Devils & Thieves (Devils & Thieves #1)(41)

Crowe gave me a sidelong glance and nodded, his hair blowing in the breeze the Deathstalker had conjured. “We’re looking for my sister,” he said to the group as they came to a stop at the edge of the woods, about twenty feet from where we stood.

They fanned out quickly, hemming us in. Crowe put up his hands—which were completely steady. “If you’ve got her,” he continued in a low voice, “the best thing to do is to let her go.”

“Yeah?” said a Deathstalker with full-sleeve tattoos and a scar across her forehead. “How about you give up our prospect first?” This one was emanating faint wisps of crimson—animus magic, like Killian’s.

“She might be trying to influence you,” I murmured to Crowe, whose eyes narrowed.

“We don’t have your prospect,” Crowe said to the woman. “But I’d like to know where he is, too. He was the last one seen with my sister.”

“Uh-huh,” said a third. He had buzzed black hair and a long beard. Glimmers of sapphire hung in the air around him. He had the same magic I had, but either he was holding it close or he didn’t have nearly as much as my dad.

“Locant,” I whispered.

Crowe gave me another look, this time with an arched eyebrow, before returning his focus to our current predicament. “Where’s Killian, Ren?”

“None of your fucking business,” said a fourth Deathstalker, the one apparently named Ren. She had dreads pulled back in a red bandanna and intense pale green eyes that contrasted with her dark skin. “And we’re gonna have to ask you to clear out now. We’re having a meeting.”

“Without your president?” Crowe asked. His fingers, still held up to show he meant no harm, twitched. A faint amber glow, one I knew only I could see, flared off his fingertips.

“Get back to your clubhouse, Crowe,” said the bearded guy, cracking his knuckles.

“I want my sister. If Killian has her somewhere on these grounds, I’m going to find her. And if she’s hurt, I’m going to have to find some way to work out my extreme disappointment.” His fingers curled, and shimmering, undulating threads of venemon began to stretch from their source.

“And if you’ve hurt Darek—” Ren began.

“I don’t give a fuck about Darek,” Crowe snapped. He took a step forward, and all six Deathstalkers had their hands out in front of them, fingers spread, power fogging and slithering in the air as the scent of all of it rolled toward me. It was coming from all sides, closing us in.

And then I smelled something new, something terrible, like stale cigarettes and burning meat. It was a magic scent I’d never come up against. My head swam with it, and I swayed as my stomach threatened to revolt.

“Crowe…” I licked my lips and peered through the cloud to try to find the source of the unfamiliar odor. To our far right, several yards into the woods, someone tall ran between trees, too fast for me to recognize. The person was emitting strands of pale yellow and crimson streaked with black. “Someone is…”

Crowe took a step in front of me, his arms spreading, his magic billowing from him.

“Watch out,” Ren shouted. “He’s going to cast!”

“Crowe!” shouted a familiar male voice. Hardy, who must have seen us and come on the run. Thank God. But whatever he shouted next was lost as a fierce wind whipped my hair. Crowe stumbled into me, and we both went down. Branches cracked over our heads as curses flew from all sides. My ears were ringing and I could barely breathe—I was choking on magic, on the bitter, burning stench of it.

Crowe’s hands were on my waist and his voice was in my ear. “Can you run?”

My breath came out of me in a strangled wheeze. “Crowe,” I tried to say as amber venemon burst from his palm and rocketed wildly into the murky fog around us. He could probably see clearly, but I was almost blind from all the magic swimming around and overwhelming my senses.

A sharp wind slammed into us again, sending twigs and leaves scraping against my cheeks and forehead. My mouth filled with grit as I struggled to my feet. Crowe shouted something I couldn’t make out in the storm of air and people and magic around me.

“I can’t—” My next words were stolen from me as I staggered back from a sudden impact. Heartbeat pounding at my temples, I looked down at my shoulder to see the hilt of a knife protruding from my shirt. The pain hit me a beat later, a racing, pounding lance of agony arching out across my shoulder like a net of needles. My knees gave out.

“Jemmie!” Crowe shouted. Two people ran by in the shadows. We were in the middle of a full-on kindled brawl, shouts and grunts and gasps punctuating the fight. More of the Devils’ League must have found us because we’d initially been surrounded by Deathstalkers, but now people had spread out, seeking safe places from which to hurl their curses. Their voices were coming from all sides.

Another knife whistled through the air, a glint of steel in a ray of sun, piercing the blanket of thick fog around me. Crowe ducked out of the way as he landed at my side, and the blade skimmed past his face, leaving a long, bloody gash across his jaw.

I tried pulling myself into a sitting position, but every inch of my body throbbed with pain, as if the knife had pierced not just my flesh but every nerve in my body, sending electric shocks down to my toes. Was this real or an illusion? I put my tingling fingers up to the wound and felt blood streaming across my palm. As I became dizzy with shock, I squinted at another person moving between tree trunks nearby, palms open toward us, giving off puffs of purple magic mixed with red and black. Confusion filled me. Was that who it looked like?