the ice in the wind. I took a deep breath and let the cold take the edge off my headache.
Paul shut the door but did not lock it. He left his coffee in the car and unzipped his coat to allow easy access to his gun.
I was beginning to like this man.
“Witnesses say they saw her there.” He pointed to the elevator. “The story breaks up as to whether or not they saw anyone on the elevator when she got in it. No one’s seen her since.”
“How long ago was that?”
I walked over to the elevator with him. It looked like every other parking garage tiny metal coffin of death. An orange number three was painted on it, big enough it would split in half when the door opened. The wall next to it was tagged. Gang symbol, not magic glyph.
“Three days. Do you mind if I record this?” he asked. He had a small tape recorder in his hand.
“That’s fine,” I said.
I heard the recorder click. He said something in it, and then he sort of faded from my awareness. I could feel the lingering weight of the old spell in the air. I whispered a mantra, set a Disbursement. This time I was going for general muscle aches and fever to Proxy my use. I hoped that wouldn’t kick in until I got rid of this headache.
I drew a glyph for Sight, Taste, and Smell and pulled it toward me. I very carefully drew upon a small amount of the magic coursing through me and poured it into the glyphs.
My senses heightened.
The parking garage shifted. Lines of burnt magic, faint and far between, threaded through the air. People rarely cast spells in parking garages. Maybe a Locator so they could find their car or a Shield to keep them dry once they stepped out into the rain, but other than that, a concrete parking garage was just a concrete parking garage. There weren’t even any lead and glass lines to channel magic through here.
Which was why I was so surprised to see the heavy gold knot of burnt magic webbing the door of the elevator. Someone had cast a hell of a spell here.
Paul said it was three days old, yet it still pulsed with the slow throb of magic in rhythm to the city’s heartbeat. That was strange. Unless someone was paying the price to maintain it-to come back and pour more magic into it-it should have burned out by now.
I walked over, not caring that Stotts was taping me, not caring that the spell was centered around an elevator, not caring that a low pastel fog was gathering at the edges of the garage and slowly, slowly lifting.
The spell wasn’t complicated. It was clearly an Illusion glyph, cast to hide actions from another person. Under a strong Illusion spell, a herd of hippos could roll down Main Street and no one would notice.
If I were going to smuggle something or kidnap someone, this is the kind of spell I would use.
I leaned in toward the elevator door and took a deep breath, my mouth open so I could get the smell and taste of the spell on the back of my palate and sinuses at the same time.
It stank of burnt wood and something sweet I couldn’t quite nail. I drew my fingers gently along the thickest line of magic. A snapping tingle resonated up the marks on my arm.
I traced the glyph, memorizing the strokes, the turns, the twists. The signature was familiar. I traced the full glyph and then pressed my mouth against the strongest pulse of the spell, at the spell’s heart, to taste it. Cool metal of the door met my lips.
The flavor of hickory and sweetness bloomed in my mouth and spread out through me like I was drinking it down.
Magic stirred in me, and I wanted more, needed to taste the spell, the magic. I knew I had Hounded this signature before, knew I had been around this caster. There was more to it, more of the spell I needed to unravel, more of the rank sweetness hidden inside the lines of magic. I wanted to taste that, smell it, lick it.
Closer. I needed to be closer.
I pressed the elevator button, impatient and not caring that I’d have to get in the damn thing. The door opened. I took a deep breath.
And nearly gagged. There was Glamour here. A blocking and shielding that burned with anger, with strength.
Someone had hurt that girl. Hurt her and then taken her. I could smell the slippery musk of violence in the lines of the spell.
There was blood here too, but not on the floors, not on the walls. The blood was in the spell. I knew blood magic was usually cast by dipping the tip of a silver or gold needle or knife in the caster’s blood, and often the victim’s blood, and then drawing the glyph in the air with the knife instead of the fingers. Great care had to be taken that the blood didn’t touch any other surface while it was tracing the glyph; otherwise magic would not flow into the spell.
Blood magics hurt. Blood magics scarred. And mixed with drugs, blood magics could be the highest high ever obtained.
Which is why they were illegal except for during certain medical procedures performed by well-trained and well-regulated doctors.
It was very difficult to sniff out and separate the mix of blood cast in this spell. Every person’s blood carried its own unique scent, but the differences were so minute, it would take a better Hound than me to untangle all of them.
I stepped into the elevator, into the tiny space with no air and no room, walls closing down around me, magic clogging my nostrils, burning my throat, hurting my lungs.
Pain. Violence. Glamour. They didn’t see anyone on the elevator with the girl because the attacker had been hiding. In plain sight. But he had been there. He had been right here.
I knelt down, pressed my palm to the floor. She had fallen here. She had been frightened here. Hurt.
This is where the true center of the spell was located. In the faint burnt ash of the caster’s handiwork, I could finally recognize the signature.
A Hound had cast this spell.
A Hound I knew.
Pike.
I didn’t want to believe it. I traced the lines of the spell again. Inhaled again. Hickory, just like Pike; the glyph drawn just like Pike’s signature. And the blood, at least one of the bloods involved, was Pike’s. I was sure of it. He’d been bleeding this morning. I’d had plenty of time to learn the smell of his blood.
Damn.
But the sweetness that lingered in the spell, I had never smelled on Pike. It was the tang of sweet cherries, blood magic. Maybe Pike wasn’t doing house repair. Maybe he’d been bleeding for another reason. Maybe Pike was teaching Anthony, who always smelled like cherries, how to use blood magic.
But why would Pike kidnap the girl?
Maybe he didn’t think he was kidnapping her. He might think he was saving her. Saving her like he couldn’t save his own granddaughter who had been about her age. Saving this girl before Lon Trager could get his hands on her.
Or maybe Trager had already found Pike, cut his wrist, and told Pike this was the favor he owed him. I didn’t like any of those ideas, didn’t want to tell Stotts that my friend might be behind the disappearance of these girls.
My heart thumped against my chest as I looked over my shoulder at Stotts.
A wave of watercolor people gathered behind him. They took one slow step, two, slid past Stotts, slid
“Shit!”
“What?” Stotts said. “Allie? What’s wrong?”
The watercolor people lunged.
They filled the elevator, smelling like fetid death. Cold fingers stabbed me and I yelled at the pain. Fingers pulled magic off my bones like meat from a turkey. They stuffed the magic in their mouths and moaned for more.
I yelled again. Fingers slid into my mouth, sucked at my tongue and inside my cheeks. The taste of raw,
