Brush With Death: A Sadie Salt Urban Fantasy (Sadie Salt Series) Read online

  I hope, in my dream-state, that Alec or Henry had made sure they were shut.

  When we arrive, Benji shakes me awake. A cool breeze greets me as I exit the car, chilling cheeks that I now feel are wet. I press away the tears, happy that they finally came. There’s something cathartic about crying and acknowledging pain and I hope that feeling this grief will allow me to think about my situation more clearly. It’s just like my parents: Allow myself to feel it, really feel it, and it passes through me. I’m left stained, but in control.

  My uncle’s house is exactly how I remember it. Tucked into a nook on the mountain, its cabin-like front is hidden by a myriad of lush, verdant plants. Over-large ferns, thick tree trunks, and a small herb garden hold your attention until you see his home, which seems small, but sturdy. However, I know that once you go through the front door, you’ll see a back wall of windows and the skyline of the Blue Ridge Mountains beyond. If you approach the window, you’ll see the twinkling lights of Grimloch below.

  I’d spent many nights when I lived with him staring at the small town, and wondering how, in a place so quaint and peaceful, a killer had found my parents and destroyed my life. And how, in the huge expanse of mountains, I might figure out a way to find him and pay him back for it.

  But Benji hasn’t been here before, so far as I know, and when he says, “This is cute,” I remember that the last time I’d been here, Uncle Oliver and I had an argument that had ended in me calling him some choice words. It was my fault, but even now it’s hard to forgive him for not just explaining magic from the get go. My deal with Tee rests largely on my shoulders, but the childish, immature part of me blames it on him. With all that has happened, though, Alec and Benji are right. I need help warding my home.

  I ring Uncle Oliver’s special doorbell. It’s hidden away from the obvious one. The obvious one is for the rare solicitor who finds their way up the mountain. When pushed, it releases a small curse that is Oliver’s equivalent to Montezuma’s revenge.

  The door opens almost immediately, and I jump back into Benji. It’s akin to jumping back into a wall; hard and cold and unflinching. But his smile puts me at ease.

  “You’ve always been the kind of girl to call first, Sadie.” My uncle is leaning in the doorway. Oliver has always been a weird guy, and he makes sure his appearance reflects that. Currently he’s wearing an old Grateful Dead tie-dyed shirt and some sort of low-slung linen pants that look more like pajamas than respectable clothing. He’s barefoot, because he’s always maintained that Japanese-clean in his house. His hair is longer than I remember, and graying at the temples. Though the rest, like mine, is dark brown. We share the hair color and the same brown eyes, but that’s about it. His beard has come in, dark but dashed with white and red hairs. “You’ve got a vampire with you,” he adds. Knowing Benji, he’s flashing Oliver a ridiculous smile, showing off his teeth.

  “Yep. May we come in?”

  “Sure.”

  Benji clears his throat and Uncle Oliver rolls his eyes. “Please, won’t you both come into my house?”

  Oliver is a pretty powerful warlock. It’s telling that he’s allowing a vampire into his home without hesitation. It means he’s not concerned for his life, because he can zap Benji before Benji could drain him. Benji’s old, but he’s not ancient, according to him. He’s strong for a vampire, but it’s the really old ones you should be scared of. There’s few who have magic enough to stop them.

  Inside, I’m jostled by the memories and feelings of home that come from his house. It’s the crazy ass knick-knacks all over the place. Shrunken heads and herbs hanging from the ceiling. Glass balls and skeletons and taxidermied animals in funny displays on all the surfaces. He likes dead mice dressed in medieval clothing the best. When my uncle had home visits by CPS when he was being considered for my guardian, he’d been forced to put all his toys away, because it’s probably unnerving to consider leaving a child with someone who has voodoo charms and swords all over his home. It had made him cranky and his house look barren.

  This is how he likes it: Like a tourist-trap shop in the Amazon. It’s supposed to be creepy and scream dark magic. Even though more than half the stuff is just kitsch and Oliver doesn’t dabble in the dark stuff anymore.

  “Do you want anything to drink?”

  Now that the bone magic is wearing off, I’m parched and tired again. “Coffee, if you have it.” It’ll help with the tired, but make the parched part worse. Oh well, one problem at a time.

  “It’s night time, Sadie. You don’t want tea?” Ah, yes, here’s the Oliver I know and love. He tries to keep the rules and ‘parent’ routine light. So, aside from the rules of his home, he’ll never tell me I should or shouldn’t do something, but he’ll passive-aggressively suggest it.

  “Coffee, please. It’s been a long week.”

  “It’s Wednesday.”

  “Don’t I know it,” I sigh, and plop down on his couch, thankful that Oliver doesn’t seem to want to rehash the fight we had before I left. That’s when I told him I was going to find my parent’s killer, and he was staunchly against it. Names were called and words were said that neither of us meant, but they cut nonetheless.

  “Not that I’m not happy about the visit, but why are you here, Sadie?”

  “A werewolf was murdered in my apartment last night. He was just a pup.”

  “In your apartment?”

  “Yes. Benji helped me after I found the body, and Alec and Henry cleaned it up.”

  Oliver begins pacing, one hand stroking his beard. “How did he die?”

  “A lot like mom and dad,” I whisper, unable to say it any clearer. I see Benji’s green eyes flick toward me.

  “There’s something else,” Benji adds and, before I can signal that there are things that should be left out, says, “Sadie was using bone magic.”

  I feel like I’m about to see a tornado blow over, and the best thing I can do is hide in the bathroom and pray to some deity to save me. Oliver’s not a loud man. He does the silent seething that’s somehow scarier. “Sadie Salt. You have got to be joking me. How many different ways can I say don’t ever use that magic and have one get through? Let me see your feet.”

  Wait, what? I am not sure what my feet have to do with the fact that I’ve broken a promise to him to never use the only kind of magic that comes naturally to me. But unwilling to poke the beast, I take off my shoes. Oliver kneels in front and holds them both up, frowning when he sees my left foot. “Look at this.”

  Bending my knee, I peer at the sole of my foot. There, like I’d had it inked, was a row of sigils that look foreign. “What the fuck is this? I didn’t get tattooed.”

  “That’s old Cyrillic,” my uncle murmurs. “It’s a curse. On you. Each time you use bone magic, more of this will appear on your body. You can hide it now, but if you were to continue to use bone magic and somehow not get caught, it’ll make its way up to your legs, arms, neck, and face.”

  Frowning, my fingers trace the designs on my foot. “What does the curse do?”

  Benji answers. “It will eat away at your life force, Sadie. At the end, when it consumes you, you don’t die. You turn into a spectre, vengeful and mindless, and you will destroy everything you touch.”

  Whoa. That’s major. “But there’s only a little. I did two tiny spells. It would take ages to cover my body, so that’s not a risk.”

  Oliver shakes his head. “It is. Two minor spells, two minor bits of life force. But if you were to do something major, something that contained a lot of power? It could cover half of you in one go. This is one of the ways people hunt bone witches, Sadie. You can’t erase or glamor them away. You’ll always need to hide this now. Forever.”

  Well screw me. “You know, you could have explained this when I got my powers, Oliver.”

  “I told you it was taboo! I told you never to use it! What more did you need to know? I don’t ask a lot of you, so when I tell you not to do something, just don’t do it! If you hadn’t broke
n into my study—” He jerks to a stand.

  “I was eighteen!” I’m up now, too. “I was afraid and hurt and angry! I wanted answers and you never told me anything! Of course I was going to break rules!” Our voices are escalating and this is feeling like an old, familiar hat that I keep trying to get rid of but ends up on my head regardless.

  “Hey,” Benji stops us. He’s moved between us in a blink of my eye. “Let’s start with the bone magic, shall we? I’ve let Sadie live this long after figuring out she was a witch because I trusted that if you, Oliver, a former council member, didn’t kill her, then maybe there was a reason. Also you do such great cleanings, Sadie.” He offers this to me like I’m going to forget that he just said he’s let me live and with a clause that suggests it’s temporary.

  “I’m making some tea,” Oliver spits. Probably to get some distance from me. “You tell him your big story. Don’t kill her, vampire, until we’ve all spoken about this.”

  “Why else are we here?” Benji responds, before sitting again on the couch.

  Resigned, I plop down, though not as close as before. It’s hard to sit close to someone who’s just threatened your life so casually. “My parents were murdered.”

  “I’m aware. I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “Well, thanks. I’m angry for my loss. I’ve been angry about it for five years. The killer was never found.” I press my palms into my eyes to soothe the sleepy itch and to hide from the story I need to tell. One of monumental hubris and stupidity. “Oliver told me to let it go. That it was the police’s job. I asked him to teach me magic, but he lied—” I emphasize, just in case he’s listening in, “and said it was something that was innate and that I didn’t have it.

  “So when my eighteenth birthday happened, I stumbled on his magic books. One particular book about summoning stood out. I took it and read it overnight, hidden under the covers like a child, despite technically being an adult. In it, there was a spell for a bargainer. A demon to make a deal with for power or whatever.”

  “Or whatever, indeed,” Benji teases me and I glare. “Sorry. Please continue.”

  After one pointed frown, I do. “You already know where this is going. I attempted to summon the demon. I wanted to find out who killed my parents and how to hurt them, back. But instead I managed to summon the freaking Tooth Fairy. And she decided to make a bargain, despite the fact that she wasn’t what I meant to summon.”

  “You were lucky,” Benji mutters.

  “Was I? Because that fairy gave me the lousiest deal.”

  “It was your own fault,” Oliver yells from the kitchen. I knew he was listening in.

  “Fine. I asked her for the ability to find my parent’s killer and exact vengeance. In exchange, I owe her three hundred pounds of teeth. The more magical they are, the faster I pay off the debts. At the time, I didn’t know what teeth were to paranormals, so I thought it would be easy.”

  “You were wrong. But what about your parent’s killer? What did she give you?”

  “I guess, in an attempt to be funny or ironic or something, she gave me the bone magic. So technically I can do magic and technically I could probably have vengeance, except it’s fucking not allowed and I’ll be killed for it. And I still owe her the teeth.”

  Oliver comes in with a tray with three steaming mugs. He hands me one and I catch a whiff of coffee. Unlike Dr. Wilson, Uncle Oliver knows how to brew a pot. This smells good, and like it has a hint of—

  “There’s some vanilla and cream in your coffee, Sadie.” He starts to hand Benji a mug, but the vampire signals no. “It’s type O negative. You’re a guest.”

  With a subtle nod of thanks, Benji takes the mug. Gross. I mean, I get that blood is kind of vamp’s thing, but it’s much better to have an out of sight, out of mind policy. For that matter, I’m a little curious as to why Oliver’s even stocking blood. Oliver sits across from us, and blows on his tea. “Sadie also received a resistance to all other magics when she made the deal. She can use some with concentration, but she’s very limited. I imagine you’d have trouble hypnotizing her, and I’m sure Alec hates that he can’t command her.”

  “That’s a useful trick,” Benji murmurs before politely sipping at his blood-in-a-mug.

  “It would be, if she was a practicing bone witch. Very useful, actually. As it is, it means it’s very difficult for me to ward her places. Her apartment is safe—as long as she’s not in it. But when she is, it weakens my spells. I’d hoped that moving in with a psychic would give her—”

  “Ingrid’s a psychic?”

  “Yes—”

  “And a stripper?”

  Now Oliver looks surprised. “Is she?” He’s directing the question to me.

  “Um, yes?”

  “Huh.” There’s a look of wistfulness in his eyes that I don’t appreciate.

  “Gross, Uncle.”

  He’s not affected by my chastisement. Instead he waves his hand like he’s brushing me off. “The point is, I’d hoped you’d have a bit of a warning system, except that she’s a terrible psychic.”

  “That’s why she strips. Otherwise she’d probably work in stocks.”

  “Marvelous,” is all Benji cares to add, and I’m beginning to doubt our friendship. First he flirts with werewolves, then I learn he’s been considering killing me, and now he’s watching my family drama unfold like a soap opera. Yeah, super friend.

  “The point is, I don’t practice bone magic.”

  “Except you did,” Benji adds. “That’s what I smelled. The wolves smelled it as well, and now they think there’s a bone witch in town. And there still might be.” He looks at Oliver. “The wolf pup’s teeth were missing. All of them. And the heart.”

  My uncle’s forehead is lined. “Hmm... but those are two different magical elements. Either a bone witch for the teeth, or a necromancer for the heart.”

  “Both magics are forbidden,” Benji offers, and I just start sucking down my coffee. It feels like he’s decided not to kill me, so I’m trying to relax and refuel while I can. “I think the heart was just to make sure the pup stayed dead, though. But why attack the weres? A single witch, or even a pair, would be hard pressed to stand up to a pack. And why in Sadie’s home?”

  “It’s obvious,” Oliver answers, his eyes growing stormy. “It must be a message for Sadie.”

  Chapter Nine

  My heart feels like ice is forming in it. Fear crystallizing, slowing the beat, until I have to remind myself to breathe. “Why?”

  Oliver growled in frustration. “I wish I knew. But it sounds too similar to your parents. There were... some details the police and I left out.”

  A fuse lights inside of me. Whatever he tells me will determine how long it is. “What kind of details?”

  “Like you saw your parents’ bodies, but I know you didn’t check them too closely. You missed, for example, that their teeth were missing, too.” Oliver’s shoulders dip and he looks at his mug of tea, too ashamed to look at me as he drops this knowledge on my shoulders.

  I suppose, on the one hand, my parent’s bodies were already so mangled that it shouldn’t bother me to hear this extra fact. When your limbs have been severed and tossed around, what’s a few teeth? But hearing it burns inside of me, casting light onto painful memories better left shut away. There’s red in my vision and I can’t tell how much of it is my parent’s blood and how much is rage at Oliver for hiding this from me.

  “What,” I rasp, my voice not feeling like my own, “theories do you have?”

  “Were you the only one using bone magic?”

  “I don’t know.”

  He looked at Benji, who just shrugged. “I smelled it, but I couldn’t tell if there was more than one user.”

  Something in me releases a bit. “You both think it’s another witch.” Their silence is affirmation enough. “Okay, but why target me? I’m just a dentist, so far as everyone knows. This is the first time since I was eighteen that I used a spell. There shouldn’t have b
een any way for them to track me.”

  “I don’t know,” Oliver said, and I can hear his frustration. “But the teeth suggest it.”

  “Wouldn’t they have taken other bones, too?”

  Benji answers this. “Not if there wasn’t enough time. Teeth are small and portable. Easy and handy to use. Larger bones might have more juice, but it’s pretty obvious if you’re walking around holding a ribcage.”

  Point made.

  “What do I do?”

  “You don’t do anything,” Oliver snaps. “I’ll talk to Alec and start hunting around myself.” Here he goes again. Keeping me in the dark. That fuse from earlier? Real freaking short now.

  “If the witch is after me, doesn’t it make sense for me to, I don’t know, help hunt them down?”

  “With what? You can’t do the magic, Sadie! You don’t have any fighting skills, no weapons training, nothing! What are you going to do? Water pick them to death? Stab them with a scraper?” Oliver looks at me as if I’m a loaf of dense bread instead of his niece.

  He’s right and I hate it. Even more, I hate the small need in my body that’s whispering just get a few teeth and we’ll show him. This is what happened before, in the bathroom. A small whisper that got incrementally louder until I gave in. I’m not stupid—I can tell the hints of addiction. My concern is whether it’s magic itself, or the type that makes it so appealing?

  “I’ll help,” Benji offers.

  Oliver’s jaw opens for a moment before he snaps it shut. “Why would you do that?”

  Benji’s arm slides over my shoulder and his chilly body tugs closer. It’s like snuggling with a popsicle and not particularly appealing. “Sadie is my friend. That’s what friends do—they help out. Besides, if this is another bone witch, we’ll need all the help we can get.”

  “What kind of friend are you?” Oliver asks, his gaze traversing between Benji’s body and mine. I realize where his mind is headed.