Casting Shadows, page 12
part #4 of The Magicsmith Series
Releasing my hand, James wrapped his arm around my shoulders and hugged me tight to his side. Stop worrying. You’re missing the ceremony.
I opened my eyes.
Jynx and Ava leaned over their joined hands and kissed. Targe cheered. The rest of the room followed suit. Then the neatly formed lines dispersed. Most of the fae headed straight for the bar. Music burst through the speakers. People began to dance.
I blinked. “That’s it?”
Chase grinned. “Best to get the formal part over with quickly.” He clapped his hands and rubbed them together. “Now we can move on to the reception.”
He headed for the bar, where Targe had enlisted the help of two other fae to serve drinks. Emma followed him. Jynx and Ava were already on the dance floor. I looked up at James. “Shall we?”
Lifting my hand, he pressed a kiss to my knuckles.
We spun and laughed, weaving between other dancers, clinging to each other when our bodies came close, straining like magnets when we moved away. Smiling faces whirled all around us, lost to the music. Chase’s distraction had been a success.
Then an earsplitting boom broke through the beat of the music, a section of wall collapsed, and I was blown off my feet.
Chapter 11
HIGH-PITCHED ringing filled my ears, and the world spun as I shook my head to clear it. Shadows danced in piercing beams of light that swept across billowing clouds of dust. I coughed and curled around an ache in my right side from where I’d slammed into a wall.
Fingers wrapped my upper arm. I jerked away. Then James’s face came into focus. His lips moved but the ringing in my ears drowned out any words.
He pulled me to my feet.
I swayed as a wave of dizziness hit me, followed by more coughing. Even after my vision cleared, it was hard to see. The overhead lights had blown out in the blast. Flashlight beams swept through drifting clouds of dust. Bodies were scattered around the room. Some moved, others didn’t. One wall had been reduced to splintered wood and plaster dust. Debris fell from the ragged edges of a gaping hole, and through that breach, men and women in tactical gear advanced with guns drawn.
The ringing faded. I could make out raised voices, though I couldn’t tell if it was the fae or the advancing troops doing the yelling.
I spotted Emma clutching the edge of the bar, her disheveled teal hair drooping over one eye. She saw me and began making her way through the rubble in my direction. Behind her, Chase hopped on top of the bar and scanned the room. I waved to draw his attention, but his gaze passed over me and continued on.
Targe emerged from behind the bar and swung his arms in a wide arc. A patch of sifting dust began to shimmer. He cupped his hands to his mouth and bellowed. This time, the words broke through my dazed senses.
“Everybody through!”
Fae began pouring from every corner of the room toward Targe’s portal. The floor vibrated with the force of the stampede.
“On the floor!” screamed a PTF agent, swinging his weapon toward the nearest fleeing fae.
A green-skinned woman with willowy limbs and pale-yellow hair dropped mid-stride, a feathered dart stuck in her arm. A bronze-skinned nixie collapsed to my right, crumpling like a cut marionette. A pixie with shimmering wings fell from her flight, landing on the crowd bunching up around the portal.
The PTF advance slowed as some of the fae turned to face their attackers head on.
Screams rent the night as mortals fell to teeth and claws.
A flashlight beam swept over a braided net of bright-red hair a few feet away. I clambered over the uneven floor toward Ava. More fae fell, mostly near the advancing troops who were still shouting for everyone to freeze. James stuck to my side as we struggled against the flow of the crowd.
I dropped to my knees beside Ava and grabbed her shoulder. She cringed and lifted her head. Blood ran from a gash near her temple. Cursing, I cupped the sides of her face. Her eyes rolled for a second before coming to rest on me.
“Can you stand?” I had to shout to be heard over the racket.
Ava blinked slowly, staring at my face.
A second later Emma dropped to one knee on Ava’s other side.
“Targe’s got a portal open,” she hollered. “We need to go.”
I squeezed James’s arm and pointed to Ava. “Can you carry her?”
Nodding, he scooped up the disoriented girl.
Chase’s face appeared in front of me, eyes wide and full of worry. He gripped my shoulders. “Have you seen Jynx?”
I shook my head.
He turned to face the chaos near the collapsed wall. “I can’t leave without her.”
“I’ll help you look,” I said, then turned to James. “Get Ava to the portal.”
James frowned. “I’m not leaving you.”
Ava was looking around now. She raised a hand to her wound, pulled it away, and stared at her red-tipped fingers.
Then James dropped, taking Ava with him. He barely managed to keep his hold so she didn’t tumble from his arms. Chase reached for Ava and I reached for James. Together, we managed to slow their fall, but we couldn’t arrest them completely. We all ended up on the floor.
I pulled a feathered dart out of James’s calf and tossed it away. I cupped the side of his cheek and turned his face toward me. His eyes were glassy and unfocused. His lips parted as though his jaw had gone slack.
Emma, the only one of our little group still standing, gasped. When I looked up, she wasn’t paying any attention to us. She was pointing over our heads.
I followed the direction of her finger.
It was hard to make much out through the crush of fae around the bar, but a second later, the fae scattered in panic. I spotted Targe’s mop of bright-red hair. The burly leprechaun lay on his side, a feathered tuft sticking out of his chest. Our exit had been cut off.
The remaining fae made a run at the PTF agents, and the only remaining exit.
I gripped Ava’s shoulder, pulling her attention. “Targe’s down. Can you open a portal?”
Her eyes were scared saucers. Her lip quivered.
“Ava,” I snapped. “Can you do it?”
She shook her head. “I can open a portal, but . . . I don’t know the location of the next jump point.”
A second wave of agents pressed forward, plugging the gap. These bore three-foot iron-coated riot shields. The agents with guns continued to pick off any moving fae from behind the mobile wall. A small orb was lobbed from somewhere behind that line. I tracked the arc through the sweeping lights as it sailed toward the back of the room.
“Don’t look!” Chase’s palm slammed into the side of my face. I turned away from the blow, my eyes closing involuntarily from the impact. A second later, bright light shown through my scrunched eyelids and a wave of dust and debris slammed into me. My ears were once again ringing.
Carefully, I opened my eyes and blinked. Many of the fae near the back of the room were down, hands pressed to their heads. The agents had used the fae’s natural ability to see in darkness against them. After adjusting to the gloom of the room, the flash from that grenade had blinded them, at least temporarily.
The PTF troops pushed forward with renewed force.
“Get us out of here,” I shouted at Ava. “We’re sitting ducks.”
Emma was on her butt beside James now, either to make herself less of a target or because she’d been knocked down by the blast. She was blinking and wiping watery eyes. Guess she hadn’t gotten them closed in time.
With Chase’s help, Ava struggled to her knees, swayed, and swung her arm in a large arc. The air began to shimmer.
“Hold her steady,” Chase said to me.
I took Chase’s place, bracing Ava’s shoulders to keep her stable.
Chase set a hand on Ava’s outstretched arm. “Keep it open as long as you can. I’ll find Jynx.”
Stripping out of his dirty purple shirt, Chase dropped to all fours as a gray tabby and darted into the chaos. As a cat, he could move faster and he was a much smaller target.
“Emma,” I said.
She swung her face in my direction, but I could tell she was having trouble seeing.
“Ava opened a portal. It’s about two feet to your right. You need to go through.”
“What about the rest of you?”
“We’ll follow. Now go.”
Nodding, Emma crawled to her right, and with a few more directions managed to pass through Ava’s portal.
The fae nearest us took notice. The tide of those rushing the exit shifted again as several fae broke off and darted through Ava’s portal. As they went through, more began to turn. It wouldn’t take long for the PTF to notice the new breach.
James, sitting beside me, gripped my leg.
There. The word resonated through me. He pointed, and I swung to follow the line of his finger.
Haru leapt over the fallen form of a rock troll who’d just punched a hole through the PTF line. He stumbled when he landed, thrown off balance by the body draped over his shoulder. His passenger’s legs bumped his chest, draped in a long train of blue fabric.
Releasing Ava, I spun in the direction Chase had run, cupped my hands to my mouth, and shouted, “Chase!” Then I made an exaggerated gesture toward Haru, which served the added purpose of drawing Haru’s attention.
A streak of gray darted between stomping feet to fall in line a step ahead of Haru, leading him back to us.
With the others on their way, I tucked myself under James’s arm.
“Time to move,” I said, pulling him to his feet.
Silver swirled groggily through the icy depths of his eyes, glinting unnaturally in the dim light. Was the fae tranquilizer loosening James’s grip on his demon? The last thing we needed right now was an out-of-control vampire.
We shuffled to the portal, jostled by the fae swarming in on either side. There was a brief, twisting sensation as we passed through the shimmer, then we were standing on asphalt under a street lamp. Snow drifted through the air and my breath came out in a cloud.
I shivered. I’d left my coat in the office at Crossroads . . . along with the bag Emma had packed for me.
Fae continued to stream out of empty space behind me, darting off as soon as they cleared the portal. With the jump line compromised, it was every fae for themselves.
“Alex!” Emma struggled through the fae swarming around us. She gave me a quick hug, then ducked under James’s other arm. His feet scraped the ground with each step, but his head didn’t loll as it had a moment before. The silver in his eyes was becoming more pronounced. It seemed the demon in him was fighting off the tranquilizer.
“Take James.” My shout was eerily loud in the suddenly quiet night.
“But—” Emma grunted as I shifted the remainder of James’s weight to her.
Once free, I darted back toward the portal, swerving to avoid a collision with the evacuating fae. I could see the shimmer of air, like flecks of ice frozen in place. Taking a deep breath, I jumped through . . . and landed on the asphalt on the far side.
I stumbled and spun around. I could still make out the distortion of the portal. Fae were still erupting from the far side.
Frowning, I tried again.
This time I slammed into the back of an eloko who’d just appeared. He twisted to growl at me through bared teeth, then scampered away toward the nearest alley.
“I can’t get through.” I looked at Emma, panic sinking in.
She shook her head. “Maybe Ava’s portal only works in one direction.”
I opened my mouth, but at that moment Haru burst into existence in front of me. He charged half a dozen steps down the street, Jynx bouncing precariously on his shoulder. Chase—once more on two legs—soared through the portal a second later. He grunted when his shoulder hit the ground, rolled over twice, and flopped onto his back. When he opened his arms, Ava looked up from where she’d been clutched against his chest.
I blinked, and looked back at the space where the portal had been. The shimmer was gone. Two bloody stumps rested on the dark street. One was an arm, severed just above the elbow. The other was half a foot.
Bile rose in the back of my throat. I clamped a hand over my mouth and turned away, taking deep breaths of the frigid air until my stomach settled.
Haru circled back to our little group and lowered Jynx’s limp form down beside her brother.
Ava scrambled off Chase, making him grunt again. She knelt beside her new wife and cradled one pale hand.
“How is she?” I asked.
“Only sleeping,” Ava said, relief thick in her voice. “She’ll recover when the drugs wear off.”
Chase sat up, looked down at Jynx, then up at Haru. An expression I couldn’t identify passed across his face. A muscle in his jaw twitched as if he were clenching and unclenching his teeth. If I had to guess, he wasn’t happy Haru had been the one to save his sister. His hands balled into fists.
“Why did you save her?” Chase’s words were a whisper.
“You’d rather I left her?”
“You could have just run, saved yourself.” He crossed his arms. “That’s what you’re good at, after all.”
Haru looked away, but a flicker of emotion tightened his features before he hid his face. Frustration? Shame?
Chase pushed to his feet so he was no longer looking up at Haru. “This settles nothing between us.”
I moved to James’s side, resuming my position as a human crutch. “The important thing is that we all made it.”
“Not all,” Ava whispered. Blood still coated one side of her face, and the area beneath it looked swollen.
My chest tightened. I’d been so relieved to find all the people I cared about had made it to safety, I’d forgotten about Targe. Ava had lost her uncle. And who knew how many of the fae left behind had been her friends or acquaintances.
“I’m sorry,” I mumbled. The words were inadequate.
She sniffed and nodded, never taking her gaze off Jynx.
I looked around, taking in the cold, dark street. Slush collected in the gutters. Snow drifted through cones of light cast by evenly spaced street lamps. The towering silhouette of an apartment building loomed on the far side of the street. Light shone through a few of the windows, but most were dark. On the near side, beyond a sidewalk coated in salt crystals, a wrought-iron fence guarded the snow-covered, rolling hills of a golf course. I didn’t see any street signs.
“Where exactly are we?” I asked.
Ava finally looked up from Jynx. She glanced around the street, then wiped a wrist under her nose with another sniff. “Westminster.”
Haru’s eyes widened. “You sent us to England?”
I shook my head. “There’s a Westminster in Colorado about a half hour east of Boulder.” I looked to Ava for confirmation. She nodded.
“In any case,” I continued. “We’re too exposed here on the street.”
Emma shifted her feet on the far side of James and hoisted his arm higher on her shoulders. “Any chance you can get us to the reservation, Ava?”
She shook her head, red braids wiggling along her back like snakes. “I’ve got one, maybe two jumps left in me. A trip like that is at the very edge of my ability even when I’m well rested.”
“Then we need to find somewhere to hole up for a bit.” I glanced at James, who still drooped between Emma and me. “Obviously our houses are all out.”
“What about a hotel?” Emma asked.
I frowned. “My face was on every TV in the country, and James is in no condition to cast an illusion. Besides, hotels have security cameras.”
“The nest,” James said. His voice was airy and quiet, as though he were talking in his sleep.
“The what?” Emma asked.
I bit my lip. True, the vampire nest was secure from the PTF, at least for now, but there were plenty of other dangers there. Despite James’s reassurance that the new master vampire was nothing like the previous sadistic bastard we’d put down, I wasn’t eager to put myself at the mercy of an unknown predator.
Chase was pacing beside Jynx. “Bad idea. Vampires and fae . . .” He shook his head. “We don’t mix well.”
“Wait, vampires?” Emma’s voice rose an octave.
“Victoria . . . will grant . . . asylum.”
Chase stopped his pacing and pinned his green gaze on James, his eyes flashing like reflectors. “And if she doesn’t?” He spread his hands wide. “We are hardly in a position to defend ourselves.”
“As in suck our blood, vampires?” Emma asked.
“Do you have a better option?” I asked Chase, honestly hoping he did.
He pressed his lips tight and turned away, fists on his hips.
“I’m not eager to bunk down with the vampires either, but—”
“Ha!” Haru’s outburst made us all jump. “Sorry,” he said, waving a hand. “I just . . . the mortal capacity for lies is so . . .” He trailed off into laughter.
“If you don’t have anything constructive to say, keep quiet,” I said.
“But honestly,” Haru continued, ignoring me. “To say you won’t bunk down with them even as you’re snuggled next to one?” He gestured to James.
Emma gasped and jerked away. The sudden loss of support on James’s other side was more than I could make up for, and James went down to his knees.
“You’re a . . .” Emma’s eyes were wide and bright.
I glared at Haru, then turned my attention to Emma. “We don’t have time for this right now, Em. I’ll explain everything later.”
