Midnight Marked (Chicagoland Vampires, #12)(83)

“We’re looking for confirmation we’re translating correctly,” Paige said. “Even if we can’t yet translate the entire thing, we’ll know we’ve translated correctly certain parts of it.”

Mallory nodded. “It will help me calibrate the machine. We want to find this alchemy. I need to be certain I’m looking for this alchemy. Otherwise we’re going to end up with a machine that tags, I don’t know, coffee drinkers in Chicago or something.”

“Which would be useless,” I said. “Especially in the Loop.”

“And Wicker Park!” Mallory said. “There’s a whole-bean, shade-grown, cage-free coffeehouse on every corner now.”

“I didn’t realize beans required cages,” Ethan said.

“Neither did I,” Mallory said. “Now hush and let me work.”

“I guess she’s giving you orders now,” I said to Ethan with a smile.

“I guess she is,” Ethan said as they turned to their work, putting material in the crucible, arranging components on the top of the patio.

Paige and Mallory looked happy and very compatible working together. Paige’s height and red hair matched interestingly with Mallory’s petite stature and blue locks. Mallory moved quickly, efficiently, as she prepared the work. Paige’s movements were more deliberate. For two sorcerers on the right side of the law, they hadn’t spent much time together. Maybe a friendship could blossom. If so, I’d take credit for that, too.

“How was the meeting?” Ethan asked.

In response, I growled.

“I guess that means we’ll discuss it later.”

“That would probably be best.”

“All right,” Mallory said as Paige handed her a box of matches. “Let’s do this.”

When Mallory snapped the match against the side of the box, Malik, Ethan, and I took a simultaneous step backward. As she dropped it into the crucible, Paige took a step backward, too. Mallory stayed exactly where she was, watching and waiting for something to happen.

The crucible rattled once. Then again. And then it began to vibrate as if someone had flipped a switch.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we have alchemy.” Mallory put her hands on her hips, and her smile was as sly as a vampire’s. “That’s resonance.”

We clapped politely, and Malik leaned in. “Is anyone else disappointed there wasn’t a pretty blue or green explosion?”

It was as if he’d made a wish.

There was a whistle, like a teapot at the ready, and a small blue spark popped out of the crucible, burst like a tiny firework.

Malik nodded. “Nice.”

A second spark popped, and then a third, all in shades of blue, all shattering in the air like tiny crystals. But it took only a moment for those few pretty sparks to grow bigger, faster, and more explosive. Daubs of blue flame began to shower from the crucible, whistling like an Independence Day celebration.

Paige squeaked, darted away from the showering fire. Mallory just stood there, hands on her hips, and stared at it like a woman contemplating the cosmos.

After a moment, when the sparks had died down, she patted at a spark in her hair. “And that’s why we didn’t do it in Wicker Park.”





CHAPTER NINETEEN




OLD WOUNDS


Mallory concluded they hadn’t distilled the plant’s “salt” as much as they’d needed to before running the experiment. But otherwise it was a success. They cleaned up the mess and put out the residual sparks, and Mallory headed home to work on the machine.

The rest of us went back inside, found vampires streaming toward the cafeteria. Margot had prepared an all-American dinner: hot dogs with the appropriate Chicago trimmings, hand-cut fries, milk shakes. Meals like that were always more popular than the fancy French things she was just as capable of cooking.

Ethan and I grabbed food, but took it back to the office to talk through status while we ate. Ethan no longer ate his hot dog with a fork off undoubtedly expensive China, and he’d striped it with neon relish and added sport peppers, which brought it closer to a proper Chicago dog. I was getting through.

“Would you like to tell me about your RG visit?” he asked, taking a bite.

“Nothing changed,” I said. “That’s really all there is to say. We’re at an impasse.”

“Odd. You’d think meeting atop the Navy Pier Ferris wheel would make for a happy occasion.”

I started to say something, then looked at him. “Are you trying to guess where the meetings are?”

“I would do no such thing.”

“You completely would. But, seriously, the Ferris wheel?”

He formed a box with his fingers. “I believe it has cars.”

I just shook my head. “How have you lived here so long without a ride on the Ferris wheel?”

“I’m a vampire,” he said, as if that was the obvious explanation.

I just sighed.

“Did they recognize the Rogue?”

“No. No one recognized him, and no one had seen any alchemy. They don’t seem naive to the possibility Reed’s our villain, but they don’t seem terribly interested in doing anything about it, either. I gave them a speech about how we’re the allies, not the enemies, and then walked out and left them to think about it.”