Blade Bound

   Something had happened. Something that had drawn the attention of the humans and, from the jittering energy in the room, had made them very skittish.

   Take care, Ethan silently said, and we walked through them, whispers in our wake. We stepped outside . . . and into a thick swirl of white snow.

   The flakes were enormous, the snowfall heavy enough that I couldn’t see the buildings across the street. They muffled the sound of traffic, of pedestrians, of the typical buzz of the city.

   “It’s seventy degrees outside,” Ethan said. “This isn’t possible.”

   I’d paired a thin, three-quarter-sleeved black shirt with jeans and boots and was actually a little warm. This probably wasn’t the first time it had snowed in Illinois in August. And while we could see only a sliver of sky between tall skyscrapers, what we could see was dark and clear. Which meant the snow wasn’t falling from clouds, but from nothing. It was spawning out of literal thin air somewhere above us.

   “Magic,” Ethan quietly said. “Gabriel said there was something in the air. I thought he meant last night.”

   “Yeah. I did, too.”

   Magic buzzed around us, but without the chemical smell that had marked the hallucinations. This was magic, but different magic. I wasn’t sure if that was better or worse than the other option.

   Our meeting with the mayor was about to get a little more intense.

   My phone began to ring, and I pulled it out, checked the screen as Ethan did the same. There were alerts from Jeff and the House about the weather—and the wards that were screaming across the city.

   Sorcha’s wards had been breached, which meant this was Sorcha’s magic—and she’d somehow managed to control the weather.

   That was Official Big Bad territory.

   “Let’s get moving,” Ethan grimly said, and we headed to City Hall.

   • • •

   The Loop’s sidewalks were busy with people who’d come out to wonder at the weather, catch snowflakes on their tongues, or take videos to share for the shock and awe of it.

   City Hall looked like a lot of government buildings in the US—square, with granite, symmetrical rectangular windows, and lots of ribbed columns. The doors were edged in brass that gleamed like gold, and the lobby was marble, with towering vaulted ceilings and elevators covered by more lustrous brass.

   Catcher and my grandfather stood in the lobby, just past the security area, waiting for us. My grandfather had exchanged his usual brown sport coat for a dark suit that was a little baggy in the arms, the trousers a smidge too long. I found both of those things almost stupidly endearing. Catcher wore jeans and a black T-shirt without a smart-ass comment, which was practically business wear as far as he was concerned.

   “Good evening,” Ethan said.

   My grandfather nodded, his expression somber.

   “She’s in the city?” Ethan asked.

   “There’s been no report of her yet,” Catcher said.

   “If she isn’t here yet,” my grandfather said, “she’ll be here soon.” He glanced back at the snow falling outside. “She’ll want to see this.”

   “What’s the protocol now that the wards have been triggered?” Ethan asked.

   “Baumgartner will send a patrol to each sector,” Catcher said. Baumgartner was the leader of the Order, the sorcerers’ union. “They’ll determine where the breaches occurred, which will hopefully help us locate her and figure out what kind of magic she’s using.”

   “It’s about damn time.”

   Everyone just looked at me.

   “Sorcha,” I explained. “She’s too egotistical to walk away, to be cool about what she would have seen as a humiliating defeat. That’s not how she operates. This was inevitable. At least now we won’t have to wonder when it’s going to happen.”

   I looked around at all of them, saw the flash of acknowledgment in their eyes. Even if we hadn’t talked about it, we’d felt the same. We’d believed she’d come back. And now she had.

   “There’s no chemical smell,” I said.

   Catcher nodded. “I noticed that. We haven’t tied the voice or the chemical smell to any known magic. But the absence suggests this is something different.”

   “A different magic, or a different sorcerer?” Ethan asked.

   “Either,” Catcher said. “Or both.”

   “How are the humans?” Ethan asked.

   “All are stable except the woman with the knife,” Catcher said. “Her name is Rosemary Parsons. She’s in critical condition, but they’re hopeful.”

   “She’s sedated?” Ethan asked.

   “She is,” my grandfather said. “And still at the hospital. Everyone else is at the factory.”

   The supernatural prison, he meant. “Why?” I asked.

   “Quarantine,” Ethan said, and my grandfather nodded.

   “We don’t know why this is happening, or if it’s actually transmittable. So we have to take precautions. The CDC’s Chicago field office is doing some testing, just in case. But they don’t think this is a biological contagion, either.”

   “We need to talk to them,” Ethan said. “Get more information about the delusions they’re experiencing.”

   My grandfather nodded. “Winston Stiles is awake and communicating. He’d like to see you, to apologize.”

   “Maybe he can give us some damned idea of what’s happening here,” Ethan said.

   “It can’t hurt,” I agreed.

   “And tonight’s meeting?” Ethan asked, gesturing to the elevator.

   “We’ll report,” my grandfather said, “and offer ideas for resolving this thorny little problem.”