Chapter 27 #2
“You don’t have to like it.” I met his eyes, speaking the words we’d practiced. Giving him what he wanted without letting him come. “We’ve been sitting around for far too long. We’ve got to go do something.”
“I could search the Tangles,” Pip offered quietly. “While everyone’s out. Sprites talk to each other. We always notice things others don’t.”
“Good idea,” I said, perhaps too quickly. “That’s good. We split up, cover more ground, meet back here tonight to compare notes.”
The Oracle finally spoke, her words coincidentally aiding our planning. “The storm breaks this evening. Tomorrow, the docks will be active again.”
Wickett’s head jerked in a nod. “Then tomorrow we investigate there. All of us.”
“Agreed, but don’t forget we have to go to the game tomorrow,” I said, knowing plans could change really quickly. Right now, I just needed today. Needed to get to those addresses. Needed to know whether Vitoria’s parents’ known associates could tell us anything useful.
“Well then,” Lucette said, standing and smoothing her oversized pants. “I should get ready. Can’t meet my parents looking like I’ve been living in a military compound in a man’s pants.”
Pip’s eyes grew as wide as her smile. “Wear something shiny. You can borrow from me if you want. I have this.” She pulled a piece of brass from her pocket, though I couldn’t quite tell what it was until Wickett choked on his drink.
“Is that my belt buckle? How did you even—”
“Finders, keepers,” Pip said, cutting Wickett off with a scowl, protectively shoving the buckle back into her pocket as she left.
Slowly, the others began to disperse. Wickett remained near the door, watching us with those calculating gray eyes.
“Be careful,” he said finally, clearly holding back what he wanted to say. “The Crook isn’t forgiving to people who ask the wrong questions.”
“The Crook’s been my playground for many years. We’ll be fine,” Calder assured him.
“Will you?” Wickett’s gaze found mine. “Because it seems like every time you go out, you nearly get caught or killed. Or both.”
“Third time’s the charm,” I said lightly.
He didn’t smile. “That’s not funny.”
“It kind of was. You’ll laugh later. Pretty sure.”
We stared at each other across the kitchen, and I felt that pull again. The one I’d been trying to ignore for days. The one that had started in the darkness behind the curtains and hadn’t let go since.
“Just—” He stopped himself. “Come back. Both of you.”
“We will,” I promised, knowing it might be a lie.
He left, and I exhaled slowly.
Calder raised an eyebrow, plucking an untouched piece of sausage from Lucy’s abandoned plate.
I rolled my eyes. “Don’t start.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You said it with your face.”
“Can’t control what my face knows.”
“That makes no sense, Calder Grimm.”
His eyes narrowed. “You’ll get it later. Pretty sure.”
The townhouse in the Tangles was squeezed between a tannery that reeked of chemicals and decay with the rain, and an apothecary that used to be run by witches who’d vanished three months ago. Now operated by nymphs, the only things you could get in there were blood and bad hangovers.
The building itself was narrow, three stories of weathered brick that sagged slightly to the left. Windows featured faded curtains. A door painted sky blue suggested it might have been cheerful here once.
But the door stood slightly ajar.
Calder’s hand went to the blade on his belt immediately. I glanced up at Silas to make sure he was still there. Ready. Watching.
“That’s not good,” Calder whispered.
“Could be nothing. The wind. Maybe it won’t close properly.”
He shook his head. “You don’t believe that.”
“No.”
Before we could move closer, a flash of blue darted overhead. Pip descended in a spiral, her wings drooping from the heavy rain.
“Syn! Calder!” She swooped down near his shoulder, slightly out of breath. “I was just heading to Colly’s shop in the Tangles. She knows everyone and everything, when I spotted you two. What are you doing here?” Her eyes found the open door. “I thought you were going to the Crook?”
“We did,” Calder said smoothly. “Got an address immediately. Someone said they’d seen a fire witch matching the Phoenix’s description.”
The lie was almost too easy. Pip didn’t question it, but her expression turned serious.
“The door’s open,” she observed.
“We noticed.”
She pulled out her tiny sword, barely longer than my finger but sharp enough to cut through leather, at least. “Right then, we'd better go together.”
Shit. There’d be no getting rid of her now.
I reached into my pocket, pulling out the rune I’d woven last night while everyone else slept. The slate was still warm from my inscription of the symbols for concealment and protection, woven together in a pattern that took me years to perfect.
“Here,” I said, holding it out to Pip. “It’ll help hide you. Make you harder to see, harder to target.”
Her eyes went wide. “You made this? For me?”
“Last night. But be warned—”
She snatched it before I could finish, pressing the rune against her chest.
Immediately, her entire body went rigid. Her wings froze mid-flutter. Calder dove to catch her, and a grimace twisted her small face. I saw her teeth clench against what had to be excruciating pain.
“It’s going to hurt,” I finished weakly. “The magic has to sync with your own. I’m sorry, I tried to warn you—”
“It’s fine,” Pip gasped, though her voice was strained. “If I need it to be better protected, then I can handle it. I can—”
“Don’t worry, Pip Squeak,” Calder said, his voice gentle. “The pain goes away after a moment.”
Pink flooded her cheeks at the nickname, visible even through her discomfort. Then, as Calder predicted, the tension in her body eased. Her wings resumed their natural flutter, and she straightened with visible relief, tying the rune onto one of her many necklaces.
But something else happened, too. The rune’s magic settled over her like a second skin, and suddenly she was harder to focus on. Not invisible, but like my eyes wanted to slide past her, like she was simply forgettable. Unimportant.
It was perfect.
“That’s so much better,” Pip breathed, examining her hands like she could see the magic working. She turned toward the house, squaring her tiny shoulders. “Ready when you are!”
Calder moved first, pushing the door fully open with the tip of his blade. It swung inward with a slow creak that raised every hair on my neck.
The smell hit immediately.
Blood. Recent. Mixed with something sharper, fear, maybe, or the metallic tang of magic violently released.
We stepped inside.
The entrance hall was narrow, barely wide enough for two people to stand side by side. A coat rack lay toppled on the floor. Shoes scattered. A mirror on the wall hung crooked, its glass spider-webbed with cracks.
But it was the sitting room beyond that rattled me.
Complete carnage.
Something with claws had overturned and shredded the furniture.
Books were ripped apart, their pages scattered.
Glass from the broken windows crunched under our feet.
And blood. So, so much blood—splattered across walls, pooled on the floor, even dripping from the ceiling where the violence had splashed upward.
“Furies,” Pip whispered, her sword trembling in her small hand.
Calder knelt beside a victim near the overturned sofa. “This was recent.”
“How recent?” My voice came out steadier than I felt.
He met my eyes, and I saw the answer before he spoke it. “Hours. Maybe less.”
A sharp tug on my awareness made me gasp. Silas. The bond between us pulled tight with urgency, screaming through our connection seconds before he bellowed a warning.
“We need to go,” I snapped. “Right now.”
Pip shook her head. “We should check upstairs. If someone’s hurt—”
“No one survived this.” Calder was already standing, scanning for exits. “And if we’re found here, we’ll be blamed for it. Through the back door. Now.”
Another tug from Silas, more insistent, more like a yank. His panic bled through our bond. We moved quickly through the wreckage, careful not to touch anything, not to leave footprints in the blood. The kitchen was completely untouched, but the back door hung from one hinge.
Voices carried in from the street out front.
“Please. Someone inside was screaming,” a woman said. “I summoned you an hour ago.”
There was only one race someone would report to for help.
Hunters.
“Go,” Calder hissed, urging Pip through first. She flew out into the narrow alley beyond, her new rune making her nearly invisible in the shadows.
I followed, and Calder came last, pulling the damaged door as closed as it could go.
We ran.
Down a back street, away from the hunters, away from the house of death.
A man stepped from the shadows at the mouth of the alley.
Beautiful face. Unsettling in its perfection.
I’d seen him before. On the Nexus field the day I became Venatori.
He’d been watching from the stands, still as stone while everyone around him cheered.
Now he stood draped in darkness, his long coat sweeping the ground like a spill of shadow.
The high collar framed his sharp jaw, and beneath it I caught the faint patterning of a tailored vest, black-on-black embroidery that drank the light instead of reflecting it.
Everything he wore was immaculate, severe, too elegant, even for a place like this and far too deliberate to be mistaken for anything but dangerous.
His eyes found mine for just a heartbeat as we ran.
Then he turned, disappearing as quickly as he’d appeared.
The strangeness of it settled in my chest, but there was no time to think, no time to question why he was there or what it meant. We didn’t stop until we’d put six blocks between us and the townhouse. Finally, in a covered alcove that reeked of garbage, we collapsed against the wet wall.
Pip was shaking. “What—what was that? Who would—”
“I don’t know,” I said, though my mind was racing. Fresh blood. Hours old, maybe less. Whatever did this could still be in the city. Could still be hunting.
“The second address,” Calder said quietly. “In case this wasn’t a coincidence, we need to go now.”