Chapter 15

15

GAbrIEL

I was reeling from the revelation of our shared dreams, but like any good politician, I'd been trained to fall back on inanity when I needed room to think. If you got your companion talking, you could buy yourself time. Time was something I sorely needed if I was going to explore the implications of Evangeline's dreams bleeding into mine.

"Are you looking forward to getting Pothos back?" I asked. Pets and children , I could practically hear my mother telling me. People always liked talking about their pets and their children.

"Yeah, I've missed that little guy," Evangeline said. "If he was, uh, an actual cat I'd never leave him by himself for so long, but he's pretty self-sufficient, and Chanel can handle the rest. He's probably pretty bored, though. And he can get a little…" She winced. It was odd seeing Evangeline's expressions on a stranger's face. "I usually try not to let him get bored."

I considered the range of abilities I'd seen from the small, green monstrosity the witches seemed content to treat like a normal cat. "I can imagine."

"It'll be good to see the place," Evangeline continued. "That's the weird thing about magical buildings. It makes being homesick worse because you're also kind of missing a friend."

"You've been living there a while, I assume?"

She nodded, and her glossy bob bounced. "Since I came to Eldoria. So, a couple years now. At first, it was because the rent was cheap, but I got attached. The cheap rent is still a bonus. I love doing paranormal private investigator stuff, but trailing someone's spouse to figure out if they're secretly a werewolf doesn't really rake in the big bucks."

I bit my tongue so I wouldn't do something stupid like offer to shower Evangeline in riches. I knew instinctively that would not go well for me. If I wanted to shower her in riches—and I did, I wanted to see her in fine things that I had given her, decadent and happy, marked as mine… No. Not the time —then I would have to be more subtle about it.

Soon, the familiar fa?ade of Evangeline's apartment stood in front of us. The restaurant on the first floor had boarded up its windows, but the sign hanging in the door was still flipped to OPEN. Evangeline patted the brickwork next to the door that led upstairs like someone greeting a beloved pet, and the door swung open. The hinges creaked, and she frowned.

"Weird," she muttered.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"Chanel usually keeps herself in better shape than that," she said. "I don't like this. Keep your guard up."

I fought the urge to go up the stairs ahead of her. Evangeline was capable. Evangeline did not want to feel coddled. She took the lead, posture shifting into something combat ready.

We climbed the stairs slowly and cautiously. The apartment door was closed, but at a slight angle, and upon closer inspection, I realized it had been taken off its hinges and propped back into place. How had Chanel allowed this to happen? Evangeline twisted the handle, more out of habit than anything else, and it turned uselessly.

"Please, allow me," I said and moved the door out of the way.

Evangeline sucked in a breath.

The apartment was wrecked, and Chanel hadn't attempted to clean up the chaos. Someone had searched the place. Books had been thrown from the shelves, and papers scattered everywhere. Someone had even slashed the cushions on the sofa and the large, patched armchair by the window. The plants in the window ranged from limp and pale to desiccated, which was, while not a priority, distinctly odd. I wasn't an expert in magical dwellings, but one as developed as Chanel should have kept the plants from getting quite so close to death.

There was a ‘mrrp!' and a small green blur rocketed into the room, charging straight at Evangeline. Pure instinct had me throwing myself in front of her, but the blur simply scrabbled up me and threw itself over my shoulder at Evangeline, who cooed.

"Hi, sweet boy," she murmured. I turned and saw she was cradling Pothos in her arms. The cat was slamming his head against her chin and purring like a brand-new engine. "I missed you, too, sweetie. Yeah, hi, sweetheart. Oh, wow, that was pretty soggy." That last bit was in response to Pothos sneezing happily into her face.

I stifled a sigh and took my hat off, smoothing a hand over my hair. It was an old habit—one I hadn't been able to shake. It simply felt wrong to wear a hat indoors. As I inspected the damage, I saw the cushions hadn't been slashed with a knife as I'd first thought, but instead bore the telltale signs of claw marks and a smattering of grass-green fur. At least part of the chaos was due to Pothos's boredom.

Evangeline, still cradling Pothos, looked around the apartment. She was keeping it together, but it was taking its toll. Her lips were pressed into a firm line, probably pale behind the disguise's lipstick. Then she spotted something, and her face went blank, her eyes flashing with fury.

The cause of her rage seemed to be a large gray box on the coffee table. It was plastic, with a few dials and switches on it, and it looked like some sort of mass-produced piece of technology. One of the panels had been removed, and its insides were modified with strips of wire and ribbon. Runes had been painted onto the interior.

"Fucking hell." Evangeline snarled. "Gabriel, open the window."

I barely had time to get the window open before she snatched the thing up and threw it out onto the street below. It smashed into pieces, letting out a cloud of yellow smoke.

"What is that?" I asked, then looked down at the heap of plastic and metal on the street and corrected myself. "What was that?"

"A DIY magic sponge," Evangeline said. Pothos was winding around her ankles while she pressed her hands against the surfaces of the apartment. She swept her palms over the walls, the window frame, and the kitchen counter. "If you know what you're doing, you can modify a dehumidifier to suck up excess magic instead of water. They have more official-looking ones in museums with magical artifacts to keep stray magic from getting rowdy."

"Isn't Chanel powered by stray magic?" I thought I already knew the answer, but I was hoping I was wrong. I thought of the dead and dying plants. How much would it take to strip the magic from Chanel?"

Evangeline spared me a glance over her shoulder, eyes furious. "Yes," she spat. "That's how they managed to get in. They must have brought it along to neutralize her, keep her from putting up a fight. If whoever made that thing had done a better job, they could have killed her." The familiar scent of Evangeline's magic filled the air. "Luckily for us, they were pretty shit at it. I can fix this, but it's a goddamn good thing we got here when we did." She gritted her teeth, pushing magic into the building.

Pothos meowed at her feet, and Evangeline pulled one hand away from the cabinet to pat her shoulder. The cat sprang up and settled across her shoulders like a luxurious stole capable of malice. A bright vegetal smell began to mingle with the paper and jasmine scent that I knew to be Evangeline's. Pothos was helping, I realized, as a familiar should. There was a faint rustling from one corner—a book rising and wobbling back to its place on one of the shelves.

Chanel was awake.

"It's working," I said.

Evangeline grinned viciously and pushed out a final burst of energy, then sagged against the counter, rubbing at her chest.

"Hey, Chanel," she said softly, patting the linoleum countertop. A faded mug that read: MY FRIEND WENT TO THE MARITIME WITCHCRAFT MUSEUM AND ALL I GOT WAS THIS LOUSY T-SHIRT, wobbled to the sink, filled itself with water, and scooted across the countertop to butt against her hand. Evangeline let out a breath that might, under other circumstances, have been considered a laugh and drank the water.

"Thanks," she murmured.

I wanted to go to her, but I had no idea what she needed. I also had no idea what she would allow. So, I opted to give her privacy and gathered the scattered papers.

"I wonder what they were looking for," I said.

"No clue," Evangeline replied. "Me? The ascendancy array? A way to track me down?" She hesitated. "Maybe they were looking for you."

I kept moving, building my stack of papers. "We are known associates." I didn't relish the thought that this might have happened because of me. If it had been my fault, however obliquely, the least I could do was clean up.

"Known associates," Evangeline echoed in amusement. "Is that what we are?"

I glanced up at her. She was smiling, the curve of her lips half-hidden by the ghastly. "Among other things," I said, giving her a smile in return.

Now that Chanel had enough energy to repair the damage, Evangeline shifted her focus to finding the things she needed. She disappeared into the bedroom for a few minutes, returning with a half-full duffel bag and Pothos asleep on her shoulders. His green fur wasn't completely out of place with the coat, and he looked like a bold, if somewhat out of place, design statement. Evangeline rummaged through the books that had shelved themselves and grabbed a few. Once or twice she picked one up, scanned the index, and slid it back onto the shelf. For the most part, though, it seemed she knew the contents of her books by heart.

Once Evangeline had gotten what she needed, we went back out into the streets, side-stepping the smashed magic absorber. Pothos was still curled around Evangeline's neck. I was carrying the bag of books and clothes, mostly because I had won the race to pick it up before Evangeline could. I'd had an argument ready about the benefits of vampiric strength, but I hadn't needed it, for which I was grateful.

We made it two and a half blocks before I realized I'd left my hat—and therefore my disguise—in Evangeline's apartment.

"I forgot my disguise," I said, irritated at my own sloppiness. "I can run back and get it if you think Chanel is likely to let me back in."

"I think we should stick together," Evangeline said, keeping an eye on the streets around us. "We can go back for it, but it's not like?—"

Before she could tell me what it wasn't like, a skinny vampire darted out from a side street. He was tall, wild-eyed, holding a long knife, and charging right at us.

I moved without thinking, sweeping forward and knocking his legs out from under him. From behind me came a snarl, then a roar. The vampire stumbled forward a few more steps, then fell, and Pothos pinned him down with one huge green paw on his chest. In the time I'd moved, the little plant beast had become massive and grown a leonine mane bristling with poisonous flowers.

"Who are you?" Evangeline snapped, leaning over the vampire. "What the fuck do you want?"

The vampire struggled against Pothos's weight. Huge thorn-red claws slid out of the grassy paw, pressing against the man's chest. They weren't digging in yet, but it sent a very clear message.

"Sorry, sorry. Nothing personal." He gasped. "It's just that there's the bounty, and times are hard!"

"What bounty?" Evangeline snapped.

"For him!" The vampire started to point at me, but Pothos snarled sharply, and he lowered his arm immediately. "For… for the imposter Gabriel De Montclair. Some sort of changeling stole his face, and there's a reward for its capture!"

"How big a reward?" I asked.

Evangeline let out a low whistle when the vampire gave us the number. I swallowed hard. Very few people would turn up their noses at that amount of money.

"Tell us what you know about this bounty," Evangeline demanded. The vampire hesitated, and she raised an eyebrow. "Tell us, or I'll let my cat play with you for a while." The claws dug in just a little. It was enough.

"The imposter's to be brought to the citadel," the skinny vampire said quickly. "Alive. No staking him, or the deal's off. S'posed to be taken directly to Lord De Montclair."

Evangeline met my eyes over Pothos's back.

"Who knows about this?" she asked the vampire.

"Everyone, lady," he said. "Where've you been? It's in the news and everything."

"We should go," I muttered. "We should go right now. We've drawn too much attention."

And we had. Above us, curtains twitched as the people hidden away in their homes watched us. A little ways away I heard a door creak open slowly, as though whoever was peeking didn't want to be noticed.

People appeared from the side streets and doorways. I spotted a few gaunt vampires moving alone or in pairs, and a handful of werewolves stuck close together. A bounty that large would be tempting, even split between an entire pack.

"You're right, we need to get out of here," Evangeline said. We were back-to-back now, trying to ensure that at least one of us had eyes on each possible attacker.

"Now would be a good time to teleport away," I muttered, quiet enough that the skinny vampire couldn't hear it.

"And let all these people find out I can do that?" Evangeline whispered back.

I risked a glance over my shoulder at her, and she tilted her head toward Pothos. "Follow my lead," she said. She broke out of our makeshift formation and threw herself up onto Pothos's back like he was a horse, reaching a hand down for me. I took a split second to curse the choices I'd made in my life that had led to this precise moment and swung myself up behind her, burying my hands in Pothos's mane. The huge cat charged, bounding down the streets, and leaping over the pack of werewolves.

Our surroundings blurred as Pothos ran, growling happily to himself. I could practically feel the cat's delight. After so long cooped up in the apartment, he could finally run as fast as he wanted to.

Toward the edge of town, Pothos's energy began to wane, and he started to get smaller and smaller, until riding him became comical, then impossible. Our feet hit the ground, and then he was the size of a regular cat. Evangeline scooped him up and scratched his cheeks.

"You did so good, buddy," she told him. "You were so, so fast! You're gonna get an award for being the best at zoomies." She looked at me expectantly.

I floundered for a moment. "Yes," I said finally. "We're all… very impressed. I'm sure your trophy will be sent out posthaste."

Evangeline nodded in approval. Pothos yawned at me, showing every single one of his teeth. They went deeper back into his maw than they should have. It was oddly hypnotic.

Then, nearby, footsteps. This part of town had rough cobblestone streets, but the steps fell confident and even. Heavy steps, not trying to be quiet. The layout of the area made the sounds echo oddly, bouncing them across the space. It made it hard to track by ear.

I didn't have to worry about that for long. The man who stepped forward was hard to miss. He was tall and broad, perhaps towering to eight feet. His coat added to his bulk. It was a leather duster, the sort of thing that, on someone without the confidence to pull it off, would look like a try-hard affectation. The man in front of us looked like he had never thought about affectations, nor did he look capable of spelling the word. His hair rode the fine line between dramatic widow's peak and premature balding and was pulled back into a short, tight ponytail, giving the effect that his head had been painted a dark brown.

Evangeline muttered a curse.

"Is that Pothos?" the man asked with the voice of someone who smoked a pack a day and followed it by eating a sheet of sandpaper.

I started. How did this man know Evangeline's cat? His eyes narrowed. They were so dark there was no telling where the irises started and the pupils ended. I'd seen eyes like that before, but only ever on the fair folk. He had a hand on his belt, clearly ready to draw a weapon.

The huge man cocked his head. "Where Pothos is, Evangeline's never far behind."

"John Galehaut," Evangeline reported in a low voice. "Gale to his friends. Magical bounty hunter. Half-fae, probably giant. Magical training of a witch, sense of morals of a fairy. We've crossed paths before."

I grimaced. "Will he let you go?" I whispered back.

"One way to find out," Evangeline said grimly. She stepped forward and took off her hat. The disguise shimmered away.

"Hey, Gale," she said. "We don't want any trouble."

"Oh, good," Gale said. "Neither do I. Got no business with you, Ange, I just need the vamp."

Evangeline squared her shoulders and planted her feet, staring up at the man. "How's the eye healing up?" There was a barb in that, I could tell. Retaliation for being called Ange, probably.

Gale barked out a laugh. He ran a hand over one of his eyes, wiping away a glamor. That side of his face was now a web of blue-gray scar tissue around a snow-blind eye. "I figured you'd want a chance to see your handiwork," he said, then slid the glamor back into place. "It's been great catching up, but I am here on business. This is your last chance to get out of my way."

Evangeline didn't move.

Gale nodded, then drew a crossbow. The bolt he fired went straight for Evangeline. He barked a command in a language I didn't know, and the bolt split into three pieces and parted around her, heading straight for me. I dived out of the way and the bolts slammed into a utility pole behind me, burying themselves into the faded wood.

Evangeline was readying a spell, but as she threw it at Gale, he shouted again and the cobblestones rose up in a wall between them, forming an arc around Evangeline. The blast of magic she'd thrown ricocheted back to her, and she dispelled it angrily before it could hit.

Now I recognized the language. It was the tongue of the stone giants, and anyone who was born to it could bend the rocks to their will. I was willing to bet that if I checked the bolts in the man's quiver, I'd find them all to be flint-tipped.

Gale barked commands like a shepherd at a trained sheepdog, and the cobbles were responding, trying to herd me and Evangeline together. Pothos was too tired out to do more than hiss and swat at stray pebbles that got too close. Evangeline was?—

Evangeline was holding back.

I had seen her fight before—more than I would have liked—and I could tell she wasn't even using all the strength she'd had before her ascendancy. Was she going easy on the half-giant? Was there more history between them than I'd initially thought?

There wasn't time to dwell on it. The stones were closing in around us, and Evangeline wasn't using enough power to get them out of our way. I shoved against one, and it barely moved. Ah. Now, that could be useful.

I grabbed onto the cobbles and vaulted up, springing to the top of the swarm of stones. I moved faster than I'd expected. The top of the makeshift wall was ten feet above the ground, and balancing on top of it put me far above Gale's head. How dare he? How dare he try to hurt me and mine?

I threw myself at him.

I aimed for his head, intending to grab onto him and cover his good eye, but I'd judged my own trajectory wrong. Instead of wrapping around him, I slammed into him with enough force that he was thrown back to the ground, although he managed one hoarse shout that got the cobbles to rise up and soften our fall. An unexpected advantage, and one I couldn't throw away.

The stones around Evangeline had dropped to the ground, but even without Gale directing them, they formed a heap five feet high. Stone giants. My mind raced. What did I know about stone giants? They were hardy and usually kept to themselves. Practically impossible to kill. But they had to have a weakness. Everything had a weakness.

"Get him over to that shop!" Evangeline called, clawing her way over the pile of stones. They slipped under her, but she kept her balance. Gale was still dazed, but he tried to shake me off. I grabbed him by the ears and slammed his head down against the stones once, twice. He groaned, not going limp, but no longer focused enough to grab for me.

I climbed off him, prepared to try to drag him, but when I grabbed him by the ankles, I could move him easily. The stones he'd called up to stop his fall were acting as a fulcrum, I realized. I hefted experimentally—his weight was significant but manageable. With a massive heave, I threw him across the square to the shop Evangeline had indicated.

Gale's bulk slammed into the metal boxes set against the wall of the shop, and sparks flew. He bellowed as he dropped to the ground. A few of the boxes cracked and swung open, revealing some sort of wiring I didn't care to identify.

"Come on!" Evangeline grabbed my hand and started running. I followed her on autopilot, and then there was the now-familiar jolt of teleportation.

I shouldn't have been able to do that, I thought as we made our way back to the safe house door. I was strong, but not that much stronger than the average vampire. I shouldn't have been able to take someone of that size down so easily. I certainly shouldn't have been able to throw him.

I followed Evangeline up to our shared room in something of a daze. As soon as we'd entered the building, Pothos leaped down from her shoulders and began trotting around the place, apparently exploring his new stomping grounds.

There was a moment of stillness. The frenetic energy from our mad dash and unexpected fight coursed threw me, and Evangeline was still panting from the exertion. Our eyes met. Her cheeks were flushed from running through the cold, her lips slightly parted.

The shimmering soap-bubble of stillness popped, and we surged toward each other. We crashed together in a rough, open-mouthed kiss. Evangeline's skin was still cool from the fall air, and for a nonsensical moment, I wished I could warm her, wished I could give her that comfort. Her lips were cold, but her tongue was hot and alive in my mouth, and when I sucked at it, she groaned, lashes fluttering.

I had more or less lost any spatial awareness beyond my immediate vicinity, so it was something of a surprise to find myself up against the wall. I leaned back against it and tugged Evangeline closer. She moaned and dragged her lips across the hinge of my jaw before doing something devastating with her tongue at the spot below my ear. I hissed and buried my hand in her hair so I could tug her mouth back to mine.

I'd never felt like this after a fight before. So strong, free, damn near unstoppable. My thoughts, such as they were, were all of Evangeline. Not just the taste of her or the familiar floral scent of her magic, but of how ferocious she was when she had to be. In another time, she could've been a warrior queen.

In this time, she had her head thrown back as I left a trail of teasing nips and licks down her pale throat. The heady thudding of her pulse seemed so loud, it should've filled the entire room. Our legs were tangled together, one of her thighs pressed against the hard line of my cock, her hips grinding forward. I reached between us, fitting a hand into the narrow space where she moved against me. The heat of her radiated through the layers of fabric as her blood rushed south and she grew slick and eager for me. I crooked the tips of my fingers into the fabric, and she gasped, her hand clenching on my shoulder.

"Off," she said, reaching for my shirt buttons. "Off, off."

I obliged. One of the joys of button-down shirts was that you could remove it without breaking a kiss, and I made liberal use of this trait as I stripped to the waist and let the shirt drop to the floor. Evangeline broke the kiss only to tug off her pants, which I deemed to be an acceptable reason.

There was another of those soap-bubble moments as Evangeline's hair sprung loose from its restraints, and her cheeks flushed a deeper shade of pink. Her lips were swollen and slick with my spit. She stood before me in an oversized shirt and her underwear—black panties, practical cotton, but with the barest hint of lace trimming the waistband. With my fingers on the jut of her hipbone, I brushed my thumb over the tiny bow that decorated the front of the underwear. She looked up at me as if hypnotized, her eyes dark.

Again, the bubble popped. I spun us and pushed Evangeline against the wall. She gasped and let me, yanking me down into brutal, devouring kiss. I grabbed one of her thighs and lifted it, encouraging her to wrap it around me. Her skin was smooth, and intoxicatingly soft. I dug my nails in to hear the soft, sweet sound of her moan.

As I reached for the hem of Evangeline's shirt, she put a hand to her chest. "No, leave it on."

I frowned but didn't push the issue. As much as I loved seeing Evangeline entirely naked, there was something to be said for this as well. Her bare legs, creamy pale and covered in constellations of freckles, went on for miles. I wanted to map each perfect mark with my hands, then my tongue, then my hands again.

Evangeline reached for my trousers, pressing a hand to the length of my cock through the fine wool. She squeezed just the right side of rough, and I hissed, hips bucking into her touch, which made her grin in triumph, as though this was some great victory. To be fair, every time I got to touch Evangeline, I felt as though I'd just done something incredible, so I couldn't judge her for it.

Evangeline undid my fly and pulled out my cock. She gave me a few quick strokes, and I had to close my eyes. The sight of her hand moving over me was dangerous, as was the pleased, hungry look in her eye. The adrenaline rushing through me urged me to push forward, and the rational part of me knew the night was young. Still, I didn't want this to end with a quick hand job. I tugged Evangeline's underwear down enough to slide two fingers between her folds, not pressing in, just teasing.

"Fuck." She groaned and moved her leg from around my waist, so her underwear could drop to the floor. I missed the sensation of her wrapped around me, so I lifted her thigh back into place. I gave a considering glance to the wall behind Evangeline and took a half-step forward until she was pressed between it and me, then reached down and raised her other leg.

Evangeline went still for a moment, then her eyes widened, and she allowed me to take her weight. With her legs spread to wrap around my hips she was spread open for me. I moved against her, watching my cock slide against her flushed cunt, and she gasped as the head brushed against her clit.

"Fuck," Evangeline said again, breathlessly this time. She reached down and guided me into her. It was somewhat awkward, and I had to cant my hips away to give her room to maneuver. But then I slid into her molten core, and any awkwardness vanished.

I fucked Evangeline with rough, grinding thrusts. She tried to move back down to meet me, but there wasn't much she could do in her position. All she had to do was relax and enjoy the ride. A steady stream of curses spilled from her mouth, although they began to be interrupted more and more frequently by moans she couldn't hold back.

Evangeline's eyes were closed, her head tipped back against the wall. I loved watching her like that. When she closed her eyes, any self-consciousness she had about sex fell away. She got louder, more expressive, and the expression on her face every time I hit the right spot was transcendental. Tiny, bright spots of pain ignited across my back as she dragged her nails over my skin, and it only made the pleasure more overwhelming.

I buried my face in the curve of her neck, mouthing blindly across her pulse, and she moaned, putting a hand to the back of my head to press me closer. Well, if she insisted. I gave her the barest prick of a fang, and she cursed, one of her legs kicking. I bit down gently, and Evangeline wailed, clenching around me in dizzying waves as she came. With the taste of her on my tongue and the pulsing of her body around mine, I followed her over the edge.

We were in the living room when Theo, Vic, and Marcus returned, looking tense and drawn.

"Any luck?" Evangeline asked them.

"Yeah. Yeah, we found something," Theo said.

"Wraithwood School," Marcus supplied. "It was before your time, I believe, Evangeline."

Her brow furrowed. "Yeah. The magic school, right? Closed down ages ago."

"Well. ‘Ages ago' is relative." Marcus sniffed.

"It's dead," Theo cut in. "It should've had enough background magic in it to maintain a strong personality for decades, even stronger than this place, but it's just… empty. I tried to communicate with it, but there wasn't anything there."

"The school used to have an incredibly vital presence," Marcus said. "It frequently played pranks on the students, and on the faculty. Never on the staff, however. It had a great deal of respect for the janitors."

"Something's been draining it?" I asked, thinking of the device that had been left in Evangeline's apartment.

"Someone," Marcus said. "Or something."