all were, but it didn’t matter. Frank was inside, and we couldn’t abandon him to Deborah’s evil plans. When Sera and I had been reckless undergrads, the owner of the Rat Trap took care of us. He made sure we received only the best booze, then he made sure we got home safely. Both Christopher and Brian had worked for him. A lot had happened since those wild college days, most of it bad, but once they’d been our second family. Of the three, Frank was the only one still alive. He needed to stay that way, no matter what waited for us inside.
The Rat Trap was the world’s only combination lounge/dive/tiki bar, and for a few years it had practically been my and Sera’s living room. At midnight, with the lights dimmed and beer goggles firmly in place, it felt like a glorious land of possibility.
At ten in the morning, with the sun streaming through the dirty windows, it was barely recognizable. The dark red vinyl booths were cheap plastic, and the tiki artifacts on the walls likely had a “Made in China” label. Instead of being packed with healthy young coeds, a few old-timers ringed the bar, the sort of men who showed up early to fight the shakes and didn’t leave until they were numb or broke, whichever came first.
The place was ugly as sin, but at that moment it looked beautiful. It was standing, and so was Frank—and the council was nowhere in sight.
Frank stood behind the bar, watering a listless potted ivy. He’d always tried to keep a few living plants. He said it gave the place a bit of warmth. The fact that they all died within a month never dissuaded him.
“Aidan, my beauty!” he called out, earning startled glances from the old-timers. “And Sera, too? Tell me what I’ve done to deserve this, and I’ll be sure to do it again.”
Frank was short, skinny, and hirsute, with features too heavy to be handsome. He was also an unrepentant flirt, and his enthusiasm and ability to make every woman feel special made him a surprisingly successful one. Frank was also devoted to his long-suffering wife, so no one took his frequent declarations of love seriously. Mac didn’t even growl when Frank smiled at me.
Frank considered the enormous man at my side. “Don’t tell me this is your type. It’s no wonder I didn’t have a shot.”
“Please. A charmer like you always has a shot.”
Frank winked, then looked over my shoulder at the others. In addition to Mac and Sera, Vivian had insisted on coming.
“I like Frank,” she’d said, and that was that.
Some of the others stayed at the cabin while Will and Carmen returned to their homes to check on both the buildings and the people inside. With the council escalating their threats, I regretted that there was no equivalent of the compound in Tahoe. We could really use an underground bunker right about now.
Frank picked up a rag and rubbed down the already clean counter. “Don’t think I’m not pleased to see you, but I don’t remember you lot being morning drinkers.”
“We’re not here to drink,” Sera said.
Though it had taken twenty minutes to drive to the Rat Trap, we’d been too panicked about what we might discover to bother coming up with a plausible explanation for our visit. I wasn’t sure we had time to be subtle, anyway. “You have to leave. It’s not safe here.”
Frank’s considerable eyebrows stretched toward his hairline. They didn’t have far to go. “I only got the damned place open again after a bureaucratic nightmare you wouldn’t believe.”
“We’ll pay for the lost business. I can’t go into the details, but you really are in danger.” I hoped for once my transparent face worked in my favor and Frank could see my sincerity.
Whatever he saw, it wasn’t enough. “I’m going to need more information than that, Aidan.”
I tried again. “I can’t. You’ve known me for years, Frank. Maybe I didn’t always make the best decisions, but I’m not a liar. Please believe me.”
Frank braced both hands on the bar and leaned forward, tilting his head up to meet my gaze. “And you know me. I’m not running for no reason.”
My voice rose. “There is a reason! I just can’t tell you!”
Frank matched my glare, and I struggled to think of a reasonable explanation for my request.
“Ahem.” When Sera had Frank’s attention, she nodded at the ivy he’d been watering a minute before.
Before his eyes, the brown leaves turned a rich green, the thin stems strengthening and sprouting new leaves. Vivian’s face was tight, all her limited power focused on this demonstration.
“What on earth?” Frank’s eyes darted between the plant and Vivian.
I stared at Vivian, torn between shock and admiration. My friend was becoming a rule breaker.
She’d also made things a lot easier for us.
“Exactly. Vivian’s an earth. Sera’s fire. I’m complicated. But we can flood this place or burn it down with a thought, and we’re not the only ones. Right now, people who really don’t like us are threatening to hurt those we care about. So will you close the bar now?”
It wasn’t like we could get in more trouble by that point.
Frank’s mouth opened and closed with no sound. The old-timers considered the plant, then their drinks, trying to decide if there was a connection.
Mac suggested they finish their drinks and move on. They didn’t argue. Then it was just us, waiting on Frank’s answer.
“You’re an earth?” He said the word like he’d never heard it before. He turned his dazed eyes on me and Sera. “You two… does this have anything to do with the way you haven’t aged in fifteen years?”
Sera leaned toward him. “We’ll answer all your questions as soon as we’re somewhere else.”
Frank seemed dazed, but he managed a nod. “Let me get my coat.”
He was walking back to us when the front of the bar exploded.
Glass flew toward us, thin slivers and heavy shards alike as the front windows shattered. I barely registered what was happening before I found myself on the floor, struggling under Mac’s immovable form.
I turned my head enough to see Sera under a table, her eyes black as she counteracted the spreading flames. If they reached the bottles of alcohol lined up behind the bar, the whole place would go up. I threw my power in with hers, and together we extinguished the fires.
Before we could relax, a second explosion rocked the building, louder than the first. The roof crumbled, chunks of plaster falling to the floor. Mac twitched as a large piece landed on his shoulders. He wrapped himse
lf tighter around me.
“I can’t see,” My ears rang. I shouted, but my voice sounded tiny and distant. “Let me up.”
He ignored me.
We waited, fearing a third explosion, but nothing came. I gave Mac’s shoulder a hard shove, and finally he moved.
Sera was unhurt, but Vivian wasn’t doing as well. Her back was braced against the bar. She held her right arm at an awkward angle, and her dark complexion had grown ashen.
I crawled to her. “Oh hell, Vivian. Let me see.”
I expected to see fear in her eyes, or despair at finding herself in this situation yet again. Instead, I saw only strength. “I’m fine.”
Sera’s broken sob reminded me that Vivian wasn’t the only one who required help.
A six-inch piece of glass jutted from Frank’s neck. If that wasn’t enough to kill him, the layers of roofing pressing against his chest would finish the job.
“Hell no. Oh hell no.” It was all I could say, and I kept repeating it as I knelt at Frank’s side. I didn’t waste time focusing. Frank needed to live, and I could only heal him if I moved fast.
My magic shot past Frank’s skin and attached to the water molecules that form so much of the human body. I was rewarded with a tiny flicker of life. So long as his heart beat, he could be saved.
Creation magic, I reminded myself.
I pushed the embedded glass outward, knitting the arteries and tissue as I went. It was unexpectedly easy. Life wanted to triumph, and Frank didn’t fight me.
Sirens wailed in the distance. I moved as fast as I dared, expanding Frank’s lungs and stopping the internal bleeding. Above us, Mac lifted layer after layer of the ceiling, lessening the pressure on Frank’s chest.
Sera tapped my shoulder. “You’ve stabilized him. Let’s go.”
“We can’t leave him.”
“You hear that? It’s an ambulance, and it’ll be here in thirty seconds. If the cops following them see us, we’ll be answering questions all day when we should be figuring out how to end Deborah once and for all. Now move your fucking ass.”