Allie Beckstrom 09 - Magic for a Price

  “I’m still in a hurry,” I said. “Are you and Zay all right?”

  Shame tipped his head so he was considering me through his bangs. “We have an understanding that will do for now.”

  “If I can help—”

  “Bloody hell, Beckstrom,” he said with a smile. “Who told you it was your job to fix every damn thing in the world?”

  “Pretty much everyone,” I said.

  “Stop listening to them, okay? We’re fine. And, as I understand it, we have a wild goose to chase.”

  “You don’t think there’s magic in St. Johns?” I asked.

  He hitched one shoulder. “I don’t think your da would tell us about it now, after all this time, unless there was a reason for him to. A big reason.”

  That’s exactly what I’d been thinking.

  Shame climbed into the van behind Terric and slid the side door closed. I was the last person to get in the van. I stepped up into the passenger’s seat, got in and held on as Zay headed toward St. Johns.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Why do we need Stone with us? I asked Dad as we careened down the noticeably empty streets.

  To make sure the magic there is purified. I am…tired, Allison. Let me rest until I am needed.

  He pulled away to some corner of my mind and essentially closed the door behind him.

  Something about his answer didn’t feel right even though it made perfect sense. Sure, we had used Stone to purify the wells, but the only thing we’d done with the cisterns was shut them down. Dad had been deliberately vague about what the source of magic in St. Johns was, exactly. If we needed Stone, then it must be a well.

  Shame leaned forward and tapped my shoulder. “Mum said to give you this.” He handed me a phone.

  “Thanks.” It was the one I’d been using before. I must have left it by the bed. I still wasn’t all that used to carrying one around.

  “Shame.” I turned in my seat so I could more or less face him. “Thank you. For before. When I…” I swallowed. I was having a hard time saying it. I had died. Didn’t mean I wasn’t in deep, deep denial about the reality of that.

  “You know I wasn’t going to let you go that easy,” he said. “Last time you walked into death, Jones was miserable to be around.”

  “I was in a coma,” Zay said.

  “Like I said. No fun at all. I have pictures to prove it.” Shame smiled and leaned back in the seat.

  I opened my mouth, trying to get him to understand how grateful I was that he had pushed me away from death. That he hadn’t let me take the easy way out.

  “You’re welcome, Beckstrom,” he said. “Anytime.”

  I nodded. I guess that would have to be enough for now. Maybe later I could make him understand what it meant to me, to know he had my back like that.

  We didn’t talk for the rest of the drive, everyone lost in their own thoughts.

  “This is it.” Zay slowed the van and parked it across the street from Mama’s place.

  It was weird. I almost always felt some kind of immediate relief coming to St. Johns. Today was no different. My shoulders relaxed and the headache I’d been ignoring removed its teeth from my forehead.

  We piled out of the van and I strode up the steps to Mama’s diner door.

  It was early, but the diner had probably been open for hours now.

  One of the Boys, since Mama called all the strays and orphans she took in Boy, stood behind the counter. He didn’t have his hand on the gun I knew was under the shelf. I was flattered.

  “Is Mama here?”

  He tipped his chin toward the dining room.

  I started off that way. The tables were empty except for one elderly couple, who got a look at me and Zay and settled back with their coffee to see what was about to go down.

  “Mama?” I called.

  She was in the back of the room, wiping off a table. Mama stood barely five feet tall, and had the disposition of a wet cat. She and I were almost friends back when I was barely making rent taking Hounding jobs. That was before I knew about the Authority and all this secret magic stuff. She’d hired me to investigate a hit on one of the kids she’d taken in. A hit that had led to my father’s murder.

  I’d helped out her boy, but in doing so, had gotten her son, James, thrown in jail for killing my dad. To say our relationship suffered from that turn of events was an understatement.

  She turned toward me and her face darkened. “Why are you here, Allie girl? You want breakfast?”

  “No. I want to talk to you. In private.”

  She glanced up at Zayvion, who just shrugged, then over at the patrons.

  Mama shook her head. “Okay, okay. Come this way, we talk.”

  She stomped off and opened a door I hadn’t paid much attention to with an EMPLOYEES ONLY sign on it.

  I had expected a storage room but it was a large, modern office with a desk, shelves, and a computer. There was an old map of St. Johns on the wall, displaying roads that I didn’t recognize.

  Mama turned and put her hands on her hips. “What do you both want with me? Is the Boy you took all right?”

  “Cody’s fine,” I said, guessing his spirit, who had pretty much haunted this place for a while before he was rejoined with the living Cody, was the “Boy” she was talking about.

  “So?”

  “First, you need to know something. Two undead spirits are coming to Portland to tear the city apart. They want to rule all magic. And they will kill anyone who gets in their way.”

  She opened her mouth, but I held up my hand.

  “We don’t have a lot of time. They’ve been moving across the world killing powerful magic users. That’s why we locked down the wells, and turned off the cisterns. We don’t want them to have access to Portland’s magic.”

  I rubbed my fingers back through my bangs, wishing they’d stay out of my eyes. “They will make our fight with Jingo Jingo out in Cathedral Park look like child’s play. They’re going to kill people, Mama. A lot of people. If there’s magic here, in St. Johns, they will use it to destroy St. Johns, and then the rest of Portland.”

  “Why are you telling me these things?”

  “Because my father told me there is another source of magic in the city. He said it’s here in St. Johns. And he told me you and he were the only two people who knew about it.”

  “He lied. Your father was a liar.” She started forward as if to leave the room, but Zayvion simply stood in front of the door, his bulk blocking her escape.

  “Mama,” I said, “please. Everything is at risk. All of Portland. St. Johns too. If there is some kind of magic here, something that might be tapped into, or could have been tainted—”

  She scoffed.

  “—we have to know. My dad believed it was important enough for us to know about it that he risked breaking his word to you.”

  “Who knows what was in your father’s head? He was a desperate man, Allie girl. Did such things…” She shook her head. “Terrible things. I want nothing of him.”

  “You don’t have to have anything of him. I just need to know if there is magic in St. Johns.”

  She looked down for a moment. “You tell me, Allie. Is there magic here?”

  “I don’t know.” I ran my fingers through my hair again. My chest ached. Not from where I was still sore from the CPR. Someplace deeper inside me ached.

  “You don’t know, I don’t know.”

  Allison, Dad said. Just tell her yes. Trust me.

  I rolled my shoulders. “Give me a sec.” I closed my eyes, ignored Dad, and tried to clear my mind. I refused to lie to her.

  Did I feel magic here? Was that possibly why I always felt welcome, more comfortable here? No, that didn’t make sense. Magic made me sick. In one way or another, magic always did some kind of harm to me. There wasn’t any magic that could make you feel good.

  Somewhere inside me though, I knew the truth. Not because Dad had said it. Not because it was what I wanted to believe.

  Th
ere was something magic about St. Johns. There always had been.

  My dad moved aside, lifting his hand away from some small point in the center of my chest.

  That was where my small magic used to be. Since I had traded that bit of magic to get Zayvion’s soul out of death, I’d had nothing but a hollow coldness there.

  But I remembered what it was like to carry that small flame of magic. It felt like being here in St. Johns—warm, safe, home.

  Why? I asked Dad.

  None of this made sense to me.

  You were hurt, he said. I…she, Mama, healed you.

  How?

  With the magic of St. Johns.

  And the truth of his words was undeniable. I knew he was right. I knew there was magic here.

  “Yes,” I said. “There’s magic here. I can’t exactly feel it. Not like other magic, but I know it is here.”

  She considered me for a moment or two. “Who are the undead who come this way?”

  “Leander and Isabelle. They were alive hundreds of years ago. Do you know about them?”

  She shook her head. “Why here?”

  I could lie. But I didn’t want to ruin what trust might be building between us.

  “They want to control magic, and Portland has four wells of magic, plus whatever St. Johns has. And I think they want to destroy my dad.”

  “Your dead father?”

  “He isn’t dead now. He’s more like a ghost who possessed a corner of my mind.”

  Her scowl grew deeper with every word.

  “The possession thing was an accident,” I said.

  “Nothing that man does is an accident.” She sliced her hands through the air. “There is no magic here. Never has been. You tell your dead father to go to hell. And stay there.”

  She stormed past me and glared at Zayvion.

  “This is my house. Get out of my way.”

  Zay moved aside, and Mama strode out the door.

  “That went well,” Zay said.

  “Shit,” I said. “I wasn’t lying. There’s magic here. Some kind. I just don’t know where, or what.”

  “Maybe it doesn’t matter,” he said. “If we haven’t been able to find it for the last thirty years, then maybe it’s hidden enough that Leander and Isabelle won’t find it either.”

  “Do you want to take that chance?”

  “Not really.”

  We headed out of the office, out through the dining area where two Boys were now positioned, making no effort to hide the guns on their hips. We took the hint and walked out the front doors.

  Shame, Terric, Cody, and Nola were standing by the van, waiting.

  “Any luck?” Shame asked.

  “Just the bad kind,” I said. “I think there’s magic here. Dad is positive there’s magic here. Mama won’t admit to it. Suggestions?”

  “Can you sort of feel for it, Jones?” Shame asked. “That thing you do?”

  “I don’t feel any magic here,” Zay said. “Never have.”

  “Cody?” I asked. “Do you remember any draw of magic in the area? When you were…um…”

  “Dead?” he asked. He frowned, thinking. “I don’t think so. That…it’s hard to really remember anything clearly. A lot of that time is sort of fuzzy and dreamlike. I get images, maybe memories, but it’s hard to tell. Sorry.”

  “How about Stone?” Shame lit a cigarette, exhaled. “Think he could sniff it out?”

  No, Dad said.

  “No,” Cody said at the same time.

  Interesting.

  “So what?” I asked. “We just hope Leander and Isabelle don’t find it?”

  Terric shook his head. “I hate that idea.”

  “How about a Truth spell?” Nola said.

  We all turned to her. I, for one, was shocked.

  “Just because I don’t use magic doesn’t mean I don’t know how it’s used,” she said. “And I know Truth is usually only effective between blood relatives…”

  “Not at all,” Shame said. “That’s just what we tell people.”

  “So…?” she asked.

  “We’ll need to use magic,” I said. “In the disks. You have them, right?”

  Zay nodded. “Three left.”

  “Who’s the best at Blood magic?” I asked.

  “Shame or I,” Zay said.

  “I’ll do it,” Shame said. “But someone’s going to have to make sure I’m not shot to hell by her gun-toting Boys.”

  “Easier done with magic,” Terric said.

  “Then we use magic on them too,” I said. “We use one disk to cast a Hold, or knock them out, and one to work a Truth spell on Mama.”

  “Which leaves us only one disk left to deal with, Close, or hide the source of magic here in St. Johns,” Zay said.

  “And no magic up our sleeve if we get into a wrestling match with the Overseer.” Shame was staring down the street, thinking.

  “Is there another option we’re overlooking?” I asked.

  Zay shook his head.

  “Say, I have a question,” Shame said.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Anyone else see that?” He pointed.

  I followed the angle of his finger.

  Roman Grimshaw, the ex-guardian of the gate, was striding our way. Or rather, the ghost of him was sort of floating our way. His spirit that should be locking the gates and keeping them closed was no longer in those gates.

  Holy shit.

  “Roman?” I said.

  Our phones started ringing. All of them.

  “Zay?” I said. “The gates?”

  “They are coming,” Roman whispered.

  And then an explosion rocked the world.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Not one explosion. Ten, in quick succession. I ducked and covered my ears as the roaring blasts filled my skull. The blue morning sky burned yellow then bled down to a deep umber red.

  “What the hell?” I yelled.

  “Gates,” Zay said, hauling me up onto my feet. “Roman’s soul must have been released so now the gates can be used.”

  “How?” I asked.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Maybe a Guardian of the gates from some other city. Get in the van!”

  We hauled into the van. Shame and Terric were on their phones, and when my hearing came back I realized someone was talking on my phone too. I pulled it up to my ear.

  “This is Allie,” I said.

  “We have confirmation that gates have opened around the outer edges of Portland,” Victor said.

  “How many?” I asked.

  “Twenty-four at last report.”

  “Shit. What’s coming through?”

  “Magic users. Groups of ten. They’re staying near the gates, keeping them open.”

  “What are they keeping them open for?”

  “Magic. They’re pulling on magic from the other sides of the gates.”

  “Can they do that?”

  “Not for long. We’re going to close the gates.”

  “We’re in St. Johns. Didn’t find the source of magic. Where do you need us?”

  “Is Zayvion still with you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Let me talk to him.”

  I handed him the phone. “Victor,” I said.

  “Zay.”

  I can usually hear both sides of a conversation over a phone. It’s one of the good things about being a Hound. But whatever Victor was saying was covered by the muffled ringing in my ears from the blast and other voices in the van as Terric and Shame and Nola talked on their phones.

  The sky was still bloodred. Somewhere not too far off sirens started up. A lot of sirens.

  Mama stepped out of her diner, a shotgun resting casually in her hands. Four Boys stood behind her.

  Don’t leave St. Johns, Dad said. This will be the only hope to stand against them.

  Mama hadn’t raised her weapon yet. She glanced up at the sky, then turned and disappeared into the diner. A hand in the window turned the sign from OPEN
to CLOSED.

  But Dad’s plea got me thinking.

  Why did Leander and Isabelle name you as the person behind this all?

  What?

  Leander and Isabelle. Why would ancient, dead Soul Complements want you dead? What did you do?

  I suspected early that Sedra was possessed by Isabelle and tried to remove her as the head of the Authority. I suspected that she killed Mikhale. It made them notice me, and tipped my hand as a person to be reckoned with. But what matters now, Allison, is your decision. Victor will tell Zayvion he wants to Close the gates. It will take an immense amount of magic to do that. Will you unlock the wells so that magic is available for everyone, including the armies at the gates, or trust me that there is magic here that can be accessed and can be used against them all?

  You seem to have a lot riding on whether or not we access the magic in St. Johns. Why?

  Allison…

  Why? I repeated.

  It is a crystal well, he said. The magic in St. Johns is old, untapped, crystallized. Kept untouched and pure, a relic of light and dark magic still joined. Mama and generations before her for hundreds of years have kept it secret and safe. It is a magic even Leander and Isabelle don’t know about. It can do things other magic cannot.

  Because it’s light and dark magic joined? Would have been terrific to have known that a long time ago. What else aren’t you telling me?

  So many things.

  “We’re heading back to the Death well.” Zay started the van and was halfway out of St. Johns in seconds.

  “Why? What did Victor tell you?”

  “I need to Close the gates. I need a well opened to do it. Death well is the closest.”

  “They know where our wells are, mate,” Shame said. “They’re just waiting for you to pick one so they can take you out.”

  “If I Close the gates, they won’t have magic. Then you can take them out.”

  “No,” I said.

  “I don’t see another option.”

  “You will not die to save this city. Not like that.”

  “Allie,” Terric started.

  “Stop the van.” When Zay didn’t do anything, I touched his arm, hoping our connection would carry more than my words could.

  “I mean it, Zay. Stop the van.” St. Johns was already miles behind us. “We can’t do what they expect. Listen to me.”