Magic Mourns by Ilona Andrews Page B

I grabbed the little toy car and hid it in my fist.
    Raphael was a mere shadow in the distance. I burst into a run. It felt like flying, light and easy. My muscles welcomed the exertion and I sprinted, catching him with ease. Together we dashed through the woods, two humanoid nightmares, fast and slick, our voices faint whispers on the draft.
    â€œI can’t see you.”
    â€œI don’t want you to see me.” I purposely picked my way so he caught only the mere flashes of me.
    â€œDon’t hide from me,” he asked.
    I ignored him.
    Suddenly he burst through the brush. I had no chance to hide. He saw all of me: my limbs, my face that was neither animal nor beast, my breasts . . .
    â€œYou’re lovely,” he whispered as he passed me in a burst of speed.
    â€œYou’re sick,” I told him.
    â€œYou’ve a perfect union of human and animal: proportionate and elegant and strong. Your form is what we aspire to. How’s that sick?”
    â€œI’m a human!”
    â€œSo am I. You don’t have to hide from me, Andrea. I think you are beautiful.”
    Nobody, not human, not shapeshifter, not even my mother had ever told me that the beast form was beautiful. Inside me, the human me put her hands on her face and cried.
    Miles flashed by. We passed a house in a blur of speed. Trees parted, underbrush snapped, and we burst into a clearing. A ward ignited with gold, barring our way in a translucent wall.
    Inside the ward, a dark-haired boy crouched on the ground, hugging his knees. Past him a dead vampire lay broken on the grass, its skull shattered. To the left, an unnaturally large snake was dying on the grass, a second vampire caught in its coils. The vamp’s neck was broken, its vertebrae crushed. Blood drenched the snake’s coils. With each new squeeze, more blood washed the scales.
    Past them, a ring of colonnades carved of pure white stone guarded a narrow apple sapling. Four yellow apples hung from the branches. The fifth apple, with a small piece bitten off, lay on the grass, by the hand of a dark-haired woman. She slumped on the grass. Her horribly distended stomach had ripped through her tailored slacks.
    Oh no. She ate it. We were too late.
    â€œNow look what you did.” A man walked up to us, his eyes fixed on Spider Lynn. “I done told you to leave the apples alone.”
    Raphael snarled. The fur on his back rose.
    The man was tall and broad-shouldered, built with strength in mind. Dark stubble peppered his face. He wore a white T-shirt, a pair of old jeans, and yellow work boots. A flannel shirt hung from his blocky shoulders. He looked like a good old boy in search of a porch with a rocking chair and a glass of iced tea. He turned to us and said, “Hi.”
    This was surreal. “Who are you?” I asked.
    â€œI’ m Teddy Jo.”
    â€œYou’re the man who called me about Raphael running from Cerberus?”
    â€œI called Kate,” he said. “You answered the phone. Do you have the bracelet?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œDoulos’s bracelet. You have it?” He saw the bracelet on Raphael’s arm. “Oh good then. We’re in business.”
    Lynn squirmed on the grass and began to cry. “What is happening to me?”
    Teddy Jo glanced at her. “You’ve brought this on yourself.”
    Raphael lunged at him. His clawed fingers closed about Teddy Jo’s throat, the bracelet glinting with steel on his forearm. “What are you doing here?”
    â€œWell now, you might want to rethink that,” Teddy Jo said, raising his arm. His sleeve fell back, revealing an identical bracelet, but made of gold. “Given as we’re on the same side.”
    Magic slammed my senses. Teddy Jo’s eyes turned solid black. The flannel shirt ripped on his back and two colossal black wings thrust into the night. Fire ran from his bracelet down into his hand and snapped into a flaming