“What were you thinking?” he said.
I gave him a grin, licked the blood off my split lip, wondered how many more little cuts Death magic had left me with this time.
“You wanted to use magic with me but were afraid we couldn’t control it. Which we did, I’d like to point out. I was tired of listening to you whine about it.”
“I wasn’t afraid of our control.”
“Yes. You were. You’d be stupid if you weren’t.”
He swore softly, didn’t meet my eyes. I wasn’t the one who ususally told the truth in this relationship.
“So we’re good now, right?” I wiped the side of my face on my arm. No blood. Maybe I’d gotten out of this one relatively unscathed. Or maybe there had been enough Life magic still in me it had healed up all the nicks. I licked my lip again. Blood was gone.
One point for Life magic, then.
“No,” Terric said. “We are not good. Using like this . . . uncontrolled . . .”
“Speak for yourself, mate. I was plenty controlled.”
He pressed his head back into the headrest and stared out at the rain. “You hit me with Death magic, Shame,” he said. “I could have killed you.”
“Already dead. Also, good luck with that. Also, also, we’re late for that baby shindig you wanted to go to.”
He focused on something over my shoulder and out the door, as if he’d just noticed we were still in his car.
“One last thing,” I said. “I think some of the people passing us called the cops. So getting the hell out of here might be in order. Unless you want to explain that magical explosion you just set off to Detective Stotts?”
“I set off?” He sat forward, turned the key. The engine purred. “You hit me in the face with Death.” He glanced out his side window. “And you broke my window with my head.”
“You were the one who wanted an outlet for Life magic so you could be stable around Allie and the baby Beckstrom.”
“Beckstrom-Jones. They’re hyphenating,” he said. “And there is a difference between Death magic absorbing Life magic and being a dick, Shame.”
“Don’t I know it?” I said. “If I’d wanted to be a dick, I’d have broken more than one window.”
“I don’t think that’s how it would go down.”
“Oh?”
“Life always wins. Always.”
I felt the best I had for the last couple weeks. I was pretty sure Life had won this time.
No need to tell Terric that, though.
“No, I just went easy on you, mate,” I said. “If it was a fight, a real fight? I’d win.”
“Why?”
“Because when it comes right down to it, you won’t cheat to get your way. You’re on the side of heroes, Terric.”
“And you’re not?”
I didn’t say anything. I didn’t have to. Hero hadn’t been in my job description since the day I was born.
Chapter 3
SHAME
Allie and Zay’s place out in St. Johns was a three-story farmhouse that backed the Willamette River, and was within spitting distance from the formerly secret crystallized well of magic.
It was a pretty place with a rock wall fence and a garden they’d expanded again because the Hounds kept planting weird vegetables like bottle gourd, kohlrabi, and rhubarb in it when Allie wasn’t looking. An old apple tree with a tire swing claimed the corner of the yard.
Hard to imagine two of the most powerful and dangerous magic users in the world lived here. Hell, few other Soul Complements in the world could come close to challenging their magical mojo. If I had to put my last coin down on two people who would always, no matter the circumstance, come out on top, it was Allie and Zayvion.
Which is why I found the whole baby-on-the-way panic they had going kind of hilarious.
Terric parked the car next to several others in the alley behind the house. “Ready?”
“It’s a baby bath—” I said.
“Shower.”
“Whatever. I’ve got nothing on the line here. How ready do I have to be?”
I pushed out of the car, lit a cigarette, and filled my lungs with smoke. I wanted to roll up on the balls of my feet and stretch, I felt so good. That tussle with Life magic had taken the edge off the hunger inside me, steadied my heartbeat and all my other vital functions. I almost felt normal, human. Sure, it wouldn’t last. But for the moment, it was plenty good enough.
I waited by the car, smoking, while he tried to pull his head together, tried to line up his thoughts. After he cast magic like that, he had to remind himself what a human did, and how a human acted.
Which was why we tried not to use magic in big doses, or at all, for that matter. It was just a delay of the inevitable. There was no way to get rid of the magic inside us. All magic came at a price, and we were paying out with our souls every time we used it. One day, Terric would no longer be Terric and I would no longer be whatever I was.
No rosy future for us. We both knew it.
We didn’t talk about it.
He finally got out of the car and paused before shutting the door.
“Have your keys?” I asked.
Took him a minute before he answered. “Yes.”
He was still just standing there. Looked a little lost.
“Did you bring a gift?”
He stared at me, and I stared right back. “For the baby? Or Allie, or however this thing works.”
The last brittle edge of light in his eyes finally slipped away, leaving the deep blue of sanity. And with it, Terric.
Good. I relaxed a little. It was hell to see him losing ground. I knew one of these days, he wouldn’t come back from our little meetings of magic.
“It’s in the trunk.” He walked back to get it.
“See you inside, then.” I headed toward the house.
The wooden gate between the stone fence had little pink and blue balloons fluttering at the top of it. They’d tied more balloons to the railing of the covered porch and over the doorway.
I chuckled. It used to be all bullets and battles with these two. Now it was babies and balloons. My, how we’d changed. Well, at least how they’d changed.
I took the last of the heat out of the cigarette, flicked it into the wet flower bed, and jogged up the steps to the back door.
Eleanor was already ahead of me, grinning and excited. It didn’t matter if they were dead or alive—women had this thing about babies. Also parties. So today was win-win for her.
I clomped across the porch, the voices from inside rolling out in that particular music of happiness and friends. I could feel their heartbeats, knew who they belonged to.
There were about a dozen Hounds in the house. I could hear the rhythm of Nola, Allie’s best friend, Violet, her stepmother, and of course little Daniel, Allie’s only sibling. Zay and Allie were there too, two hearts beating in rhythm.
Other than that, I quickly picked out Sunny’s pulse and my mum’s.
Great. My mother was here.
I paused at the screen door. Took a second to make sure the Death in me was deep-sixed. I hadn’t seen Allie for three months. I hadn’t seen my mum for at least two.
Allie and Zay never asked why I didn’t come around. They knew. And frankly, this was going to be a short visit. No one wanted to watch what happened when a Death magic user lost control of his hunger in front of a pregnant woman.
But my mum didn’t care that I was death walking. She insisted I show up at her dinner table occasionally.
“. . . worry, you got this,” Terric said as he slowly climbed the stairs behind me.
“What?” I said.
He paused. Then, “This attention problem of yours? There’s a pill for that.”
“Shut up.”
I opened the door and braced myself for the wash of living—the heat, the tangle of emotions, laughter, and conversation.