Erica opened her eyes to see a tiger’s massive head blocking out the sky. She jerked with a yelp of alarm.
“Hey!” Dave said, as the tiger quickly retreated from her wild stare. “Hey, it’s me. You’re okay. I think you’re okay.” He looked around. “Is she okay?”
Genevieve bent over her, replacing the cat. Her aura blazed, and Erica felt the feathery brush of her friend’s magic. “Looks that way. Are you all right, Erica? Anything hurting?”
Her skull was throbbing in time to her pulse, and she groaned, dropping back down to cover her eyes with both hands. “God, my head is killing me.”
“I’m not surprised, considering how fast you were pulling power at the end. You’ve got to be more careful when you do that trick. Can you sit up?”
Erica lowered her hands and considered the question cautiously. “I think so.”
“Let’s give it a try.” Genevieve took one of her hands and slid an arm around her waist, helping her into a sitting position.
Erica groaned as her head thumped like a bass drum. “That wasn’t the smartest thing I’ve ever done. Got any Excedrin?”
* * *
Fifteen minutes later, she was sitting in Gen’s kitchen, polishing off a glass of water to wash down the aspirin.
“You never did have a well-developed sense of self-preservation,” Dave told her.
“Look who’s talking.”
He flicked his tail and shook his huge head. “You and Jake really are made for each other. Both of you are stubborn as hell.”
Erica stiffened.
Genevieve’s red eyebrows climbed. “Well, that’s not a happy expression. What’s the King of the Jungle done now?”
“Jumped her because she almost got herself killed.” Dave rolled over on his back so that all four feet were in the air. He covered his eyes with one big forepaw. “I swear, that boy could fuck up a wet dream.”
“He also can’t keep his mouth shut,” Erica growled.
The tiger lowered a paw to glare. “You’re no better. We’ve talked about this.”
“He roared at another cop!” She held up two fingers pinched together. “He came about this far from getting fired. Cops must keep their heads or people get killed. And Jake and I are really lousy for each other’s self-control.”
Dave flipped over onto his stomach and stared up at her, ears rotated forward. “So what you’re saying is it’s not just him who’s got a problem.”
Erica ground her teeth. “No, it’s not just him.”
Genevieve headed to the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of wine and a Mellow Microbrew, then reached into the cupboard for a pair of wineglasses and a bowl. Digging a corkscrew out of a drawer, she asked, “So what are you going to do about it?”
Erica opened her mouth to tell the Arcanist she didn’t want to talk about it -- only to realize she did. Maybe talking it out would help. “Only thing I can do. I broke it off.”
Genevieve filled Dave’s bowl with beer and put it down in front of him, then poured wine in their glasses and strolled over to hand one to Erica. “And that’s going to make you happy?”
Erica sipped the wine -- a chilled, fruity Riesling -- before she answered. “Sometimes it’s not what makes you happy. It’s what makes you less miserable.”
Genevieve sat down and sipped her wine, her eyes very green and direct. “I’ll admit a romance with a Feral can be pretty damned complicated. Sometimes it’s downright dangerous. But it’s got its rewards too.” One corner of her mouth quirked up. “And not just that.”
“But if you want to talk about that,” Dave said brightly, looking up from his beer, “I’m here for you.”
Genevieve reached down, grabbed his twitching tail tip and gave it a tug. “Shush.”
“You have no shame,” Erica told him with a reluctant grin.
He widened his big gold eyes in an attempt at innocence that failed completely. “Shame? I’m not familiar with this concept.”
“Yeah, we noticed.”
Gen toyed with her wine glass a moment. “Are you really so sure giving him up will make you less miserable?”
Erica opened her mouth to answer… and hesitated.
“I didn’t think so. Maybe you need to give that one a little more thought.”
* * *
The next morning, Jake was trying to keep his mind off Erica when the call came in. “Alpha 23, Laurel County dispatch. I have a 911 hang up at 320 Blackstone Court. The female caller was screaming at someone when the call cut out. Sounded like a man.”
“Laurel County, Alpha 23 en route.” He put the address in his GPS, activated lights and sirens, and hit the gas.
Nine times out of ten, a 911 hang up turned out to be someone’s four-year-old playing on the phone. But the raised voices suggested this was a domestic, and domestics could get seriously ugly.
As he accelerated, Erica’s voice spoke. “Laurel County, Alpha 22. Backing up Alpha 23. ETA ten minutes.” Which put her at roughly the same distance from the address as he was, since it was on the outskirts of his patrol zone.
Evidently, Erica hadn’t liked the description of that call any more than he had. Despite the situation, his heart lifted. He knew he was being ridiculous. Any zone partner would do the same. But the more often he and Erica worked together, the more chances he got to prove they could work together without him fucking it up…
Damn it, Nolan, keep your mind on the job and off your dick.
Some instinct made him kill his siren as he drove into the development. It was a thoroughly middle-class neighborhood, a blend of new construction and older homes. Which meant absolutely nothing when it came to domestic violence. The middle-class and the rich were just as likely to beat their wives as anyone living in a trailer park.
Jake slowed the cruiser as he approached the house, killing his blue lights. He’d rather not find the homeowner waiting at the door with a gun.
He had the feeling this was that kind of call.
A cranberry-red Honda Accord was parked halfway on the grass, half on the driveway that sloped upward to the house. Black skid marks striped the concrete leading from the garage, as if the driver had peeled rubber pulling out, only to lose control of the car.
“I do not like the looks of that,” Jake muttered. He parked the car diagonally in the drive, passenger side toward the house, in case he needed to use the unit as cover from gunfire. “Laurel County, Alpha 23 on scene.”
“10-4, Alpha 23.”
Clarence? he thought, reaching for their link as he got out of the car. With a soft chuff of greeting, the lion filled his consciousness and burst into full manifestation around him.
Better than a bulletproof vest.
Jake straightened, magically drawing on the cat’s acute leonine hearing, and scented the air. He didn’t hear anything but Clarence’s psychic growl of warning, but there was a faint hint of something magical and rank on the air. He drew his Glock.
A car engine rumbled as Erica’s cruiser rounded the corner and pulled into the drive. She parked diagonally next to his car and got out, staring at the house, eyes grim. He gave her a hand signal to follow and moved toward the car.
Erica drew her gun, aiming it at the ground in a two-handed grip as she followed. “Somebody’s working some really dark magic in that house.” She nodded at the Accord. “And it’s affecting whoever’s in that car.”
Jake stopped, tensing. “Is there a MEED?” The last thing he wanted to do was trigger a magical bomb. Or, God forbid, a spell trap that drives me crazy as Bobby.
She hesitated, frowning. “I don’t think so. It looks like a feedback loop, as if magic is flowing from the house into the driver and back again.”
Closing his eyes, he looked toward the car. A sullen red magical nimbus surrounded the vehicle, but he couldn’t tell what it did. Which was no surprise. If Erica couldn’t identify it, he certainly wouldn’t be able to.
“Shit.” Her voice took on an urgent, alarmed note as she switched on her body cam, holstered her weapon, and moved fast toward the car. “Whoever that is, I think they’re dying.”
“Oh, hell.” Transferring his Glock to his right hand, he activated his own body cam, then grabbed his mic to radio Dispatch. “Laurel County, Alpha 23. I need an ambulance at 320 Blackstone Court, and we need backup. It looks like a Code 76 with unknown injuries. I’ll give you the details as we get them.” As he spoke, he shadowed Erica, ready to step in and surround her with his manifestation if things went sideways.
There was a tense pause as the dispatcher digested the fact that the department’s magical heavy hitters were calling for backup on a magical crime. “10-4, Alpha 23.” There was a definite oh shit note in her voice. “Be advised multiple units are tied up with a search for a subject who fired on a deputy in Daniels.”
Fuck. The town of Daniels was on the opposite end of the county. God only knew how long it would take backup to arrive from there. Jake bit back a curse. “10-4, dispatch.”
As Laurel County dispatch went into a flurry of radio traffic, Erica jerked the Accord’s door open. A woman sat slumped in the driver’s seat, her head lolling, her face slack.
“Ma’am?” Leaning in, Erica laid two fingers on the woman’s throat, searching for a pulse. “Meghan. Meghan O’Reilly?” So she must know the woman from somewhere. “Can you tell me what happened? Who’s doing this to you?”
“Wha…” O’Reilly stirred, then jerked as if coming awake, a note of panic entering her voice. She lifted her hands as if to ward off a blow. “Ray… no, Ray, no… Not Noah…”
“Meghan, who’s Ray?” Erica’s voice sharpened into a demand. “Who’s Noah?”
“My son,” the woman moaned. “Bastard’s sacrificing… my son… in a spell…”
Oh, holy fuck.
* * *
Muscles clenching, Erica stared into Meghan O’Reilly’s bruised face. Somebody had hit her in the jaw at least once. Her skin was pale, clammy with shock to the touch, her green eyes vague over bloodless lips. She didn’t look like the same defiant shop owner who’d tried to rip off Wanda Jefferies over a cocktail ring last week. Did you try to scam the wrong guy this time?
Because someone was using magic to kill Meghan as well as her son.
“Who’s sacrificing Noah?” Erica demanded. She and Jake needed more information if they wanted to save the boy. If they charged in blind, the Arcanist might murder the kid on the spot, or trigger a booby trap that could kill them all. “What’s the spell do?”
“Ray… my boyfriend… He cut Noah. Bleeding him for the spell… Ray’s a drug dealer. Al… chemist…” Her eyes narrowed, and dull recognition flickered in her eyes. “Wait… I know you. You’re that… cop. Told you I needed the money. Your fault. He’s doing this because a’ you…”
No, he’s doing this because you moved in with a drug dealer with a taste for human sacrifice. Erica drew a look over her shoulder at Jake, still surrounded by the blaze of his manifestation. “Spell must be targeting her through her blood link to her son.”
“We’ve got to get in that house now,” Jake growled, his deep voice reverberating with Clarence’s magic. “We can’t afford to wait for backup. I’m not even sure any’s on the way. You call Lieutenant Williams while I put her in the back of my car. She needs to be prone with her legs raised or she’s going to code.”
Erica stepped back and plucked her department cell off her belt. The Alpha shift supervisor picked up on the first ring. “Harris? What have we got?” Lt. Williams’ voice was crisp with tension. He must have been listening to the radio traffic.
She briefed him quickly. “Nolan and I are going in. Judging by O’Reilly’s condition, the boy must be in pretty bad shape.”
“You think he’s still alive?”
“Yes, or his mother would already be dead.” She looked toward the house, eyeing the stream of burning red energy now swirling around Jake’s patrol car since he’d put the woman in the back seat. It had gotten brighter in the few moments they’d been here, probably building strength as this Ray bled the boy. “I’m afraid if we don’t get in there in the next five minutes, we’ll be too late. If I can break the spell fast enough, we may be able to save him.”
“Do it. I’m mobilizing SWAT and sending all the manpower we can spare from that search. Be careful. And good luck.”
They were going to need it.
* * *
The front door was locked. Jake slammed a booted foot into the thick door beside the knob, and the deadbolt shrieked as it ripped through the wood frame. The door flew open to bounce against the inner wall.
Fully manifested, he stalked inside, Erica at his heels. Weapons drawn, they scanned for attackers. “Laurel County Sheriff’s Office!”
A short foyer lay before them, an arched doorway on the right. Erica let Jake lead the way. His manifestation would deflect any gunfire short of a sustained burst with an AR-15.
“Keep your fucking distance!” a male voice shouted, pitched a little high with a kind of manic hysteria.
“I don’t think so.” Jake prowled into the room, the shell of his lion glowing around him.
A pudgy redheaded man knelt in the center of a triple ring of revolving sigils, the sprawled form of a child lying in front of him. The boy looked perhaps nine years old, a sturdy-looking kid in a sweatshirt and jeans. He stared at them, his green eyes dazed in a face smeared with tears, snot and blood. Erica saw a resemblance to his mother in the eyes, the shape of his mouth, and the curve of his jaw.
The two were surrounded by a pool of bright red on the gleaming blond hardwood floor. The blood welled from slashing cuts in Noah’s left forearm.
Ahead of her, Erica saw Jake’s big shoulders tense inside the glow of his manifestation. “If you don’t let that child go, I’m going to fucking kill you!” The last two words emerged as a shattering leonine roar that made the killer jump.
Noah cried out, his weak voice inaudible as the house vibrated with the echoes of Jake’s rage. Instinctively, Erica reached out with her aura, trying to touch the boy’s, soothe his terror. But when her power hit the outer ring of sigils, light exploded in her head as if she’d run headlong into a brick wall.
Yeah, not good. Erica stepped to one side, trying to get clear of the blinding nimbus of Jake’s magic. She needed to see the spell Ray had cast.
Erica frowned, eyeing the blazing sigils rotating in the air. The working was far brighter than it should’ve been, given the power of Ray’s aura. Had Meghan helped him cast it?
No, the witch didn’t have that much power, either.
Great, a third Talent is involved in this shit storm. But when she reached out with her senses, she didn’t detect anyone else in the house either. Thank God for that. We’re going to have our hands full as it is.
Ray stared at Jake, one hand holding a knife with a wavy blade and a black handle -- an athame, or ritual knife. His blue eyes were too wide in his round face, which was stubbled as if he hadn’t shaved in a couple of days. Sweat slicked his skin, and smears of blood marked his forehead and cheeks as if he’d tried to wipe it away with bloody hands.
Judging by the bloodshot eyes in the blown pupils, he was flying very high on something. Probably Tink, the illegal stimulant some Arcs used to enhance their magical abilities. Fairy Dust was addictive as hell, with long term use triggering paranoia, psychosis, and, eventually, heart attacks.
“Keep your distance, Simba, or I’ll cut the kid.” Ray pressed the tip of the knife against the child’s chest. Noah stared up at the bloody blade, his eyes huge and hopeless. “You don’t have a prayer of getting through my wards.”
Erica ground her teeth. We’ll see about that, motherfucker.
Whoever had created that spell circle had known what they were doing. As Jake and Ray exchanged insults and threats, Erica studied its outer ring, looking for any sigil that was dim or misshapen. If she could find a weakness, she could use it to disrupt the spell and crack the ward like an egg.
Damned if she saw one. Each one of the sigils was as sharp and bright as though someone had formed them with laser beams. She didn’t…
Wait. There. There was a gap between two of the sigils that was a fraction greater than the space between the others. Extruding a tendril of her aura, Erica shaped it into a long, thin spear, drawing on her magic to feed more and more power to the probe. Good thing Ray’s high on Tink and thoroughly focused on Jake, or I’d never get away with this.
Sweat trickled down her spine, cold against her heated skin. If it doesn’t work…
She sucked in a breath, gaze fastened on the weakness orbiting toward her. As it started to revolve past, she flung the spear of power into the gap with all her strength.
The probe bounced off the spell like a raindrop against a car windshield. Pain exploded behind her eyes and she staggered, barely catching herself in time to keep from hitting the floor on her ass. Shit piss fuck!
She’d never hit a ward with that much juice. I don’t have the power to break it. Genevieve might, but BFS was on the other end of the county and it would take her half an hour to get here. Judging by the crazed glitter in Ray’s eyes and Noah’s weakening aura, they didn’t have that much time.
The amplification spell!
She sidestepped over behind Jake, who was glowing in full manifestation like something out of a Spielberg movie. He made a damn good distraction.
“Let me in,” Erica murmured, knowing his Clarence-enhanced senses would make out what she was saying. Ray didn’t hear her. He was too busy ranting about Meghan smoking a cookie of Tink worth four hundred dollars… Suddenly she remembered Meghan’s excuse for ripping off Wanda Jeffries, something about owing money to her boyfriend. Meghan, you have lousy taste in men.
The back of Jake’s manifestation thinned, and Erica stepped into it, knowing Ray wouldn’t be able to see her from his spell circle. Leaning in, she murmured, “That’s one of the strongest wards I’ve ever seen. No way can I break it by myself, but Genevieve showed me how to draw on someone else’s magic. If I can use yours, I think I can do it.”
“Then do it,” Jake told her, without taking his eyes off Ray.
“You’ll have to drop your manifestation to feed the magic to me. I’ll be drawing a lot of juice, and it may knock me on my butt, but it won’t hurt me. If I go down, you stay focused on the asshole. Take him down and grab Noah.”
It occurred to her that she was giving him orders -- normally the kind of thing that could set a cat off -- but Jake only nodded, his Glock steady in one big hand. “I’ll take care of it.”
And he would, too. She laid a hand against his broad back, wishing she could feel his body through his winter jacket and bulletproof vest. Pushing the thought away, she reached into his aura as he opened his consciousness to her.
The ability to touch another’s thoughts was the core of Feral magic -- the Talent for twining your soul with another’s. She felt the soundless mental click of connection, felt for a moment the dark male swirl that was Jake and his cat -- the strength, the stubborn nobility. And under it all, his hunger for her.
The last time we did this, we were making love.
But she didn’t have time to explore those seductive feelings, so she stepped back. He thinned the manifestation to allow her to leave, but even as she moved away, a thin shining cord of aural energy stretched between them. The weapon in his hand was unwavering, though Ray’s spell could probably bounce a bullet, just like Jake’s manifestation.
“I told the little bitch what I’d do if she didn’t get my money, but she didn’t listen,” the Alchemist snarled. “Now she’s going to learn her lesson. And so are all of you…”
He broke off as they stepped closer to the rotating sigils of the ward. “What the fuck are you doing?” Ray lifted the athame, his face contorting in a snarl. “Do you want me to kill the brat?”
Peering through the spell’s glow, Erica saw Noah’s eyes were closed, and he lay too still. At least his chest still rose and fell. This had better fucking work.
The gap in the spell drew level with them. Erica sank a hand into Jake’s manifestation, which vanished as he blasted his magic into her.
The power slammed into her in a white-hot explosion of pain that seemed to sink fanged jaws into her brain. Teeth clenched, Erica snatched the power into a spear and drove it into the gap between the sigils. As she blasted their joined magic into the spell, the pain increased, burning, blinding until she could have sworn she smelled smoke. Gasping, she jerked away from Jake, trying to break the link between them.
Ray’s spell popped like a soap bubble. She tripped as her knees went weak, and she went down hard. Crushing pain tore a scream from her throat -- feedback from breaking the spell.
* * *
From the corner of one eye, Jake saw Erica hit the ground with a cry of pain, but he didn’t dare look away from Ray as the Alchemist rose with a screech of outrage. “My spell! What the fuck did you do my spell?”
In the depths of his mind, Clarence roared his need to make the bastard pay for torturing the child. Jake’s lips peeled off his teeth as he shared the cat’s craving to manifest and rip the bastard apart. He clamped down hard on their shared rage. We’d never be able to clear the distance in time!
“I warned you!” Ray’s wild eyes narrowed as he raised the knife over Noah’s chest. “The kid’s dead, fucker! And it’s all on --”
Jake shot him. Twice.
The double blast thundered in the enclosed space, hitting his Clarence-amplified ears like a fist.
The Alchemist looked down in shock, then collapsed with a crimson splash. Jake leapt into the circle, boots slapping down in the red puddle of Noah’s blood. Kneeling, he unbuckled the Alchemist’s belt, dragged it off, and whipped the leather strap around the boy’s forearm below the elbow. Pulling his ASP baton, he slid it beneath the strap and began to twist the makeshift tourniquet. The child didn’t stir.
Jake laid his fingers on Noah’s throat, and was relieved to feel his pulse still throbbing, if dangerously weak. In the distance, he could hear the distinctive wail of an approaching ambulance.
“Fuck, that hurts.” Erica sat up, bracing her head with both hands as if it might fall off.
“You all right?”
“Fine. Is Noah okay?”
“No, but I hear an ambulance pulling into the development. I hope they have enough blood on board, or he’s not going to make it.” Glancing at the sprawled corpse of the Alchemist, Jake wished he could kill him all over again. With a sigh, he rose and started to collect cushions from the couch pushed haphazardly against one wall, evidently to clear a space for the circle. They needed to elevate Noah’s legs to keep his blood pressure from sinking any further.
Erica began to swear in a string of profanity so inventive, his Arcane Corps DI would have been impressed. Alarmed, he stared at her as she reeled to her feet. “What?”
“The inner ring of that spell is still active. And it’s pumping a hell of a lot of magic somewhere.”
“Oh, crap.” Jake closed his eyes and looked with his magical senses. Sure enough, sigils still revolved slowly through the air. “I thought you broke it!”
“I broke the ward, but I wasn’t able to touch the inner sigil rings.” She paced around the spell, studying the sigils in frowning worry.
Jake bent to tuck the cushions under Noah’s legs. “What does the spell do?”
“What does any human sacrifice spell do? Collects the life force released when someone’s killed.”
Jake stared at her, feeling sick. “You mean I just fed it by shooting the son of a bitch?” He frowned. “Wait a minute, that makes no sense. If the Alchemist is dead, who’s it feeding power to?”
“I have no idea, but I’m going to have to try to break it as soon as I get my magical wind back.” Erica stepped into the circle and stalked over to the Alchemist’s body, staring down at it. Her eyes widened, and she bent to jerk up the man’s T-shirt, baring a hairy potbelly and a pair of man boobs. “Oh, fuck me!”
He rose to look over her shoulder. An upside-down pentagram was tattooed in the middle of Ray’s flabby chest. Judging by the raised red flesh around it, the tatt was no more than a couple of days old. “He’s a Satanist?”
“No, the pentagram’s camouflage for a sigil tattooed underneath. And it’s active.” She looked up at him, her expression grim. “This bastard was working with somebody.”