Bitter Night (8 page)

She shrugged and sat back down, returning to her food. “I was afraid of that. I’m a bad kisser.”

“That’s not what I meant,” he protested.

“But you weren’t satisfied. How disappointing for you.”

Niko chortled. Akemi was simply staring, her mouth open.

“You’re just screwing with me now,” Oz said.

Max shook her head. “And risk being judged unsatisfactory again? Oh, no. My ego isn’t that strong. I’ll leave screwing you to others.”

His hand flashed out and grasped hers. He pulled it to his lips, waiting until she met his gaze. “One day, you’re going to take me seriously.”

She smiled, tugging her hand back. “I always take you seriously, Oz.”

Magpie brought out more food, and the rest of the meal passed in pleasant ribbing. Max was more comfortable than she had ever been, and Akemi even loosened up enough to tease Niko about his love of designer clothing.

“It’s a little silly in our line of work, don’t you think?” she said softly, cutting her steak into precise cubes.

Niko smoothed a hand over his dark blue polo shirt. “What else am I going to spend my money on? And don’t I look great in Dolce and Gabbana? It’s made of bamboo. Looks like silk, washes like cotton. Blood comes right out of it. Women love me in it.”

Akemi rolled her eyes and Max chuckled. “You’re the most fashionable man in Montana. The grizzlies and elk have never been so impressed. Besides, wouldn’t you rather women love you out of it?”

Before he could answer, Max’s phone chirped its high-pitched ring. Oz’s followed in quick succession. His played the Miss Gulch theme from The Wizard of Oz. Max grinned at him, flipping open her phone. It was a text message.

Trouble. Come now.

Before she could think about what kind of trouble, Max had leaped over the table and down the stairs to the floor of the warehouse, Oz hot on her heels. Max flung open the door of Giselle’s RV and climbed the stairs in two lunging steps.

Giselle flung her phone against the wall as they entered. She turned, her expression taut. “Alton is on his way.”

“You told him where we are?” Oz asked in a flat voice that did little to hide his fury. Away from the covenstead their wards were not nearly as strong, making them far more vulnerable. Secrecy protected them from attacks, and Giselle had thrown it away.

“He’s Horngate’s oldest ally,” she said. “And he can’t reach Old Home. There’s not been a word since last night.”

Old Home was Alton’s covenstead, a postage-stamp-size territory in the lush old-growth forests of northern Idaho.

“Did he scry?” Max asked with a frown. There should be no good reason a covenstead didn’t answer.

Giselle shook her head. “He’s too worked up. He’s asking for our help.” She looked at Oz. “Go guide him in. He can bring in his Spear Prime, but no one else. He also removes his personal wards.”

Oz nodded. “I’ll have my Spears close the perimeter. No one else will come through after him.”

“Good. Go now.”

He departed and Max eyed Giselle. With a mental twist, she forced aside her antipathy for the witch, focusing instead on the threat. “You really think this is an attack? You and Alton have been allies for a decade.”

The witch shook her head. “I don’t know what to think. But something is wrong. I can feel it. I can’t treat him like an enemy’what if Old Home is in trouble? But we’re vulnerable here, and he’s the only one I might tell where we are, and only for something as dire as this. If he or somebody wanted to attack me, there would be no better way and no better time. I can’t ignore the possibility. All the same, Max, he is an ally. Be as careful as you can without being too obvious.”

“You’re warded?” Max asked.

“I am, though if he’s come for war, he’ll be prepared and my personal wards won’t stand.”

“Then I’m about to be as obvious as a sword up his ass,” Max said. “If he’s innocent, then he’ll just have to suck it up and get over it. Don’t come out until I say so.”

With that she exited the RV. Niko and Akemi were waiting outside.

“Alton’s coming in with his Sunspear Prime,” Max told them. “He says Old Home’s gone silent and he wants help. It might be a trap. Roust the Blades. I want four snipers trained on the two of them from the moment they enter. You two join Oz in guarding them, and everybody else will shield Giselle. Questions?”

The two shook their heads and hurried away. Max went to her Tahoe and flipped up the cargo box beneath the backseat. She once again pulled out her shotgun. Flash-bombs would blind her Shadowblades and do nothing against Alton’s Sunspear Prime. Grenades were too indiscriminate. Instead she loaded her .45 with shot shells. The steel pellets inside spread on penetration, and most of the steel remained inside the flesh. Both Uncanny and Divine beings were susceptible to the power of cold iron’which is what steel was mostly made out of. Hollowpoints would blow apart their heads or pulp their insides and tear a hole the size of a bowling ball on the way out, but at short range, the shot shells had enough stopping power to drop both Alton and his Spear Prime and still leave them alive to answer questions.

She frowned. Alton was a mediocre territory witch, relying on Giselle’s strength to protect his covenstead. His coven was small, with only himself and six other witches. But he was as ambitious as any witch and tended to brag loudly and strut around to hide the fact that he didn’t have a lot hanging between his legs. He was, in a word, a weasel. Max didn’t like him. She snorted. She didn’t like witches. But Alton was barely one of those. His Sunspears and Shadowblades were equally unimpressive. She could break Dorian, his Sun-spear Prime, in half with one hand.

Ten minutes later Oz returned with Alton and Dorian in tow. Niko and Akemi waited just inside the small side door as it opened. They stood well out of the way of the wedge of sunlight that fell inside, then closed ranks on either side of the witch and his Sunspear Prime as the door swung shut. Oz and the two Blades held their guns ready, though politely aimed at their visitors’ feet rather than at their chests.

Max stood in front of Giselle with six of her Shadow-blades ranged in a circle around the witch, all of them armed to the teeth. Alton and Dorian both got the message.

“What is this, Giselle?” Alton demanded as he stopped. “Is this the way you greet your friends?”

He was a slender man dressed in tailored clothing that no doubt cost more than Max’s Tahoe. He wore a ruby stud in one ear and a silver cuff bracelet on his left arm. His eyes were ringed in dark makeup, which, combined with his heavy brow and lantern jaw, gave him a look of brooding anger’sort of like a pissy housecat, Max thought. He also looked twitchy and worried. But what caught Max’s attention was that he looked younger than the last time she’d seen him four months ago. The lines around his eyes and mouth had smoothed, and he walked more vigorously, his eyes bright with energy. Her shoulders tensed. Only magic could make a witch younger, and plenty of it. More than Alton had, or why would he have let himself age in the first place?

“Keep him there,” she barked, and Niko, Oz, and Akemi leaped back and spun around to face the witch and his Sunspear Prime, their guns rising to heart height.

“Max?” Giselle said softly.

“He’s lost a good ten years,” Max said softly. “You can talk to him from here.”

“I demand an apology,” Alton called out, his voice rising. “I am here to call on our friendship and alliance and you point guns at me? This is intolerable!”

“All the same, Alton, the precautions are necessary. You are looking very well,” Giselle said. “I’ve never seen you look so young.”

He stiffened, his chin jutting stubbornly. “I would speak with you in private.”

“Say what you have to say or get out,” Max said, her words hard as bullets.

“Put a leash on your dog, Giselle. She’s crossed the line.”

“I would, Alton, but Max is protecting me. Even if I order her away, she will not go. Her compulsion spells won’t let her. Tell me about Old Home.”

His face twisted, though with frustration or fear, Max couldn’t tell. Maybe it was both.

“I have not been able to reach them since last night. The phones are down and no one responds to my computer messages.”

“Did you scry?”

He dragged in a harsh breath, the muscles in his jaws knotting as he clenched his teeth. Red seeped into his cheeks like war paint. Max watched his hands. If he made even the slightest twitch like he was going to fling a hex, she’d drop him like a rabid dog.

“I could not settle myself enough. I have come to ask you to scry for me. You see far better than I do, anyway.”

“Of course I will help. But it must wait until after the Conclave is over,” Giselle said.

“No! That is too late. What if they need me?” he said hoarsely.

“There is nothing you can do from here. A few hours will make no difference.”

He swayed forward. “Please! I left Caro there.”

Max bit down hard on her lower lip. Caro was Alton’s fourteen-year-old daughter. Behind her she heard Giselle draw a sharp breath. But her response was adamant.

“I’m sorry, Alton. I can’t spend that much energy before the Conclave.”

“You promised me help when I need it!”

“And I will give it. After the Conclave. Maybe you should go back to Old Home. You will almost be there by the time I can scry.”

“I can’t,” he said, his teeth clamped together. “I must attend the Conclave.”

Witches did not meet often, and usually people died when they did. Only at Conclaves was there a mutual peace, and this was the first in almost nine years. Max didn’t know the purpose of this one, but only territory witches were invited, and to miss was to put up a neon sign saying you were too weak to sit at the grown-up table. Alton’s cotton-glove ego couldn’t handle that. He’d rather see Old Home swallowed by hell first.

A sly, menacing look slid over his expression. “That’s what you want, isn’t it? I go home and don’t attend the Conclave.” He paused a moment, his mind tumbling with the possibility. Suddenly he shouted. “Bitch! What have you done to Old Home?”

Silence echoed in response. Then Giselle said coldly, “Get him out of here.”

Max heard her turn and step up into the RV. The door shut firmly. For a moment no one moved. Alton’s mouth hung open in shock, and Dorian’s brows furrowed as his gaze ran back and forth, figuring out just how deep was the shit he was standing in.

“You heard her. Time to go,” Max said, striding forward.

“I refuse. Put your hands on me and I will fry you,” Alton told Oz, who had begun to reach for him.

Dorian stepped in front of Oz, bristling. He was smaller than Oz by a couple of inches, and not as muscular. His weapons had been stripped before entering the warehouse, and now he held his fists like a boxer. Dumbshit. Oz had a gun and he didn’t have any stupid ideas about playing fair. He’d put a hole in Dorian’s head without batting an eyelash.

Suddenly Dorian turned and hoisted Alton over his shoulder in one smooth movement before jogging for the door. Maybe he wasn’t as dumb as he looked.

“Put me down, Dorian, damn you! Giselle! This is the end for us! Our alliance is over! I will make you regret this!” Alton was still shrieking as Dorian carried him out into the sunlight. Oz followed.

As the warehouse door shut, Giselle’s RV door opened. “Max, come inside.”

Max did as ordered, setting her shotgun on the kitchen counter as she entered. Giselle was standing in the little hallway leading to her bedroom. She had her hands pressed flat against the wall on either side of her and she was shaking. Her face was gray-white.

“I’m sending Oz to Old Home. He’ll take a mix of Sunspears and Shadowblades,” she said abruptly.

Max shook her head. “That leaves you too vulnerable. We should wait until we get back to Horngate and then send out a team.”

“No. This is an order, not a request. I want them on the road within the hour.” Giselle started to turn away.

“Why? You generally aren’t stupid, and this ranks right up there with canned cheese and clothes for cats. Better make a good case for it or Oz’s compulsion spells will keep him right here where he belongs.” Max couldn’t help her smirk. Giselle’s spells forced her Sunspears and Shadowblades to protect her at all costs. If it came down to a choice between obeying her orders and keeping her alive, the spells won every time. At Giselle’s wince of annoyance, Max’s smile widened into a grin. “Sucks, doesn’t it?”

Her smile vanished as magic enveloped the witch in a crackling nimbus. Giselle crossed the kitchen in two strides and slapped Max across the face. The blow itself was nothing, but the magic was another thing entirely. It crashed over Max in a wave of black energy. It was like standing inside a nuclear reactor. Liquid heat filled her, cutting channels through her flesh and bones. Swords with electric blades stabbed her over and over. Max sank to her knees, gasping. She didn’t fight, not that she could. She breathed, counting to four with each inhalation and exhalation. Her vision swam. She clung to consciousness, her fingers gouging streaks in the linoleum floor. Her body convulsed and her legs and arms twitched uncontrollably. The magic swelled until it felt like her skin would split.

Minutes passed as Max struggled in silence. She would not let her moans of pain escape. Her bladder clenched and her face screwed tight as she clamped down on the urge to pee. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d ended up at Giselle’s feet in a pool of her own piss, but she had no intention of doing it today. Finally the magic began to subside. Max felt certain spells inside her coming alive and beginning to gather it up to use for food. Brilliantly, Giselle had made Max’s punishment as strengthening as it had been debilitating. Slowly Max pushed herself up, holding onto the counter as she swayed, her head spinning.

Giselle sat stiffly in her chair, her hair pushed back behind her ears, her hands clamped together. Her face was expressionless as she watched Max recover.

“Well, that cleared the sinuses,” Max said in a raspy voice. Fueled by the residual magic, her healing spells were writhing inside her like a giant ball of spiders, fixing whatever Giselle had broken. “Feel better?”