Gray witch, p.19
Gray Witch, page 19
Goddess bless, what a mess.
The world was safer with the Bureau in it, I believed that, but could I stand in Dad’s path to preserve it?
Dad, who had spirited away my mother rather than work with me to release her.
Dad, who had stared a hole in my chest as if he could sense the nearness of the grimoire.
Dad, who was eager to fulfill his bargains and be done with a life he no longer wanted to live.
And Parish, that bastard, had handed Dad the perfect distraction to keep him off the director’s back.
A black witch, such as my father, had no afterlife ahead of him. Mom, on the other hand, as a white witch, would join Meg. Unless the fuzzy area of gray magic they practiced together blurred those edges too much one way or another for them both.
How far would Dad go to spend one more day, week, month, year with Mom?
And how would I convince him to ever let her go?
14
“I’ve got him.”
The tense conversation ground to a halt, and shame hit me that I had forgotten Colby was listening in.
“I’ve got him,” she repeated, her voice squeaking as it rose. “I’ve triangulated his cell phone signal.”
How we leapt from tracking Parish’s computer to his cell flew over my head, but Colby was in her element.
“Where is he?” Clay whooped with glee. “Let’s nail that bast—” he cleared his throat, “—bad man.”
“I have his coordinates.” Colby gave us all a second to pull up map apps. “Ready?”
We all grunted agreement, eager to punch in the numbers and find where the case took us next.
Before we finished, I could tell Asa and I weren’t going to like the answer.
“He’s here.” I pinpointed our location on the map. “In Tupelo.”
“About a quarter mile away.” Clay narrowed it down. “He’s moving in the opposite direction from you.”
“He sicced Mom on me.” I pivoted toward the signal. “Then he watched to see what would happen.”
Either she killed me, I banished her, or…I delivered the director’s own personal boogeyman to him.
“He was gambling on you being in contact with Saint.” Asa worried one of his earrings. “You were the bait, and your mother was the trap. Saint won’t rest until he’s collected all her bones, and there’s no telling where they’re hidden.”
“That narrows the scope,” Clay agreed. “Parish now has a grid where your father will eventually strike.”
“He must have taken Mom’s bones from wherever the director was hiding them.” I kept an eye on the directions Colby sent to lead me straight to Parish. “I wouldn’t be surprised if the director locked them in a box under his bed.”
To learn my parents, both my parents, might have been beneath my feet for all those years made the dark yearnings within me stir with a hunger for vengeance against my grandfather and the atrocities he had committed in the name of building his legacy.
A legacy that had ultimately rejected him, time and time again.
“We need a plan.” Asa strode beside me. “We don’t know if Parish is working alone.”
“That might be why he liberally sprinkled so many teams in the surrounding area rather than let us do our thing. There are dozens of agents within a two-hour radius of you.” Clay grunted. “That means he’s got all the backup he needs.”
“We find where he’s holed up,” I gritted out, “who he brought with him, and we wait for backup.”
Our lives were tied, Colby’s and mine, and I couldn’t throw hers away because I didn’t want perspective.
“You’re going to wait for little ol’ me?” Clay tittered in a falsetto. “Why, I’m positively flattered.”
“We’ll be there in ten.” Colby updated us. “We’ll meet you beside Bistro Americana.”
“Mmm.” Clay made a happy noise. “I wonder if they serve steak frites with béarnaise butter? Or mussels with caramelized fennel and leeks? Maybe an elegant smoked whitefish tartar with herb oil?”
“You’re getting close.” Colby spoke over Clay’s ramblings. “I’ll switch to texting for stealth.”
The call ended, and I forced myself to breathe in and out.
We had directions. We had backup en route. We had our ringleader.
“It’s all right to be angry,” Asa said from beside me. “At Parish, the director.” He hesitated. “At Saint.”
“He didn’t even look at me.” I mashed my lips together, but the words kept coming, pried out by the fascination roiling through me. “Once he saw her, that was it. I ceased to exit. He only cared about her.”
“I can’t imagine what he must have felt, seeing her again. Or you, meeting her in that state.”
“This isn’t the first time he’s chosen her over me.” I hadn’t realized that Dad’s reappearance had sliced me that deeply, or that the wound had been festering since the night I first saw him. “He made a vow that would end his life after he avenged my mother. He decided there and then to make me an orphan. He didn’t care that he was leaving a child behind. He only cared his wife was dead.”
“Rue…”
“I wanted him to be my dad.” I swallowed past a tight throat. “I wanted him to stay.” I shook my head. “He doesn’t care about me, Asa. He doesn’t love me. Maybe one love is all a black witch can manage.”
There was an argument to be made that Dad was half crazed from his time beneath the compound. That he wasn’t of sound mind or body. But I reverted to the small child I had been when I last saw him, and I wanted him to pick me.
Me.
Twice now, he had chosen Mom instead, and that cut deep.
Enough to draw tears that threatened to blur my view of what lay ahead.
“Is there a point where we have so much sex that fascination stops making me a weepy mess?” I checked with Asa, who choked on air beside me. “Is there a magic number? Should we have been keeping count?”
“That’s not how fascination works,” he said, his voice strained. “I wish I could make this better for you.”
“You’ve been making everything better for me since the day I met you.”
“I thought you wanted to kill me then?”
“I wanted to punch your face in. Lucky for you, your good looks distracted me.” I allowed myself a moment of levity. “Almost as much as your butt in those slacks is distracting me right now.”
“It’s the spandex,” he confided. “It really sculps and lifts.”
A snort blasted out of me, startling a nearby bird from its perch. “I can’t believe you went there.”
“Clay said that once, after the drycleaners mixed up our pants. He was able to pull mine on, but it was a stretch.” Asa’s lips hooked up to one side. “He went as far as to order a pair in his size, but he wore them to a food truck show one weekend and caught the reflection of his food baby and vowed to never wear them again.”
“As many food babies as he’s carried, I’m amazed he’s not the father of hundreds of thousands.”
We reached the meeting point but lingered outside rather than venturing into the restaurant.
“You’re not your father,” Asa said after a while of me staring down the road.
The impact of those words coming from Asa, who feared that most of all, forced me to face him.
“I love you enough to become something more terrible than I have ever been if I lose you.”
“And you love Colby enough not to put her in the middle of what’s between us.”
“That doesn’t mean I don’t want to.” I pressed my face into his chest and looped my arms around his waist. “I love her, so much, but you…” I tipped my head back. “I can understand why Dad did what he did in the moment. He didn’t want to live in a world without Mom. There was no world without her.”
“You won’t make that choice.” He breathed me in. “You would never take that decision from Colby.”
“I want to believe you’re right.” I turned when gravel crunched behind us. “But it gets harder every time I see your slacks lift and sculp your butt to ever imagine my life without that view.”
Laughter crinkled the corners of his eyes, and he captured my mouth in a kiss that tapped his newest piercing against my teeth. “I never should have told you that.”
“Ugh.” Clay pretended to talk into his phone to enable him to speak freely with Colby. “If we leave them alone too long, they’re like ice cream left out in the sun. They turn into gooey puddles of pure sugar.”
“I like gooey puddles of pure sugar,” Colby said from within his pocket. “But yeah. They’re gross.”
“Totally.” Clay wrinkled his nose as he walked up and stole a hug from me. “So gross.”
Again those stupid tears threatened to prick my eyes, and I found myself holding on to Clay for too long.
“It’s all right, Dollface.” He kissed the top of my head. “You can cry all you want. It’s good for you.”
“I hate crying.” I shoved away from him. “I hate feelings.”
“Feelings hate you too.” He ruffled my hair like a big brother. “That’s why they’ve ganged up on you.”
“I want to punch them all in their touchy-feely faces.”
“I know you do.” He tweaked my chin. “You know what will make you feel better?”
Like a lady, I sniffed and wiped tears and snot on my shirt. “Punching someone else in the face?”
“That’s my girl.” A throat cleared in the vicinity of his pocket. “My second-best girl, that is.”
This again? Really? I was starting to develop a complex. “Et tu, Clay?”
First the daemon demoted me, then my dad—or first my dad?—ditched me, and now Clay dumped me.
“You’ve been neglecting me lately.” He lifted a shoulder. “Colby was there for me in my time of need.”
“I held his hand,” she confirmed, “when they announced the winner of The Great British Bake Off.”
A rustle of fabric drew my attention to Clay’s pocket where Colby’s antennae stuck up on high alert.
“He’s on the move.” Colby peeked out to point the way. “We can catch him at the intersection.”
“I don’t suppose you can tell if he’s got backup with him?”
“No.” Her frustration was evident. “There are no cameras in the area, so my vision is limited.”
Of course, my little hacker moth would have tried before it occurred to me to ask. “That’s okay.”
“We’ll do it the old-fashioned way,” Clay agreed. “You guys go down two blocks then cut north. Colby and I will head northeast. Eyes and ears open, people.”
They peeled off and began their recon from a safer distance while Asa and I waded into the thick of it by trailing Parish directly. We could have tracked him by the thick cloud of smoke curling over his shoulder as he pinched a cigarette between his lips. The scent that followed him wasn’t chemically treated tobacco but brimstone and death.
We didn’t have much to hide behind, but that worked for us as much as against us. We kept a clear line of sight on Parish, who was on his phone, distracted and alone, puffing away, while he strolled through a town where he had just kicked a hornet’s nest then stomped it flat.
“He’s baiting us.” I hung back. “There’s no way he’s this oblivious.”
Parish had a reputation, but that wouldn’t protect him if he kept his head down while enemies were circling him. And if he had been in that clearing, then he knew we were enemies. There was nothing else we could be after what he did to my mother.
A quick text to Clay told them to hang back while we watched for his next move.
“I can smell you,” Parish said, putting away his phone and his pretense. “You might as well come out.”
That sounded like a terrible idea, so we held our ground, waiting to see if he was bluffing.
“Show some spine.” He removed his jacket, let it hit the road, then began rolling up his sleeves. “Do you really want to die cowering?”
Only Asa’s grip on my upper arm kept me from launching myself at Parish and clawing off his face.
“I’m old,” Clay called, shrugging out of his suit jacket. “Insults won’t make me move any faster.”
His jacket, and the moth within, he draped over a branch, giving Colby cover to escape. As Parish had, he rolled his sleeves up over his forearms.
“You’re eternal,” Parish countered. “Age means even less to you than it does to my kind.”
“I bet you miss the old days when you could set fire to any old village you wanted, steal the maidens, and eat the humans.”
“You have no idea.” Parish thrust his hands into his pockets, the picture of calm. “Life was simpler then.”
“Food tastes better than ever, plus you can pay people to cook for you, so you’ll have to forgive me if I disagree.”
A faint tingle in the back of my mind confirmed my familiar was nearby, and she was working magic.
“Where are the others?” Parish glanced up and down the street. “You’re never alone.”
“We’re all alone, in the end.”
As the lament settled into the space between them, Clay broke into a run, pumping his arms, aiming for Parish.
Their bone-jarring impact made my heart squeeze. Before Parish landed his counterstrike, light exploded from the trees. A hair-thin bubble of iridescence expanded to encapsulate them within a shimmery ward that would protect the innocent from their brawl.
Good call, smarty fuzz butt.
Drawing in a full breath, as if readying himself to spew fire, Parish instead burst into his dragon.
Brilliant red and gold scales glittered across his massive body, and his wings arched high overhead. Horns ringed the crown of his skull, and spikes lined his tail. He watched Clay through narrowed yellow eyes, almost luminescent in the streetlights, and his voice rolled like thunder across the pavement.
“You would dare?” Another gulp of air, and Parish spat fire at Clay. “Burn, golem.”
Had Asa not wrapped me in a bear hug from behind, locking me in place, I would have run straight to Clay. As it was, I gave serious thought to stomping Asa’s foot or jolting him with magic to break free.
“Fire won’t harm him,” Asa reminded me. “He can survive anything as long as his shem remains intact.”
Survive it? Yeah. But it would hurt.
The torrent of flames lasted only so long as Parish had breath, and then he was left panting for air.
Meanwhile, Clay was…
“If you wanted to see me naked—” Clay dusted ash off his chest, “—all you had to do was ask.” He touched his scalp. “Damn it, I liked that wig.” He folded his arms across his chest. “It made me look taller.”
“He’s buying us time.” I squirmed in Asa’s grip. I couldn’t help it. “We have to help him.”
“That’s not what he’s doing.” Asa released me and yanked me to my feet as he stood. “Look.”
The sky above us roiled with churning clouds and streaks of lightning. Wind picked up, buffeting Parish’s wings until he snapped them shut to avoid being blown backward. His roar was deafening as he reared onto his hind legs, swiping at the barrier until his claws left visible marks.
Enormous wings that stank of rot and copper exploded into view as Colby’s freshman attempt at solo warding failed, and the creature at their center folded them in tight then dove straight for the dragon’s open maw.
“That’s my dad.” I ran toward them. “Good goddess, what is he doing?”
Forget Clay and the daemon’s roughhousing back home. This was a true clash of titans.
And no magic protected the citizens caught out in town from having front row seats.
The black magic spell Dad used to conjure his wings expanded until his size rivaled the dragon beneath him. As a piercing shriek rent the night, I conceded he resembled a giant bird of prey more than a man.
Wicked talons spread wide, he dove and sank them into Parish, ripping open his side.
An indrawn breath tore my focus from the battle as I sought the source behind us.
“Look, Momma, look.” A small boy pointed at the brawl. “Are they filming a movie?”
“I don’t…” Her voice trailed off as she got an eyeful of the scene unfolding. “Come on, Wren.”
“Don’t let them leave.” I shoved Asa toward them. “Round up anyone else who saw and contain them.”
Refusing to budge from his spot by my side, he speared me with his penetrating gaze. “What are you going to do?”
“First, I’m going to help Colby raise her ward again. Then I’m going to cast an illusion over the block to prevent any more witnesses. After that I…have no idea.”
“Solid plan.” He kissed me quickly. “Be safe.”
“You too.”
The familiar connection thrummed between Colby and me, warm and bright, and I set out at a jog around the perimeter, anchoring the spell to buildings, to lampposts, to curbs. I drew on the threads binding us to weave a powerful ward shrouded with a complex illusion that would have pushed me even at my black witch best.
“Rue.”
Heart clenching, I paused to scan for the owner of that tiny voice. “What are you doing?”
“Helping you.” Colby smacked into my shoulder and wrapped her arms around my neck. “We’re stronger together.” She buried her face against me. “I might also be a tiny bit scared. I didn’t realize dragons were that big. The eggs in Mystic Realms can’t be to scale. Do you think your dad will be okay?”
Shoving worries for Dad aside, I focused on her. “You need to hide. Dad can’t know about you.”
A pang shot through me, and I flinched away from confirmation I didn’t trust him, no matter how much I might want to, not with her.
Colby, it seemed, was the ultimate test of faith with me, and he didn’t make the cut.
“Hairbow mode activate.” She shrank to her smallest self. “Hair or bra?”
“Bra,” I decided. “Hold on to the strap, like old times.”
Fewer and fewer of my bras had tiny Velcro patches sewn onto the upper straps these days. A wardrobe staple there in the beginning, I had phased them out over time. The idea had been whenever Colby was overwhelmed, she could climb in my shirt and hold on to the loop side with the delicate claws on her feet. Nowadays, I was busier spelling the various shirt and jacket pockets in Clay’s wardrobe to suit her.
