Chapter 32 #2
I’d made it twenty paces before the rest of the Venatori appeared, emerging from the maze of warehouses and stacked cargo like they’d been there the whole time.
Calder’s gaze found mine. “Okay?”
I managed a nod. “Okay.”
They walked beside me without question, and we made our way back toward refuge through a city that felt like it was dying by its own choice. We passed the heretics huddled on street corners, the sprites swarming above, moved past the crowds streaming toward the docks because they were curious.
A young hunter, who couldn’t have been more than ten, sat on the ground outside a shuttered shop, fidgeting with her Life Rune. Adjusting it. Checking it. Making sure it was still there, still working, still keeping her alive.
We passed a scorched woman who leaned out a high window to see what the commotion at the docks had been, her face lined with the kind of exhaustion that came from simply surviving.
And, on the corner, a boy sold newspapers, his voice cutting through the afternoon noise. “Nexus update! The championship is coming! Betting odds! Monster attacks in the Tangles leaves families dead!” He paused for breath, then continued. “Get your papers! October ninth, hot off the press.”
We kept walking, leaving Wickett farther and farther behind.
His easy dismissal before, I’m tempted to remind them what a witch’s blood looks like, echoed in my mind.
A reminder of exactly why I needed to keep distance between us.
No matter how much something in me didn’t want to.
“I think I need a bath. I smell like rotten fish now,” Pip said, circling above us with Silas, the moment he’d left the ground. “And your kitty is trying to eat me.”
Silas snapped a beak at her. She tapped him firmly on the top of it with her sword. “I will eat a cat. I know I don’t look the kind, but I’ve got a weird cousin in Solaire that taught me how. Don’t make me do it.”
Calder chuckled lightly. “Pip, the boy you were chasing at the docks threw a fish carcass in your bag.”
She gasped, spinning around as she tried to find it. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Lucy reached forward and plucked the bones free. “You collect weird shit. We assumed you wanted to keep it.”
Pip placed her hand on her chest, drawing back. “I do not collect weird sh... stuff. How dare you, Lucy Varrow?”
“You have a button collection,” I pointed out.
“Buttons are valuable.”
“You have seventeen,” Calder said. “You’re edging closer to obsession.”
“Eighteen now, thank you very much.” She patted her pocket protectively. “And they’re all beautiful and shiny and completely normal things to collect.”
“One of them has dried blood on it,” Lucette said.
“That adds character!”
Silas made a sound that might have been a laugh. Pip glared at him. “Don’t you start. You’re supposed to be on my side. We’re both small and underestimated.”
He snapped his beak again, closer this time.
“Syn, control your murder bird!”
“He’s a griffin,” I said mildly.
“He’s whatever nightmare creature ate a cat and a bird and became both!” Pip flew higher, out of reach. “And he’s being mean to me after I had a very traumatic day, thank you.”
“We spent the morning playing cards before we went to the arena,” Calder pointed out.
“And I won! Which was also very stressful!” She crossed her arms mid-flight, somehow managing to look dignified despite the lingering smell of fish. “You try counting cards while that creepy raven keeps giving you looks.”
“Corvus was helping you cheat again,” Lucette said.
“Corvus was only providing moral support. There’s a difference.”
“Is there, though?” I asked.
“Yes! Moral support is when someone believes in you. Cheating is when—” She stopped, narrowing her eyes at all of us. “You’re all ganging up on me because I have more buttons, and now you’re jealous.”
“That’s definitely it,” Calder said, his voice completely flat.
“I knew it. The burden I carry—”
“Speaking of burdens...” Lucette’s head tilted to the left.
“They’ve been trailing us since we left the docks,” I said, jutting my chin toward Silas, who’d flown to a rooftop ahead of us after he was done harassing Pip. “According to his signal, there’s four of them.”
“Not quite sure how we’re supposed to hunt the Phoenix when we’ve got hunters watching our every move,” the shifter said dryly.
“It’s like he wants us to fail,” I muttered. “Every order he gives is designed to put us in impossible situations. Investigate the docks, but make sure everyone sees you. Find the Phoenix, but don’t actually look in places that might be useful.”
“If his son wasn’t bound to us in this blood oath, I’d swear the goal was for us to die,” Lucy said.
And that was exactly what it felt like. Twenty-two days left, and the Magistrate was actively sabotaging our investigation while pretending to support it.
“So, what do we do?” Pip asked quietly.
I thought about those bodies we’d found. About Jorn likely dying in that explosion. About Crimson tracing three letters with his last breath. “We stop playing by his rules.”