Page 101 of Misfit Monsters
The man we’re trailing is never going to hurt me again. We’re going to make sure of it.
We follow David Blaver into the nearest town, where he parks on the main street and goes into a café. For a tense hour, we wait for him to finish his meal and eat. When he returns, he drives for another half an hour before turning off at a parking lot for a local beach. He takes a folded chair and a bag with a rolled towel out of his trunk.
The five of us peer at him. I can’t help breaking the silence. “He’s going to spend the day sunbathing?”
Jonah swipes his hand across his mouth. “Maybe he likes to relax for a little while before getting on with his business?”
“Or maybe he’s decided not todoany business for a few days after he tangled with Peri yesterday,” Hail says. “If he recognized her powers, he might have been just as surprised as she was to run into her… It could have made him think he should lie low.”
Raze inhales roughly. “He doesn’t look all that scared—he’s not moving like prey. I don’t think he cares all that much, even if he’s pretending to be normal just in case.”
It’s true. Having shut his trunk, the sorcerer is strolling through the parking lot as casual as can be.
He slows briefly near one of the other cars. After a quick glance around, he eases closer, glances through the back window, and then heads down to the lake.
My stomach flip-flops. “I think he’s scoping out a new target. Someone he’s going to send his brainwashed shadowkind after when he thinks he can get away with it.”
Hail frowns, his pale face turning abruptly pensive. “Maybe we should?—”
The peal of Jonah’s phone cuts him off. Our sorcerer grabs the device. “It’s Rollick.”
My body tenses up. Even the gentle tightening of Raze’s arm around me can’t stop my nerves from dancing a jitterbug as Jonah answers the call.
We were supposed to meet with the demon today to report on what we found out at the rift—which isn’t anything all that useful right now. Is Jonah going to decide there’s no point in continuing the investigation on our own?
Will Rollick let me stick with the mission once he finds out that my powers exploded all over again?
Jonah’s voice stays even. “Yes. It didn’t go exactly as planned. We’re following up on another lead. We’ve found the sorcerer who’s been messing with the warped creatures. I didn’t want to reach out until we see where that takes us.”
He pauses, and his jaw works. “Yes, you’re right. It could be we’ll want some backup. You can track the van, can’t you? And we’ll call you if we need you here faster.”
After he ends the call, he slumps in his seat. “Rollick wants to monitor the situation directly. He’s going to give us a couple more hours, and if we’re still uncertain of what todo by then, he, Sorsha, and her shadowkind partners are going to come join us.”
One of Mirage’s tails twitches into view for a second. “And take over.”
“Something like that.”
Hail grimaces. “They’re all shadowkind, even Rollick. What can they do against a sorcerer that we can’t?”
“I don’t think Sorsha will be affected—benefit of being hybrid,” Jonah says. “But it’s true, even Rollick avoids tangling with hostile sorcerers. They might go straight to the tearing apart option.”
My heart sinks. In a couple of hours, David Blaver might still be lounging in the sun, scheming against his neighbors and giving us no help solving this problem.
All Rollick will see from our efforts is a bunch of burnt out equipment, not proof our team can shine.
Unless we get on with the shining…
I turn to Hail. “You were going to suggest something before.”
He stares at me as if surprised that I remember—or that I’d want to know what it was. Then he sits a little straighter.
“If the problem is that this prick doesn’t feel like prey—doesn’t think he has anything to worry about—maybe we shouldgivehim something to worry about. If we make him nervous, he’ll check on whatever’s most important to him or go wherever he feels safest, right? Which is probably wherever he’s got his enslaved shadowkind and the rest of his sorcerer things.”
Mirage perks up. “I can conjure something to terrify him.”
Jonah holds up his hand to stop them. “That’s a reasonable idea—but we’d have to be subtle about it. If you throw any illusion that’s too intense at him, he’ll realize it’s supernatural influence. Especially if it’s a generically scarything. If we knew what he’d personally find most frightening…”
As he trails off, his gaze slides to me. My heart skips a beat in understanding.
