Ash was booked and shuffled off to one of the jail cells.

  13

  I sank onto the sofa by the fireplace in my office, running a hand through my hair.

  “Christ, what a mess.”

  Discovering that any Rogue had been allowed to exist in my territory was a huge problem. It undermined my authority and put my community in danger. No one ever hid their status because they were a saint.

  With Ash, as with everything about her, this complication was magnified by a thousand.

  There was no way this would stay under the radar. Not given that she had undocumented magic before, and certainly not given who her mother was. It was scant comfort that this was going to blow up worse for the Untainted Party than for me. Knowing them, they’d find a way to turn it to their advantage and paint Nefesh as the villains.

  “Levi?” Miles rapped softly on my office door. “You want to go question her?”

  He could have said “I told you so,” a dozen times over where Ash was concerned. He didn’t.

  I clapped him on the shoulder. “Yeah. Let’s get this over with.”

  We went down to the cells in silence.

  Ash looked up as Miles unlocked the cell door and held out her hand. “I want my phone call.”

  “You’ll get it,” he said. He was an imposing figure, but Ash didn’t shrink back as he stepped close and jerked a thumb. “Up.”

  “About time,” she said, and made a snarky face.

  Before I could escort her to the interrogation room, she did a double take, ripped off a scab to draw blood, and shot a red ribbon of magic into Miles.

  No, not Miles. Into some oily shadow that flowed out of him.

  14

  “What the fuck?” I yelled.

  Miles looked over his shoulder and jumped about three feet.

  “Don’t move!” Ash said.

  The shadow rose over Miles’ head, stretching towards Ash and me. The only thing stopping it were these red branches that speared through it.

  What had she done? Was she trying to kill us? I stepped toward the shadow, calculating how to disarm Ash with my illusion magic. But what if she hadn’t conjured that up? At least she was doing something, while I sat her with my thumb up my ass, totally clueless. I stepped back, my hands balled into fists. “Get it out of him.”

  “What do you think I’m trying to do?” she said. “Give it a facial?”

  “It’s in me?!” Miles hurled fireballs behind him that sent flames lapping along the walls and ceiling of the cell. “Where?”

  Cursing hard, I grabbed a fire extinguisher mounted outside the cell and doused the fire, yelling at Miles to stay calm.

  He didn’t like it, but he obeyed, holding himself in check, his entire body taut, and his breathing raspy.

  More of that shadow fucker flowed out of him, entangling in the red branches, but it was slowing to a stop. Was that a good thing?

  Ash swayed on her feet and I grabbed her arm to support her.

  “How do we stop it?” I said.

  She opened her mouth, then a curious expression flashed over her face, and white clusters sprang up like flowers along the branches, eating the shadow up. She sank to the floor, curled in on herself.

  15

  “It’s gone?” Miles said. He’d fallen back into his nervous tick from childhood of running his hand over his forearm when he got anxious.

  “Totally gone,” Ash said.

  Miles caught himself and dropped his hand to his side. “Thank you.”

  “Can you walk?” Ash’s Rogue status, this ghost-thing that I’d never seen before, it was all connected, and only one person had answers. I crouched down beside her, but she shook her head, so I lifted her into my arms.

  “Where are we going?” she said.

  “To talk.”

  Miles offered to take her from me, but this was my problem, and I had this absurd fear that if I let go of her, she’d find a way out of this, leaving me with a mess of questions and no answers.

  She tightened her hold, gazing up through half-slitted lashes.

  “You dying?” I said.

  “You wish.”

  “Then you’re checking me out?”

  “Just finding your jugular in case you get handsy.”

  I chuckled softly and repositioned her against my chest. Ash had such a hard shell around her that her softness came as a surprise, the silky fabric causing her to slide against me with every step. I kept my mind carefully blank and my hands locked in appropriate holds.

  The elevator deposited us on the executive offices on the top floor and I carried Ash to my office. She was trying to play it cool, but her eyes dared between each piece in my art collection. I could practically hear her brain whirring, attempting to figure me out.

  16

  She was still too pale, so I placed her on the leather sofa next to the fireplace and asked Miles to get her some juice.

  Ash snapped her fingers. “Illusions.”

  “What?” I moved over to my desk.

  “Your art collection. It’s all about illusions. Like your magic.” She was babbling. Good.

  The more unsettled she was, the easier it would be to get answers out of her.

  She was also right. I could count the number of people on one hand who’d figured out the theme of my collection the first time around. Underestimate her at my peril.

  Miles returned with a bottle of juice and claimed his favorite club chair. “What the hell was it?”

  I nudged my desktop pendulum into motion, its rhythm calming. “Show Miles the tattoo, then start at the beginning and walk us through this.”

  Ash chugged back most of the bottle before answering. “You believe me now?”

  “I don’t know what to believe,” I said. “One second, I thought you were attacking Miles, the next you’d speared some blurry black shadow that I hadn’t even seen until your magic touched it. That I’ve never seen before.” I gazed into the flames for a second, wondering how today had spiraled so far out of my control. “You say you’re not a Rogue, but you sprang into action without hesitation. For all I know, you could have called that thing up in the first place.”

  “It was instinct, not experience or training. I saved your lives tonight and I can prove it, but you’ll have to hear me out.”

  I glanced at Miles, who half-shrugged, then I nodded.

  Ash’s story was unbelievable, starting with a Mundane case, a blow to her head, and yet another shadow–that she called a smudge–that had caused someone’s death.

  17

  My magic shivered through me but I listened impassively. I’d woken up in a world that made sense, but every word out of her mouth unmoored everything I understood to be true.

  Magic didn’t just show up. Mysterious creatures didn’t just start rampaging. I unclenched my fists.

  Miles ended up calling our friend Mols in to examine the tattoo, while Ash insisted that we call Green Thumb and verify the earlier death.

  “Because whatever killed that guy and jumped into the woman,” she said, “was the same type of thing that flowed out of Miles. If I’d been behind it and wanted Miles dead, I wouldn’t have lifted a finger to stop it and since you couldn’t see it, you’d never have known it was me.

  Unless you think I had some other nefarious agenda in mind?”

  I hesitated. She had a point, but... “No.”

  “Bite me,” Ash said. Her indignance worked its way under my skin like a splinter.

  “Find out if there have been any other sudden heart attack deaths,” I said to Miles and motioned for her to continue.

  “I can’t explain why my powers didn’t manifest earlier or why it’s blood magic since I’m not some weird fetishist,” she said in conclusion.

  Yeah, well, that made two of us. And the jury was out on the fetishist part. The form that magic took wasn’t random.

  “In Kabbalistic terms, Nefesh is the animal part of the soul, correct?” Ash said.

  “Right.” I grabbed some bottled water from the fridge “Similar to Freud’s idea of the Id.

  Impulses, basic human drives, pleasure principles. Which isn’t surprising since Freud was well-versed in Kabbalistic philosophy.”

  18

  “Then correct me if I’m wrong,” she said. “Boiled down, magic, like these impulses, stems from our attempt to find whatever is pleasurable and avoid that which is painful, developing through childhood. It’s the instant gratification of our wants and needs, be they food, safety, love, or whatever, and it manifests in a fuckton of ways.”

  “Exactly,” I said. “Though people’s abilities vary according to how much they train and develop them.”

  “Regardless, I’m not jonsing for blood,” Ash said. “I don’t even like vampire stories.”

  “Maybe not consciously, but did you end up having a bunch of blood transfusions back when…” I cleared my throat.

  “When in my rage that Daddy Dearest had abandoned us, I went joyriding in my mom’s car and totaled it? Why yes, Levi. I did have a bunch of transfusions then.”

  I tamped down on a smile. She was as unflinching with herself as everyone else. Then I remembered that she was still a Rogue and any amusement drained away. “Blood would have meant life. Pretty strong desire.”

  “But I was already thirteen and the magic would have taken form much earlier than that.

  Not to mention, oh yeah, I didn’t have any of it before yesterday.” Her frustration at my refusal to believe her was almost palpable.

  “There are rare cases where extreme trauma influenced the magic. Changed the nature of it.”

  “You’re not listening to me. There. Was. Zero. Magic.” She squeezed the bottle, sending water flowing up over the top. “Besides, other people have been in accidents. Why aren’t there any other cases of blood magic?”

  “Coincidence that you know that or covering something up?” Miles said.

  19

  “Professional curiosity,” she said. “I’m interested in noteworthy crimes. Back in the 1980s, there was a case in London where a serial killer claimed to have blood magic. Freaked the cops right out, because they were imagining evil wizard movie crap. It turned out he didn’t and he was just a sick fuck, but the press had gotten so frenzied that Nefesh historians had to squash the panic, stating there were no recorded or anecdotal cases of blood magic. Ever.”

  I slammed my hand on the desk. “It’s magic. There aren’t exceptions to how it works.

  You had to have been born with it. You somehow hid it and the accident changed it.”

  Exhausted, I dropped into my desk chair, turning my back on them. Why couldn’t she give me something that would make the ground solid under my feet once more? How could I lead effectively and keep everyone safe when I had no clue what I was fighting?

  “Think logically about this, Levi,” Ash said. “If there are no exceptions, how come I was the only one who saw the smudge initially shoot out of Miles? It wasn’t visible to either of you until my magic revealed it. I was the exception initially. There’s also no way I hid magic from you all this time. I didn’t conjure that thing up and you know it. Something happened in the last twenty-four hours that made me magic. I just don’t know what yet.”

  If Ash could have used her magic to hurt me when we were teens, she would have trotted it out on more than one occasion, consequences be damned. I swore and swung the chair back to face them. “Was this the same thing that killed that other man?”

  “Same type. Exact same entity?” She shrugged.

  A flash of motion at the door caught my eye. “Mols.” I smiled. “Come in.”

  Miles hugged her and Ash introduced herself, allowing my friend to examine the tattoo.

  I didn’t believe the Star of David was relevant until Mols announced that this wasn’t an ordinary tattoo. The star was a ward. One that had been recently broken.

  20

  Ash wasn’t lying. She hadn’t willingly deceived anyone. Her magic had been warded-up.

  Why? And by who?

  She jumped up. “Get it off me.”

  Mols looked to me and Ash snapped.

  “It’s not his body,” she said. “It’s mine and I want this fucking ward off me. Now!”

  “You heard her.” A sour taste filled my mouth. Guilt wasn’t an emotion that sat well with me. I could have listen a dozen reasons why I’d been right to doubt Ash, but the distress I’d felt at this situation paled in comparison to the bone-deep horror she exuded now.

  My magic had been the source of some of my greatest pain, and yet the idea of someone depriving me of it without my knowledge was horrific.

  “How do I find who did this?” She gripped the top of the sofa.

  “I have no idea,” Mols said. “I’ve worked with tattoos and magic for years and I wouldn’t know where to begin.”

  “You were telling the truth.” I stood up, sounding more wooden than I’d intended. It was a tough admission. “As Head of House Pacifica, may I extend my apologies? Any charges about you being Rogue will, of course, be dropped and–”

  She nailed me in the chest with her water bottle. “Fuck your charges. Fuck your House.

  And most importantly, fuck you.” Grabbing her things, she made to leave but Miles blocked her.

  Ash swung around to look at me, primed for a fight.

  We still didn’t have answers and Ash, even if through no fault of her own, was still a Rogue. It would be madness to allow her leave, but despite her feisty attitude, a weary sorrow clouded her eyes. She was minutes away from breaking down and she deserved her privacy. Her dignity.

  21

  “She’s been through enough,” I said. “Let her go.”

  Scene #3: Fun and Games

  Life had been so much simpler when Ash had stuck to her assigned role in my world. I didn’t want to know that she smelled like summer, an airy freshness that brought to mind lazy hot days.

  I kept my eyes shut for the ride back from the auction, letting the blindness envelope me.

  It only made me more aware of Ash’s suffering: her chattering teeth and the tiny gasps of pain she tried to swallow.

  We got out at the Wickanninish Inn. The second the car’s engine faded into the night, I dropped the glamours and stumbled forward. Every muscle in my body had tensed up hard from holding that illusion too long, and the blindness hadn’t diminished one iota.

  “We’re not staying here,” I ground out, and jerked my thumb in what I hoped was the right direction. “One property over.”

  Ash pushed me down onto a bench. “Stay.”

  Stupidly, I hadn’t brought along the remedy for this particular side effect. It was a simple illusion that I’d never anticipated holding this long. Now I was at Ash’s mercy and I’d reached the point where I wondered if this was the time I wouldn’t recover.

  She left me alone for a while. I was glad of the fact if it kept her staring at me with a pity I could all too easily envision. The blindness was never so kind as to wipe out the images in my head.

  “When is this going to wear off?”

  22

  I started at the sound of her voice, arranging my limbs into a loose and relaxed position.

  “I’m fine. I need rest and food and there’s both at the cabin.”

  She sat down next to me, her body a long warm slide against my arm.

  “Why did you let me search the place?” she said. “If we’d gotten out of there sooner–”

  “Had we left, we wouldn’t now have the briefcase and one more smudge to destroy.” The half-truth came easily, the rest of the answer–that I would not show weakness–hidden by the shadows engulfing me.

  I raised my head at the sound of the taxi, but I wasn’t sure exactly where it was. All I needed was to crash into the door like some drunk idiot. That would hit the papers pretty damn quick.

  “Come on, babe.” Ash slid her arms around my waist and helped me into the car.

  Part of me wanted to lean into her and surrender all control, but in the end, the only one who could look out for me was me, so I held myself stiffly, careful of the message I sent with each step.

  The ride took mere minutes. I directed Ash to the cabin we’d been staying in, precise in my directions. The path was gravel and uneven, the lampposts were spaced far apart, and I still couldn’t see.

  “I’ve got you.” She sounded exasperated.

  “Why don’t you worry a bit more about yourself?”

  Ash let go of me, her footsteps growing fainter as she returned to the parking lot.

  Screw you. So long as I took it slowly, the gravel would lead me to the cabin door.

  Lurching forward like Frankenstein wasn’t ideal but neither was bashing into something and breaking my nose.

  23

  “Your current trajectory should land you in the ocean and out of my hair soon enough,”

  she said, sneaking up behind me.

  Had I gotten turned around somehow? “Can you help me inside?”

  Slowly we made our way inside. By the time I dropped onto the sofa, I was chafing at this damn blindness that made me feel as helpless as a child, knowing that it wasn’t just my sense of responsibility but my pride that had landed me here.

  “Can I get you something to eat?” she said.

  I shook my head. The hiss of the gas fireplace was the only sound in the room. I strained at every tiny pinprick of light, willing my vision to return.

  “The only things inside are the vial with the smudge and a thumb drive,” Ash said after a while. “It’s really a third-party smudge if we’re going to be technical. You know, already torn away and out there floating free, versus magic that’s inherently part of a person but has not yet been torn out, like what happened with Birthmark…” She was getting pitchy and panicky.

  “Fuck.”

  A comet of light streaked across my still-closed lids. I cracked one eye open and sighed.