Chapter Two
Leander’s apartmentshould have been condemned long ago.He’d learned to take a shit at whatever fast food place he brought dinner in because the plumbing never worked and one window had no glass.
However, the small studio was full of so many plants it still felt like home.He knew the sharp prickle of philodendron, which he could spin into pain.He wove the pothos plants with their creeping vines into magical steroids or poisons or healing elixirs for viruses.But moonflowers and henbane covered most of his apartment.Leander twisted them into drugs more powerful than anything a mundane chemist could produce.The plants had a softness to them that brushed against Leander’s magic and made the tension drain from him.
His bed stood against the south wall where, hopefully, his amorous neighbors to the north wouldn’t wake him with rhythmic banging.He stripped off his shirt before sitting cross-legged on the worn quilt.He closed his eyes and breathed out as he slid into the meditation he’d learned from his sifu.
Threads connected him to the plants he tended, anchoring his soul, but he also found the gossamer line to the leaf he had dropped into Cadell’s pant cuff.Movement.For a second, the ghost impression nauseated Leander as he adjusted to sharing an existence with the leaf.But he breathed out and let his awareness slide along the silk thread.
He rode in a semi-conscious twilight as Cadell’s car stopped.He heard slamming doors and felt the jarring motion of walking.Leander’s own body listed to one side and fell over, but as he was on the bed, he focused on the leaf.
“Mr.Druwolf is waiting in the gym,” someone said.
“Thank you.”Cadell was moving again, faster this time, and Leander listened to echoing footsteps until the sound of weights hitting the floor made him shiver.
“About fucking time.”
“Sorry, Charlie.Leander showed up after you left.”
“Did he?”He sounded too interested, and Leander would have felt horrified had he not placed so much of his awareness in a leaf incapable of emotion.“Is the fucker stabbing us in the back?”
“I don’t think so.”
“You don’t fuckingthinkso?”
“What do you want me to say?”
“I want you to have a fucking answer for me.Was he working with Tecca or not?”
“I seriously doubt it.He hated the woman.”
“He worked with her for five years.”
“He would have stabbed her in the back a decade ago if it would have gotten her out of the way.”
“Yet he never came to us with her betrayal.He never said one fucking word about that bitch.”
“She never would have confided in him.If there was a list of people she would trust, he would be at the bottom.She’d come to me and try to turn me against you before she’d go to Leander.”
“You’re putting a lot of faith in him.”
“I’m calculating cost and benefit.We don’t have many flora mages who can do what he does.His product sells for more than anyone else’s.We can’t take him out before we have another who’s as good at understanding both the magic and the chemistry of plants.”
“His shit got top dollar when we had that fucking traitor around to strengthen the damn drugs.Now we don’t.”
“We’ll find another blood mage.They aren’t as hard to train as flora mages, and we’ve invested a lot of money in making sure Leander is the best.”
“So, we just let a potential traitor waltz around our organization?”
“No.”Cadell chuckled.“I told Victor he could never get Leander into bed.You know what he’s going to do with that.”
Druwolf laughed, his booming voice filling the space and making the leaf tremble.“That fucker is going to hunt Leander like he’s a turkey on Thanksgiving.”
“And if he can fuck Leander, we’ll have leverage.If Leander is a traitor, Victor will sniff it out, and I’ll take care of him.”
“No,” Druwolf said.“If he’s a traitor, you won’t touch him.You’ll bring him to me, and I will make him beg for mercy.I will set his soul on fire.I will destroy him in ways that will make what I did to Tecca look like mercy.By the time I fired that bullet, there was nothing left of her mind or soul, but I’ll take my time with Leander.No one will interrupt us.”
“Speaking of interruptions,” Cadell said.
