As if she could read my thoughts, she asked. “What is your fee?”
“I suppose that depends on who is paying.” I’d charge the Devil of Darkvale—Grey, as I now thought of him—a hell of a lot more because he was rich as Croesus. But someone who didn’t have a lot of money? I’d charge them less.
“I can afford it,” Seraphia said. “Or at the very least, the library can. The book is from their collection, after all.”
“Then we’ll work it out after the fact.”
I rose and strode over to the book.
My skin prickled with awareness at the slight pulse of dark magic coming from the leather and paper.
“You might want to sit,” Seraphia said. “First time I touched it, I fell on my arse.”
I took her advice and slid into a chair, feeling their gazes on me. I drew in a breath, focusing on the object in front of me and on the magic welling inside me.
Control.
I needed to see what I wanted to see. Not whatever blasted out at me.
I looked at Seraphia. “What do you most want to know about this book and its dark magic?”
“Why now? It’s been in the collection for years, I think. So why is it now saturated in evil? And who took the pages out of it? Why?”
I nodded, then turned back to the book and ran the question through my mind.
Tell me why.
The book seemed to pull at me, an unnatural tug that I’d never felt before. As my fingertips grazed the smooth leather cover, pain slammed into me, followed by a vision of the city wall. I gritted my teeth and kept contact with the book, trying to narrow in on the vision.
Where was this?
Somewhere in Guild City, definitely. I recognized the large stone blocks that made up our city wall. They had been laid in a distinctive pattern and occasionally seemed to shimmer with magic. This was definitely Guild City…but where?
I tried to memorize the stones, then opened my eyes. The interior of the book called to me, and I flipped it open, searching for the missing pages.
Dark magic seeped from the book, coating the air in a sickening, oily sheen, and I held my breath as I laid my fingertips on the stumps of the torn pages.
Who did this?
Nothing, not so much as a hint, as if there were a steel wall between me and the information.
“It’s protected by a charm,” I said. “Someone has used magic to conceal their actions.”
“What did the pages used to say?” Seraphia asked.
I asked the question and once again hit the same wall. “I don’t know. That information is hidden from me.” The vision of the wall flickered in my mind. “But I’m seeing a section of the city wall. I think our answers are there. It’s…pulling at me.”
It felt wholly unnatural. Cursed.
I shuddered.
What the hell was going on?
2
Carrow
“Let’s go find it,” Mac said.
I withdrew my hand from the tome and nodded, trying to shake off the sickly feeling. “Yeah, our answers are definitely there.”
“Where, exactly?” Seraphia asked.
“A section of the city wall, but where precisely…I’m not sure.” I closed the leather cover, still feeling the pull from the city wall, and stood. “I think I can find it.”
Seraphia jumped off the couch. “I’m coming.”
I nodded at her and grabbed the book, holding it away from me. Just touching it made me feel queasy.
“Let me get a bag.” I hurried to my little bedroom, which was already cluttered with clothes. The books that my dead friend Beatrix had given me had pride of place on the bedside table.
Quickly, I rifled through the old armoire that Mac had found at a car boot sale—only magic could fit an armoire into a car boot—and found the leather messenger bag inside. I stuffed the book into it, grateful to feel the magic dim.
I returned to the living room, and the three of us hurried down the stairs, spilling out onto the street. Fortunately, the rain had slowed to a faint drizzle, and the early afternoon sun was trying to peek through the clouds.
“So all you could see was a section of the city wall?” Seraphia asked.
“Yeah. I don’t think I was even supposed to see that much. There’s a spell on this book that’s meant to stop a seer’s vision, I think.”
“But you’re not a seer,” Mac said.
“I think that’s why I can see part of what the book wants to hide.”
“What are you, exactly?” Seraphia asked.
“Um…”
She held up her hands, an apologetic look on her face. “Sorry, sorry. It’s rude of me to ask.”
“The truth is, I don’t know what I am, exactly.”
“Let’s get a move on,” Mac said.
I smiled at her, grateful for her ability to deftly move the conversation off me.
Seraphia nodded enthusiastically.
I turned and headed down the street, following the tug of magic that pulled me toward the edge of the city. We hurried along winding streets dotted with a variety of shops built hundreds of years earlier, their Tudor fronts—dark wooden beams, white plaster, and glittering mullioned windows—holdovers from the age of Elizabeth I. The windows of these businesses displayed potions, weapons, spells, books, and restaurant tables set with smoking cocktails. People laughed and talked inside, magic sparking around them.
Here and there, huge trees grew out of the pavement, ancient relics of the past that had remained undisturbed for centuries. Fairy lights glittered around the branches.
The vision of the wall directed me to the gate preferred by my friends and me—one of many entrances to the city, a magical portal that led directly to the Haunted Hound pub, where Mac worked with Quinn. Before we reached the gatehouse, I was drawn to the right, and I made for an alley that was dim and dusty despite the watery sunlight.
“I don’t go down here much,” Mac said.
“Me neither.” Seraphia stuck close to us as we entered the narrow space.
I led the way down the seemingly endless passage of brick and stone. The cobblestones beneath my feet were uneven, and the walls were without windows or doors.
“This must be the narrowest street in town,” I said.
“And long.” Mac moved closer to me and peered around my shoulder.
We hurried down the corridor, the walls of the buildings on either side nearly scraping against my jacket. About fifty meters later, we arrived at a clearing that separated us from the city wall.
“Ah, No Man’s Square,” Mac said.
“What is that?” I inspected the space. There were many clearings around town, most of them situated in front of the guild towers that punctuated the city walls at irregular intervals. In most such areas, shops and restaurants filled the buildings at the edge of the clearing, but here, the buildings were abandoned and boarded up.
“There’s no guild tower in this square.” Mac pointed to an empty expanse of wall that pulled at me strangely. “This area is deserted. There may have been shops and restaurants here once, but not in my lifetime.”
The grass in the square was damp and scraggly, with wildflowers blooming in patches. The vegetation looked weak and limp, as though struggling to suck nutrients from the oppressive air.
The city wall, constructed of massive stones, rose tall and beckoned. “Where are we in relation to the gate that leads to the Haunted Hound?”
“Not far,” Mac said. “It’s to our left a few hundred meters, as the crow flies.”
“Are there any guild towers between here and there?” I asked.
“No. The closest guild tower is to our right, and it’s another few hundred meters away.”
“So nothing really happens here.” I eyed the statue of a man in the middle of the square. It was an ancient stone thing, worn and battered by time and the elements.
A bird sat on top of its head, black and regal.
“Is that Eve’s raven?” I asked.
Mac tilted her head. “Maybe. But don’t ask her.”
Our fae friend was followed everywhere by a black raven she claimed not to see. I’d learned the hard way that she got plenty annoyed if you asked her about it.
“Who was that guy?” I asked.
“Councilor Rasla.” There was a slight edge to Mac’s voice. “Bloke’s been dead a few hundred years, but he was the one who put the strict guild rules into place.”
“That everyone must join one?” I asked. “No weirdos allowed in Guild City?”
“That’s the one.” Mac’s lips twisted.
“Jerk.”
“It explains why all the local birds are using his head for a loo.” Mac pointed to the statue, which was covered in white drips.
I smiled, but even the joke wasn’t enough to distract me from the tug on my soul. I slowly approached the wall, curiosity pulling at me. As I cut across the grassy square, I avoided the larger clumps of flowers that were wet from the rain. The day was too cool to get my trousers soaked.
But the closer I came to the wall, the more strongly it pulled.
It almost…sang to me.
I picked up the pace, forgetting my reluctance to wade through the flowers. Vaguely, I recognized that the calves of my jeans were getting wet, but I plowed onward, determined to reach the wall.
What was it about this place?
“Carrow!” Mac’s voice sounded from behind me, echoing slightly with concern.
I could barely hear it.
I kept going, unable to resist the wall’s siren call.
I reached it and pressed my hand to the rough, shimmering stone. Magic. Mac shouted my name again, but the stone wall held my attention. It pulsed, changing in temperature from cool to warm. Dark magic surrounded it, sickening me, but my fascination with the wall was stronger than my discomfort.
A vision flashed in my mind of me walking into the wall, stepping through the stone, which should be impossible.
What happened here?
I asked the question but got no answer. Again, that steel barrier flew up between the information and my vision. This place was also protected by a spell.