Dark Crossroads (The Templar Book 6) Read online

  Dark Crossroads

  Debra Dunbar

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  About the Author

  Also by Debra Dunbar

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter 1

  I was in my basement, staring at a spoon.

  “The candles are lit. What’s next?” I asked.

  “Place the object in the center of your circle by walking the east-to-west line of the pentagram.”

  Thankfully the candles meant I could actually see the pentagram. Before I’d lit them, the basement had been dark as I imagined the grave to be—if a grave had a faintly luminescent outline of stones around a magical circle, a giant furnaced, and some broken furniture and rusty paint cans, that is. Weirdly enough, even in the darkness I could see Chuck’s face in the spoon. Let me tell you, that was one of the creepiest things I’d seen outside a horror movie, and as a Templar, I’d seen lots of creepy things.

  “There.” I was now at the west quarter candle of my magical space, eyeing a smooth river stone at the center of the circle.

  “A quick review,” Chuck said, sounding an awful lot like one of my college professors. “Why six candles?”

  I wanted to be a smart ass and reply “because that’s what the ritual calls for,” but I held back. When I’d been with Haul Du, they’d only taught me to follow the ritual as outlined in various grimoires. They did encourage further study of symbolism and structure of a ritual with the more advanced mages, but with novices the idea was to get them to follow directions down to the last letter, and get used to channeling energy and controlling Goetic demons.

  Chuck was making me deconstruct each ritual before I even attempted it, which meant there was a frustratingly long time before I got to actually try magic. I persevered because I understood why Chuck was taking this approach. After he’d met my mother and eyeballed her sword, he believed my Templar gifts would sometimes counteract a magical spell—or send it off in an unpredictable and possibly fatal direction.

  I also persevered because Chuck was the only mage who would teach me. I’d been kicked out of Haul Du the moment they’d discovered I was a Templar and blacklisted from any registered magical group—which was basically any magical group. If I wanted to level up my magical skills, then I had no choice but to do it Chuck’s way.

  “The four corners anchor the magical space, but candles at the pentagram capture and hold. Using both sets a strong barrier, and holds the spell tightly inside, concentrating it. That’s useful when the energy you’re trying to read, or what you’re trying to divine is faint. Six is also the number for harmony.”

  “And as a Templar…” Chuck prompted.

  I glanced at my candles, glad that I’d bought long-burning ones because this lecture in the middle of my ritual was really slowing things down.

  “Three is the most sacred of our numbers. It’s the symbol of creation. It’s the beginning, the middle, and the end. It’s the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. It’s also a masculine number. Usually feminine numbers are considered Satanic, hence the symbolism of 666, but six on its own escapes the darkness of other female numbers. It’s the first perfect number, therefore it is balanced. Two trinities. It is the only number that is both of the light and the dark.”

  “Good.”

  I squinted at Chuck, wishing he’d been able to perform this magical Skype spell on a larger utensil. I guess people serving time in prison couldn’t be picky about what dinnerware they had access to.

  “And you have the herbs?”

  “Birch bark, rosehips, goldenrod, and raven’s bread.”

  All those had been easy except for the raven’s bread—otherwise known as Amanita muscaria or fly agaric. First, it wasn’t an herb, it was a fungus. Second, even though it was supposedly common in North America—a large, bright red toadstool that grows in birch and evergreen forests—finding any in the wild was pretty much akin to that whole needle in a haystack thing. Most mushrooms could be easily bought over the internet, but given that this one was lethally poisonous in some doses, and intensely hallucinogenic in others, it was illegal—as in “Class A Drug” illegal. Chuck had finally needed to step in and help out by giving me the name of someone who sold the stuff over the dark web. I had purchased the raven’s bread and hoped I wasn’t on any FBI or DEA watchlist.

  “And the ritual?”

  This was where things got tricky. The usual words hadn’t worked the first time we’d tried this, so Chuck had made me modify them to mimic a Templar blessing. In addition, I was using my sword as an aid instead of the athame I’d purchased that had never felt right in my hand.

  “Light incense at the west quarter. Sprinkle on the crushed herb mixture, which you hopefully measured correctly, then build your energy. When you feel it peak, recite your incantation and direct both energy and intent in the words toward the object using your sword as an aid.”

  I knew all this since I’d practiced the ritual a few times, and memorized the heck out of it. I also had been meticulous in measuring and crushing the herbs, all while chanting to blend their properties and power. This better work because I’d put a ton of time and effort into it. And it would be an incredibly useful spell. Knowing what human owned something would be awesome. From there it was a small step to modify the spell to know who held something last, or even whose energy was within a radius of an object. I could even work to expand the spell to include whether the owner was human or supernatural. Next time I came across a soul trap, a charm, a bloody crime scene, I would have a spell in my arsenal that would cut mine, and Detective Tremelay’s, job in half.

  “Showtime.” I breathed in for six counts then out for six counts, clearing my mind of all except for the spell I was about to perform.

  I was already at the west quarter, so I just had to squat down and light the incense. It took a few minutes for the flame over the fragrant disk to die down, leaving a glowing round ember. Holding tight to my intent, I sprinkled the herbs on top, standing and stepping quickly back so I didn’t breathe in anything that might end up with me in the hospital or running naked through the streets babbling about pink unicorns.

  Even in the dim light I saw the curl of smoke rising from the incense disk. Suddenly, energy filled the circle, snapping tight to the confines of the barrier I’d established. The lines in the concrete glowed blue, the perimeter stones sparkling like stars. This energy wasn’t from within me, it was gathered from the cosmos and held together by a magic I didn’t quite understand, no matter how many books I read.

  I admired the energy for a brief moment, then stepped forward to stand on the circle, willing my body to become just another conduit to its flow. It felt strange, like I was holding on to the hot wire of a cattle fence with one hand and gripping an icicle with the other. With a ragged breath, I slowly began to draw the energy into myself. There was a point where I wasn’t sure I could hold any more, but still energy remained swirling about in the circle. Chuck hadn’t covered this in his instructions and I wasn’t sure what to do
. Would the spell work if I wasn’t holding all the energy? Would I explode if I tried to take in more than I felt I could hold? Unfortunately I wouldn’t be able to communicate with my bodiless mentor until the spell was over, so I was going to have to make a decision on my own.

  Hoping Dario didn’t arrive tonight to find me splattered all over the basement, I eased more and more of the energy inside until I held it all.

  Bloated was an understatement about how I was feeling at that moment. I’d gorged myself on Thanksgiving dinners before and not felt quite this stuffed.

  Raising my sword, which I belatedly realized was the icicle-feeling item, I pointed it toward the stone in the center of the circle. Energy quivered at the edge of my hand, barely held in check and ready to race down the blade.

  “Earth is to earth, and stone is to stone. Saint Anthony show me who calls this their own.”

  I was no poet, so I’d kept it simple and to the point. The original spell had lines of gratitude to everything from the four quarters to the elements, and individually called upon a host of deities. I had no problem performing spells that expressed gratitude to God’s creations, but I figured Saint Anthony was the dude I needed for this particular spell, not Celtic goddesses.

  I recited the incantation over and over until my vision blurred and my skin heated, then I sent the energy down the sword in a huge bolt of white. The basement lit up like the sun, then just as quickly went dark. Temporarily blinded, I held still and blinked until my vision slowly adjusted. I was supposed to see something overtop the rock. With the spell modifications, Chuck wasn’t sure if I’d see a person’s face, or words with their name or both, but he said I should definitely have a sense of who owned the object in the center of the circle.

  There was nothing over the smooth river stone—not the face of my beloved great grandmother, not her name, not even a crude stick figure. I was still so hot I felt as if I were in a sauna, but there was no sixth sense of who owned the stone.

  “I don’t think it worked.” Think. There was no doubt in my mind that it hadn’t worked. I’d spent so much time on this spell—time, money, effort. And I’d gotten nothing for it. Maybe this just wasn’t a spell I would be able to work. Maybe this wasn’t a Templar-compatible spell.

  “Everything looked spot-on from my viewpoint,” Chuck-in-the-spoon said.

  I walked forward, thinking that maybe instead of a giant projected image, there would be something so small I couldn’t see it from the edge of the circle. When I got close, I saw something flicking around the stone. It was dim, fleeting, and looked sort of like a distorted diamond shaped object that was a bright reddish-orange.

  I went to pick up the rock and yelped, dropping it back to the ground and shoving my burned fingers into my mouth. The faint illusion vanished and I saw steam rise off the rock.

  “What was that?” Chuck asked.

  I took my fingers out of my mouth and flexed them gingerly. “I don’t know. Looked like a red-orange butterfly or something. It wasn’t very distinct.”

  “Well, that’s clearly a success, but it may not have been the result you were hoping to get,” he commented.

  “No shit, Sherlock.” I waved my fingers around, thinking an ice pack would be nice about now. What the heck had the spell delivered? It was supposed to reveal the owner of the rock, not it’s fiery origins. Maybe this could be a useful spell if I wanted hot burning rocks to lob at enemies, but honestly it would be faster to just shove a bunch of stones in the fireplace if that was my intent.

  I frowned, thinking about the spell and all the different iterations that could return. Owner. Who last touched the object. Where it was last.

  “Remember when you did the identification spell on the soul trap and it initially returned the Argentinian mage instead of Dark Iron because he was the actual owner?” I asked. “Do you think instead of who owned it last, maybe my spell identified the original owner.”

  There was no mistaking the exasperation in Chuck’s sigh. “It’s a smooth rock. That’s not exactly the sort of thing someone passes down for generations.”

  “My great grandmother gave it to me,” I countered. “Maybe someone gave it to her.”

  It did sound ridiculous. It was a worry stone, a rock worn smooth by water and decades of oils from Essie’s hand. But just as she’d given it to me when I’d gone off to college to soothe a troubled mind, perhaps her great grandmother had done the same to her.”

  “And the someone who gave it to her is what?” Chuck drawled. “A dragon? A fire elemental? A demon?”

  Crap, I hoped not. It was actually better to believe the spell was a dud than think Essie stole, or was given, the stone from a demon.

  “It would have been easier to just kill a chicken,” Chuck lamented. “That spell works. That spell always works.”

  “I’m not killing a chicken. Besides you said that wouldn’t work for a Templar.”

  Not that Templars were vegetarians and I’m sure at one time we’d killed plenty of chickens to stick in the dinner pot. Chuck felt the problem wasn’t in ending the life of an animal, it was doing so for the purpose of a magical spell. I agreed because any sort of ritual killing was a line I wasn’t going to cross.

  “Let’s move on and try something else,” I suggested. “I really do want to perfect this spell, but maybe later when I’ve had a few more successes under my belt.”

  My confidence had really taken a hit the last few weeks, and I needed a win to show me that this course of study really was something I could do.

  Chuck sighed. “Tell me what you’ve done so far—besides accidently summon a high-level demon and get yourself marked, that is.”

  Jerk.

  “I can create null bags. Templars learn to create null spaces since we might be called upon to bring in an artifact. My keychain is spelled to blister vampires, but that’s also a Templar thing since it’s a blessing and not really a mage spell. As a Templar I can send wraiths and undead spirits back to their graves. I can create a globe of light. I can also sanctify an object and create a holy space. Oh, and my butter knife!”

  Chuck’s face in the spoon scowled. “You can conjure a butter knife? Like, if you need to spread some jam on toast or something? What in the world is that spell possibly good for?”

  “No, I put a spell on a butter knife. At first it was a spell to harm vampires. Then I spelled it to open locks, which I’m particularly proud of I’ll have you know.”

  Chuck didn’t look impressed. “So what’s on the top of your list? What spell do you want to try next?”

  I thought for a moment. The ownership spell would have been handy, but there was something else that had been bothering me. Yes, I knew how to shoot, but throughout the centuries, our consecrated weapon had always been a sword. That had been pretty handy in the fifteenth century, but in the twenty-first, it was…well, it was bringing a sword to a gunfight.

  Although it would be amazing to figure out how to bless a Glock and have the equivalent of a holy hip cannon, I was more concerned about not getting shot again.

  “Can I do something to make myself bulletproof? I mean, I’d really love it if the spell could make me invulnerable to any sort of attack, but if that’s too ambitious, then I’ll take just not getting shot.”

  I watched the spoon as Chuck’s face distorted in thought.

  “There’s a potion. It’s a pain to make, but I think it would be compatible with your Templar alignment.”

  We discussed the ingredients and the preparations for the spell, then I signed off, which meant I stuck Chuck’s spoon into an old Crown Royal bag and stashed him behind a rusty paint can. Then I picked up the worry stone which was now only room temperature, and went upstairs.

  Working with Chuck was more difficult than my brief stint with Haul Du, and it wasn’t just because he was a pain in the butt. He had a broad knowledge of different magical practices, but his main focus was in death magic. And, of course, that was the one practice I wouldn’t do. Even if I w
as willing to cross that line, Chuck was fairly certain that my being Templar meant death magic wouldn’t work for me anyway, so that left us sifting through the others, trying to figure out which spells could be modified, which ones would work as-is, and which ones were a definite “no.”

  Goetic demonology was compatible, but I wasn’t about to go down that path without someone who specialized in that particular practice. Blessings and charms were compatible as were hexes and curses but wouldn’t be as helpful as spells that did days of research in a few hours, or ones that could protect both me and others.

  I got ready for work and walked to the coffee shop in the Inner Harbor, willing to brave the January cold rather than drive and fork out the exorbitant fees to park within a few blocks of the shop.

  There was something about January that always seemed so bleak. The streets were bare of their holiday decorations and cheerful colored lights. The joy on people’s faces just last month had been replaced by a grim sort of stoicism. Just get through this month. Just manage to chisel down the Christmas debt a little. Just keep the heat on and don’t get the flu, seemed to be the silent mantra of everyone inside and outside the coffee shop.

  We hadn’t had a customer in over an hour. The sun had set, but I still had three hours left on my shift. I was tempted to text Dario and tell him to swing by, but I knew he had stuff to do as the head of his Balaj, and I was supposed to go over to his house later. We were doing this balancing game in our relationship, trying to figure out the perfect mix of work time, alone time, and together time. Now that I was on a more regular schedule at the coffee shop, and his small Balaj wasn’t facing any immediate threats, we’d fallen into a pattern of spending three nights a week together, and at least meeting for dinner or something another one or two nights.