“Wasn’t old enough, or around then. Neither were you. Do you think you can Hound Greyson, Allie? If not him, Chase?”
“Chase ran down that road. I know that. But if she got in a car, and wasn’t casting magic, I won’t be able to find her.”
“Do you swamp-walk?” Terric asked.
Color me impressed. I didn’t think anyone in the Authority kept up on those kinds of things. Swamp-walking was pretty woo-woo, even for people who threw magic around on a daily basis.
“I can. Do any of you have something that belonged to her? Or that she’s recently touched?”
“How about a car?” Shame suggested.
Yes, I was full of smart tonight. “Yeah, I think that would work.”
I crossed the parking lot to Shame’s car and felt the gossamer caress of Zay’s Illusion sliding away from me. The night felt colder outside that spell, outside his touch.
I opened Shame’s car door again, but instead of casting spells for my senses, I simply knelt down and placed my fingers on the seat of the car. I could still smell too many scents, and still smell Shame’s blood and sweet cherries over them all. I wondered if they’d gotten into a magic fight before she knocked him out.
I pulled on the magic inside me and drew a glyph for finding, then concentrated on it, letting the magic pour through my fingertips and wash over the seat of the car. It picked up on the high emotions Chase had left behind, picked up on her energy—not on a particular spell like Hounding.
That was another problem with swamp-walking. The emotions any person left behind on any object were transitory at best. If the person was in a high-enough state of emotion, a good swamp walker could sense at least something of which way that person had gone before the emotions faded away.
Chase had very high emotions. The magic Ouija’ed my fingers east, and I got the faintest impression of green. Lots and lots of green. Like Forest Park.
“East,” I said. “Maybe Forest Park. Would she go there?”
Zay, who had been pacing behind me, started off toward his car. “We’ll find out.”
Chapter Thirteen
I jogged back across the lot to Zay’s car, glancing over my shoulder once. True to their word, Terric was driving, and Shame got in on the passenger’s side.
“Forest Park?” Zay said. “That’s a lot of ground to cover.”
“Get me there, and I’ll try to Hound her. Or him.” Once we were there I could use a Seek spell. Seek had a pretty limited range, so we’d need to be close for it to do us any good.
Zay put the car in gear and with Terric following, we made good time heading through the city, then up along Highway 30 to Forest Park. Ahead and to our right, the Gothic arches of St. Johns Bridge flashed with red and white lights, the broad cables scalloping the skyline. St. Johns lights were electric yellow and white, without fancy magical enhancements. Since St. Johns was off the magic grid, it looked like it belonged to an entirely different city from Portland.
Zay pulled off in a gravel lot in front of a spooky old brick building with a clock tower and enough peaks on the roof, it looked like it belonged to another century. The old Portland Gas and Coke had been abandoned for years.
“Here?” I asked. “We can’t get into the park from here.”
“Best to check again before we go in.” He paused, and the headlights from Shame’s car slid across his face.
“Don’t trust my swamp-walking abilities?”
“I don’t trust Chase.”
Right. I got out of the car. Still no rain, only clouds clotting the dark sky. I saw a spark of a star against the black, before the gray snuffed it out.
Terric killed the engine. He and Shame got out. Zay walked with me, though he gave me plenty of room.
I cleared my mind, something that always seemed a little easier when I was close to St. Johns. I didn’t know what it was about that part of town, but it always made me feel better.
I set a Disbursement, then drew the glyphs for Sight, Smell, and Taste. I drew magic out of my bones and blood and poured it into the glyphs.
The world came into hard focus, every color brighter, every shadow sharper.
I looked for magic. I looked for Chase. I looked for Greyson. And I looked for signs of blood and violence. Spells pulsed against the chain-link and barbed-wire fence that cut the forbidden building off from street