Storm in a Teacup (18 page)

"And that's where I'd come in."

"If you're willing."

He stops, his reflection wobbling in a dark-tinted window behind him. "I don't know if I can cover that big of an area. It was a strain to cover just the one...thing...in Madeline's."

I don't know how magic works. "Did you seal him in a bubble or something?"
 

He nods. That's not good. A warehouse would be way too much to drape a bubble over. But what if he didn't have to?
 

"What if you just covered me instead?"
 

Gryfflet ponders that. "That might actually work. With him I was trying to keep sound out, but keeping sound in might work even better. I could probably cover both of us."

"You free tonight?"

He gains a chin as he pulls his head back into his neck. "Tonight? You want to do it tonight?"

"I want to test it tonight. See if we can pull it off. Not on creatures; with a Mediator or a morph. A morph would be better; they have better hearing."

The second chin vanishes. Gryfflet nods, hesitant. "I could do that, if I get a nap."

"Well, then go to bed. I'll call you around ten."

I make it to the Summit about ten minutes early and sit in my car to kill the time. Gryfflet could be very useful if we can perfect his little trick, but I don't want to get my hopes up too far. Still, if we can figure this out today, it'll mean were a few steps closer to getting rid of the hybrids. I don't know what to call them yet, but they've already mucked up their welcome.

A text from Gregor tells me to go to a conference room instead of Alamea's office. Yes, Mediators have conference rooms. Sometimes we even have conferences.

I expected there to be more than just Alamea and Gregor in the conference room, but it's just them. Alamea's taken the head of the table, and with her stature, any chair she sits in looks like a throne. Gregor wouldn't look regal even if you plunked him in ermine and plopped a crown on his head. As it is, he's got both feet propped on the polished marble of the table, a toothpick hanging out of his mouth. If anyone's used to Gregor, it's Alamea. She doesn't seem to care about the feet or the dangling toothpick, and she indicates for me to sit next to her.
 

At least she's not having me sit across from Gregor's feet. Even with shoes, they smell like he's been fleeing speedy little blitz demons without changing his socks for a month.
 

Alamea doesn't waste time. "We hear you've had significantly more luck in battling shades than we have, Mediator Storme."

"Shades?" I ask.

The toothpick tumbles from Gregor's lips, and he replaces it with a grim smile. Shades. It's a step up from creature, if that's what I think she's saying.

"One of the others came up with the term. Their human physique appears to be a shield against the sun. Like sunglasses. Shades. It stuck." Alamea looks as though she'd prefer something more grandiose.

"I've killed four of them."

"How?"

"Chopped off their heads." That's typical demon protocol. Some of them carry their hearts and vitals in odd places. Blitzes have their hearts in their asses, maybe to supply their muscular and very busy legs enough blood flow.

Alamea has very long eyelashes, and at my comment, they hike up into her eyebrows. After a beat, they flit back down, and any indication that I've startled her vanishes into the smooth cocoa lines of her face.

"What I meant, Storme, was how you managed to fight them without dying." Her tone is as even as her expression. The kind of even that comes from concealing information, like a floorboard that fits just too closely over a hidden cache.

If she's asking that, it means someone — maybe multiple someones — has died trying to fight the creatures. I haven't fought them. Not really. I went straight for the head in all cases. They're too fast. Too strong. They've knocked me flat before I had a chance to respond, and if I didn't have the habit of keeping my sword drawn at all times during a patrol, I'd be lining the inside of their warehouse nest by now.

"Never knew you to hold back on the smart-ass remarks, Storme," Gregor mutters around the toothpick.

"I actually wasn't planning to be a smart-ass till later. What I was going to say is that I aimed for the head first and didn't give them time to pin me. Also, they rush in a lot. Go hard and fast straight at you. You can disorient them if you use their attack to get your sword in their gut. Heart's better. Then pull back and get a clean decapitation." I'm surprised no one else has figured this out. Maybe they've been fighting them like they'd fight super-strong humans. Humans don't usually want to eat you. Except maybe in Florida. "How many have you lost?"

"Four Mediators." Alamea says in that same even tone.

"In a week?" I can't keep the naked incredulity from my voice. We don't lose that many in six months, even considering the danger of our job. Occasionally we'll have a blip of deaths, but one of the things we're trained for is evasion and not being stupid. If the fight's not on our ground, we move it until it is.

"And that's not all we've lost." Gregor slides his feet off the table, leaving streaks of dust on the marble. "At last count, over fifty normals have been confirmed dead or missing."

This is my opening. There's too much carnage, and I can't pull off my plan even with Gryfflet on my side.

I look Alamea in the eyes.
 

"I know where there's a nest. I'll help you take it out."

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

For a solid twenty seconds, I don't breathe. I watch Alamea and Gregor's eyes, hoping for some sort of window into their souls or at least what the hell they're thinking about what I just said.

Instead I get big fat silence, as pregnant as Lena Saturn in that clearing.

I sit still in my chair, willing my knees not to twitch, trying not to squirm, deflating more and more with each passing heartbeat.
 

"What do you need from us?"

It takes me a moment to understand that Alamea is on board. I look at Gregor for confirmation, and he nods.
 

"Just tell us what you need, Storme." His eyes focus on Alamea, and she looks back at him. I don't know what they're telegraphing, but whatever it is seems to be in my favor.

The basics aren't too bad. We can go over the equipment later. I slide my chair close enough for me to rest my elbows on the cold, flat marble.

"I'm going to need at least fifteen Mediators. Find the ones least likely to view these creatures — these shades — as human. They need to know that heart and gut hits won't slow them for long. Sever the head. That's their one mission when they fight them."

"Done. I want Ripper and Wheedle on this one." Gregor's not really talking to me on this one, because he knows I wouldn't bring Ben.

Alamea opens her mouth, and I can't be sure if she meant to object or not, because she closes it again and nods.
 

There's something else I need to know before the rest of my plan has a chance of working. It's an experiment. And these shades are bad news, right?

Alamea senses my hesitation. "What is it, Storme?"

"I want to capture one of the shades. The only way I think we'll be able to take out the whole warehouse full of them is if we blow it up. And if we do that, I want to know for sure it'll kill them." Even though these things are taking big bites out of Nashville's citizens, I don't like what I'm suggesting. Fire's a shitty way to go for anything.

"You want to capture one and see if fire will kill it." Gregor shrugs. "Sure."

I expected them to balk. I guess I shouldn't be surprised. They do what they have to do to kill demons. And these shades might wear human suits, but they are demons. I've said it before, and I'll say it again.

Looks like I've got some snares to set.

Turns out, Alamea has other plans. Just as I'm getting home, I get a text saying that four Mediators managed to track and capture a shade. And then they doused it in lighter fluid and lit a match.
 

The shade went up like a bottle rocket.
 

I'm relieved I didn't have to be there for that, and it's good to know that there's another option for getting rid of them. But it still makes me feel squidgy inside, and I don't know why. You don't feel bad about killing demons. Maybe it's that I really hate the idea of burning to death. I guess I don't wish that on anything, no matter how people-eatery and evil.

Gryfflet's going to help train a couple other witches for the Mediators to work with, and tomorrow night we're going to set the surveillance. And the explosives. You couldn't pay me to go near the explosives. I don't like things that go boom unless they're in an action film.

Now that part of my plan is out of my hands, I feel nervous. Call me a control freak.
 

I'm just settling in with a glass of Chianti when someone knocks at my door.

I don't get visitors. I set my wine down on the coffee table and get up to look through the peep hole.

And it's Ben. If I wasn't feeling surly a minute ago, I am now.

"I know you're there, Ayala. I heard you walk up to the door."

Damn Mediators with their...ears.

A human wouldn't have been able to hear my footsteps through a door like mine. I want to growl, but instead I pull back the slide bolt and flick open the other locks. "What do you want, Ben?"

"I wanted to apologize for intruding on your space."

By turning up at my door? Whatever. "Apology accepted. Was there something else?"

"I was going to see if you'd want to go to dinner. On me. No strings, just me saying sorry."

Dinner with Ben. I can't get past his farm-boy looks. I feel like he ought to be wearing blue flannel and Wranglers and lassoing demons from the back of a horse. Hey, some Mediators used to do that back in the 1800s. You never know what'll blow somebody's skirt up. Do I want to go to dinner with the farm-boy?
 

"What did you have in mind?"

"Italian. Trattoria Soprano off Demonbreun."

"Fine." My wine will wait for me. Mellow its tannins a bit. Plus, if he's buying, I can get myself a glass.
 

I've never been to the Trattoria Soprano, and I see why the moment we arrive in Ben's Jeep. It's a strip mall hole in the wall with a sign chipped in three places that makes the Italian flag look as though it's eroding. But inside is a different world.

The walls are done in ivory stucco, so I approve the moment I walk through the door. Dim lighting in electric sconces lines the walls, making a golden glow throughout the restaurant. The tables are solid wood and polished, and the top third of the wall is a mural of the Italian countryside that stretches around the small dining room, morphing into a city-scape of Rome. Even the ceiling fits in — it's painted a deep azure with fluffy clouds lazing about.
 

"Surprised I have decent taste?" Ben holds up two fingers to the host, who leads us to a table under the vineyard portion of the mural.

"Not really."

"I've always wanted to go to Italy." Ben pulls out a cushioned wooden chair for me, but sits in it himself when I glower at him. Not a date, Ben.
 

I pull out my own chair and sit facing him. "I don't like to think about things I know I'll never be able to do."

Ben shrugs. "You never know. Anything is possible."

"Who are you, Hallmark?" No Mediator can leave her area. Ever. Sometimes they overlap, so I've worked with Columbus Mediators and Atlanta Mediators, but never New York or D.C. But they've got the boring areas anyway. All the demon hotspots are farther south or inland. Yeah, it sucks. When I was a kid I wanted to see Hawaii. Or Belize. Never gonna happen, so why should I sit here and pine about it with Ben?

"So your plan for this hellkin-invasion. You think it'll work?" He seems to sense he's hit a nerve. One point for him.

"If we manage to blow up the shades, yes. If we manage to blow up ourselves, no."

The waiter brings us a basket of warm, crusty bread, and I fall upon it like a shade on a frat boy. Ben watches, a small smile hovering on his lips. It vanishes when I look directly at him.