Emery shook his head, and I shook mine with him. He said what I was thinking. “This ward didn’t just go up. It’s old, with new patches. Some of those patches are very new. As in, the ward was broken through, and patched up, last night.”
Roger stiffened and magic seeped from him, winding through my body and crawling up my back.
“In addition…” Emery scratched his cheek. “I’m not sure how much you know about me, but I get premonitions whenever Penny and I are in mortal danger. Moments before the kill strike occurs, I’ll see it coming. It’s saved our lives more times than I can count. In a few instances, I have also gotten blanket warnings. I don’t totally know what they mean, but that mage”—Emery pointed up toward the others, who were now a good distance in front of us—“sets me off. He reeks of the feeling I get with those warning premonitions. This whole area”—he made a circle in the air with his pointer finger—“sets me off the wrong way. You’ve got a breach. After seeing the ward, that’s as clear as day. But, at this point, I don’t think it’s a matter of finding and fixing the loose ends. I think you need to get your people out of here. If you stay and fight, you’ll lose a lot of shifters before you even get to the Guild compound.”
“They tried to thin your numbers at that shifter bar yesterday,” I said. “If they know you’re here, it’s a no-brainer for them to run in with a bunch of magical spells, set them off, and get out. With your own magical guys against you, you’d be cooked before you knew what hit you.”
Roger shook his head slowly, staring straight ahead. “My people are in and out of this place constantly. Nearly a hundred people are stationed here. Too many for me to uproot them on a hunch.”
“I hear you loud and clear,” Emery said. “And that’s all I got. A hunch. But hunches like this have kept me alive for the last few years. They’ve helped me get out from under the Guild.”
The people in front of us turned toward the house.
“I’ll take it under advisement,” Roger said. “I need to talk to a few of my—”
A shotgun blast rang through the air. My mother was in danger.
I was running before I had time to form a swear word.
25
Another shotgun blast went off, followed by a deep rumbling. I crashed into the brush to get around the others, who had braced themselves but not put on the jets, when I felt the intent of a spell.
Slash.
I yanked at elements and wove them together as Todd turned. His hands up near his chest, full of leaves and herbs, he spouted off some Latin and shoved both arms forward. The spell, having already taken shape, just needed that push to be off. After it cut through Devon, it would be on to Reagan in a flash.
My own weave done, I threw it out as Reagan grabbed Devon and tossed him to the side. The spell just barely missed him and was speeding right for her face. She bent backward like someone in an action flick, her fingers spread wide to attack the spell.
Todd’s spell unraveled as mine reached him, meant to blast him in the face and knock him unconscious so Roger could question him. I hadn’t accounted for the dual-mage bond and the extra magic I’d accepted from the goblin.
My spell smashed into Todd, tearing off a layer of his skin before bursting. His head blew back…without his body attached.
“Finger-flinging leotards.” My stomach churned and I burped fire. “I hope he was guilty.”
“He tried to kill me. He was definitely fecking guilty.” Reagan snatched her ringing phone out of its fanny pack and jammed it to her ear as we ran forward again. Shifter magic blasted out behind us, different than the challenging feeling we’d been hit with since we got here.
A glance behind confirmed that the shifters were changing. Roger into a burly gray wolf, larger even than his human body, Devon into a lean and lithe black wolf, just as tall at the shoulder as he was standing, and the third shifter, whom we’d largely forgotten about since he was behind everyone, became a decent-sized gray wolf. Patrick started before taking off through the trees. The smaller of the wolves chased him.
“There goes our hopes of a misunderstanding,” I muttered as Emery grabbed my arm and pulled me closer.
“I’m a little busy—” Reagan cut off, running as fast as us even though she had a phone pressed to her ear.
“We need to get to the others and stay together,” Emery said, confidence ringing in his tone.
“Stay in that house,” Reagan yelled through the phone. “The ward will hold. Keep everyone in there until nightfall. I’ll be in touch.”
“What is it?” Emery asked. Roger caught up easily in animal form, falling in next to Reagan.
“Darius’s house is under attack. Mages and mercenaries have it surrounded.” She jammed her phone back into her fanny pack. “They’re trying to break through the ward.”
“They won’t,” Emery said confidently. “Not even if they bring in a couple of naturals and all their friends. That ward is too complex to tackle in an afternoon.”
“What about the ward at Vlad’s hideout?” I asked.
“I guess we’ll find out.”
Roger gave a small yip as he and the other wolves dashed by us, their lopes beautiful and graceful and way faster than I could run.
“Go get ’em, Lassie,” Reagan called.
We rounded a bend and the house loomed ahead of us, the front door and surrounding wood blown out of it. Windows had been blown out, too, and glass glittered from the front lawn. Animals ran around or stood growling in furry chaos.
Magical intent bloomed over the house, heady and strong.
Explode.
“Get clear,” I yelled as I ran, trying for a burst of speed. “Oh God, Mother, please don’t be in that house. Get everyone clear!”
“Penny, here.” Emery ripped me sideways. Reagan had already turned.
My mother stood at the Lexus, the back opened up, feeding a magazine into some sort of machine-gun-looking weapon.
“Holy crap,” Reagan said, running straight at her. “Ms. Bristol does not fuck around.”
If there was one thing I knew about my mother when someone was attacking us, it was that no, she did not fuck around.
Callie and Dizzy stood in front of her, ingredients ready and in hand but mouths closed. They weren’t doing spells yet. They saw us coming and relief crossed their faces.
“You’re okay,” Callie said on an exhale. “What took you so long?”
My mother glanced up, relief on her face as well. A moment later, determination crawled right back onto it. “Good, Penny, we need to get moving. We have to get out of here, bust Darius out of the house, pick up some sort of present, and then meet a different, incredibly attractive vampire so we can attack the Mages’ Guild. We have a lot to do and a short window in which to get it all done.”
“What—” I was about to ask what had happened when her words sank in. “What?”
“I told you a change of scenery would be the best thing to shake loose more foretellings,” Dizzy said. “Now maybe you’ll listen to me more often.”
The two older ladies huffed at the same time, but neither of them refuted him.
A shock of magic shot into the air before an explosion shook the house. A chunk of the far side of the house went flying, tumbling across the manicured lawn. An animal went with it, hitting the ground and not getting back up.
“They’ve got dirty mages,” Callie yelled over the noise. “A lot of them. They have this place primed for attack. Karen saw it all. She was just blabbing everything she saw out loud. Which was fine at first, because that scarred one—Axel Rod or something—”
“Alder,” Dizzy said.
“—was soaking it all up. But one of the mages overheard and tried to get off a spell. Then more joined in, the know-nothing hacks.” She jerked her filled hands at the front of the house. “I had to blast us out of there. We barely got back to the car and the shotgun before they reached us.”
“You must’ve missed,” I said, glancing around and spying some blood splashed across the gravel. Another step brought me closer to the blood trails.