“Ergo, the fence,” Alexis commented. She was hunched over a little, her gloved hands folded inside her sleeves, except when she wanted to remove her cigarette from her mouth to talk. Each hand got its turn in venturing out into the cold.
Her nose was red from the cold, I noticed. She saw me looking and smiled.
“Fence for the mundane, and practitioners put up wards to shoo people away,” I said, forcing myself to avoid staring. “Runes that would make people more inclined to take detours, or just avoid or ignore the area altogether. They had it for the parkland where the Hyena was lurking. Except here, I don’t think it’s working.”
“Might be because of the radiation,” Rose said. “Eating away at the protections, so they don’t last as long as they should. Windows of opportunity are created.”
“Maybe,” I said. “Or maybe it’s the metaphysical equivalent of a vacuum. Nature abhors a vacuum, or something like that? He eats reality, stuff gets drawn in as a matter of course. Or it’s just a failing of the modern age. The era of the internet. You can divert people who might happen across the place, but when it’s featured on ‘abandoned building’ websites and the practitioners aren’t invested or savvy enough to take down the website or stick a big fat rune on the site’s homepage…”
“We can’t and probably won’t ever know just how many people have been caught by that demon,” Rose said.
“Any number is too many,” I said. “This isn’t today’s project, but it’s a project. Rose has access to the books. We can prop one mirror up by another to read them through the surface.”
“Provided I’m willing to keep going from person to person, turning pages on demand,” Rose said.
“Yeah,” I said. “It’s good these guys have a chance to wrap their heads around this, and I like having a chance to look at it from a distance without rushing.”
We stood there, watching. Our breath fogged in the air, joining the heavy mist and Alexis’ cigarette smoke.
Evan returned from the air. I held my hand over my head to give him an easier landing spot.
“Good flight?” I asked, holding him out in front.
“Yep! I still like the motorcycle more, though.”
“That’s weird,” I told him.
“Nuh uh.”
“Flying has to be better.”
“No it doesn’t. I’m small. Imagine riding on top of a motorcycle the size of a train. Makes my bones shudder and the wind blows through my feathers, and-
I shook my head a little as he went on.
“Did you see anything interesting while you were up there?” Tiffany asked.
“A big bird screamed at me. I think it might have been a hawk. I screamed back, and he left me alone.”
My hand found its way to my face. “Yeah, don’t get caught by a hawk.”
I couldn’t shake the mental image of the hawk taking Evan to pieces, and the effect that might have on me.
“Actually, it wasn’t so much me screaming back. More just me screaming. You don’t expect something to come after you like that when you’re all the way up there. I was surprised, and then I realized what it was before I’d finished the first scream, and I kept screaming, and I didn’t stop until he went away.”
“Be careful,” I said. “Be aware, and don’t get caught by a hawk. Or a cat for that matter.”
“I think a cat would stop if I screamed at the top of my lungs.”
“If a hawk or a cat hit you full-strength, you might not be in any shape to scream,” I said.
“Huh,” he said. “You know, this is just one more argument in favor of giving me special powers.”
“That’s already on the metaphorical to-do list,” I said. As I’ve said a dozen times now. “Blood sparrow, box yet to be ticked off.”
“Maybe you should put it on a real to-do list,” Evan said.
“You know what could be even better than a blood sparrow?” Ty asked. “Considering the demon your practitioner wants to fight?”
“No, Ty,” I said, before he could say anything.
Ty ignored me. “A fire sparrow.”
“Yes.”
“Fuck you, Ty,” I said.
“Blake, Blake, Blake!” Evan hopped around on my outstretched hand. I let my hand drop, and he caught himself with a few flaps of his wings, full-intensity flying until he’d circled around to land on my shoulder. He hopped in place there. “Blake!”
“What?”
“Fire sparrow. Ty thinks it’s a good idea!”
“I heard it, just as you did.”
“Maybe you didn’t, because you’re not even half as excited as I am about the idea! Imagine me doing everything I’ve been doing already, except I’m on fire.”
“Great, Ty,” I said. “Now he’s not going to let this go.”
“It’s like all this stuff I’ve been doing with moving around and epic dodges and biting that guy’s eye, except I’m like a daredevil. Being on fire while flying through a flaming hoop or something.”
“He’s a kid, on top of everything else,” Ty said. “He gets bored, and he needs to get excited about stuff. You’ve got to give him that.”
“Devil-bird? No, that might give people the wrong idea.”
“Yeah, probably would, Evan,” Rose commented.
I briefly considered making Evan ride on Ty’s shoulder for the ride back, then thought twice about it. Ty was liable to stir him up further.
I sighed.
“What about those flaming birds?” Evan asked.
“Phoenixes,” Rose said.
“Yes. I could be like one of those!”
I ignored him. I looked over at Tiff and Alexis, only to see that Tiff was smiling.
“Don’t,” I said, under my breath. “If he thinks you approve, it’ll only egg him on further. He’ll get on your case until you get on my case.”
Tiff did a terrible job of wiping the smile off her face, and settled for looking away, off in the direction of the ice-laden trees.
Alexis rubbed her hands together.
“Cold?” I asked.
“Yeah. You?”
I touched my coat. It was hideous, a thrift-store buy, a down-filled brown corduroy coat with a folded-down collar, but it had deep pockets, it was warm, and it had only been eighteen dollars.
“I’m warm enough,” I had to admit. “All the same, if we’re not getting anything more out of this, we maybe should head back soon, get a move on with something more concrete.”
“Sounds like a plan,” she said. “I’ve been reading about protective spells. I was just thinking that if I got a picture of the graffiti-”
She patted her coat. “Forgot my notebook in the car.”
“No prob,” Ty said. He drew his phone out of his pocket.
I saw it, made a mental connection, and moved my hand to stop him from raising it. In the process, I very nearly slapped the phone out of his hand.
“What the hell?” he asked, as he caught it with the other hand, stopping the phone from dropping into the snow.
“You remember the rules that Rose and I outlined before we arrived?”
“If something comes up, it’s vulnerable to fire, very possibly vulnerable to other things of creation and light. No looking in or at the windows. If something goes down and we’re at any risk at all, we’re not supposed to try and save each other. We save ourselves first.”