Terrestrial Magic (Jordan Sanders, #1) Read online

  “You’re saying someone’s afraid Dr. Berti is going to violate that unspoken agreement?” I shook my head. “No, even if that’s the case, I still don’t know how to solve a crime.”

  “Oh, come on.” She hopped off the bed. “If this were a criminal case, the police would be dealing with it, safety zone technicality or not. You don’t really think that a crime occurring outside of safety zones would scare them off, do you? This is Rome, Jor. Everyone goes outside the safety zone. As members of the community, they’re still protected by law enforcement. The reason we aren’t getting an investigation is because it’s not a criminal case. If someone had shot a gun at us out there, the police would be all over it.”

  Okay, I was following her so far. No arguments yet. The police didn’t have any authority over whatever legend was involved with this. They couldn’t make any arrests even if they wanted to.

  Hayley continued. “This is a dispute between two local communities with no unifying law or government. That hasn’t happened often here, because of the whole non-interference thing, but it happens where you come from all the time. Even if you didn’t deal with the decision making back home, you still know more than anyone else here.”

  That actually made a strange kind of sense. I still wasn’t convinced it was a border dispute, but I did realize that the politics of the region would get entwined in any attempts to figure out what happened. In a way, we were dealing with a diplomatic problem. But just because it wasn’t obvious who should deal with this, didn’t mean it should be me.

  “The difference is,” I began, trying to figure out how to phrase my thoughts, “that we don’t know which other community we have the dispute with. Which brings us back to the ‘I-can’t-solve-a-crime’ problem.”

  Hayley waved her hand in a dismissive gesture. “I know you don’t like Simonetta, though I’m the first to confess I have no idea why. But even you have to admit, she’s got plenty of uses. She’s the one with the connections. Let her and her friends take the lead in figuring out who did this. How are we going to deal with this in the meantime, though? And what about when she does find out who did it?”

  My dad would have disagreed with us getting involved like this. He would have said that I—that all of us—needed to trust the people around us. We could only survive by depending on each other to hold up our ends, and by contributing within the bounds of what we were good at.

  My mom would have said that was all well and good, until something came up that nobody wanted to handle. If they could get away with not doing it while saving face, then they wouldn’t do it. That was when we all needed someone to step up, and we could never count on someone else to do the stepping up. She’d also have said that I should never be the one to step up unless the thing that needed doing was essential for me personally, but this was.

  Asking Tommy for advice was a headache waiting to happen, but I knew what he’d say, too. He’d just look at me with those calm, gentle eyes, and ask me what I wanted. And I wanted to feel like I had a measure of control over my own life.

  I was really going to do this. The thought was accompanied by a nice helping of trepidation, which was sensible. But underneath that lay a hint of relief, which was a lot less so. Yesterday, I’d just wanted to dump this on someone else and make the problem go away. But now...well, I still wanted the problem to go away. But something in me knew that it wouldn’t, not unless I made it. Not this time.

  Maybe that was arrogant of me. Probably, it was arrogant of me.

  But I needed to be sure the situation was handled. I needed this to be over. Despite myself, I started thinking about how my community dealt with these kinds of things.

  “We won’t know how to respond without more information,” I finally said. “We need to know what they want, what they can do, who they’re trying to maintain a good relationship with. I hope you’re right about Dr. Berti’s connections being able to discover something. That’ll help us decide what to do.”

  If we could figure out who did this, maneuvering them into a politically uncomfortable position might get them to back off. Then we’d come to some sort of agreement on compensation, to let everyone know they couldn’t mess with us without consequences.

  It didn’t feel like enough.

  Not when I thought back to what happened, and saw Tony’s silhouette running from a deadly predator. Not when I closed my eyes and remembered the heat of the fire, scorching against my skin. Not when we set out that day, excited to see an awe-inspiring animal live, and ended up watching her die. Ended up wishing she would die.

  But I was afraid that we wouldn’t even get that much. That the perpetrator might be found or might not be found, but either way, no one would back a legend into a corner. Something inside of me needed to make sure that whoever was responsible didn’t get away with it.

  And I couldn’t quite bring myself to believe that anyone else would make that happen.

  Sorry, dad. But it looks like it’s going to be me.

  Chapter Six

  THE STORY OF ROMULUS and Remus is the story of Rome’s beginnings. The two brothers founded the city, but disagreed over which of them should be king. So they decided to wait for a sign from the gods. Remus chose to wait on the Aventine hill and was the first to see a sign, sighting six birds. But Romulus, waiting on the Palatine hill, saw twelve birds.

  Each brother claimed that he was the one meant to be king—one on account of receiving a sign first, and the other on account of seeing a greater number of birds. Romulus began to build a wall around his hill. Remus jumped over it, and Romulus killed him for breaching his city’s defenses, as they were. And so ended the story of Remus, while his brother went on to become Rome’s first king.

  Still, Remus’ lineage had the last laugh. During the medieval period, tales spread around the Mediterranean of people performing amazing deeds, claiming to be heroes from Greek and Roman myth—Herakles, Perseus, Aeneas. And of course, Romulus and Remus.

  Today, we know those people weren’t really the same legendary heroes of the stories—they’d been members of those Houses masquerading as their founders. But back then, no one knew any such thing. Because of that, the House of Romulus was never really established. No one wanted some dude wandering around, calling himself the first king of Rome. (Especially not the Pope.) But the man claiming to be the Remus was left alone, and went on to create the House whose help we sought today.

  A House situated on the Aventine, the same hill their founder had (allegedly) chosen thousands of years ago. A short drive across the river, just barely outside the safety zone, and we’d arrived.

  Our group came in two cars—one was our pick-up, the other was a city car owned by our lab mentor herself. We reached a small parking lot, enclosed on two sides by tan and orange buildings, and on one side by a wall with an archway leading through it.

  As we filed out, Dr. Berti took off towards the arched opening. “The Remus will be waiting for us in the garden,” she said. “It is his House’s public gathering place.”

  We passed through the arch, which opened onto a park on top of a hill, spacious and secluded. Tall, mushroom-shaped trees known as stone pines covered the space, their branches reaching up towards the sky. Smaller trees sat laden with oranges, emanating the scent of citrus. And clusters of people peppered themselves throughout the park, mostly dressed in jeans or dresses, but occasionally sporting tunics or togas.

  Dr. Berti started down a wide pebbled avenue, heading towards a man standing calmly at the end of it. His toga was a reddish-purple, his hair cut short and tidy, his skin a light brown. He didn’t look Italian to me, but that shouldn’t have been surprising—Houses of legends in Italy weren’t an ethnic group so much as a religion shared between relatives. Many of them had been at least semi-nomadic before the Boom, and the House of Remus would have roamed over the breadth of the former Roman Empire. They considered all of it to be their heritage.

  He watched us as we approached, the leader and face of the Ho
use of Remus. I realized I knew nothing about him. Not about his powers, not about his personality. He must have been dangerous, to hold this position. And we were coming to tell him that one of his kind had attacked us. How would he react? For the first time, I felt a growing unease as I realized how much faith I was placing in Dr. Berti’s judgment.

  “Simonetta,” he said in a surprisingly pleasant tone. “How wonderful to see you again.” He must have been using English for the benefit of us Americans.

  Dr. Berti smiled, dazzling as always. “And it’s always a pleasure to come see you.” Then her expression turned serious. “But, the circumstances this time are regrettable, given that someone tried to kill my researchers. A legend.”

  The Remus regarded her with a frown. “What makes you think it was a legend?”

  She gave him a short summary. Hearing the words spoken by someone else, addressed to a stranger and a legend, I started to appreciate how ridiculous it sounded. When she got to the basilisk breaking down the wall for us, I almost flinched at the absurdity of my own story. In his position, I wouldn’t believe us.

  During her explanation, the Remus’ eyes drifted away from her and towards us. I couldn’t tell what was behind that stony gaze, and not knowing was really freaking me out. Dr. Berti took out a photo of the impression we’d made from a piece of the invisible wall, and his attention shifted to it immediately. I took a shaky breath, relieved that he wasn’t looking at me anymore.

  “I must think about this,” the Remus said, with a shake of his head. “I will send someone to bring you to your rooms, as you are our guests. Please, make yourselves comfortable.”

  Another member of his House approached as he departed, ready to lead us away—until Dr. Berti turned to me. “A moment, Jordan. The others may go on and settle in, meanwhile.”

  Alright, then. She led me towards a large balcony at the edge of the park overlooking a panorama of the city, the openness of the area unsettling given my current sense of vulnerability. We leaned against the waist-high wall, a fair drop beneath us—not something I could jump, but nothing that would kill me, either.

  “I want to make sure you understand the situation we’re in,” she said, her gaze out towards the city rather than on me. “The others may take comfort in believing what they wish, but you need to be aware. If we bring this to Rome, it will be buried. They will call it an accidental carelessness on the part of unknown legends, perhaps issue a statement that whichever legend community is responsible must be more careful not to leave their magic lying around. They do not want to deal with this.”

  “They don’t want a conflict with the neighboring legend communities,” I agreed. “Especially when they don’t even know which one, or how many of them.”

  I caught a barely perceptible clenching of her jaw, her eyes growing distant. “It is not as if they have held legends responsible for their actions before,” she said.

  For a moment, it was like I wasn’t even there.

  Which was just fucking typical. Even when she specifically asked to see me, she locked herself away in a memory I knew nothing about, rather than actually dealing with me.

  With a deliberate exhale of breath, she returned to the present. “The attackers would remain unidentified,” she continued. “There would be no disincentive for them to try again. None of you would be safe. This is why I have brought you to the Remus. I have connections in other legend communities as well, but none of them can be trusted the way he can. Do you understand? We must resolve this ourselves, at least until we have enough information to force our government into action. We can trust no one except the Remus.”

  “I understand,” I said.

  “May I intrude?” came the Remus’ voice from behind us.

  I fought to hide an instinctive flinch, realizing that while Dr. Berti might trust this man, I didn’t. I didn’t even know him. And we were at his mercy now. In his territory, surrounded by his people.

  Suddenly the drop before me seemed more ominous than it had a second ago. An irrational thought occurred to me, that he could toss me over it, if he wanted to. I couldn’t help imagining the impact, the way my bones might crack. Suppressing a shudder, I moved to sit on a bench, putting some distance between myself and that wall.

  I really hoped Dr. Berti was right, and coming here wasn’t a mistake.

  “But of course,” Dr. Berti replied.

  The Remus’ eyes turned my way, for some reason, raising my hackles. Never in my life had a legend given me his full attention, and I didn’t think I liked it much. Knowing that he concealed some kind of power, probably impressive, that I couldn’t even guess at? That made me seriously nervous. I needed to get myself together.

  Be nice, dad would have said. There isn’t a lot you can’t accomplish by making a real, human connection.

  Don’t show fear, mom would have said. Act confident and don’t let him think he can intimidate you, or he will.

  Be yourself, Tommy would have said. You’d be surprised how well it works. My brother came through occasionally, but most of the time, his advice was useless.

  Mom’s guidance seemed best for this situation. Acting confident and hiding how totally lost I was. I straightened my posture and forced myself to make eye contact—which was awkward and intimidating. I ended up looking away within seconds, before catching myself and jerking my gaze back up.

  Yep. This was going well. He was going to be so totally impressed with my poise.

  “Ms. Sanders,” he started. “I would not want to leave you and your colleagues with the impression that I was not taking your situation seriously. I understand this must be a trying time for you, and will do everything in my power to alleviate this.”

  His tone was kind and sincere. Yet something about the head of a powerful House of legends, attending to my concerns, freaked me out. He didn’t know me. If anything, he was doing this on Dr. Berti’s behalf. And having him look at me, pay this much attention to me, was intimidating in a way I didn’t know how to describe. I stuttered out some sort of platitude, but hell if I even knew what I was saying.

  So much for my valiant leadership role, right? I’d wanted to find out the truth and go after the people who attacked my team. But now that I was face to face with a legend—a supposedly friendly legend, at that—I just wished I was back in the safety zone. It was pathetic. How had I ever imagined that there was anything I could do?

  Confidence, my mom’s voice reminded me. But when I reached for it, I realized that I couldn’t grab hold.

  The Remus cocked his head, a look of puzzlement on his face. “I assure you that you will be safe here,” he tried again, not realizing that I’d gotten what he meant—it just wasn’t the problem.

  Thankfully, Dr. Berti—who had plenty of personal experience with my lack of social graces—intervened. “We’re grateful, but surely this isn’t all you came here to say.”

  A flash of amusement crossed his face as he looked at her. “No, you are right. It occurred to me that you mentioned the arrival at Hayley at the site, after the chimera’s death.”

  He glanced at me, and I realized he was inviting me into the conversation, indicating he wanted to include me. I suddenly registered the angle of his body, staged to let him address the both of us rather than to close me out. It surprised me, given that Dr. Berti was the one he knew.

  Dr. Berti gave an acknowledging wave of her hand, and the weight of the Remus’ gaze seemed to expect some sort of reaction from me. I nodded, to indicate I was following him. I wasn’t likely to forget Hayley’s dramatic arrival anytime soon. Just the thought of it still made me want to bang my head against something.

  “My question,” he continued, “is what was Hayley doing there? Why did she come?”

  Because she was irrationally brave. “She thought we were in trouble, so she showed up to see if she could help.”

  He leaned forward a bit. “Really? Then how did she know to come?”

  Unthinkingly, I repeated what Hayley had said
, when I’d asked her the same question. “The communication system she was using to talk to Luca cut out.”

  But as soon as the words left my mouth, my brain kicked in, registering the oddness of what I’d said. At the time, the adrenaline of the moment kept me from noticing just what that meant, but now, it was clear. Neither the communication system nor our phones had been working. What could knock out both of those things? And did the House mean to do that, or did whatever magic they’d trapped us with do it incidentally?

  The Remus must have seen the look on my face, or heard the catch in Dr. Berti’s breath, because he nodded. “Yes, that is very strange. There are not a lot of Houses that would know how to interfere with human technology. Maybe the ones with members living in the human world might.”

  Members living in the human world. That in itself was a clue. “Do you know which Houses have had members living among us?” I asked, finally managing to reach inside myself to the box labeled ‘professional’, and putting on that role.

  “Some,” the Remus replied, his brow creasing as he thought. “But certainly not all. There are some Houses who refuse so strenuously to have anything to do with the humans that they may be excluded. For most, though, it would be hard to tell. Some make sure their exploits are known, others keep them quiet.”

  So it didn’t narrow things down too much, but even a little was a start.

  “None of them can hurt you here,” the Remus said, directing those words at me. “Not in my center of power.”

  He was genuinely trying to reassure me, I realized. The big bad all-powerful legend of the Aventine was actually trying to make me feel better. Okay then. Mind blown.

  “That is why we came to you,” Dr. Berti retorted, and the Remus shot her a reproachful look.

  “When the rest of your people return from settling in,” he continued, “I would like to speak to all of you as a group. This has helped me get past the surprise, into a more useful thinking about the problem. Thank you.” He made sure to make eye contact with each of us, a note of appreciation in his expression.