Shifty Magic (24 page)

"Marla," I gasped, carefully rolling my head
to the side so I could see her.

"So you figured that out. Not soon enough,
but good for you." She stood near the dark, narrow cave entrance
pouring vials of blood into a polished gold goblet. She'd changed
from the shorts and white halter top she'd had on at Falcon's into
a dark purple dress with a plunging neckline and a skirt that
brushed the floor. The symbol of the Indonesian god had been
embroidered in gold thread in the center of the bodice.

"Kind of late for prom isn't it?" I asked,
bracing my hand on the stone floor and pushing myself up.

"But not for a royal marriage." She uncapped
the sixth and final vial and poured the nearly black liquid into
the cup.

"The last of Danny's blood?" I asked.

"And my ticket to finally getting what's
rightfully mine." Gathering up the containers, she carefully set
each one into a small black duffle bag that she'd placed next to
the entrance. As she pulled back the edges, I noticed the handle of
my gun.

"What else have you figured out?" she asked
in a conversational tone.

"You're dabbling in some serious crap." I
considered the distance to the duffle bag. If I could get to my
gun, I might have a chance to stop her.

"Not really. I'm making my dreams come
true," she countered.

I got up carefully, swayed a bit, but
managed to stay upright. The coolness of the stone seeped into my
bare feet and another chill ran over me.

She tossed her curly brown hair over her
shoulder. "Aren't you going to ask what my dreams are?"

Sweeping my gaze around the small cave, I
made a quick assessment of what I had to work with. I estimated the
area to be about twenty-five feet long and maybe fifteen feet wide.
Big enough for a fight, which was a plus. Even better, unless there
was some kind of weapon hidden under her dress, the newly revealed
Marla was unarmed. "Why? I don't care."

Lifting her chin, she gave me a haughty
look. "Even when the answer has to do with how you're going to
die?"

"I've seen your handiwork. At some point,
you'll try to cut my throat."

She laughed. "Not me. My guardian can be
very persuasive. You'll happily cut your own throat just like they
all did."

"Except Laiyla," I said, struggling to hold
back my anger. Tipping my hand by losing my temper wouldn't get me
what I wanted.

"She was mean to me once, so I decided to
make an exception. But she went willingly. Climbed the ladder
without a peep and begged my guardian to kill her in the end."

I narrowed my eyes at her, fury boiling my
blood. I forgot my promise to restrain myself. "You murdered four
people," I ground out. "Danny. Keith—"

"He was a mistake," she interrupted. "I
actually kind of liked him."

"Laiyla. Sean. You killed them all."

"No I didn't. They did exactly what they
wanted to do. I only stood back and watched."

"Then you framed the real Kathy for the
murders. Your friend."

"She
was
my friend. Until she wanted to
come clean about the ID switch so she could marry her bartender
with a clear conscience." The real Marla shrugged. "Framing her for
the murders was the perfect way to teach her a lesson."

"Always more convenient if you can make a
killing look like someone else did it," I muttered, my disgust
deepening.

She shook her finger at me in a childish
reprimand. "You have been very annoying, Addison. Kathy had told me
about Danny's heritage, so I knew his blood would be powerful. The
night you 'saved me', my plan was to lure him off and drain him.
When two of his stupid friends tagged along, I decided to have a
little extra fun playing the helpless human while I pulled
Aedodra's strength into me. I couldn't wait to see their surprise
when I ripped their heads off, but you had to interfere."

Surprise and fury tightened my throat. She'd
meant to be there? Had planned to drain Danny all along? I ground
my teeth. Bitch.

Putting her hands on her hips, she gave me
one of her fake pouts. "In fact, you nearly spoiled everything.
Twice! I was lucky I caught Danny at Kathy's and almost didn't get
him in time, thanks to you. When you started nosing around
Laiyla's, I realized that you had to go, but you had the nerve to
kill the assassins I sent! That was very uncooperative of you."

"Sorry to disappoint." Without warning I
charged at her—and hit an invisible ice-cold barrier that knocked
me on my butt.

I slid across the stone a few feet and my
back slammed into another invisible wall, knocking the air out of
me. The real Marla's shrill laughter echoed around the cave like a
flock of screeching parrots while I struggled through the momentary
flash of pain.

"That never gets old," she chortled. "You
paras are so arrogant. Always thinking that your superior strength
will get you what you want."

I looked at the circle of symbols.
"Enclosure spells don't work on humans," I wheezed.

Her eyes widened, sparkling with delight.
"Despite everything, I like you, Addison. You're as full of false
humility as I am." She sauntered across the cave and stopped a
couple of feet from the edge of the circle. "I don't know exactly
what you are, but I do know this." She leaned closer, dropping her
voice to a dramatic whisper. "You're not human."

A level of fury that even surprised me
surged into my chest and I launched myself at her again, hands
outstretched. She jumped back with a squeal of surprise. Snarling
at her, I stopped just short of the barrier and slammed my hands
against it. Rubbing my cold palms across the cotton fabric of my
robe, I glared at her.

"You're also apparently delicious," she
added, studying me with interest. "Or at least your special brand
of paranormal energy is. It worked out in the end that I wasn't
able to get you out of my way. After sensing you at Laiyla's
sacrifice, and then in the bar, my guardian and mentor was very
insistent that you be the one that frees him to be with me." Her
self-satisfied smile returned. "All's well that ends well."

I shifted my weight, casually sliding my
right foot toward the symbols. If I could smudge one of them out,
the spell might be broken. That had worked when I'd shot the pagan
symbol before. Maybe it would work again. "Let me guess. We're
waiting for just the right moment, and then I die some horrible
death that brings something unpleasant into the world, do I have
that right?"

"Gold star for you," Marla said. "Though
'something unpleasant' is pretty much a relative term. Unpleasant
for everyone else, not for me. It'll be fantastic for me."

The tips of my toes hit the freezing barrier
just a millimeter from the symbols. Frustration bit into my
stomach. The only other possibility was to go up; how high did the
prison wall reach?

"Where are we, anyway?" I asked as I walked
around the parameter looking for a clue in the hieroglyphs.

"Hoping for a rescue? Don't. We're too far
beyond the city limits for anyone to ever find you before it's too
late." She did a girlish spin, arms outstretched, skirt billowing
around her legs. "Welcome to the legendary Were clan killing
grounds." She stopped spinning and pointed toward the top of the
cave. "It's right above us."

I looked at her in surprise. "If they find
you here, they'll kill you."

"They have no idea and aren't likely to
figure it out in time."

The killing grounds were in what was once
the Lake Norman State Park north of town. The area was sacred to
all the Were clans after hundreds of them died there in a final
push to defeat the terrorist faction. Non-Were trespassers were
slaughtered on the spot, no questions asked.

Since that would only be an issue if I
stopped Kathy and managed to escape, I turned back to the problem
of my cage. As I ran my gaze over the glyph patterns, I caught my
breath as I recognized a series of shapes just ahead of me. I
walked past it as if I hadn't noticed. "How long have I been out?"
I asked, hoping to keep her distracted.

"We didn't come by hoverbus, if that's what
you're hinting at," she said, pride in her voice. "My guardian
taught me a better way."

"Does this better way have something to do
with the white powder?" I guessed, glancing at her. "Don't tell me
we jumped dimensions."

"You guessed," she said with approval. "If
Aedodra didn't plan to destroy you, I think I'd have to be
jealous." Pride flickered across her face and she lifted her chin.
"The New York coven rejected me because I didn't register strongly
enough on the practitioner scale. Now I can fold dimensions
together and step through as easily as going from one room to the
next."

"That's high-level magic."

"Something even the oldest and most skilled
practitioner hasn't managed in three hundred years. And in about
twenty minutes, I'll be even more powerful. Powerful enough to
force all three paranormal nations to do exactly what I want."

I held down my urge to look up as I paced
back to the side near Marla. I doubted she knew what most of these
markings meant. If she was being directed by a stronger entity,
she'd probably just scribbled down what it told her to, or what
she'd found in a tablet, book or scroll.

What she didn't realize was that this
particular combination meant circumference and height. The bad news
was, I wasn't sure if the scribbling for height meant five feet or
fifty. I would either go over the invisible wall or break my face
on it. But, if Marla's insinuation that I was a para was right,
then I had a chance of making it.

"Thank you for the fun distraction," Marla
said, amusement still in her voice. "But I have to get ready for my
hero's arrival. Enjoy having your soul sucked out of you." She
strolled over to the goblet and picked it up. Saluting me with it,
she put the edge to her lips. "Here's to my new, very powerful
life."

Alarm shot through me. Vamp blood was deadly
to humans. If she drank it, I could never prove that the other
Marla, the real Kathy, was innocent. I backed up to the far side of
the circle, said a prayer as I sprinted for the other side and
jumped. As I reached the height of the leap, I bowed my body like a
diver and arched over what I hoped was the top of the barrier.

I felt the cold edge of the wall scrape my
stomach through the cotton robe, and then I dropped headfirst for
the floor. Tucking into a summersault, I hit the rock at a roll,
grunted from the pain of the impact, and bumped along for a few
feet like an out-of-control tumbleweed.

Springing up, I bunched the obnoxious choir
robe into my fists and raced for Marla as she drank. Cooper shot
through the entrance of the cave and slammed into her just as I
reached her. Grabbing her one on each side, we went down.

The cup flew from her hand, scattering drops
of blood over us as it clattered to the floor. We held on as she
fought us, then her body bowed in agony and she threw back her
head, mouth open and black with blood. A horrible screech tore from
her throat as we wrestled her to the floor.

Her hands clenched, and then Cooper was
thrown back, the side of his head bloody from the lightning fast
blow she'd given him.

Marla turned toward me, her blue eyes wide,
the whites of them as red as any feeding vampire's. Baring flat
teeth at me, she threw me at the circle. "My lord!" she cried as I
slid across the symbols as if nothing were there.

My head slammed into the barrier on the
other side. Stars flashed in my vision as I scrambled up and
prepared myself to rush at the wall again. Marla's look of rapture
as her body contorted with agony brought me up short. I spun
around, my heart pumping with fear.

* * *

The symbols drawn on the back of the cave glowed
with a filthy, reddish light. As I watched, the signs for each
paranormal race oozed toward the Indonesian symbol. As they merged
with the sunburst and Z, it took on a three-dimensional thickness,
radiating the same triumphant malevolence that I'd felt at the vamp
house.

I wasn't surprised when a trickle of thick,
oily fog crept from the center, thickening and growing as it
separated from the symbol. As the shape floated down, facial
features formed on the surface. The orb grew and thickened,
stretching down to form a body, torso, limbs, hands and feet. My
skin crawled as a dark human shape formed.

I backed away. We had to stop this.

Glancing over my shoulder, I shouted
Cooper's name and was relieved to hear a low groan. "Don't let her
die!" I called to him, and then I turned to face the creature that
Marla had called forth. Nothing could have prepared me for the
fully formed monster.

His features and body were as perfect as the
most stunning Michelangelo sculpture. Naked except for a white
cloth wrapped in an elaborate pattern around his hips, he landed
lightly on bare feet and smiled at me, completely human in
appearance except for his large, almond-shaped black eyes.

The beautiful smile startled me, and I
almost let my guard down, remembering just in time that evil didn't
have to be ugly. This thing might look like an angel, but it meant
to destroy us.

"I won't let you do this," I snarled. "I
won't let you have my world."

"Of course you won't," he said, his voice
flowing over me like the most beautiful song sung by the most
perfect singer.

He made no move toward me, yet I found
myself retreating until my back was up against the icy cold
barrier. I didn't see how I was going to get out of the trap Marla
had sprung. Her Indonesian god would stop me before I could jump
over the barrier again, and if sliding across the symbols hadn't
broken them, smudging them with a toe certainly wouldn't.

Trapped in this small space, my chances of
winning in a fight were probably zero. My only option was to keep
him talking and hope that Cooper or I thought of a way to stop
him.