Magic Claims by Ilona Andrews

“Luiza will take Cuddles back to the safe house,” Curran said. “Helen will need backup until the patrols come in.”

At any given moment, there were three shapeshifter patrols moving through Wilmington and the surrounding area, not counting the pair of shapeshifters who watched the Farm. Keelan wanted to know what was happening in the city, and he was very thorough about things.

We reached the cars. I dismounted, took the saddlebags with my gear off Cuddles, and handed the reins to Luiza together with a bag of carrots.

“If she stops in the middle of the road, don’t try to force her. Show her that you have a carrot, give her a small piece, and keep the rest. She’ll follow you. Also, Conlan looks like an eight-year-old, but he doesn’t think like one. He’s very polite, so he’ll say things like ‘Yes, ma’am’ and ‘No, ma’am,’ and before you know it, he’ll talk you into letting him do something everyone will regret. Treat him like a smart, conniving teenager. Above all, please keep him away from Penderton.”

Luiza smiled. “I can handle him. No problem.”

Famous last words.

I pulled a copy of Isaac’s sketch out of my bag. I had made several at the chapter while the tech held out.

“What’s this?” Curran asked, focusing on the creature.

“Something the knight-pathfinder saw in the woods. I’ll tell you more on the way.”

I passed the sketch to Luiza. “When you get back, show this sketch to Helen in front of Conlan and tell her that we asked you to research it. If he asks you for the sketch, tell him it’s boring adult stuff.”

She grinned back at me. “Got it.”

“It will keep him occupied,” I said. “But we do need to know what this animal is. Maybe run it by Forest Service.”

“And the hunters,” Curran said. “Butcher shops buy venison and other game at auction during Friday market, so a lot of hunters will be there. Ask them if they ever saw something like this.”

“Yes, Alpha.”

We climbed into the vehicles and started down the road. Curran drove, with me in the front passenger seat and Keelan and Da-Eun in the back.

“Did you find out anything?” Curran asked.

I brought him up to speed on my fun visit with Barrett.

Curran laughed.

“Barrett’s been the king of his little island for too long,” Keelan grumbled. “He needed a reality check.”

“That man has the straight-A student syndrome,” Da-Eun said. “He’s been the most powerful Master of the Dead for so long, it’s gone to his head and permanently fucked it up.”

Isaac’s story didn’t go over as well. Neither did the copy of his sketch, which I had passed to Da-Eun and Keelan.

Da-Eun rubbed the bridge of her nose. “It’s not enough that there are mud-smeared women and human sacrifices, now we’ve got a weird-ass elephant.”

Keelan shrugged. “It’s still a herbivore, just larger. It bleeds, so it can be killed. If it gives us trouble, we’ll bleed it and run it down like an oversized stag.”

Werewolf thoughts, uncensored. If it bleeds, it dies. Not worried about the giant mysterious pachyderm in the slightest.

A side road came into view on our left. We took it, rolling deeper into the woods. After a couple of minutes, the trees turned into fields wrapped in barbed wire. Onion, corn, squash—most of it either waiting to be harvested or in the process of it. An occasional farmhouse and a few solid barns dotted the landscape, all reinforced new construction designed to shelter the farmers and their livestock from the weird predators breeding in the magic-soaked forest. To the right, a herd of red and white cows with foot-long horns grazed in a pasture. Three big Anatolian shepherds watched us as we drove by.

Another pasture, sheep this time. No dogs. Optimistic of them.

Something stirred on the roof of the barn and stood up. The creature was about forty inches at the shoulder, gray, with a lean lupine body and a wolf’s tail. Its head resembled that of an eagle, with a dark beak the size of a dagger. Its feathery wings draped over its back.

“What is that?” Da-Eun asked.

“A wolf griffin,” I told her. “A pretty good-sized one, too.”

Magic hit. The SUV’s gasoline engine sputtered and died, and Curran gently guided the vehicle to a stop just past the barn.

An unsettling feeling touched me. A kind of instinctual unease, as if a sniper were staring at me through the scope of their rifle.

Hmmm. I opened the car door and got out. Curran exited on the other side, and the two shapeshifters followed.

I stared at the woods, trying to sort out what my senses were telling me. Magic wasn’t a specific sense like a scent or a sound. We didn’t have an organ devoted to analyzing it. Instead, it was a combination of things, a pressure, a feeling, heat or ice, a faint odor, a sense of danger, sometimes overwhelming, sometimes vague.

This was… I wasn’t sure what this was.

Da-Eun began to chant, priming the water engine. Behind us, the second SUV disgorged its passengers, and I heard Troy’s voice launching into a monotone chant.

The wolf griffin pivoted to us. It gripped the edge of the roof with wicked, sickle-shaped talons, lowered its head, and raised its spotted wings, every feather erect, tipping them down like an owl trying to make itself larger.