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I was about to give up when another faint twinkling caught my eye, though it was well out of line with the other stones. I walked across and squatted down beside it. This time, it was a whole stone rather than a shard. Maybe, just maybe, luck had finally fallen on our side.
I held a hand above the raw diamond, fully expecting it to be as dead as the earlier shards.
It wasn’t.
The spell still pulsed though the bright heart of the stone, but for whatever reason, had failed to execute. Maybe the caster hadn’t set it properly. Or maybe it had been set too close to whatever magic had shielded the sacrifice oval and that had caused a malfunction. Either way, it said a lot about the strength of the spell that the remaining stones had still activated when one section had been somehow kicked out of alignment.
But its failure meant I could now use it to trace whoever had set it, though that person wasn’t our wraith. The spell was gray rather than black.
“Saska,” I said. “Found something you might want to look at.”
She immediately walked across and squatted opposite me. “A spell stone, complete with a spell attached.”
I nodded. “It was part of a ring of six, and the only complete stone that’s left. Do you recognize the spell on it?”
“It’s a weather-based curtain spell—no doubt the source of the fog that shielded the island. Our wraith didn’t cast this though.”
“No, but we can trace whoever did through this stone.”
She raised an eyebrow. “I’m thinking you don’t mean via any of our usual methods for tracking the creators of inert or misfunctioning spells.”
I had no idea what their usual methods were, so simply said, “I can use my psychometry to trace the creator, but it’ll have to be done now rather than later, as the more time that passes, the weaker the connection will become.”
She nodded, took a couple of photos, then handed me a pair of gloves. “Do your thing. I’ll go meet and update the troops, then we can go.”
“They’re here?” I glanced around in surprise but couldn’t see anyone else.
“They just pulled in. I also called in the paramedics, so make sure you get that arm checked out.”
She rose and headed toward the trees. I pulled on a silicon glove, then carefully picked up the stone. Though it wasn’t touching my skin, images nevertheless stirred. They were fleeting and distant, running across my senses like a broken picture reel. There was one snapshot of a shadow-haunted shop that was dominated by old wooden shelving. Another of faded charms and glassed potions, all of them thickly coated with dust. A man in a chair, his hair gray and wild-looking, his clothes threadbare and old, wearing purple glasses so thick his closed eyelids looked huge. He didn’t look dead, but he didn’t exactly look alive, either.
I gripped the stone a little tighter and tried to pull a location. After a few seconds, the picture reel jumped, giving me the image of a run-down, two-story shop. A second jump revealed a street name but not a location. Which was annoying but better than nothing.
As the images faded, I dug out my phone and quickly googled the street name. Thankfully, there was only one Gartside Street, and it was located in Erindale, a good twenty minutes away.
I pulled the glove off around the stone to keep it secure, tucked it into my pocket, then rose and walked through the trees. Our boat was once again sitting at the dock. Saska was talking to Samuel and a couple of other people, and two paramedics were also dockside.
Saska must had said something to them about me, because they immediately headed my way. There were no seats, so I made do with one of the old concrete bollards and let the medics do their thing. They tsked over the state of my arm, insisted it needed stitches, and looked less than pleased when I told them using Steri-Strips would do exactly the same thing. But then, they had no idea one of my DNA adaptions was the fast healing of a werewolf.
With a few more grumbles, they patched me up, gave me some painkillers, and told me to go see my doctor the minute there was any sign of infection. I thanked them, took the painkillers, and headed down to the boat.
“Seems like you did hit a wee bit of trouble,” the captain said, offering me a hand in.
I nodded. “I don’t suppose you saw anyone else leaving the island, did you?”
He wrinkled his nose. “A boat appeared from around the far side and headed over to the other shore, but I couldn’t say whether it originated from that side of island or was merely passing through.”
“Any idea how many people were in that boat?”
He hesitated. “Two for sure, but there was this weird shadow near the stern that might have been a third person. Hard to be certain from such a distance.”
I was betting the weird shadow was our wraith, and the fact he was partially visible suggested that there were at least some limitations to his powers and his strength. Why else wouldn’t he have created a spell to fully hide his form?
“Are there any docks over there?”
“Several, but a boat that size could basically stop anywhere along the shoreline.”
And probably had, given the wraith and whoever was helping him wouldn’t want to be seen.
