Page 92 of Outfoxed

I took my own advice and fled while I could.

Sunday, May 24, 2043.

Lake George, New York.

The East.

Sandro’s raspberry soda contained crushed ice, raspberry syrup, carbonated water, whipped cream, and raspberries on top. The next time I needed to distract him, I’d provide raspberries. One box might keep him busy for a while. While we soaked in the hot tub, which could easily fit six, his mother sat on a lounge chair nearby, sipping at a green soda. She’d even turned her whipped cream green.

“Lime?” I guessed.

“Melon. Honeydew, to be specific. I almost made myself a sour apple, but the bottomless pit in the hot tub with you would beg for a sip, and then I’d be out my drink.”

“It’s true. They’re my second favorite, and I’m very good at suckering my mother out of hers.”

“That you are. Jade, tell him about the choir. You may also clarify your witch powers while you’re at it, as I’d like to have a better idea of what training you’ll need. Are you trained for the East?”

I sipped at my soda, debating how much I wanted to tell them. “A week ago, I was absolutely determined to make certain you would never learn a damned thing about what I’m capable of. Now? I’m sipping soda in a hot tub and debating what I should tell you.”

Sandro’s mother laughed. “In your shoes, a week ago, I would have felt the same way. Start with what you’re comfortable with sharing. It’ll help Sandro know what you’re capable of so he can plan your adventures together. I expect he’ll handcuff you to him so he doesn’t lose track of you again.”

“I really might,” Sandro grumbled.

“What does the whole uncontested courtesan contract say about handcuffs?” I asked.

“Have fun but try not to have too much fun,” Sandro’s mother replied.

I laughed, wondering why I’d bothered asking. “I’m a witch, and I don’t need to be trained in the East.”

“The Alley?” Sandro asked.

“It’s my weakest quadrant. That’s how it is with us scryers. I need to find an object with the right connection to what I want to see, and if it does, then I can get a view of the past. There are a lot of factors at play. Items that have a strong history can override a scryer’s control, too.”

I wondered if Mansfield was gathering scryers to control who found out about their unnatural cause. If the general population learned someone was deliberately killing them, I gave it hours before the entirety of Tulsa rioted. If Tulsa rioted, Asylum wouldn’t last long, even with its collection of powerful witches and mages.

Numbers mattered, and a thousand weak mages could easily defeat one powerful one. With tens of thousands of people rioting, the meager numbers of Asylum residents wouldn’t stand a chance. The longer the storms lasted, the higher the chance riots would happen.

“Well, we definitely can’t let Mansfield know you’re a scryer or witch of any type. He’s had the ones he’s been able to lure into asylum sequestered, and he’s the one who is giving the storm warnings to the siren operators and local radio stations. I just thought he was doing it to make sure they didn’t get killed in the storms. It’s a bad season this year.”

“It’s a bad season because there is a choir of music mages in the South making it a bad season. I’m a past scryer, and the storm we got caught in together wasn’t natural. I saw it from a tree’s perspective. The twisters spiraled in a pattern—a very set pattern. That’s not natural. It can’t be natural. Then I went to Owasso, where I got my first real look at the music mages. At that point, I was planning on suckering you into helping. I figured I’d agree to be your uncontested courtesan only if you made that problem disappear.”

“I’m a good music mage. I could probably handle a choir on my own. It’s not all that hard to disrupt a choir; a few discordant notes and a little help from a gun, and the problem is solved.”

I blinked. “Discordant notes?”

“Beginner’s trick when a music mage. If you sing a discordant series of notes loud enough they can hear, you can fry their music—and their hearing—in a hurry. I’m particularly good at it, because that’s how you counter a music mage. And I have enough control I can sing without using magic. What are you in the South?”

“Voodoo witch. I learned from a New Orleans Voodoo queen, enough to make sure I didn’t stomp on their religious beliefs. I can do a little of all the various practices, but only because I bothered to learn about all of them. The last thing you want to do in the South is piss off a New Orleans Voodoo queen.”

“You actually got a queen to teach you?” Sandro’s mother blurted.

“Well, yes.” I flicked an ear back. “Is that a problem?”

“They’re notoriously stingy about teaching anybody who isn’t a believer in their specific religion, Jade.”

“Well, it helps I’m a fox. The queens like foxes—and often try to marry them. I don’t know why. I didn’t explicitly notice anything in their religious beliefs that made foxes so desirable. I got lucky. There weren’t any single Voodoo princes on the market, else they probably would have tried to marry me into one of their lines. The Voodoo queen I learned under only had daughters.”

Sandro’s mother shrugged and sipped her melon soda. “Seems simple enough to me. They want their daughters to be strong queens, too. It’s the same reason everybody wants foxes right now. Are they buying their foxes?”