chapter twenty-two

Other insects were making their way out of the tree now. I stepped back, book ready, but they didn't care about us. They were drawn to the clover, entranced by the power of Jeneta's words.

"Thank you," Lena whispered. She stepped closer to the oak and pressed her face against the wood. Her eyes closed, and her fingertips sank into the tree. Her hair wisped forward, clinging to the bark as if static held it in place.

I waited to make sure no more insects would emerge, then aimed the book at the flowers. I dared to hope this might be as simple as it appeared…thus

proving that even after close to a decade with the Porters, I still hadn't learned from experience.

The instant I touched the book's magic, the bugs went berserk. They rose from the pile of clover as frigid air poured forth, and liquid nitrogen splashed into thick white fog. A brass-and-steel grasshopper leaped out of the cloud, wings a blur as it flew toward Jeneta. Lena spun from her oak and snatched up her bokken. She knocked the grasshopper back like a tiny baseball, but more were emerging from the fog, stunned but not yet dead.

Jeneta screamed. A metal earwig had landed on her ereader. She flung it away. More insects clung to the screen, digging through glass and plastic as easily as clay. Nidhi grabbed Jeneta's arm and hauled her out of the garden.

"Whatever works," I muttered, aiming the book at Jeneta's reader. Two more metal bugs had joined the earwig on the screen. When the next stream of nitrogen cleared, they looked like tiny frost sculptures. They shattered beneath my shoe, as did the ereader.

I poured more liquid nitrogen onto the clover, then closed the book while Lena destroyed the rest of the insects. Plants and bugs alike crunched beneath her feet.

"Is that all of them?" I asked.

"Yes. Thank you." Lena stepped back and sagged against her tree. "Do you think whoever did this will send more?"

"Probably."

Jeneta was crying like a child half her age. Nidhi sat with her in the grass, whispering and running her hands through Jeneta's hair while they rocked back and forth. Jeneta buried her head in Nidhi's shoulder.

"What happened?" I asked. "Was she hurt?"

Before Nidhi could answer, Jeneta jumped to her feet and ran at me. "Why in the name of ever-loving God would you do that to me?" Her fists slammed into my chest, hard enough to bruise. "Was this some kind of messed-up test? Is this why you were asking about my nightmares?"

I stepped back and did my best to fend off her punches. "Jeneta, I didn't know they'd come after your ereader."

She wiped her sleeve over her eyes and stared at me. "You think I'm upset about my reader?"

I looked past her to Nidhi, but she appeared to be as confused as I was. Nidhi stepped closer, hands out like she was approaching a wild animal, and said, "Can you tell us what happened to you, Jeneta?"

"You said you needed me to help kill magic bugs. You never said they were devourers."

It was like she had turned the liquid nitrogen on me, chilling my body from the inside out. "What do you mean?"

She swallowed. "You didn't hear them?" "What is it you heard, Jeneta?" Nidhi asked.

"They weren't attacking my reader. They were trying to attack me, through the spell." She started to shiver again. "Dragging me under. Climbing through my bones and chewing me up, and all the while she's laughing—"

"She?" I asked sharply.

"I heard a girl laughing." She stared at me. "It might have been me. I was losing my mind, Isaac. I could feel myself going mad, losing my grip and slipping away."

"I didn't know. I'm so sorry. I never would have asked you to fight them like that." Devourers infesting Victor Harrison's experiment. A butchered wendigo and a man who could hide from my magic. What the hell was going on?

Jeneta folded her arms, visibly working to stuff the fear back into its bravado-lined cell. "You owe me a new ereader. Don't even think about trying to pass off some secondhand clunker from last year. I want the newest model, and I want an orange case to go with it."

"Fair enough."

Jeneta looked at the fog rising off the crushed bugs and flowers. "What are they doing here?"

I didn't have an answer. I didn't even know what they were.

"Why do they hate us?" Jeneta asked. "Not just people in general. You and me. They know us, and they're going to keep coming after us until we're dead."

"If they come after anyone, it should be me. I'm the one who pissed them off earlier this year." With Lena's help, I had destroyed their…host, for lack of a better word. If the devourers were capable of remembering, then they had good reason for coming after me or Lena, but why target a teenaged girl who knew next to nothing about magic? "Nidhi, could you take Jeneta to your place?"

"Of course."

Jeneta said nothing, but her body sagged with relief. I doubted any of us would sleep well tonight, but she'd be somewhere safe, with a woman who knew how to deal with magic-induced trauma.

"I'll watch over Lena's tree," I said. "Could you reschedule any appointments you have tomorrow? We need to take a road trip."

Nidhi folded her arms. "Nobody has the energy for dramatic lead-ups tonight, Isaac. Get to the point."

"Sorry. We're going to check out Victor Harrison's old house in Columbus,

Ohio. I'll need to call Deb DeGeorge down in Detroit first." Jeneta perked up slightly. "The vampire?"

"How did you know that?" Deb had been a libriomancer, and until recently, a good friend. Three months ago, the vampires in Detroit had turned her, hoping to use her as a spy within the Porters. When Gutenberg caught up with her, I had fully expected him to burn her to ash on the spot. Instead, he had begun using Deb as a liaison between Porters and vampires.

"The right poem can make people babble about all sorts of things," Jeneta said sheepishly. "It was after the Porters found me. They sent a field agent to give me the Orientation to Magic lecture. I wanted the advanced course, and it's possible I might have 'encouraged' her to talk about more than she was supposed to."

I waved a hand. "Deb's not technically a vampire, but yes. The important thing is that she's scared of Gutenberg. Hopefully scared enough to cooperate with just about anything we ask for."

"And you're planning to ask for…?" Nidhi said impatiently. "I'm hoping they'll be able to help us talk to Victor."