Shadow Hunt

CHAPTER 7



“I can’t release the wards,” Zander argued, facing off against Cam.

Ellie thought the mage was being remarkably brave considering the full blackness of Cam’s eyes. Her sweet man needed to get out of this Shadow as soon as possible, or the only one who could stop him would be her shadow.

“You mean you won’t,” Cam shot back.

“Not without incriminating myself,” Zander said. “So if you’re going to kill me, then go ahead. Gunnar will, and creatively, if he suspects I helped you.”

So they were screwed. After everything, they were still screwed. The only one who’d potentially come out on top was this guy, for doing very little. Ellie glanced at the window. The sky was going light gray as dawn approached. Sooner or later the household would realize that Mathilde and Slight were missing and initiate a search.

“Isn’t Brand coming today?” Ellie asked. “Couldn’t we explain everything to her and have her get us out? She’s the High Seat of the Council. Gunnar has to do what she says.”

Zander snorted. “There’s no way in all of Shadow that Gunnar will let you go after you killed his daughter.”

Cam bent his head and Ellie feared he might be coming close to the edge again. This place was driving him crazy. Driving her crazy too, but in a different way.

Damn her shadow for liking the smell of blood.

But when Cam lifted his face, she recognized his expression. That smooth flex of forehead meant he had an idea. He was thinking again. This was good. Ellie was suddenly hopeful. She’d gotten herself a smart man.

Cam looked up at Zander. “What if we exit the wards the moment Gunnar opens them for Brand when she comes to meet with all of us this morning?”

Brilliant, Ellie thought.

“Many have tried to dash through the wards,” Zander said. “All are cut to death. You’d have to be in motion before even knowing that the wards were being raised. It cannot be done.”

Cam smiled. “You mean I’d have to be able to see the wards rising before Gunnar commands them to do so?”

“Well”—Zander shrugged—“yes.”

“You get us through the house and across the grounds,” Cam said. “And I’ll do the rest.”

Cam’s sight, Ellie thought. He can see everything.

“And my debt will be paid?” Zander asked.

Ellie didn’t know what this debt business was, but she was all for it.

Cam nodded. “In full.”





Cam gripped his skull at the barrage of Twilight magic on his mind. He and Ellie crouched at the southernmost curve of the wards, protected from sight by dense foliage.

By now those in Martin House had to have discovered the murdered bodies of Mathilde and Slight. Cam could sense no movement in the Shadow around him, so he figured that they hadn’t thought to search here yet, but that didn’t give him any comfort.

The fae were talking to him again . . . coming . . . coming . . . coming.

The last time they’d done that, he and Ellie had been overtaken by Martin House.

A cold sweat dampened his salt-stained T-shirt. Ellie crouched beside him in her workout wear from yesterday as well. All of their other belongings were left behind in their room.

His attention was caught when she unrolled a small box from her waistband. His grandmother’s ring. He nodded to her, so glad she’d thought to grab it on the way out.

She flipped open the box and the diamond glittered under the morning sun and gleamed with a moody reflection of Twilight. “You were going to ask me something.”

. . . coming . . . coming . . . coming . . .

Maybe they should make their way farther along the wall. Maybe Martin had found their trail. Maybe the fae were actually trying to help.

Ellie nudged him with her elbow. “Cam?”

“You get that this is not the time . . . ?” he said, the phrase echoing in his mind.

Ellie grinned, picking up the thread. “Yeah, well can you tell me a better one?”

The gatehouse. It seemed so long ago.

She leaned in to him, and her proximity made the rush of magic thin a little. “I promised myself I wouldn’t say yes until we were on an equal footing.”

Cam didn’t understand. Who wasn’t equal?

“I didn’t want a keeper,” she continued. “Wanted you to trust me.”

“I trust you,” he said. Always. But now he understood where she was going with this. “But maybe we need more time to figure things out. Especially after—”

He didn’t like what he’d become. Didn’t trust himself.

. . . coming . . . coming . . . coming.

“After what, silly man?” Ellie put her forehead to his shoulder. “I think I know a shadow when I see one. We’re the same now, you and I. I can say yes now.”

Cam couldn’t speak. After that? After today?

She lifted her face. “You’d, uh, have to ask me.”

Heavy on the hint.

That she could still love him boggled his mind. She’d been there when he’d lost it.

She put out her hand and wiggled her fingers impatiently.

“I wanted everything to be different.” He took the ring from its velvet case, his heart doing heavy, wrenching things in his chest. “I had a whole dream for our future. How it was going to be.”

She made a face. “Don’t you think our odds are better if we both dream it?”

He couldn’t deny the logic. Brilliant woman.

“Marry me, then.” He slid the ring onto her finger. It fit perfectly.

The shadows were stirring, but the motion wasn’t coming from behind them. No pursuit just yet, but it would come; Cam had no doubt about that. Martin would avenge his daughter.

Cam stood and brought Ellie close to him to be ready.

The sun was a bright ball of hope rising in the sky. And superimposed upon the morning, the wards suddenly glimmered into a million stars. It was time. Brand must be approaching for the meeting at Martin House.

He wished Brand luck. She was about to walk into a war zone. Cam would not delude himself; that war would follow him and Ellie back to Segue.

Bring it on.

Cam grasped Ellie’s waist, pulling her forward into the moment, escape and a future all in one breath.





Read on for a glimpse of Erin Kellison’s

next full-length novel,

Soul Kissed,

available in September 2013.

Mason waited for his son to climb out of the car, then slammed the back passenger door shut. “One more time, please.”

“Ugh, Dad.” Fletcher’s gaze was off across the tire-matted stretch of grass that acted as parking for the fairgrounds. Families with strollers and groups of summer-ready teens slowly streamed toward the entrance and ticket booth.

“Fletcher.” Mason put a little warning in his voice.

Fletcher dragged his attention over. Sighing with exaggerated eight-year-old suffering. Repeated by rote, “I’ll do whatever you say.”

Mason didn’t like this, didn’t like it at all. It was one thing to go out into the open himself. Entirely another to take Fletcher. “One mistake—”

The eye roll, which was new this year. “Jeez, Dad. I know.”

Mason let the point go, though anxiety still riddled his nerves. He fished out a tube of sunscreen from a plastic grocery bag. “Hand.”

Fletcher held out a palm for a squirt. He smeared the lotion all over his face. When he was done, Mason had a Red Sox baseball cap waiting. And when that was settled on his son’s head, Mason held out a twenty-dollar bill. “So you don’t have to bug me for every little thing.”

Fletcher grinned, showing front teeth too big for his mouth, empty gaps on either side. The sight did something to Mason’s heart. It took so little to make his son happy. And so very much more to keep him safe. And yet, this was the time he’d been born into; better that Fletch start learning to handle himself now, before the world grew even darker.

They started across the grass, host to lots of small, biting flies. The grass grew sparse nearer the ticket booth, where the buzz turned to bees dancing around the still-sweet trash bins.

Mason had his head down to look at his wallet when he felt the telltale sing in his blood of a mage passing by behind him. He glanced at Fletcher, who kept his attention on the booth as well, though Mason knew his son had to have sensed the passage of Shadow too. The magic would have pulled at his son’s own senses. Having an awareness of Shadow nearby was a family trait.

Keep a cool head, and Fletcher will do the same. Mason had read about modeling behavior in his parenting books. He just hoped his son didn’t know what he did to make a living, or the teen years were going to be a nightmare.

“All right.” Mason turned. “Should we stuff our faces first, or do you want to hit the rides?”

Fletcher went for long-suffering again. “Rides.” The kid wisely left off the implied duh.

The sideways pie of the Ferris wheel loomed thataway. Other side of the fair. Mason put his wallet in his back pocket. “Come on.”

The Stanton public recreation department had gone all out for the city’s annual May Fair and Market. More interesting was the full-page invitation in the city’s newspaper, inviting the “Shadow people” to the event—a friendly, if desperate, measure, in an increasingly frightening world. The fair’s committee had elected to go medieval with the theme, probably thinking magekind would like it. As if mages hadn’t been around in every era.

The main path was festooned with ropes of fragrant flowers, all leading to the centralized park, where a many-ribboned maypole had been erected. Vendors lined the walkways with art, dragon jewelry, face painting, and sugar-crusted deep-fried donuts, the last of which made Mason’s mouth water against his will. Might have to get one of those. The bass and drums of live music bounced down the paths, though the band was playing at the far end, on a stage erected at the closed-to-cars traffic circle. Droves of people congested the walkways, some because the May Fair was tradition, but all hoping to spot a real live mage.

The public open invitation to magekind was a smart attempt on the part of the mayor to draw out his mage constituency and to show that he was friendly to their interests. Very clever. Risky, but clever.

In most places in the world, the idea that there were people with magic in their blood was still met with derision. And yet, it had been years now that soul-sucking wraiths skulking the alleys had been caught on mobile phone cameras and uploaded online. And though mage law forbade the use of Shadow in public, it was happening more and more often. Plus, the earthquakes last year had never been fully explained.

The awful truth? Shadow now saturated the world. Mages could feel the return of power in their blood. And they were organizing various interests to suit themselves.

The newspaper invitation had done its job, and the “Shadow people” had come, mostly for the fun of it. People with magic-black eyes were everywhere, standing in line for the twist-and-spin, winning at the ring toss, and wolfing down mustard-dipped hot dogs on a stick.

Yes, a very friendly venue.

The rides made both Mason and Fletcher nauseous, so of course they had to eat. Mason scanned the crowds as they headed toward the food alley, and spotted Bran and his father, Dalton Webb, head of Webb House, an instant before Fletcher grabbed his arm. Dalton was thinly built with long limbs, like a human daddy longlegs. He was aged closer to grandfather than father, but then he’d had to go through three wives to get the desired male heir.

The boy, Bran, took after his mother—stocky, towheaded, always chattering.

“Can I?” Fletcher’s face had pinked with the late spring heat. He had a cloud of boy sweat around him.

Mason steeled himself inside—here we go—but nodded. Webb was someone he’d hoped they’d bump into. “Okay.”

Connections like these were why they’d come in the first place. That, and curiosity. Would this be what the coming Dark Age would be like?

“Dalton,” Mason drawled when Webb joined him to watch the boys whoop and wrestle in the dust.

“Mason,” Webb returned, holding out his long, thin hand. “Was wondering if I’d see you here.”

“Couldn’t resist after I saw the invitation.”

“First open invite to Shadow in our lifetime. No one could resist.”

Mason’s point exactly.

“I’ve been hearing things about you,” Webb mused.

“Oh?” Mason had been doing work for a lot of terrible causes lately. Maybe Webb had a job for him too.

“How did a lousy stray like you catch the Council’s ear?”

Stray meaning no family, no House to claim him or Fletcher. He and his son were at the mercy of all the hellish things this world and the other worlds beyond could throw at them. The more friends Mason could make, the better Fletcher’s chances at surviving.

Mason laughed and shook Webb’s hand. Dalton had deigned to speak to a stray, which was a good beginning. That the master of Webb House gripped his hand was even better. It meant respect.

“I have my uses,” Mason answered.

“So I’ve noticed.”

Which was the point of all Mason’s work. Not that he remotely cared what the mage Houses thought of him. In fact, he’d been prepared to walk away from magekind some nine years ago.

Then came Fletcher, and his life had radically upended, like a sudden magnetic reversal of poles. The mage Houses became everything: safety and strength. Mason just had to find, connive, coerce, or thieve his way into one. Right now Fletcher might as well be exposed in the open, a hurricane bearing down on him. These people all around—debating handmade jewelry and licking the sides of their ice cream cones for drips—they had no idea what was coming.

Fletcher came running back, babbling about a sword and begging, “Please, Dad, five more bucks,” and repeatedly saying, “Epic!”—a word he must have picked up from Bran.

Mason hoped the verbal tic was temporary.

One minute later, the boys were thrusting and parrying and making asses of themselves in the middle of the path. The cost of the sword was robbery, plain and simple; the fact that Fletcher was playing with the heir to Webb House, invaluable. Webb House would be ideal.

“We should talk.” Webb’s eyes had gone flinty.

Mason knew the tone, knew the look. Webb had work. And if he was thinking of employing a stray, then the work had to be to some degree illegal.

Well, they had to start somewhere.

“I’m in the area for a few more days.” Mason retrieved a card from his wallet.

Webb took the card. “Meeting with another House?”

Mason pulled a half smile. He wasn’t going to answer that, and Webb knew it. “As far as I know, I’m not working on anything that could conflict with the interests of Webb House.”

The admission was generous, a show of good faith. It was up to Webb now to follow through.

Gasps brought his attention back to the boys. A group of three or four humans, cringing in their skin, had stopped to watch them.

“Mages,” whispered one.

A mom just passing by yanked her children back, as if Bran and Fletcher were dangerous.

Mason frowned, and put himself in human shoes to see what had captured the bystanders’ attention. Fletcher and Bran merely looked like two almost-troublemakers, just this side of a warning. Then Fletcher thrust with his sword and Mason saw it: Bran had bullied up the shadow he cast into the shape of a man-sized, fire-breathing, scaly-tailed dragon. Fletcher’s shadow had taken on the proportions of a broad-shouldered knight. This was part of Webb House’s magic—shadow play.

“Been good seeing you,” Dalton said over his shoulder, as he grabbed Bran by the elbow and pulled him up short. The shadows disintegrated.

It took only a look from Mason to shrink Fletcher from hero to boy.

Fletcher pointed at Bran. “He did it!”

Mason cocked his head. “Do I really have to tell you why that excuse won’t fly?”

Webb and Bran had already moved away to blend back into the throng of fairgoers, preferring to leave suspicions behind them. Typical of mages, stirring up fear and uncertainty. To the frightened mother still gripping her children, Mason shot a look, parent to parent, that said, “Boys this age.”

The band’s song ended, but instead of drumming into another, there was a short pause, and then a man cleared his throat into the mic.

Mason looked down the way toward the stage, while simultaneously bringing Fletcher close by his side. Poor kid had been outed as a mage in public. Maybe bearing the long looks and unease of the humans around them would teach him a lesson.

From the speaker on the stage: “Thank you to the Larry Trumpet Blues Band for starting us all off rocking this morning.”

A smattering of applause. People were too closely packed, too hot to muster more enthusiasm than that.

Mason could make out a few figures standing on the stage. If one was the mayor who’d invited the “Shadow people,” this could get interesting. He kept a hand on Fletcher’s shoulder and milled forward with the crowd to be able to see better. Webb and Bran were up ahead, even closer. And Mason spotted several other mages among the throng as well, black eyes fastened on the action at the stage.

“And a thank you to the organizers of our May Fair, led by our intrepid Judy Hart Langley.”

More polite applause while some woman in a pink pantsuit waved to the crowd.

“And now to welcome you all here today, Mayor Bingham!”

Bigger applause. People wanted to hear this.

The mayor was wearing a suit too, and probably sweating through it. Though his hairline was receding, he seemed surprisingly young. But then that made sense. It would be the younger generation who more readily accepted the existence of Shadow. They’d spent hours online poring over those wraith videos and watching the Fact-or-Fiction? shows on TV, modern witch hunts and the like.

“Our May Fair has been a tradition for the 173 years since Stanton’s founding. I’m personally thrilled to have discovered that one of our very first businesses was run by a family with ties to the Shadow people—my own.”

The mayor held up his hands to quiet murmurs; he was loving being associated with this new, exclusive group. Dumb. Possibly dead.

“I don’t have any magic—or Shadow as they call it. Wish I did. But when reports began circulating about these people who could do wonderful things, I tended to believe them. Fear does no one any good.”

Anyone with common sense would know that fear is a valid reaction to a perceived threat, and with reference to magekind, a necessary reaction—be afraid—but it was nice that this guy was preaching tolerance. Very optimistic of him.

“Which is why, on this very sunny morning, I am more than happy to welcome Shadow people here today—or mages, as I’ve just now learned, is the correct term. In fact, for the past twenty minutes I’ve been having an interesting conversation with a mage, and he has graciously agreed to say a few words to you himself.”

Mason didn’t breathe until he saw the mage in question—Ranulf Smythe, as antihuman, antitolerance as mages could come. He still kept wraiths in his employ, even after the Council had banned their use last year, which begged the very obvious question: Since wraiths fed only on human souls, how was he feeding them?

Fletcher didn’t need to learn this lesson today.

The crowd tightened with interest.

Mason picked Fletcher up around his middle, ignoring the horrified, “Daaad!” at being treated like a baby.

Too bad. It had been risky to come. They’d made a little headway with Webb; that was more than enough for a day’s work. A stray mage knew when to run. That, or he died young.

Mason was shouldering his way roughly through the crowd when Ranulf Smythe began to speak, feedback squealing through the mic. “Thank you, Mayor Bingham, for inviting me to say a few words.”

Mason lifted Fletcher over a park bench, then vaulted over the back of it himself. But it didn’t get them far. People had closed in all around them. The car was on the other side of the fairgrounds.

“Mayor Bingham has this idea that we’re all basically the same. And in many ways we are. Family, for example, is very important to us. And loyalty is one of our most prized character traits. Power, too, is highly sought after among my kind.”

Mason glanced over long enough to see the mayor’s smile faltering. Yeah, buddy. Little late now.

The crowd was utterly silent.

“But it’s best for you to know that we’re fundamentally different, so much so that there can never really be peace between us.” Smythe continued, “Point of fact, you humans have souls. We don’t. We have dark magic within us. There was a time when you humans used to hunt us down and burn us alive. It’s time for Shadow now.”

That mother who’d seen what Bran Webb could do was looking at Fletcher, her features growing tighter. Mason knew what she was thinking, or would think soon enough—that no soul meant soulless, which meant evil.

Mason held his son, his reason for living, even tighter. What Smythe left out was that each mage had an umbra deep within, a source of magic, not so very unlike a soul. Fletcher was all good, in every way. A person would be lucky to know him.

Smythe kept talking,“. . . what the Dark Age will bring . . .” but Mason thought he’d already made his point. No peace.

Mason looked for an escape. The car was too far, the crowd too tight to make much progress. Up ahead, Webb was doing little better with Bran. Any minute now, some mage was going to use Shadow to get free of this place or to make a point. And then there would be chaos.

He squeezed Fletcher. “Everything I say.”

Fletcher nodded.

“Keep your head down.”

With that, Mason adjusted his hold—the kid had grown; why did he keep doing that?—and plowed toward the nearest break in the crowd. He elbowed into backs and barged through groups. The rank smell of sweat hit his nose, that and greasy food too long in the sun. Blood, no, catsup smeared up his arm.

The crowd made a sound of astonishment, one voice that rolled through the gathering as if it had become a single organism.

Mason swore, though he usually tried not to around Fletcher, and craned his head to see what kind of magic had finally been used to break away from this place.

A black snake of Shadow darted and twisted above the heads of the crowd.

Mason didn’t recognize this kind of Shadow. What was it? Who controlled it?

He squinted to see better, adjusting Fletch again, who was trying to see as well.

The sky snake of Shadow branched out, while rushing toward Smythe, who’d trailed off speaking. Guess he didn’t know what kind of Shadow it was either.

The Shadow spread into a dirty blanket of haze and enveloped Smythe.

Mason was too far away to see what the effect was, but the scream of the lady in the pink pantsuit made things clear enough. When Ranulf Smythe collapsed on the stage, Mason was pretty sure the mage was dead.

More black snakes twisted through the air.

More screams rose from within the crowd, and like birds startled by gunshot, people scattered. Mason was buffeted by the rush, but ducked into a jewelry stall to avoid immediate trampling. Others got trampled, though. Strollers were abandoned, children clutched in parents’ arms. See? Humans and mages weren’t so different after all. Not where it really mattered.

“It’s going to be okay,” Mason said into Fletcher’s hair as he put him down on the ground. The booth, with a thick plastic-and-steel girder, would protect them for the moment. “Stay right there.”

Mason’s attention was caught on a mage some twenty feet away, visible only intermittently as the passage of fleeing humans allowed. Mason could see that he’d raised his arms to hold back the darkness, when he should’ve known that Shadow could permeate anything.

The murk descended upon him and the mage convulsed, his skin pock-marking with burns, as if from the inside. His eyes rolled back to the whites, then grayed to viscous ash, and the mage collapsed.

Mason came to a simple conclusion: the May Fair wasn’t about peace; the fair was a trap set for mages.

How many times throughout history had a hearty welcome been the early guise of a massacre?

He’d been so stupid. A stray has to know better.

Mason looked to the sky, now polluted with thin Shadow. The death-dealing stuff was inching closer. The booth wasn’t safe anymore.

Mason hauled Fletcher over the side. “We run. As fast and as far as we can. We run, or we die.”

Could an eight-year-old understand?

Mason would have carried him again if it would have been safer, but the humans had grown more dispersed, and frankly, Fletcher could run almost as fast as he could. The kid had speed and power in those legs. Mason’s eyes burned as he cursed again. He just hadn’t anticipated Fletcher would have to run for his life so soon.

They got as far as the parking lot access road when black doom torpedoed overhead, poisoned Shadow picking out the mages from the panicked crowd.

They weren’t going to make it to the car.

Mason made a grab for his son, who was still in flight. Fletcher jackknifed in the air—the muscle in Mason’s shoulder shredded—but he brought his son to his chest and went down on his knees on the street.

He’d have prayed, but if there was a God, he’d long ago forsaken the Shadow born.

Mason curled his body around Fletcher. Screams of fear and pain ripped the air so close, Mason groaned. He strove to make a boy-sized hollow out of his chest and belly, kneeling on the pavement and hugging his son, hands splayed over Fletcher’s face and head, his own head bowed to close the man-made cocoon. Within his grasp, Fletcher trembled, his heartbeat fast like a rabbit’s. Mason’s own heart had stalled. His throat had strangled shut with horror. All necessary body function was diverted into willing his son to live, at any cost, including his own life.

Black, smoky arms of terror reached among the throng, brushing by Mason like whispers of vicious gossip. He felt the Shadow singing in his blood as it drew near; ironic that his affinity with magic would help him know when his death was near. The dull thump and burn of a body falling nearby brought bile searing onto his tongue. Another mage down, moaning, then gargling into death.

“To the Webb wards!” Dalton’s voice, far away, rallying the stricken mages.

Yes, House wards would protect the mages who’d come to the May Fair. House wards were impenetrable magicks of safe harbor. And Webb’s wards were the nearest, not ten miles from the fair site.

But since Mason had no House, no wards to offer in return, that option wasn’t open to him. To his son. Not yet. Though he would have begged if there’d been any chance or service he could have traded.

Stray mages were outsiders, no matter how friendly the handshake. How many times did Mason have to learn that lesson?

Humans whimpered and ran, their passage bumping Mason’s shoulder, riffling his hair, as if they were the ones at risk. Stupid. This was a trap for Shadowed blood.

Inside Mason was frantic too: Not my son. Please, not Fletcher. Pass over. Pass him by.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Today was supposed to have been about peace, an opportunity to make friends.

Someone somewhere was laughing.

Mason ground his teeth against the burning in his eyes. He clutched Fletcher and vowed again, as he had a million times before, he’d do better for his son. Safer. No matter what in blackest Shadow he had to do.