Bound by Magic (15 page)

You are not just a shifter, Sunaya Baine,
a voice murmured in my head.
You are also a mage, and it is your birthright to use your magic to protect the weak.

I started, not just at the unfamiliar voice in my head, but at the way the air around me changed – it grew lighter somehow, reminding me of the air inside Resinah’s temple. I didn’t know if it was she who spoke to me but the words filled me with strength, and my doubts and fears fell away. I wasn’t helpless – I had the power to help these victims, and damned if I wasn’t going to use it.

Reaching for my magic, I focused all my attention into the center of the ring, willing the illusion in my mind to form. Two seconds later, a towering flame sprang to life right between the two combatants, licking the ceiling with its long, colorful tongue. The lion shifter, who was about to pounce, shrank back, and the crowd’s cheers turned to terrified shrieks as the fire began to spread.

Of course the fire wouldn’t actually burn them, but they’d feel the heat and smell the smoke as if it really were.

The humans in charge of the Royale rushed to contain the shifters, a few of them throwing sand on the flames to try and put them out. I allowed the illusion to die down before the humans realized the fire wasn’t real, and leapt from the bleachers as everyone else stampeded for the exits. I tried to make a run for the cages, but Annia grabbed the back of my dress and yanked me back.

“Get ahold of yourself, Naya,” she growled. “You’ll blow our cover for sure!”

I snarled, spinning around to confront her, but the velocity of the stampeding crowd forced me to either follow her or get trampled. People pushed and elbowed each other as the crowd clogged outside the stairwell, and I glanced back once more at the shifters stuck in their cages. They were already being moved out of the room by the few staff members who weren’t corralling the spectators into an orderly evacuation, through a panel that had been slid open at the corner of the far wall when we weren’t looking.

Guess we weren’t allowed to use it as an emergency exit.

I wanted to turn around and investigate the secret entrance so badly it was a physical ache in my chest, but I knew Annia was right. If I did anything more now it would only blow our cover and possibly get us, and the shifters, killed. No, it was better to get an actual team of Enforcers, ones who weren’t being bribed, to come in here and arrest everyone. Until then, we had to pretend we were normal humans just like everyone else.

Once we made it to the upper floor of the warehouse, things calmed down a bit. Members of the event staff worked to direct the flow of traffic to the various exits, and they managed to gather everyone into the lot outside of the front of the building.

“Ladies and gentlemen!” The announcer called, standing up on the hood of a steamcar to make himself visible. “We apologize profusely for that rude interruption of tonight’s Royale. Our staff has managed to put the fire out, so there is no need to call the fire department. If anyone is injured, please head over to the front – we have professionals who will render you first aid. For the rest of you, we are giving out free tickets to our next Royale as compensation for the abrupt end to this evening’s entertainment. For those of you who are interested, please go and see Solin Endeman over there.” The announcer pointed to his right, where Solin, the man who’d sold us the tickets, stood waiting.

About half of the crowd surged toward Solin, eager to claim tickets, but quite a few of the humans shook their heads and turned to leave, muttering amongst themselves. From the snippets of conversation I overheard, it didn’t sound like they were planning on coming back to the Royale, and weary satisfaction briefly swept through me. Maybe I hadn’t been able to rescue those shifters tonight, but I’d put a dent in the Royale’s operation, and that would have to be enough to tide me over until I could crush them completely.

A handful of the attendees had been injured in the evacuation, trampled or smashed into walls, and those were led over to where Brin and Nila stood with a few other humans, a table with medical supplies set up. Brin looked like he’d been hurt, maybe by one of the shifters – Nila was binding his right forearm up with a length of gauze. My hands clenched into fists again, and I took a step toward them.

“Wait.” Annia placed a hand on my shoulder. “Let me go and talk to them. I can help out with the first aid and see if I can get anything from those two. You, on the other hand, don’t look like you’ve changed a bandage in your life, so you should wait for me here with Lakin.”

“Fine.” I wrinkled my nose at the accusation – I’d changed plenty of bandages, thank you very much – but I was playing the part of wimpy female tonight, so I hung back and watched as Annia made her way toward Brin and Nila. She introduced herself as an Enforcer from a neighboring town, and after answering a couple of pointed questions Brin and Nila seemed to accept her.

“That was incredible, what you did back there with the fire,” Lakin murmured in my ear from behind me. I shivered a little at the sensation of his warm breath on my neck, and turned my body at a three quarter angle so that I could see both him and Annia and also put some distance between us. “It was an illusion, wasn’t it?”

“Yes.” I looked up into Lakin’s eyes, and felt a pang in my chest at the admiration I saw there. I wanted to lean into that gaze, to soak up the affinity and the admiration my soul craved, but I knew I couldn’t trust that look. “I wasn’t going to start a real fire, especially not in such a small space.”

“Well you saved that tigress’s life.” Lakin squeezed my shoulder as he smiled down at me. “We may not have been able to free those shifters tonight, but you made sure that none of them died.”

“I was just doing my job.”

“No. You were just being you.”

Warmth flooded through me, and I turned away before Lakin could catch the blush on my cheeks. Annia was crouched down in front of a human, bandaging up his ankle as she talked to Nila, and I tuned in on their conversation, hoping they were talking about something useful.

“… amazing, the way you guys manage to keep the shifters under control like that,” Annia was saying. “Haven’t any of them lashed out and killed someone?”

“Oh, that happened once or twice in the early stages,” Nila said casually, as if she were talking about training a puppy who still hadn’t learned not to pee in the house. “But we’ve been doing this for a couple months now, and we’ve got those shifters under control.”

“How do you manage to get them here in the first place?” Annia asked. I was impressed at the admiration in her voice – if I didn’t know better I would have thought she was actually praising Nila. “I can’t imagine they’re happy to be here or that they came voluntarily.”

“They’re not happy to be here,” Brin said with a smirk. “But they only have themselves to blame. They should have been more careful about who they decided to default on their obligations to.”

“Indentured servitude?” Lakin hissed, drawing the same conclusion I did from Brin’s insinuation. “That’s not only barbaric, but illegal!”

I agreed, but something more important was rolling through my mind. “Lakin, Brin said that the shifters here all defaulted on obligations. Do you think those obligations could be financial?”

Lakin narrowed his eyes. “I suppose. What are you suggesting?”

“There’s a certain bank that’s been offering interest-free loans to shifters,” I said dryly.

Lakin’s eyes widened. “You mean Sandin Federal? Do you really think such a reputable bank would be involved in a dirty scheme like this?”

I shrugged. “Just because they’re interest-free doesn’t mean they’re payment-free. It’s possible that the shifters they took just couldn’t keep up with the payments.”

Except for Mika,
a voice in my head reminded me.
She was taken because of you.

“Alright,” Annia called, and I turned my head to see her walking back toward us. “Let’s head home.”

We all climbed into the purple and white steamcar in silence, the tension thick in the air as I waited for someone to stop us. But no one even spared us a second glance. Still, I held my breath until we were out onto the road, and didn’t relax until we were far from Turain’s industrial district.

“So,” Annia finally said. “You got everything Nila and Brin told me?”

“Yeah. Debt slavery.” I pressed my lips together. “I’d be interested to know who the investor is behind this, if we’re right about what Brin is saying.”

“And also why they’re giving out loans to these shifters,” Lakin interjected. I could see him scowling through the rearview mirror. “I interviewed nearly every one of those families, and none of them looked like they were in the position to take on a loan. Why would an investor extend credit to someone who almost certainly can’t pay it off?”

“It almost sounds as if the investor, whoever they are, is trying to get these shifters indebted to him on purpose.”

“But why?” I demanded. “So that he can force them into an illegal fighting ring? I don’t know about you, but that sounds like an expensive way to get labor. He’d probably save more money if he just kidnapped them straight off.”

“I don’t know if it’s about saving money,” Annia said slowly. “I think it’s about control.”

“What do you mean?”

“I read something in a history textbook, back during my brief stint as a college student, that sounds kind of similar to this.” Annia drummed her fingers on the steering wheel. “Two centuries ago, Garai was giving out loans to some of its smaller neighboring countries in the East, countries that were struggling with their own economies already. They ate up the gold greedily, of course, but they didn’t fix their broken economic system and ended up being unable to pay back the debt. Garai used that as leverage to extort supplies, mages, and various favors from these countries, and eventually they were assimilated into their own country.”

“Well that explains why Garai is so huge,” I muttered. It was the largest country on the Eastern continent.

“I wonder if all the shifters who owe this investor money are being forced to fight in the Royale like this, or if this mysterious investor is extorting them in other ways.” Lakin’s eyes sharpened. “I’m going to have to interview friends and families again first thing in the morning and find out if they borrowed any money from Sandin Federal, and if so, whether they’ve been harassed by their creditor recently. Out of those twenty names on the list something ought to pop eventually.”

“You want some help dividing that list up?” Annia asked. “Would probably be faster if you split up the workload.”

Lakin hesitated. “I can always divide it up amongst my deputies.”

“Not this time.” I twisted around in my seat to face Lakin. “We could have gone to the Royale without you, Lakin, but I brought you in. The least you could do is let us help with the interviews in return.”

“Alright,” Lakin agreed. “Meet me at my house at eight in the morning. We need to get an early start on this, before any more shifters are taken.”

“Sounds like a plan.” I turned in my seat, settling my eyes on the Firegate Bridge as we approached it from around Hawk Hill. We were going to get to the bottom of this tomorrow, even if that meant I had to play hooky and piss the Chief Mage off all over again.

A
nnia
and I showed up at Lakin’s house at eight in the morning, and we split up, Annia taking half of the phone call list, Lakin and me taking the other. At first I’d protested not having my own list, but Lakin insisted and I relented. After all, this was his case, not mine.

“So,” I said as I settled onto my steambike. “Where are we headed first?”

“We’re going to visit Tyron and Myrna Laniren.”

“Laniren?” I echoed, racking my brain for the familiar name. “Wait, aren’t those Tylin’s parents? The wolf shifter from the local pack?”

“That’s right.” Lakin started up his engine. “I thought it would be good for you to see them for yourself, since it was their son’s disappearance that sparked Sillara’s investigation.”

“Well that’s very thoughtful of you.”

Lakin grinned before putting his helmet on. “I try.”

The wolf clan was located on the west side of Shiftertown, closer to the heart of the city. Small, wood-framed houses lined the streets, some in better condition than others, and because it was summer there were many shifter children out on the sidewalks and the front yards, laughing and playing. Their mothers stared watchfully at us from their front porches, colorful shifter eyes narrowed on our bikes as we passed. Most shifters didn’t own bikes or cars – for one, vehicles were expensive, and for shifters they weren’t really necessary as many of them could travel just as fast in beast form. The children stared wide-eyed at our bikes as we zipped by, curiosity and excitement on their little faces, and it reminded me of how excited I’d been when I’d first laid eyes on a steambike myself. I’d been sixteen years old, tagging along on an errand with Roanas in Rowanville when a trio of Enforcers had shot out of the Guild parking lot riding steambikes. I’d been transfixed by the vehicles, with their large wheels and shiny handlebars, and the way the riders moved so fast on them, leaving nothing but clouds of hot steam in their wake. It had taken me six years, from that very point on, to save up for my own bike, and I loved it to death.

The Laniren house was at the top of a hill – a small, two-bedroom dwelling with white siding and robin’s egg blue shutters and roofing tile. I narrowed my eyes as we parked across the street from the house – the paint looked new, the tiles freshly laid, unlike many of the houses we’d passed.

“Looks like the Lanirens have spruced up their house a bit,” I commented.

Lakin’s eyes narrowed as he nodded. We crossed the street, and the woman playing in the front yard with her toddler froze at our approach, her pale-blue wolf shifter eyes narrowing on me.

“Good morning, Mrs. Laniren,” Lakin greeted her as she stood, scooping her toddler up and propping the child on her hip. “This is my associate, Enforcer Baine. We’d like to speak with you and your husband, if that’s possible.”

“I know who you are,” Myrna said, her eyes still focused on me. She was a pretty woman, with long, curly brown hair and a decent figure wrapped up in a simple green dress, but the look in her eyes as she stared at me was downright ugly. “You’re the hybrid, the one in favor with the Chief Mage. What would you care about my son’s disappearance?”

“The Enforcer who was working on your case, Sillara Tarenan, was a friend of mine,” I said coolly, ignoring the scorn in Myrna’s eyes. “We believe she was killed for looking into your son’s disappearance, and I have a vested interest in finding her killer, so I’m helping Inspector Lakin out today. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Well, I’m afraid my husband isn’t home today.” The toddler on her hip babbled, reaching a hand out toward me as she stared up at me, and Myrna shifted her stance, putting distance between me and the baby. The blatant show of distrust stung, and I forced my gaze away from the baby’s wide blue eyes. “He’s working, and will be until dinner.”

“That’s quite alright, Mrs. Laniren,” Lakin said smoothly. “We can just talk to you in the meantime. Is there somewhere more private we can go?”

Tears suddenly filled Myrna’s eyes. “You… you’re not here to give me bad news, are you? My son isn’t dead. He can’t be dead!” Her already pale cheeks turned a dead white.

“No, no of course not.” Lakin placed a soothing arm on Myrna’s shoulder. “We’re just trying to run down a lead that may help us with your son’s whereabouts, and I need to ask you a few more questions.”

“Very well.” Myrna sniffed, then turned around. “Come this way.”

She led us inside, and my eyes narrowed as I studied the interior. The granite countertop separating the kitchen to my left from the rest of the living room looked fairly new – it was blemish-free and sparkling, as were the refrigerator, stove and cabinets. Of course that could possibly be attributed to Myrna’s cleaning skills; she could just be really good at maintaining her house.

But the living room beyond boasted fairly expensive looking furniture – stuffed couches, gleaming oak side tables, a thick Garaian rug… and the hardwood floor that creaked beneath my feet looked new.

“Can I get you anything?” Myrna asked Lakin with a tired sigh as she set her daughter down in a playpen set up alongside the wall. The little girl instantly plopped down onto her butt and reached for a stuffed wolf to play with.

“No, we’re fine,” Lakin assured her. He allowed his eyes to play across the furniture as we sat down on a dark green love seat, as if he hadn’t already taken in the surroundings. “You have a very nice home, Mrs. Laniren.”

“Thank you.” A brief smile lightened Myrna’s face, taking off a few years. Since shifters normally lived to around three hundred, we aged much more slowly than humans, but stress could still take a toll on our looks. “We had everything redone a few months ago and I’ve worked hard to maintain it. Which isn’t as easy as it sounds when you have a toddler around.” She glanced fondly at her child, and pity stirred in my chest. It was clear she loved her son as much as she did her daughter – it was probably killing her that he was gone.

“That must have been quite expensive.”

Myrna sighed again. “It was.” Lines tightened around her pale blue eyes as she, too, looked around the room. “We never really intended to fix up the entire house, but the pipes were rusting and the roof badly needed repair, and when rats started chewing through our electrical wiring… oh, it was just horrible.” She dragged her hands through her curly hair. “If Tyron hadn’t gotten us that loan, I don’t know what we would have done with the house.”

“Loan?” I asked, my heart leaping as Myrna confirmed my suspicions. “Where did you get the loan from?”

“Sandin Federal Bank.” Myrna narrowed her eyes at me. “Why do you ask?”

“Have you been keeping up with your loan payments, Mrs. Laniren?” Lakin asked.

“Of course!’ Myrna’s face flushed. “We’re responsible people. We wouldn’t take on a debt that we couldn’t pay.” But Lakin and I could both smell the lie, and she knew it.

“Mrs. Laniren, nobody is trying to judge you,” Lakin said soothingly. “We’re just trying to get more information. Are you sure that you were keeping up with your payments? You never missed any, not even one?”

Myrna sighed. “Well, we did miss a
few
of them, but never two in a row, and we always tried to pay extra the following month to keep up. It happens to everyone, doesn’t it?”

“Of course,” Lakin said smoothly. “Did you ever receive any threatening communication from the bank when you missed the payments? Phone calls, letters?”

“I don’t understand. Why are you asking all this?”

“Some information has recently come to light,” I butted in, impatient to cut to the chase. “Information suggesting that all of the families of the recent kidnapping victims may have been struggling with debt payments. We’re trying to see if there might be some connection, something that could lead us to the kidnapper, and aside from the fact that you’re all shifters, the debt problems are the only common theme we’re finding.”

The blood drained from Myrna’s face. “Are you saying that Tylin was taken from us because we weren’t making our payments?”

“We can’t be sure,” Lakin said gently. “But we’re not ruling it out, either.”

The color abruptly rushed back into Myrna’s face, turning her skin bright red. “I
knew
we never should have taken on that loan!” she growled, jumping to her feet. She bared her fangs as she began pacing back and forth across the rug, her expression livid. “I’m going to kill Tyron when he gets home!”

The toddler let out a distressed wail at the sound of her mother’s voice, and Myrna’s expression softened as she dropped down to her knees in front of the playpen to scoop up her daughter.

“Don’t worry, Liv,” she cooed, rocking the small child. “Mommy’s okay. You don’t need to be upset.” She dropped a kiss on the top of her daughter’s curly head and I heard her whisper, “I’m just so glad I still have you here.”

My heart ached at the pain in her voice, and for once I was glad to be unattached – I couldn’t imagine what it would be like if I had a child and he was taken from me. I may not have been a mother, but the maternal instinct stirred inside me at the sight of this woman’s pain, and for a moment I wanted to comfort her.

But I didn’t, because I knew she wouldn’t accept comfort, not from an outcast like me.

“So was it your husband’s idea to seek out a loan in order to make the repairs on your house?” Lakin asked.

Myrna placed her toddler back in the playpen, then turned toward us, a simmering anger burning behind her eyes. “Yes, it was Tyron’s idea to take advantage of the interest-free loans being advertised. He was initially only going to take out enough money to fix the bare necessities, but Sandin Federal offered him five times the amount, and it was more money than Tyron and I had ever seen in our lives. I couldn’t find it in me to be angry when he came skipping home with that pouch of gold in his hand. But I’m angry now.” Her lower lip trembled as she clenched her fists. “If I’d known that money was going to bring tragedy down on my family, I would have made him return it right away.”

“So did you receive any threats from Sandin Federal?” I asked. “Anything beyond the usual late payment notices?”

Myrna hesitated. “Not at first, no, and never directly. But there were a few times I heard Tyron arguing with what sounded like a creditor, so it’s entirely possible we were threatened and I just never knew.” She bared her fangs. “Just you wait until he gets home. I am absolutely going to
murder
him!”

Lakin and I exchanged a look, and I had a feeling he was going to send one of his deputies around to make sure Myrna didn’t follow through on her threat.

We didn’t get much more out of Myrna after that, so we moved onto the rest of the interviews on our list. About half of the victims had family in Rowanville while the other half were within the state of Canalo but out of town, so Lakin made some phone calls while I hopped on my bike to pay a few house calls. The shifters in Rowanville I could handle – they didn’t have the same level of prejudice against me that the Shiftertown residents did. One for one, we found out the same thing – all of the victims, or their families, had taken a loan from Sandin Federal Bank at some point within the year, and each of them had failed to make payments.

“Well,” Lakin said after we’d finished exchanging reports. “The evidence seems pretty conclusive at this point. The investor has got to be someone with significant control at Sandin Federal Bank, and access to confidential files.”

“No kidding.” An image of Warin Danrian’s fear-filled eyes flashed in my mind. “I think it’s time we head back to Sandin Federal ourselves to find out what Mr. Danrian was hiding. I have a feeling he knows exactly who that damned investor is, and where we can find him.”