He squeezed Fletcher. “Everything I say.”
Fletcher nodded.
“Keep your head down.”
With that, Mason adjusted his hold—the kid had grown; why did he keep doing that?—and plowed toward the nearest break in the crowd. He elbowed into backs and barged through groups. The rank smell of sweat hit his nose, that and greasy food too long in the sun. Blood, no, ketchup smeared up his arm.
The crowd made a sound of astonishment, one voice that rolled through the gathering, which had become a single organism.
Mason swore, though he usually tried not to around Fletcher, and craned his head to see what kind of magic had finally been used to break away from this place.
A black snake of Shadow darted and twisted above the heads of the crowd.
Mason didn’t recognize this kind of Shadow. What was it? Who controlled it?
He squinted to see better, adjusting Fletcher again, who was trying to see as well.
The sky snake of Shadow branched out, while rushing toward Cawl, who’d trailed off speaking and was gazing into the air. Guess he didn’t know what kind of Shadow it was either.
The Shadow spread into a dirty blanket of haze and enveloped Cawl.
Mason was too far away to see what the effect was, but the scream of the lady in the pink pantsuit made things clear enough. When Ranulf Cawl collapsed on the stage, Mason was pretty sure the mage was dead.
More black snakes twisted through the air.
And more screams rose from within the crowd. Like birds startled by gunshot, people scattered. Mason was buffeted by the rush, but dived into a jewelry stall to avoid immediate trampling. Others got trampled though. Strollers were abandoned, children clutched in parents’ arms. Humans and mages weren’t so different after all. Not where it really mattered.
“It’s going to be okay.” Mason put Fletcher down. The booth, with a thick plastic-and-steel girder, would protect them for the moment. “Stay right there.”
Mason’s attention was caught by a mage some twenty feet away, visible only intermittently through the flock of fleeing humans. Mason could see that he’d raised his arms to hold back the darkness, when he should’ve known that Shadow could permeate anything.
The murk descended upon him and the mage convulsed, his skin pock-marking with burns, as if from the inside. His eyes rolled back to the whites, then grayed to viscous ash, and the mage collapsed.
Mason came to a simple conclusion: the May Fair wasn’t about peace; the fair was a trap set for mages.
How many times throughout history had a hearty welcome been the early guise of a massacre?
He’d been so stupid. A stray ought to know better.
Mason looked to the sky, now polluted with thin Shadow. The death-dealing stuff was inking closer. The booth wasn’t safe anymore.
Mason hauled Fletcher outside. “We run. As fast and as far as we can. We run, or we die.”
Could an eight-year-old understand?
Mason would have carried him again if it would have been safer, but the humans had grown more dispersed, and frankly, Fletcher could run faster than he could. Kid had speed and power in those legs. Mason’s eyes burned as he cursed again. He just hadn’t anticipated Fletcher would have to run for his life so soon.
They got as far as the parking lot access road when black doom torpedoed overhead, poisoned Shadow picking out the mages from the panicked crowd.
They weren’t going to make it to the car.
Mason made a grab for his son, who was still in flight. Fletcher jackknifed in the air—the muscle in Mason’s shoulder shredded—but he brought his son to his chest and went down on his knees on the street.
He’d have prayed, but if there was a God, he’d long ago forsaken the Shadow born.
Mason curled his body around Fletcher. Screams of fear and pain ripped the air so close, Mason groaned. He strove to make a boy-sized hollow out of his chest and belly, kneeling on the pavement and hugging his son, hands splayed over Fletcher’s face and head, his own head bowed to close the man-made cocoon. Within his grasp, Fletcher trembled, his heartbeat fast like a rabbit’s. Mason’s own heart had stalled. His throat had strangled shut with horror. All necessary body function was diverted into willing his son to live, at any cost, including his own life.
Black, smoky arms of terror reached among the throng, brushing by Mason like whispers of vicious gossip. He felt the Shadow singing in his blood as it drew near; ironic that his aptitude with magic would help him know when his death was near. The dull thump and burn of a body falling nearby brought bile searing onto his tongue. Another mage down, moaning, then gargling into death.
“To the Webb wards!” Riordan’s voice, far away, rallying the stricken mages.
Yes, House wards would protect the mages who’d come to the May Fair. House wards were impenetrable magicks of safe harbor. And Webb’s wards were the nearest, just ten miles from the fair site.
But since Mason had no House, no wards, that option wasn’t open to him. To his son. Not yet. Though he would have begged if there’d been any chance or service he could have traded.
Stray mages were outsiders, no matter how friendly the handshake. How many times did Mason have to learn that lesson?
Humans whimpered and ran, their passage bumping Mason’s shoulder, riffling his hair, as if they were the ones at risk. Stupid. This was a trap for Shadowed blood.
Inside Mason was frantic: Not my son. Please, not Fletcher. Pass over. Pass him by.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Today was supposed to have been about peace, an opportunity to make friends.
Someone somewhere was laughing.
Mason ground his teeth against the burning in his eyes. He clutched Fletcher and vowed again, as he had a million times before, he’d do better for his son. Keep him safe. No matter what in blackest Shadow he had to do.
Chapter One
Cari Dolan sat on a hard straight back chair in the servants’ access hallway to the study, where her stepmother and stepsisters wouldn’t think to look. Her gaze was fixed on the white wall before her. Her eyes were hot and gritty, but she wasn’t going to cry. If she breathed shallowly, the smell of smoke from her father’s funeral pyre grew faint, almost absent. The rest of her was in a cold grip, arms folded for heat, her body painfully tense, which made moving an unthinkable effort.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a maid peek down the hallway, then dart back out of sight.
This chair was for Allison, the housekeeper, who was supposed to wait outside the study until called upon by a member of the grieving family. Like when Cari was four and her mom had died; her father had summoned Allison to take her from the room with the instructions to tuck her in bed and read a nice story and to stay by her side until her father could come himself.
Now the Dolan heir was hiding there instead of standing tall next to her stepmother and silently vowing reprisal. Part of her mage brain knew this was a time for heat and curses and dark plots, but . . .
Cari rocked forward, foundering in a wave of loss. She hadn’t been ready to lose him. To become him. She wanted her father back to protect her from the storm of everything that was to come. His loss made her feel so unready. So scared.
For several weeks now, starting with the Stanton May Fair Massacre, unexplained attacks on magekind had taken place. Shadow, the strength of magekind, had been poisoned, and the death it brought was a catching kind, a plague.
A quiet had settled over the Houses, a hush of abject terror. Some caught the plague from direct contact, falling where they stood in a fester of hot wounds. Others carried it unknowing with them back to their Houses. A touch here. A kiss. And the poison worked more slowly, but nevertheless, claimed its victims. It had riddled families and left heartache in its wake.