Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 109329 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 547(@200wpm)___ 437(@250wpm)___ 364(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 109329 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 547(@200wpm)___ 437(@250wpm)___ 364(@300wpm)
An empty vial lay beside the man. There were two puncture marks in his back and on the side of his neck. Knife wounds.
Shifters wouldn’t typically use a knife. Neither would basajaunak. Gargoyles might if it were a drunken brawl, but not in the back. Mages did this type of thing, and there was a vial beside the body to prove it.
He glanced around the alleyway, the last before the edge of town. It was a quiet area and patrols weren’t as heavy here. Across the street and beyond, well-manicured homes lined the way. There was a corner store, a real estate office, an antiques dealer—nothing a mage might be interested in. Then again, he’d thought that about the tourist office.
The beating of gargoyle wings announced Tristan’s arrival. He landed, depositing Sebastian in front of him. Niamh flew in right behind, her golden hooves thumping down before she shifted.
“Here.” Sebastian handed off a bundle of purple.
Niamh took it as Sebastian stepped forward. She slipped a muumuu over her head and then gave Tristan another.
“What’ve we got?” Sebastian noticed the vial, then the wounds. “Where’s—”
“What’s all this?” Armendale walked down the street, showered and awake and dressed for the day despite the early hour. Two alphas flanked him, his biggest support in the alpha network, followed by a half-dozen of their combined enforcers.
“Is that…” The gaze of Theo, the burlier alpha on Armendale’s left, stuck to the form at Austin’s feet. “That’s Calvin’s man.”
From the angle, there was no way Theo could’ve known that. He couldn’t see the face and the body was in a limp heap, the outline hardly discernible.
Austin glanced back at Niamh, whose eyes tightened. Keep your mouth shut.
“What were you planning to do, Black Sheep Barazza?” Armendale said, coming to a stop ten feet away. “Hush this up so no one would know your territory isn’t as safe from mages as you claim?”
“Keep calling me names, Armendale, and you’ll make me mad,” Austin said in a growl. “The body was discovered a half-hour ago. We’re assessing the situation.”
Fancy meeting you here, right on time to “discover” the body, he wanted to say. After Austin’s dealing with mages and working with Nessa and Niamh, Armendale couldn’t be any more obvious. He’d clearly had a hand in this, but without proof, Austin couldn’t make an accusation, something Armendale was obviously counting on.
“Sebastian?” Austin prodded.
“Where’s the cork for the vial?” Sebastian pointed at the little glass canister that had been “discarded” near the body.
“You have a body on your hands.” Armendale sneered. “A man died, and you’re worried about a cork? Obviously, a mage got in here with his invisible potion, happened upon Calvin’s man, and created a situation. It doesn’t seem like you are very on top of things, Austin.”
The other guy with Armendale was named Chris. He was leaner, but Austin had heard he was trouble in a fight. Chris made a soft sound, barely discernible—a baa, if Austin wasn’t mistaken.
Keep taunting us, boys. I will rip your limbs from your bodies the second I have cause.
The look Sebastian gave Armendale held all kinds of swagger, Elliot Graves peeking out from the nerdy mage. His command was clear: Shut up, I’m working.
Armendale’s expression darkened. Power curled into the air around him, but he didn’t press. He clearly knew better. Too bad.
“With a consumable potion, a mage always puts the cork back in the vial and drops it into his or her pocket,” Sebastian explained. “We then wash them and use them again. The right kind of vials are expensive. We don’t waste what we don’t have to. A mage in a hostile territory, where other mages are present, certainly wouldn’t discard a vial that once contained a potion. May I?” He glanced at Austin.
“Please.”
Sebastian gingerly stepped over the body, looking at the wounds as he did so. His posture gave nothing away.
“You’re just going to let him—” Armendale cut off with a hard look from Austin.
Sebastian used the edge of his shirt to pick up the vial, his fingertips pinching the glass. He looked into it and then smelled it.
“Niamh.” He held the vial for her.
Without questioning, she used her muumuu to take it from him.
“This is ridiculous,” Armendale groused to Theo.
She smelled it and then held it out for Austin. He took a whiff and then shook his head. “I don’t get anything other than your smell, Niamh, and Sebastian’s.”
“Probably because it’s a scentless invisibility potion, no?” Armendale’s annoyance was plain. “Let’s stop all the theatrics, Barazza. Call this what it is.”
“Yes.” Sebastian looked harder at the wounds. “Let’s. This was done by someone who doesn’t know how potions work, how mages work, and how blood congeals after death.” The three alphas froze. Sebastian pointed down at the body. “The obvious issues? Leaving the vial behind. Where’d you even get that vial? Regardless, it hasn’t been used.”