It was a bedroom and it ran the entire width of the building. A glass door led out onto the front balcony, but even from here I could see it was securely locked. He hadn’t gone out that way—though we would have seen him if he had. The all-encompassing white theme was in residence in this room as well, with the only splash of color coming from the dark wood of the old-fashioned four-poster bed and the large vase of cream and pink lilies and roses sitting on the dressing table.
I swung around and headed for the back bedroom. My skin began to crawl, and the awareness of . . .
something . . . was growing. I slowed as I neared the door, listening intently, trying to figure out whether the thing I felt was real or imagined.
Not,
Amaya said.
Evil inside.
I do wish you’d get a bit more descriptive,
I mentally muttered.
I mean, are we talking live evil, dead evil, or something in between?
Live not,
she said.
Dead not. Just is.
Which still wasn’t very helpful—but I guess it was hardly fair to blame her.
Will eat if can,
she added.
If it attacks, feel free.
I took a deep breath, then once again pushed the door with my foot. Tension ran through me as it swung open, and every bit of me was ready to jump back, to react, if anything so much as squeaked the wrong way.
Nothing did.
What stood in the middle of the room was a set of cuneiform stones. They were about six feet tall and roughly four feet wide at their base, and both reached up to a needle-sharp point. Though most of the other stones we’d discovered had been primarily gray in color, these were white—as white as the walls within this house—and their surface was littered with small crystals that Amaya’s flames sparked to life, sending rainbow-colored flurries skating through the room. They reminded me of the second set of stones we’d found under the warehouse near Stane’s—the ones we’d initially believed had been the sorceress’s entry point onto the gray fields.
They even
felt
like those stones. All the others we’d come across had felt ancient and powerful.
These
stones—like the others—were undoubtedly both old
and
potent, but there was also a foulness emanating from them. It was as if they were something that should not exist in this time or place.
I took a step closer. Pinpricks of energy snapped at my skin, drawing blood. I shivered and stepped back. While I had no doubt that Mike had disappeared through this gateway, there was no way in hell I was about to follow him. I might have risked it had it been only my safety I had to worry about, but I was a mom-to-be now, and I wasn’t about to jeopardize the health of my son by exposing him to something that felt so . . . unclean.
I retreated to the wall and walked around the stones. I didn’t learn much. I didn’t understand cuneiform, and I wasn’t about to call the one person in my life who did back into the line of fire. I might have promised to call Uncle Quinn if I needed help, but I wasn’t about to risk Hunter finding out where they were hiding for something as minor as this.
Which meant that as far as Mike went, we were at a dead end until he showed up again.
I sheathed Amaya, then left the house, making sure that I left everything as I’d found it—everything except the rear-door locks, and there wasn’t much I could do about that except hope that no one noticed it.
“So this would appear to confirm that Mike is at least working with the dark sorceress,” Azriel said, as I climbed into the car.
“It confirms that both my mother and I are blind fucking fools.” I thumped the steering wheel. “Damn it, how could he keep something like that a secret for so long? Mom wasn’t an innocent when it came to the arcane—why did she never sense something was wrong until it was altogether too late?”
“The Aedh placed a spell you,” Azriel said. “What makes you think they didn’t also do the same to your mother?”
“I guess. It’s just—” I stopped and shrugged. “I guess I’m just sick of being three steps behind everyone else in this game.”
“It’s possible Mike is not aware that we suspect him. That will play in our favor.”
“Only for as long as it takes him to realize someone broke into his house. He’s going to suspect it was us.”
“Which may or may not matter to him. He needs you, remember, so if it prompts any sort of action, it’s going to be another attempt to ensnare you.”
I glanced down at my hand, remembering the somewhat slick feel of his initial handshake. “Do you think that’s what he was doing in the restaurant?”
“No. I think he was simply trying to uncover both what you knew and what you suspected. I also suspect you will hear from him sooner rather than later, probably with another invitation for dinner.”
“Over which he’ll try to magic me.” I rubbed my wrist and hoped the ribbon bracelet was strong enough to withstand the onslaught of dark magic. “Do you think he’s Lauren?”
Azriel raised his eyebrows. “That is a question you should answer, not me. You know him. I don’t, nor can I read him.”
“I’d like to think he’s not, that we couldn’t be that gullible.” My lips twisted. “But then, I’ve already had more than enough proof of
that
with Lucian.”
“Everyone is entitled to make a mistake,” Azriel commented sagely. “At least you rectified yours by ridding this world of his presence.”
“Yeah, but revenge didn’t taste as sweet as I’d hoped.”
“It never does.” He reached over and squeezed my hand. “Let’s dwell on the problems we can do something about, not the ones we can’t.”
“Good idea. So where the hell do you think Mike might have gone?”
“We know Lauren has at least two warehouse bolt-holes. It is possible that we have not found all that either of those places conceal.” He shrugged. “Given the
relative ease with which we found that first one, it is entirely possible that she allowed us to find what we did in the hope we would then discard it.”
“Then let’s head there and see if we can pick up Mike’s signal.” I started the car and pulled out into the street.
“And if we do? We have no idea whether Mike is merely working for her or if he’s our sorceress herself, but either way, I doubt it would be wise to confront either of them in one of her lairs.”
“No, but at least we’d finally have a concrete lead.” And once the bastard stepped away from protection, well, one way or another, he was ours.
It didn’t take us all that long to cut across to the warehouse. I parked in the street behind the building, then glanced down at the tracker Azriel still held. It was deathly quiet.
Mike wasn’t here.
“It is still worth checking the building,” Azriel said. “The witches are here. If nothing else, we can see how their progress with that second barrier goes.”
I nodded, climbed out of the car, and walked around to the front of the building. It wasn’t much to look at in its current state—the wind rattled the rusted iron roof and whistled through the small, regularly spaced windows, many of which were broken. Like many of the other buildings in the area, its walls were littered with graffiti and tags, and rubbish lay in drifting piles along its length. But its bones were essentially good, and I couldn’t understand why it had lain derelict for so long; it would have made several smashing apartments.
But once again there was an odd, almost watchful stillness about the place. It was a stillness that seemed to affect the immediate surrounds, which were unnervingly quiet. Even the roar of the traffic traveling along nearby Smith Street seemed muted.
I shivered, despite the heat rolling off the man walking so closely beside me. This place had always seemed . . . wrong . . . to me. More so now, perhaps, because I knew what evil its dark interior sheltered.
There were two entrances into the building on West Street. The first one remained heavily padlocked, but the other—a roller door over what had once been a loading bay—was where we’d gotten in previously. Someone had done a rough repair job on the broken section of the door, but the welding didn’t look too good and I didn’t think it would take more than a kick or two to be rid of it. Which was precisely what I did.
I got down on my hands and knees and squeezed through the small hole. The witches had woven an exception into the magic that warded this place to allow Azriel to enter, but it seemed to have a wash-over effect on me, because this time there was very little in the way of resistance or stinging as I crawled through the small gap. I still felt it, but it wasn’t resisting me like it had previously.
I rose and dusted the dirt off my jeans as I scanned the area. The large loading dock and the offices that lined the upper area hadn’t changed, and I couldn’t smell anything in the air that suggested anyone was in this portion of the building.
Azriel rose and stood beside me. “The witches are still here, but I cannot feel the presence of anyone else.”
“I’d normally say that was a good thing, but in this particular case, I’m not sure it is.”
“That would depend on what lies behind the hidden door and whether the magic that protects it also interferes with my ability to sense souls.” He pressed his fingers against my spine and guided me toward the stairs. “We may yet find either Mike or our sorceress here.”
I snorted softly. “Do you really think it’s going to be that easy?”
“No, but one can always hope.”
We went through the end office—the one the farthest away from the trapdoor Jak and I had fallen through during our first visit—and moved into the deeper darkness of the main warehouse. The roof here soared high above us and was snaked with metal lines and some sort of conveyer system. The windows lining the left side of the room were so thick with dirt that very little outside light seeped in, and on the right side, there were several small, rubbish- and rat-filled offices. The concrete floor was stained with rust lines and thick with grime.
Azriel drew Valdis. Her flames flared across the shadows, making it easier to traverse the space, especially in the end third of the building, where the sludge from the old machines was thickest and as slippery as hell.
I briefly wondered where the ghost of the woman who’d led me to the hidden doorway was. I couldn’t sense her presence anywhere near, but maybe she was simply keeping watch now that there was no immediate danger.
We reached the inky wall that protected the stairwell down into the basement. I led Azriel around to the two-foot-square doorway Rozelle had woven into the sorceress’s magic and crawled through. Magic immediately hit me, but its feel was clean, pure, caressing my skin rather than attacking me.
The witches were still at work on that door.
I grabbed the metal railing and made my way down to the basement. It was a cavernous space, all concrete, and filled with lines of dust-laden, somewhat rusty metal shelving—all of which were empty. Whatever the inky barrier was protecting, it wasn’t
this
particular area.
I led the way through the shelving. Rozelle turned around as we approached. She was tall and pretty and looked all of twenty. Given that most witches didn’t usually begin training to be masters—which was what she was doing at the Brindle—until they were at least thirty, she’d
either become
very
proficient at a very early age, or she was much older than she looked. I suspected the former, if only because Kiandra had placed a lot of faith in her.
“We’re almost through,” she said. Though her eyes were bright with excitement, her skin looked pale and the droop in her shoulders suggested weariness. “The spell protecting this entrance is nothing any of us has ever seen before. It’s been quite a learning curve unpicking all the interwoven threads.”
I glanced past her. Six witches sat within a protection circle in front of the section of wall that held the hidden doorway. The crisp, clear magic that rolled across my senses was emanating from them, but underneath it, I could still feel the caress of the sorceress’s dark and oddly dirty magic. But it was an energy that was flickering, fading, fast.
I returned my gaze to Rozelle. “So whatever the magic is protecting, it’s something our dark sorceress cares about greatly.”
Rozelle nodded. “We suspect it could be her ritual room. There is no other reason for a spell of this intricacy.”
“And if it is?”
“We destroy it. She will undoubtedly have other, minor rooms she could use to cast spells, but the loss of this one, situated as it is on a main ley-line intersection, will severely curtail her ability to create major blood magic.”
I frowned. “Why? Couldn’t she just make another one somewhere else?”
Rozelle shook her head. “Blood magic is a difficult and dangerous art, and it cannot be performed any old where. It would have taken her years to set up her ritual space so that she was secure and well protected from the forces she is summoning.”
“If that’s the case, why isn’t she here, protecting this place with everything she has?”
Rozelle’s cheeks dimpled. “Because we are not without some skill ourselves. She has not attacked because, as far as she is aware, this place is as safe and as secure as it ever was.”
“Using magic to counter magic. Nice.”
“We thought so.” She turned to face the circle, her gaze narrowing. “It shouldn’t be too long.”
“Do you think there will be any sort of spell or trap inside?”
“Possibly. We’ll ensure it’s safe to enter before anyone does so.” She glanced past me. “But in case it
is
protected by something more mundane than a spell, I would have your sword ready, reaper.”
Azriel didn’t comment, but Valdis’s flames flared brighter. Surprisingly, Amaya had nothing to say about being left out of the possible killing spree, but maybe she was merely waiting to see whether there
was
something worth attacking before she started complaining.
In the brief silence, there was a loud crack, and a doorway-sized section of the concrete wall began to shimmer, waver, fading in and out of existence and providing tantalizing glimpses of a rusted metal door. The flickering got faster, more violent, as if the magic that concealed the door was fighting back. Then, with a sigh rather than a bang, it bled away, and the solid metal door was revealed in its entirety.