Sacrificial Magic

  Not when the sick creep of death magic slid around her body, up her legs to wrap around her chest and squeeze, as she looked at the dead body—at what was left of the dead body—of Jia Zhang, spread-eagled within the confines of the hafuran painted in still-wet blood on the cracked patch of cement right outside the school’s front doors. It was worse than Eddie’s, in some ways; it hadn’t burned, so the slices on the girl’s skin, the way she’d been torn open, were still clear.

  That had been the ritual being done, she guessed, the spell they’d felt. The one giving the spell caster more power. And the ghost was coincidence. Wrong a-fucking-gain.

  “I can feel them this time,” she told Terrible, standing close to him. Not too close, but close. If she stood too close she thought he’d move away, and she couldn’t bear it if he did. Especially now, when even her bones felt cold despite the balmy night, and all she wanted to do was bury her face in his chest, feel his strong arms around her keeping her from falling into the abyss beneath her. She couldn’t see the pit, the crack in the earth that wanted to swallow her, but she knew it was there; she walked a tightrope over it every day, every minute.

  It took almost all of her strength not to throw herself at him. It took almost all of her strength not to dig into her pillbox and swallow everything she had. She couldn’t take this. Too much stress, too much sadness, too much frustration … it would never end, and she was so fucking tired of trying to find a place to rest.

  Tired of finding it—thinking she’d found it—and having it torn out from under her.

  Terrible nodded. “Aye? Same as Eddie?”

  “Eddie? Who is that? This happened before?” Beulah seemed to have no compunction about standing close to either of them. She circled the hafuran and came to a stop right between them. So helpful of her to stand there; Chess would have to remember to thank her later.

  Terrible gave her a sharp glance. Right. Shit. Did Beulah already know? But—no. No, the idea that she’d deliberately come into the theater just so she could seem stunned and upset at the murder to throw them off the trail seemed a bit much, didn’t it? Why wouldn’t she just not show up at all?

  Lex had mentioned Blue more than once, yeah, but never in connection to work. How much did she have to do with all of that?

  Guess it was time to find out. Chess took a deep breath, filtered through her tight throat. “He’s—he was—from our side of town. Killed the night before last, just like this.”

  Beulah’s mouth turned down. “And you didn’t tell me. Or Lex.”

  “Why the fuck would I tell you? Or Lex? Why do you need to know?”

  “Someone’s performing ritual murders in Downside and you don’t think—”

  “Someone performed a ritual murder, on our side of town.” A ritual murder Beulah’s father might already know about, but she bit that one back. She’d find out soon enough. And even if he didn’t, fuck Beulah. “So no, I didn’t think it was time to call in backup. Sorry. I should have known how much more skilled at this shit you and Lex are than me. Oh, but how would I have known, when you didn’t even tell me who you are?”

  “Don’t get on your fucking attitude train with me. You should have said something and you know it. You knew I had connections in the community, you knew I could have had people watching.”

  “Yeah, your fucking community watchdogs were really effective when those hookers were being murdered. Very impressive how they caught the guy— Oh, no, wait. That was me.”

  “With help from my brother.”

  “Oh, bullshit. If you think he was any—”

  Her gaze fell on Terrible watching them with the disinterested expression he generally wore when he was bored or trying not to react to things. She didn’t know which one it was at that moment, but she knew neither of them really appealed.

  Beulah seemed to come to her senses as well. After a few seconds of embarrassed silence she said, “I’m sorry, Chess. You’re right, why would you have told me. Or Lex. It wasn’t our territory.”

  “Thank you.” That sounded stiff, so she softened it with, “I shouldn’t have yelled, either.”

  Beulah smiled, a quick flash in the darkness. She turned her head toward poor Jia’s mutilated body. “I guess I should call my father about her, get someone to come pick her up—”

  “You can’t,” Chess said, but as soon as the words left her mouth she realized there was no way in hell she could call the Church and report this. Not when she hadn’t reported Eddie’s similar death the night before. What could she say? “Oh, yeah, well, I saw a man murdered just like this last night, but my drug dealer just took care of discarding his body somehow so we didn’t have to get you involved.” Sure. That would totally work, and totally not get her ass fired and thrown in jail.

  If she called the Church, she would lose everything. If she didn’t, she’d be giving Slobag something serious to hold over her head, something that wasn’t her addiction and didn’t implicate him in it. If she didn’t, she’d have to handle the case by herself, and for some strange reason that thought just didn’t hold much appeal for her.

  Two choices, both of them shitty. Story of her life.

  Beulah stood before her, arms folded, eyebrows raised. The look on her face told Chess that the other woman knew exactly what sort of mental calculation she was doing in her head. “Well? Are you going to tell me why I can’t do the only logical thing?”

  Fuck. Chess couldn’t quite look up, couldn’t quite meet either Beulah’s eyes or Terrible’s. “No. You’re right, that’s what you should do. And— Okay, I guess we should go, huh? So your father’s witch can get a look at it?”

  “What?”

  “Your father’s witch. He has one, correct?” Beulah’s eyes narrowed. “I thought they were talking about you.”

  “No.” Okay, that answered that one—sort of, anyway. Beulah could be lying.

  Whether she was or wasn’t, though, what was Chess going to do, leave this for some random maybe-witch to deal with?

  She wanted to. Fuck, how she wanted to. Wipe her hands of this whole mess and head back to Terrible’s place, to his big warm bed. Or hers, which wasn’t quite as big but would be just as warm. Either one, she didn’t care, as long as no one would interrupt them again.

  She folded her arms over her chest, gritted her teeth. “Fine. I’ll stay. Until he gets here, at least.”

  Beulah nodded, but instead of pulling out her phone, she looked at Terrible. What was that about?

  Oh, right. If one more positive thing happened in this whole situation she was going to explode from the sheer joy of it all. “Beulah, can you take him home? We came in my car, so—”

  “Ain’t leavin you here alone.”

  “You can’t stay, though. Not here. They’ll kill you when they see you.”

  He snorted.

  “She’s right, Terrible,” Beulah cut in. “Not to mention what seeing you with her will do to anyone he might bring, what they’d say. She’s having a hard enough time getting any information at all.”

  Oh, fuck, Chess hadn’t even thought of that. If they knew she wasn’t actually with Lex, wasn’t Slobag’s witch, one of “them”—ha, they’d probably think she was cheating on Lex with Terrible. Oh, the irony. So fucking funny.

  Or it would be if Beulah wasn’t spot-fucking-on in saying that they’d try to kill him the minute they saw him.

  She took the three steps that brought her right in front of him, put her hand on his still folded arms, and looked in his eyes, wishing violently that this hadn’t happened, that none of it had happened, and she could just get in the car and go home with him, dive under the covers and stay there.

  She let that wish show on her face, hoped he’d be able to see it. “They don’t trust me. It’ll be worse if they see you.”

  He shook his head. “Ain’t leavin you alone.”

  “I— You can take my car. Take my car, and Beulah will drive me home. Right, Beulah? See, she’ll drive me home. Just please, take my c
ar and go, okay?”

  “Don’t trust her.” He said it loud enough for Beulah to hear it. Deliberately loud enough.

  Thankfully Beulah didn’t respond, although she very well might have made a face or something. Chess didn’t know; she refused to turn around and look. Didn’t want to look, anyway, not when she could look at him instead.

  “Please. I don’t want anyone else to get hurt, not tonight. Especially not you. I’ll be fine, you know I will.”

  He was going to give in. She saw it in his eyes, in the way his brow furrowed. “Ain’t like it. Who the fuck knows what them might give a try on. Ain’t want you here when they do.”

  “I don’t either, but—”

  “Lex and I will both be here,” Beulah cut in, and Chess’s heart—along with any hope she’d had that this would be resolved without making him angry—smashed to the bloody cement at her feet. She had to bring him up, didn’t she?

  Of course if Chess knew anything about Terrible—which she did—it was that he’d already thought of that, already seen it play out in his head. But knowing something was one thing; having it confirmed was something else entirely.

  And oh, shit, was that why he didn’t want to leave? He’d seemed to believe her about not knowing who Beulah was, but she knew very well how much he could hide when he wanted to. What if his wanting to stay didn’t have anything to do with worrying about her? What if he was really worried about what she might be up to with Slobag, with Lex?

  She didn’t want to think about that, but she couldn’t help thinking about it, either.

  “You know Lex won’t let anything happen to her. You know that.”

  The almost-bruise on his throat disappeared again, lost in the dark flush spreading over his skin as he glared at Beulah. Shit. Just what Chess needed. Reassurance from Beulah about how Lex would take such great care of her.

  Nobody spoke for a long moment, the silence hanging between them like a crystal globe about to shatter.

  “Aye.” He reached up, rubbed the back of his neck, turned his head away.

  “I’d rather have you here,” Chess said, quietly so Beulah might not hear it. She wasn’t embarrassed or anything, she just didn’t think it was any of Beulah’s damn business. She put her hand on his chest. “You know I would. But I’m tired, and I want to go home as soon as I can, and if you stay— You need to tell Bump anyway, right? Go let him know and everything?”

  Beulah coughed. A deliberate cough. “I’d like to go home myself sometime before dawn, if that’s okay with you two.”

  Rather than punch her, Chess handed Terrible her keys. If it made him trust her less, fine. At least he’d be alive to do it. “Have fun driving my car.”

  That earned her a sort of half smile, a semi-laugh. “Aye. Be all cool in it, maybe get myself one.”

  Relief flooded her system, in the same way and pattern as her pills; and damn, how she wanted a few of those, too.

  But then, she could have them, couldn’t she? Wasn’t like Beulah didn’t know.

  Still … something kept her from pulling out her pillbox and chasing her troubles away enough for her to breathe. “Will you go back to my place?”

  “Aye, leave yon car there. Then Bump’s. You text me aught happens, dig? Anything.”

  “I will.”

  He hesitated. She waited for him to kiss her, to give her some sort of reassurance, something she could hold on to after he left. Some sign that he trusted her.

  It didn’t come. A nod; a short glance at Beulah. Chess watched him disappear around the corner of the building, into the shadows there, black as a murderer’s heart. It was an effort to keep her feet from running to catch up with him.

  Beulah’s voice formed an oddly familiar background, speaking Cantonese into her phone while the grass behind the school turned briefly, shockingly red from the taillights. Chess watched the car slither through the grass, slow and smooth; watched him drive away. He was too far for her to see his face, so she didn’t know if he was looking at her or not. She lifted her hand in a useless wave anyway.

  “They’re coming,” Beulah said behind her. Like it was good news or something, instead of yet another fucking complication destroying yet another night. Like Chess wasn’t probably going to sleep alone again, like her stomach hadn’t landed in her shoes and decided to set up housekeeping there.

  She slipped a little on the damp cement patio as she neared the body again.

  She and Terrible had been inside. They’d been making out inside while a sorcerer killed a young girl right outside the building. Had Jia known what was coming? Had she screamed?

  Would Chess even have heard her if she had? Over the sound of her own heart and her breath and the curious isolation of desire that made the entire rest of the world, everything but herself and Terrible, disappear?

  Never mind that they’d been hunting, battling, and losing a ghost for part of the time. When the spell started, they’d been in the booth. If she hadn’t been yanking his jeans open they might have heard sounds outside, might have been paying attention.

  She knelt by the symbol, taking care not to lean over it, not to let the energy touch her yet. She’d have to touch it, yeah, but she wanted to examine it first; this one wasn’t destroyed by fire.

  “You know I’m not going to tell him,” Beulah said, yanking Chess back from her speculation.

  “What?”

  “I’m not going to tell him. Terrible. About you kissing Lex today.”

  “Lex kissed me.” Bitch.

  Beulah waved her hand. “Whatever. The point is, I won’t say anything. I won’t tell him.”

  Chess waited for the rest of it, for the “as long as you do this or that,” or “if you give me a couple of hundred bucks,” or whatever.

  It didn’t come. So why the hell would Beulah bring it up in the first place? If she wasn’t going to tell, why not just pretend she didn’t see it at all?

  Beulah must have seen her thoughts on her face. “I don’t want you worried about that, or wondering. So you can just focus on this.”

  Ah, right. “Thanks for your concern.”

  “Don’t be— I’m trying to be nice to you.”

  “Why? Why be nice to me? What’s the point? You weren’t worried about it before. Or was it just because you didn’t have a use for me then? What do you need to butter me up for?”

  Beulah stared at her long enough for Chess to really feel it. “You know, Lex said you could be a real bitch sometimes. And I didn’t believe him, I thought it was just because he’ll drive anyone crazy, but I guess I was wrong. Fuck you, Chess.”

  She stalked away, over to the wall of the building, and leaned against it. The white light of her phone’s screen hit her face, made it glow there in the dark while she frowned and started fiddling with the buttons.

  Damn. The last thing she needed was to start feeling guilty because she hadn’t been nice to Lex’s sister. Beulah hadn’t exactly been nice to her, what with the office ambush and the sly grins and the snotty comments. That was pretty much the opposite of nice, in fact. Chess didn’t owe her shit. Especially not niceness.

  That was Truth. So why did she still feel like an asshole?

  A feeling she didn’t need, not compounded with the memory of her car driving away, of the look on Terrible’s face when Beulah mentioned how safe it would be once Lex got there. Not when she saw headlights approach and knew Lex had arrived.

  This was the Slobag she’d always imagined. Not the one dressed in bells and velvet when he met with Bump, but the one in soft gray trousers and a tidy button-down shirt. The only indicators of who he actually was were his hands heavy with gold and his broad-brimmed red fur hat, like a wealthy Siberian cowboy.

  Did he recognize the ritual, the symbol? Had he ordered this?

  But if he had, why there? Why Jia, why outside the school?

  “So what’s the tale, Tulip?” Lex slid his arm around her, kissed the side of her head. Great. “What we got on here?”

&
nbsp; Okay, there was one good thing about that awful dead body. It gave her an excuse to slide away. Had he really told Beulah that she was a cold bitch sometimes?

  Not really the time to ask. “It’s a ritual murder, it—”

  “Oh, aye? You for certain on that one?”

  “Ha-ha.” She gave him a dirty look, even though it wouldn’t be effective in the dark, and if she held her flashlight up to her face she’d just look like a creepy idiot. Looking like a creepy idiot would be a dumb thing to do. She didn’t want to alienate him or anyone else there; they’d brought two other men along with them, tall stocky men who looked quite serious about the job they were obviously hired to do.

  Terrible could kick their asses, she thought, examining both with a critical eye and more than a little pride. He definitely could. Easily.

  Too bad he wasn’t there, which meant she’d need to be careful, didn’t it? Bad idea to accuse the drug lord of murder while his men watched. Sure, Lex was her—her friend. But she somehow didn’t think he’d take her side if that subject came up.

  “Anyway. It’s a ritual murder, a sacrifice. The symbol on the ground is called a hafuran. It’s designed to build power.”

  Lex looked at it, looked at her. “A couple of them in that ink you got, aye? There, and there.” He pointed at her right shoulder and her left upper arm.

  If she hadn’t been blushing before, she definitely was now. And if the two men Slobag brought with him hadn’t already thought or known she’d slept with Lex, they definitely did now.

  And Lex … he remembered her ink that well—remembered her naked body that well? She’d never thought he paid that much attention to those particular parts of her. They were usually busy with far more fun ones.

  But then, she supposed if she thought about his, she could remember it in vivid detail, too. Just like she could remember Terrible’s. That thin line of hair down his stomach—she’d never thought she’d like that, but she did, a lot—the scars and ink on his arms and side and back; she could draw those from memory, couldn’t she?