I took a deep breath, then flicked the packet of quartz dust into the air at the same time I swept the rune-inscribed fan through a strong arc, released my will, and murmured, “Optio.”
Light kindled in the spreading cloud of fine dust, a flickering glow that spread with the cloud, sparkling through the full spectrum of visible colors in steady, pulsing waves. It was beautiful magic, which was rare for me. I mean, explosions and lightning bolts and so on were pretty standard fare. This kind of gentle, interrogative spell? It was a treat to have a reason to use it.
As the cloud of dust settled gently over the sleeping boy, the colors began to swirl as the spell interacted with his aura, the energy of life that surrounds all living things. Irwin’s aura was bloody strong, standing out several inches farther from his body than on most humans. I was a full-blown wizard and a strong one, and my aura wasn’t any more powerful. That would be his father’s blood, then. The Forest People were in possession of potent magic, which was one reason no one ever seemed to get a decent look at one of them. Irwin had begun to develop a reservoir of energy to rival that of anyone on the White Council of Wizardry.
That was likely the explanation for Irwin’s supposed immunity to disease: The aura of life around him was simply too strong to be overwhelmed by a mundane germ or virus. Supported by that kind of energy, his body’s immune system would simply whale on any invaders. It probably also explained Irwin’s size, his growing body drawing on the raw power of his aura to optimize whatever growth potential was in his mixed genes. Thinking about it, it might even explain the length of River Shoulders’s body hair, which just goes to show that no supernatural ability is perfect.
Oh, and as the dust settled against Irwin’s body, it revealed threads of black sorcery laced throughout his aura, pulsing and throbbing with a disturbing, seething energy.
I nearly fell out of my chair in sheer surprise.
“Oh no,” I muttered. “The kid couldn’t just have gotten mono. That would be way too easy.”
I called up a short, gentle wind to scatter the quartz dust from Bigfoot Irwin’s covers and pajamas, and then sat back for a moment to think.
The kid had been hit with black magic. Not only that, but it had been done often enough that it had left track marks in his aura. Some of those threads of dark sorcery were fresh ones, probably inflicted at some point during the previous night.
Most actions of magic aren’t any more terribly mysterious or complicated than physical actions. In fact, a lot of what happens in magic can be described by basic concepts of physics. Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, for example, but it can be moved. The seething aura of life around the young scion represented a significant force of energy.
A very significant source.
Someone had been siphoning energy off of Bigfoot Irwin. The incredible vital aura around the kid now was, I realized, only a fraction of what it should have been. Someone had been draining the kid of that energy and using it for something else. A vampire of some kind? Maybe. The White Court of vampires drained the life energy from their victims, though they mostly did it through physical contact, mostly sexual congress, and there would be really limited opportunity for that sort of thing in a strictly monitored coed boarding school. Irwin had been attacked both frequently and regularly, to have his aura be so mangled.
I could sweep the place for a vampire. Maybe. They were not easy to spot. I couldn’t discount a vamp completely, because they were definitely one of the usual suspects, but had it been one of the White Court after the kid, his aura would have been more damaged in certain areas than others. Instead, his aura had been equally diminished all around. That would indicate, if not conclusively prove, some kind of attack that was entirely nonphysical.
I settled back in my chair to wait, watching Bigfoot Irwin sleep. I’d stay alert for any further attack, at least until Nurse Jen got back.
River Shoulders was right. This wasn’t illness. Someone was killing the kid very, very slowly.
I wasn’t going to leave him alone.
NURSE JEN CAME back in a little less than two hours. She looked at me with her eyebrows raised and said, “You’re still here.”
“Looks like,” I said. “What was I supposed to do?”
“Leave me a number to call with the results,” she said.
I winked at her. “If it makes you feel any better, I can still do that.”
“I’m taking a break from dating cartoon characters and the children who love them.” She held up the envelope and said, “It’s mono.”
I blinked. “It is?”
She nodded and sighed. “Definitely. An acute case, apparently, but it’s mono.”
I nodded slowly, thinking. It might make sense, if Irwin’s immune system had come to rely on the energy of his aura. The attacks had diminished his aura, which had in turn diminished his body’s capacity to resist disease. Instead of fighting off an illness when exposed, his weakened condition had resulted in an infection—and it was entirely possible that his body had never had any practice in fighting off something that had taken hold.
Nurse Jen tilted her head to one side and said, “What are you thinking?”
“How bad is it?” I asked her. “Does he need to go to a hospital?”
“He’s in one,” she said. “Small, but we have everything here that you’d find at a hospital, short of a ventilator. As long as his condition doesn’t get any worse, he’ll be fine.”
Except that he wouldn’t be fine. If the drain on his life energy kept up, he might never have the strength he’d need to fight off this disease—and every other germ that happened to wander by.
I was thinking that the boy was defenseless—and I was the only one standing between Bigfoot Irwin and whatever was killing him.
I looked at Nurse Jen and said, “I need to use a phone.”
“HOW SERIOUS?” Dr. Pounder asked. Her voice was scratchy. She was speaking to me over a ham radio from somewhere in the wilds of unsettled Canada, and was shouting to make herself heard over the static and the patch between the radio and the phone.
“Potentially very serious,” I half shouted back. “I think you need to come here immediately!”
“He’s that ill?” she asked.
“Yeah, Doc,” I replied. “There could be complications, and I don’t think he should be alone.”
“I’m on the way. There’s weather coming in. It might be tomorrow or the next day.”
“Understood,” I said. “I’ll stay with him until then.”
“You’re a good man, Dresden,” she said. “Thank you. I’ll move as fast as I can. Pounder, out.”
I hung up the phone, and Nurse Jen stared at me with her mouth open. “What the hell are you doing?”
“My job,” I replied calmly.
“The boy is going to be fine,” Jen said. “He’s not feeling great, but he’ll be better soon enough. I told you, it’s mono.”
“There’s more going on than that,” I said.
“Oh?” Jen asked. “Like what?”
Explaining would just convince her I was a lunatic. “I’m not entirely at liberty to say. Dr. Pounder can explain when she arrives.”
“If there’s a health concern, I need to know about it now.” She folded her arms. “Otherwise, maybe I should let the winged monkeys know that you’re a problem.”
“I told his mother I would stay with him.”
“You told his mother a lot of things.”
“What happened to not taking chances?”
“I’m thinking I’ll start with you.”
I felt tired. I needed sleep. I inhaled and exhaled slowly.
“Nurse,” I said. “I care about the kid, too. I don’t dispute your medical knowledge or authority over him. I just want to stay close to him until his mom gets here. That’s why I was hired.”
Nurse Jen eyed me askance. “What do you mean, it’s more than mono?”
I folded my arms. “Um. Irwin is a nice guy. Would you agree with that?”
“Sure, he’s a great kid. A real sweetheart. Thoughtful.”
I nodded. “And he has a tendency to attract the attention of … How do I put this?”
“Complete assholes?” Nurse Jen suggested.