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  He took out his wallet and found his business card. “Here,” he said, handing me his card. “Anytime you need a lunch buddy, think of me.”

  I read his card. Dr. Groshek.

  Okay, that’s hot.

  It was just my luck to meet a total gentleman/doctor/dashing chill dude when I was not even close to girlfriend material. I was a little busy either becoming a slave to a sadistic Immortal Magistrate or escaping to Sweden or being eaten by roaming, otherworldly beasts. My dance card was overfull.

  “Who has time for lunch?” I said, not meaning to be cruel.

  His defeat instantly hurt my heart.

  “Emmet, did you not see the crazy girl in front of you tonight? I mean, dude, I stuck my arm in a carafe of water. I’m nobody’s dream girl.”

  He nodded. “I think women say that, but what they really mean is that the man they are talking to is not their dream man.”

  This guy. I didn’t know why, but I suddenly kissed him.

  Shit. I’d completely lost it. “You see, I’m crazy.”

  “I’m not complaining,” he said.

  “You are a pest,” I said. “Really, and you have horrible timing.”

  “Timing’s never been my strong suit.”

  “Listen, I occasionally take a lunch,” I said. “And I won’t tear up your card. That’s all I can say in my current state.”

  He lifted his hands in surrender and started to back away. “Can I just confirm that that kiss just happened? I didn’t dream it.”

  “What kiss?” I said. “Now go, and be safe, Emmet Groshek, or I’ll use my magic to turn you into a toad.”

  He grinned so wide he looked like a boy, then turned and disappeared into the San Diego night. I waited a few strides before running the rest of the way home, fumbling with my keys, then falling to my butt on the other side of my locked door.

  CHAPTER 10

  ____________________________________

  Faion held the Immortal’s hair up to the light.

  I stepped closer to get a better view. “Do you think it’s enough?”

  “It’s not a question of quantity but quality,” he said, bringing the hair to his nose to sniff it like a hound.

  “Oh, you’re doing that now,” I said, doubts rising.

  He shushed me, then shoved the hair in his mouth and swallowed.

  “What the hell?” I said, quietly astonished.

  He washed the Immortal’s hair down with a glass of ice water.

  “That’s… disgusting.” I didn’t know what else to say.

  Faion rolled his eyes. “It’s an ancient way and the only way. Don’t be a magic snob. I can do what you cannot.”

  “I’m not a snob,” I said. “Far from it, but you could have warned me about the hair. It’s not like I grew up in the down below, I grew up in Oregon.”

  “We both grew up in Oregon, but I have this kick-ass divining blood that is already honing in on his energy core.”

  “I’ll take your word for it.”

  “Yes, thank you,” he said, closing his eyes and breathing deeply.

  “You think this will work, Faion?”

  “Not if you keep pestering me, it won’t.”

  I stopped pestering and let him do this thing.

  Afterward, we lit my Moroccan, green-glass lantern and sank into my sofa. Faion made me watch three consecutive episodes of BoJack Horseman on Netflix. It was weird as hell, in a good way, but during the third episode I must have crashed, because next thing I knew I was startled awake by a high-pitched scream.

  I sat up, realizing Faion had somehow made that high-pitched voice. His eyes gleamed like he’d gone mad.

  He pushed my feet off his lap and sprang up. I almost rolled off the couch.

  “What’s happening?” I said, rubbing my eyes.

  “I got that son of a bitch,” he shouted, pumping his fist. “I’m in. I’m all up in his physiological hard drive. The F train did this shit.”

  I dared, for the first time, to feel hope. I hadn’t let myself believe this plan would ever work. I climbed to my feet to hug Faion, but he quickly squatted down, crossed his legs and closed his eyes.

  He began murmuring an iterative chant, not the meditational Om, but definitively a reciting tone of some type. His lips created vibrations that I could feel bouncing off the walls of the apartment.

  I held my breath as his aura became visible, a soft yellow that hung in the air around him like a phosphorescent mist. I’d never seen anything like it but presumed he was entering an ectoplasmic trance.

  Faion’s eyes darted about under his closed eyelids. “He’s awakened.”

  A quick shiver swept over me. That was not even Faion’s voice.

  “He walks,” Faion’s new voice added.

  It was two in the morning. Did Immortals ever sleep?

  Faion snatched up my hand and held it tight. “It’s dark here. Cool. Sticky, wet footsteps. A subterranean walk.”

  A spear of fear split through me. “The Deep Down?”

  “The deep is not down. The down is not deep.”

  “Okay, how about his thoughts,” I said. “Can you read them?”

  His head shook quickly, just once. “Feel the thoughts, not hear them. Guarded thoughts. Layers. Barriers. Go too deep, all will be lost. He will glimpse the blood intruder. He will see. See and destroy. Must stay calm in the blood, must wait to see what his eyes see, hear what he hears.”

  I clenched my jaw. I suddenly had a bad feeling about this.

  Faion fell deeper into the transcendental state. He released my hand. His breathing grew heavier, his sentences shorter. “Voices,” he said, “faint echoes. Energy shields. A barrier, maybe. A ward, maybe. Dim light. Torches. Long corridor ahead. Heavy legs. Tired. Descending now. Narrow stairs.”

  Oh, shit. The deep, the deeper deep, the true dark of the under realm.

  “Arrived. Open space. Auditorium. Elevated stage. Orange electric lights. Feet meet carpet. Long court bench. On stage. Carved eagles in gold.”

  Faion opened his eyes, flared his nostrils. “The Seventh Council,” he said, regaining his natural voice. “The Magistrate Court. We’ve found them.”

  I tried to take his hands because I felt like I might collapse, but Faion started pacing and his hands flew about as he talked.

  His speech accelerated. “No protective barriers here. They’re deep underground. They feel safe. Four magistrates behind the bench, two females, two males. There are more around I can’t see. Their expressions are severe, their brows pensive and creased. Oh, damn. Your guy. He most definitely is not like the others. You did not tell me everything. Your stalker is hot. He’s not even candy, girl, he’s ice cream.”

  “How do you know that? How can you see him?”

  “I’m not sure. The material everything is built with seems reflective. The bench, the walls, even the ceiling. Sometimes I can see a hundred of everyone.”

  “Don’t fall in love, Faion, he’s a killing machine.”

  “Someone called out to him,” Faion said. “Strange name.”

  I must have bugged out of my skull. “You heard his name? Like his ritual name?”

  “No, his online gamer name. Of course, his ritual name.”

  Knowing the name of an Immortal was a slippery slope. You gained insight into their etheric essence, but if they ever found out you knew their name, you would become hunted and the Immortal would not rest until you were gone.

  “Well?” Faion said. “Do you want to know or not?”

  “Tell me already, we’ve come this far.”

  “Shit, you sure? It’s dangerous knowledge.”

  “More than that, I know, it’s deadly.”

  “That’s my ride-or-die-bitch,” Faion said. “I feel that.”

  “Yeah, yeah, now tell me, damn it.”

  “Okay, chill. It’s Winter. That’s his name. Winter.”

  I repeated the name in my head. Winter. It suited him. I imagined his cold heart was covered in fro
st. Like an arctic wind, he raced through the ages, freezing everything, covering the greens and blues with white death.

  “Winter stands before the magistrates, holding a scroll.” Faion’s face went cold, pale. “I’m going to tell you what they’re discussing, but you need to keep your shit together.”

  “My shit’s together. Now tell me.”

  In no way is my shit together, but whatever.

  “The Council will take a vote,” Faion said.

  “What vote?”

  “A vote on whether to kill you or not after your mission.”

  Perfect. The Seventh Council was in on this whole thing with Winter. They endorsed his perverse little games. They all believed I could help them, but how, exactly? Something to do with elemental energy, no doubt. And the bastards wanted to express their gratitude by killing me. Great. I wanted to drink down all the world’s resources, walk into their chamber and explode, taking them all to hell with me.

  Faion’s voice reached me as if from far away. “Sophie, that dude’s standing up for you. For real.”

  “Wait. What dude?”

  “Your dude. Winter. He’s defending you.”

  That can’t be true.

  “He says that an asset now will be an asset later. I think you’re the asset. Or, maybe, he likes your assets,” Faion said, grinning. “There’s more. He says a show of goodwill could make for a useful alliance with the Deep Down. Blah, blah, blah, now, in the future and so on. A little redundant, but not bad.”

  “What’s his game?” I said.

  “Don’t know, he seemed to be passionate about that message,” Faion observed. “I don’t know how well it tracked with the others, though.”

  “That’s it,” I said. “He knows that argument won’t win, but now he can pretend he’s the good guy.”

  “Wait, the Magistrate in the middle raises his palm. Stocky guy, ash-colored hair. He says the secrets must be protected over all else. You will have seen too much. He does not think you should live after witnessing the rebellion.”

  A rebellion? Now we were getting somewhere.

  “Winter says he’ll bear full responsibility. He guarantees your obedience.”

  Well, how magnanimous of him who would make me a slave.

  Faion’s face distorted. “There’s whispering behind the bench. The Magistrates, they are grim crew. Winter steps closer. He says that he will be responsible. A vote is not needed. And there’s something about him boiling the hearts of any who would so much as touch you.”

  “Is that the way to kill Immortals? Boil their hearts?”

  “I don’t know,” Faion said, “maybe it’s one of their expressions, but by their reaction, they all seem to take him at his word.”

  Faion’s mouth contorted unnaturally. His body started to shake, then it got worse—he started to seizure.

  Not knowing what else to do, I tried to wrap him in my arms, but he was too wild. I managed to usher him to the couch where he fell onto the cushions and shook uncontrollably.

  When his eyes opened, an expression of horror crossed his face. His mouth gaped wide open and his lips quivered. “I cut the connection.”

  “Faion,” I said, unable to process.

  He looked gravely into my eyes. “Sophie, something dark, something so horrible I could feel it in my bones, stared straight into my eyes.”

  “Was it Winter? Did he discover you?”

  Faion sprang to his feet and walked to the window. “I don’t know,” he said, peeking through the blinds. “I felt it as much as I saw it. Deformed. Or malformed. Sophie, I don’t know. It was animalistic. It had fur, but those eyes, it was like they could see through my soul. It wasn’t human. It wasn’t an animal. It wasn’t from the Deep Down or anywhere else on this planet.”

  Heat flushed my face. My monster. The one that chased me. I tried to remember but I didn’t want to remember. His beast, my beast. It had to be more than a coincidence.

  My encounter was bad, but to be stunned out of trance like that, with those devouring eyes staring at you, must have been worse.

  “It’s okay,” I said, hugging him. “We’re in this together.”

  “It’s just, it was all so much like my dream.”

  My throat felt like dry sand. “The dream you had about me?”

  He nodded. “It was in the woods. The moon was full. The silence didn’t seem real, like a million beings were somewhere hiding and holding their tongues. You were there, lying naked on a bed of wet leaves. A creature, not animal, not human, not magical, was licking at your toes. A second creature, bigger, stronger, uglier than the first, beheaded a third creature with an ax.”

  “That’s really fucked up,” I said.

  “You haven’t heard the crazy shit, yet,” Faion said, glancing back at me. “Maybe you should sit down.”

  I took his advice.

  “You climbed to your feet,” he continued. “You were wet and naked. You spoke an incomprehensible language.” He took a break to collect his thoughts. “Everything changed. The moon turned gray. The creatures wailed. And then they attacked, they chewed off big chunks off your belly and lower back. Strangely, you were cool with it. You laughed like a madwoman. You kept laughing even as your bloody body slowly dissolved into smoke, yet somehow you still had teeth and you…”

  “Faion, what?”

  He turned to me. “You ripped out their hearts and ate them.”

  Whoa. “I ate their hearts?”

  “Yeah, you did, and it amused you.”

  There was awe in his eyes.

  “It was a dream Faion,” I reminded him. “I don’t go around eating the hearts of yellow-eyed, deformed beasts.”

  He stepped back a little. “How did you know about their eyes?”

  “I saw one, I think,” I said. “In a wooded area near campus.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me, Sophie? I thought we’re in this together?”

  “I wanted to pretend it never happened.”

  He opened his arms and I walked into them. I lay my head against Faion’s shoulder. “Are we any better off now?” I wasn’t sure we had learned anything useful, besides that the world was scarier than any nightmare.

  Faion smirked when I looked up to him. “His left ear can’t hear for shit.”

  “How’s that possible? Don’t Immortal bodies just mend?”

  “Guess not. They’re not invincible. These guys can be brought down.”

  “Sure, you just boil their hearts like Winter. Piece of cake.”

  “True, and that bad boy S&M hottie who’s been stalking you would boil hearts to save you, that’s not nothing.”

  “To keep me alive for his own designs, Faion, don’t even play.”

  “Maybe we should forget about a trip to the Deep Down. Let’s go to a beach resort, instead. How about Cancun? I don’t think that’s a big hang for demons, beasts and Immortal motherfuckers.”

  I closed my eyes for a moment. “I wish, Faion. How I wish we could.”

  “I know. Sometimes I envy the basics.”

  The basics have their own challenges. A rebellion among Immortals may not reach CNN, but if it expanded to include magical factions, it could bring down all the worlds at once. For now, it would be best to let Immortals handle their affairs without interference. My hope was that it stayed contained.

  I had my own fight and it was mine alone.

  Fear had paralyzed me too long. I wasn’t helpless. I had been born with a power and a destiny. I had been trained to use it sensibly, but I was done being a victim. Winter had a vulnerable side. I would find it and exploit it.

  That night Faion slept peacefully on my sofa. I climbed onto my bed fully clothed. My tired back was warmed by my fluffy comforter. I wanted to stay like that forever. I wanted the future to stay away and never find me.

  CHAPTER 11

  ____________________________________

  All night, I fell into dark voids and became trapped underwater. I swam frantically in a fathomless ocea
n and, no matter how hard I tried, I could not make it to the surface. I didn’t even know which way was up.

  Suddenly, the water threw me into the sky. I was falling now, endlessly falling toward a shore that was falling faster. The water was gone and now the oxygen was gone, too. I was choking, suffocating. My feet and hands tingled. My stomach lunged. I thought I would die until I awoke gasping.

  I scuttled to the sofa. “Go!” I told Faion, shaking him awake. “He’s here.”

  Faion ran down the hall to the far stairs. I closed the door and waited at the kitchen counter, taking deep breaths.

  Winter banged on the door. After everything I’d witnessed, I should have been furious but, instead, found myself grateful he waited outside the door, rather than blowing it off its hinges.

  I looked through the peep hole before I opened the door. “Who knew you could knock?” I said.

  A strange feeling of satisfaction swelled in my chest. Having him here gave me a chance to measure his behavior up close.

  “You’re not surprised to see me? Progress.”

  “Should I be? You’re like a bad penny.”

  He nodded, perhaps getting used to my attempts at lame humor. He wore a long black coat and black boots that had dried mud on the soles.

  “Something’s off,” he said, giving me the once over.

  He nudged me aside and walked through the door. He examined every detail of my studio apartment. He noticed the Faion-sized dent in the sofa and the heavily wrinkled comforter on my bed.

  Yeah, I had a rough night.

  “Someone just left,” he said.

  “Give the man a cigar.”

  He locked his eyes on mine. “A sexual liaison?”

  Not even close, big guy. Your sensors are trash.

  “Boundaries, dude.”

  He lost patience, grabbed my wrist and led me to the kitchen.

  “You work at a coffee shop,” he said, taking a seat. “Make some coffee. I need you to wake up.”

  “I bet you’re a big hit with the immortal ladies,” I said. “It’s every girl’s dream to be thrown around like a sack of potatoes.”

  He laughed. “And you are an expert on romance?” he said. “I know you did not have sex last night. The man slept on the couch. I wonder, is it only your magic you never had a chance to use?”