Binding the Shadows (Arcadia Bell #3)

Binding the Shadows (Arcadia Bell #3)
Jenn Bennett




I scrambled through the second-story window and balanced on a square section of slanted roofing above a portico on the first floor. Lon followed, biting out obscenities. I’d never seen him move so fast. Fire is a good motivator.

We hugged the outer wall of the house, flanking both sides of the open window. A sharp night wind whipped my hair around my face and shoulders as I butted my shoulder against the siding.

Where is Merrimoth now? I thought.

“Left the room to search for the gun,” Lon said in a low voice.

I quickly surveyed our surroundings. A small balcony lay to our left, a couple of rooms away. I risked a glance below and got queasy watching the tide crash and foam around an outcropping of jagged rocks.

Merrimoth’s contemporary house was built on stilts over a lonely expanse of Pacific coast. The shoreline that stretched in front of us was studded with crags and driftwood and sea otters, and maybe the occasional wet-suited surfer seeking a thrill. I was neither sea otter nor surfer, and I figured I had a one percent chance of surviving a dive into the threatening waters below.

Long strands of golden brown hair fluttered around the back of Lon’s neck as he leaned against the house and listened. Light from the still-burning fire radiated from the open window, creating dancing shadows that deepened the long hollows of his cheeks.

Like Merrimoth, Lon Butler is an Earthbound: demons on the inside, humans on the outside—with the small exception of a wispy halo of light that floats around their heads, marking them as “other.” When Lon was transmutated, his demonic halo morphed from the usual nebulous gold-speckled green cloud to an eruption of flames that licked around his head and shoulders. He also sprouted a pair of spiraling ram-like horns, which were currently making a disconcerting knocking sound when he leaned his head against the house.

“He thinks he’s spotted where the gun landed,” he whispered.

Lon’s damned Lupara. He’d only managed one shot before Merrimoth took possession of the gun a couple of minutes ago. I’d shocked Merrimoth with charged Heka—natural magical energy kindled with electricity—causing the gun to fly out of his hand, and he retaliated by inexplicably creating a wall of fire across the room. Which is why we were now standing outside the window above a rocky shoreline when we should be sitting down to dinner.

Ambrose Dare, the very rich and very powerful head of the Hellfire Club, sent me here to put a metaphysical leash around Merrimoth’s neck after hearing reports that his Number Two Earthbound had gone mad. Not usually my business or concern, but Dare was busy at some holiday fundraiser, and I was getting paid to care.

“We can’t stand here forever,” Lon said in a low voice.

No, we damn well couldn’t. I longingly glanced at the nearby balcony. It was several feet away and connected to our roof by a slim ledge of cedar.

“Would it hold us?” Lon asked.

I tested it, easing the toe of my shoe on the ledge. Seemed strong enough, though it was awfully narrow. “I don’t know . . .”

“Try to bind him again.”

“You think I’m not?” I whispered hotly.

My inherited moon power was stronger than it’d ever been, now that I was using it regularly, but that didn’t mean I understood the mechanics behind it. All I knew was that it damn sure didn’t work in the daytime and—like the cable in Lon’s house up on the cliffs—went on the fritz during storms.

Lon exhaled in frustration. Clever eyes studied mine as his index finger and thumb moved in unison to smooth the thin pirate mustache that trailed around his mouth and matching triangle in the center of his chin.

“Bind Merrimoth,” he finally said, “and I’ll do that thing you like later.”

“It’s not like my power reacts to the reward system,” I said, then added, “What thing?”

The corner of his mouth quirked. “On the chair.”

“You mean that thing you like?”

“We both like,” he corrected. “Win-win.”

I snorted a soft laugh. “I don’t think you understand the concept of bargaining.”

He held up a hand to quiet me, then whispered after a few moments. “The gun fell behind his piano. He can see it from the landing.”

“Perfect. When he heads back downstairs—”

“Cady—”

“—we’ll just go back inside and—”

“Ahhh!”

Lon lurched away from the side of the house and nearly toppled off the narrow roof. I felt it a second later: fire on my back, spreading across the wood siding. I yelped in pain, then ducked into a crouch as a sudden boom! rattled the house. Flames burst from the open window, a column of orange fire like dragon’s breath. It spewed over our heads, just missing one of Lon’s horns, then retreated. Mostly. Flames continued to cavort around the window and surrounding wall.

The scent of burning hair wafted. I furiously patted my bleached white Bride of Frankenstein streak, which hung over my shoulders and stood out against my otherwise dark hair. “How is he doing that?” I hissed.

“Hell if I know. Even transmutated, there’s no way he should be able to do this.”

But Merrimoth wasn’t transmutated, which made even less sense. Many Earthbounds have a demonic ability, what they call a knack. Lon’s an empath. He can read your emotions. Transmuted, like he was at that moment, he can also read your thoughts. Merrimoth possessed a knack I once would’ve classified as harmless: temperature control. Last time I saw him, he could warm my hand with a touch. But creating giant blasts of fire? This was new.