“It’s not the parishioners these churches usually worry about,” Henrick said. “Shall I continue on?”
“Do a U-turn at the Ford dealership. Given there’s no movement and the place appears to be locked down, we might as well act like we’re meant to be there and go in through the front door. But keep the motor running, just in case we need to leave in a hurry.”
“Indeed, sir.”
We turned around and headed back to the church. Henrick pulled into the driveway and then reversed into a parking spot. Mathi opened the center console and pressed a button; a drawer slid out from the bottom of the console, revealing a small gun.
“You really do have all manner of nasties hidden in this vehicle, don’t you?”
“One can never be too careful when one has as many enemies as the Dhar-Vals do.”
He tucked the weapon under his coat, then we climbed out and walked over to the small alcove covering the dark metal doors and the semi-circular windows above it. There was no camera in the alcove, no doorbell, and what looked to be a simple deadlock—simple when it came to someone of Mathi’s picking skills, anyway.
“You know, this is all starting to seem a little too easy.” I’d already pulled my knives out of my purse and strapped them on. The coat was long enough to hide their presence if anyone was watching the place, and it saved me the hassle of carrying my purse in.
“I agree,” Mathi said, “but our only other option is to leave, and I do not believe that is a good idea. Not if we want answers.”
“I’m not sure they’ll be here to find, but what the hell.” I motioned him to proceed, then stepped back and casually looked around, covering his movements from any of the cameras on the other buildings that might have a line of sight with this one.
In no time at all, he had the door open. The foyer beyond was small, with little more than six feet between the front door and the plaster wall that divided this area from the next. It didn’t stretch all the way to the ceiling, which was mostly covered in those horrid foam ceiling tiles they’d used in suspended ceilings back in the eighties and nineties. The building itself was silent—the wall in front of us might be plaster, but its frame was metal, as were most of the other walls in this place, from what I could tell—which meant there was no song in this place to help me understand what might lie ahead.
I couldn’t help thinking that might have been why it had been chosen.
Mathi stepped inside and to the right. I stopped beside him. There were two doors, one at either end of the plastered wall. The one to the right was open, so I sent the wind through it to investigate. It came back echoing of emptiness. But light flickered down the knives’ fullers, so there was danger here somewhere, be it in the form of magic or something else.
“The wind says there’s no one in the room beyond the doors,” I murmured. “But there’s magic here somewhere, so I’ll take the closed door, just in case a spell lies on it.”
Though my comment was soft, something stirred through the air. Something that felt like anticipation. I shivered and drew a knife. There might be no immediate threat, but I still felt safer with its weight in my hand.
Mathi nodded and moved right. I went left and touched the blade’s tip to the door handle; no light flickered down the fuller. Which didn’t ease the tension in me, because if the magic didn’tlie here, then it was waiting somewhere else. Somewhere less obvious, perhaps.
The room beyond was a vast empty space with a dais at the far end that stretched the entire width of the room. The windows above the dais were standard metal-framed ones, but so dirty the light bleeding in was basically brown. There was a small hall and a set of stairs on my side of the building, while on Mathi’s, there was a solitary door. He indicated he was going to check it. I nodded and walked toward the hall, pressing my back against the main room’s wall before peering around the corner. Three more doors—two on the left, one on the right.
Lightning now sparked from the tip of the knife I was holding, sending flickers of bright light dancing through the shadows. There was definitely magic in this building, even if I had no sense of anything untoward in the immediate area.
I carefully eased around the corner and approached the first door. After touching the knife’s tip on the handle to ensure there was no magic, I warily pushed the door open. The room beyond had obviously been an office at some point, because in the section I could immediately see, there were a couple of old desks and a rather ratty-looking four-drawer filing cabinet. I whipped the wind around the door to check if anyone waited on the other side of the room, then quickly followed it in. Again, nothing more than a couple of old desks and more filing cabinets. I walked across to the nearest desk and brushed my fingers along the wood. Its song was faint and broken, and only spoke of the past. After getting a similar response from the other desks, I walked out, went to the next room and repeated the entry process. This room was empty, as was the one on the opposite side of the hall. I turned and retreated back to the main room, but as I walked in, the knife in my hand burned brighter, and the air began to pulse with the thick warmth of magic.
Whatever it was, its source was upstairs.
The inner tension ratcheted up several more degrees. Mathi reappeared from the room on the other side of the building. I raised the knife, sending jagged shards of lightning spearing into the gloom that held this place hostage.
He walked over, then leaned close and whispered, “Investigate or run?”
I hesitated, and in that moment, the decision was taken from me. Magic surged, and behind us, the front door slammed shut. The air that lightly stirred around me briefly whispered of movement—men, running toward us, making little sound—then the press of magic intensified, and the wind stilled. I reached for the air again, but it slid away from my touch. How that was possible, I had no idea, nor did I have the time to worry about it.
“It’s a trap. There’s a witch or a mage up there, along with a good dozen men.”
“Then let’s get out of here.” He grabbed my free hand and pulled me into a run. “Can you punch one of the front windows out?”
“From inside? No. The air is being sucked away from me. I’ll try from outside.”
“Do it. I’ll keep them off us.”
When we reached the door into the foyer, he stopped and drew the gun from under his coat. I called to the wind that swirled with almost angry force around the outside of the building and punched it toward the nearest window. Glass shattered, and thick, deadly shards thudded into the plaster to the right of the door. But there was no escaping for us yet—the network of metal grilles that had held the eight panes of glass in place remained in the window. I swore, recalled the wind, and ripped them away.
“Right—”
The rest of my words were lost to the bark of Mathi’s gun. A heartbeat later, he knocked me sideways. I hit the ground hard,and pain shuddered up my arm. I swore, heard something thud into the wall just above our heads, and quickly looked up.
