Magic Rises (Kate Daniels, #6)

by Ilona Andrews

Judging by the number of parts, this smoker was more complicated than a nuclear reactor. “Did you read the instructions?” He shook his head. “Why, were you afraid they’d take your man card away?” “Are you going to help me or just make fun of me?” “Can’t I do both?”

“Heteropaternal superfecundation. Apparently, it means twins from different fathers.

I tried to picture a female version of Jim and got Jim in a dress instead. The image was disturbing.

I’d signed six things and my stack wasn’t getting any smaller. It was like the paperwork was breeding while I worked.

troglodyte.”

“And Raphael will be joining us,” Andrea said. “So you get twice the backup. Nobody will be killing you on our watch.” So that was what this was all about. I got a cookie after all. “Aww. I had no idea you cared. I’m touched.” “You should be.” Andrea bit another bacon slice. “I’m willing to abandon the tender embrace of my future mother-in-law for your sake.” “About that,” Aunt B said. “I’m coming, too.” Dear God, the cookie was poisoned. Andrea’s mouth hung open and I got a view of half-eaten bacon I wished I could unsee. “I take it that’s the first time you’ve heard about it?” I asked. She nodded.

“The Black Sea, right? That’s the place where the Golden Fleece was and Jason grew an army out of dragon teeth?” “That’s the one.” “Whatever happened to Jason afterward?” “He married Medea, a witch-princess who was from Colchis.” “Did they live happily ever after?” “He left her for another woman, so she killed their children, chopped them into stew, and fed it to him.” Andrea put a half-eaten sausage link on her plate and pushed it away. “Well, at least I’ll be there to watch your back.”

“I heard Jim talking,” Julie said quietly. Oh boy. “He said that it was a trap and you might not come back.” Thank you, Mr. Positive Peggy, we appreciate your vote of confidence.

Thank you, Mr. Positive Peggy, we appreciate your vote of confidence.

“Last time I checked, I was a big girl, all grown up and able to put on my shoes and swing my sword all by myself. You don’t have to like it.”

A sign flashed by, a yellow diamond with a turtle on it, followed immediately by another sign, a triangle bordered in red. A turtle in the center of the triangle had a dark cone touching its mouth. “What does that mean?” Barabas asked from the backseat. “Magic turtle crossing.” “I got that one, but what about the second one?” “Beware the magic turtles.” “Why?” “They spit fire.”

Everyone looked at Curran. I decided to look at him too, so I wouldn’t feel left out.

A little exertion would do me good. I stretched, turned, and kicked the air. And one more time. I launched a quick combination, jumped, and smashed my foot into an invisible opponent’s chin. “A knockout,” Curran said behind me. I jumped in the air about a foot and managed to land with some semblance of dignity. He had managed to sneak up on me again. Time to save face. “Nah. That wasn’t a knockout. I just staggered him a bit.” “I wasn’t talking about the kick, baby.” Oh. “Smooth, Your Furriness.” I backed up and spread my arms. “Want to play?” He pulled off his shoes. Five minutes later, we were rolling around on the helipad as he tried to muscle his way out of my armlock, after slamming me onto the helipad. “I finally realized the source of your mutual attraction,” Saiman said, his voice dry. I looked up. He was standing a few feet away. “Do enlighten us.” Curran tried to roll into me to break the lock. Oh no you don’t. “You both think violence is foreplay.”

Barabas held up a folder. “As long as we’re all here, I need to brief you on our situation.” “Maybe later?” Keira said. “I have plans.” “What plans?” Barabas peered at her. “I was going to go and think deep thoughts, somewhere in the sun.” “With your eyes closed?” George asked. “Possibly.” “Someone sit on her before she escapes.”

“I had forgotten that talking to you is like trying to pet a cactus,” Saiman said dryly. “Thank you for reminding me.”

A weredolphin. Pinch me, somebody. Greek legends spoke of some pirates who’d captured the god Dionysus. They were planning to rape him and sell him into slavery. Furious, he transformed them into dolphins. Apparently, their descendants were alive and well and still in the family business.

The dolphin drew back and pointed at Curran. “First, I kill you. Then I rape your woman.” Gold drowned Curran’s eyes. I’ve seen people put their foot in their mouth. This was the first time I saw a fin jammed into one.

“Boy toy?” Curran asked. “Would you prefer man candy?”

“On behalf of Gagra, I’m here to extend the hospitality of my beautiful city to you,” Hibla said. “Gagra welcomes you with all of its warmth, its lakes and waterfalls, its beaches and orchards. But be forewarned, if you come here with violent intentions, we will leave your corpses for the crows. We have no problem murdering every single one of you.” “Awesome speech,” Keira told her. Jim’s sister was smiling, and it didn’t look friendly. “Thank you. I worked hard on it. Please, follow me.”

I elbowed Curran. “Their castle is bigger.” He winked at me. “Mine is taller. It’s not the size of the castle. It’s what you do with it.”

And here we go, straight into the lake of drama without taking our clothes off first.

In hunting, the chief difference between cats and dogs came down to the length and shape of arm bones. Cats could turn their paws palm up, while dog paws were fixed permanently downward, a fact that shapeshifter instructors drilled into their students when they trained for the warrior form. Rotating the paw gave cats greater capacity to suppress their prey after they rushed it. It meant the difference between an ambush predator and a pack hunter.

Let’s see how smart you are. “Can we speed this up? I have a dinner to get back to.” The beast tucked its deformed wings to its body and charged. It understood me. Never a good sign.

“Aha! So I’m not crazy.” “You are most definitely crazy,” Derek said. “But in a deranged, endearing way.”

“Lamassu served as the guardians of ancient Assyria. Assyria spanned four modern countries: southern Turkey, western Iran, and the north of Iraq and Syria. Assyrians liked to do war, and they fought with Babylon, Egypt, and pretty much everyone they could reasonably conquer in ancient Mesopotamia for about two thousand years. Around six hundred BC, Babylonians, Cimmerians, and Scyths, all the nations who had once paid Assyria tribute, finally banded together and sacked it. We don’t have many records of the Assyrians. They left behind some ruined cities and stone reliefs depicting fun things like impaling entire villages of subjugated people and riding around in chariots hunting lions.” “Amusing people, the ancient Assyrians,” Derek said. “They hunt, they sing, they dance, they impale people.”

“To show a creature with five legs demonstrates understanding rather than observation.” “What do you mean, understanding?” “They didn’t simply follow nature’s blueprint and make exactly what they observed,” Doolittle said. “They understood the difference between perception and reality, and they portrayed a concept rather than the exact copy of what they could see.” Doolittle took a piece of paper and a pen and began to draw. “When we are born, we start out with concrete thinking. We perceive only what we see and hear.” He showed us the piece of paper. On it a dove soared above a crushed birdcage. “What do you see?” “A bird flying away from a broken cage,” Derek said. “What does it symbolize?” “Freedom,” I said. “What else?” “Escape,” Eduardo said. Doolittle turned to Derek. “Leaving what is safe so you can be more,” Derek said. “The cage is what the bird knows; the sky is all the things he still wants to do, even if it’s a risk.” “Ah!” Doolittle raised his index finger. “All those are examples of abstract thinking. Our entire culture is based on the idea that a single concept can have many different interpretations. We actively encourage the development of this skill, because it helps us solve our problems in new ways. So did the ancient Assyrians, apparently. When looking at the lamassu, we have to consider not only what it is but what it may represent. We can’t simply take it at face value.” The million-dollar question was, what could a scaled bull with a human face and ...

“How are you feeling today?” I asked. Kate Daniels, master of girl talk. “Like shit. Have you ever been pregnant?” “No.” “Let me summarize for you: your feet hurt, your back hurts, your hips hurt. None of your clothes fit, because your maternica is stretched out from the size of an apple to a basketball. The small creatures inside you keep kicking you and turning. You can’t eat things you normally eat—they make you sick. Instead you eat strange things like marinated cucumbers and you can’t stop until they also make you sick. Worst of all, you’re not a person anymore. You’re a container. Everybody is looking at you waiting for you to pop your baby out.” I bit my tongue before I said something that would make her shut down. “Forget I asked.”

Every time I managed to scrape up a shred of sympathy for her, she did something to set it on fire.

“Your father once told me that a dog sitting on a throne is still a dog, while a king in a crumbling rocking chair is still a king.”

“I have no taste for the purple cloak,” Hugh said. “Only for the laurel wreath.” The Roman emperors had assumed the purple cloak as the sign of their office, while victorious Roman generals would ride through Rome in triumph with laurel wreaths held over their heads. Hugh didn’t want to be the emperor. He wanted to be the emperor’s general.

Go to the Black Sea, meet new people, see beautiful places, get killed by a mutant carnivorous kangaroo goat. One item off my bucket list.

“I’m going to clean your wounds.” “The hell you are.” Not with alcohol. It didn’t disinfect the wound unless one drenched it, it killed the living cells, and it generally did more harm than good. Not to mention the wound would take forever to heal after being treated with alcohol, and pouring whiskey on an open gash guaranteed scars.

“Spar with me. You know you want to.” I leaned forward and pointed to my forehead. “Tell me if you see IDIOT written on there.”

“A young djigit stopped by my room,” I said. “His name is Volodja and for three thousand dollars he will walk me deep into the mountains and show me where the bad shapeshifters live.” “How fortunate.” Aunt B’s eyes lit up. “Would you like some company for this wonderful trap, I mean, adventure?”

“We should go swimming,” Keira said. We all knew that a relaxing day at the beach wouldn’t be happening, but it was nice to dream. “There are no frogs in the sea.” “Why would I be interested in frogs?” “Jim told me one time that he didn’t swim unless there were frogs involved. I assumed he ate them.” “That’s disgusting,” Keira said. “You really should stop listening to my brother. And he swims like a fish, by the way. The Cat House has an Olympic-sized pool and he swims a couple of miles every time he stays over. Frogs. That man has never eaten a frog in his entire life.”

“What’s the connection between you and our handsome host?” Aunt B asked. Blackberries taste much worse when they try to come back up your throat. “Uhhhh . . .”

“Will you stop meddling in my love life?” I growled. “I’m not meddling. I’m offering commentary.”

I’d managed to find a hobbit in the Caucasus Mountains. I wondered what he would do if I asked him about second breakfast.

The creature slid downward, into the water. The surface smoothed out. Another ripple, closer. Smooth water again. The opening bars of the theme from Jaws rolled through my head. Thanks. Just what I needed.

Look who’s talking. An eighteen-inch-tall magic man in riding boots, werejackals, and sea dragons are all fine, but animals with human faces are ridiculous. Okay, then. Glad we cleared that up.

The colossal lion jumped and landed a foot away from me, the dark mane streaming. The impact of his leap sent sparks flying from the fire. His eyes burned with molten gold. The powerful feline maw gaped open, showing terrifying fangs as big as my hand. Curran snarled. I swatted him on the nose. “Stop it! You’re scaring the people who rescued me.” The gray lion snapped into a human form. Curran jerked his hands up as if crushing an invisible boulder. “Aaaaaa!” Okay. He grabbed the edge of a big rock sticking out of the grass. Muscles flexed on his naked frame. He wrenched the boulder out of the ground. The four-foot-long rock had to weigh several thousand pounds—his feet sank into the grass. Curran snarled and hurled the rock against the mountain. The boulder flew, hit like a cannon ball, and rolled back down. Curran chased it, pulled another smaller rock out of the dirt, and smashed it against the first one. Wow. He was really pissed.

“That’s because I don’t hunt. I’m a male lion. I weigh six hundred pounds. Do you really expect me to scamper through the brush after deer? When I want a steak, I want a damn steak. I don’t want to chase it around the woods for two hours and then eat it raw. I have food brought to me, and the only time I get off my ass is when something threatens the Pack. I’ve been on exactly one hunt in the last three years. I went because I had to go, and once they ran off, I found a nice warm rock and had myself a nap in the sun.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” “Because you can’t lie, Kate. Everything you think is right there on your face. I’ve met kindergarteners who are better actors than you.

“I love you and you love me, and we’re both too fucked up for anyone else. Who else would have us?” I sighed. “Well, clearly we’re both crazy and this relationship is doomed.” “I love you so much,” he said. “Please don’t leave me.”

“I’m still mad at you,” I whispered, and put my arms around him. “I’m an ass,” he told me, pulling me closer. “I’m sorry. You should make my life hell for the next hundred years.” “Do we need to give you some privacy for the makeup sex?” Astamur asked.

“I’m sure it would be a glorious vacation right up to the point where you serve my head on a silver platter to Roland.” “For you, I’d spring for gold,” he said.

Curran sees himself as serving the people he leads; you see yourself as being served. You brought stability to this place, but it’s the stability of a scared slave who knows he will be pummeled with a stick if he holds his head up too high.

“Are you hungry, baby?” Curran asked. “Starving.” “I think we should go to dinner.” “Great idea.” “What are you going to wear?” “My badass face.”