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“Oh, good,” Tony said. “He’s early.”
Without even thinking, I snatched the locket out of Tony’s hand and shoved it down my shirt and inside my bra. By the time the doofus realized it was gone, I was already dashing back toward Mateo, who looked ready to fight. He shoved me behind him, placing himself between me and the swirling vortex.
The portal stabilized, looking much like the first one I’d seen: black, empty. Then a figure stepped out from the nothingness. He looked to be no more than in his late twenties, but something about him made him seem much older. He reminded me of those old-fashioned wizards from the WEC, the creepy ones they’d interviewed on the news.
He wore a pristine suit, which looked out of place in the stained motel room. His dirty blonde hair was styled like he’d stepped out of an old Hollywood movie, with a deep side part and shiny from grease or gel or pomade, or something else that prevented hair from moving naturally.
Behind him floated two transparent creatures that reminded me of the genie from Aladdin, but red. They had heavy cuffs around their wrists. Above the cuffs were massive arms that were attached to equally generous shoulders and chests. They looked capable of pummeling anything into smithereens. Below the hips, they tapered off into twin wisps of smoke. Haloes of smoky red surrounded them.
The wizard’s face turned sour as he looked around the room. “This place is a fucking dump.” His eyes landed on a stain on the corner of the bed, and he looked ready to step back through the portal he’d come from. I didn’t blame him.
Then he noticed me and Mateo. “What the fuck is all this? I said just you.”
“They teleported here just now. I thought it was you at first,” Tony sputtered.
“Whatever. I’ll deal with them after. Where’s the locket?”
Tony scrambled to pull the other half of the locket from his pocket, and the man snatched it out of his hands. He grinned. “Finally. I have the whole thing.”
I caught Mateo’s eye as I pressed a hand over my bra, where my mom’s locket was warm against my skin. The slimy stranger did not have the whole thing because half of it was with me, and I didn’t plan on giving it up without a fight. This was my mom’s locket that she’d left to me, and that I’d thought lost forever. It felt so good to have a part of her back.
Mateo nodded ever so slightly, his hand moving slowly to a round object on his belt. Then, moving so fast he was nothing more than a blur, he removed the object from his belt and hurled it to the ground.
The room was instantly filled with smoke. Thick, burly arms reached around me, hauling me to a strong, familiar chest. Then we were running out of the motel room and hightailing it through a snowy parking lot. The wind cut through my clothes immediately, chilling me to the bone. We stopped behind a tractor-trailer.
“Any time now, Seth. Get us out of here!” Mateo yelled.
Tony and the stranger were tumbling out of the room now, both coughing up a lung. The two scary-looking genies — were genies even real? Guess so — floated toward us but stopped, as if waiting for orders.
Finally, the wizard guy stopped coughing long enough to yell, “What the hell are you two idiots waiting for? Get them.” He then collapsed into another fit of coughing.
For a moment, I wondered if the two genies had frozen on purpose in order to give us time to escape. Because by now, Seth’s portal was already opening, swirling on the side of the tractor-trailer. There was no waiting this time, no time to be afraid. I took Mateo’s hand, and together we leaped into the darkness.
Chapter 10
Mateo
The portal spat us out into Desmon’s library. The dragon himself was there too this time, sitting on one of the oversized armchairs with Carly perched in his lap.
Seth, who’d been pacing back and forth, stopped in his tracks and glared at me. “What the hell happened there?”
“A wizard happened,” I said. “Weren’t you watching? I think he is on the WEC, but I couldn’t swear to it. Tony was expecting him, though. He portaled in shortly after we did.”
“So that was the source of the interference. I was able to watch your interaction until suddenly I couldn’t. Something booted me off. I only got a visual again when you were running toward the truck.”
Desmon’s expression was neutral, as usual. Despite working for him for so long, it was still difficult for me to guess what he was thinking. It was a dragon thing; they didn’t show emotions the way humans or even other monsters did. They had two modes: neutral or furious. And furious was never good.
“Desmon, this is Eva. Eva, Desmon, the dragon of Darlington.”
Eva bravely stuck out her hand for a shake. Something that not everyone would do, given that he was a fire-breathing dragon.
Desmon sniffed the air. “A witch. How interesting.”
“Oh, I’m not a witch,” Eva said, shaking her head firmly. “My family was, once upon a time, but there hasn’t been anyone born with magic for generations. I’m just a regular old human girl.”
“I see.” Desmon clearly wasn’t convinced.
It made me feel better that I’d thought her a witch when we met, too. She just…felt like one. Which was a strange thing to say about someone, I guess. But magical folk can feel each other sometimes, and she felt witchy. In the best way.
