Ruby Fever

Chapter 6

Getting out of that house was like stepping out of a crypt into sunshine.

Ahead Agent Garcia half-guided, half-shoved Agent Wahl into the black SUV.

He smiled at her. “You are so . . .”

“So what?”

“Forceful,” he told her with a dreamy look on his face.

She grabbed him by the chin. “Victor! Look into my eyes.”

He gazed at her. His eyes rolled back into his skull, and Agent Wahl slumped in his seat, unconscious.

“An enersyphon,” Alessandro murmured. “That explains things.”

Enersyphons, also known as magic eaters, absorbed magic, pulling it into themselves. They didn’t guard against it, they fed on it, which granted them a mild immunity to a lot of mental and elemental powers. Agent Garcia just sapped the magic dancing through Wahl’s brain and the shock knocked him out.

“You stopped me.” I pulled my hand out of his. Our backs were to their security cameras, and I kept my voice low. “She killed Pete.”

“We don’t have proof.”

“I don’t care.”

“Yes, you do. We follow the rules. That’s what separates us from them. Catalina, it’s the wrong time and the wrong place. I know you are angry, but if I hadn’t stopped you, you would’ve regretted it.”

“No, I wouldn’t have.”

“If Linus were here, he would have stopped you, too.”

“Linus isn’t here, because she hurt him.”

He dipped his head to look at me. “This is not like you.”

This was not like me.

That thought spun my mind around. The surge of magic inside me died.

I had endangered the investigation. If he hadn’t taken my hand, Kaylee and I would be locked in a mental duel right now. She was untrained, but she was freakishly powerful.

I’d come within a hair of singing. Not only had I almost jeopardized the search for Linus’ assassin, but I would have put the lives of everyone in that room in danger. This didn’t happen to me. I’d been controlling my magic and my emotions since early childhood, but an untrained mental mage had managed to rile me up to the point of nearly losing it.

It wasn’t Kaylee. It was Linus. He was still unconscious, and it was seriously messing with my head. I needed to get a grip right now, because if I spun out of control, I wouldn’t be able to undo what would happen.

“Thank you for stopping me,” I told him.

“Any time,” he said.

Agent Garcia marched back to us. We started walking toward her at the same time. The more distance was between us and the watchful eyes inside the house, the better.

We met halfway.

“She attacked a federal agent and the two of you just sat there,” Agent Garcia growled. “Tell me why I shouldn’t get a strike team down here right now and take her into custody. Alive or dead, I don’t care.”

That would be a nightmare. I turned my back to the security camera, pointed at it, hiding the gesture with my body, and lowered my voice.

“You’re not wrong,” I said. “And your anger is justified. However, she has done much worse than that. I want to nail her to the wall, but she’s involved in a much larger scheme, and I don’t exactly know how. I don’t know what will happen if we bring her in. Please give me time.”

“Promise me you won’t sweep this under the rug,” Agent Garcia said. “I want your word that this doesn’t become one of those House politics secrets.”

“I won’t and you have it.”

“Seventy-two hours,” Agent Garcia ground out.

“The Office of the Warden appreciates your patience,” Alessandro said.

Agent Garcia squeezed her hand into a fist and relaxed it. “I’ll tell you one thing. That girl is no halcyon. Her magic tastes like jagged glass.”

She marched around the car, got into the driver’s seat, drove off, with Wahl still unconscious, and almost collided with an armored gunmetal grey Dodge as it turned into the driveway. For a moment the two cars were at a standoff, then the Dodge reversed, giving Agent Garcia room. She peeled out of the driveway.

Alessandro frowned.

The grey Dodge slid to a stop in front of us. The driver’s window rolled down, revealing a tan man in his late twenties, with light brown hair and grey eyes behind large round glasses. I’d seen him before. He was one of Lenora Jordan’s Assistant DAs. Matt Something.

“No,” Alessandro said.

Matt gave us an apologetic wave with his hand. “I’m merely the messenger.”

Cornelius appeared at the mouth of the driveway, Gus on a leash next to him. He saw us and waved. His car was nowhere in sight. He must’ve walked from Linus’ house.

I waved back.

“We lost Dag Gunderson,” Matt said.

“How, Matt?” Alessandro growled. “I left him at your doorstep.”

“Gross incompetence,” Matt said cheerfully. “He’s been spotted near St. Agnes Academy. We’re reasonably sure he’s going to bomb it. I’ll fill you in on the way.”

Alessandro’s tone was cold. “I’m busy.”

It was my turn to be reasonable. I took his hand and squeezed it. He gave me an outraged look.

“Lenora personally asked for you,” Matt said. “She said she would consider it a favor.”

There were a handful of people in Houston not even the strongest Houses cared to provoke. The Harris County DA was one of them. More importantly, hundreds of children were about to experience a magic meteor shower that would explode on impact.

“It’s okay,” I told him. “Go.”

He shook his head.

“She sent a car,” I told him. “I won’t do anything rash without you. I promise. Look, Cornelius is over there. I’ll pick him up, check on Bern and Runa, and we’ll go straight home.”

Alessandro swore again.

“It’s fine,” I told him. “There are hundreds of children in St. Agnes.”

He exhaled and got into the SUV. “Drive fast, Matt.”

“Always.” Matt smiled at me. “Thank you for your understanding, Ms. Baylor.”

The window rolled back up. The Dodge reversed and sped away.

I forgot to tell him about Konstantin. Well, crap. Not that it would change anything. He would still have had to go to apprehend Dag Gunderson. I would wait to interview the prince until he returned home.

I got into Rhino and drove it to the mouth of the driveway, where Cornelius stood.

“Would you like a lift?”

“Yes, thank you.”

He opened the rear passenger door. Gus hopped onto the seat and lay down, panting. A moment later, Cornelius got into the front passenger seat, and we were off.

“What are you doing here?”

“Gus and I decided to follow Luciana’s scent.”

And it led them straight to her house.

“Did you learn anything from talking to the family?” Cornelius asked.

“Kaylee Cabera is not a halcyon. Alessandro and I don’t know what she is. The FBI has a magic eater, and she didn’t know what Kaylee is either.”

“Do you think she is our killer?”

“Yes. I was five feet from her, and I had to let her go, because I can’t prove it.”

“Yet,” Cornelius said.

“Yes,” I agreed. “Yet.”

“Why would the current Speaker use her daughter to try to murder the former Speaker?”

“She wasn’t trying to murder the former Speaker. She tried to murder the Warden.”

Cornelius tapped his chin, thinking. “Luciana is prudent. Was prudent. I would classify her as having been extremely risk averse. This was rash and ultimately, unsuccessful.”

“It was certainly out of character.”

“It had to be self-defense,” Cornelius said. “She must have felt Linus was a danger to her or someone she loved. She was a single parent like me. Her life revolved around her child. She might not have risked retribution from the Assembly to keep her job or stay out of prison, but she would do almost anything to protect her daughter.”

“Would you have killed Linus to protect Matilda?”

“Absolutely.”

He hadn’t even paused.

“The difference is, I wouldn’t have gotten caught.”

“How would you have done it?”

Cornelius smiled. “Poison would be the cleanest. Did you know that Linus keeps a kitchen towel on the door handle of his icemaker? A large rat or an ermine could grab that towel and use its body weight to open the icemaker. A single rat can easily carry a plastic bag in a pocket of its harness with enough cyanide or any number of other lethal substances to cause death within minutes. The hardest variable to control is making sure the poison is evenly spread over the ice.”

“Wow.”

Cornelius smiled wider.

“So, are you happy with your current position and compensation? Is there anything I can do on behalf of House Baylor to make you feel more valued?”

The smile vanished. He turned toward me. “Catalina, your family is my family. My sister and brother both feel the same. You, Arabella, and Nevada are the only older sisters Matilda will ever have. You never have to worry that I would harm any of you.”

Awww.

I pulled into Linus’ driveway. Cornelius’ electric BMW waited in front of the garage next to one of our armored Humvees. A guard stood by Linus’ front door, one of our Warden people. He held a submachine gun and was doing his best to look as conspicuous as possible. The public at large had no idea what happened to Linus and knowing Linus’ ties with the military, his neighbors wouldn’t find the presence of an armed guard alarming. But if Arkan was watching—and I was a hundred percent sure he was—we wanted to show that the house was well protected.

“By the way, Matilda told me that she felt the spider,” I said.

“Did she?” Cornelius’ eyes sparkled.

“Yes. She said the spider was a she, and she was stressed out and scared. Is it possible she is an arachnid mage?”

Cornelius smiled. “It’s not that. Animal mages have degrees of power like any other magic discipline. At the very bottom of that power ladder are those who can bond with a single species. Then we start climbing up the hierarchy of zoological classification. Those with Average abilities typically can affect an order like Rodentia or Carnivora. At Significant and Prime levels, most of us are capable of affecting the entire class, meaning there are Primes specializing in Mammals, or Birds, or Reptiles. Those with remarkable power can affect more than one of these classes.”

“So, an entire series? Like Amniotes?”

He smiled. “Yes.”

Despite Cornelius’ best attempts to downplay his power, I had seen him bond with both birds and mammals.

“But arachnids are very far removed from amniotes,” I said.

He nodded again, the same quiet smile on his lips.

We would have to go all the way up, to a group that included both mammals and arachnids. “I’m sorry, my knowledge of zoological classification is lacking.”

“I suspect Matilda is sensitive to the entire Nephrozoa Clade. Almost all bilateral animals fall into that group. Over a million species. Of course, whether or not she can bond with all of them remains to be seen, but even if she simply feels them, it is already enough. I cannot sense a spider, Catalina.”

Cornelius was a reserved man. He wouldn’t say anything else, but he didn’t have to. If parental pride had a glow, I would’ve gone blind because he would have lit up like a miniature sun.

The doors of Linus’ house opened. Runa emerged and waved me over.

“I think she wants me to talk to them.”

“Gus and I will wait for you. It would be best if we travelled home together.”

“Thank you,” I told him and got out of the car.

Bern met me in Linus’ study.

“Hey . . .” I started.

He held up the USB, put it into my hand, and he and Runa walked out and shut the double doors behind them.

Okay.

I sat down and plugged the USB into Linus’ desktop. A pair of headphones waited for me, already plugged in. Whatever it was, Bern clearly didn’t want it to get out.

I put the headphones on and accessed the storage stick. A single video. I clicked it.

Linus appeared on the screen sitting in the same chair I now sat.

“Hello, Catalina. This is the proverbial Things Have Gone Terribly Wrong video. I’ve left Bernard a nice trail of bread crumbs so I’m sure it didn’t take him long to break the encryption.”

My eyes watered, and I paused it. He wasn’t dead yet. He was a stubborn, mean old bastard, who wouldn’t kick it just because he injected himself with some stupid shit.

Damn it, Linus.

I wiped my eyes and restarted the video. On-screen, Linus raised a heavy cut-crystal glass with two fingers of whiskey in it. He sipped it and smiled. “Liquid courage. Let us get on with it.”

Yes, that would be good, because otherwise I would just sit here and cry.

“My name is Linus Stuart Duncan of House Duncan. My mother’s name was Fiona Duncan of House Duncan. My father’s name was Vassilis Makris. His father’s name was Christos Makris. His birth name was Christos Molpe of House Molpe.”

The name fell like a brick and knocked me right out of my chair and to my feet. The headphone cord came out with them and I yanked the headphones off my head and dropped them to the floor.

House Molpe. The only known siren House in existence, now extinct.

Linus was a Molpe.

He was a siren.

Linus was . . .

“Go ahead.” Linus lifted his glass. “Pace for a bit. Let the implications percolate. It means exactly what you think it does.”

Linus was my grandfather.

Oh my God.

My brain shoved all sorts of facts at me all at once. I circled the desk to the right, reversed, circled it to the left, and finally settled on marching back and forth in front of it, trying to chew through an avalanche of memories.

Back after the battle in the Pit, when I had sung so hard and spent so much magic trying to kill a godlike construct that I couldn’t even think, Linus had found me, and he’d coaxed me back to reality. I’d asked him about it later and he told me he’d done some research, and it indicated that when sirens overextended, some of them lost their minds. They could no longer speak, only sing songs of insanity and beguiling magic. If I hadn’t spoken, he had a mental Prime on standby to surge into my mind and try to guide me back.

He had “done some research.” He probably called whatever close relative he knew on that side.

Wow. Wooow.

Why would a Prime of Linus’ standing take such an in-depth interest in a new emerging House, especially one as odd as ours? Even before I became his Deputy, Linus was a constant presence in our lives. He found a way in through Nevada, and soon we were invited to his barbecues and fishing trips. He smoothed the way for Bernard to enter grad school. Leon practically lived in his workshop when Linus was working on new firearms. Problems we encountered sometimes vanished, as if swept away by some unseen force, a helpful watchful presence acting on our behalf behind the scenes.

He was there when we registered as a House. He was one of the two witnesses, with Connor being the other.

A memory came to me, Alessandro and I in Linus’ summer mansion, Linus grilling meat for his patented fajitas, Alessandro looking at me, looking at Linus, and then murmuring to himself in Italian, “I’m such an idiot.”

He knew! Siren magic leaked, and Alessandro’s antistasi powers would’ve tagged it as a threat.

“Sonovabitch!”

I wasn’t even sure which one of them I was cursing at.

I braked hard in front of the desk and leaned onto it, face-to-face with the recorded Linus.

“Fuck you.” It felt good to say it out loud.

“You’re probably cursing and it’s fair. But if you’re watching this, the situation is urgent, so let’s put that part aside and move forward. I have many vital things to tell you.”

I landed back into the chair. Yes. I couldn’t wait to hear this. I knew all about House Duncan. It was an old Scottish House with a persistent line of hephaestus Primes. Duncans made weapons of all types and sizes. One time when Linus and I were chased and had to abandon our vehicle and everything inside it, he made a detour to a recycling center and built a gun out of scrap metal and magic. It fired the little tabs you broke off aluminum cans—there was a container of them there—and he’d killed three people with it.

Linus was an orphan. Both his father and his mother had died in a tragic car accident when he was a toddler. That was the official record.

“Angus Duncan, my grandfather, was a stubborn man, set in his ways and convinced he was always right.”

You don’t say. Shocking.

“He and my mother butted heads. When she was nineteen, they had a row and she left for a holiday in Greece. She met my father, who was twenty-six, handsome, and charming. They had a summer romance, and she became pregnant with me. His family pushed for marriage. My grandfather told her to come home. They had another one of their fights, over the phone this time, and the next week my mother married my father. House Duncan didn’t attend the wedding.”

Marrying someone because you were pissed off at your parent sounded like a recipe for disaster.

“The bloom was off that rose quickly. My parents were very different people. My mother had goals. She wanted to be someone, to challenge herself, and my father was content to float within the bubble his family had built to safeguard him. Still, two years after I was born, my mother was pregnant again, with a girl. My father’s relatives demanded she abort the child.”

What?

Linus’ expression turned harsh. “During the First World War the region was invaded by the Russian Imperium. Katina Molpe, my father’s oldest aunt, rowed her boat to one of those tiny rocky islands the Aegean is famous for, little more than a boulder sticking out of the water, and then she sang to the invading army. An entire battalion drowned trying to reach her, until enough of them managed to swim across the stormy water. You can guess what happened next.”

They tore her to pieces.

The love sirens inspired wasn’t truly love. It wasn’t gentle or selfless. It was a burning obsession and if allowed to linger, it grew into an all-consuming need to possess. If they couldn’t have the entire person, they would settle for a piece. A clump of hair. A nail. A finger. Anything would do. Katina died a horrible death to save her town. Nevada had told me this story just before our trials. A cautionary tale about the perils of siren magic.

“All Molpe carry the talent, but only women are Primes,” Linus continued. “I’m probably the strongest male siren alive but I’m barely an Average, and I suspect that is only due to the magic reserve I inherited from the Duncan side. I cannot compel people the way you do. The most I can do is to predispose people to like me and to sense when mental mages try to manipulate me.”

He must’ve felt Kaylee building up her power when she and her mother entered his study. The siren magic, however weak, gave him a warning. It was the only reason he was still breathing.

“After the war the Molpe family was hounded by every neighboring government and political faction wanting access to siren powers. A lot of Molpes died. The family had to go into hiding to save themselves. They relocated, changed their name, and made sure no more Primes were born.”

Selective breeding, Molpe style. Only male children were allowed to live.

“My mother refused to give up my unborn sister. She was a hephaestus Prime, and nobody would be taking her future baby away from her. She barricaded herself in a house and called my grandfather to come and get her. He and my uncles got there one day late. My father somehow got my mother to let him in and shot her in the head.”

If you want us to survive, kill your wife and your unborn daughter. Do it to save the family. It was no longer shocking to me. I had seen worse. Fear made people do terrible things. But it bothered me so much. This was my family. I came from this.

“There was a massacre,” Linus said. “The Duncans retrieved me and my mother’s body and returned to Scotland. They had a funeral for my mother. The official report said she died during an automobile accident while on a holiday in Greece and her husband’s body was lost at sea. It was a dark time. I don’t remember any of it or my parents. My first memory is getting to ride a pony by the castle walls.”

I knew that his grandfather had raised him, but I had no idea how deep the wound was.

On-screen Linus leaned forward, his expression grave. “The Makris family is not to be trusted. If they ever approach you, kill as many as you must to break yourself free. They fear you because they think your existence will drag their sordid history to light. Do not look for them to find answers to your magic, do not approach them, do not correspond with them. They will stop at nothing to murder you if you come into contact with them. Do not open that door.”

Wow.

“I know you have questions about your magic. I will tell you everything I know. Very shortly you’ll be facing a crisis, if you aren’t already. You’ve concentrated on only one aspect of your powers, but your magic is more complex than you realize. The black wings are the first manifestation of the problem, and it will become worse in times of emotional distress . . .”

A man screamed outside, his voice dropping into a tortured gurgle.

I yanked the USB stick out of the computer, shoved it into my pocket, and ran to the window.

The outline of a twenty-foot-wide arcane circle smoked on the ground. Two corpses slumped inside it, their skin turning green, the trademark sign of Runa’s work. In the center of the circle, a pile of reddish flesh steamed. Bones stuck out of it. Human bones. A teleportation mage could teleport themselves, but teleporting another person required complex arcane circles and a lot of preparation, and a slight miscalculation or variation in weight could make it backfire.

I dashed across the house to the front door. In the doorway, Runa and Bern were looking at the three corpses. A horrible stench rolled from the circle, like rotten fish being steamed. I had smelled a failed teleportation once before. It wasn’t an odor you would ever forget.

“. . . question them,” Bern said.

“Bernard,” Runa said.

She used his full name. He was in trouble.

“If you teleport me into the house of your enemy and give me one second, I’ll kill everyone I see. Even if you shot me as soon as you saw me, you would die immediately after. I love you too much to gamble with your life and I’m responsible for the safety of everyone under this roof. I stand by my decision.”

“I agree,” I told them.

“See? She agrees.”

“I also concur,” Cornelius said, approaching from the other hallway, Gus trailing him. He must’ve come inside at some point. “When there is an intruder in your house with a gun, you don’t shoot at their feet. You shoot to kill.”

Bern sighed.

I leaned past his broad back to look at the circle. The closest green corpse had long dark hair wound around her head in a kind of crown. I knew that hair. Melanie Poirier, one of Arkan’s combat mages. If Runa hadn’t nuked her immediately, we would have had a hard time neutralizing her.

Arkan risked a teleportation in broad daylight. Why? His hits were usually well planned and carefully executed. This seemed rushed, almost like a knee-jerk reaction to something. What could have upset him enough . . .

It hit me like lightning. I spun around and sprinted back to the study.

“What?” Runa yelled.

I didn’t answer.

I got to the study, yanked the keyboard to me, clicked the Warden Network, and typed in my login. Runa, Bern, Cornelius, and Gus ran into the room, followed by one of the Warden guards.

“What’s going on?” Runa demanded.

I didn’t have time to answer. The network accepted the login. The Warden interface unfolded in front of me. I accessed the databanks.

“Catalina? What happened?” Runa asked.

Ignat Orlov, alias Arkan, known associates. I scrolled through the list.

No . . .

No . . .

Trofim Smirnov.

I clicked the name. The dossier opened. The familiar face stared at me from the screen. A slender, stooped white man in his forties who looked like he was expecting a surprise punch.

Fuck.

I grabbed my phone from my pocket and called Patricia. No answer.

Bern grabbed me by the shoulders and held me still. “Explain.”

It took me a second to slow my brain enough to speak. “An hour ago, Prince Berezin showed up at the Compound asking to see me. I told Patricia to let him in. He was wearing this man’s face.”

Runa glanced at the screen. “Who is he?”

“Trofim Smirnov. He is Arkan’s Bernard.”

I had studied Arkan’s inner circle and I knew most of them by sight. But I had concentrated on combat operatives, people who were a threat if you spotted them in the crowd. Smirnov was a pattern cybermage. He was at his most dangerous behind a keyboard. He had been low priority. I had no idea how many lives my mistake would cost us.

They stared at me. Bern whipped his phone out and began making calls.

“Right now, Arkan thinks that his oldest friend betrayed him and defected to the Wardens, and we have him in our house. Smirnov knows too much. Arkan can’t let him live. He will retaliate.”

Konstantin had set us up. Arkan would stop at nothing to get his hands on Smirnov.

“Our phones are compromised,” Bern announced.

“How?” Runa asked.

He shook his head. He looked ready to rip someone apart with his bare hands.

“If Arkan can capture any of us and trade us for Smirnov, it would solve all his problems,” I said. “Everyone outside the Compound is a potential hostage or casualty.”

“Shit,” Runa said. “We can’t stay here.”

Runa was dangerous as hell, but all of the automated defenses were down, and none of the guards were above Average on the magic scale. If Arkan sent several heavy hitters and they attacked from different sides, there would be casualties.

We had to go. Now.

Bern turned to the Warden guard. “Get your people packed. Five minutes.”

I dialed Alessandro.

The guard looked at me. They answered only to the Office of the Warden.

“Do as he says,” I told him.

The guard double-timed it out of the room.

“Your call has been forwarded . . .”

Bern gently pushed me out of the way and bent over the desktop. His fingers flew over the keyboard. “Baby, I need the two laptops from the vault.”

Runa turned around and ran down the stairs.

I tried Alessandro again. Straight to voice mail. Text was my only option.

Konstantin put on Smirnov’s face and walked into our house.

Nothing else needed to be said. He would understand. I texted Leon, trying to explain the same thing as fast as I could.

Cornelius shook his head. “My phone is affected as well.”

The computer screen blinked, and Bug appeared on-screen. Connor’s surveillance specialist, lean, wiry, pale, and looking like he was taking care of ten things at once. “What do you want, weirdo?”

“Arkan hacked us,” Bern said. “Phones are down, network is down, we need to warn the Compound an attack is coming.”

The distracted expression evaporated from Bug’s face. “On it.”

Bern shut down the call, opened a new window, and started typing code.

Runa emerged from the vault carrying two laptops, Linus’ black one and Bern’s silver. Bern waved her on and she took off out the door.

I finished the text to Leon. I had no idea if it would even make it through. “Can you get the security system online?”

“I can trigger an emergency override, which is what I’m doing.” Bern’s gaze was fixed on the screen.

“What does that mean?”

“It means the vault will lock and the siege protocol will be reinstated without exceptions. We’ll have three minutes to get out. If you need anything, grab it now, because nobody is getting back in. If Linus dies, we’ll have to fight our way inside.”

He was right. It was our best option.

A phone rang somewhere in the room. Bern and I froze for a desperate second, trying to pinpoint it.

Another muffled ring.

Inside the desk.

Bern jerked open the middle drawer. Locked. Bern grit his teeth and yanked it. Wood snapped, the drawer came free, and I grabbed the cell phone. Unlocked. I answered the call.

“Catalina!” Arabella yelled into my ear.

“How are you calling me? Whose phone is it?”

“I’m calling from a burner Connor’s people brought. That phone is my emergency phone.”

“Why do you have an emergency phone at Linus’ house?”

“He bought it for me to use when I come over because my phone is always dead.”

Of course he had.

“Anyway, not important. Mom is out.”

“What?”

“She left to identify Pete’s body. She took a security detail with her, three guards. We can’t reach them.”

“Why did she go in person?”

“Pete’s son is there. Someone had to go and explain why Pete died.”

Crap. Pete had been taken to a private morgue at the Woman’s Hospital of Texas. Twenty-five minutes from us.

“I’ll get her.”

An electric crackle split the air on the other end.

“Got to go,” my sister said and hung up.

I shoved the phone into my pocket.

Bern yanked the cords out of the back of the tower and picked it up.

The three of us took off for the front door. The security team was piling into an armored personnel carrier. Jean, the tall olive-skinned woman in charge, looked at me from the front passenger seat, her window down, waiting for instructions.

The use of Warden guards was strictly limited. Guarding the family of Wardens wasn’t covered by their duties, so telling them to escort Bern and Runa was right out. Technically they would guard me if I ordered them to as long as I was performing an official investigation but going to get my mother wasn’t a Warden matter, it was a Baylor matter.

“Go back to base and fortify,” I told her.

“Yes, Acting Warden.”

The last person climbed into the Warden vehicle and banged on the side. The carrier rolled out. Linus’ people had a base outside of Houston. Its location was well hidden and the base itself enjoyed the full benefit of the best defensive weaponry Duncan Arms could provide. If Arkan went after them, he would regret it.

He wouldn’t go after them. Why would he when what he wanted was inside the Compound.

Bern loaded the computer tower into the Humvee and got behind the wheel. The Humvee rolled up to me, windows down. “Do you need us to come with you?” Runa asked.

“No. I need you to go home and get our phones back online. Alessandro and Leon are out there, and they are deaf and mute.” And Bern was the only one who could fix it.

“I’ll take care of it,” Bern promised.

The Humvee took off.

I ran up to Rhino and jumped into the driver’s seat. Cornelius was already in the passenger seat, holding a tactical shotgun. Gus panted in the back. I reversed, peeled out of the driveway, and stopped just outside the gate.

Seconds ticked off. One, two . . . Ten . . .

The gate clanged shut. Turrets spiraled out of the ground, sparking with residual magic. A low buzz rolled through the street. The system was hot. From now on Linus’ mansion would be off-limits.

Cornelius’ silver BMW waited parked ten yards ahead. He must’ve moved it.

“Do you want me to drop you off at your car?” I asked.

“No. We’d like to ride home with you. Safety in numbers. I’ll pick up my car later.”

Gus made a small woof in agreement.

I could use all of the backup I could get. “Thank you.”

I drove down the street, rolling over the speed bumps, pulled a U-turn and sped toward the Buffalo Speedway.

The Buffalo Speedway was crowded. The traffic was steady but moving at a decent speed.

“I paired the phone to the car. Your mother’s phone was already in contacts under Mom,” Cornelius reported.

“Call Mom.”

The car’s audio system obediently dialed. Ring. Ring. Ring.

“Your call has been forwarded . . .”

“Mom, I’m coming to get you. Call me.”

A sign flashed.

CAUTION

CONSTRUCTION AHEAD

The car in front of me put on its brakes. The caravan of vehicles compacted, slowing down.

“Call Mom.”

Ring. Ring. Ring.

LEFT LANE

CLOSED

500 FEET

“Your call has been forwarded . . .”

“Your mother is very capable,” Cornelius said.

“Yes.”

My mother was also a high-value target. If Arkan’s crew got to her, I would give them anything they wanted to get her back.

“Could you please look up the number for Margolis Autopsy Lab at the Woman’s Hospital and try that?”

“Of course.” Cornelius fiddled with the phone. “Here it is.”

He put the phone on speaker. Ring . . . Ring . . . “You have reached the Margolis . . .”

I waited until the tone. “This message is for Penelope Baylor. Please call me immediately.” I left my new phone number and Cornelius hung up.

The traffic funneled into a single lane. We crawled past the left lane blocked off with cones and white pickup trucks.

“Of course there is construction,” I said. My voice was so calm, it was almost robotic.

“Different cities are famous for different things,” Cornelius said. “San Antonio is known for the River Walk and the Alamo. Austin is famous or infamous for 6th Street with its bars and shootings. We have construction and floods.”

The lane narrowed, hemmed in by concrete barriers on the right. I steered Rhino with laser precision, caught between the nonexistent shoulder and the row of traffic cones.

“Catalina,” Cornelius said quietly. “Your hands have gone white.”

“Thank you.” I eased my grip on the wheel.

“You are exceptionally calm,” he observed.

“Alessandro got into a car with a man who is supposedly working for Lenora Jordan but could’ve been an illusion mage, because the Harris DA evidently has an emergency with strikingly convenient timing. Leon was supposed to shadow the FBI, but I didn’t see any sign of him at the Cabera mansion. My mother is outside of the Compound, and none of them are answering their phones. The Compound is under attack. I can’t afford anything but calm right now.”

“They separated us and are hitting us one by one?” Cornelius guessed.

“That’s how I would do it.”

“I’ll try Alessandro and Leon again.” He tapped the phone.

We passed Richmond Avenue.

“No response,” Cornelius reported.

If I thought about it for too long, I’d panic.

The phone lit up. An incoming call. “Accept!”

“Catalina?” Mom asked.

Finally. “Where are you?”

“I am in an office in Dr. Amandi’s lab.” Her voice was eerily calm. My mother had gone into that serene place she always visited just before she lined up a shot through her scope.

“Where are your guards?”

“Tyler called from the airport. His car didn’t show up.”

Tyler was Pete’s son.

“I sent the guys to pick him up. That was an hour ago. They’re not answering their phones and I can’t reach the house. My phone isn’t working. I am using their landline. There is an armored vehicle in the parking lot. They’ve been sitting there for ten minutes, and nobody has gotten out.”

They’d found her.

“It’s Xavier.” Xavier wouldn’t have passed up a chance to catch my mother. He would come in person and probably not alone. “Arkan is attacking us. Our phones are compromised.”

“Ah. That explains things.”

My voice was flat and calm. “Xavier will wait for you to come out, but he’s impatient. He will come into the lab to get you.”

“Staying put isn’t an option.”

“No.”

I crunched through our options. The Woman’s Hospital had a large campus, sprawling between Greenbriar and Fannin Street and cut off by Old Spanish Trail in the north. I was still at least fifteen minutes away. Even if she hid in the building, they would find her. And if I pulled into that parking lot, Xavier would hurl the nearest lamppost through my windshield. I had to get Mom and get out alive.

What was around the Woman’s Hospital? On the east side of Fannin, it was all medical buildings. On the west side, across Greenbriar, there was . . . Yes. That would work.

“Mom, can you cross to a different building without exiting into the parking lot?”

“Hold on.” I heard a door open. My mother said something. A male voice answered.

She came back on the line. “Yes.”

“I need you to get away from that building and cross Greenbriar to the Office of Records. Big building shaped like a quill. Go in there and tell them that I’m coming to set up an appointment and that you are waiting for me. Don’t leave the building no matter what happens. They won’t help you if you step one foot outside, but they will defend the building and they won’t allow anyone to take you out of there.”

The Office of Records kept the database of the Houses and magic users. It was a neutral institution, incorruptible and independent of all other powers in Texas, magic and civilian. It was stewarded by the Keeper of Records, whom I’d met only once and had hoped to never meet again. Nobody in their right mind would attack the Office of Records. Xavier wasn’t in his right mind, and if we were very lucky, he’d try.

Mom spoke to someone. “Okay. On my way.”

The call ended.

She would have to walk south through the medical complex and then cross Greenbriar out of the view of the parking lot, and then cross another large parking lot in front of the Office of Records. Her top speed was about five miles per hour. I wanted to step on the gas and knock the cars in front of me out of the way, so I could drive faster. Instead, I carefully steered Rhino out of the construction zone and veered through traffic, fighting for every second.

The short tower of black glass thrust from the middle of a giant lot, its lines elegant and flowing, a perfect imitation of a feathered quill. The dark building of the Arena of Trials loomed ominously behind it.

I hadn’t spoken to Mom since I’d called her. Her cell phone was about as useful as a brick. I had no idea if she’d made it.

Please be there.

“Do we go in together or do you want to take the car?” I asked Cornelius.

“Together,” he said. “We’re more vulnerable on our own.”

“Agreed.”

I had given him an out, and he’d refused to take it. I’d expected as much.

I pulled into the center row, as close as I could get to the entrance, but all of the front parking spots were taken, and we had a lot of distance to cover on foot. Driving up to the doors was out of the question. The Office of Records maintained a clear kill zone around their tower and driving into it immediately made you a target.

Cornelius handed me a DA Rattler, a compact submachine gun, one of Linus’ special editions. He picked up a tactical shotgun, and we exited the vehicle.

Fifty yards to the building. The space between my shoulder blades vibrated with tension. I strained so hard to listen for a marlin spike whistling through the air, I almost heard it in my head.

The doors slid open in front of us. Cornelius, Gus, and I entered the cavernous lobby, and I quietly exhaled. It looked just as I remembered: black granite walls, grey granite floor with a shimmering gold inlay of a magic circle in the center, and a black granite desk to the right with a lone guard behind it. But no Mom.

Ice rolled down my spine.

The guard, a middle-aged blond woman, saw us, rose, and bowed her head. “Greetings, Prime Baylor and Significant Harrison. Please deposit your weapons on the counter. Your party is waiting in the Keeper’s office, fifth floor.”

She’d made it. Phew.

Why hadn’t she stayed in the lobby?

Cornelius and I put our firearms on the counter. Cornelius nodded at Gus. “Wait.”

The Doberman lay down on the floor and watched us board the elevator.

The lights above the door flickered, counting off the floors. My heart was beating too hard.

The doors slid open, and we walked into a long hallway with rows of doors branching off to both sides. At the very end, the heavy black double doors stood wide open. I made a beeline for that doorway as fast as I could without breaking into a run.

We walked into a massive round room lined from floor to ceiling with bookshelves that were crammed to capacity. A round counter guarded the entrance. A small lamp glowed on it with a warm yellow light. Behind the counter several comfortable leather couches occupied the center of the room, illuminated by a chandelier. The Keeper of Records sat on the couch to the left. Across from him, sipping tea from a small blue cup, sat my mother.

A crushing weight dropped off my shoulders and hit the floor. If it had mass, it would have broken through the wood and kept falling until it landed in the lobby.

The Keeper of Records turned to me. He was of average height, slim, and old. Time had wrinkled his brown skin, carving a road map of years around his eyes and mouth, and turned his hair white. He wore a brown three-piece suit with a copper-and-black bow tie. His expression was always welcoming, but his eyes, guarded by large glasses, stopped you in your tracks. So dark, they appeared black, they sparkled like two pieces of polished black jade.

“Prime Baylor,” the Keeper said, “it’s been so long. What a pleasure to see you again.”

Mom looked at me. Her eyes were wide.

“Good afternoon, Keeper. Thank you for keeping my mother company. We are so sorry to trouble you.”

The Keeper smiled. His teeth were white and sharp. “It’s not a bother. We’re always happy to visit with House Baylor, aren’t we, Michael?”

Michael emerged from the shadows. He didn’t stride out, he congealed, like some mythical wraith coalescing from darkness. It was probably my imagination, and he must have walked out of some niche between the bookshelves, but one moment it was just the four of us, and then suddenly there were five.

Michael nodded. In his mid-twenties, he wore a black suit with a white shirt that set off his bronze skin. His hair was black and cut short with just enough length on top to keep it from being a buzz cut. Black and grey tribal tattoos swirled over the exposed skin of his hands and neck. His face was handsome, with what people called “good bones,” and his eyes were an odd color, almost yellow when the light caught his irises like the old scotch Linus liked to drink.

The Keeper turned to Cornelius. “It is wonderful to see you again, Significant Harrison.”

“The pleasure is all mine,” Cornelius said. “It’s been a long time since my trials.”

“Fifteen years, three months, and fourteen days. Should you wish to revisit your certification, our doors are always open.”

Cornelius drew back slightly. “That won’t be necessary.”

“As you prefer.”

Nobody “revisited” certification unless they thought they would test higher and up their rank. I would have to tell Nevada. Like me, she’d been convinced for years that Cornelius deliberately held back at his trials.

The Keeper steepled his fingers on his bended knee. “Now, what can the Office of Records do for House Baylor?”

Going to the Keeper of Records for information hadn’t been the plan. The plan had been to grab Mom from the lobby and get the hell out of here, hoping to make it home before we got attacked. But now we were here, and he’d served Mom tea. He’d made an event out of it, and I couldn’t just say, “Thanks, got to run.”

Perhaps this was an opportunity. The Keeper was the expert on magic bloodlines. I could get a lot of my questions answered. But what would it cost me?

The Office of Records was one of two magic-related institutions that did not fall under my jurisdiction, the Assembly Tribunal being the other. I couldn’t compel the Keeper to comply. Anything he told me was strictly voluntary and the more I asked, the higher the cost would be.

Years ago, Nevada had promised the Keeper that she would fulfill an unspecified favor in return for sparing our evil grandmother Victoria. Since I had started my apprenticeship with Evil Grandmother, she’d mentioned this favor at least ten times. Not many things kept Victoria Tremaine up at night, but this one sure did. She stressed again and again that the Office of Records balanced the favor owed by the favor given and sparing her had been a significant favor.

In any case, this was a conversation best had in private.

“I wish to discuss a confidential matter. Is there a place my mother and Significant Harrison could wait?”

“Of course. Michael, please show our guests to the Blue Room.”

Michael glided across the floor without making a sound. That man made my hair stand on end.

Mom and Cornelius followed him out.

The Keeper regarded me with a smile. “Tea, Acting Warden?”

And he knew. How? The National Assembly must have notified him out of courtesy. I wondered who else had gotten that memo.

“Yes, thank you.”

“Honey, milk, lemon?” the Keeper offered.

“I’ll take it plain.”

The Keeper nodded.

Michael reappeared with a platter supporting a single extra cup. He set the cup in front of me, poured black tea from a teapot, left the platter on the table, and took three steps back.

I sipped my tea. It was lovely and smelled of vanilla. “Delicious.”

“I’m glad it suits your tastes.”

This conversation would have to be structured very carefully. I couldn’t obligate the Office of the Warden to something it couldn’t honor. If the Keeper asked for something in return for the information, I had to be sure we could deliver it. Making an enemy of the Office of Records was not an option.

“I have two requests, one for public information and one requiring discretion. The Office of the Warden would be grateful for any assistance.”

The Keeper’s eyes shone for a moment, as if lit from within. “The Office of Records always welcomes an opportunity to collect a favor from the Office of the Warden, doesn’t it, Michael?”

Michael looked directly at me. Like being sighted through the scope of a rifle.

“Please, make your inquiries,” the Keeper invited.

“Has Kaylee Cabera ever undertaken the trials?”

“No.”

“Has she undertaken any preliminary tests?”

“Yes.”

Now we were in a grey area. The trials took place before witnesses. Their results were public. The nature of one’s magic could be sealed, but not the rank. The results of preliminary tests remained private. They were unofficial practice runs that were published only if the family wanted them to be known.

If I asked about her specific rank, the Keeper could tell me, but the cost of that information would be high. I needed to mitigate our obligation.

“Based on those preliminary tests, does the Office of Records expect Kaylee Cabera to be certified as a Prime?”

The Keeper looked wolfish. “It would take a miracle or a crime against humanity.”

Administering the Osiris serum without authorization constituted a crime against humanity. He just confirmed my suspicions. Kaylee was born with minor power and her mother had gone to Arkan to make her daughter a Prime. That’s why she was untrained. That’s why her magic was odd.

I took out my phone, pulled up a picture of Pete’s ruined face, and placed the phone on the table. “Does the Office of Records know what type of mage could cause this kind of damage?”

The Keeper glanced at the phone. “I always liked Peter. What a shame. This was done by a mentamalleus.”

“A mind hammer?”

The Keeper nodded. “They’re more commonly known as false halcyons, which is not strictly accurate. The false halcyons are not a twisted branch growing from the halcyon tree; rather they are two separate trunks growing from the same root.”

“How do they differ?”

“Halcyon magic attacks certain areas of the brain,” the Keeper said. “Specifically, the amygdala, which assesses environmental threats, and the hypothalamus, which has the power to trigger the production of stress response hormones. Instead of initiating the making of cortisol and adrenaline, which allow us to quickly respond to threats, the affected hypothalamus sends signals for the production of dopamine and oxytocin, causing their target to enter a happy, relaxed stupor. The damage halcyons cause is temporary, and their power is effort-based.”

“Meaning they consciously exert an effort to induce calm?”

“Precisely.” The Keeper nodded. “The magic of a false halcyon also attacks the amygdala and hypothalamus, but primarily targets the frontal cortex, and instead of triggering hormonal responses, it permanently damages the physical structure of the brain. The attack is performed mentally, but if it succeeds, the damage to the mind is mirrored by the physical trauma to the brain. The results are predictably horrific.”

The memory of being struck by Kaylee’s magic was still fresh. Like me. LIKE me.

“Is it emotion-based?”

The Keeper smiled. “Yes. Very much so. A halcyon is calm and logical. A false halcyon is an unstable creature that throws all of themselves into their attack with the passion of an upset toddler. They commit completely, they are fueled by their emotions, and they cause irreparable damage. Like true halcyons, they can induce a temporary state of euphoria, but at the end of it, their victim loses most of their cognitive abilities.”

When I had thought that Kaylee was trying to turn Alessandro into a happy idiot, I’d had no idea how accurate that thought had been.

The Keeper touched my phone gently. “In Peter’s case, the dominant emotion was rage or hatred. The primary directive behind it was very simple.”

“Die?”

“Yes.”

What about Wahl? “What if someone was grazed by a false halcyon attack? Is there any hope of recovery?”

“Yes. Like all magic users, the false halcyons vary in power. If the accidental target was coherent after the attack, the damage is likely slight. It’s much like touching a hot stove. The longer one keeps their hand in the fire, the more severe the burn will be.”

I let out a breath. Wahl had been coherent. He’d been happy and smiling, but coherent.

“False halcyons are notoriously erratic,” the Keeper said. “There are a handful of Houses who still practice that magic, but their members undergo very rigorous mental conditioning from an early age. It’s one of the few kinds of magic considered to be undesirable due to the difficulty of controlling it. Most families took steps to breed it out.”

So Kaylee awakened as a mind hammer, which Luciana would have hidden at any cost until she could get her daughter some training. The Caberas were a noncombat House. Kaylee could be seen as either a critical asset or a huge hindrance, depending on how the rest of the relatives took it.

I could now say with 100% certainty that Kaylee had killed Pete and likely attacked Linus. It was almost elegant: first, Luciana would have put everyone at ease with her halcyon powers and then her daughter would’ve smashed their minds. Except Linus was a siren. His magic had warned him.

I still didn’t understand how Kaylee had evaded the turrets. I would figure this out before the end.

Now I knew who and when. I still didn’t know why. Did Arkan order them to do it and then tied up loose ends by killing Luciana or was this something else? I would have to figure this out on my own.

There were only a few points left to clarify.

“Hypothetically speaking,” I said, “if a family had produced halcyons and only halcyons for over four generations, why would a repeat application of the Osiris serum result in an awakening of a mind hammer?”

The Keeper leaned back. “Michael, the Fata Magum, please.”

Michael retrieved a box from a shelf, brought it to the Keeper, and resumed his post three steps away. The Keeper opened the ornate wooden box and took out a small six-sided die, red like crystalized blood. Greek letters were carved into the die and inlaid with ivory, one per side.

The Keeper held it up to the light and the die sparkled. A ruby?

“The fate of the mage.” The Keeper showed me one side with the Greek letter Z. “Zeta. Sacrifice.”

He turned the die to display a different side. “Beta. Demon.”

Another turn. “Lambda. Growth. The three fates awaiting those who risk the serum. Death, distortion, or power.”

Those who took the serum died, became warped by it, or gained magic, from which they then acquired wealth and power.

The Keeper held it out to me.

I reached out and he let the die fall into my palm. Six sides, three unique symbols, each occurring twice.

“Make your roll.”

I let the cool smooth cube fall from my fingers. The die landed on the table, rolled and stopped. Zeta.

“Death,” I said.

“This die was carved in 1865, for the second wave of Osiris recipients,” the Keeper said. “Countless would-be mages held it in their hands and rolled it just like you did before making their final decision. A great many of them walked away after making their roll.”

The die glinted on the table.

“Why do you think some people died and others didn’t?” the Keeper asked.

“Nobody knows. It’s magic, not science.”

“But if you had to hazard a guess . . .”

I had read a couple of books on Magic Theory, but most of my current reading focused on practical applications. “There are five leading theories, most of them agreeing that the serum kills those without latent magical powers. Various factors have been considered, such as diet, exposure to the flu pandemic, and so on. The records from that time are understandably murky . . .”

The Keeper raised his hand and I fell silent.

“Yes, but you are a Prime, the highest rank of a magic user who has used your power since birth. I want to know what you think.”

“I think that in all three cases the Osiris serum does exactly what it was designed to do. It searches for latent abilities and makes them manifest. It’s not that those who die aren’t capable of magic, it’s that it is too powerful or too destructive, and their bodies cannot handle it. It is the same with the warped. The magic twists them because their power is too great to be contained. Perhaps those who survive intact and become mages are not the strongest, but the weakest. Nobody can predict what the die will show.”

The Keeper smiled. “Exactly.”

I felt like I had just passed a test.

“If we apply your theory to someone who was born without power, despite their bloodline, and chooses to roll the die, what is the serum to do? The subject has the magic of their family but is incompatible with it. So the serum must look for something other than that power, some hidden traces of other talents from other bloodlines gifted to the subject by previous generations. Perhaps these talents are too weak to express themselves, yet the secondary application of the serum helps them rise to the surface.”

So, there was a false halcyon talent hiding somewhere in Kaylee’s bloodline, too weak to manifest without the boost of Osiris serum. The two types of magic were closely related. It wouldn’t be unusual if sometime long ago there was marriage that resulted in an offspring carrying propensity for both. Their family could have gone generations without discovering it.

It made sense. My sisters and I all had the same parents. I carried hereditary traces for both Arabella’s and Nevada’s powers. Ten generations from now, one of my descendants could manifest as a truthseeker and never know why. That’s why genetic databases keeping track of magic bloodlines were doing such a brisk business.

“I like the way you rolled the die,” the Keeper said. “You didn’t blow on it, you didn’t shake it or toss it. You simply let it fall. Rolling that die and truly accepting the consequences is a choice none of us in this room had to make. Our ancestors made it for us and paid a great price for it. We honor their bravery through abiding by the covenants they created. The ban on unauthorized use of the serum is such a covenant. The covenants must be upheld at any cost. Those of us who understand that fact hold our duties sacred. We don’t tolerate any interference, do we, Michael?”

“No, we don’t,” Michael said.