Born in Fire (Fire and Ice Trilogy 1)

I checked the time. It was edging into the small hours of the morning. If Darius had planned to find me, he would’ve done so by now.

“He’s not naturally powerful,” Callie said as she emerged from the shed. “He’s less than middle tier.”

“How do you know?” I matched her pace as she walked around the house, leaving Dizzy behind. The slow pulse of insects throbbed in the night.

“That circle.” She scratched her head. “He had to sacrifice a large animal to reach the power level to use it. I worked backward from there. The ability to pull off the possession confuses me. You’re sure he actually took the demon into himself?”

“Positive.”

“That circle was calling a level-three demon. There are six power levels, with Lucifer himself being the only one at level six. So three is not too shabby. With the sacrifice, he could get it into the circle. That circle was well made. He’s done his homework. Once in the circle, I have every belief he could keep it there.”

“You’re wondering how he got the power boost to get the demon into his body?” I asked.

“Exactly. Usually a possession is more about opening the body, like providing yourself as a vessel to be filled by the god or goddess who chooses you. They choose you, not the other way around. The mage’s initial progression through the circle was aided by the various herbs and other plants he tossed in with that carcass,” she said, vaguely motioning around her. I grimaced, having missed that detail. “But a lower-level mage would need a substantial boost to ingest such a powerful demon. And that higher level would need to be sustained for the duration of the demon’s stay. Otherwise, the demon would overtake the body after a single night.”

The boost was the unicorn blood. It had to be. But I couldn’t tell her that.

“In other words,” I said, “as long as he keeps sacrificing and getting that boost, I have a powerful mage to look forward to. And he’d surely do all that before one of his rallies.”

“Surely. He has to look like he’s all-powerful to attract the power-hungry sheep.” She waved that thought away and shook her head. “The boost couldn’t be vampire blood. It doesn’t work like that.”

“I know.”

“You know what it is, don’t you?”

“I know nothing.”

We walked through the hedge and to the car, a beat-up old station wagon that Dizzy referred to as his “company car.” I had made a plea to take his aforementioned Cadillac, but Callie hadn’t wanted to risk getting it scratched. After seeing what they’d done to the house, I got it.

“It would sure be nice for you to pass on what you know,” she said. “But since this guy is being hunted by vampires and a hired gun, I suppose it’s better not to know.”

“It is definitely better not to know, for a great many reasons.”

“Oh yeah, like that helped my burning curiosity. Thanks.” She leaned against the car. “If he has that demon in his body, your best bet is to wait him out. Wait until the boost dies down, if it ever does. When he’s struggling for control of his own body, or better, kicks the demon out, then you take him down.”

“And if he can keep upping his boost?”

She thinned her lips and took off her goggles. “You use our spells, the ones that don’t require an elaborate incantation, get close, and stab him.”

“You guys don’t even use incantations.”

“Spells don’t have ears. The point of words is to focus the mind of the caster on what they’re doing, what they should be feeling, and their expectations of the casting. When witches or mages are trained, they use a combination of words and actions to achieve that focus. Once it becomes second nature, they can go one of two ways. The most common is to continue to use the words and actions, but once that path is forged, it becomes like a rut. Getting out of that rut often takes retraining.

“Dizzy and I, before we’d even met and formed the dual-mage bond, decided to take the harder path. We continued training, first taking away the actions, and then taking away the words. It requires more focus. More patience and practice. But now, we can cast most spells almost instantly—no words and minimal action required.”

“Then what was all that talk about Latin and Gaelic? If the words don’t really matter, why the different language?”

She shrugged. “We still use words for the harder and more complex spells. It took us nearly a lifetime to get here. There are a handful of incredibly skilled mages who can do it naturally. The rest of us have to go the traditional route and practice constantly. So when we do have to use words, we choose ones others might not understand so no one else will steal our stuff.”

“Are those natural mages in the Mages’ Guild?”

“Two are, I think. Prized, of course. The others aren’t.”

“I bet the guild is constantly trying to enlist the ones who aren’t.”

“Oh yes. One of the naturals constantly disappears, I’ve heard. He goes off-grid. Wild, that one, not that I blame him. Really handsome, too. If only the fountain of youth were real…” She shook her head and sighed. “You should dump the vampire and seek out that mage. You two would be good together.”

“I’m good. Single is a good choice.”

“Who said anything about marriage? Good Lord, no. Do yourself a favor: don’t move in with him. Then he’ll be expecting you to cook and clean—no. Just take him for a spin and return him if he breaks. That’s the best bet.”

I stifled a laugh.

“Ah. Here comes the light of my life now,” Callie said dryly as Dizzy stepped over the hedge right beside the walkway.

“Don’t believe a word she says,” Dizzy said, shifting his satchel. “She’s mad about me.”

“You’ve got the mad part right.” She grinned.

“I took some pictures. Let’s get out of here.” Dizzy headed toward the driver’s side. “This is a crime scene.”

“I doubt the cops are going to believe we pulled a house down on top of people.” Callie pulled the passenger door open.

“I’d rather not be questioned at all.” I slid into the back seat.

The roar of the car cut out the sound of the insects. “To the next house, or home?” Dizzy asked as he pulled away from the ruined house.

“That depends.” I watched the houses drift by. “Do you think he’ll use those circles multiple times?”

“He won’t reuse the one we’ve just seen.” Dizzy rested his hands on his legs and steered with a knee. “That workroom was in disarray. Anyone planning to use a circle as a permanent fixture generally treats the area as sacred. Or at least with respect. It’s your protection. It’s your container, holding a powerful and purposeful item. You treat it and the area around it like a piece of expensive furniture. He treated it like a necessary, though temporary, area. There’s no way he would have left that corpse to rot if he’d planned on coming back. It was a one-off. He’s used it and now he’s moving on.”

“You know a lot about circles…” I let the sentence linger.

“I did a little demon calling in college. Now, that was fun.” Dizzy tapped a drumbeat on the steering wheel, though continued to steer with his knee. “Killing animals wasn’t as taboo then. We ate it afterward, too, which also wasn’t as taboo.”

“Yes it was,” Callie said.

“Oh. Well, we did it anyway. It was a different time.”

“He was a bachelor, is what he really means.” Callie adjusted her seatbelt. “He did things without thinking about them.”

“That’s true enough.” Dizzy continued to tap out a beat.

“What about that crime scene you two mentioned the other day?” I asked.

“What about it?” Callie said.

“We didn’t find any casings at the house, but I’m positive this is the mage I’m looking for. So this is my guy, but he’s doing circles and sacrifices like the mage who skinned that human. Could it be the same mage?” Thinking out loud, I added, “But if he has the gumption to go big, why settle for sacrificing a calf? It doesn’t seem to fit with his power hungriness.”