Chapter 8 #5
The door opened as we approached. Though I couldn’t see any spell threads, I felt their caress as we stepped through.
It wasn’t dark, per se, but it didn’t feel “clean” either, though I couldn’t really pinpoint why.
Not without deeper inspection anyway, and it was unlikely either René or the unknown woman would give me that chance.
Not when the formation of a spell and the magic imbued within it were individual to every practitioner, light or dark, and provided a means of tracking them down if you had the skill.
I didn’t, but I had a good memory for the intricacies of such things and certainly could describe the components to those who did have that skill.
A variety of magical implements and spell stones filled various shelving that lined the building’s four walls.
Most were basic rather than upmarket, suggesting whoever owned this place catered more to lower-class witches and half-bloods rather than any of the royal lines.
The register sat in the center of the room, surrounded by a square of table-height glass cabinets; these displayed the few more expensive—and in a couple of cases, more dangerous—spell accoutrements.
“René,” a deep, somewhat metallic voice said once the door had closed behind us again. “I would say it is a pleasure to see you again, but that would be a lie given the company you currently keep.”
“I gave you my word that none would harm you here, and I meant it.” He glanced at me. “She is well aware of the protections around this place, and she has not informed her superiors that she is here.”
“Is that the truth, young witch?”
Tiny threads of a truth-seeking spell swirled around me, fragile yet powerful. Gray rather than white, at least in terms of “clean” magic as opposed to dark or blood.
My answering smile held little humor. “There is no need to use your magic on me. I have nothing to hide.”
“Oh, I think you hide more than most, aside from young René here,” came the metallic response.
She was obviously using a voice modulator of some kind and viewing us via the cameras stationed in each corner.
“But I see no deception in you regarding the reason for this morning’s visit.
Place the object you wish me to view in the receptacle. ”
I was about to ask, “What receptacle?” when it landed on the counter in front of us.
Again, there were fragile threads of magic woven around it, even though I had no sense of a spell being raised.
Did mages—be they gray or black—create their spells entirely differently to those of us who used so-called “white” magic?
I had no real idea. They’d only ever run through the processes of dealing with blood mages during Society training, probably because they were the ones who generally caused us the most problems. They’d no doubt be presuming that most of their witch applicants would have completed the various courses about the darker magics and practitioners in this world during the later years of high school and through university. I, of course, had done neither.
Which didn’t mean I hadn’t been taught about the darker magics and the creatures that used them, but most of my training had been in the more “practical” form of control, protection, and subversion, the latter coming mostly in the last half of my marriage after I’d decided I wanted to join the Society once we were divorced.
I took the shard out of my handbag and placed it in the tray. I didn’t bother removing the shielding around it, simply because I doubted its removal would cause her a problem.
The fragile threads pulsed once, and the tray disappeared. After a moment, a soft gasp came through whatever speaker she was using. “Where did you get this?”
“At a murder scene. You recognize it?”
“Yes, and I am surprised you could even save this shard. You should not have been able to.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“The glyph belongs to a very powerful man whose magic would normally have flicked yours away like an annoying gnat.”
“Then why didn’t it?”
“Possibly because he’s dead. That does somewhat alter the state of one’s magic.”
“Dead men can do magic?” I glanced at René. “Really?”
“It does depend on your definition of dead,” he replied, amusement evident. “There are varying degrees of that state.”
Well, yes, there were certainly zombies, but they were generally little more than flesh without agency, and the only magic they held was whatever their creator decided to imbue. But now was not the time to head down that particular rabbit hole. “Who are we talking about then?”
“I cannot say his name in this place. I dare not, lest it hang in the air and call its master here. But René will know him, given Thaddeus is the reason he was thought dead.”
Before I could ask who the hell Thaddeus was, René said, his tone even and yet holding the slightest flick of anger, “Can you trace this man via whatever remnant of his magic remains?”
“I can, but not here, and certainly not without full protections. If he has even the slightest inkling we are on to him, he will retaliate.”
“Indeed. You will be in contact, then?”
“Usual manner?”
“Yes. Thank you.”
And with that, René caught my arm and whisked me out of there. I shook his grip free once we were down the steps. “Who the hell is Thaddeus?”
His gaze met mine, the bright stars dimmed by the dark clouds that rolled through his eyes. “Thaddeus is—was—my father.”
I frowned. “I thought his name was Howard.”
“Some knew him by that name, certainly, but he had several identities, depending on who he dealt with.”
“And your father killed this man you cannot name?”
“Obviously not, if his glyph adorns the shard.” His voice was grim. “But if that man is the force orchestrating Monica’s disappearance, then it is as Sophie feared—it’s not just Tane or Monica’s life on the line, but his entire empire.”
“Why? What did Tane do?”
“Take everything this man—this mage—held dear and destroyed it. That man swore, with his dying breath, to burn everything and everyone Tane holds dear to the ground.”
“And yet he swore no revenge on your father, who killed him?”
His expression didn’t change, nor did the shadows in his eyes deepen, darken, but there was something in his stillness, in the brief flash of energy that burned across my skin, that had my breath hitching.
And not in a good way.
“He didn’t need to. He was no doubt aware my father was already on a trajectory from which there was no return.”
My frown deepened. “I don’t understand—”
The trajectory he speaks of, Atticus cut in, as he strolled out from under the dumpster, is one most dark witches face, a road that leads down the path of hell into a soulless death.
“Yes,” René said, meaning Atticus had once again broadcast widely. “But that is neither here nor there when it comes to this case.”
It might not be relevant to the current case, but it certainly was to me and whatever relationship I might wish to have with the man.
“Then what is relevant?”
His gaze met mine again; the shadows were deeper, angrier. Not at me, but for me.
“He would have felt the caress of your magic through the shard. He has a hunger for the pure of heart that cannot be satiated, and he will come for your blood and your life.”