Scott Tracey - Moonset

“That’s … good,” I said, still trying to keep as much distance between us as possible, for the smell, if nothing else. I was definitely right about the not showering thing—the man smelled like a rest stop urinal.

My first instinct was that the man was totally crazy, but I wasn’t stupid. I had to wonder if there were tiny grains of truth underneath the crazy haystack. If this man was a believer, if he knew my parents …

“You can’t be here,” Mal said, interrupting my thoughts. “C’mon, Jus, we shouldn’t even be talking to him.”

We weren’t allowed to have contact with cultists, for obvious reasons, so I wasn’t sure how this mistake was even happening right now. Didn’t they do security checks before they brought us somewhere? What if he tried to kidnap us just like the wraith had?

“Just because many lost faith doesn’t mean we all did,” the man said, his voice tobacco thick.

He pointed his finger at Mal, his hand trembling. “The Denton boy. Of course you’re thick as thieves, just like your daddies.”

“We’re nothing like them,” Mal said tightly. I wondered when his tune had changed from don’t engage with the crazy. Mal normally wasn’t known for having a hair-trigger reaction to our parents. He was usually the one who let it affect him the least.

“It’s one of the signs,” the man insisted. “Can you hear it? They whisper and plot, and they’ll grind up my bones to make their bread. They promised!”

Whatever sign the man was seeing, or hearing as the case may be, it didn’t look like a good one. No Exit, maybe. Or Beware of Avalanche. We were starting to attract an audience, as people found their morning chat far less interesting than the crazy, ranting homeless man at the counter. I cleared my throat. “Look, we’re not—”

“—that’s enough.” It was almost a mirage, the way Quinn suddenly popped up like a bodyguard. Or an enforcer. He had his hand around the mechanic’s forearm before I even realized he’d moved, and it slowly started to drop. “Justin, Malcolm, go wait outside.”

“Quinn?”

His dark eyes flashed. “I said wait outside, Justin.”

“Come on,” Mal said, still focused on the mechanic, grabbing my shoulder.

“Witcher, witcher, witcher,” the man singsonged.

“Hello, Johnny,” Quinn said with a sad smile. “It’s been awhile, hasn’t it?”

“Do they know? I bet they can feel it in the air, can’t they?” The mechanic closed his eyes, looking euphoric, as if the very air was the greatest smell ever. He took on a pleading tone.

“Just tell me they know. Please.”

I turned back, and heard Quinn mutter something, but I couldn’t decipher it. The tingle in the air confirmed it was magic. The man was caught off guard; his jaw worked but no sound came out.

“C’mon,” Mal urged, pulling me away. I wasn’t sure, but it looked like Quinn had used some kind of silence spell on the Harbinger.

Since most magic required a voice, anything that affected the ability to speak was a highly coveted ability. But as far as I knew, as far as any of us knew, there was no such spell. They drilled it into our heads year after year. You can’t steal someone’s voice, you can’t drown it out, you can’t take it away.

If they were lying about that, then what else had they lied about?

“What the hell is going on?” I breathed, once we were outside. Mal opened his mouth, then abruptly closed it and shook his head. He had a hand in his hair, his expression unreadable.

That threw me. Mal had seventeen different early morning grunts for “hello.” I knew them all.

But I couldn’t tell what he was thinking—maybe for the first time ever.

No one else in the diner seemed to notice anything out of the ordinary. Quinn had his hand on the other man’s shoulder, and whatever conversation they were having, it wasn’t going so well.

Mechanic was shrinking in place. Another man walked in from the back, taking off a white apron and joining them. Quinn nodded to him, saying something emphatic while gesturing with his hand.

“What was all that?” I demanded. It wasn’t like I expected Malcolm to have the answers, but

I had to ask someone. Now the two men were facing the mechanic, and the new guy had his arms crossed in front of him.

I still couldn’t tell what Mal was thinking, but his attention was on the exchange inside as much as mine was. “I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore, Toto.”

“Humility is for people who cower before storms instead of causing them. Power is there to be taken. If you can’t stand the heat, then get away from the person with the fire.”

Diana Bellamont (C: Moonset)

Unknown Date

I didn’t get a chance to tell Jenna about the Harbinger, or about pretty much anything, because the minute the three of us walked in the front door, she was lying in wait with Cole at her side.

We were lucky Quinn even let us stop at a drive-thru on the way home for something. None for Mal, of course—he looked at the greasy bag with a horrified expression. I could imagine just what he was thinking: exactly how many hours on the treadmill or how many sit-ups it would take to burn off my instant breakfast.

I didn’t care, though.

But generic fast food coffee and soggy bagel sandwiches were no fortification against Jenna on a mission. “Good, you’re finally back,” she began, a speech that I was sure she’d practiced more than once. “Now that we’re all settled in, I think we need to talk about training.”

“We do?” Quinn asked, sounding almost amused. He moved past us into the kitchen and leaned against one of the counters, a paper coffee cup held lightly in his hand.

“We do,” she said firmly. “We were almost killed, Quinn. Because we couldn’t defend ourselves. The only reason that we’re standing here right now is because you were there. So what happens the next time, when you’re not?”

“Lucky for you, I’m right down the hall.”

Mal opened his mouth, but I held out my hand. I wanted to see where Jenna was going with this. She almost sounded reasonable. Maybe the wraith had been a wake-up call.

Jenna’s lips compressed, and she shifted her stance. I don’t think that was the answer she was looking for. “But even you couldn’t beat it. You had to use one of us to stop it, and even then, you got lucky. Next time, you might not be that lucky.”

Quinn’s smile was wide. “You’ll find I’m a very lucky guy. Relax, you’re in good hands.”

“And that’s it? We should just trust you?” Her earlier composure was starting to slip, and the acerbic cut of her normal tone crept in around the edges.

“That’s it,” Quinn said magnanimously. “I’m on your side, kids.”

“We’re not kids,” Cole muttered, speaking for the first time.

“So we’ve got your assurance for what … three months? What happens after that, when we never see you again?” Jenna asked pointedly. “When it comes to us, no one’s on our side. At least not for long. And you can’t guarantee that the next one will be competent.”

It didn’t seem like Quinn let very much get to him. This was no different. “So what are you expecting? That you’re going to demand to be taught some spells that will arguably be useful in self-defense? Spells that a girl with your track record could easily abuse in a plethora of creative ways. Now why would I do that?”

“Jenna has a point, though,” I interjected. This was about thirty seconds from getting ugly—

anyone could see that Quinn wasn’t about to give Jenna what she wanted, and that was always dangerous . “Isn’t there some kind of appeal system? I mean, no offense to Jenna, but she abuses the spells she knows anyway, and we don’t get taught something without at least a dozen people signing off on it first.”

It was more than a little annoying that I’d agree with Jenna on that. There was so much fear and nervousness that we were the Second Coming, that everything we were to be taught was checked and double-checked. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Congress had entire think tanks established just to predict what kinds of chaos Jenna could do with a spell that turned glass opaque or one that could change an article of clothing into a primary color.

After all, this was the girl who had cobbled together a couple of eavesdropping spells, a rumor-spreading spell, and one that made the caster seem incredibly trustworthy, and somehow turned that into a riot.

“Jenna’s not going to change—” I started.

“—and you’re always going to be there to cover her ass,” Quinn interrupted. “I get it. But you guys have to realize that everyone else is doing the same thing. Every time Jenna abuses what power she does have, it makes them question your progress all over again. There are some people advocating that you stop training entirely.”

“They can’t do that!” Jenna shouted at once. She started to pace, very quickly and without looking where she was going. Cole fluttered in her wake, looking unsure if he was supposed to pace with her or get out of the way. As a result, she nearly barreled into him at least three times.

“They can do a lot worse than that,” Quinn replied matter-of-factly. “That’s the way the system works. If you abuse your power, you don’t get any more.”

“And if we get killed because a bunch of old cowards are scared of us?” she demanded.

“Then they’ll think that the problem worked itself out.” Quinn raised his shoulders in a halfhearted shrug. “The Council may take care of you, giving you all the things you need to be comfortable, like your phones and a healthy allowance, but it’s not a luxury. You’re not the political darlings you seem to think you are. They teach you as little as possible because they’re scared, and you give them every reason to be even more scared. So you can’t be surprised that they’re not looking out for your best interests.”

“And what,” Jenna scoffed, “you are?”

“I’m looking out for your survival,” Quinn replied. “I’m a Witcher. That’s part of my job.”

Part of his job. The unspoken other part hung in the air, and the four of us who weren’t

Witchers each absorbed it differently. Cole shuffled his feet, Jenna’s expression grew taut, Malcolm rolled his eyes, and me? My heart thudded in my chest.

Because there were two jobs that any Witcher around us would be expected to perform. To protect us from threats. And to eliminate us in the event that we became the threats.

Jenna still hadn’t moved on by the next day. She was sulking, barely speaking to any of us unless it was a snide remark. Quinn’s refusal to break the rules and teach us new spells hadn’t sat well with her. For some reason, she was particularly hostile to me , as if I had something to do with it.

Trying to figure out girls, especially ones I was related to, was definitely not one of my superpowers.

It was another day of shopping. Jenna and Bailey were both complaining about not having enough clothes. Our wardrobe from Kentucky still hadn’t arrived, if it ever would. After the wraith had showed up, I think we all wrote our stuff off as a lost cause. They wouldn’t want to send anything to us on the off chance that it had been tampered with. So that meant a lot of shopping.

“Again?” Mal had groused first thing in the morning, when everyone had collected in his kitchen. I didn’t really want to go, either, but the other three were all about it. And I figured it would be better to keep an eye on Jenna rather than let her unleash her temper on an unsuspecting population.