Wayward Son (Simon Snow, #2)(51)

“This isn’t even enough for gas,” Shepard says, looking at the pile.

“We’ll cast spells for gas,” Bunce says. “And we’ll make this stretch.” She holds her ring over the bills. “A penny saved is a penny earned!” The pile doubles. Bunce smiles. “I’ve always wanted to try that.…”

Shepard’s mouth drops open. “You can make money?”

“Looks like it.”

“You can’t keep casting American phrases,” I say to her. “It’s too unpredictable.”

“Needs must.” Bunce shrugs. “We need food and clothes. And this one”—she points at Shepard—“needs to tell us where we’ll find the NowNext.”

“I don’t know exactly,” he says.

Simon is eating the last of the pizza. “Tell us what you do know.”

Shepard pushes up his glasses. “That they’re a new group of vampires. Any vamps we get around here tend to be loners. Or part of a family that keeps to their own. But the Next Blood … they’re not a family. They’re more like corporate raiders. They don’t sneak around, snagging spare Normals—they just take what they want. And they’re ambitious. Even I know they’re trying to obtain magic.”

“What about the magicians?” Bunce says. “How are they letting this happen?”

Magicians don’t tolerate vampires. The fact that the Mage made a deal with the vampires was the biggest hit to his reputation back home. It’s the reason he was buried without a marker. Even the Mage’s Men, his little band of minions, spit on his memory now.

“The magicians could probably stop them,” Shepard says, “but they’d have to get organized. I don’t know what it’s like where you come from, but Speakers over here don’t really … talk to each other.”

I don’t feel like volunteering anything about where we come from. “You said these vampires were trying to learn how to speak with magic,” I say. “They can’t. You’re either born a magician or you’re not.”

Simon clears his throat.

“Is it genetic then?” Shepard asks. “I’ve always wondered.… Does that mean, if I married a Speaker, we could have a magickal baby?”

Bunce guffaws.

“How do you know that these new vampires want magic?” I ask. “If you know so little about them?”

“They’ve sent out feelers all over the country, looking for tricks and lore. They’ve contacted some of the magic enthusiasts in my network.”

“This is why!” Bunce points at him. “This is why we keep secrets! Are you going to share what you learn from us with upstart vampires?”

“No!” Shepard is adamant. “I’ve already sworn on my life.”

“Where are they?” I ask.

“I don’t know where the Next Blood is,” he says. “But I know where most of America’s vampires are. Vegas.”

“Las Vegas…” Bunce looks vaguely disapproving.

I look over at Snow. He’s grinning.



* * *



Before we leave, Simon decides we should try calling Agatha.

“But what if the NowNext track the call back to us?” Bunce worries.

“If they find us,” he says, “we won’t have to find them.”

“Let’s call,” I say, “just in case Wellbelove picks up and tells us she’s at a wellness camp, having her pores extracted.”

“You don’t really believe that,” Bunce says.

She’s right. I don’t.

Bunce and I spell her phone secret, or try, and call Agatha’s number. It goes straight to an automated voicemail. Agatha’s never recorded a personal message. (I wouldn’t have been surprised if it had been, “Penelope, stop calling me.”) Bunce immediately hangs up.

“Right,” Simon says after a moment. “We press on.”

When we open the hotel room door to leave, most of my socks and three of my shirts fly in. I’m so happy, I actually hug them. (I was going to have to magick up a shirt. Or let Shepard run into a Walmart to buy me something. Without a shirt, I wouldn’t even be allowed into a Walmart.) One of my socks is covered in feathers, but the shirts are clean. I put one on straightaway—a good print, aubergine with navy leaves—and tuck the rest into a plastic bag. (I regret leaving my suitcase in that creek, but there’s no going back for it now.)

Bunce has spelled Simon’s wings away again. He insists I squeeze into the cab of the truck with Penny, instead of riding in back with him. “You’re already sunburnt,” he says. “And you know what the wind does to your hair.”

Shepard tells Simon he has to lie down in the truck bed; apparently riding back there is dangerous and illegal. “Both my middle names,” Simon says.

“You don’t have a middle name,” I say. Which seems to hurt his feelings, which I immediately regret. I’m just worried about him. I grab his hand, trying to make up for it. “Just be careful,” I say. “Plenty of time for derring-do when we’re fighting vampires.”

“What’s ‘derring-do’?” he asks.

“Your middle name.”