The Shifting Price of Prey

Chapter Six

Conan the Barbarian twirled his sword like a cheerleader’s baton, pointed it out at the cheering crowds forty feet below in Leicester Square, then did a slow bump and grind as he shot me a salacious wink.

‘Bet you don’t do that in the film,’ I muttered, ignoring the whoops, whistles and calls for ‘more’.

I used the controls on the hydraulic lift basket I was standing in to nudge myself closer to the top of the film poster, then focused on the splatter of muddy-coloured oil paint that was the ‘Harry Potter’ spell. How the hell the magical vandal had got it this high was a mystery – one the police were responsible for unravelling – all I had to unravel was the spell.

Which was proving easier said than done.

‘Okay, let’s try this again,’ I murmured, crunching three liquorice torpedoes to boost my magic, and touching the cleaned mascara brush I held to the paint. Carefully, I teased out a fat orange stripe from the muddy mess, then another of indigo, followed by pink, green, and five shades of yellow, until I had all the stripes separated out into a seemingly random colour wheel. Mentally crossing my fingers, I checked the poster. Conan scowled, hefted his sword like he meant business and froze. I compared it to the A4 copy the cinema manager had given me, and blew out a relieved sigh. They matched. Finally, I’d hit on the right combination. After two long hours.

The time was within the budget, but I’d hoped to nail it in less. Of course, cracking the ‘Harry Potter’ spell would’ve taken a couple of seconds, but cracking a spell also cracks whatever it’s attached to, and shredded posters and damaged buildings were a definite no.

I’d tried absorbing the spell, but all that had done was turn the poster white. Luckily I’d managed to spit the spell back out unchanged before the magic had mutated, though I was still suffering the nasty side-effects: mouth dry with the bitter taste of juniper berries, and six, so far, desperate trips to the cinema’s facilities. Even that hadn’t killed my constant urge to pee. The idea of setting a Privacy spell and making use of the spell-dumping bucket as a handy potty was my newest fantasy. Absorbing magic can sometimes bring out its ‘mischievous’ side.

Mischievous magic aside, now I’d managed to reverse-tweak the spell to get the poster back to normal, all I needed to do was suck it up and dump it in the potty – sorry, bucket – with our new Spellcrackers spell remover, a.k.a. the common turkey baster: the kitchen implement with a hundred and one uses, according to Leandra when she’d suggested it. (Unnerved by the slightly manic glint in her eye at the time, I’d refrained from asking what the other ninety-eight were.)

A sudden gust of warm wind hit and I grabbed the metal hopper’s handrail as it gave a stomach-dropping shudder. Heights don’t usually bother me, but something about being forty-odd feet up, in a three-foot-wide metal basket, suspended on a seemingly fragile-looking arm cantilevered up and out from the back of a small lorry, brought on an unexpected attack of vertigo.

Dizzy, I slumped down and tried not to think about water, potties or how far away the ground was. I took a few deep breaths, willing the dizziness to pass, then switched my phone on (leaving it on when dealing with unknown magic is a sure-fire way of cracking the Buffer spell) and texted the rest of the team with the ‘reverse tweak’. Now I’d figured out the colour combo, removing the ‘Harry Potter’ spell from the other fifty-odd posters (who knew there were so many posters in Leicester Square?) would be as easy as, well, sucking up gravy.

I checked my messages— and found one from Malik, his clipped, ice-cold tone almost willing me not to phone back.

I took a breath and brought his number up, the nerves in my stomach not made any better by my constant need to relieve myself. And the minefield of thoughts I’d sidestepped earlier, when I’d decided Malik was the obvious choice for info, opened up in front of me. If I was honest, things weren’t just complicated and confusing between us, they were downright awkward. And it was all my fault.

I should never have blackmailed him.

Oh, it had seemed a great idea at the time. He’d started ordering me around, right in the middle of the ToLA case, and as he’d had my freely offered blood, I had no choice but to do as he said. His orders were all meant to protect me, and the one chance I had of recovering the stolen fae’s fertility. Later, when I’d discovered that, I’d forgiven him. But at the time I’d felt betrayed, mad as hell, and had been determined to stop him from ever abusing his power over me again. Plus, I had a plan to rescue the victims with his help, and knew the only way to get it was to force him.

So I’d come up with the clichéd ‘in the event of my death’ letter, left with the police, except I didn’t actually have to die for the letter to do its stuff; I only had to give the nod to Hugh – (acting) Detective Inspector Hugh Munro – and the full force of English justice would fall on Malik like the bricks of the High Court collapsing atop him.

Not that I thought Malik cared so much for himself. It was more that if what he’d done became public knowledge, it would break the ancient Live and Let Live Tenets between the vamps and the witches, and set them at each other’s throats. If the witches and the vamps went to war, then no one was going to come out a winner. Least of all the vamps. That, Malik did care about, hence the awkwardness.

And the reason I’d only seen the beautiful vamp once since the end of the ToLA case three months ago.

Not that I’d realised anything was different at first. In fact, I’d sort of fantasised that after he’d helped me, and healed me after the – literal – dust from the ToLA case had settled, things between us would . . . move on . . . and that the heart-thudding attraction I’d always felt (and had a wishful idea wasn’t just on my side) might develop into more. Though quite how ‘more’ would work out, his being a vamp and my running Spellcrackers, a witch company – and with a certain satyr I’d promised myself not to think about in the picture – was a problem my fantasies didn’t have an answer for. I wasn’t too proud of myself for wanting to have my relationship cake and eat it when it came to the satyr – I – wasn’t – thinking – about and Malik.

So despite my fantasies, or rather because of them, I’d reluctantly told myself it was better to stick to being ‘just good friends’ with Malik.

Then I’d called him to thank him. Malik had been distant and formal as if there’d never been anything between us, and my ‘just good friends’ idea was slapped back in my face. Though after my shock dissipated it hit me that, as far as he knew, I was still prepared to carry out my blackmail threat, so in order to protect the vamp/witch status quo, he was doing exactly what I’d demanded: leaving me alone.

Hoping to ease into sorting things out, I’d come up with a minor problem with Darius, my ex-fang-pet, and asked to meet. The meeting hadn’t gone quite as planned – an understatement if ever there was one – and I’d been left with the impression that the last thing Malik wanted was any sort of relationship with me.

Now, if nothing else, this Emperor/Autarch stuff counted as a good opener to clear the air.

I chewed my lip, worked out a polite greeting in my head and called.

He answered on the second ring. ‘Genevieve.’

My heart did a stupid excited leap at hearing his not-quite-English accent, even if his tone was the same clipped, ice-cold one as his message. Then, as the metal bucket shuddered in another gust of wind, my carefully prepared words disappeared and I blurted, ‘Do you know a vamp called the Emperor?’

‘Why?’

The part of me that didn’t need to pee relaxed at his sharp question. If he’d given me an unequivocal ‘no’, I’d have hit a dead end on all fronts. But his question was almost an acknowledgement.

Keeping it business-like and brief, I told him about Tavish wanting my help, the Emperor tarot card with the Rod of Asclepius, the peeping tom and the faint ping I’d got off a nearby vamp. I finished with the million-pound question that had been bugging me: ‘Can the Autarch go outside in daylight, if he was in the shade of nearby trees or something? Is he the Emperor?’

There was a brief silence. ‘Where are you now, Genevieve?’

He hadn’t denied it was possible. My heart leaped again, with fear this time, and thanks to my magically irritated bladder I nearly wet myself. Crap. I swallowed, clenched my inner muscles tighter and said, ‘Leicester Square, I’m dealing with the problems here.’

‘What problems?’

‘A prank spell on the movie posters. It’s been all over the news. They’re calling it a “Harry Potter”,’ I finished wryly.

There was a brief burst of noise as if a TV had been switched on, then it was gone. ‘Ah, I see.’ Malik’s voice held a thin thread of amusement. ‘Do you plan to be there for some time?’

‘Probably another hour.’

‘I would prefer to discuss this situation in person. I would like to meet you there, if you agree?’

He wanted to talk face to face— relief, and not a little hope, filled me despite his formal tone. ‘Of course I agree, Malik. I wouldn’t have called you if I didn’t want your help.’

‘You require my help?’ The words seemed to whisper out of the phone and slide like ice down my spine. Goosebumps pricked my skin with uneasy anticipation, and I shivered.

‘Yes.’

‘Good. I will see you shortly.’ The phone went dead.

I stared at it. Had I heard a note of eagerness beneath his coldness, or was it just my imagination? And if so, what did it mean? I shook my head. No use biting off trouble before the gorgeous vamp arrived. Time enough for all sorts of things then, including biting. If the Autarch was about, I wanted Malik on my side. Whatever it took. And if the Autarch wasn’t, I still needed his help to find and do a deal with the Emperor.

I looked up at the scowling Conan, decided it would only take minutes to finish up and dug the turkey baster out of my backpack. I crunched another liquorice torpedo, and activated the glyphs (drawn on the plastic with Leandra’s silver sharpie) with a quick touch of my will. Time to suck up the ‘Harry Potter’ spell and then I really, really needed to pee.

Fifty minutes later, feet thankfully back on solid ground, I was dealing with the ‘Harry Potter’ spell tagged to a poster for Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. Val Kilmer and Robert Downey Jr were playing Russian roulette and hamming it up whenever they bought it. After another desperate visit to the cinema’s facilities, along with the drastic measure of drinking a pint of salt water followed by the expected stomach-emptying results, I’d knocked my magical bladder problems on the head. I didn’t do the salt emetic often, but it was either that or a full cleansing ritual followed by a salt bath, something I didn’t have time for. Not with Malik due to appear shortly.

‘Miss?’

I carefully sucked up the spell’s last daub of paint then plunged my turkey baster into the bucket of salt water at my feet before turning to the owner of the soft, hesitant voice.

A Gatherer goblin, small at about two foot six, was waiting a deferential distance away, entertaining himself by hopping from one foot to the other to make the lights in his trainers flash red and green (much to the delight of a group of snap-happy Japanese tourists who’d previously been pointing their cameras my way). The goblin wore the standard issue navy boilersuit of a worker goblin, with the goblin queen’s logo embroidered in gold on its right chest pocket. On the left chest pocket was a large enamel badge, its design enhanced by tiny silver sequins. A similar badge was pinned to the front of the goblin’s peaked cap, which was doing a good job of flattening the tinsel-silver curls of the goblin’s massive Afro.

‘Hi,’ I said.

The goblin looked up and I noticed another badge under his chin; it said his name was Obadiah. Obadiah ran his knobbly finger down his long ski-slope nose in the respectful goblin greeting and gave me a tight-lipped smile. He closed the distance between us, careful to make his trainers flash (goblins always attack in the dark; showing the shiny is a flag of truce), the silver-lamé satchel slung across his body reflecting the bright lights in Leicester Square. He took something that glinted from the satchel and offered it to me.

‘For you, miss. From Mr al-Khan.’

‘Thank you, Obadiah.’ I returned his greeting and the tight-lipped smile, and took the glinting thing. It was a silver-coloured electronic hotel keycard. The logo on it was the same as the one on Obadiah’s badges (minus the silver sequins) and on the hotel occupying one corner of Leicester Square.

Obadiah tapped the plastic keycard with a silver-painted claw. ‘Penthouse. Miss take lift.’

I dropped the keycard into my pocket and glanced at the hotel’s seven floors thinking I was hardly likely to take the stairs. And more importantly why was Malik using a goblin to play messenger? But as my paranoia twitched, Obadiah held out his hand again and said, ‘For our blood, now lost.’

Dangling from his knobbly fingers was a long-stemmed rose, leaves stripped, thorns blood-red and sharp, petals a rich dark crimson.

The meaning of the flower bled into my mind. A rose for Rosa – the only vamp Malik had ever offered the Gift to. The only vamp to survive the curse of his blood and not turn into a mindless, shambling revenant maddened by bloodlust.

Though Rosa not turning into a revenant was pretty much irrelevant, as she’d been off-her-head nuts before becoming a vamp, and sadly the lifestyle change only added to her issues. Something I knew only too well, since I’d unwittingly borrowed Rosa’s body (until she died the true death during the demon attack last Hallowe’en) after buying what I thought was a Vamp Disguise spell. The ‘spell’ had blipped a couple of times, merging my consciousness with Rosa’s and leaving me with fragments of her memories. Those memories were enough to tell me that Malik had given Rosa the Gift out of guilt, but not why he felt guilty. They also told me he’d loved her, and she him . . . as much as she could love anyone, damaged as she was. The crimson rose was a secret tryst signal between them.

Rage and jealously ignited like wildfire that he would use our secret sign with another. I snarled at the goblin, baring my teeth. He threw the rose at me, backing off quickly, stamping his feet hard as he disappeared into the crowd.

Then the emotions were gone, leaving me with nausea roiling in my gut. I pressed my lips together and slowly unclenched my fists, remorse at frightening the goblin warring with fear that Rosa’s memories, and the emotions they aroused, had . . . What? Influenced me? Possessed me?

Crap. No way did I need this. I had enough of my own bad memories without hers surfacing. And no way did I need Malik to help them resurface, whether intentionally or not.

I grabbed the rose, squeezing the stem until the thorns punctured my palm. The brief pain twisted magic low inside me, and the honey smell of my blood mixed with the dark spice scent of Malik’s as the spell the flower carried activated. The rose shed its petals into the ether leaving me holding a platinum ring set with a black crescent-shaped gemstone: Malik’s ring.

Except his ring was attached to my bracelet. Wasn’t it?

With a thought I revealed the bracelet hidden beneath the rose-shaped bruises encircling my left wrist – Malik’s mark; signifying that I was his blood-property and giving me protection from other vamps. The bracelet popped out of my body, its various spells glowing red and gold, with a clattering of charms: the plain gold cross to protect me from the demon (the one that had attacked last Hallowe’en); the cracked gold egg that had trapped the sorcerer’s soul I’d eaten during the attack and which had stopped the sorcerer from turning the tables and possessing me (The Mother goddess had later hooked the soul out of me and sent it on its way, thankfully); the inch-long obsidian scimitar to cut my connection to Rosa (a precaution in case she wasn’t quite as dead as Malik believed); and the tiny platinum ring that, apart from its current size, was a twin to the one I held.

So if Malik’s ring was still attached, whose ring was I holding now?

It came to me in a swirl of angry disbelief: Rosa’s.

He’d given me Rosa’s ring. Which, whoever’s emotions I was channelling, hers or mine, was all sorts of wrong.

I let the bracelet sink back into my skin, texted the rest of the Spellcrackers team that I was going into the hotel to sort a problem, and went to beard the infuriating vamp in his penthouse.