Tricks for Free (InCryptid #7)

“We’ve only managed to have three dates,” I protested. “One was at the carnival, one was at a roller derby game, and one was at Lowryland.”

“So you found a boyfriend who likes to do the shit you like to do? Miracles never cease. Now.” Rose sobered. The air in the room seemed to chill. Her hands were still shoved into her back pockets, but she suddenly looked much older than her apparent sixteen years, and there were shadows in her eyes I didn’t want to challenge. “Why did you send her,” she hooked a thumb toward Mary, “to drag me off the ghostroads and into whatever you living people are trying to do to each other this time? I’ve got shit to do, little Annie, and my thumb didn’t bring me here.”

“I need to ask you about routewitches.”

Rose went still.

Routewitches are common, as humans with magic go. That’s a very qualified statement. Maybe one person in a thousand has the potential to become a routewitch, and most will lose or bury that potential before they hit their teens. I don’t know what the actual numbers are, but if more than one person in ten thousand can actually hear the highways sing, I’ll eat my skates.

It’s commonly understood that most, if not all, road ghosts—ghosts like Rose—were or could have become routewitches when they were alive. Not only that, their natural habitat brings them into regular contact with the routewitches, whether they want it to or not. Routewitches and road ghosts represent one of the frontiers where the living and the dead collide, no matter how hard they try to keep themselves separate . . . and quite honestly, most of them don’t seem to try at all.

“I don’t know what you’re expecting me to tell you,” said Rose stiffly. “I’m not a routewitch. Even if I could have been, once, that kind of magic belongs to the living. I haven’t been among the living in a long, long time.”

“I know,” I said. I glanced to Cylia before looking back to Rose, and saying, in a careful tone, “Someone is siphoning off my magic, Aunt Rose. I can’t start fires. I can barely feel the fire. It’s being drained away. And someone stole Sam’s luck, which meant that when I touched him, the siphon took the energy that lets him transform.”

“I gave him some luck back, but when I tried to take a slice from Annie to supplement it, whatever’s been draining her—wait, what?” Cylia’s head snapped around as she stared at me. “What do you mean, magic?”

“I’m a sorcerer,” I said with a shrug. “Surprise.”

“She sets shit on fire. It’s pretty sexy,” said Sam.

“Too much information, monkey-man,” said Mary.

Rose blinked. Rose snorted. And then, without further ado, Rose burst out laughing. She pulled her hands out of her pockets and put them over her eyes, bending slowly forward until her elbows were resting on her knees and her entire body was shaking with the effort of continuing to breathe. Which was honestly just dramatics, since she was already dead.

Sam leaned a little closer to me, careful to keep from touching my skin as he asked, quietly, “Is she okay?”

“Rose has a weird sense of humor,” I replied, not bothering to lower my voice. I glared at my dead aunt instead. “Which is fine, except for the part where it gets in the way of her getting on with things and telling me what I need to know.”

“Oh, man. Oh, Annie. Oh, jeez, I want to be there when your parents find out about this one.” Rose straightened up, wiping phantom tears from her eyes. “If I promise not to tell them about him, will you promise to call me before you take him home to meet them? Please?”

“Yes, but I need you to tell me about routewitches,” I said.

“Am I the only one upset by the idea of her,” Cylia pointed at me, “having the power to set things on fire with her mind?”

Rose shrugged. “Matches are cheap. Setting fires is good for a parlor trick, but it’s not as useful as it sounds. Are you asking whether a routewitch could steal your magic, Annie?”

“Yes,” I said.

“No.” Rose shook her head. “That’s not how routewitches work. They couldn’t steal your luck either. Those aren’t road concepts. They can’t take them.”

“What can they take?” asked Sam.

“Excuse me?”

“You said luck and magic aren’t road concepts, so routewitches can’t take them,” said Sam. “That makes it sound like there’s something they can take. What can they take?”

“Distance,” said Rose. “Routewitches can steal distance.”

I frowned. “Meaning what, exactly?”

“Distance is potential, and potential is power,” said Rose. “If you walk a hundred miles, that’s a hundred miles of power slathered all over your skin. A good routewitch can peel that away from you. It’s the basic driving force of the snake cults, only less scaly, and less stupid.”

“I knew that part,” I said. “I’ve heard of routewitches using distance—it’s the main power behind most of their spells—but I’ve never heard of them stealing it before.”

“That’s because ethical routewitches won’t,” said Rose firmly. “Apple won’t let them.”

Sam put up a hand. “Who’s Apple?” he asked, with the air of a man who had gone wading in the shallows, only to discover that there was a whole deep ocean waiting to devour him.

“She’s the current Queen of the Routewitches. She holds court on the Ocean Lady, and she’ll kick your ass from here to Tuesday morning if she thinks you’re breaking her rules. Not a nice woman, necessarily, but a fair one, and a reasonably kind one, when it comes to that. The routewitches have done worse.” Rose shook her head. “Stealing distance is like stealing anything: it’s a violation. They’d have to rip it off of a person, unless they could make it a trade somehow, and even that would be . . . difficult. The road thrives on fair exchange.”

“Meaning . . .” I prompted.

“Meaning I get flesh from the loan of a coat, and a phantom rider gets freedom from the length of a road, and everything balances. If a routewitch wants distance from the living, they would normally need to make it part of a barter. I’ll give you this if you give me that. It’s hard to do that accidentally.”

A cold feeling appeared in the pit of my stomach. I felt myself go very still, the hair on my arms standing on end. “Sam,” I said, and turned to face him, only him, focusing on the lines of his face until I couldn’t see anyone else, not even in my peripheral vision. It needed to be only him, because this was my fault. “Can I see your ticket?”

Sam blinked. Understanding bloomed in his eyes, spreading to cover his entire expression, wiping everything else away. “Yeah,” he said, and dipped his hand into his pocket.

He put the ticket on the table like it was a dead rat, something to be dropped as quickly and as cleanly as possible. He pulled his fingers away almost instantly, as if he was afraid lingering would give me the opportunity to touch him again. That hurt. Not as much as the realization of what must have happened, but . . . it still hurt.

I picked up the ticket, turning it over. The fine print on the back was as dense and tight-packed as I remembered. Turning my body toward Rose, I read aloud, “‘This ticket is provided under the auspices of Lowry Entertainment, Inc., and cannot be transferred or re-sold once activated. Acceptance of this ticket constitutes agreement to be filmed, photographed, and interviewed for future marketing purposes while on Lowry property. Acceptance of this ticket is perpetual and binding. All clauses can and will be exercised at the discretion of Lowry Entertainment, Inc. No refunds or returns will be entertained.’” My mouth was dry. I paused and swallowed, resisting the urge to close my eyes. “There’s a quote under that, from one of the early Monty Mule cartoons. ‘If you’re lucky enough to be lucky, share the luck around.’”

Rose snapped her fingers. “And there it is.”

“Oh, my sweet Zeus.” Cylia put her head on the table. “I think I’m going to be sick.”