The woman arched an eyebrow as she clicked off her penlight and turned around to hit a small button beside the door. Marci had already opened her mouth to launch into a new slew of demands, but she never got a chance. The moment the woman pressed the button, a strange sound had started outside. It was distractingly familiar, a low pitched, rhythmic thumping, almost like someone was riding a horse at full gallop down a dirt road, which, of course, made zero sense. You were more likely to see a unicorn than an actual horse in the DFZ. The sound was so distinct, though, she couldn’t actually imagine what else it might be until the woman opened the door, proving that Marci’s first instinct was both right and terribly, terribly wrong.
She’d been busy staring at the spellwork on the walls when the woman came in, so Marci hadn’t actually gotten a look at what was on the other side of the door until this moment. Since they were in a room, she’d just assumed they were also in a building, but again, she was wrong. There was no hallway or building or even a roof beyond that door. Only forest. An honest-to-god, moss carpeted, sun dappled, fairy-tale-style old-growth forest that started just across the door’s threshold like the cement room had simply been airdropped into the wilderness.
Given how crazy that was, Marci’s first instinct was that had it to be an illusion. An extremely good one since she could smell the rotting leaves and wet dirt from here, but an illusion all the same. But while there was alotof magic on the other side of the door, it didn’t feel like a spell. It was just power, a dense bank of loose magic sliding between the trees like mist, and in the middle of it was a man on a horse.
No, Marci thought with a sharp shake of her head. The thing outside the doorlookedlike a man on a horse, but no horse had ever been that big or reflective. It actually sparkled in the hazy sunlight like it was made of glass, but even that wasn’t quite right, because it was clearly moving. Water, she realized at last. It was water, an amalgam of crashing waves put together in the shape of a horse. Likewise, the man on its back wasn’t actually a man at all.
It was a spirit.
Or, at least, sheassumedit was a spirit. With the notable exception of Ghost, Marci’s experience with spirits was limited to ones like the tank badger they’d banished this afternoon: the small, stupid, animistic spirits you ran into in normal life. She’d certainly never seen one this large, or humanoid, but while the spirit’s shape resembled a large, burly, Viking-warrior sort of man, his skin was a dark, stormy, and definitely inhuman blue. Likewise, his long hair, full beard, and bushy eyebrows were dark green sea kelp, while the armor he wore from his neck to his toes was made of scallop shells with their scallops still inside. But remarkable as all that was, what really made Marci stare was the enormous driftwood spear the spirit held in his right hand.
From inside the room, it was hard to tell scale, but going from the relative height of the trees around him, the spirit’s weapon was easily as long as a telephone pole. But while it looked like nothing more than a glorified pointy stick, the runes scratched into its handle radiated a cold, crushing power that sliced through the ambient magic of the forest like ice water down your back. Marci wasn’t sure what those runes did exactly, but the old, dark stains on the spear’s tip made her think it wasn’t something she wanted to mess with.
Thankfully, the spirit set his weapon down when he dismounted, propping it up against one of the massive trees. Seeing him disarm almost made her feel more comfortable. That was, until the spirit stepped inside, ducking his head to fit through the human-sized door the security woman held open for him.
Marci shrank down in her chair. The spirit had looked big standing outside, but being in the same room with him was like being trapped in a closet with a grizzly. It wasn’t just his size—though being stuck in a small room with a man whose head brushed the eight-foot ceiling was definitely intimidating—it was also his presence, a chilling, heavy aura that filled the room until Marci felt like she was drowning. With all that, it took every ounce of her pride just to lift her head enough to look him in the face. She was working up the courage to repeat her demand for a lawyer when the spirit suddenly spoke, his voice booming and grinding through the small room like breaking sea ice that just happened to be forming words.
“Servant of the dragon,” he rumbled. “You have been restrained by order of Algonquin, Lady of the Great Lakes and ruler of this land. By her mercy alone, your life has been temporarily spared so that you may tell us everything you know about your master.”
And that was when Marci knew she was screwed.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she stalled frantically. “I was just trying to check my mail.”
The spirit’s scowl deepened. “You are a very bad liar.”
Marci began to sweat. “I am not—”
“I can hear your heart pounding like a trapped animal,” he said over her. “You are afraid, as you should be, and lies flow as a result.” He turned around, beckoning to the Algonquin Corp. mage, who was still in the room. “It seems we must take precautions to prevent further indiscretions.”
The mage nodded, placing her hands on the spellwork covered wall. The moment she touched it, Marci felt a flare of magic, and the writing lit up as the spell activated. Pressure clamped down on her head at the same time. It wasn’t painful, just uncomfortable, like someone had tied a string around the front portion of her brain, and Marci’s fear turned to righteous indignation.
“Did you just cast alie detectoron me?”
“No,” the spirit said, nodding at the glowing spellwork surrounding them. “This is a truth teller. So long as it is active, you will be physically unable to speak anything but the truth within this room.”
Marci’s eyes shot wide. Lie detector spells were internal magic that monitored your body for heart rate changes and other physiological signs of deceit. They were highly invasive, which was why they were regulated in every country that cared about personal privacy, but not actually dangerous. Truth tellers, on the other hand, were close enough to true mind control that they’d been outlawed everywhere. Marci had never even seen one in person, and she didn’t like being inside one now.
“You can’t do this!” she snarled, trying her best to sound threatening. “Mind-altering spells were forbidden by the Stockholm Magic Treaty of 2045. Even Algonquin is bound by international law!”
“Not in this place,” the spirit said, glaring down at her with black, glinting eyes. “Foolish mortal, where do you think you are?” He nodded back over his shoulder at the closed door that led to the strange forest. “This is Reclamation Land. Here, there is no rule but ours.”
For the second time in as many minutes, Marci felt like the floor had just been kicked out from under her. Reclamation Land was Algonquin’s private sanctuary, a whole quarter of the DFZ fenced off from the rest of the city for spirit use only. She’d never even heard of an outsider getting in, probably because, if they did make it inside, they never left again, which meant she was screwed. The knowledge must have shown on her face, too, because for the first time since he’d appeared, the spirit smiled.
“I’m pleased to see you understand,” he said, holding out a massive hand. Behind him, the human mage jumped and reached into the official looking document bag on her shoulder to pull out a manila folder. A real, paper one. Marci hadn’t even realized they still made those things, but the spirit just took it as a matter of course and flipped the file open.
“Marcivale Caroline Novalli,” he read. “Formerly of Las Vegas, Nevada.” He glanced up. “This is you.”
It wasn’t a question, but she nodded anyway. “I go by Marci.”
His response to that was a cold glare she felt to her bones. “As is the proper way of things, I will now state my name so that you may know the fate you face. I am Vann Jeger, Lord of the Black Narrows, spirit of the Geirangerfjord, and the Death of Dragons.”
Marci didn’t know what a Geirangerfjord was, but the last part was definitely not good. “You’re one of Algonquin’s dragon hunters.”
“I am heronlyhunter,” Vann Jeger corrected. “Or, at least, the only one that matters.” He flashed her a cruel smile, turning to hand her file back to his assistant. “We know you are a servant of the dragon who appeared over the Pit last month. You will now tell us where that dragon is hiding.”
Marci held her breath, waiting for the inevitable “or die,” but the spirit didn’t bother with an ultimatum. Apparently, he wasn’t even going to give her that choice. Marci supposed she could take it herself, but despite the catastrophic turn her life had just taken, she wasn’t actually ready to die tonight. But when she started to say she didn’t know what he was talking about, her tongue seized up before she could open her mouth.
She stopped, puzzled. The words were there, clear in her mind, but she couldn’t actually make the sounds. It was like there was a clamp holding her tongue in place. Apparently, the truth teller spell worked by physically preventing spoken lies rather than actually keeping her from thinking them. But while the curious Thaumaturge in her found the highly specific nature of the spell’s limitation fascinating, the rest of her was already working on a way around it.
