Veiled Magic (10 page)

Half an hour later, Donata knocked on Peter's door carrying a large wrapped package and a small, irate cat. She was pretty sure she looked like crap, but was almost too tired to care. Almost. Once she got out of the elevator, she leaned the painting against the wall, tucked the cat under one arm, and banged on the entry door to Peter's apartment.

Belatedly, it occurred to her that he might have company, but it was too late to go away. Besides, she had no place else to go and he'd already buzzed her up. She picked up the painting again and looked over her shoulder at the elevator. What the hell was she doing here, anyway? She swayed, overcome by exhaustion and the desire to be somewhere else. Preferably her own bed.

The door opened and Peter poked his head out. Still fully dressed, he didn't bat an eye at finding a strange woman standing on his doorstep holding a stolen painting. She didn't know what the heck that said about the kind of life he led; she figured she probably didn't want to know.

“Sorry,” she said shortly, “I didn't know where else to go. There were . . . people . . . waiting for me at my apartment when I got home. I hope you weren't sleeping. Or, um, busy.” She tried not to blush. Some tough cop she was.

He shook his head. “Nope. I was just reading.” He gestured her into the apartment, only looking mildly startled at the cat. “I don't sleep much, to be honest. And I told you, I don't bring women here.”

Hmph.
Donata thought about how private he was, and decided she wasn't surprised. Elmyr the French bulldog came up and sniffed at her, whiffling a little at her companion, who gave a halfhearted hiss in response.

“Cut it out, Grim,” she said. “It's late, and I'm too tired for this.” She put the cat down in front of the dog, figuring they might as well get it over with. “Grimalkin, meet Elmyr. He lives here, so try and be nice.” She bent down and spoke to the dog. “Elmyr, meet Grimalkin. He's had a rough day, and he's a Witch's familiar, so he can kick your butt. Try and be nice.” The two animals glared at each other for a minute, then stalked off to sit on opposite sides of the room.

Peter stifled a laugh. “Well done. Do you do a lot of interspecies introductions?”

“You have no idea,” Donata said. After a slightly awkward pause, she added, “If you offered me a cup of tea, I wouldn't say no.”

Peter blinked. “Oh, right, sorry. I'm not used to playing host.” He walked toward the kitchen area, but his attention was clearly focused on the package under her arm. “Is that the painting?”

“Yep,” she answered, figuring there was no point in making excuses about theft to the forger. “I, um, borrowed it, earlier. So you could take a look at it. But when I got back to my apartment, there were these guys from the Cabal there, and I couldn't go in. So I came here instead.”

Peter peered at her closely from across the granite-topped counter. “You look dead on your feet, if you don't mind me saying so. Why don't you sit down and have your tea and tell me about these Cabal people. Sounds like the mob or
something else decidedly unfriendly.” He put a beautiful oriental porcelain teapot and matching cups down on the counter in front of her, and pulled out one of the wrought-iron seats.

Donata blinked at it tiredly for a second before realizing he was holding it for her. “Oh, thanks.” She inhaled the floral aroma of the tea gratefully. “What is this? Jasmine?”

He nodded, pleased that she'd recognized it. “Can I look at the painting?” he asked eagerly. “I can listen at the same time.” He pulled the other stool over next to where she sat and poured himself a cup of tea.

“Sure,” Donata said, figuring she'd have to show it to him eventually anyway. That was why she'd stolen the damned thing, after all. “But be careful with it.” She started to pull away the wrappings gingerly. She'd tucked cardboard around it so she could safely tie it to the carry rack on her bike, then tucked the poor cat into one of her saddlebags with only his furry head sticking out. It was going to take a lot of treats to make up for that one. But at least they—and the painting—had made it here in one piece.

Peter looked offended. “Of course I'll be careful with it,” he said, indignantly. “I'm a professional!”

Donata waved one hand in the air, leaving the other to hang on to the delicate teacup for dear life. “No, no, I wasn't worried about you hurting the painting, Mr. Casaventi. It's more the other way around.”

He gave her a curious look. “Call me Peter. We're partners in crime now, after all.” The tiny lines around his eyes crinkled with amusement as she made a face. “And what the hell are you talking about?”

Donata swallowed a mouthful of too-hot tea and tried to make more sense. “The painting has a curse on it. At least that's what the guy from the Alliance Council said.”

“The Council? They're kind of like a parliament for Witches, right? Is that the same as the Cabal?” he asked, looking confused.

“Gods, no. Opposite sides. Good guys and bad guys.” She stopped and thought for a minute. “Well, the Council is mostly the good guys; I'm not a big fan, personally.”

Peter didn't look any less befuddled, and she couldn't really blame him. She was sure she could explain it a lot more clearly if she could just get a couple of hours of sleep. She'd barely slept for two days now, and it was really catching up with her.

“So you had visits tonight from both the Council and this Cabal?” Peter said. “You
have
had a busy night.”

Donata gave a halfhearted laugh. “You don't know the half of it. I've been working magic on and off all day.” She swigged more tea. “That can really take it out of a girl.”

Her accommodating host poured additional steaming ambrosia into her cup. “So tell me more about this curse.” He peeled away the rest of the paper wrapped around the painting so it lay exposed on the counter between them. “It looks okay to me.”

Donata poked at it gingerly with one fingertip. “Well, I handled it before, and it didn't do anything to me except give me the tingles and a weird-ass vision. But Clement Moore, the guy from the Alliance Council, he said there's supposed to
be some sort of curse on the thing, to prevent tampering by Paranormals.”

“Good thing I'm not one, then.” Peter peered at it more closely, obviously only listening to her with half his attention. “Looks like a Caspar David Friedrich, all right. Painted sometime towards the end of his life, I'd say.” He got up and rummaged around in a drawer in the living room, then returned with a magnifying glass in one hand.

“What's this black blotch?” he asked, examining it through the glass. “It doesn't seem to be paint. Was it done during the robbery? I remember seeing it in the photo you showed me, but I thought it was just a spot on the photo itself. I can't believe someone did this to a painting.” He looked indignant at the thought of someone purposely marring a work of art.

“No, that was there already,” Donata said. “In fact, it was part of what I wanted you to work on—hey, watch it!” She knocked his hand away as he rubbed one finger gently across the surface of the black material. “As far as I can tell, the curse only gets activated if you try to make some kind of change to the painting, but let's just take it slow and careful, okay?”

Peter gave her a curious look, but withdrew the offending digit. “You really believe in this curse, Officer Santori? And why would it be a problem for me? I'm a boring old Human.”

“Donata,” she corrected absently. “Partners in crime, and all that. And I'm not sure what I believe, exactly, other than you're anything but boring, and you never know who exactly is in your family tree. But I can tell you there is something odd about this painting.” She pointed at the lower right-hand corner. “See that spot?”

“What spot?” Peter asked. “I don't see anything.”

“Exactly,” she said. “When I first saw that painting, Clive Farmingham had cleared away a small piece of the top painting and revealed the—what did you call it?”

“Pentimento.”

“Right. The pentimento underneath.” She swallowed the last of her tea. “But when I got it out of the lockup tonight, I noticed that the empty section had filled itself back in again. I don't know if that's part of the curse or not, but it's pretty freaky.”

Peter shrugged. “Are you sure? I mean, not to be insulting, but you're obviously pretty tired. Maybe you're confused?” He reached out a tentative finger, but pulled it back when she glared at him.

“I may be tired,” Donata said, “but I know the difference between what I saw that first day and what I'm looking at right now.”

“Okay,” he said. “I'll take your word for it. But I still don't understand why you're worried about me touching it. I'm not a Witch.”

Donata rubbed one hand over her eyes, feeling like someone had poured ashes into them. Actually, considering her alley face-to-face with Dhumavati, someone probably had. She sighed. It was way too late at night to be explaining the obvious.

“I didn't say the curse only affected Witches,” she said, impatience making her short with him. “Clement Moore said it affected
all
Paranormals. And since you're half Dragon, that means you too.”

Peter gaped at her. “I'm half
what
?”

Oh, crap. Double crap.
This is what came of spending two days in far over your head on too little sleep. She'd completely forgotten that he didn't know about his Dragon heritage. Now what was she going to do?

One look at his scowling face told her it was too late to backtrack. Besides, she rationalized, he was going to have to know more about the whole mess if he was going to work on the painting. Right?
Oh, just hell.

Peter reached out and grabbed her chin in one hand so she was forced to gaze directly at him. His eyes were black again, and glowed as if backlit. If she'd needed any more proof about his father's race, she had it now.

“Tell. Me. What. You're. Talking. About,” he said through gritted teeth. “I'm half what?”

Donata pulled her chin out of his grasp and picked up her empty teacup in self-defense. “Um, Dragon. You're half Dragon. On your father's side. More tea, please?”

Peter looked like he didn't know which question to ask her first, but dutifully poured more tea into her cup. “Dragons? There are Dragons? What other kinds of creatures are there if there are Dragons? And how can I be a Dragon? I feel perfectly normal. And are you saying my father is a Dragon?”

He put the teapot down gently, but she saw it tremble slightly as it came to rest on the countertop. Well, she guessed her hands would shake, too, if someone dropped a bombshell on her like she'd just dropped on him.

“Look, Peter,” she said softly. “I'm really sorry I sprang it on you like this. I'm so tired, I forgot you didn't know already.”

He shook his head as if trying to clear away the fog that had suddenly obscured all the things he thought he'd known about his life. “You're serious? I'm some kind of Paranormal creature? Well, half some kind of Paranormal creature?” He gazed at her blankly. “I guess I always knew there was something different about me, but a
Dragon
? How come I don't breathe fire?”

Donata took a deep breath. “Let me see if I can answer your questions one at a time. It's kind of complicated.”

Peter looked bleak. “I'll bet.”

She felt just awful. “Hey, it isn't all bad news. Really.” She tried to think of a way to begin what was clearly going to be a long and convoluted explanation. “Um, okay. So obviously, Witches aren't the only Paranormal race, like most people think.”

He perked up a little, as the ramifications sank in. “Wow. How many Paranormal races are there, then? And why don't most people know about any of them other than Witches?”

“Partially self-protection,” she answered, “and partially because of the Compact.” He looked confused. “Right. There's so much you don't know.” Silently, she cursed both the Council and Peter's mother for leaving him in ignorance of his true place in the scheme of things. And leaving her to explain it. “The Compact was an agreement that the Paranormal races made with the Catholic Church at the end of the Inquisition, which was really a war between the Church and us. The Paranormal races, that is.” Donata had a feeling she wasn't explaining things very well.

“Anyway, there are five major Paranormal races, including Witches, and a whole bunch of minor ones.” She stopped for a second. “Well, maybe six, but let's not get into that now.”

He looked even more confused, for which she couldn't blame him. “So there are Witches, and Dragons, and what else?”

Donata held up one finger. “Okay, so there's Witches; you know about them already. What you probably don't know is that Witches are a hereditary matriarchy, with the powers passed down through the female side. In the Compact agreement, Witches were allowed to retain their magical abilities, but they had to go underground and practice in secret, which essentially handed over all their real-world power to the Church. And, of course, they had to allow themselves to be publicly discredited.”

Peter scratched his chin, the sound of stubble rasping through the quiet room. “Sounds like a pretty raw deal. I guess politics are the same no matter the era. So what did they get in return?”

Donata gave a short, bitter laugh. “They got to live. More or less in peace.” She took a sip of tea to try and wash the nasty taste out of her mouth. “The Paranormals were losing the war, you see. So most of the concessions were on our side. Witches were allowed to keep their powers, as long as they didn't use them in any obvious way, but they'd been given such a bad reputation, people persecuted them so badly that until recently it just wasn't safe to admit you were one.”