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“Hero?” Viveca repeated.
The woman took a moment to sweep her gaze over them, settling on Aric. “Von’s dad was stuck in the fire. We would definitely not have gotten on site, let alone through the blaze, in time—but about when we were close enough to see the building burning, the fire just evaporated. Like it was undone, for lack of a better term. Not room by room or level by level, but all at once.” Her lips twitched. “It was kind of amazing, honestly. Except the structure was already compromised by then, and it was a woman’s scream as something caved in from the back that even made us aware someone was there.”
“Miss Breila,” Von said. “That was Miss Breila.” He looked up at Aric pleadingly. “She saved my daddy’s life, but weird people took her away.”
Aric arched a brow, laid a hand on Von’s dusty brown hair, and met the clinician’s patient gaze. “Weird people? Why would Caram Clinic let an injured, exhausted patient be carted off?”
She held up her free hand in defense. “I was there,” she admitted. “I was pretty much immediately set to working on Mr. Amund, because of the severity of his burns. But another team of rescuers also showed up to the scene, and since it was just me and my brother from our clinic, they offered to take care of her. Said they had room and more than enough skill to treat her head wound. We weren’t in a position to argue. The arsons this morning struck a bunch of businesses simultaneously and all the city’s clinics have been running ragged since.”
“Did you get their names?” Aric asked. The arson statement would also have to be investigated, he realized, but one conversation at a time.
The woman nodded, took a swallow of her water, and said, “Celia and Enam.”
A series of stuttered gasps from his team echoed Aric’s thoughts perfectly. He couldn’t begin to comprehend the purpose behind involving themselves in something so public, disguised or not, but those aliases were too coincidental to be ignored.
“Aric,” Darnel said after a second, “you don’t think…?”
“Yes. I do.” And it was too fresh a lead to let sit.
Chapter Nineteen
Aric had known going after Cecilia and Denham—if he was right about their connection—would mean facing a pair who could deceive possibly as well as he himself could wield ordinary magic. So he’d prepared. He’d had two months to brace himself to stand against any deceit which assaulted his senses. He was confident there were very few, very unlikely ways even magically empowered deception could fool him now.
He was still a little surprised to have to use that new skill as soon as they found the site where Cecilia and Denham had, supposedly, last been seen. It seemed they’d absconded with a woman who’d heroically risked her own life to save another. Was the woman a co-conspirator who’d been unintentionally caught in the wreckage? Or a victim who had, for some yet unknown reason, gained their ire? They were possibilities to ponder, later.
“What exactly do you hope to get from this?” Viveca asked, rolling a piece of crumbled stone beneath her foot. “They weren’t exaggerating the damage this place took. That poor guy must’ve been in pretty bad shape.”
Aric layered what he had mentally labeled his Clear Sight over his ordinary senses and looked again.
The burnt-out husk of Amund’s store remained largely as he’d seen it a moment earlier, at least up front. “There’s something else,” he said. “Follow my footsteps.” He started forward, stepping carefully, and followed his instinct around the far side of the building’s shell. Positioned technically between two pieces of destroyed wall, stone stairs suddenly opened into view. They descended straight down, into darkness.
Aric followed them.
“Whoa,” Viveca said, her mumbled voice carrying in the pitch-black space. “Sweet ancestors, I just walked through a wall…”
“I don’t think that was really a wall, Viv,” Darnel said. His own voice was the slightest bit unsettled.
“Aric,” Mitzi whispered from directly behind him, “where is this taking us?”
“It opens up in a second,” Aric said. Another couple of steps took him, and then them, into what looked like a back room in a stone basement. Except there was only one opening, the opening that led straight to the staircase. He’d have found that odd if his attention hadn’t immediately focused on the most interesting, and incriminating, detail in the small space. Nearly centered in the floor was a familiar pit-like design, dug into the ground.
“Do you see something, Aric?” Darnel asked. The question reminded Aric that no one else could see what he could. They likely couldn’t see anything at all.
Aric motioned with the arm closest to them, waving them closer. “Gather close to me. There’s no time to explain, but brace yourselves. What happens next might be jarring.” The one thing he couldn’t have done without risking tipping his hand was practice how to trace these portals without actually opening them. So they’d have to jump blind. It was fortunate they were capable.
Mitzi and Viveca gathered up on either side of him, grabbing hold of his sleeves. Viveca reached for the hilt of her sword with her other hand, and Mitzi reached for her fiancé as Darnel came up beside and behind her. Darnel’s material magic swirled around them, reinforcing their standard clothing to something sturdier. It was a practiced defensive maneuver Aric hadn’t taken part of in years.
When everyone was ready, Aric dropped a bit of mana into the unassuming portal in front of his feet and willed it open. Even if this failed to lead to his targets, he could still learn something useful.
****
Blood bubbled up past her lips and Rochelle tipped her head as much as she could tolerate before sloppily spitting it out. At least she managed to land the nasty dribble on her skin, but her pounding head and screaming wounds didn’t let her linger on the glimmer of positivity.
“You should really consider being a little more cooperative,” Denham said. There wasn’t a single inflection in his voice that indicated he was moved in any way by what he’d already done. Or allowed.
Rochelle dragged her lips up, sure the smirk more closely resembled a grimace. “Or what? You’ll kill me?” She swallowed against her still ragged throat. “You won’t get … anything from me … if I’m dead.”
Cecilia’s enchanted vine-whip uncoiled from the floor and slipped into Rochelle’s hair, tightening and yanking her head back. “Those sounded like questions. Should I remind you what happens when you ask questions?”
