Wild Sign (Alpha & Omega #6)(74)

They worked in silence. Tag wasn’t naturally quiet, but he was a little afraid of him, Charles knew. That was all right. His reputation, even among his own pack, was another weapon that Charles could use. And Tag was not wrong to be afraid.

Charles had paid for the entire contents of the storage locker, but he had told the manager that once they had gone through everything for what they wanted, he was welcome to sell the remainder. Charles had thought at first that they had been lucky, given that the check was six months old, that the manager hadn’t already garage-saled or auctioned off the contents.

Then he’d shown them the locker. The manager hadn’t even been able to get his hand near the lock. Charles had managed it, using the manager’s key. Charles sent the unhappy manager, who had hoped to get a look at the contents of the unit, back to his offices before dealing with Carrie’s spells so they could open the door safely. Working with her magic, and seeing how she’d dealt with Daniel Erasmus, had made Charles move from respect for her to outright liking.

Going through the unit now—without the driving need to pin down the grimoires—only reinforced his opinion. He didn’t know if he’d have liked her if he’d met her in person—he liked very few people.

But her magic reminded him of the computer code written back in the early days, when memory space was at a premium. Programmers back then created elegant script without a wasted symbol to complete the necessary task. Carrie hadn’t had a lot of power, but she’d made good use of what she did have.

Not that he knew how witchcraft worked—he wasn’t a witch by anything except raw ability. His father had offered to teach him once, but that offer had been full of such . . . horrific hidden emotions that even as a child he had known to refuse. He couldn’t have reproduced Carrie Green’s work, but he could feel its delicacy.

“Here,” called Tag.

Charles found him crouched over a plastic bin filled with smaller boxes. He held one of the boxes in his hand and offered it to Charles.

The box was lined with silk and filled with dozens of charms. Handmade bracelets and necklaces crafted from inexpensive wooden beads. Each one marked with a paper tag that read Health and $15.

Together he and Tag sorted through the boxes of charms. Health, Joy, and Luck accounted for all but two of the boxes. One of those boxes held a single necklace, a jade bead strung on a silver chain. Protection from Evil had a price tag of two thousand dollars. And unlike the smaller charms, this one held real power. Made, he thought, after Carrie had been given more power by the Singer. He couldn’t be sure that it was labeled correctly, but her magic had an honest feel about it. He supposed that this necklace was imbued with the same magic as whatever she’d had that kept her grandfather from torturing her for her power. It wasn’t that one—Underwood had said it had been made with moonstone, and this necklace felt unused.

The final box held a bone shard strung on leather. Its label read Death. There was no price. He thought at first it was a murder weapon. But there was no feeling of darkness to the magic.

“Don’t touch that,” said Tag. “It’s a cyanide pill.”

“She didn’t wear it,” murmured Charles. “Unless she made a second one.”

“It’s not the kind of thing you’d make two of,” Tag said. “One is useful, but you can’t commit suicide twice. She left it here in the end. I hope she didn’t regret that.”

“I thought you said you could detect witchcraft, but you didn’t know anything about it?” Charles asked.

Tag shrugged. “Maybe I picked up a thing or two along the way. But it’s not anything like vast knowledge.”

Outside of those two boxes, none of the charms would have been enough to get anyone into trouble. Even taken together, there was no harm in them. The purpose of each was very carefully set, and they would have been impossible to use additively. One charm for good health was as effective as wearing sixteen at the same time. It wasn’t Carrie’s doing—it was just the nature of this kind of charm.

They could have left the bin, minus the two small boxes, to the storage manager’s care without worry. But after exchanging a brief look with Charles, Tag moved it into the pile of things to take with them. Charles wasn’t sure what tipped the balance for Tag, but Charles didn’t want Carrie’s careful work to go to people who would not appreciate it.

Anna showed up, parking the SUV in front of the next unit over because they had filled the available space in front of Carrie’s unit with approximately half the contents of her locker. Anna looked tired, and the expression on her face when she got out of the rig made him open his arms.

She walked into them and buried her face in his shoulder and relaxed against him.

“She didn’t know,” she told him, her voice muffled. “They figured out she was pregnant after we left them yesterday—apparently she’d gone to see a doctor about her unusual tiredness and upset digestive tract. On the good side, her wife now believes that Sissy didn’t cheat on her and then lie about it. That is, believe me, the only good side.”

“Abortion?” Charles suggested.

Anna shook her head. “Apparently Dr. Connors has protested and fought for reproductive rights for others, but finds the idea personally unacceptable. Tanya disagrees. I found them fighting about one thing and left them fighting about another. If they aren’t careful, this will destroy them.”