Or maybe not progress. Mason was just juicier gossip.
Cari felt a tired smile coming on. At least her stepmother was distracted from both her grief and the upset of losing Erom Vauclain. The story of Livia Walker made a very effective cautionary tale about what happened when a mage girl forgot her House.
Once upon a time, it could’ve been Cari. Easily. Burned a little, remembering. The Mysterious Mason Stray, so tempting, so dangerous.
But Cari refused to think about what had almost happened at Walden Pond. It was ancient history, anyway.
Shortly thereafter word had gotten out that Liv was pregnant, probably from fooling around with him before they’d broken up. As Mason was stray, he couldn’t marry Liv, a House-born mage woman. So he’d convinced her to run away with him, to have the baby—a baby that because of Mason would be accepted nowhere, just like him. And as the child constituted Liv’s firstborn, no other mage would marry her and risk the bastard child making succession or inheritance claims.
Two lives ruined: Stupid Liv, who’d soon grown tired of living on nothing and had returned alone, to be outcast in her own House, and the child, wherever the poor, unwanted thing was. All because Mason Stray liked to screw dangerously.
“I don’t like him much either.” He was a means to an end, that’s all. And—shock of the century—he actually had the Council’s respect.
A man-shaped shadow loomed outside the front door.
Scarlet’s voice went raspy. “Please be careful.”
“I will.” The search for the killer would be fast, the resolution final.
Scarlet flicked her gaze toward the door to direct her meaning. “Mason Stray should’ve been neutered. Now, if you were
already
engaged . . .”
Cari smiled. Kissed Scarlet’s cheek. She was, after all, only trying to be a good mage mama.
“I can take care of myself.”
Scarlet lifted her brows, as if to question the Erom decision again and then retired up the stairs.
Cari turned and opened the door.
Nine years and the man only had gotten more . . . Mason. Older, yes, with fine lines around those haunted eyes, and he hadn’t bothered to shave, so he looked like a bandit from the old West about to rob a train. His hair was a reckless shock of dark brown, begging for scissors. And he was taller than she remembered, his shoulders wider, taking up the doorway. Smelled the same though, Shadow take him.
Poor, stupid Livia.
“Mason,” Cari said, haughty, in defense of her old friend.
“Cari,” he returned, just as hard.
Mason couldn’t shake the excruciating feeling that he was missing a vital part of himself, that he’d left his arm or lungs or heart somewhere, and he didn’t know how to function without that missing piece.
He was surly and restless. He wanted to fight something big and mean with his fists until he was too bloody for consciousness. But he could only grip the doorframe to Dolan House and hope the carved wood didn’t crumble in his hands.
Cari had opened the door, the princess herself.
She’d grown up, or rather,
into
herself. Her wide, smart eyes used to inspire stunts to impress, but now something in their depths made him wary. Grief, that’s what it was. Her cheekbones were set for classic beauty, with creamy skin that glowed in contrast to glossy dark brown hair, which broke in natural waves on her shoulders. Her black eyes betrayed her Shadowed heritage and she had a full, expressive mouth, which had always said more without words than with. Like now for example.
Didn’t matter if she hated him. At the moment, he was beyond caring.
She stepped out of the way for him to enter. “Welcome to Dolan House.”
He stayed put, but remembered his manners. A stray mage without a House, or worse, a
human
, always had to remember his manners. “I’m very sorry for your loss. Your father was a great man and a brilliant mage.”
Every word was true. The Dolans were well-known for their facility with umbras, which was probably why they had always been able to make discerning decisions regarding staff and allies. But Caspar Dolan’s power had gone beyond that. Mason had tried many times to understand the source of his strength, but had gotten nowhere. Caspar was an enigma.
“Thank you,” she said. His courtesy had bounced right off her armor. “Are you coming in?”
“No.” Like her, he didn’t have it in him to make small talk. What was Fletcher doing now? “Have you been back to the site of your father’s attack?”
Cari frowned. Her stance shifted to one hip, arms crossed. Less formal, even more tense. “I was waiting for you. I thought we’d discuss how we were going to proceed, as well as what you and Kaye Brand think you can contribute while I’m searching for my father’s killer.”
This was going to go just swell.
“I’d rather do this on my own, too.” Mason looked beyond her into the house. The foyer was bigger than the total square footage of any of his places. And if he let his eyes lose focus, just for a second, he could sense movement in the Shadow. He’d been inside a mage House two times in his life: when he’d pled his case to Livia Walker’s father, and just now, when he’d left Fletcher with Webb. Both Houses had ripped him apart.
Cari made a self-satisfied line out of her lips. “But you can’t track umbras.”
He gave her a failed smile of his own. “You don’t have the Council’s information.”
“With a call, I could get it. Your services aren’t necessary.”
The head of her House. Good for her. She did the job charmingly.
“Why don’t you do that then?” He turned to go back down the walkway toward his car. He had to keep moving or he was going to go insane. Why had he bothered parking in the first place?
He had no patience for playing power games with Cari. The girl he remembered hadn’t been interested in games; seemed like she was all grown up now. He was here for one purpose only—to make good on his side of the bargain for Fletcher. He would find the perpetrator, and after that . . . ? He had no idea. The course of his life was now plunged into darkness.
Human?
One thing at a time.
The engine had been idling ten minutes when Cari deigned to open the passenger side door. Instead of getting in, she leaned down to make eye contact. The shift revealed the scorch of a plague wound at her neck. “My car has an integrated computer with wireless and is stocked with provisions for just about anything we might need.”
Cari had obviously made her call, but the Council belonged to Brand and Brand was siding with him.
“My car doesn’t need gas.” It ran on Shadow. What
human
could do that? “Have a seat.”
“I require my guards”—she looked back to the rear bucket seats—“and you don’t have enough room.”
He ground his teeth into a smile. “No guards necessary. I’ll protect you.” Him and his Shadow-tricked Glock.
She stood her ground, which he respected, so he made a concession so he could let his engine have its way with the road. “Okay, how about I meet you there and I’ll fill you in on everything the Council has learned about your father’s killer . . . later.”
She straightened. All he could see was her body and her uptight clothes—gray dress to her knees, fitted but plain, shiny slender black belt. Her figure more than compensated for the serious packaging. Cari had never realized her own impact. He’d liked that about her. Simple. Direct.
A century passed while she was making up her mind. House pride was a bitch sometimes. But there was no way he was taking her car and becoming either her driver or her passenger on this escapade. He could not allow himself to be put into a secondary position, where he could be bossed or worse, overlooked. Both situations were a short step to an inconvenient witness. And witnesses were often disposed of after dealing with sensitive mage matters. Pride had nothing on basic survival among magekind.
Cari finally settled herself in the passenger seat. She didn’t seem impressed that he’d restored the interior to its original chrome, leather and walnut, but then she was used to nice things.
He waited for her to put her seatbelt on. Leaned over to make absolutely sure she didn’t require anything else. “If you’re ready?”
Cari smiled, her eyes narrowing dangerously.
It was the kind of smile a wise man might do well to avoid, but he wasn’t feeling wise. A strange and warm sensation had settled into his bad mood. Provoking Cari Dolan was just the thing to help him get through the next five minutes, maybe hour, without turning his car in the opposite direction and spying to see how Riordan and Fletcher fared. Riordan didn’t know what brilliantly idiotic schemes Fletcher could come up with when left to his own devices. And with Bran as an accomplice . . .
“What does the Council know?” Cari’s voice was business direct. She’d learned at Caspar Dolan’s knee. More bothersome was the concentration of Shadow he could sense humming within her. He’d felt something like it around Kaye Brand, when she worked with fire. But never before with Cari. Late bloomer?
Mason settled uneasily back into his seat, shoved the stick in gear, and took the turn of the drive fast enough that the surrounding trees suddenly went luminous, not unlike the forest of Twilight. “In a nutshell: they think it’s one of theirs.”
“You don’t say.” Unimpressed again. “Who do they suspect?”
So sure of herself. Well, why shouldn’t she be? Dolan had stayed strong throughout magekind’s history. Considering the gathered night he sensed inside Cari—when
had
she come into such power?—he was starting to understand the House’s longevity. Dolan had thus far sidestepped violence and reprisals; knowing whom to trust made a big difference.
And now once again, Dolan was in a position to know. How did they manage that when Mason had to trade blood and favors for his puzzle pieces?
“When Kaye took over the Council from Ferrol Grey, most of the original Seats supported her because she is so adept—spectacular, really—at fire. Made her seem like one of the Old Ones in the mage story books.” Maybe Cari was like that, too. Maybe this new Dark Age bred old power. Mason continued, “Plus Brand is an old House, and she seemed to have contacts everywhere.”
“And then the Council found out about the angel,” Cari supplied.
“Yeah,” Mason said, turning onto I-95. He spat out the name: “Jack Bastian.”
Cari looked over, eyebrow raised. “And?”
Mason shrugged. “He’s a son of a bitch. Older than the hills. I don’t know how much he qualifies as an angel anymore, except that technically he is one.”
Cari snorted. “I’m surprised the Order keeps him, a soul crazy enough to sleep with Shadow.”
Mason found it ironic that he’d unknowingly done the same with Liv, all those years ago. And yes, it had been crazy. Brand and Bastian should take note.
“Most Houses are disgusted, including the ones that still back her. And some feel outright betrayed. But since Brand and Bastian seemed to forestall a strike by the Order against magekind, the Houses have tolerated his presence with her in the Seat.”
“Until lately,” Cari said. “Brand mentioned that she was concerned someone might target her.”
Mason chuckled bitterly. “Kaye Brand isn’t scared of anything. If she seemed vulnerable, she was manipulating you.” He still believed that Kaye was the only thing standing between magekind and open hostilities with the Order. But without Ferrol Grey and his iron ring, there was no House holding the Council together.
“So who do they think it is behind the plague?”
“A Council insider, possibly a member, since some of the deaths could only have occurred if the perpetrator had privileged information. Whoever it is has killed children in this ugly enterprise as well.”
Silence from Cari. Then, soberly, “The contagion has ripped through many Houses. Which children?”
Mason listed the names and the Houses to which they belonged. The House responsible for this plague would be crushed until all that was left was its broken foundation.
“Parents must be worried out of their minds.” Cari looked out the side of her window, but Mason caught the sheen of tears.
Was Fletcher homesick? Would Webb do right by him?
“Yes,” Mason said in an undertone. “We are.”
Chapter Three
“And your child?” Cari couldn’t have felt more awkward. She didn’t even know if he’d had a boy or a girl. She’d heard nothing about the baby after Liv had gone back home so long ago. The subject was taboo among the Walkers.
Plus, she’d been a little devastated herself.
“Safe.” His low, clipped tone permitted no further discussion.
Since Liv had run off with him, Cari hadn’t wanted to know anything about Mason Stray and his exploits. But now she was older, wiser, and immune. She wanted to add
informed
to that list.
Mason turned into the DolanCo Business Center, the place where her father had died.
The center had always reminded her of a blocky cruise ship in a sea of grass that ran unbroken to the horizon. The main building was multi-storied, but at the tenth floor, the structure drew in to accommodate a large patio with a wide lip. The grounds had an outer courtyard and several smaller buildings, all white concrete, so that as one approached, the structures looked like the frothy wake of the ship’s passage.
Mason parked in the general lot—she hadn’t thought to direct him to the Dolan garage on the other side. Maybe it was better this way—she remembered how he’d frowned at her house and refused the better car. Maybe he was sensitive to
things
, having them or not having them. Made sense, considering he was a stray, but it was short-sighted of him. Things didn’t matter; family did.
They walked in silence down the path that led to the courtyard and the spot where her father had fallen. The buildings seemed to close around her. Someone, recognizing her, started to approach, but Mason held up his hand to keep them back.
Cari appreciated the gesture. She was having a hard time coordinating the in and out of her breathing as she was once again confronted with that terrible moment. The Center employed hundreds of humans, but she had no idea what they’d been told about her father’s death. By now everyone would connect what had happened at the Stanton Massacre to what had happened to her father, and they would know that they were employed by mages.
“Over there.” Cari motioned toward the fountain where some people took their lunches, now empty in the late afternoon.
This was where her father had fallen. The desperate panic that had been her companion since his death tightened her chest. Felt as if she’d just been here. Just seen it. As if it was still happening and wouldn’t stop. She was going to burst.
“What do you see?” Mason’s voice was almost gentle. He respected her loss. She remembered how he could be kind when he wanted to be. It’d surprised her years ago, so it shouldn’t have now.
He would know about her House’s ability to see the umbra trails of mages. Every mage did. But right now, she could perceive nothing. Just the cold, gray day. A dank heaviness to the air.
“Cari?” His low tone plucked a bass string within her that resonated on a primal level. She remembered that too. The lingering vibration helped her find her voice.
“Okay.” Time to do this. She should have come as soon as she’d recovered. Fact was, she’d been scared to do it alone.
She called upon her umbra, and Shadow sprang readily from the concrete and saturated Cari’s senses with a rough wave of awareness that rushed her blood, mind, and vision. A week ago she’d had to pull and coax the stuff to do her bidding. But now . . . so very much breathless Shadow exploding from within her. A cold sweat broke out on her skin, but she could see the dark paths of what had to be herself and Mason trailing to and from the parking lot. She wasn’t interested in them, so she pulled harder, felt herself grow somehow bigger, grow vast as she fought time, forcing it to reveal the Shadow trails that had passed
before.
Her attempt to look back in time should’ve been laborious, but today turning back the clock was easy.
You are the Dolan now,
said a strong voice in her head. Her father’s?
I am the Dolan,
she repeated, understanding that this ease of power was part of her inheritance, and how she would keep her House strong in his absence. There were so many things that she would have to work for now that her father was gone—every day seemed more difficult—but it seemed that Shadow wasn’t one of them. She hoped that it would give her the edge to survive, to honor her House and his memory.
Starting now . . .
No mages had walked these paths since her father’s death, so the very first silhouette to form out of magic was his own. And next to him, what had to be hers. Yes, that was her, though it was difficult to recognize herself. She seemed like a stranger.
And there were the guards as well, who’d been following them everywhere since the May Fair Massacre. The two imprints they made were full-bodied Shadow, filled with constellations of dark light.
She remembered a few humans, the executives, who had joined them as they crossed the courtyard to enter the big ship, but no sign of their ephemeral passage remained.
Cari could see no one else, no killer, in their group, no mage lurking nearby, but had to witness once again the moment her father staggered. She sobbed openly as it all played out again.
Cari-from-before lunged forward to help him up.
Her father swiped a command at the guards to get her away. She’d missed the gesture before—that her father’s last act was to protect her.
The guards pulled her away as she fought them. Her arms had clawed the air for purchase. Back into a car, where she’d started to shiver herself. One guard sped her away, while the other returned to kneel by her father.
The Cari of today filled with desperation. Who had killed him? Where was the assassin?
She demanded more Shadow, more magic.
And it came to her. Easily.
The Earth was thrown into darkness; a black wind scoured the ground. The ship became a wrecked vessel, foundering on the plain, as ancient trees populated its passage.
But no killer was revealed, no tell-tale sense of person, whom she could later identify.
Too many days had passed. She should’ve come earlier, no matter how sick or afraid she’d been.
A sudden prickling in her mind warned her that someone was near. Now. The assassin?
Who’s there?
She whipped around, but saw only the smoking Shadow of Mason’s tall, broad-shouldered form, waiting for her nearby.
A breath on her neck. She whipped the other way. Someone was definitely here. And not as a thumbprint left behind at the scene of the crime. Someone was here now.
Mason shouted Cari’s name from far, far away. He sounded urgent.
So she released her pull on Shadow. Gladly, to get away from this feeling of being watched. Stalked.
The humid gray of the present settled back upon Cari and her vision dulled. Magic washed away from the plain before her, the ship and its wake coming back into the ordinary.
“What happened?” Mason demanded.
A girl!
Maeve’s joy sent birds leaping upward from the branches of old trees, bowed with magic, and into the Twilight sky. All the creatures of faerie sang a lament of delight.
And she was just now trying her power. Which meant Caspar was gone to dust and his heir was female. Maeve loved surprises, how they burst within the breast. The stubborn old man hadn’t told her anything!
The Dolan males didn’t fit Maeve well enough for her
to see
or
to feel
or
to thrill
to the pleasures of the mortal world. Neither did males offer the chance
to cross
into that realm and partake of the pleasures in person. Only
a girl
afforded that chance.
And Maeve was going to snatch it up. A hunger lengthened her nails to claw for purchase in that realm.
The last female Dolan heir had been such a disappointment—she’d been too obstinate and hard, like the age into which she’d been born. Her death had come before a solemn and gray tribunal of humans. Their faces had been as pinched and cold as the lives they lived. They’d spurned color in their apparel for piety, and had bent the exquisite passions of the body toward the ecstasies of suspicion and hysteria—the witch hunt.
Maeve enjoyed these, too—anything that quickened the blood was good. But not if they killed the Dolan! Her House had spurned her for madness, and the girl wouldn’t do anything to save herself. She’d wanted oblivion, if only to shut Maeve up.
So unkind. So ungrateful.
A loop of rope had gone round the Dolan’s neck.
Maeve promised her power and riches and sex, one last time.
The girl did not reach for Shadow. She hummed to herself, urgently, as if that would block the voice in her head.
A nod from an ugly man in black.
A brief blur of motion. Then a
crack
, bringing darkness.
Centuries of darkness.
Now Maeve peered through the new Dolan’s eyes at a smoky stack of man nearby.
Much better view. A Dolan girl after Maeve’s own heart.
The man’s features were cast in Shadow, though his soul burned bright blue and sharp like a star in the void. A half-breed. Best of both worlds. His shoulders were wide, legs braced. She giggled, imagining what hung between them. The angles of his form, the cut of muscled youth. She wanted to stroke his naked body with her mouth. Take a bite somewhere juicy.
If the new Dolan heir saw him this way, then yes, Maeve had finally found her match.
She hadn’t had a girl in
so
long. The Dolans bore too many sons. They didn’t know that desiring sons was a human conceit, not worthy of magic.
But a girl . . . !
The lesser fae that followed in Maeve’s wake made a quailing sound—fear, joy—it didn’t matter as long as the noise lifted to the sky. Twilight’s trees shuddered, the craggy old beasts. They didn’t know fun. Or pleasure.
“Cari,” the man said.
Maeve leaned in to taste his voice.
Cari
seemed to be made for his throat, his tongue.
Maeve’s heart fluttered. She wanted to be pierced by the star of his soul.
Pierce me!
She laughed. Human men, young ones, were glorious. She could eat him alive.
Maybe she would.
The new Dolan, Cari, turned at the man’s call. Maeve did too; they’d live in tandem like this. One to another. Flesh to faery.
The new Dolan was a gift.
Caspar had kept his child secret from her. But he’d loved Maeve all the same to have sired a female for his heir. After the years they’d shared, the Shadow she’d delivered into his keeping, just see how he’d blessed her back.
Cari Dolan. Maeve would see to it that she had
everything.
Mason grasped Cari by the shoulders, and shook the Shadow from her clouded eyes. He’d seen many mages work Shadow, but this was the first time he’d seen Shadow work a mage.
The Cari he remembered had had control. She’d been a credit to her House, everyone said so. She was the example held up to others—accomplished, graceful, smart. Heir to the old and mighty Dolan House. Liv had been friends to her face, but had hated her behind her back. “Perfect Cari.”
Shy Cari. Sweet Cari. Sly Cari. If you knew what to watch for.
The umbra thing. That had to be it. The Shadow within. Mason had always thought it was a passive ability, an almost intellectual one, considering how present and mindful Caspar had always seemed. Cari, too, for that matter. The Dolans were rarely given to the drama so frequently found in other mage households.
But the way Cari had been overcome just now—her skin taking on that anti-luminescence. The crawl and grasp of Shadow around her body had made him think that she was receding from the world instead of calling on the magic within it.
He was sure that the Dolans knew their business, but this seemed . . . off. Not wrong, necessarily. But inside-out.
Cari didn’t fight his grasp, but when awareness came back into her gaze, she turned her head to the side—still shy, then—and shivered.
“Are you all right?”
She squirmed a little, as if to stretch. He could feel the darkness within her flex.
Mason tried not to curse. He didn’t want to be . . .
rough
in front of her.
“I’m fine,” she answered.
“You don’t seem fine.”
She lifted her black gaze. “I’m excellent, in fact.”
Somehow her skin, even through that tidy dress, was too hot. Or too electric. Dangerous, anyway. It had always seemed dangerous to get too close to princess Cari. Mason let go of her. Strays weren’t fools. “Did you get what we needed?”
Her expression gathered. The sadness he recognized. And frustration. Whatever had gripped her was passing. Good.
She shook her head. “It’s been too long. I should’ve come back immediately.”
“You sensed nothing?” He couldn’t quite believe her, after all that.
Her mouth tightened.
“There’s more,” he guessed. That mouth never lied. Someone should let her know before the wrong person discovered her tell. She had a House to protect.
“Maybe the fae,” she suggested. It sounded like the truth.
He had to make sure. “The fae?” Creatures of Twilight were drawing closer. And with all the Shadow she’d just used, the fae would be attracted.
She shrugged. “I don’t know.”
Mason looked away to take a deep breath. This was going to take time. They’d just started. And finding a killer was nothing Cari had been prepared for. They’d put it together. Eventually.
It’d be easier if he hadn’t liked her so much back then, when they were kids. It made him worry for her now.
His vision focused on a group of people—humans—who were watching him and Cari from across the courtyard.