Kevin Hearne - Hexed

“Wow,” I said. “It’s just like my garage, except with extra overkill.”

“Clearly these weapons are not for personal defense,” Leif said at the threshold. Mr. Semerdjian was under his control, but he hadn’t invited Leif into his home of his own free will yet. The man was standing, somewhat slack-jawed, by the door that led into his house. “Mr. Semerdjian,” Leif addressed him, “please explain why you have all this weaponry here.”

“It’s for the coyotes,” he replied.

I looked up sharply. “What did he say? What coyotes?”

Leif repeated my question, since Semerdjian wouldn’t answer anyone but him.

“Coyotes. The men who smuggle people across the Mexican border.”

“Oh, those coyotes,” I said. “Okay.”

“I supply two different gangs of them,” Semerdjian continued. “They always need something extra to get away from the border patrol these days.”

Leif pumped him for more information about his suppliers and customers, while I loaded up. I took a flak jacket, remembering that die Töchter des dritten Hauses liked to use handguns, then I snagged two RPGs and stuffed five frags into my pockets. I laid the RPGs in the trunk of Leif’s Jaguar and then called across to him that I was just about ready to roll.

Granuaile and Oberon were inside the house, entertaining three werewolves with the extended version of The Fellowship of the Ring . One of them was Dr. Snorri Jodursson, and I called to him to follow me into the backyard for a minute. He inquired after my health and thanked me for paying his huge bill so promptly, then vaulted me up into the branches of my neighbor’s palo verde tree, where I unbound Fragarach and Moralltach but kept them camouflaged. That was the full extent of the aid I could expect from the Tempe Pack, under Magnusson’s orders.

After depositing the weapons in the trunk of Leif’s Jaguar, I was truly ready to pick a fight—or, rather, to finish one that die Töchter des dritten Hauses had picked with me.

“Come on, Leif,” I called across the street. “Wrap it up and drop a dime on him later. Let’s go pick up the nice witches now so we can go kill the naughty witches.”

The Sisters of the Three Auroras came down from their tower quickly and met us in the underground parking garage. They walked briskly in their pointy boots toward a line of slinky two-seat sports cars. Malina and Klaudia stepped lively to an Audi TT Roadster; Bogumila and Roksana made for a Mercedes SLR McLaren; and Kazimiera and Berta, something of a mismatched pair, looked as if they were going to squeeze themselves improbably into a Pontiac Solstice. Unlike the German hexen , they knew what decade it was and how to properly dress in black. Bogumila had actually pulled her hair back into a practical ponytail, and I was mildly disappointed that the previously hidden side of her face was perfectly pleasant, no hideous scarring or missing chunks of flesh or gaping ocular cavity with a worm wriggling around inside.

“Time is of the essence,” Malina explained as their cars’ security systems chirped at them. “I think we’ve shielded ourselves from divination, but if they somehow penetrate it and know we’re unprotected now, they may have time to repeat the hex that killed Waclawa and wipe us out all at once. I’m sure they have demons ready and waiting to aid them.”

“The clock is ticking, eh? How long do we have?” I wasn’t worried about being found through divination; no one but the Morrigan could find me that way, thanks to my amulet. And Leif had nothing to worry about either, because it’s tough to divine dead guys, and they’d have to know he was involved ahead of time before trying.

“Once they begin the ritual, perhaps as little as twenty minutes. Follow us and we’ll talk on the phone.”

Leif became a little bit envious as he watched the witches pull out in front of him. “Those are very nice toys. What do they do for a living?”

“Consulting.”

“Really? What sort of consulting?”

“Magical, I guess, in the sense that they magically draw a salary without truly consulting anyone.”

“How very clever of them. Though I suppose it is not all that different from real consultants.”

“Malina made the same observation,” I said as we turned left onto Rio Salado and headed for Rural Road to catch the 202 east. My cell phone began to play “Witchy Woman,” and I said, “Speaking of whom, she probably wants to consult with me on our plan of attack.” I flipped open my phone and cooed, “Hel-loooo,” with my voice gliding up into an interrogative tone at the end.

“You’re sounding remarkably cavalier about this confrontation,” Malina said, her Polish accent pronounced. She was already getting herself into a snit.

“I’m simply living in the moment and enjoying it. The near future holds a kill-or-be-killed situation, so I am sucking all the marrow out of life while I can. Leif has a crush on your car, by the way.”

Malina ignored all this and said, “We are traveling to Gilbert and Pecos, so we’ll be heading south on the 101 right after we get on the 202. They’re on the top floor of a vacant three-story building. Something’s waiting for us on the bottom two floors, but we couldn’t see what it is.”

“So you and your sisters are going in while Leif and I wait outside?”

A cold silence greeted me for a few beats, then Malina said, “No, it’s going to be the other way around.” I could almost picture her grinding her teeth as she said it.

“Oh, that’s too bad, because we were going to stop off at Starbucks and get a couple of lattes while you took care of this.”

“That’s the famous vampire Helgarson you’re riding with, isn’t it? Is he fond of lattes?”

“I don’t know.” I looked over at Leif, who was grinning—he was hearing both sides of the conversation, of course—and said, “Malina wants to know if you like lattes, and I want to know if you’re famous.”

“No to both,” he said, as we screamed onto the 202 on-ramp.

“Sorry, Malina,” I said to the phone. “He’s not famous.”

“Perhaps it would be better to call him infamous. It is irrelevant at this point. What is relevant is that my sisters and I are not great warriors. Were the odds even and they did not cheat with modern weapons, I would say, yes, we could walk in and win a magical battle against most opponents. But we are outnumbered more than three to one.”

“How many are there?”

“Twenty-two. Some of them have firearms, but they are not great warriors either. And while they may be expecting you, Mr. O’Sullivan, they will not be expecting Mr. Helgarson to get involved. I imagine the two of you together will be quite formidable.”

“She’s complimenting our martial prowess, Leif,” I said to him.

“I feel more manly already,” he said. The short distance on the 202 was already covered and we were merging onto the southbound 101.

“Hey, Malina, tell me how much you want to see us play with our swords.”

Leif threw back his head and laughed. Malina’s accent thickened to the point that her English was nearly indecipherable. “Mr. O’Sullivan! You will stop this unseemly innuendo immediately! How someone so old can be so immature and inappropriate is beyond me. Try to refocus your attention on our goal, please.”

“Oh, right, right. My apologies.” I grinned, completely unrepentant. One day I’d get her so mad she’d give up on English entirely and just cuss me out in Polish. “I suppose you were going to explain what you and your sisters will be doing once we arrive.”