"I can't just conjure up a story."

"Well, then, I guess I already have my sound bite."

I glared at her. "You broke a major story when you discovered the tear-which I'd love to learn how you found, by the way, because that little tidbit wasn't in your broadcast and I can't see you heading out this evening thinking, 'I know, I'll go poke around abandoned warehouse lots and see if a story turns up.' Especially not in those heels." I nodded at her purple slingbacks. "You got your story, and because of Bell's barricade, Witch Watch is the only show that has footage of the rip up close. So why do you have to put a target over my head just to ride the coattails of your own success?"

"The tear will be old news soon unless I dig up something to add as a new development. My original footage is already viral and streaming from countless places on the Net. I need something fresh. Now I imagine you're here for one of the cases you're working." She lifted the hand holding her mic, not to shove the mic in my face but to point at me with one of her perfectly manicured nails. "Scratch my back and I'll scratch yours. And because you asked, I'll tell you how I found the tear-that is, as long as what you give me is good."

I glanced at Falin. He scowled at Lusa, his face hard, ungiving, and totally unreceptive to her idea. I, on the other hand, was inclined to capitulate. I'd worked with Lusa before, and I knew she kept her word. Which meant she'd help me out if I helped her, but it also meant she wasn't kidding about using me as a sound bite. But perhaps more important than that, while the woman could be extremely irritating if you were the story she'd latched on to, she was a d.a.m.n fine researcher and investigative journalist.

And I happened to have a page full of runes I needed researched.

"Off the record," I said, nodding at the blinking light on the camera behind Lusa.

"Micky, take a break," Lusa said, handing her mic to her cameraman. "Come on, Craft. There are fewer people closer to the bridge."

I started to follow her, but Falin grabbed my arm, stalling me.

"You really think this is the wisest plan?" he asked, his voice a hissed whisper beside my ear.

I considered the decision again, staring at him as I tried to puzzle out which part he objected to. I hadn't learned anything from the file he took from the FIB office, so it wasn't like he could say any of the information I had on the case was privileged-everything I had I'd learned myself, mostly just by living through the events. Runes were witch magic, so though the glamour proved the constructs had some tie to the fae, the individual runes didn't, so sharing them didn't breach any rules about "issues best kept amongst the fae" as Malik had put it. No, I didn't see anything at all he could object to about my sharing the runes with Lusa.

"I'm sure." In fact, I didn't see any downside. If I gave her the runes and she turned up nothing, then I'd lost nothing. But if she did find something . . . well, that could be very beneficial.

Falin continued to frown and Lusa sauntered back to us. She pursed her lips. She hadn't heard what we'd said, but our body language probably told her all she needed to know about our conversation.

"Detective Andrews," she said, studying him, "I heard you were jettisoned from the force for going MIA during the Coleman case."

Falin didn't answer, but pulled his jacket aside to reveal the FIB shield at his waist.

"My mistake, Agent," she said before turning back to me. "Are we still on for a little t.i.t for tat?"

"Yeah. I'll be right there." I shot her a smile and then focused on Falin again. "It's a good idea," I told him. "Weren't you going to get a warrant?"

"I'm more concerned with getting you out of here."

And I was more concerned with my friends not spending a moment longer than necessary carrying some shadowy, crystallized spell that was just waiting to overwhelm them at an unknown moment.

"I'll keep my head down," I promised.

He huffed out a breath and rolled his eyes. "Because you're so good at that."

As if to accent his point, Lusa chose that moment to turn and call out, "Miss Craft."

Falin and I both cringed. Okay, so keeping my head down wasn't one of my strong suits.

"I have to go," I said, and then jogged to catch up with Lusa. Falin didn't stop me this time.

Lusa headed away from the news vans and cop cars to where the fence ended at the steel supports of the Lenore Street Bridge. The traffic on Lenore had died down. Everyone who was interested in seeing the commotion had apparently already arrived, so the bridge was still, quiet, and rather dark. Safety lights dotted the span at evenly s.p.a.ced intervals, but I could have wished for a little more light, especially as Lusa trudged deeper and the bridge towered over us.

I had to say one thing for her-I'd told her I wanted this off the books, and she'd found a place where no one was likely to overhear or disturb us. And she wasn't done yet. Once we stopped, she fished a silver necklace from the top of her blouse, pulling the chain until a half dozen charms spilled over her collar. The air around us hummed as she tapped into the raw magic in her earrings and channeled it into one of her waiting charms. A spell buzzed to life around us.

"You're a sensitive, right?" she asked and I nodded.

"Good, then you know that I activated a privacy bubble. No one but us can hear what we say. Now, why are you really here?"

I'd rather have heard how she found the hole in reality first, but I wasn't in a position to demand she show me hers before I showed her mine. Opening my purse, I dug out the page of runes I'd copied. Then I unfolded the paper and pa.s.sed it to Lusa.

"Those are sketches of runes from a magical construct. As you can probably tell, they aren't exactly common. When I watched your broadcast, I noticed similar runes cut into the ground around the tear. My theory is that whoever sent the construct also cast the ritual that opened that tear. I'm here to prove that theory, and to find out anything I can about the witch who is responsible."

"Nice. This might actually be newsworthy."

She'd threatened and goaded me but hadn't actually thought I could provide her with a story? Figures.

"So do you know what the runes do?" she asked, and I shook my head.

"I did a little cursory research, but so far I haven't turned up anything definitive." I paused, letting her study the runes for a moment before I asked, "You've used Aaron Corrie as a source before, right?"

Lusa furrowed her brow, which I'd never seen her do on TV-probably because the thought lines that crawled across her forehead weren't terribly attractive. "Dr. Corrie? Yes. He wasn't able to identify the runes either?"

I made a rude sound and Lusa looked up, surprise on her face.

"He'd like to identify them. Unfortunately he doesn't care for the company I keep," I said, and her lips formed a perfect O, but she didn't look surprised. Since she knew the man, she surely knew his stance on the fae. I didn't ask whether she thought Corrie had disapproved of my company due to the fact that I lived in a fae's house or because I'd partnered with an FIB agent-the fae-phobic geezer had plenty of reasons not to trust me-but as long as she didn't guess my heritage, I didn't care. "Since you've worked with Corrie before . . ." I trailed off, and Lusa's glossed lips stretched in a slow smile.

"I like the way you think, Craft. I suppose you'll want to know what Dr. Corrie and I turn up on the runes?" she asked, but obviously she antic.i.p.ated that I'd agree because she didn't wait for me to answer before saying, "So, we've got a tear into the Aetheric surrounded by odd runes, and a magical construct built from the same runes, that, when dispelled, opened a hole into the Aetheric."

Oh, I liked her theory-I didn't think it was right, as none of the ravens Caleb, Falin, and the collectors destroyed had torn reality, but I wasn't going to correct her. After all, if she ran with that theory for her story, the attention for the holes would shift off me.

Lusa squinted, pulling the paper closer to her face. "These are incomplete, right?"

"I left the upper left-hand corner unconnected."

"Perfect." She folded the page in half. "Can I keep this?"

I nodded. I could always draw another copy. "You were going to tell me how you found the tear."

"Yeah." She tucked away the page of runes. "Follow me," she said, and carefully picked her footing as she and her designer shoes led me closer to the bridge.

We slid around the support pillar that the fence b.u.t.ted up against, and then Lusa ducked under the bridge, her ankles wobbling as stones skipped down the steep incline. Somewhere in the shadows under the bridge the river rushed by with an endless murmur. She grabbed one of the diagonal support beams to steady herself and then pointed beyond the beam.

"What do you see?"

I squinted, searching for what she was pointing at, but all I saw was inky darkness. "Nothing. Grave-sight has burned out my night vision."

"Oh. I'd heard wyrd witches had trouble with their abilities burning out their senses, but I wasn't sure I believed it. Well, what you aren't seeing is a tent city established by the homeless. I was looking into possible victims for the Sionan floodplain foot murders. That many people couldn't have gone missing without anyone noticing, but there hasn't been an abnormal rise in missing-persons reports. It didn't add up."

I nodded. I knew all this from what John had told me. She smiled and ran a hand through her brown hair, brushing it back from her face. "I went looking for people who wouldn't be missed, and one of my searches turned up the fact that a homeless man who spent the night in jail for public intoxication seven days ago found all of his buddies missing when he was released the next morning. He reported it to the cops, but transient people disappear a lot. No one looked into it. "

No one but a reporter on the trail of a story.

"When I interviewed Eddie, the homeless man, he swore everyone had to be dead. That they couldn't have just relocated because they'd left everything behind: clothes, shoes, possessions-when you don't have anything you can't afford to abandon anything. I came out here to follow up. Stumbling over the tear was a very happy accident, though if you quote me on that I'll deny saying it."

As she spoke, a car drove across the bridge and I jumped as a nearly deafening roar rumbled under the structure. The sound echoed against the supports, the bank, the columns, the water, and back again, like rolling thunder.

Thunder.

Thundering.

My head snapped up. From underneath a bridge, a bridge didn't look like a structure that joined two landma.s.ses. It looked like a portal that the river pa.s.sed through. A gate. The kelpie's "thundering gate" wasn't a gate at all. It was a bridge.

Maybe this bridge, if Lusa is onto anything with her missinghomeless angle.

I cracked my shields, slightly, ever so slightly, so just bits of my psyche crossed the planes of reality. The chill of the grave, of the dead, hung in the air, the grave essence reaching for me. Grave essence that emanated from something very close. And fresh.

I opened my shields a little wider. The shadows in my vision rolled back to reveal the skeletal carca.s.s of the rusted and collapsed Lenore Street Bridge. Beyond the bent and sagging support beams-which I was careful not to touch, as I did not want to be responsible for a bridge collapse-I could see the remains of dilapidated lean-tos and weathered tents huddled on the bank. Grave essence leaked from amid the abandoned tents. Not a lot, just the smallest string that whispered across my skin like a northern wind. But essence meant a body-or at least part of one. And this one was human.

"Your eyes are doing that creepy glowing thing," Lusa said, staring.

I slammed my shields shut. "Lusa, I suggest you find your cameraman. This place is about to be deemed a crime scene."

Chapter 19.

I hung back at the edge of the crowd as I waited for the site to be declared a crime scene. I'd told Tamara what I found before I called John. The revelation that there was a body-or really, part of one-on the scene garnered a low groan from her, but she rolled her shoulders back and went to talk to the officer in charge.

John had been at home when I called him, but by the time I finished telling him where I was, what I'd sensed, and what Lusa had uncovered, he'd already been on a second line, waking up a judge for his warrant. He, the warrant, and cadaver dogs were on their way. Now all that was left was to wait.

A scream rang through the darkness and the crowd around me went silent as dozens of heads turned toward the sound. I couldn't see the screamer, but the voice was masculine, though pained, and distant. One of the skimmers? I squinted even though I knew I had no chance of spotting him-after my brush with the land of the dead under the bridge, the shadows were even darker.

"What happened?" someone beside me asked.

"Not sure," another said.

"Can we get closer?" asked a third.

That question seemed to reflect the sentiment of the entire crowd. Shoulders brushed against mine and a hot hand pressed into my back as people shoved forward. The crowd surged toward the fence, carrying me along with it as everyone jockeyed for a better view.

Somewhere ahead of me the scream mutated into a fullthroated howl of pain, and suddenly I could see. Not from a spontaneous reversal of years of damage, though until that moment I would have said that possibility was only slightly less likely than spontaneous combustion from magical overload. No, I could see because one of the skimmers ignited, the blaze casting the scene in grim light.

The flame engulfed the man in a single heartbeat, the raw Aetheric energy he'd gathered acting as fuel for the unnatural fire. It illuminated the group of skimmers surrounding the tear, splashing them in color as the fire spit out sparks of green, purple, and red.

I'd heard that drawing too much Aetheric energy could burn up a witch from the inside out, but the few cases of overload I knew of had resulted in madness or the inability to access the Aetheric after overexposure. I'd never heard of anyone actually combusting.

The skimmer's scream broke, his voice hoa.r.s.e from his howls. He flailed, but the other skimmers never looked away from the rift. They didn't even appear to notice their burning companion.

"Let me through," a woman wearing an official OMIH tag yelled as she charged the gate. A second official flanked her. "We can help."

A contingent of Bell's guards blocked the entrance, but the redheaded lawyer threw out his arms, motioning the guards to move.

"Get that gate open. Let them through," he yelled at the guards, and then to the OMIH officials he called, "Hurry."

The two officials and the lawyer ran for the burning skimmer. Forming a semicircle around the man, they pulled the raw magic br.i.m.m.i.n.g under his skin, drawing it out and dispersing it harmlessly into the air. I cracked my shields.

Different planes of existence snapped into focus before my eyes, making the night around me both crystal clear despite the darkness and almost too chaotic to perceive. The skimmers glowed with mottled light. Most witches resonated with only one or two colors of Aetheric energy, but the skimmers had been drawing down every wisp of raw magic that had escaped the rift. They swelled with a noxious mix of magic, each quite possibly in danger of being the next to ignite.

The skimmer who had ignited dimmed as the witches drew the magic from him. The Aetheric flames died as his broken scream faded to wracking cries. But it looked like he'd be okay.

Until the soul collector appeared behind him.

"Too late," I whispered.

The witches didn't know that yet, though. They continued drawing and dissipating the magic, their faces cut with hard lines of concentration and their shoulders stiff. Then the collector I'd first seen in Lusa's footage reached forward, his hand pa.s.sing through the skimmer.

The skimmer's knees locked, his face freezing in a silent scream as sound failed him. His body collapsed facefirst, the empty husk crumpling to the ground. His soul remained standing upright, caught in the collector's fist. Anytime I'd seen Death or the other collectors take a soul, they pulled it free and then flicked their wrist and the soul went wherever it was souls went. This collector didn't.

He turned, his coat flaring around him with the movement and his hand still clenching the soul. The witches rushed forward, checking on the dead man. The collector stepped around them, dragging the soul with him. A soul that was staring at his own dead body.

I'd met several ghosts over the years, witnessed Death collect a handful of souls, and was even present once when a soul resisted collection, but I'd never before witnessed the very moment when someone was forced to confront the fact that his life had ended. The shock and confusion lasted only an instant and then the skimmer's mouth fell open, his features twisting in a mix of agony and rage. He thrashed in the collector's grasp and screamed. But there were no human lungs or living vocal cords involved in this scream. It was the scream of a soul and it made me want to reel back and clutch my ears. Several of the people in the press of bodies around me flinched-they might not have been able to hear the scream with their ears, but I think everyone present felt it.

The collector ignored the soul's pitiable distress.

"Why doesn't he send him on?" I muttered the question to no one in particular.

The man in front of me must have heard because he turned, and then he startled.

"Holy Mother-" He backed up and into the person beside him. "Your eyes," he whispered. Then he pushed people aside as he retreated farther from me.

I barely noticed him, but his pa.s.sage disturbed several other people, who turned. More exclamations sounded, more movement, and soon a ring of empty s.p.a.ce opened around me. I was too intent on the events unfolding on the other side of the fence to care.

The collector had moved to the next skimmer. She held her arms above her head as if reaching for the Aetheric energy helped her draw more of the excess magic that was poisoning her body. Despite the fact that she'd exceeded her overload point, the only expression on her face was pure and unadulterated ecstasy. I don't think she even noticed when the collector thrust his hand through her sternum and jerked her soul free.

No, she isn't dying. Not yet anyway. I marched forward-my bubble of empty s.p.a.ce had opened a path all the way to the fence-without ever looking away from the collector, who now gripped a soul in each fist. Who is he? I'd never seen a collector strike before the cause of death guaranteed an end to life.

A hand wrapped around my arm, jerking me back. "This is what you consider keeping your head down?" Falin asked in a voice that had turned gravelly with anger. "Do you want to be dragged off to Faerie? Because if that's your goal, I can take you there myself."

I blinked at him and then my gaze snapped back to the scene beyond the fence. "She wasn't supposed to die." Or at least it hadn't looked like she was supposed to die.

"What? What are you talking about? Jeez, Alex, your eyes are glowing like lanterns." Falin lifted his hand as if blocking a glare and green light reflected off his pale skin. Light from my eyes.

I didn't have time to worry about that.

"He took her and she wasn't dead yet." I pointed at the knot of skimmers, but no one except me realized the woman was dead-apparently not even her own body noticed it was now unoccupied.