The gears of the rotary convertor rose out of the floor like a ship’s propeller, encased in a metal support structure taller than Patrick. The idol sat on the highest point of the arch, Santa Muerte’s magic seeping into the intricate wards like poison. Despite the supernatural wind, Patrick didn’t hesitate to throw the coin at the idol, knowing that whatever magic Hermes had imbued it with, the coin would find its way to where it needed to be.
Patrick only had a second to confirm the coin hit its target when Jono howled a warning—all that saved him from a broken arm. Patrick loosened his hold on the railing right as Tremaine slammed into him, driving him to the floor. All the air left his lungs with the impact, marigold petals rising in a cloud around him. Some slipped past his lips to twist against his teeth and tongue. The taste made Patrick want to gag.
Jono snarled, but the threat went unheeded by Tremaine. The master vampire loomed over Patrick in a way that reminded him too much of the altar in the subway. One cold hand wrapped around his throat so tightly Patrick couldn’t breathe. The strength behind that grip was capable of snapping his neck and Patrick didn’t try to pull free.
Before Patrick could get his bearings and stab Tremaine, the master vampire pinned his right wrist to the floor. Tremaine’s cold fingers dug into the tendons in his wrist, forcing his own fingers to loosen around the dagger’s hilt. Tremaine jerked his hand to the side and the dagger clattered free of his grip.
“This feels familiar,” Tremaine said, smiling down at Patrick, revealing red-tinged fangs.
Patrick wished it didn’t. He would’ve said as much if he could speak. Only he didn’t have enough air to get the words out, much less the scream that wanted passage through his throat when Tremaine placed the black Santa Muerte idol from the door on his chest.
Black lightning erupted from the artifact, slamming through his shields and his body with enough power to make his spine arch on its own accord. Patrick’s heels slid against the floor as he convulsed from the shock of Santa Muerte’s magic coursing through him. His shields frayed at the edges, skin hot beneath his tactical uniform.
Black spots ate away at the edge of Patrick’s vision, the burn in his throat—in his lungs—hotter than the foreign magic assailing him. Above him, ugly satisfaction twisted Tremaine’s face into something monstrous as the wards popped around them, going off like fireworks. Santa Muerte’s magic embedded in the artifacts warred with the lone barrier ward erected by the coin—but Hermes’ magic was holding.
Patrick couldn’t reach his dagger, and Santa Muerte’s magic was like a binding ward around him. What magic was left in his soul wouldn’t be enough to defend himself.
Except Patrick’s soul wasn’t the only one he had access to.
He closed his eyes to block out Tremaine’s face and focus on the howling in his ears that wasn’t the wind, but Jono. The soulbond resonated between them, a link to power Patrick had lost three years ago and never thought he’d find again.
He’d never wanted to find it like this.
It reminded him too much of what Ethan had done to Hannah—tying souls together for power they each had no right to take. Patrick’s tainted soul was scarred and broken in ways he’d learned to live with. He had never wanted what now tied him and Jono together.
He’d never wanted to be like his father.
I’m sorry.
The silent apology rattled through Patrick’s brain even as he cracked open both their souls.
It hurt, like stretching long unused muscles for the first time in ages. Patrick reached through the soulbond connecting them, Santa Muerte’s magic incapable of keeping their souls apart. Patrick poured his magic through Jono’s soul in search of the ley lines that fed the nexus that lived deep beneath New York City.
Ethan hadn’t completely damaged the nexus back in June, but Patrick didn’t trust his control enough to access that deep reservoir of wild magic. Instead, he tapped a ley line, the rush of external magic like the best high as he drew it out through Jono’s soul and formed a mageglobe with it.
His magic crackled to life between himself and Tremaine. He opened his eyes, seeing the shine of his magic reflected in Tremaine’s blue eyes for an instant before Patrick exploded the mageglobe.
Patrick’s thinned-out shields held.
Tremaine wasn’t so lucky.
The master vampire threw himself off Patrick, but he wasn’t quick enough to escape the blast radius. The blast caught him in the arm and his side, sending him flying through the air. Patrick drew in a harsh lungful of air, his throat burning with it.
“Fuck,” he coughed out.
Shoving aside the pain, Patrick solidified his shields and rolled to his side, soul still open to the ley line. The motion dislodged the idol and it clattered to the petal-covered floor, its eyes staring right at him. Santa Muerte’s magic sloughed off his shields. Patrick made a sweeping gesture with his arm and sent the figurine careening away from him with the help of magic.
Breathing hurt. His entire body hurt, nerves doing that annoying pins and needles sensation in every limb. It left him clumsy and shaky, but he still had enough coordination to wrap his fingers around his dagger.
The unearthly wind hadn’t died down, the force of it still keeping Patrick and Jono physically separated. The soulbond hummed between them, and Patrick sank into it, letting its stability help clear his head. He got his knees underneath him and shoved himself upright. He stared at the magic above arcing from anchor point to anchor point like some demented Tesla oscillator.
If it exploded, they—and too many others—would die.
The idols needed to be destroyed all at once to ensure the damage to the protective wards didn’t get any worse. The magic in Hermes’ coin had slipped between one of the idols and the anchor point, disrupting Santa Muerte’s power, but it couldn’t cover all of them.
It was still a weakness in the goddess’ power that Patrick intended to use.
He conjured up another mageglobe, casting a spell through it that he hadn’t used in three years and counting. A military grade fusillade spell could be rated up or down a scale of power depending on the target, but the underlying framework of the spell within the mageglobe was something only a mage could keep stable. It required a lot of magic to power because a spell like that was meant for a precision attack with a continuous flow of magic to ensure eradication of the target.
