Magic on the Storm

Chapter Thirteen

I jogged back across the lot to Zay’s car, glancing over my shoulder once. True to their word, Terric was driving, and Shame got in on the passenger’s side.

“Forest Park?” Zay said. “That’s a lot of ground to cover.”

“Get me there, and I’ll try to Hound her. Or him.” Once we were there I could use a Seek spell. Seek had a pretty limited range, so we’d need to be close for it to do us any good.

Zay put the car in gear and with Terric following, we made good time heading through the city, then up along Highway 30 to Forest Park. Ahead and to our right, the Gothic arches of St. Johns Bridge flashed with red and white lights, the broad cables scalloping the skyline. St. Johns lights were electric yellow and white, without fancy magical enhancements. Since St. Johns was off the magic grid, it looked like it belonged to an entirely different city from Portland.

Zay pulled off in a gravel lot in front of a spooky old brick building with a clock tower and enough peaks on the roof, it looked like it belonged to another century. The old Portland Gas and Coke had been abandoned for years.

“Here?” I asked. “We can’t get into the park from here.”

“Best to check again before we go in.” He paused, and the headlights from Shame’s car slid across his face.

“Don’t trust my swamp-walking abilities?”

“I don’t trust Chase.”

Right. I got out of the car. Still no rain, only clouds clotting the dark sky. I saw a spark of a star against the black, before the gray snuffed it out.

Terric killed the engine. He and Shame got out. Zay walked with me, though he gave me plenty of room.

I cleared my mind, something that always seemed a little easier when I was close to St. Johns. I didn’t know what it was about that part of town, but it always made me feel better.

I set a Disbursement, then drew the glyphs for Sight, Smell, and Taste. I drew magic out of my bones and blood and poured it into the glyphs.

The world came into hard focus, every color brighter, every shadow sharper.

I looked for magic. I looked for Chase. I looked for Greyson. And I looked for signs of blood and violence. Spells pulsed against the chain-link and barbed-wire fence that cut the forbidden building off from street access. In that building was something else. Something magical. I couldn’t tell what it was. But none of that magic, not the ward spells nor whatever magic lay crouched in that building, smelled, tasted, or looked anything like Greyson or Chase.

“Not here. Not them,” I said. “Something, though, but not them.” I walked along the road. Scented, maybe, just the slightest hint of vanilla and blood up ahead.

Crazy. This was no way to track someone. I could try Seek, but if they were in Forest Park, they’d be out of the spell’s range. I returned to Shame’s car.

“Shame, ride with Zay,” I said. “Terric, I’m going to swamp-walk, and you’re going to drive.”

And, wonder of wonders, all the men listened.

I let go of the sensory spells and got in the passenger’s side of the car. I closed my eyes and pressed my fingers down on the seat next to me, focusing on the emotional residue there to sense Chase. Got a flash of Shame, angry, and, strangely enough, hopeful. But there was still a hint of Chase’s emotions beneath that, her emotions vibrating even higher than Shame’s, high enough for me to follow.

“Okay, we’re going in the right direction. Right. Turn right.”

“Over the bridge?”

“If that’s a right.” It was hard to sense the subtle tugs of the swamp-walking in a moving car with quickly fading emotional energy.

I heard the sound of tires on the bridge. Just as Chase’s energy faded for good, I felt a tug to the north.

“Shit.” I opened my eyes. “That’s it. All I got was a slight shift north. Where are we?”

“St. Johns,” he said. “Does she have a place out here?”

“I have no idea.” I didn’t feel like I had been much help at all. As a matter of fact, I might have just led us on a wild-goose chase. I needed something more. Something that was still connected to her. And the only thing I could think of was Zay.

“Stop the car, okay? I need to regroup.”

Terric found a grass and gravel stretch along the road, and Zay pulled up next to us.

I got out of the car and jogged over to Zay’s window. He rolled it down.

“Listen, I lost the trail. I need something else that Chase has touched, some other way to connect to her, and I have an idea.”

“What?”

“I want you to call her.”

Zay’s eyebrows rose. “Because?”

“I’m going to try to follow the connection.”

“Have you ever done that before?”

I wanted to say yes. Wanted to tell him I could track down people by cell phones in my sleep. “No.”

“Then we do it my way.”

“What-get out the search-and-rescue team?”

Zay ignored me. He pulled his cell out of his pocket. “You think she’s in this area?”

“This is as far as I could track her. She may not still be here. Does she have a house here? Family?”

“No, but this is the only place in Portland off the grid. It’s a good place to hide. Except she knows we know it’s a good place to hide.”

He pressed a button on his phone. I was pretty sure my phone didn’t have that button. Then he chanted, pulling the tiniest bit of magic up from five miles away, on the other side of the railroad track. And he did it like it wasn’t as hard as sucking water out of stone.

The glyphs encasing his phone rolled with silver light, then went dark.

“She’s not close,” he said.

And then his phone rang.

Zay frowned at the caller ID. “It’s Chase,” he said calmly.

“Chase,” he said.

He didn’t tip the phone so I could hear. He didn’t have to. I was a Hound. I had good ears.

“I knew they’d send you out to look for me,” she said.

“Where are you?”

“I’m safe. I know where Greyson is.”

“Are you with him? Are you hurt?”

“You don’t understand. You just believe everything they say. But it’s not true. Lies. It’s all lies. You’re on the wrong side, Zayvion. You can trust me on that. Don’t come looking for me.”

Zay’s lips pressed in a thin line. Chase sounded a little hysterical, and out of breath.

“Tell me where you are.” Zay traced a glyph in the air, drew a circle and line through it to cancel it, turned south, did the same thing, until he had drawn four spells, one at each compass point.

Chase’s voice changed, went down a little, trying for normalcy. “Don’t do it. Don’t look for me. Or him. You can’t. . I don’t want you mixed up in this. Two of us is enough. This is war, Zayvion. War.”

The connection ended and Zay put the phone in his pocket.

“Anything?” Shame asked.

“She’s on the other side of the river. Vancouver,” Zay said.

So it had been a goose chase.

“Goddamn it,” Shame said. “Let’s go.”

“Are you sure?” I asked.

“Can you sense her here?” Zay asked.

I shook my head. “I thought so. Nothing I’d swear on, though.”

“She’s good, Allie,” Zay said like I shouldn’t blame myself. “One of the best.”

That was what I was worried about. If she was good enough to get us out here, she’d be good enough to lead us to where she wanted us to be.

Shame stayed where he was in Zay’s car. Terric nodded to me, offering a ride again.

“We’re better than her, right?” I asked Zay.

“We are.” He hesitated. Nodded. That worried me, but I didn’t tell him so.

I got into Shame’s car next to Terric.

“How good is she, really?” I asked Terric once we were on the road and speeding to Vancouver.

“I haven’t worked with her for a couple years.” He was silent for a minute, navigating traffic. “She is very good. I’ve always thought Zayvion was better.”

“Is he?”

“He is if he doesn’t pull his punches.”

“Which means?”

Terric rubbed the side of his nose, then brushed his hair back, even though it was banded at the nape of his neck. Boy had a lot of nervous twitches. I wondered if he was always like this or if this kind of thing made him nervous.

Wondered if I should get my worry on too.

“What does that mean, Terric?”

“They used to be lovers.”

“And?”

He glanced at me, maybe glad I already knew that. “How easy do you think it would be to kill someone you’ve loved?”

A knot in the pit of my stomach clenched. Memories of Zayvion flashed through my mind, his smile, the easy sense of humor that he kept so carefully hidden under his dutiful exterior. His touch, the weight of him next to me, in me. Could I kill him if I had to? If he did something stupid like what Chase was doing?

“He doesn’t have to kill her,” I said a little doubtfully.

“Maybe not. But he might need to.” Terric shifted his grip on the steering wheel, and pushed his shoulders down as if settling an uncomfortable weight. “It is always possible when you’re a Closer.”

“To kill?”

His eyes were a darkness in the night. “To destroy the ones you love.”

Creepy. Sad. And so not what I wanted to deal with. “We’ll all be there. Enough of us to stop her and find Greyson, and what? Does the Authority have a jail?”

“There are. . places. Out of the way. Guarded. Betraying the Authority doesn’t always end in your death. There are worse punishments.”

There he went with the creepy again.

“So that’s where they’ll take Greyson. And her?”

“That’s where I’d put them.”

We were on the other side of the river now. Ever since magic had been found and piped, Vancouver had become Portland’s darker sister. Maybe it was because there were so many wells in the area, or maybe it was just geographic luck, but somehow all the light seemed to shine on Portland, while Vancouver huddled in Portland’s slick, dusky shadow.

We were following Zay. He drove like he knew exactly where she would be. Terric and I didn’t say much. Zay took the exit right on the other side of the Interstate Bridge that dropped us immediately on the other side of the river.

Fort Vancouver spread out to our right, a collection of historic buildings in brick and clapboard, with barracks and winding neighborhood-like streets, huge oak trees, and fields surrounded by split-wood fences.

Zay stopped by the brick three-story buildings down in Officers Row. It was late. There were no lights on, no one out on the street. Zay killed the engine and got out of the car, striding, then bolting into a run, heading between two of the big brick houses. I couldn’t see where he was running, but I felt his heartbeat, kicking strong against my wrist. I felt his emotions, grim determination with the heady thrill of the hunt. Shame was out of the car too, not running.

He walked a short distance from the cars, turned on his heels, spinning so he faced the cars while he walked across the street. He had a lit cigarette, and held it in his mouth, the cherry glow of it marking his place in the shadows.

He motioned with one hand for us to get out of the car.

“This is it,” Terric said. “Ready?”

“Always.”

He didn’t give me flak, just got out, paused as if scenting the air, then headed to the left of where Zayvion had gone, breaking into a jog.

Shame waited until I was next to him. He hitched his hands forward, which drew the sleeves of his jacket off his wrists, and flicked an Illusion over the two cars so that they faded from casual observation.

He grunted, and swayed, his heartbeat under my wrist missing a beat, then pounding hard to make it up. I reached over and caught his elbow. He was shaking.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

He pulled the cig out of his mouth. The cherry trembled and jumped as he tried to push his hair out of his eyes. “Just. Fucking tired. I’m okay.”

And that was when I smelled the pain on him, and the blood.

“Bullshit. She hurt you, didn’t she? Where? How?”

He gave me a considering look, noticed I was fuming mad. He exhaled. “My gut. I’m fine.”

I gripped his elbow tighter and dragged him back to his car. “No, you’re not.”

“What part of the language don’t you understand, Beckstrom?”

The very fact that I could actually force him to walk with me told me just how badly he was hurt.

“You need a doctor?”

“No.”

“Stitches?”

“No.”

We passed through the Illusion he had cast, the slippery green scent of aloe filling my nostrils and throat. I opened the front door of Zay’s car. “Get in.”

“For Christ’s sake,” he started.

“Duck.” I pushed on his shoulder at the same time I shoved him into the car.

He gave in, or more correctly, his knees gave in, and he folded down into the seat. Groaned.

“Let me see.”

He turned his pale face in my direction. “I’ll call my mum. Honest.” He pulled out his cell phone and flipped it open. “You go make sure Z. and. . Make sure Zay’s okay.”

He looked sick, greenish even in the low light. Casting that spell must have exacerbated his wound.

“How badly are you bleeding? Don’t bullshit me, Shame.”

“She stabbed me once. With a knife. I remember that.” Dead serious. What did you know? The man could tell the truth without going up in flame. “The bleeding isn’t too bad. She planted a Blood glyph and when I cast that spell, it started bleeding. It’s not enough to kill me-you can trust me on that, Beckstrom. But she is seriously fucking up my fun.”

“Show me.”

He scowled. Gave in. Lifted his jacket. Even in the low light, I could see the glyph of Blood magic spread out across the width of his flat stomach, just catching on his hip bone. It bled-not badly-from one edge, probably the entry of the wound. The rest of the glyph snaked out under his skin, like deep red ropes. Blood magic was strange stuff. The glyph formed itself to the caster’s will like a time-release capsule after the incision was made.

He pushed his shirt back down.

“You’ll call your mom?”

He held up the phone again. “Go. No one’s gonna find me under this Illusion, and if they do, I’m not without weapons. And a phone.”

I nodded, and shut the door. Shame tipped the seat back a bit, and I saw a brief flash of the phone’s blue light against his cheek and jaw before I was out of the umbrella of the spell, and then couldn’t see the car at all.

I started off in the direction Zayvion had run, concentrating on the heartbeats at my wrist. Shame’s was slow, labored, but even. I was glad he’d stayed behind.

I shifted my focus on Terric’s heartbeat, fast, like he was running. His emotions: angry, but calm.

Then Zayvion. His heart beat in the steady rhythm of a marathoner or an athlete. Someone who was used to this kind of exertion. But his emotions hit me like a brick wall falling. Surprise. And fear.

Something was wrong.

I broke out of my jog and into a run. The concrete beneath my feet gave way to soft soil, well-tended grass wet from all the storms and the night’s dew. Zayvion was near. I could feel him, like a heat beneath my skin.

And he was in trouble.

I broke out from between the buildings to the grounds in the back. Trees and outbuildings cut my view into bits.

The acrid scent of a Confusion spell burned like black pepper at the back of my sinuses. I couldn’t tell which way I should go. Didn’t even know which way I had come from.

Okay. This wasn’t the first time I’d been hit with Confusion. I knew what to do.

I stopped, closed my eyes, because you can’t do anything if you’re staring at Confusion. I took a deep breath to calm myself. It didn’t matter how good I was-there wasn’t anyone who could cast magic in high states of emotion. Even Zay, whose fear I could feel in the tattering heartbeat at my wrist, still gave off a calm focus and determination.

Sometimes casting magic meant you had to be of two minds, or two emotions, at once.

I set a Disbursement-I was tired of muscle aches and went instead for a headache. I muttered a few lines of a coffee-commercial jingle to clear my mind. With my eyes still shut, I drew Cancel with my right hand and Sight with my left.

Cancel should wipe out the Confusion. Sight should show me what other magic was being used.

I opened my eyes. Cancel worked wonders. I didn’t even smell the pepper anymore.

Sight showed me magic burning like carved fire on the buildings around me. I actually hadn’t made it all the way through the alley between the buildings, even though it felt like I’d been running for blocks.

Confusion spread a sticky spiderweb between the structures, but now that Cancel was in effect, hovering like a shield over my head, the tendrils of Confusion were no longer touching me.

I took a second to focus on the heartbeats again. Zay and Terric were near. Very near.

I walked past Confusion, and stopped short.

Just on the other side of the spell and buildings, the grounds opened up. It was too dark to see how far back the grounds reached, but somewhere back there were trees and shadows, and flickering lights in the distance.

What I could see, very clearly, was the battle.

Terric glowed like a slice of moonlight, his hair gone silver, his skin pure white except for where dark glyphs shifted and moved across his features. His eyes burned an eerie blue while he chanted, the words falling from his lips in a lyric prayer. He had his feet spread, hands out to either side, holding a Containment spell that covered a twenty-yard circle.

And in that Containment spell were two people: Zayvion and Chase.

I’d never seen them even spar before. Chase hadn’t been around during any of my training sessions. And the only time I’d seen her fight was when the gate opened during my test. She’d been fighting Hungers then, beasts from the other side of death.

Now she was fighting Zayvion.

Even with Sight, watching them hurt my eyes. Still, I didn’t let go of the spell. Zayvion was a seven-foot tower of black flame, silver glyphs whirling over him in liquid ribbons, glowing the same metallic shift of wild colors as the marks magic had left on me.

He wove a spell with his left hand, heaved it at Chase like it was made of lead, and lunged, the machete in his hand pulsing with dark jeweled lights, a different kind of magic, dark magic, coursing through the blade.

But Chase was good. Unlike Zayvion, even through Sight, even throwing magic around-and she was throwing a shitload of the stuff around-Chase looked like Chase. Pretty, a little gaunt, pale-skinned, dark hair pulled back in a braid, black jeans, and a black turtleneck.

Except for one thing. Her eyes glowed red. It wasn’t just the light from magic. It was something else, something more, something dark, like the Hungers, like the Necromorph, burning out from within her. And it was not human.

It scared the hell out of me. Instinct told me to run, to leave this place, to go somewhere where magic didn’t do what they were making it do.

Yeah, well, instinct would just have to suck it.

Chase, knife in one hand, caught the weight of Zay’s spell on the edge of her blade and tore it apart. She re-drew and recast that magic into something else, flicked it low at Zay’s feet.

He dodged. The spell burned after him. He tucked and rolled over the spell, sliced it apart with the machete, and was on his feet again.

In Chase’s other hand was a sword. Not a machete, no. This thing was beautiful, slick, graceful, powerful. Maybe a katana. It burned, not with flame, but with darkness. The air around it seemed darker than the night, and wavered as if heated.

Chase cut a spell into the air with the tip of the blade.

Zayvion closed the distance.

Blades and magic met, clashed. Fire exploded on a viscous wind. Terric, standing inside his Containment spell, turned his face away from the blast, adjusted his grip on the spell, and did something that extinguished the fire.

Silent. I heard nothing. Smelled nothing. Felt nothing but the hard-hitting heartbeats at my wrist. The Containment Terric held was amazing. It made it seem as if there were no one on the grounds, no fight, no magic. Nothing but a quiet night in a quiet field.

Zayvion pressed Chase, chanting, even though I couldn’t hear him, the machete in his hand flicking like a rapier, then slashing out like a broadsword. The blade changed as he used it, and used magic to morph it, a wicked weapon of speed, power, steel, and magic.

Chase gave ground, breathing hard. She was bleeding-at least I think it was her blood that left a dark trail on the grass behind her.

I’d fought with Zay. I knew the punishment he could inflict on the practice mats. And that had been sparring. I had no idea how Chase endured his assault.

Why didn’t she give up? What did she think? That she could beat him down? And then what? Kill him with Terric standing by? Kill Terric too? Run? It didn’t make sense. Zayvion was the best at what he did. And it didn’t look like he had any trouble not pulling his punches.

Chase was not stupid. She was a Closer. She certainly wasn’t foolish enough to take on Zayvion and Terric alone.

The soft moth-wing flutter of my dad in my head brushed behind my eyes. Then snapped so hard, I gasped. Stars flickered at the edge of my vision, and my dad’s awareness pressed down on me like an avalanche.

Something was wrong. Something was wrong with this whole thing.

Zay had said where we found Chase, we’d find Greyson. So where was he?

The flutter behind my eyes flicked hard again. Pain snapped at my temple. Allison, Dad breathed. Behind you.

I turned, and dropped Sight just as the man-no, not man; Shame-lifted his hands and threw the world at my head.