Kevin Hearne - Tricked

“Don’t know, except that she and her coven are out of town. I expect that might tell you something,” she said, nodding at the envelope. “They kind of have the same arrangement with the firm that you have. They’ll let us know when they settle down somewhere, but we can’t tell you anything about it when they do. Hal wanted me to thank you for sending their business to the firm.”

“He’s very welcome. May I ask a question regarding the Pack?”

Greta’s jaw tightened, but she said, “Ask.”

“Have you ever run afoul of skinwalkers?”

She hadn’t expected the question. She looked bemused and shook her head.

“Ah, well, kind of a long shot anyway.”

Greta didn’t pursue the matter with a polite inquiry. She looked down at the paperwork in a clear signal that we should hurry up and finish. It was a good idea, since we had to make it back to the hogan before sundown.

“I’ll need Hal to transfer about forty thousand to each of our accounts,” I said, finishing the documents and handing the stack over to Granuaile to sign. “He’ll need to draw smaller sums from multiple accounts to avoid attracting the attention of the IRS. And I need it there tomorrow.”

“Done.”

“Please give my regards to Hal, Snorri, and the rest of the Pack.”

“I will.”

She said nothing more as she placed the paperwork back in her bag. With a curt nod to us that was supposed to serve as a farewell, she slid out of the booth and stalked out to the parking lot. I put my finger to my lips to tell Granuaile it wasn’t safe to talk yet. While we waited for Greta to drive away, I opened the letter from Malina. There was a single sheet inside, written in the same impeccable hand as the address on the envelope.

Dear Mr. O’Sullivan ,

We have taken your advice and have decided to move the coven elsewhere. If you ever need to contact us in the future, please do so through Mr. Hauk .

During our last divination ritual, we learned that the vampire situation will become extremely fluid and dangerous in the near future. There were hints that someone powerful — perhaps you — might be drawn into it somehow, and we urge you to avoid this, if at all possible, for your own safety .

Kind regards ,

Malina Sokolowski

I showed the letter to Granuaile. “You know what this means?”

She scanned it quickly. “It means you shouldn’t meet Leif tomorrow.”

“That’s right. But I owe him the courtesy of a meeting after all we’ve been through. And I’m curious to see what sort of shape he’s in. You should have seen him. You know that comedian, Gallagher, who smashes watermelons with a sledgehammer? Leif’s head was the watermelon.”

Granuaile frowned. “I don’t know that comedian, sorry.”

Augh! Oberon, that was dreadful!

“Why not just ask Hal to send you a picture from his camera phone or something?” Granuaile said. “You don’t need to risk it. Wait until things stabilize.”

“Well, you’re coming to Flagstaff with me tomorrow anyway.”

“I am?”

“Yep. It’s time for you to die.”

Granuaile’s face deflated. “I think my mother’s going to be upset about that. Dad might shed a tear too. My stepdad will laugh, unless my mother’s watching.”

I reminded her that it didn’t have to be that way. She could always go back to being a barmaid with a philosophy degree and hang around with normal people.

“No, that’s not an option. The fact that I’m expressing my dismay over a necessary course of action doesn’t mean I’m not willing to go through with it. But let’s not talk about that right now; let’s talk instead, if we’re finally allowed, about what just happened. That woman was astoundingly rude to us. To you.”

“Yes, she was.” We exited the sub shop as an act of mercy on our optic nerves. As we drove back to the hogan, I explained to Granuaile the finer points of dealing with werewolves when one is a shape-shifter but still not part of the pack. Challenge with the voice, not the eyes, and you can get away with quite a bit.

Oberon insisted.

To the werewolf, snacks are something to be taken, not given , I reminded him.

The hogan, once we reached it, was in considerably better shape. The walls and the roof had been coated with a thick layer of insulating mud, and in the magical spectrum the walls were covered completely by the ward of the Blessing Way. The only way the skinwalkers could hope to break through tonight without burning themselves was through the roof. They knew it, and they knew we knew it and would be waiting for them to try it. And, in all likelihood, they were still in no shape to try such shenanigans.

The ceremony was in progress when we entered. Frank Chischilly looked tired but determined. Ben Keonie and his crew were in there, and so was Sophie Betsuie. Surprisingly, Coyote was present in his role as Mr. Benally and lending his own mojo to the final night of the ceremony. He was wearing a gray hoodie sweatshirt but still had on his black cowboy hat. He smirked when he saw my neck brace and black undershirt. We received tight nods as greetings, and we gave them tiny smiles in return and tried to keep out of everyone’s way.

The skinwalkers came but did not attack the hogan. They were still nursing injuries, as I suspected. We heard them out there in the night, both of them. They circled the hogan for about a half hour, snarling and hissing and issuing threats, and then the noises stopped. No one believed they had truly gone; they were simply waiting to see if anyone was stupid enough to go outside and check. No one was.

I wondered if their appearance meant that the Famine curse was still in effect despite Garm’s meal or if they were here purely for revenge and to protect their territory. They did not renew their demands to feast on my flesh, so that was a hopeful sign.

The downside to being so well protected was that I couldn’t see the skinwalkers anymore unless I used magic to create my own wee peephole. I would have liked to see if they were just as fast as before or if they had slowed a bit due to their injuries. The fact that they were out there at all was testament to healing powers that rivaled my own, but how bad off were they?

There was very little for us to do, yet we couldn’t go to sleep with all the chanting, singing, and praying going on. I wouldn’t want to take a nap around Coyote anyway — the only way to sleep comfortably near him is to make sure he’s sleeping too. To pass the time, Granuaile asked me to talk about when I first came to North America.

Oberon said.

“All right,” I said, speaking in hushed tones. “We might as well.”

Long, long ago, when every collection of humanity smelled of shit and there was simply no helping it, I longed for a new, fragrant land. My longing was based on more practical matters than simply my sense of smell: My tattoos made me a target wherever I went in Europe, and I was running out of places to hide. The Romans had wiped out the Druids on the continent and burned all the groves that allowed us to shift planes, and on the islands, missionaries like Saint Patrick destroyed us through proselytizing and patience. I spent years traveling constantly, living off the land or eking out a meal from this farm or that, and slowly adjusting to the new reality: Druids were no longer the powers they once had been, and if I wanted to survive in the villages, I would need to pretend to be illiterate, know nothing of herbalism, and laugh at everyone’s lame jokes.