concerned.”
 
 “Oh.”
 
 33
 
 Savannah
 
 Dark images filled my mind. A lone hovel beneath the trees. An old
 
 woman with sharp fangs and long, cruel fingers, cackling softly to herself.
 
 That couldn’t be what we were dealing with, could it?
 
 She wrote a grimoire. Possibly using human skin. How many humans
 
 would that take?
 
 My stomach twisted a little. Perhaps looking up the author of a book used
 
 to summon nightmarish creatures and invade people’s dreams was not, in
 
 fact, a good idea. Why couldn’t things ever be easy?
 
 “How do we get there?” I asked, dreading the answer.
 
 “We’ll take a portal to Magic’s Bend. It’s another magical city in
 
 Oregon.”
 
 Damn it.
 
 “Or we could take a plane,” I suggested, hoping against hope he’d bite at
 
 the suggestion.
 
 Jaxson wasn’t paying much attention. Instead, he was looking around the
 
 room and ignoring my input. “No time. We’ll head out in half an hour. Hang
 
 tight until then—I need to make sure everything is running smoothly here.”
 
 With that, he stepped away to deal with logistics, leaving me to watch the
 
 bustle of activity. Casey and his team were busy inscribing runes in the floor
 
 of the warehouse. Every so often, they yelled at workers to back off and not
 
 step on their work. It was all posturing. The werewolves were obviously
 
 steering clear of both the magic ring and the sorcerers, and I could smell their
 
 mistrust and trepidation.
 
 I glanced over at one of Jaxson’s goons, who met my eyes.
 
 “They’re trying to help,” I offered feebly.
 
 He blinked. “Asking a LaSalle to cast a protection spell is like asking a