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“Unless it’s moved,” Gabriel suggested, strolling to join them.
“Doubtful.” Peri shook her head. “It takes years to prepare the ground with layers of spells to enhance their magic as well as provide a circle of protection. And the Dayan Society has been around for nearly a century. It would take a catastrophe for them to relocate.”
“Is there something the humans can offer?” Gabriel asked.
It was a good question. Just because mortals didn’t possess magic or immortality, it didn’t mean they couldn’t have value for the miasma. Valen abruptly recalled the screaming crowd as it battled to get out of the fairgrounds.
“Emotions.” He spoke his thoughts out loud. “Fear. Hate. Fury. And violence.” He grimaced. “Death.”
“The miasma could get the same emotions at a coven at the same time they could be drained of their magic. That seems like a win-win,” Peri pointed out. “With the bonus of being isolated from their neighbors. The Dayan Society might not be as paranoid as my mother, but they took their privacy seriously.”
“Damn.” Comprehension hit Valen with shocking force. How had he been so blind?
Peri sent him a confused glance. “What?”
“Publicity,” Valen said with absolute certainty. “The miasma wants to be seen. Why else would it bypass a coven filled with witches? Or avoid the dozens of remote farmhouses, ifit hungered for human emotions? The miasma could have fed and been long gone by the time anyone discovered the bodies. Certainly no one would have been filming it on their phones and posting it on the internet.”
Gabriel studied him as if he’d lost his mind. “You believe the magic has enough self-awareness to select a public location for its feedings?”
Valen didn’t flinch. “It has to be self-aware, or it’s managed to infect Destiny and she’s being manipulated by the evil. How else could it be traveling from one spot to another?”
“But why?” Peri demanded.
“It could be that the evil is trying to spread fear through social media. Eventually the strange bouts of violence will be connected and people will become paranoid.” Even as the words left his mouth, Valen knew they didn’t feel right.
“It does thrive on chaos,” Peri agreed, although she looked equally dubious.
“Why not stay to enjoy the fear it’s caused?” Gabriel asked the obvious question. “There’s no doubt that the town is still a seething pit of emotions.”
Valen arched a brow at his friend’s melodramatic description. “Seething pit?”
Gabriel waved a hand toward his vast collection of books. “I like words.”
“He’s right,” Peri retorted. “It could cause more chaos if it’d chosen a theme park or a shopping mall. It didn’t look as if there were more than a handful of people at the fair.”
“Same thing with the bar,” Valen added, accepting that his theory remained frustratingly incomplete. “Why not head straight to Cheyenne or Denver to choose a bar filled with customers?”
“It would certainly make more sense to choose an area dense in population,” Peri said.
“Could it be avoiding a Gyre? That’s how it appears.” Gabriel shook his head, as if irritated by his inability to follow the reasoning of the miasma. “But why? It feeds on magic. The more potent the better, I would imagine.”
Yes. That was it.
“Say that again,” Valen commanded. Gabriel sent him a wry glance, as if suspecting he was being mocked. “Seriously?” Valen nodded, feeling as if a puzzle piece had just snapped into place.
“It feeds on magic,” Gabriel obediently repeated.
Valen deliberately turned toward Peri. “The more potent the better,” he said, adding the other words that Gabriel had muttered.
“Yes.” Peri hesitantly nodded. “Do you have a point?”
“The miasma is hunting you.”
“Me?” Peri recoiled as if she’d been slapped. “That’s crazy.”
He folded his arms over his chest. “You have twice the magic of an entire coven of witches.”
“So why didn’t it attack when I was at the ranch?” she reminded him, clearly disturbed by his suggestion. Understandable. Being hunted by the miasma would unnerve the most courageous mage. “It had to be there.”
