Suzanne Johnson - Elysian Fields

“Sorry.” I tried to appear contrite. “I wanted a spot where an open transport would be camouflaged.”

He gave me a look that would freeze habaneros and high- stepped out of the brush. “I half expected you not to be here. I heard on the television news that another ax attack had occurred. Do you still believe it’s the historically undead Axeman at work?”

“I do.” I gave him a quick rundown while we walked to a bench located near the Lafitte Pirate Ship ride, ignoring his expression of derision at the information from Jean about a necromancer’s involvement.

“Well, obviously the local Regent of Vampyre is the culprit and Lafitte is covering for him.” Adrian assumed an I- smell-turnips expression. “Nasty creatures, vampires. Totally self-absorbed. We should never have allowed them open access to our world.”

In my albeit limited experience I’d found the vampires to be among the most self- regulated of all the species, and I’d never heard a whisper of complaint about Etienne Boulard or any of his people. Vampires were extremely practical. After all, they knew following prete law kept their favorite snack food—i.e., humans—close at hand.

“Have you met our local Regent?” Except for one sample tour with Eugenie, my visits to L’Amour Sauvage and the Tour Blood offices had only exposed me to his human minions. Tonight, I had an appointment to meet the Regent himself.

Adrian’s upper lip curled. “Of course not. Why on earth would I want to meet a vampire?”

Maybe because he was one. A few minutes in Adrian Hoffman’s company could suck the soul out of a banana. “I’m going to talk with him tonight at his bar. It’s not far from your apartment. Why don’t you go with me? I’d like to get your reactions and compare them with my own.”

Yeah, I was sucking up, and he fell for it. “That would be most . . . interesting. Yes, I’ll go.” He almost smiled.

Good. Sucking up done. Now for the real show. “What are we doing today?”

I expected a bunch of dry lectures on elven history and lore, but he surprised me. “Show me what you can do.” He sat next to me on the rusty bench, crossed his legs, and waited for me to perform like a trained seal.

The thing I’d most like to do was point my elven staff at him and set him on fire, but such an act would probably hurt my opportunities for career advancement. “Can you be more specific?”

He rolled his eyes heavenward as if asking the Almighty to spare him from idiots. “What elven skills do you claim to have? We’ll start there. Next time I’ll test you on some other skills known to be elven.”

Wait, this might actually be helpful. My mouth dropped open involuntarily.

He sniffed. “Unless, of course, you’ve highly exaggerated your abilities.”

What a jackass. “Fine. I can do hydromancy. I can—”

“Show me.”

I sighed. “It’s daylight. And we’re outside.” The ideal time to do hydromancy was at night under a full moon and, failing that, indoors in a dark place.

“You’ve a reputation for being creative .” His tone left no doubt as to what he thought of creativity: out-of-the-box thinking sat atop the undesirability scale alongside horrible things like genocide and polite behavior.

“Some people consider creativity an asset.” He wanted creative? I’d show him creative. I studied the area around us, grabbed my pack, and walked toward the long midway, filled with a couple dozen dilapidated wooden structures tricked out like French Quarter buildings. Before the hurricane, they’d sold overpriced Cajun- and voodoo-themed souvenirs. The sign leading into the area read PONTCHARTRAIN BEACH, a lakeside amusement park in New Orleans that had been closed years ago. The name had a certain irony now.

The storefront on the end had once been bright yellow, with orange window and door trim and sage-green shutters. Designed to mimic a Creole cottage, the building more resembled something a colorblind do- it- yourselfer had painted using clearance-bin paint from Home Depot, then left to rot for several years. The windows gaped open, and graffiti covered the front. In bright red, VENDETTA; in black, ROACHERY.

Shuddering, I stepped through the open doorway and picked my way around shards of glass and empty display cases, dodging a rodent-like skeleton the size of a terrier and taking shallow breaths to protect my lungs from the chalky smell of dried mold spores—a scent I remembered too well from the post-Katrina city. Gerry’s entire neighborhood of Lakeview had reeked of it for a year.

I knelt in the darkest corner. Not pitch-black, but dark enough to work. My skin jumped and twitched and itched with the feet of imaginary spiders and roaches and God knew what else crawling inside my clothes. At least I hoped they were imaginary.

“What in bloody hell are you doing?”

I started at the sound of the petulant voice coming from the doorway. Adrian had been following closely until I reached the building.

“I’m going to do some basic hydromancy and I need darkness. Come closer—just past the giant mutant rat carcass. I can’t do it any closer to the door.”

Glass crunched under his feet, and he muttered curses at me all the way across the room. A pair of dust-covered, fancy loafers came to a stop about a yard to my left. Had the man thought he was dressing for a garden party?

The creak of his knees as he squatted echoed in the dark, and the crackle and whisper of something crawling nearby made the little hairs on my arms prickle. We needed to get this done and get out of here.

I felt around in my backpack and pulled out my portable hydromancy kit. Unzipping the leather pouch, I removed a small black-glass bowl, a flask of holy water, and two cones of patchouli incense. If I did the ritual at home, I used mimosa leaves, but the incense was more portable.

I looked up. “You got a match?”

“Did you not even inherit enough of your father’s Red Congress magic to light incense? What a pity. He was a powerful wizard.”

I hoped he didn’t see my teeth gritting in the gloom. I could light incense; I just saw no need to waste my energy reserves.

“How well did you know Gerry?” I touched a finger to the incense cones and sent enough physical magic into each one to ignite the ends. My father, whom I’d known only as a mentor until he went missing after Katrina, had been a strong Red Congress wizard, warrior class. I’d inherited very little of his physical magic and Adrian was right—that was a pity.

“I knew him too well.” I imagined the wizard assuming his most condescending expression, which would match the tone of his voice. “He squandered more talent than most wizards ever have. He was arrogant and unwilling to follow the rules or respect the traditions of wizardry.”

Adrian would hear no argument from me. Gerry had raised me since I was six. I loved him and I missed him. But I wasn’t blind to his faults. Willem Zrakovi had expressed much the same opinion.

I poured the holy water into the bowl and sat back on my heels. One final element. “You have a pen? Or anything small that I can use for a focus?”

Fabric rustled as Adrian dug through his suit coat and handed me a fountain pen. A really nice one, judging by its sleek casing. Exactly what I’d need to help me stage a little magic show he’d appreciate.

“Okay, keep your focus on the water,” I said, and closed my eyes. In my left hand I clutched his pen while my right index finger touched the surface of the water. I used a little more of my native magic to shoot a small burst of energy into the bowl, keeping Adrian’s face fixed in my mind.

I heard a sharp intake of breath and opened my eyes. He squatted next to me, and peered into the water at the image of himself as viewed from above. I shifted my finger to different sections of the water’s surface, and the view of his image shifted in correlating angles. I twirled my finger more deeply into the bowl and the image zoomed in on his horrified face.