Faith Hunter - Easy Pickings

I staggered under the combination. Actually staggered, and grabbed Jane’s arm so I wouldn’t fall down. My friend Melinda, who refused to talk about it but implied she had a close personal relationship with her goddess, had thrown some impressive power around a few times in the past. Mel had nothing on the power of a witch standing side by side with her god. Right in that instant, I believed to the bottom of my soul that Serena could crush us like bugs if she wanted to. I wondered if I was seeing the birth of an avatar, one of the rare humans actually blessed with the direct magic of a god.

I wanted, however, to wonder that from a long way away, so I grabbed Jane’s arm, whispered, “Let’s discuss it outside,” and hauled her away before Laz and Serena got bored and squashed us.

The street was full of dead things and dazed magic-users. We avoided the worst of both, dripping our way down the road until we found a pool of light beneath a lamp, and together slid down to sit in its bath. Bath being the operative term: we were still drenched to the bone, drops of water sliding down my nose to hang at its tip, then fall. I was too tired to even wipe them away.

“A god,” Jane said after a while. “And you didn’t tell me.”

“I honestly didn’t know. He had shields like nobody’s business. Maybe it’s the connection to the earth that Papa Legba’s supposed to have. Or maybe he was trying to hide. The other gods I’ve met . . . weren’t. Is, um, splitting Amaury in half, is that going to stop a vampire?”

Jane laughed. “Yeah. That should do the trick. We can’t leave him here. Laz, I mean. We can’t leave him here. Can we?”

“I don’t think we could send him home even if we wanted to. Did you feel the power rolling off Serena?” I had no idea if Jane was sensitive to that kind of thing or not, but she nodded. “Besides, it’s either he stays or Katrina obliterates the Big Easy. I’m not crazy about a million deaths on my head. How about you?”

She curled a lip. “When you put it like that. Well, crap. I guess we saved the day.” She looked up at the night sky, now clear of clouds, and a bright star visible even through the city lights. “I’m starving.”

“Yeah, I bet you are.” I glanced at her. She looked worse than hungry, really. She looked like a big, soaking wet cat who hadn’t eaten in about three months. I lifted my own wet foot, sighed, and squelched it back down against the pavement. “You need to eat something.”

“We could hit Antoine’s again.” Jane got up.

I didn’t. She offered a hand and I took it, letting her pull me to my feet, but instead of striking off in search of food with her, I looked back at the vampire bar. “That sounds awesome, but there’s this one thing.”

Jane got a wary look, shoulders lifting like a cat ready to jump. “What?”

“Gods are kind of capricious. I’m kind of afraid if we don’t go home right now while Lazarus is still thinking about it we might never find him again so we can go home. He might keep not-quite-accidentally forgetting about us. We’re kind of a lot of magic. He might want to keep that around.”

“Ah, crap. Great. Does that mean we have to go through that freaky cold portal thing again?”

“I’m pretty sure it does.”

“No way,” Jane said firmly. “Not without food. I’ll die.”

I wasn’t entirely sure she was kidding. I pursed my lips. “Can’t have that. Not after all this trouble. Look, do you mind if I. . . ?” I called healing magic up. I was pretty certain Jane could see the power anyway, but I put a little extra effort in, making sure it had a visible component. Silvery blue washed down my arms, intensifying as it reached my hands.

She eyed the glow warily. “Mind if you what?”

“Just offer you a boost. It probably won’t stave off needing to eat an elephant later, but it should get you home without you collapsing.”

“You’re still gonna make me go through that nasty portal, aren’t you. I didn’t have to coming in to this . . . world. I mean, I was just in downtown and it went a little weird, that’s all.”

I crooked a smile. “Yeah, you’re still going to have to go through it. Serena’s magic brought us here, but Legba’s is going to send us home. So was that a yes?”

Jane grunted, which I took as an agreement. I reached out with two fingers, touching her over the heart. I did that a lot. Sometime when I got all introspective it would probably strike me that heart magic was, like, big important mojo and there was deep meaningful symbolism in the gesture. But I wasn’t much into introspection, so mostly I just let go a bubble of power: refreshing, strengthening, perky, enlivening.

Jane hissed, sounding like a surprised cat, and almost stepped back, but caught herself at the last moment. Around the tips of my fingers, a gray light swirled up, gray sparkling with black and silver sparks. It was cold and hot all at once, tingling against my fingertips like static electricity.

Jane took a breath and it too was filled with the silvery-gray light. I could See inside her, into a place filled by stalactites and stalagmites dripping water, with shadows and flames that danced on the walls, hiding and illuminating. I was used to Seeing souls as gardens, but I had no doubt that this dark cavern was Jane’s soul place.

She sat beside the fire as a little girl who watched me with an emotionless face. She was wearing a homespun dress and wore her hair in braids to either side of her face. Feathers were tucked into the braids, and around her neck was a necklace of claws and bones.

In the shadows, sitting on a ledge, was a . . . was her Beast, watching me with a predator’s intensity. Her tail draped off the ledge, hanging like a thick rope.

The little girl reached up and took my fingers. Her grip was hot, like the coals in her fire, and when she put my fingertips on her chest, over her heart, I sucked in a breath and steadied myself against the pull.

Her body ate the healing magics up like so much steak and eggs, hungry for more. The little girl before me stood, and stood and stood, growing in to an adult, the Jane I knew. On the human plane, her muscle mass swelled again, becoming healthier. I could almost feel the roar of emptiness in her belly. I couldn’t do anything about that, not exactly, but I could mask it for a little while longer. Long enough to get home, now that her bone and body were a little less fragile.

I gave a last push of energy and sagged, both impressed and faintly alarmed at the glimpse I’d gotten of Jane’s soul. That tough little girl inside her had been able to take exactly what she needed from me. I thought it was a damned good thing she hadn’t needed, or decided she wanted, more.

Jane staggered back a step when the magic sluiced off. “That was . . . I feel better. A lot better. I feel like I could shift again.”

“Don’t,” I said hastily. “Mostly you still really, really need to eat. I’ve just given you enough to claw your way through without passing out. I can’t actually replace the mass you lost, not without giving you some of my own, or something, and that would get—”

“Freaky,” Jane supplied, though I’d been going to go with “dangerous.” Either way, I nodded and she flexed, looking all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. Or as bushy-tailed as somebody still sopping wet could be, anyway. “All right. Okay. I can face that stinking void now, I think. Let’s go before this wears off.”

We set off toward the bar. Jane’s stride matched mine exactly, and her competitiveness was just slightly greater. She kept pulling ahead. I kept catching up, until we were almost running and then both laughing. We broke into a full-on run, leaping swamp things and dead weres as we skidded toward the bar. We slammed into its front doors—what was left of its front doors—at exactly the same time, and burst out laughing again. A bunch of shell-shocked vampires stared at us, but not one of them made a move toward the kooky humans laughing it up on the doorstep.