Dark Heart of Magic (16 page)

“Dude!” Felix said. “How do you know about me and Deah?”

Devon gave him a look. “It's kind of obvious. I've known for a couple of weeks now, ever since that dinner for all the Families, when the two of you were staring at each other all night. Besides, every time we run into her on the Midway, you suddenly, mysteriously disappear for a while.”

Devon was smart, able to pick up on subtle things like that, piece them together, and figure out what was really going on. That's how he'd realized who I really was and that I had transference magic. Just by watching and listening and putting together all the small, inadvertent clues that I hadn't even realized I'd let slip about my past and my power.

“I was hoping that you would come clean with me, but you didn't,” Devon continued. “I went to your room, but you weren't there, so I figured you must have hiked over here. And when Lila wasn't in her room either, I decided to come look for you both.”

Felix chewed on his lip. “And what do you think about me and Deah? Are you going to tell your mom?”

Claudia wouldn't like the idea of Felix dating Deah, especially not now, when the Draconis seemed poised to strike out at the other Families. She would order him to break things off with Deah, and he would have to do it. Claudia's word was law with the Sinclairs, and you either followed it, or you left the Family—for good.

Devon sighed and ran a hand through his hair, the mist turning his dark locks more black than brown. “I don't have a problem with Deah. She's always been nice enough to me, given that she's a Draconi. But she
is
a Draconi—and not just someone who works for the Family. She's Victor's daughter and Blake's sister. You couldn't have picked a worse person to sneak around with.”

Felix's shoulders sagged. “I know that, all of that. But I love her, Dev. I have for a while now.”

Devon looked at his best friend. “I know you do, and I think Deah cares about you too. That's why I'm not going to say anything to my mom . . . for now. But something's gotta give, man. You need to figure out if she's really worth all the trouble that being with her will bring down on both of you.”

Felix momentarily brightened; then his face sobered. He wasn't just talking to his best friend right now, and he gave Devon a curt, respectful nod, realizing that the Family bruiser was giving him a chance to make things right—for everyone.

Devon turned to me, his gaze lingering on my long coat. “And you came over here to spy on Victor.”

I smoothed down my coat, making drops of mist slide off the spidersilk. “And why would you think that? Maybe I saw Felix leave and was following him instead.”

“Three reasons. You stayed behind in the library to talk to my mom earlier today, you only wear that coat when you're up to something sneaky, and we're still standing on Draconi property.” Devon ticked the points off on his fingers. “Victor's up to something, isn't he?”

There was no use lying to him. “Yeah. Although I still have no idea what it is.”

I told him and Felix everything I'd seen and overheard at the Draconi castle. When I finished, they were both frowning.

“What do you think those notes in the Draconi files mean?” Devon asked. “What sort of things was Victor going to give his people to increase their magic? Or whatever he's doing?”

“Not a clue. I took photos of the files, though. Maybe Claudia or Mo will be able to make sense out of them.”

“And Victor has a file on Deah?” Felix asked. “You don't think he would actually . . .
hurt
her, do you?”

He chewed on his lip again and started pacing back and forth.

“Of course not,” I said in a smooth voice. “His notes were all about how proud he was of her mimic magic. Nothing else.”

Devon could tell I was lying, and he nodded his approval at me. There was no need for Felix to worry any more than he already was.

Felix opened his mouth to ask me another question, but Devon cut him off.

“We can talk more back at the mansion,” he said. “I don't think that the Draconi guards patrol this far out, but I don't like waving this flashlight around where they might see it either. Let's go home.”

Devon turned around, the flashlight swinging in a wide arc. I was just about to fall in step behind him when the beam swiped across something that was a bright, glossy red.

Blood.

“Wait,” I said. “I see something. Shine your light back over here.”

I pointed as I walked toward the spot where I'd seen the splash of crimson.

“Lila?” Devon asked, peering into the trees and mist around us. “What's wrong?”

I shook my head. I didn't know yet. But something
was
wrong because it was once again quiet in the forest—too quiet.

No owls hooted in the trees, no rockmunks scuttled through the underbrush, no monsters peered out at us from the bushes. I glanced around and realized that this was the same place where I had noticed the eerie silence before, on my way over to the Draconi estate.

I skirted around a couple of dead, fallen trees, with Devon and Felix trailing along behind me. I hopped over the last fallen tree and stopped, since the ground dropped away into a sharp, rocky ravine that was about ten feet wide.

My friends stood on either side of me, with Devon shining his flashlight back and forth, straight out in front of us, highlighting the dense thicket of trees on the far side of the ravine.

“I don't see anything,” he murmured.

Me neither. So I looked around, searching for the blood I'd seen before. A second later, I spotted it, splattered on a tree to my right, with smears on the ground as well. A horrible thought occurred to me.

“Shine your light down,” I whispered. “Into the ravine.”

Devon did as I asked, the beam of his flashlight sinking lower . . . and lower . . . and lower....

Until it hit the first body.

A tree troll was lying on the ground about ten feet down in the ravine, its furry gray arms and legs splayed out at awkward angles. Deep, vicious cuts crisscrossed the creature's chest and belly, and a few small pools of blood surrounded its body, although not nearly as much as I would have expected, given the horrible wounds.

And it wasn't the only one.

Devon moved the light back and forth, from one side of the ravine to the other, revealing more than a dozen dead trolls. All of them were in various states of decomposition, and many had been reduced to nothing but bones, although none of them had been killed as recently as the one closest to us.

“What do you think did this?” Felix whispered. “A bear? A copper crusher? Another monster?”

I shook my head. “I don't know. I doubt a bear would be this close to the Family compounds, not with all the people, lights, and noise. Of course, monsters are everywhere, but they usually like to stay hidden. But if it was a copper crusher or some other monster, why wouldn't it have eaten the tree trolls, bones and all? There are
so
many of them—”

“Too many for one monster to eat.” Devon finished my horrible thought. “Way too many.”

“But why kill a tree troll if you aren't going to eat it?” Felix asked. “It just doesn't make any sense.”

I thought of the murdered troll we'd found behind the dumpster yesterday. Once again, that soft, evil laughter echoed in my mind, making me shiver.

“Maybe . . .” my voice trailed off. “Maybe it was just about the killing. Maybe whoever did this didn't care about eating the trolls at all.”

Felix gave me a horrified look. “You think someone did this
for fun
? That they caught and killed a bunch of tree trolls? How would they even do that?”

“They'd have to have some sort of trap,” Devon said.

He lifted the flashlight, shining it up into the trees around us and moving the beam back and forth.

I sucked in a breath when I spotted the cage.

It hung about ten feet up in a blood persimmon tree off to our right. A cage. Someone had actually put a cage out here so they could trap, torture, and murder monsters. Anger roared through my body, and I ran over, took hold of the trunk, and started scrambling up the tree.

“Lila,” Devon said. “Be careful.”

I nodded and kept climbing. A few seconds later, I was at eye level with the cage. It was a small, metal contraption, about the size of a pet carrier, with bars all around it. The door on the cage was open, and something flat and gold gleamed inside. I reached through the opening—careful not to trip the lever that would send the door shooting down—snagged the object, and dragged it out where I could see it.

A dark chocolate candy bar.

My stomach twisted, and bile rose in my throat. Someone had deliberately put the chocolate here to lure a new troll into the cage since they'd already killed the monster who'd been trapped earlier tonight—and all those other poor trolls before it.

“Lila?” Devon called out. “What is it?”

I tucked the chocolate bar into one of my coat pockets, then took hold of the metal cage.

“Use your compulsion magic and tell me to destroy something,” I snarled. “Now.”

Devon drew in a breath. When he spoke again, his voice held a cold crack of magic. “Lila,
destroy
.”

Devon's voice wrapped around me like the mist cloaking the trees. The second I heard his command, invisible hands took hold of my arms, moving them this way and that. Devon's power soaked into my body and quickly melted into a familiar, icy wave of magic flowing through my veins, so cold that it was almost painful. Suddenly, I was stronger than before—and I used that strength to rip the metal cage apart with my bare hands.

Bit by bit, bar by bar, I tore the trap apart, the pieces
ping-ping-pinging
off the tree branches and disappearing into the darkness. I had just snapped off the final bar when the last of Devon's magic burned out of my body. I exhaled and took a moment to get my emotions under control before I threw away the remains of the cage and climbed down the tree.

“The trap?” Devon said, shining his flashlight at the broken pieces of metal that had fallen to the ground.

“Yeah.”

“But who would do such a thing?” Felix asked. “And why? Who would deliberately be that cruel to a bunch of harmless monsters?”

I thought of Victor and Blake. Both of them were definitely that cruel. Both of them could easily kill monsters—and people too—just because they wanted to. Just because it amused them. Just because they thought it was
fun
. But I didn't understand why they would bother with tree trolls.

“This must be what's driving the trolls down the mountain and into the squares,” Devon said. “They know that someone's hunting them.”

The three of us moved back over to the ravine, with Devon shining his flashlight down the rocky slope again. We stared at the broken, murdered creatures, but there was nothing we could do for them. We didn't have any rope to climb down to get to them, and we didn't have any shovels or other tools to bury them.

Besides, all around us, blue, green, and red eyes appeared, glowing brighter and brighter as the other monsters crept closer and closer, drawn by the scent of fresh blood. Whoever had killed the troll was long gone, which meant that the danger had passed. But there were still other things lurking in the mist, hungry things that would be happy to snack on the dead troll—and us too, if we didn't leave soon.

“Let's go,” Devon said. “There's nothing we can do for the trolls, and it's not safe for us to stay here any longer.”

He moved away from the edge of the ravine. So did Felix. But I stayed behind, staring down at what was left of the dead tree trolls.

For some reason, Seleste Draconi's warning whispered in my mind. I shivered, clutched my sword a little tighter, and hurried after my friends.

W
e made it back to the Sinclair mansion without running into any more problems—or finding any more dead monsters.

The three of us headed to the library, where Claudia was sitting behind her desk, shuffling through papers and pointedly ignoring Mo, who was lounging on a white velvet settee by the fireplace, sipping some delicious-smelling hot chocolate.

I went into the library first, and Mo straightened up.

“Where have you been, kid?” he asked. “I was getting worried.”

“Oh, I picked up some company in the woods on the way back.” I jerked my thumb over my shoulder.

Felix and Devon stepped inside the library, with Devon shutting the doors behind him.

“We need to talk,” Devon said. “About exactly why you sent Lila to spy on Victor.”

Claudia sighed, took off her silver reading glasses, and sat back in her chair. Mo looked at me, but I shrugged. I hadn't been here all that long, but I'd quickly learned that there was no stopping Devon when he wanted answers about something.

Devon marched over to Claudia's desk, crossed his arms over his chest, and glared at his mom. “Why didn't you tell me that you were sending Lila to spy on the Draconis? I'm the Family bruiser. I should know about these things.”

“Because I knew that you'd try to go with her,” Claudia said.

“And what would have been wrong with that?”

She arched her eyebrows at his harsh tone, but Devon didn't back down.

“Because Lila is a thief and a very good one at that,” she said in a cool voice. “She's used to getting into and out of places she isn't supposed to be with no one seeing her.”

“You'd better believe it,” Mo chimed in, toasting me with his cup of hot chocolate and extolling my virtues, such as they were.

Claudia ignored him. “This job required the Family thief, not the Family bruiser. Besides, there was more risk of both of you getting caught if you went with her.” She looked at Felix. “Although I see that you took Felix along with you . . . unless he had some other reason for going over to the Draconi compound?”

Felix gave her a tentative smile, but Claudia's gaze was hard and knowing. It looked like Devon wasn't the only one who'd noticed Felix and Deah making googly eyes at each other. Then again, it was Claudia's job to know everything that was going on with all the Sinclairs.

“Felix saw Lila leave, and we went after her,” Devon lied. “But that doesn't change the fact that you should have told me what you asked Lila to do, especially given how dangerous it was. She's only been here a few weeks. You should have sent someone else, if you were that worried about Victor.”

“I'm
always
that worried about Victor,” Claudia snapped. “And with good reason. You know he's plotting something against the other Families, against
us
.”

“And you sent Lila to try to find out what it was?” Devon shook his head. “You should have sent someone else. You should have sent
me
.”

“And you need to set your feelings aside and trust Lila to do her job,” she snapped again. “Just like you trust the guards to do theirs. Just like I trust you.”

Devon opened his mouth to keep arguing with her, but I stepped up beside him.

“She didn't
send
me anywhere,” I said. “The whole thing was my idea—hiking over to the Draconi property, sneaking into the castle, searching Victor's office. I
wanted
to do it.”

He threw his hands up in the air. “Why would you want to do something like that? Something so dangerous? Do you know what the Draconis would have done if they'd caught you, Lila? Victor would have executed you on the spot.”

Frustration blazed in his eyes, along with more than a little stomach-churning fear. He'd been worried about me. That was why he'd come looking for me. His obvious concern touched me, but it also annoyed me. Because Claudia was right—I was a good thief, a good fighter, and Devon needed to trust me to do the job I was here to do.

“It was a risk I was willing to take.”

“Why?”

“You know
exactly
why—because Victor murdered my mom.” I ground out the words, my hands clenching into fists, my whole body trembling with fury. “And I will do everything in my power to make sure that he pays for what he did to her. I don't care what I have to do or how dangerous it is. I would go right back over there this very
second
if I thought it would help us and hurt him.”

Everyone stared at me. They could all hear the rage and need for vengeance in my voice.

“So what did you find out?” Claudia asked in a neutral tone, trying to diffuse the tension that blanketed the room.

“Lots of things. For starters, Victor, Blake, and Deah were having dinner with Nikolai Volkov. Carl and Katia were there too.”

“What did they talk about?” she asked, leaning forward in her chair. “Tell me everything. I want to hear every single detail.”

So I told her, Mo, Felix, and Devon everything that had happened while I'd been skulking around the Draconi castle, except for Felix and Deah hooking up in the greenlab.

“So Victor wants to combine the Draconis and Volkovs into one Family,” Claudia murmured. “Interesting. That's a bold move.”

“But Victor has to know the other Families would never allow that,” Mo said. “It sounds to me like it's just a distraction. Victor gets everyone stirred up about a possible merger, while he's really planning something else.”

Claudia picked up her glasses and
tap-tap-tapped
them on her desk. “For once, I agree with Mo. But if the merger isn't his main goal, then what is?”

“Maybe it has something to do with all those creepy files in his office,” I said.

I filled them in on the files and e-mailed the photos I'd taken to everyone. Claudia, Mo, Felix, and Devon all pulled out their phones and scrolled through the pictures.

“All the files had these weird notes in them?” Claudia asked. “With all these
CC2
and other codes?”

“All the files have notes about the person's magic, but the Draconi files were the only ones that also had the codes. At least, from what I could tell.”

Her green eyes glinted with interest. “How many Draconi files were there total? If you had to guess?”

I thought back, picturing the tall stack of files on Victor's desk. “Probably around twenty or thirty. However many people he has competing in the tournament. But that was just on his desk. He could have had more files in his office, maybe one on every single person in the Draconi Family. I didn't have time to search everywhere.”

I thought of that secret space I'd discovered behind the stone dragon carving. Victor had
something
hidden back there, and I was going to find out what it was. But I didn't say anything to the others. Claudia might have risked my going over to the Draconi castle once, but I didn't know if she would approve a second trip. Then again, I didn't plan on telling her about it—until after I was back.

“Files on people, notes about their magic, talk of increasing their powers.” Mo let out a low whistle. “It sounds like Victor is trying to build an army.”

Claudia didn't say anything, but her mouth pinched with worry. This was not what she'd wanted to hear. But at least she knew that Victor was trying to ally with the Volkovs now, even if we had no clue what his files or notes were really about.

She looked at Mo. “This is more serious than we thought.”

He nodded. “I'll reach out to my sources. See if anyone else knows that Victor is trying to merge with the Volkovs or why he has detailed records on everyone in the tournament, including his own people.”

Mo pulled out his phone and started texting.

“There's one more thing,” I said.

I told them about the dead tree trolls we'd found in the ravine close to the Draconi compound. I also pulled out the candy bar I'd taken from the trap and showed it to everyone, but it was just chocolate, the sort of thing you could buy at any store.

“That just sounds like Victor being Victor,” Claudia said. “He's always been the sort to pull the wings off a butterfly just because he can. Trapping and killing tree trolls is right up his alley.”

“Blake's too,” Devon agreed. “Either one of them could have put that cage in the woods.”

“But what about the troll we found next to that dumpster yesterday?” I asked. “That wasn't anywhere near the Draconi section of the Midway.”

Devon shrugged. “Blake could have done that too. We ran into him and Deah a few minutes before we found the troll, remember?”

I nodded. He was probably right, but I still couldn't help but feel there was something more to the monsters' deaths. Sure, Victor and Blake delighted in their cruelty, but they also didn't waste their time on things that wouldn't help them. What could they possibly hope to gain from murdering a bunch of monsters?

I didn't know, but I had a bad, bad feeling that it was the key to Victor's plot against Claudia and all the other Families.

 

There was nothing else for us to report, so Devon, Felix, and I said our goodnights. Mo shooed us out of the library, claiming that we needed to get as much sleep as possible, since the Tournament of Blades would start bright and early again in the morning.

Yippee-skippee.

I went back to my bedroom, where Oscar was sitting on the front porch steps of his trailer. Tiny was on his back, snoozing in the corral, not looking like he had moved an inch in all the hours I'd been gone, although the tortoise's feet were twitching in time to the twangy country music drifting out of the pixie's trailer.

Oscar drained the rest of his honeybeer, then crumpled the miniature can in his hand and tossed it out onto the lawn, where it clattered against the ones already littering the grass. His violet gaze locked onto my coat. “I see you've been out.”

I shrugged out of the sapphire-blue spidersilk and hung it up on one of the posters on the bed. “It's what I do.”

“And where did you go skulking off to tonight?”

“Nowhere special,” I said. “Just the Draconi compound.”

“What!” Oscar's voice rose to a shriek that was loud enough to drown out the music.

Tiny grumbled and cracked one of his black eyes open, giving the pixie a reproachful look for disturbing his nap. Oscar ignored him and hopped to his feet, yanking his black cowboy hat off his head and whipping it back and forth in agitation.

“Why in the world would you go over
there
?” Oscar demanded, his voice climbing up another octave. “Don't you know how dangerous that is?”

I winced at his screech. “Of course I do. But it wasn't any more dangerous than living on the streets for four years. First Devon, now you. It seems like all anyone ever does around here is tell me what I shouldn't do.”

“Well, maybe you should listen to us,” Oscar sniped back. “Because we've been doing this a lot longer than you have, cupcake. Call me crazy, but I'm not in a hurry for you to get yourself killed, especially not over a piece of scum like Victor Draconi.”

I winced, this time at my own stupid thoughtlessness. Oscar had lost a lot of friends to the Draconis over the years, so he was a bit sensitive about my putting myself in danger. In a way, the pixie and I were just alike. We didn't want to care too much about people because we knew how easily they could be taken away from us—and how much it hurt when your heart was broken over and over again.

“Oscar, I'm sorry. I didn't meant to worry you—”

“Forget it,” he spat out. “I don't care to hear your lame-ass apology right now.”

The pixie glared at me, then slapped his cowboy hat back onto his head, stormed into his trailer, and used one of his boots to kick the door shut behind him. The resulting
bang
was hard enough to rattle the trailer windows and make a few more loose shingles slip off the roof and drop down onto the lawn. A few seconds later, Oscar turned his music up as loud as it would go, assaulting my ears with the twangy tunes.

I sighed. So far tonight, I'd fought with Deah, Felix, and Devon, and now Oscar was upset too. Plus, I still had no idea what Victor was really up to, I'd gotten some creepy, cryptic warning from Seleste Draconi, who might or might not be able to see the future, and I'd stumbled upon a mass grave full of tortured, murdered monsters.

Perfect end to a perfectly miserable day.

 

I took a shower, but I was too restless and frustrated to go to bed, so I threw on a T-shirt, a pair of shorts, and some sneakers. Country music still blared from Oscar's trailer, so I went out onto the balcony and climbed up the drainpipe until I reached one of the mansion roofs that formed a wide terrace.

The terrace was open on three sides, and three lawn chairs were perched close to the iron railing to take advantage of the spectacular view of the Midway and all its flashing lights down in the valley below. But I wasn't here to admire the view. No, tonight I wanted to hit something—
repeatedly
.

So I headed over to a series of metal pipes that jutted out of the mansion wall, snaking up and down like an elaborate jungle gym. Several punching bags dangled from the posts. An open footlocker full of boxing gloves and other sporting gear sat close to the pipes, with a cooler full of ice and drinks over by the railing.

I didn't bother taping up my hands or grabbing a pair of gloves from the footlocker. Instead, I marched over to the closest bag, raised my fists, and just started hitting it. I slammed my fists into the heavy bag over and over again, all the while imagining that it was Victor's smug face I was pummeling. He'd gotten rid of my father and had murdered my mother, and now he was threatening to hurt everyone else I cared about. And I had no idea how to stop him.