Sarah Brennan - The Demon's Covenant

The leader of the Aventurine Circle would only agree to meet them over running water.

“So we’re meeting them on the Millennium Bridge,” Alan explained as he drove around more tall gray office buildings than even London should have been able to hold, until they found a five-story car park near the Bankside and parked the car on the fourth level.

Mae was simply glad to get out of the car, after hours of driving with the boy who’d just asked her out and the boy who had just announced that he’d never ask her.

Not to mention the brother who was apparently not talking to her. Jamie avoided Mae’s gaze when she tried to catch his eye, standing close to Alan, as if Alan was his only possible ally out of the whole group.

His and Nick’s little knife-throwing bonding session had obviously not been a resounding success. Nick was standing to one side, looking generally uninterested in the entire world.

Mae started walking through the car park, the rubber soles of her shoes squeaking on the concrete as she stalked through oily puddles. The streets by the Tate Modern museum were narrow, the buildings varying shades of yellow and brown brick. She walked north toward the bridge and refused to let herself look back.

They drew level with her just before she reached the red brick courtyard of the museum and started up one of the two steel slopes that led to the bridge.

She allowed herself to glance across at them, wondering how Jamie was holding up. He was looking a little apprehensive, but Alan was taking care of him. He had a hand on Jamie’s shoulder and he was talking in that lovely, soothing voice that meant it didn’t matter what he said because every syllable was gentle as a touch, like someone stroking a frightened animal with sure, steady hands.

“This was really the first important horizontal suspension bridge to be built in the world. There was a competition for the design,” Alan said. “The effect is meant to be like a ribbon of steel, or a blade of light, and”—his voice slid into a warmer note, amused and affectionate—“I’m sure you’re fascinated by this lecture on architecture and engineering.”

“Fascinated’s a strong word,” said Jamie, dimpling up at him. “Maybe a bit reassured.”

Alan smiled. “I’m told many people find engineering very soothing.”

“A blade,” Nick repeated from his place behind them, and gave the bridge before them a slightly approving look.

“And now I am all unsoothed again, thank you,” Jamie said. “Does it always have to be about pointy weapons of death, Nick?”

“You want me to start killing people with blunt instruments?” Nick asked. “Well, okay, if it makes you happy.”

He was holding on to the glass-and-steel rail, his grip white-knuckled. Though it was hard to tell with Nick, Mae thought the edge to his voice was sharper than usual.

“You all right?”

“Fine,” Nick bit out with enough force to make Alan turn his head.

“Is it the running water?” he asked, his voice more like the voice he’d used to talk to Nick last month, before Nick erupted from a demon’s circle in a rush of magic and fury.

The tight, unhappy line of Nick’s shoulders eased a fraction.

“No,” he said. “I’ve been feeling weird for a while.”

Alan slackened his pace so that he was walking beside Nick rather than Jamie. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Nick shrugged. Alan studied his face as if he had a chance of reading something from it.

“You’d call me stupid if I asked whether you wanted to go back to the car and sit this one out, right?”

“Right,” said Nick, his voice a little less sharp. “Stupid.”

Mae stopped eavesdropping and looked straight ahead to find that Jamie had gone on in front, apparently determined not to walk with her.

Beyond Jamie’s thin, held-straight back, she saw the glittering spread of London laid out before her, glass-fronted buildings and neon lights shedding their brightness on the dark river, and the white cathedral dome of St. Paul’s going gray in the gathering dusk.

The thin steel bridge was empty except for the magicians.

The Aventurine Circle must have cast some sort of don’t-notice-us-but-don’t-come-by spell. Mae thought keeping the Millennium Bridge clear of London commuters was pretty impressive magic.

The Aventurine Circle looked pretty impressive as well.

There were seven of them standing on the bridge, two men and five women. They were all in pale clothes, standing out against the cobalt blue of the sky and the reflecting waters below.

The woman at their head wore white.

Celeste Drake herself was the least impressive figure of the group. She was the shortest, and she was not even beautiful. She was pretty, like a china doll made human, with silvery blond curls ruffling in the wind, a slim body covered in white wool, and a pale throat with a black pearl dangling in the hollow. Mae thought that if Celeste had shown up at her mother’s tennis club, she would have been welcomed with open arms and bullied into making the sandwiches.

“Hello,” said Celeste, opening her white-woolen arms, and Mae realized who her sweet smile was for.

“Hi,” Jamie responded, sounding awkward but pleased.

“It’s a most unexpected pleasure to discover one of our kind at this little meeting,” Celeste said. “You’re very welcome to our territory.”

“Oh, thanks,” said Jamie. “Um, it’s very nice. Your territory. Good shopping, and—I’m sure other good—magical stuff.”

Celeste laughed and a silvery ribbon appeared as if her laugh had created it, the sound ringing out and the ribbon drifting toward Jamie, twisting in the breeze and leaping back like a puppy who wanted to play. He reached for the silvery line of magic: It touched his hand, shining on his skin for a moment, and then bobbed backward. Jamie took a few more steps toward the Aventurine Circle, reaching out to have the magic again.

“Jamie, don’t be an idiot!” Nick snarled.

Jamie blinked and stopped, the silvery tendrils clinging to his arm like a bracelet of light.

Celeste’s eyelashes, little golden fans like the lashes on a doll who could be sent to sleep, snapped up. Her gray eyes were cold and still as lakes in winter.

“I don’t think any of us require a lecture from a demon.”

She stepped forward, and the others all stepped with her in what seemed for a moment like a procession.

Mae took a step backward to be on Alan’s right as Nick was on his left, so they were flanking him in as much of a show of solidarity as they could make with Jamie still standing to one side, wrapped in magic and wonder.

Mae noted with disgust that even tiny china doll Celeste was taller than she was.

Alan held out his hand and said, “I’m—”

“I know who you are,” Celeste told him, ignoring his outstretched hand. “You’re the traitor, the boy who has managed to cut himself off not only from his own people but from all of humanity; the one who stands with the demons.”

“And you agreed to meet with me anyway,” said Alan. “Why is that?”

There was a tiny, smug curl to Celeste’s lips. It made her look like a cat smiling. “Put it down to a curious nature. What do you have to tell me?”

“The Obsidian Circle invaded your territory last month,” Alan said. “They’re in Exeter now. I understand the penalties for trespassing on another Circle’s territory are fairly severe. I wanted to point you in their direction.”

“Oh, I see,” Celeste remarked in dulcet tones. “Thank you so much. I’m delighted by the idea of being a tool in the hands of a demon.”

Alan’s voice stayed calm and friendly. “I just thought you might like to know.”

“Well,” said Celeste. “I’d like to let you know some things. I know perfectly well where Gerald Lynch and the remains of Arthur’s Circle have run. I know that Arthur Dee, the maniac who gave a demon its own body and who dared to come into my city without my permission, is dead. I know that I am not the kind of woman who would start murdering my own kind, particularly when their new leader is young and promising and was only following orders when he did me a wrong. Some of us have loyalty to our own kind, Alan. Now tell me something I don’t know—could you possibly have anything interesting to say to me at all?”