Page 12

12

HAILEY

Just like the weather, my nerves fluctuated between the scalding frustration of another failed spell and the cool embers of fragile hope.

Each time the daggers slipped through our magical nets, it chilled me further, but I had to believe we would find a way.

Even if it took every magical being in the supernatural world banging their heads together to come up with some solution.

I glared down at my phone.

After days of hitting dead end after dead end trying to magically track the killer, a spark of static from the dry fall air made me jolt as my finger brushed the screen.

The sting sharpened my determination.

This couldn't go on. We needed a new approach. Something bigger. Bolder.

I typed out a text, stabbing each letter with enough force to slay a vampire, if autocorrect was any judge.

Emergency Magical Hive-Mind Session. Our place. 2 hours. Everyone better be here.

I jabbed the send button, then added a bit for clarity.

Bring all your magic, all your brains, and all your pointy objects. It's time to make these daggers give up their secrets before someone else dies.

The tiny gray text bubbles appeared and vanished in quick succession as the others started responding with variations of "On my way." Thank goodness.

We needed the whole crew together, with all of our magic in one place.

Maybe a full dragon-vampire-witch brainstorming session could finally break through whatever wards the killer had wrapped around those daggers.

Or maybe getting all our particular brands of supernatural crazy together would knock something loose.

It wasn't like I had a treasure map with a big red X marked "Solution Here." But I had my friends, my little found family of things that went bump in the night. And I had a really big backyard. If we couldn't figure this out between the dozen of us, then I was officially out of ideas.

After sending the text, I sank into our oversized couch.

I stretched out and reached for the remote, flipping through channels until the familiar chords of the Supernatural theme song filled the room.

In the kitchen, I heard the distinctive sound of Jax moving around.

The soft thunk of the refrigerator door, the rattle of a pan being set on the stove, the click of the igniter as he lit the burner.

A smile tugged at my mouth as I picked up the warm, savory smell of chicken and herbs.

My Jax, cooking for one tiny hungry dragon.

Gosh, I loved that man.

"Is this the one where Dean makes the devil's trap bullet?" Kendra asked as she flopped down on the other end of the couch.

I shook my head. "No, I think this is the one where they find out the Colt can't kill Lucifer. Oh, hey, Adalinda."

The dragon queen gave a regal nod as she settled into Jax's favorite armchair.

Flint's happy trill drifted out from the kitchen, followed by Jax's deep chuckle. "Yes, you can have the big bowl, you little beggar."

The front door opened, and Luke walked in just as Dean Winchester plunged a machete into a snarling vampire's neck, lopping the head clean off in a spray of way-too-fake blood.

"You know, it really is a good thing that vampires aren't actually like that," Kendra said as the headless body thudded to the ground. "Can you imagine the mess?"

"Excuse you, Dean Winchester can hunt me anytime." I waved a hand at the screen. "Or Sam. I'm not picky."

"Preach." Luke high-fived me as he passed to settle on the arm of the couch.

"Team Winchester all the way."

From the kitchen, Jax's voice carried a distinct note of amused warning. "Hey, I heard that!"

I leaned my head back to smirk in his general direction. "I said hunt, not hump! I'm a taken woman, but I'm not dead. Well, no more than usual."

Kendra snorted, Adalinda raised one elegant eyebrow, and Luke chuckled. "Don't worry, no fictionally hot hunters are stealing your mate anytime soon."

The sizzle of meat hitting a hot pan merged with the sound of TV machetes and magic. I let the familiar, teasing exchange settle around me like a warm blanket. The comfort of a prickly, dangerous, wonderful family that would literally face down hell together. Or in this case, a mystery held in a couple of shiny knives.

I glanced at the clock. Less than an hour until the group descended in full force. Forty-five minutes to soak up the calm before the storm.

They trickled in like a stream of supernatural suspects in a mystical murder mystery. My very own collection of Clue characters, ready to point fingers and unveil secrets. We headed out to the backyard, the only place big enough to hold us all. Paige and Claudia arrived hand in hand. Grim and Nash flanked Cleo like dark sentinel bookends, their usual snark subdued by the gravity of the situation. Even Izora swept in with minimal dramatics.

Xander and Kendra claimed spots at the picnic table, making room for Luke to perch on the table beside them. Zara hovered near the deck, her normally animated face drawn into lines of tense readiness. Ransom took up his usual sentinel post near Jax. Janice walked through the gate in the fence a few minutes later and waved hello as she sat across from me in one of the yard chairs.

I eyed the blades like one might eye a coiled snake. With wary respect with a healthy dose of "please don't bite me." Each leather sheath looked harmless enough on its own, but together, they seemed to buzz with a low-level energy that set my teeth on edge. Maybe it was just nerves, but I swore the damn things knew we were about to dig into their secrets.

Adalinda's long fingers flipped open the latches on the lead-lined case with deliberate, hypnotic precision.

The hinges creaked softly as she lifted the lid, the sound obscenely loud in the sudden hush that fell over my backyard.

For a long, suspended second, nothing happened.

The daggers lay revealed in their case, the polished hilts and scabbards gleaming with a malevolent sort of invitation.

Then reality stuttered.

It was like the world hiccupped, a visual glitch that rippled out from the exposed blades.

For a disorienting instant, everything seemed to blur and refocus, edges going soft and colors bleeding together.

I blinked hard, trying to clear the distortion from my vision.

That's when I heard the sharp, collective intake of breath from the others. My eyes snapped to Janice, following their stunned gazes. At first, I couldn't process what I was seeing.

It was like watching a time-lapse video of a caterpillar liquifying in its cocoon before rebuilding itself cell by cell into a butterfly.

Only instead of a butterfly, Janice's form was morphing into something decidedly less colorful and way scalier.

Her magical aura shivered and collapsed, the metaphysical equivalent of a house of cards caught in a stiff breeze. As it fell away, the woman I'd come to know as a bossy, busybody neighbor melted with it, leaving behind a towering figure that seemed to absorb the afternoon light into his emerald scales.

Janice, or the creature that had been wearing her face, rose to a height that put even Jax's six-foot-plus frame to shame.

"Damn you," Luke yelled. "You whammied me!"

I didn't know what the heck he was talking about.

I could barely hear him over my heart beating a staccato drum line in my ears.

Draconic features mixed with humanoid ones in a combination I'd never seen before. It was like he was a human half-shifted into a dragon. Vivid green eyes blazed above angular cheekbones, the pupils sharp vertical slits. A ruff of iridescent spikes crested the top of his head and trailed down the back of his neck, disappearing beneath the blouse he'd been wearing as Janice.

"What the actual flying fu—?" The half-strangled words forced themselves out of my throat, jagged with shock and the first rising sparks of fury.

Luke kept yelling, cutting me off.

"I oughta kick you’re a?—"

Around me, the others snapped into battle-ready stances without conscious thought.

But nobody could use magic.

I quickly slammed the lid of the blade box shut and my vampire strength returned in full force.

Blades sang as they cleared sheaths, and I heard the distinctive click of at least one gun being cocked.

We might not have planned for this particular twist, but we damn well knew how to respond to a threat.

The strange man-dragon-thing raised his hands in a universal gesture of peace, but the razor-tipped claws glinted at the ends of his fingers.

He opened his mouth, and I tensed, ready for anything from a blast of dragon fire to some kind of siren song designed to enspell us all into slack-jawed compliance.