Page 51 of Thief of Night
Charlie got out, reached into the back seat, and took her limited gear out of her bag.
On the concrete steps outside the door, she spotted a stainless steel dog dish, licked clean. She remembered the first time she’d seen Raven put it out, full of microwave-warmed blood for the little shadows. Charlie hadn’t believed there could be so many of them close by. All Blights, all hungry, none strong enough to attack, if that was even what they wanted. Raven had taken one to use like thread in her alteration.
Charlie wondered whether it would be possible to create a more powerful Blight from something so small as she moved past the empty dish. At the very least, leaving out blood had brought the little Blights to Raven’s door, but maybe it had also lured something larger. Something that was less interested in blood than on feeding on the smaller shadows.
Charlie’s shadow slid sideways, at an impossible angle from the setting sun.
“Red,” she breathed.
“Didn’t mean to startle you,” he told her, a dark, hungry look of anticipation on his face. “But you should wait here.”
Then he slipped under the door.
She stared at the thread that connected them. For a long moment there was silence, then a loud scream that sounded a lot like Raven. Something crashed to the ground.
Charlie yanked the door open.
Raven was standing in a circle of powdered onyx, looking like a witch caught in her own summoning circle. In her hand she held an onyx hammer, probably the only weapon she could find in short order. She was breathing hard and tears streaked over her already-wet cheeks.
Her gaze was on Red, who was mostly solid, except for shadow hands that held a Blight the size of a dog. It growled like one too, shifting shape into different ferocious animalistic forms.
Raven turned. At the sight of Charlie and the line of shadow connecting her to Red, Raven slumped to the floor and sucked in a few breaths that sounded like sobs.
Charlie held up the onyx netting.
“Good?” she asked Red.
Yes,he said in her mind.Throw it.
She tossed it toward the Blight struggling in his arms. His hands became solid and so did the creature. Charlie wrapped the netting more tightly around it.
“I’ve got it,” she said. “But I don’t know if I can hold it.”
“Is he…?” Raven stared at Red with narrowed eyes.
Charlie had no idea what to say. If he was going to be Remy Vincent Carver with a black card and a private jet, then his true nature would have to be a secret. A secret that Raven would already know. A secret that Raven could blackmail him with.
“Am I…?” Red echoed, drawing her attention.
Raven rubbed her eyes. Tattoos covered her brown skin, illustrations of roses, skulls, several goddesses, and the words “El arte es largo y la vida breve” down the inside of her arm. Her flame-colored hair had pulled mostly loose from the clip that held it. Still, she looked remarkably composed as she walked to where she kept her broom. “You’re him, the Blight everyone’s talking about.”
“I’m tethered,” Red pointed out, gesturing toward the floor. “Which means I’m not a Blight.” In his arms, the netted shadow still squirmed.
Raven laughed outright.
“You’re pedantic too. I have no idea what that makes you.”
Charlie found some zip ties in a cabinet and used them to secure the shadow in the net. It had become smaller, somehow, and more dense. Now it was the size of a furious bobcat. “Where did this thing come from?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t even know it was there until it came inside. I used the onyx dust I had to make the circle and then I piled more near me so if it tried to jump over the barrier, I could throw some at it and then hopefully hit it with the hammer.”
“Did it try?”
Raven made a gesture that Charlie couldn’t interpret as she swept up the onyx into a dustpan. “It looked like it wanted to sometimes. It did that weird wiggle cats make when they’re going to pounce. But no.”
“Do we think this thing is an animal shadow?” Charlie asked, glancing toward Red.
He shook his head. “It doesn’t remember, but it was human once.”
