Letters From New York [Blood Magic, Book 2]

Chapter 18: Ramifications

"Keep walking," Ephraim whispered; the lowness of his voice made the words no less of a command. "And try not to let anyone bump into you."

It was slow going as we wove our way down the street, away from where the cops were rushing to set up a taped-off barrier to preserve the scene of the crime. Even as an awkward, shuffling, huddled mass, we drew no attention. In fact, it was as if no one could see us at all. Ephraim must've cast some sort of cloaking spell, I realized, but I still barely dared breathe until we were well beyond the shot-up car that had sheltered him and Bruce. Two blocks later, my father steered us into an alleyway, to the protest of several foraging rats, which squeaked and skittered for cover as we navigated ourselves around the pile of  oddly shaped, semi-full garbage bags stacked at its entrance. When we were far enough back from the street to be cloaked in the shadows, Ephraim stepped away from us, back into the mouth of the alley. I knew this meant he had dropped the shield; with blood magic, proximity was a constant, immutable consideration.

"The minivan's just across the street." If anyone else had said that, it would have been a rather bland statement of fact, but Ephraim turned it into an order. Two minutes later, all four of us had piled inside the vehicle ‒ Bruce and Ephraim in the front, Lucia and I in the back. As we drove away from the barrage of flashing lights and ever-growing mob of gawkers, no one spoke.

The uncomfortable silence held as we pulled into our apartment's underground lot, and continued during the elevator ride up to our unit. The tension felt like an ever-tightening noose around my neck. It was getting hard to breathe.

"Find her something clean to wear," Ephraim instructed, as we doffed our shoes and coats inside the apartment door.

"Okay," I said, and headed down the hallway towards my bedroom. Lucia fell in step behind me.

"He's really pissed, isn't he?" she said once we were in my room.

"Yeah, he is." I wished I knew what to tell her. I was sure saying anything at this point would only make it worse; awful things happened to humans who knew about supernaturals, especially once the supes became aware of that knowledge. And Lucia had bigger, more important secrets than any human: this would be ten times worse for her. 

I slid open my closet door. "Take anything you want," I said. A moment later I clarified that with, "Just not the red dress."

"I think it's a little too fancy for the occasion anyway," Lucia said dourly.

After riffling through my entire closet twice, she fished out a pinstriped blouse and a light purple, velvet knee-length skirt. They were both Estella purchases. "Why do you have so much black?" she asked. "I mean, you're not exactly a goth."

I wondered if she was actually curious or just using small talk to distract from the impending awfulness. I decided it didn't matter. "Don't know," I said. "I've never really thought about it." I'd always been a bit basic in my tastes, but it had only been since the compound that I'd become so monochromatic. Perhaps that too had something to do with Keel and the bond, or perhaps clothes just didn't seem so important anymore. Still, neither of those things explained the red dress. Like me, it was an anomaly.

"Can I wear these?" Lucia asked, holding the ensemble she'd picked out up to herself in front of my stand-up mirror, as if we were merely two teenage girls swapping clothes and not about to sit down with our judge, jury, and... executioners? That's how the saying went, but Ephraim wouldn't really do that, not now, not after all our strides, would he? I wished my magic could blink the world into that former, much more innocent configuration.

"Absolutely." I said. "In fact, you can keep them."

"Thanks," Lucia said, then disappeared into the bathroom. I selected my own outfit - black jeans, black cable-knit sweater, stripy socks - and waited my turn for the shower. Once we'd washed up and dressed, we made our way out to the living room. Ephraim didn't need to tell me that was what he expected: most of our big discussions happened there. Sure enough, he and Bruce were waiting.