“It is Lucifer’s home. I doubt you will be able to do so,” Nathaniel said.
Nathaniel’s arm was around my shoulder to help keep me upright as I swayed back and forth. I needed to focus, to push off the shifter as I had done before. But he was smart. A direct attack would have brought a full show of force on my part.
Instead the creature had chosen a subtle magic. That magic wormed its way inside, weakening me before I even realized it was there. If not for Beezle, I might not have known it was a spell at all. It felt exactly like a sudden illness.
“I do not like standing here while this monster does as he likes,” Jude said. “It is infuriating that we can do nothing when we know it is so close.”
“We could chase around and make a scene,” I said through the haze of fever. “But it would just drop the spell and we wouldn’t be any closer to finding it.”
“In the meantime you’re getting sicker by the minute,” J.B. said. “Let’s make a scene if that’s what makes it stop.”
It was getting hard to think straight. “No, I want to try to trace it back.”
“How?” Nathaniel said.
“Beezle, you can see the effects of the shifter’s magic.”
“But the spell fades away when I look at it,” he said.
“Right,” I said. “But if I push back against the spell, push against the source, you’ll be able to follow my magic back to him.”
Beezle gave me an admiring look. “That’s pretty good thinking, Maddy. I didn’t think you had it in you.”
Nathaniel shook his head. “I do not like it. The shifter will be able to continue to harm you. We should do what is necessary to break the spell now.”
“Just trust me,” I said, and my voice sounded little and breathless. “Jude, you get ready to follow Beezle wherever he says you should go.”
I knew the wolf had personal reasons for wanting to capture the shifter himself. I also knew that if I didn’t give Jude something to do soon, he might start rampaging around just to burn off his excess energy.
Should I stay with you? Samiel signed.
“No, Beezle should go with you and Jude,” I said. “J.B. and Nathaniel can stay here with me.”
Beezle fluttered over to Samiel. His little face was concerned as he watched me struggle against the fever.
“Maybe Nathaniel’s right. You don’t look so good,” Beezle said.
“This is our chance,” I said. “He’s here in Lucifer’s mansion. I don’t want to look over my shoulder for him anymore. Now be quiet.”
I turned my focus inward, searching for the thread of the spell that was sickening me. My baby turned over and over in my belly. He could feel the magic, too. He could feel what it was doing to me. But it wasn’t hurting him, and that was some consolation at least. The magic was so small and subtle that it didn’t have the power to go after my child as well.
In fact, the subtlety was so great that it was hard to catch hold of the magic. It moved not like a river, as most magic did, but more like a fine mist. Now I could see the reason why I didn’t notice the intrusive spell immediately. The difficulty was in pushing it away. I couldn’t shove the magic back out by force when it was spreading in every direction. I collected the disparate pieces of the spell into a kind of arrowhead, and then blocked them with my own power.
I hoped that once the invading magic was drawn to that point, I would be able to bulldoze the spell out of me. Otherwise I would be using up a lot of energy when I was already in a weakened state. Then the shifter would be able to finish me off, and no one would be able to find the culprit.
As before, the shifter seemed to sense my resistance and redoubled its efforts. This actually worked to my advantage, for strengthening the spell gave it a more solid and consistent form.
Which meant it was a lot easier for me to push back, once I could clearly see what I was pushing.
A few moments later I felt significantly better as the shifter’s power cleared my body.
“I see it,” Beezle said. He directed Samiel and Jude in the direction of the spell I had sent in pursuit of the shifter’s power.
The shifter seemed to realize that the magic was no longer affecting me. It strained back toward me, tried to take advantage of my physical weakness. The few minutes of illness had left me feeling drained, and it was extremely difficult to fight back without drawing on the darkness inside me. If I called upon that power in Lucifer’s presence, he would surely be able to sense it.
The tug of magic back and forth between the shifter and me was almost like a rope, a long rope that joined the two of us. I was slightly shocked that in a roomful of magical creatures no one else seemed to be aware of what was going on. Then I realized that any little pulses of magic that came from me or the creature would be easily drowned out by the show of power coming from Lucifer and Evangeline’s corner. The shifter had timed his attack perfectly.
Even though Alerian, Puck and Lucifer were pretending to get along, each was clearly trying to outmuscle the other in presence. The guests were fascinated by the display while trying not to notice it, because gawking openly might draw the attention of one of these big, bad immortals.
In the meantime the shifter was able to attack me under everyone’s nose.
Beezle, Jude and Samiel disappeared into the crowd as I continued my battle with the shifter. I wanted to make sure to keep its attention long enough for Beezle to track my magical signature back to the creature.