Dead Man's Deal Part 23

Brown Hair worried me, though. The strange energy ball that glommed onto my s.h.i.+eld was a new twist. He was smart, sneaky, and dangerous.

What was worse, Fox had yet to move. He cast no spells, issued no commands beyond his initial head nod. You didn't get to be on the council without being very powerful. I didn't know what Fox was waiting for, but the antic.i.p.ation was eating a hole in my stomach.

With the wind still in hand, I swirled it up into the sky, stirring the clouds. I immediately released it, hoping that I sent enough energy up in that direction that the momentum of the s.h.i.+fting weather took over. Over the years, I had become good at two types of spells: defensive and weather. I had had to learn to be good at conjuring defensive spells at the drop of a hat if I was going to outlive Simon. They could be tricky because the very art of magic was tricky. Most offensive spells were curses and they had to be deflected or unwound with very specific countercurses. Fear of Simon had taught me to recognize a spell before it left the fingers of the caster.

I had gotten good at weather spells because turbulent weather generated more energy in the area that a warlock or a witch could use. Not all warlocks or witches could tap that energy, but there were enough that I was potentially helping one of my opponents as much as I was trying to help myself.

At my left, I felt a new spell creeping toward me, a soft whisper of words on the edge of the energy that caused me to instantly stiffen with fear. Brownie was working a binding spell, but I couldn't tell if it was a physical or a magic binding spell. Gideon had used a physical binding spell on me every once in a while to gain my undivided attention. The words of a countercurse flared to life in my mind, but I tweaked the spell, sweeping my hands through an intricate pattern before my chest. You couldn't immediately unravel a binding spell once it was started. The countercurse always sent it back at the spell caster, but I knew this b.a.s.t.a.r.d would be prepared for such a thing.

On my right, Greasy shouted, his pale face growing unattractively red and splotchy. The binding spell had swept past me and hammered against him, leaving him waving his hands in the air harmlessly. There was a dead zone of energy surrounding him. Judging by the mixture of fear and rage radiating off it, the binding spell was a d.a.m.n powerful one.

I sighed in relief, my right hand trembling and tingling slightly. It had been a close thing. I felt drained, and only one of the four was out of magical commission for now. A chuckle was rising in my chest when I felt the swell of energy at my back. The b.i.t.c.h had gotten her second wind. Unfortunately, my brain was moving too slowly under the temporary fatigue and the icy spell crashed through my defense like a rhino through wet tissue paper, throwing me to the ground. My back slammed against the gravel-strewn concrete and my head followed, lighting up a white glare before my eyes. My breath burst from my chest and I sucked in before I could stop myself. The air froze in my lungs like I had swallowed Freon, locking up my chest so I couldn't breathe.

Panic swarmed over me, painfully tensing my muscles. Cold chills racked my body, making it nearly impossible to think. It felt as if the b.i.t.c.h had dipped me in water and dropped me naked in the middle of the Antarctic. I had to think of the countercurse, but the biting cold was making it impossible to concentrate. The words scattered within my brain, darting off in a thousand different directions.

Someone was shouting. It wasn't me because I couldn't draw a breath, but I could hear it over the pounding of my blood in my ears. Twisting on my side, I looked up to find Fox pointing at me while he shouted at the witch. A small swell of energy washed over my chest and I could suddenly breathe. The absolute wretched cold didn't disappear, but I wasn't going to suffocate.

"You idiot!" Fox screamed. "I need him alive! He's useless to me dead!" A long knife flashed in his right hand from out of thin air as he moved in front of the woman. I could no longer see her, his larger body was blocking my view, but I saw his right hand reach back again and again. A sick, squis.h.i.+ng and sucking sound echoed against the unnatural silence of the early evening as the blade sank into her chest with each thrust. No one moved except Fox as he stabbed the woman repeatedly.

Anger spent, he stepped back from her, letting the body crumple to the ground, a lifeless sack of chopped meat. I was pus.h.i.+ng to my feet when he turned to look at me. A twisted light shone in his blue eyes while blood soaked into his s.h.i.+rt and slacks. It dripped from his face while more rained from the fist tightly gripping the knife. He might need me alive, but the insanity dancing in his eyes said that he wanted to carve me up like a Thanksgiving turkey and dig for the wishbone with his fat hands.

"And now you know I'm serious," Henry Fox said, breaking the thick silence.

I forced myself to smirk because fear was shredding what was left of my self-control, making it hard to grab a lungful of air. "Never doubted your seriousness, old boy."

Fox flinched at my familiar tone, his hand tightening on the knife, so that fresh blood dripped to the ground. "Good. Then I'll give you a choice. You can come willingly and submit to questioning, or we kill you. I will then raise you and you will tell me anything I want. I'm sure you can guess my preference."

Yeah, I knew the s.a.d.i.s.t's preference, but he would avoid it if he could. I'm sure he thought he could raise me from the dead, but we both knew that zombies were notorious for giving incorrect and incomplete information. The mind deteriorated way too fast after death because the soul couldn't be anch.o.r.ed in the body. And I was pretty sure that with Lilith holding a chunk of my soul, the underworld b.i.t.c.h wasn't going to let me be called back unless she could gain from the bargain. Henry Fox wasn't going to raise me, no matter how powerful he was.

Unfortunately, my other option was pretty s.h.i.+tty too. Questioning always equaled torture, and I was not going to let this b.a.s.t.a.r.d touch me. Particularly since he was going to kill me after.

If I was going to get out of this, I needed to change tactics. I couldn't remain on the defensive because they were going to wear me down until I made a mistake. But I wasn't a full-fledged, trained warlock like they were. I knew most of the spells that they could attack with, but I couldn't perform them with the same speed or strength. Most would be batted away before I finished. I had to stick with my strengths, the common, seemingly useless spells I could work reflexively. They weren't curses, but types of enchantments-easier to unravel but much harder to predict.

Widening my stance to keep my balance, I blanked my mind while shoving down the nausea rising in my stomach. Adrenaline bubbled in my veins until it felt like my hair was standing on end. In a breath, I pulled up a swell of energy, and I slammed it into Greasy and Fox. I couldn't manage all three at once. Greasy was a nuisance and Fox was dangerous. Brownie was somewhere in the middle.

Narrowing my eyes, I could feel Brownie summoning up a s.h.i.+eld, but it wouldn't work. With only the smallest push, I directed the energy toward him but my only thought was of peeling an apple. I was vaguely aware of him jerking one arm sharply and twisting, looking around for whatever was attacking him. His face was a mask of confusion as he stubbornly held on to his magical barrier while straining to figure out what I was doing. A second later, his scream rang out, sending shards of gla.s.s cutting through my soul. His body twisted and writhed in pain. I tapped down the revulsion while my brain locked on the vision of a small paring knife sliding around a bright red apple as it cut away the skin in a single, long coil.

With the spell in place, I turned to find Greasy staring in horror. He seemed to have forgotten about me. I lifted one hand and extended one finger, pointed down. I slowly spun it in place, imagining that I was stirring a cup of coffee. The warlock gave a surprised shout as he began to spin in place as well, but his shouts and flailing arms were quickly replaced with pain-filled shrieks. When I took the time to magically stir my coffee, I also heated it.

I should have been feeling horror, revulsion. I should have been throwing up the contents of my stomach, but I felt detached and numb as I killed them. My mind desperately clung to the images of an apple and coffee because if I thought about what I was doing, I'd go mad.

I started to turn to look for Fox when I heard a voice directly behind me.

"Interesting approach," he said as if he was admiring an artist's use of light in a bucolic landscape painting.

Before I could move, pain exploded behind my eyes, blacking out the world. A sense of falling overcame me, but I couldn't recall ever hitting the ground. My last thought was that I should have used the spell I'd perfected to debone fish on Henry Fox.

23.

THE WIND WAS blowing, but I couldn't feel it. Tall gra.s.ses were swaying and the thick wall of trees in the distance was dancing in the strong breeze, but I felt nothing. I had no sense of time because the sky was a heavy gray as if a storm had moved in but had yet to dump its load of rain. Fingers twined with mine on my left and I looked over to find Lilith standing next to me. The sickly, gray cast to her pale skin made her look almost dead, but a frightening light danced in her dark eyes.

"Where are we?" I asked.

With a jerk of her chin, she motioned toward her left. I looked to find that we were standing a few yards from an enormous tower made of white marble. It gleamed against the dark sky like a spotlight shooting up toward the heavens. The Ivory Tower was one of eight that dotted the earth, housing the witches and the warlocks of the world.

I tried to step away from her, but she tightened her fingers around mine. "Why are we here?" I didn't want to be anywhere around the monster that was clinging to a piece of my soul.

Lilith smiled and my blood turned to sludge in my veins. She was the queen of the underworld in a way. When a creature had to spend a year dead to pay a debt to magic, Lilith was the one who watched over him. When I pa.s.sed through the underworld a few months ago, she had begged me to help her escape. And with my one-year debt and a portion of my soul, Lilith was positively itching to get me back into her domain.

"Help me escape, Gage," she whispered in a silky, sinuous voice that coiled around my brain. "We can set everything right. Just you and I." She raised her free hand toward the Ivory Tower before us, and in a rush, it was engulfed in flames. Behind it, one after another, trees burst into flames. Fire broke out of slender windows in the Tower followed by thick ropes of black smoke. The front double doors were flung open and people in black robes ran out as flames danced on their flailing limbs. Screams rose in the night to accompany the crackling of the fire and the thick scent of smoke that perfumed the air.

"I'm more powerful that any warlock or witch," she said. Her low, breathy voice brushed against my ear, sending a chill across my flesh. "With you helping me, we can destroy the Towers. We can make this world new."

I couldn't tear my eyes off the people streaming out of the Tower, dying wretched, pain-filled deaths. People ran free of the building, engulfed in flames, only to drop to the ground and roll in an attempt to escape, but the fire didn't stop until they were dead. Lying lifeless in the tall gra.s.ses that curled and blackened in the flames, the bodies sizzled and hissed like bacon on a cast-iron skillet. The witches and the warlocks were mostly horrible creatures, and maybe they deserved a horrible death for the atrocities they committed, but it wasn't my place to decide.

"Would your reign in this world be any different than theirs?" I asked.

Her laugh was like someone had shoved fat needles into my skin. "Of course." Yes. It would be different. The world would be far worse than its current fractured state with her running loose. The vision of the Tower burning was only the start. Lilith would bring h.e.l.l to earth.

Unlike my dream of Bryce in which I woke up on a scream, this dream slipped away quietly and I slowly eased back into consciousness. Lilith was taunting me. Time was running out and I had yet to think of a way to escape her.

It hurt to think. It felt as if every stray thought bouncing through my head came armed with a sledgehammer and a s.a.d.i.s.t grin. I was vaguely aware that my body ached, but it was nothing compared to the gut-wrenching, soul-searing pain filling my head. I could feel the bones cradling my brain sliding around, slos.h.i.+ng fluids and pinching tissue as they tried to settle into their respective spots.

Sucking in pained breaths through clenched teeth, I cracked one eye open to find a witch bent over me. Her fingers were pressed against my head, but I could barely feel it. She was staring down at me with chocolate-brown eyes, but by her grim expression of concentration, I wasn't sure if she saw me.

"Take slow, deep breaths," she directed in a low voice. "It will help."

I tried, but it wasn't easy, as I started to get light-headed. My eyes fell shut again and I could feel her move her fingertips to another location on my head. As my breathing evened out, the pain was starting to ebb and I could feel the soothing flow of magic through my body. She was using a healing spell, fixing whatever Fox had done to my head.

"Why are you healing me?" I asked, my voice rough. I opened my eyes to see her frowning, but this time she was looking at me.

"Master Fox can't question you if you're in a coma." She released my head and took a step back.

I sighed with relief. A killer headache was still banging against the back of my skull, but it was significantly weaker than what I had been feeling. "Thanks."

The witch's face twisted with ugly rage. Lurching forward, she reached between my legs and grabbed my b.a.l.l.s in a grip that had me screaming. Fresh pain lanced through my body, bowing it off the bed I was lying on while all the air rushed from my lungs. "Thank me again, traitor, and I'll rip your b.a.l.l.s off with my bare hands and feed them to you!" she snarled. She gave them a quick twist before releasing them and stomping out of the room. I was vaguely aware of the door slamming and locking behind her, but I could barely hear the sounds over my own moaning.

I tried to roll on my side, wanting to pull my body into a fetal position, but my arms and legs were tied to the posts of the narrow twin bed. There was no mattress below me, only a metal web of hooks that were now digging into my back and squeaking as I s.h.i.+fted. The pain eased, but I was ready to throttle the b.i.t.c.h. Shoot me, stab me, or set me on fire . . . that was fine. Just don't grab my G.o.dd.a.m.n b.a.l.l.s!

I took a deep breath and willed my heart to slow back down as I a.s.sessed the damage. My head and b.a.l.l.s hurt like a motherf.u.c.ker, but the rest of me seemed fine. I wiggled my fingers and rolled my ankles, checking to make sure that blood was reaching all my extremities. Well, if I could get loose, there was a good shot at me moving. The problem was getting loose and getting out.

Looking around, I found that I was in a small, windowless room with white walls and bare wood floors. The single door held a slight blue glow that I could pick out from the corner of my eye, indicating that it wasn't just locked but also guarded by magic. s.h.i.+t. Bunch of sneaky b.a.s.t.a.r.ds. They couldn't just put a guard outside the door to keep an eye on me?

Of course, I had a feeling there was a guard outside the door as well. A shudder ran through me as fractured memories from the parking lot seeped back into my consciousness. I had shut down when I hit Brownie and Greasy with those spells. I couldn't let myself remember because I was afraid I would start screaming and never stop. It was one thing to kill for survival, to protect yourself and those you love. It was a completely different matter to subject your prey to a slow, painful death.

Sadly, I was certain I wouldn't be penalized two years for killing them with magic because you couldn't die from having your skin peeled off. You died from shock and blood loss. It was a technicality, but for some reason, the fates and balance of powers observed it. And Greasy wouldn't die from being spun and heated. No, it was more likely that his feverish fat a.s.s fell once the spell wore off and he died of splitting his head on the ground. I couldn't dare owe Lilith a second year. Not after her most recent dream visit. A second death caused by magic would mean that I'd have to fight her for two years, and I doubted my resourcefulness when it came to such a task.

For a moment I wasn't sure if it was sadder that those men had died because of what I did or because Fox had done nothing to save them. I banged my head against the springs beneath me in frustration and winced as fresh pain bloomed behind my eyes. Fox had hit me on the back of the head, cracking my skull and giving me a serious concussion. a.s.shole.

It could have been worse, but I was sure that it was only a matter of time before Fox came back to put me in some real pain, in the name of extracting information. Fantastic. Considering the comment from the witch, I figured he either suspected that I had released the locations of the Towers or he was going to torture me until I confessed to doing it so he could have an excuse to kill me. I had to get out of here. Even if I handed over Reave's name, it wouldn't save me. I needed to strike a bargain with the Towers if I was going to get them to back off.

Looking up at where my right wrist was tied to the bedpost, I twisted my arm, testing the strength of the knot. It was tight, but as long as I didn't mind a little rope burn and blood, I was pretty sure I could work it loose. I knew a spell to unravel the knot, but I didn't want to use it. If there was a single brain in the building that held me, they would have set a spell to alert them if I used magic. I had to sneak out of here the old-fas.h.i.+oned way.

With my teeth clenched, I pulled and jerked, twisting the rope and stretching it as much as possible so that it slid over my hand. Blood was streaking down my arm and it hurt like h.e.l.l, but this was nothing if I didn't get moving. Carefully turning to my left so that I didn't make any noise, I untied the knot and freed my hand before bending down to free my ankles.

It took me nearly a full minute to sit up and put my feet on the floor. As I s.h.i.+fted my weight on the springs, they screeched loudly. My breath caught in my chest as I waited for my guard to charge into the room before I was ready, but he never did. I moved each hand and ankle, one at a time, making sure that circulation was flowing back into my extremities and everything was working properly.

Standing, I paused to wipe my blood from the bed with my s.h.i.+rt and pocket the ropes that had absorbed my blood. If I escaped, I didn't want anyone using it to find me again . . . or worse. There was an old belief that if you knew a person's real name, you had power over them. It was bulls.h.i.+t. Blood, on the other hand, was a great way to get at a person.

I crossed the bare wood floor slowly, rolling my feet with each step to try to reduce any creaks and groans. Stopping a couple feet from the door, I got down on my hands and knees to gaze under the opening beneath the door while praying that I didn't cast a shadow. At an angle, I could see a pair of shoes. It looked as if someone with big feet was seated outside the door. A man, or rather, a warlock.

Pus.h.i.+ng to my knees, I inched a little closer to the door but was careful not to touch it. The spell was a simple one designed to keep me from using magic to pick the lock, which was also quite simple and old. By the age of the wood beneath me, the style of the door, and the old-fas.h.i.+oned iron doork.n.o.b with lock, I could easily guess that this was not a newly constructed house, which meant that the floors would creak and groan when I moved. Doork.n.o.bs would jiggle and rattle. Doors would moan when opened. In short, this was going to be a noisy f.u.c.king house for me to sneak out of.

But I didn't need to get far. Just out of the house. Without being detected. If I could escape to a quiet location that was hidden, I could teleport. If I tried it in the house, not only would they know I used magic, but they'd be able to trace the spell to my final destination. Sure, I was going back to Low Town, a.s.suming I wasn't in Low Town at the moment, but I wasn't going to my apartment. I needed to hit the parlor if these f.u.c.kers were going to continue to play rough.

But first things first. I had to take care of the a.s.shole guarding my door. Standing, I soundlessly backed up until I was sure that I wouldn't be trapped behind the door if he threw it open, but stayed as close as I could so I could jump on him when he came in.

I drew in a deep breath and closed my eyes for a second, willing the twisting and knots in my stomach to ease. My heart was pounding, increasing the pain in my brain, but I was barely aware of it. I had to get this right. If an alarm was sounded, I knew Fox would be here in a heartbeat.

Fisting my hands tightly at my sides, I raised my voice to a frantic scream. "Oh G.o.d! No! G.o.d! No! Help! Oh G.o.d! No! Help! Stop it!" Over my desperate, hysterical shouting, I could hear the sc.r.a.pe of a chair and the pounding of footsteps heading toward the door. I kept shouting as the key was inserted and the door unlocked. As I had expected, the warlock threw the door open wide as he stepped inside, ready to take out whatever monster had apparently snuck into my room from the closet. Jumping across the distance before he noticed me, I gripped his short blond hair in one fist and slammed his head against the doorjamb as hard as I could.

His large body became deadweight as he was knocked unconscious. I grabbed his sweater with both hands and silently lowered him to the floor in hopes of not making more noise than I already had. If anyone had heard me, I was hoping that my shouts had been generic enough for them to think that my guard had stepped in to torment me. Sweat ran down the side of my face as I grabbed his feet and pulled him into the room before closing the door.

The big oaf was out cold. There was a smear of blood on the wall, but a pool hadn't immediately started to gather on the floor, so he wasn't hurt that bad. Kneeling next to him, I pocketed the old skeleton key he had used to unlock the door and then grabbed the wand he had dropped. I turned it over in my hand, testing the feel and gauging the energy inside of it before cursing my luck. It was made of yew.

I stood and glared down at the warlock before giving him a swift kick in the ribs. What was this a.s.shole doing with a yew wand? Yew branches were strong in death magic, which was nasty business. I could use the wand, but I wouldn't have the same kind of control over my spells that I did when I used my hands and I was a h.e.l.l of a lot more likely to accidentally kill someone with a spell using this wand.

Regardless of my desperation, I wasn't going to use the yew wand. I was better off with my hands. Of course, I wasn't going to give this a.s.shole the chance to use the wand should he wake up before I could escape. With a grin, I broke the wand over my knee. I dropped one half in front of him and shoved the other half in my back pocket without the hole. I'd burn the wand later. He wouldn't recover the magic from this one.

Stomping down the swelling of relief that I had gotten at least this far without being caught, I moved to the door and listened for the sounds of voices or footsteps, but all was silent. I briefly peeked out to find the hallway empty before slipping out and closing the door behind me. I locked the b.a.s.t.a.r.d in and put the key in my front pocket. With any luck, the spell on the door would keep him busy for a little while.

The hallway was narrow and dark, more white walls and bare wood floors. There was more light coming from the far end of the hall and what looked to be a set of stairs leading down. There were three more doors on either side of the hall, leading to either bathrooms or bedrooms, but all were closed. No noises came from the other side of the doors. I was itching to look out a window to figure out what time of day it was or even try to learn where the h.e.l.l I was, but I didn't want to risk opening a door to an occupied room.

Frowning, I edged down the short hall, trying to make as little noise as possible. The floor creaked here and there, but I was hoping anyone who heard shrugged it off as noises that the house made as it settled. It was a struggle to swallow, my mouth had grown so dry, and I found myself clenching and unclenching my fists at my sides as anxiety ate away at me. I had made a ton of noise with the guard. Had no one heard me? Was there no one else in the house? Someone should have already stormed up the stairs.

At the end of the hall, I peered around the corner and looked down the stairs only to find another landing and more stairs. f.u.c.k, I was on the third floor. How big was this place? Of course, if everyone was on the ground floor, they might not have heard the racket I was making. Praying that was the case, I eased down the stairs, sliding along the wall while trying to keep an eye out both above and below me.

Just as I neared the landing on the second floor, a door was thrown open and the witch that had twisted my nuts in her fist stomped out, frowning. She was wearing the same wrinkled blue blouse and black slacks I had seen her in a while ago, but her dark hair was now down around her shoulder instead of in a neat bun. She looked to be in her early forties, but her constant frowns and glares were putting years on her face. The witch walked to the stairs leading to the first floor and I crouched down, trying to stay out of sight while keeping an eye on her.

"Marceau, what's going on down there?" she shouted. We both waited, but there was no response. The witch made an angry sound in the back of her throat before turning back to the bedroom she had exited. Instead of going inside, she leaned in and said something to the darkness before heading down the stairs. A couple seconds later, a warlock emerged, tucking his s.h.i.+rt into his pants as he followed her down the stairs.

I couldn't stop the smirk that twisted my lips. The prevailing rule was that witches and warlocks weren't supposed to have physical relations.h.i.+ps, but while no one openly admitted to it, I had little doubt that it was happening.

I waited until I could hear his footsteps moving away on the ground floor, before I followed behind him. I didn't know what had drawn the duo to the first floor, but I was hoping that it would work in my favor. If I was lucky, everyone would be gathered in one part of the house and I could sneak out another.

Before hitting the main floor, I peered through the railing to find that the stairs ended near what appeared to be the living room. Bright sunlight was streaming through the windows. It had to be near midday, but which day? Was it the same day I had been attacked, but we were in another part of the world? Or was it the next day or even later than that?

There was no one I could see in the living room. Only old plaid furniture and spindly tables covered with magazines. I looked around and my eyes caught on the front door. Freedom! So close. Even better, I could see no spells on the door. Nothing to alert them if I walked right out of the house and down the driveway or street or wherever the f.u.c.k I was.

But I was too slow. Just as I started to straighten my body and head down the stairs, fast footsteps approached. I reached into my pockets and found only the skeleton key I had taken off the guard. The witch turned the corner, one hand on the large wooden banister, as I reached the last step. She looked up, her mouth dropping open in surprise to find me standing in front of her. With the end of the key clenched in my fist, I shoved it into her throat, crunching through flesh and her trachea. She gasped, but the sound was more like a b.l.o.o.d.y gargle. Her hands fluttered helplessly around her throat as she started to crumple to her knees. Grabbing her shoulders, I spun her around and laid her on her back on the stairs. She wouldn't be visible until someone tried to go to the second floor.

At the back of the house, I heard a brief scuffle and then nothing. By my guess, there were at least two more people in the house, the warlock from the second-floor bedroom and Marceau. If I was careful, I could take both out and then escape, which might buy me more time. If I left someone behind alive, they could alert Fox. But if they were all dead or unconscious, Fox might not find out for a little while.

Carefully heading down the main hall on the first floor, I approached the source of the noise. Common sense said to stay hidden, but the sight in the tiny kitchen stopped me cold. The two men I had been concerned about were lying on the white linoleum floor in a spreading pool of blood. Over them stood . . . kids. Kids holding wands. Except for one. A girl between the age of twelve and fifteen stood over one man holding a blood-splattered baseball bat.

I must have made some noise because all eyes swung to me at the same time while wands were raised in my direction. I knew in that second I was f.u.c.ked because nothing in this world could get me to attack a kid, let alone kill one to save my own life.

"Gage!" the girl with the baseball bat said with an exuberant laugh. "We were just coming to rescue you!"

I could feel the blood draining from my face at that announcement as my eyes skimmed over each young face. There were five kids gathered in that little kitchen, faces smudged with dirt but all looking at me with an expression of joyous expectation and wariness. Five kids with wands.

Oh G.o.d, the runaways had found me.

24.

I SAT AT the wobbly folding card table with my head in my hands. The throbbing in my temples had returned with a vengeance at the sight of the five kids determined to "rescue me" when I had been doing my d.a.m.nedest to make sure our paths never crossed. After checking to make sure that the two warlocks were still breathing, I ushered the kids back outside to a secluded location in what turned out to be the Austrian countryside before we used a teleport spell to return to their secret hideout. The crumbling, abandoned house had no electricity, no running water, and no heat. While a quick look around revealed that it was relatively clean, I knew that they couldn't stay here, but I wasn't sure what to do with them.

Lifting my head, I found the oldest of the group and proclaimed leader, etienne, frowning at me. From what I could get out of him, the seventeen-year-old French teen had escaped from the Tower in Brazil with Paola and Anthony. They had hidden out in Texas for a short time before coming to Low Town, where they were later joined by the baseball-bat-wielding Alice and her brother, James, from the Tower in upstate New York.

For now, we were waiting. It was about an hour before dawn. Luckily, Fox and his cohorts had had me for only a few hours rather than days. If I planned carefully, I could still get Trixie to contact the elves about Gaia and then I could turn my attention to my brother and Reave. Yet, I first had to do something about this little band, and I needed help for that. With some reluctance, I used magic to send a message to Sofie, who was supposed to locate Gideon and send him to me. From what I could tell, neither etienne nor Paola was fond of my plan. Anthony, or Tony, as he preferred to be called, seemed to smile and roll with it all, while Alice busied herself with tidying the small house and making me a sandwich from their meager pantry. Her younger brother, James, remained silent and close to her at all times.

He was the one who worried me the most. His thin face and large eyes held dark shadows, as if he was constantly haunted by the memories of the Towers. James needed somewhere safe to live. He didn't need to spend every second of his life looking over his shoulder and flinching at every sound. The others seemed stronger, more pulled together, but every once in a while I'd catch a ghost float through their eyes, find a crack in their armor. No child should have to live in hiding like this.

"How did you even find me?" I demanded, dropping my hands to the slightly sticky surface of the table as I tried to turn my mind away from their future and focus more on the present.

etienne's lips pressed into a hard, thin line and the muscles in his jaw flexed. The kid was taller than me, but he was too thin, his T-s.h.i.+rt hanging on him so that he looked like a scarecrow. His handsome face was smudged with dirt and his blond hair was becoming long and s.h.a.ggy, and yet he managed an almost regal bearing. I didn't know if it was a defense mechanism or if it was a French thing. I didn't take it personally. He took the safety of his companions very seriously and he didn't trust me.

Tony laughed from where he stood next to etienne. "We'd been keeping an eye on your place for the past couple of weeks, trying to figure out a way to approach you. We saw the fight. Paola was afraid they'd take you, and we wouldn't be able to follow. James came up with the idea to hit you with a spitball, seeing as he'd be able to track his spit with a spell." He laughed again and nudged etienne with his elbow. The older boy tried to maintain his frown, but was struggling. There was something infectious about Tony's laughter.

"Disgusting," Alice muttered from across the room with her crisp British accent. She and her brother were from the United Kingdom, while Paola was from Italy. Tony sounded as if he was from somewhere in the South like Alabama or Mississippi, which added to his charm.

A part of me wanted to laugh with Tony because the trick was quite simple and ingenious. With all the chaos going on, I doubted anyone would have noticed a spitball hitting me. But I was equally sickened by the thought that these kids had witnessed the brutality and ugliness of that fight. I was going to have nightmares for years, and I was supposed to be the f.u.c.king adult in the room.