Harley Merlin 2: Harley Merlin and the Mystery Twins Read online

  “What… What the hell?” I croaked, pointing at one of the images.

  The photograph showed Susan and Larry, holding a little boy between them—Micah, only his face had been burned out. The others were the same. Everywhere I looked, Micah’s face had been taken out with fire.

  Santana came by my side. “That’s not good,” she said. “That’s a very ugly and dark spell.”

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Obliviscaris in Perpetuum,” Wade breathed as he joined us. “It’s a forbidden curse. It rips a person out of everything. Photos, clothes, memories… anything that Micah has touched or left a trace on.” He pointed at various black spots in the room. “Every strand of hair or fragment of skin he’s left behind… it’s all burned out of existence.”

  “Why… Why would they do that?” I replied, trying to wrap my head around the purpose of such a heinous act.

  “They don’t want us to use a tracer spell to find him,” Raffe concluded. “The Ryders took him. I know it in my bones.”

  “They don’t want us to—” I paused, then took a deep breath, trying to keep myself calm. My palms were itching. My blood was boiling. “What do we do?”

  “I’ll check outside,” Raffe said.

  He left us there, with the lifeless bodies of Susan and Larry Cranston, who had adopted little Micah, hoping to give him the best family possible. The cruelty of what the Ryders had done was beyond monstrous.

  “My Orisha is gone,” Santana repeated, frowning. “That’s not normal. I can’t feel her anymore. I didn’t feel anything earlier, either. Whatever magic the twins are using, it overrode all my charms…” The color drained from her face. “I think they killed my Orisha!”

  Wade was stunned. I was even more confused.

  “Santana, that’s some incredibly dark and evil magic the Ryders are conjuring,” Wade said. “That’s worth a life sentence in Purgatory.”

  “They killed my Orisha!” Santana replied, tearing up. “She would’ve fought them. She never would’ve allowed them to take the kid! They killed her!”

  I felt her pain, and it was more than I could take, on top of my own.

  “Santana, check the boy’s room, please,” Wade said, trying to keep her focused. “Take photos, imprints, anything you can. I’ll handle this room and call a cleanup crew.”

  She nodded slowly and went upstairs. I had to get out of the room, so I went around the ground floor to check the rest of the place out. I hadn’t spotted them at first, but there were charcoal smudges all over the place, even in the hallway.

  The kitchen was a mess. The fight had spread throughout the house, from what I could tell. There were broken dishes and pots everywhere, food splattered over the floor—mac and cheese, pieces of bread, mashed potatoes… They were preparing Sunday lunch when the attack happened.

  It was vicious. It took me a while to reconstruct the entire scene, but I managed to get all the clues together. Outside, Raffe was looking around, checking every corner of the backyard. We briefly looked at each other, and I could feel the confusing mix of grief, sadness, and excitement coming from him.

  I went back into the living room, measuring my breaths as I carefully walked along the edges of the carpet. “The door wasn’t broken, and there was no sign of magical tampering on it,” I said.

  “They likely knew them,” Wade replied.

  “Assuming the Ryders are Shapeshifters, they must’ve somehow adopted the personas of people that the Cranstons were familiar with, maybe even Social Services. They came in, then all hell broke loose. The parents tried to fight them off. From what I saw in the kitchen, my guess is that Micah made it all the way there.”

  “Susan and Larry went down fast,” Wade said. “There are barely any defensive wounds. I’m guessing by this time they’d already disabled all the charms and traps.”

  “Which means they were left with apprehending Micah—”

  “Who didn’t go down easy. I guess he employed all his abilities against them,” Wade continued my line of reasoning.

  “Which, again, explains the mess in the kitchen.”

  Santana came down, tears streaming down her cheeks. It took her a while to say something.

  “The bedroom is black. Everything was burned to a crisp,” she managed, her voice shaky. “But it was controlled, part of the spell.”

  “They wanted us to find all of this. Otherwise, they would’ve just burned the whole place down for good measure,” Raffe added, coming back in. “They wanted us to find the bodies, the burned spots, everything.”

  “But why?” I asked hoarsely. “To mess with us?”

  Every single thing we’d discovered about the Ryders pointed them out as extreme psychopaths, the most vicious magicals I’d encountered so far, for sure. They made Finch look like a Boy Scout. He didn’t get his hands dirty—he let the gargoyles do the dirty work for him. The Ryders got up close and personal.

  I resisted the urge to puke, though I could feel my coffee and half a bagel struggling to come back up. A few deeper breaths in, and I got it under control, but I couldn’t shake the chills that had settled in my bones.

  “To make us aware of what they can do. To make us feel helpless,” Wade replied. “They want us to understand that they can stop us from tracing the people they take. They want us to see the damage they can do.”

  “They want us to be afraid of them,” Santana murmured.

  “Well, screw that!” I snapped. I didn’t let Finch get to me. I had no intention of letting these bastards break my morale, either. This entire scene made me rage with the fire of exacting revenge, but not fear. No, the Ryders made me furious, not scared. “We’re going to find them, and we’re going to put them in Purgatory. And I hope, I really hope they put up a fight, because then I can just light them up and watch them burn!” I shouted.

  The air felt heavy as Wade, Santana, and Raffe stared at me, speechless and befuddled. I thought about what I’d just said, realizing it may have come across as extreme. My cheeks burned.

  “Okay, scratch the last part,” I muttered.

  “No, no, leave it in. I’m with you there,” Santana replied. “They killed one of my Orishas. They’re not getting away with this.”

  At least we were on the same page, as I was getting a similar vibe from Raffe and Wade—Raffe’s was particularly interesting, since, despite his calm demeanor, there was a thirst for blood bubbling beneath the surface. It was a tad creepy, but I was in no position to judge.

  I’d just expressed interest in burning two magicals alive.

  Susan and Larry Cranston didn’t deserve this. I was determined to get justice for them, by any means possible. Most importantly, I had to save Micah. He was an innocent child. All he ever wanted was a home and a family, and the Ryders had taken that away from him.

  As a foster kid myself, I took this personally.

  Wade called a cleanup crew to the Cranstons’ place and put out another ABP on Micah. The fixers were going to make it look like a home invasion gone wrong, torching parts of the place and turning the sprinkler system on. I didn’t want to know the rest of the details, as I was still wrestling with my undigested coffee and bagel.

  We couldn’t stop doing our jobs. We had to keep our emotions in check and go through the rest of the list. The other families were okay, though. The Ryders had left cards there, as well, and in one case with magical parents, they’d pretended to be from the San Diego Coven, trying to convince a couple to send their kid over.

  I tried to understand why they’d gone to such lengths to get parents to send their children to the coven, until a possible answer hit me. In addition to the fact that the Ryders didn’t want to risk conflict with magical parents or early exposure by killing them and taking the kids, they might also want them to essentially give up on their children. They might want the chicks out of the nest, so they could snatch them. So the parents would feel miserable for letting them go and even blame the coven for their disappearance. That would be de
vious, indeed… But they didn’t succeed, and I wound up walking out of the last house on our list with a half-smile on my face.

  I breathed a sigh of relief as we reached the Jeep.

  My heart hurt, but I had to keep going. Santana rigged all the homes with additional and more potent charms, hoping they might at least alert us in case the Ryders showed up. Wade called Alton, demanding additional security details on each family. The Ryders were bound to strike again, though we weren’t sure when. Fortunately, Alton was totally on board with that.

  “We should round up all the families we still have and bring them back to the coven,” I said out loud while Wade was still on the line with Alton. “We shouldn’t leave them out here where the Ryder twins can get them!”

  Alton said something to Wade, but I couldn’t hear it. Once he hung up, however, I felt his anger boiling through me.

  “We can’t. All we can do is get security magicals to watch over them until further notice,” Wade said.

  “Why not?!” I asked, my voice getting louder.

  “Because the California Mage Council wants us to see this through! Because they ordered us to keep the families where they are and wait for the Ryders to strike again. They want them caught,” Wade snapped.

  “What if the families want to come to the coven for protection?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “We’ll assure them that it’s not necessary.”

  “But that’s insane!” I croaked. “They’ll be sitting ducks…”

  “They’ve got charms and traps set up. There are security magicals on their way out to each of the families on our list,” Wade said. “Alton wouldn’t tell me more, but these are the orders, and we are to follow them. Period!”

  On our way back to the coven, we didn’t speak much. There wasn’t much to say, really. What happened with the Cranstons felt like a phenomenal failure. The more time that passed, the worse I felt. I’d insisted that Micah stay with his parents. And now, his parents were dead, and Micah was missing.

  I looked at Wade. He was livid, but he held it all in beneath a straight face. Whenever his eyes found mine, rage blared through him and echoed in me. That just made me feel even more responsible. I didn’t know what to say. If I could go back and undo yesterday’s decisions, Micah would’ve been safe, with us, in the coven. Susan and Larry would still be alive.

  And I hated that we couldn’t even round up the rest of the families and take them to safety. But there was nothing I could do about that now.

  “Can you drop me off at St. Clair’s?” I asked, my voice barely audible.

  “Why?” Wade asked, his tone clipped.

  It felt like a punch in the gut. He was so angry with me.

  “I need to do something,” I replied.

  “Harley, given what we’re dealing with right now, a little more transparency would be appreciated,” he replied.

  God, I feel so horrible.

  “I just need to be alone,” I conceded, tears streaming down my cheeks. I caught a glimpse of Santana and Raffe in the rearview mirror. They were just as broken as I was, but they weren’t experiencing the crippling guilt that was building up inside me. No, that cancerous darkness was all mine and mine alone to bear. And I deserved it. “I just need to be alone. I’ll take a cab back.”

  The Jeep came to a rough halt, a couple blocks before St. Clair’s. Wade gripped the steering wheel, his knuckles white. Again, he stared ahead, not looking at me.

  “Thanks,” I murmured. “I won’t be long.”

  “Whatever,” he replied coldly.

  The frustration and pain were too much to handle. I got out and slammed the car door. Santana and Raffe watched me as the Jeep roared back into traffic. A few seconds later, I was all by myself in the middle of a busy sidewalk on a Sunday afternoon.

  The sun was out. The weather was perfect.

  And I felt like crap.

  Twenty-One

  Harley

  I stood there, in the middle of the street, unable to move or think for a while.

  Tears rolled down my cheeks as I went back over everything that had happened. Hindsight was always great, but I didn’t have the ability or the luxury to turn back time. I wondered if any magical could do that. I probably would’ve heard about it.

  I could only go forward from this point. However, I needed to clear my head first. Most importantly, I needed to be around people who weren’t involved in any of this. I often thought of the Smiths’ place as a refuge, and this certainly felt like the right time to pay them another visit.

  Besides, I needed to see what Jacob was up to, and confirm whether I had, in fact, spotted him earlier at the Hamms’ house.

  I stopped by St. Clair’s and picked up some sweet and savory pastries in a small gift basket, then made my way to the Smiths’. I composed myself as I walked up the narrow pathway leading to the front door. I did my best to make sure that my expression reflected the weather, not my emotions.

  The door opened, and Mrs. Smith greeted me with a warm smile.

  “Sweetie! What a joy to see you again so soon!” she exclaimed, before she noticed the pastry basket and chuckled. “Do you intend to bribe me for anything?”

  “Hah, no… I just had the rest of the day off, and I wanted to spend it with people I love,” I replied, smiling.

  “Oh, honey,” she murmured. She took the basket from my hand and used one arm to hug me. I sank my face in her soft hair, welcoming the scent of freesia. Still using the same fabric softener.

  We went inside, to find Mr. Smith in the living room, flipping channels on the TV.

  “Harley!” he said, beaming at me. “You’re making our weekend even better!”

  “Hey,” I replied, and went over to hug him, awkwardly, bending downward over the sofa. “How’s your Sunday turning out, so far?”

  “Fantastic! I get to watch the game, the missus gets some yummy treats, from what I can see,” he said, grinning, “and Jacob’s out in the backyard, fumbling with a project for school.”

  “Ah. I was hoping I could talk to him,” I said.

  I followed Mrs. Smith into the kitchen and helped her get the pastries out of the basket and fairly redistributed across several plates. Jacob was outside. I could see him through the wide kitchen windows. He was trying to build some kind of device, kneeling under a massive umbrella, with lemonade and half-eaten sandwiches next to him on a small rattan coffee table. He didn’t seem to know what he was doing, barely able to clamp down on a couple of wires, but he was definitely enjoying it—I could feel it in my tummy.

  “You’ve come by to spend some time with Jacob, huh?” Mrs. Smith asked me, smiling.

  I nodded. “I see he’s busy, though.”

  “Stick around. He needs all the help he can get, and there’s not a single mechanical engineer in the Smith household to assist him.” She giggled. “You might be able to save him. And, since you’re here, do you want to have dinner with us?”

  “I’d love that,” I replied, unable to stop myself from smiling.

  “I’m making lasagna,” she added with a devilish grin.

  Mrs. Smith handed me one of the pastry plates and nodded at Jacob. “Well, why don’t you go out there and give him a hand? You’ve got your car, now. I’ll bet you understand what he’s doing over there more than us.”

  My car. I missed Daisy like crazy. I hadn’t yet decided what I was going to do with her. Murray the dirtbag gargoyle had crushed her a month ago, and I was still recovering from the heartache. Daisy was a heap of mangled metal at this point, held in storage, but I couldn’t bring myself to take her to the salvage yard. I didn’t have the courage to buy another car, either. It would’ve felt like a betrayal to Daisy.

  In the meantime, Wade or Santana hauled me around if I needed it. Cabs were okay, too.

  I sighed, brushing aside the sadness of Daisy’s “passing away,” and shifted my focus back to Mrs. Smith.

  “You don’t like leaving him out there on his own? Turning int
o a helicopter mom, now?” I forced a laugh.

  “No, not at all. I’m just trying to get to know Jacob a little better, and he doesn’t talk to me much. Maybe he’ll open up to you. I don’t know, I’m just positive there are things he isn’t telling us, and maybe you can get more out of him than we can.”

  I gave her a warm smile and took the plate out into the backyard. Jacob turned his head when he heard the sliding door open. He struck me as nervous. I was making him nervous.

  “Hey, Jake, brought you some goodies,” I said. “Mind if I join you?”

  “Sure, have a seat,” Jacob replied, keeping his focus on the small device in front of him.

  I did just that, crossing my legs and settling the plate next to the sandwiches and lemonade.

  “St. Clair’s?” he asked, eyeing the pastries for a moment.

  “You betcha!” I replied, grinning, then pointed at the device. “What are you doing there?”

  “Oh. It’s an automatic pet feeder,” Jacob said.

  “Are you sure?” I asked sarcastically.

  I figured he was halfway through with it or something, because to me it looked like a box with some circuits and gadgets on the inside. I doubted Mrs. Smith had actually thought that I could help the kid better than them—it was most likely just an excuse to get me out here with him.

  I could at least pretend to help while I asked Jacob some questions, including whether he’d been near the Hamms’ place or not.

  Jacob looked at me, raising an eyebrow and making me laugh. “I’m kidding, dude,” I said, then pointed at the device again. “Need me to help?”

  “Nah. But you can keep me company, if you want,” he replied, his voice low. “Just don’t tell Mrs. Smith about my cursing. This damn thing’s getting on my nerves.”

  I chuckled. “When is it due?”

  He sighed. “Tomorrow. I always leave the important stuff until the last minute.”

  “Meh. It’s cool. You’ll figure it out. And someone’s dog will be grateful to you in the end,” I said.