pushed through the swinging double doors, and walked through the back of the restaurant. I didn’t stop until I opened another door and stepped outside into the alley that cut between the rows of buildings on the block.
It was after seven, and night had already fallen, wrapping the structures in thick, coal black shadows that stretched all the way up to the sky. Wispy clouds flitted by in front of the not-quite-full moon, rolling over the bright silver orb like waves crashing onto a sandy shore and then retreating back out to sea.
My eyes zoomed in on a crack in the alley wall across the way, a tiny sliver of space barely big enough for a child to fit into. My old hiding spot when I’d been living on the mean streets of Ashland back before Fletcher had taken me in. For a moment, I wished that I were still small enough to fit into the crack and hide from all my worries—at least for a little while.
I’d thought killing Mab would solve all my problems, but instead it had just created a whole host of new ones. Sure, business was better than ever at the Pork Pit, but only because people came to gawk at me. Everyone wondered if I was really the notorious assassin known as the Spider and if I’d really killed Mab Monroe like some folks claimed.
Then there were the people who actually knew I’d taken out the Fire elemental—people like Jonah McAllister. He’d been Mab’s lawyer and one of her top lieutenants before her death, and he had a number of reasons to hate me, especially since I’d killed his son, Jake, last year. McAllister had even gone so far as to offer a price for my head, sending a variety of bounty hunters my way, but no one had been able to collect—yet.
To many, my taking out Mab had made me something of a folk hero, given all the people the Fire elemental had stepped on, hurt, tortured, and killed climbing her way to the top of the Ashland underworld. A few folks had even been bold enough to offer me an atta girl and other kind words upon her death. But to others, especially those who walked through the shady side of life, I represented nothing more than a fat payday or the means to make a name for themselves.
Either way, I was the center of attention these days—and I hated it.
I breathed in, enjoying the peace and quiet after the tight, nervous tension that permeated the restaurant. It was early April, and the nights were still cold and frosty, although the warm days whispered of spring. I heaved the trash bags into the closest Dumpster, but instead of going inside, I lingered in the alley outside the back of the restaurant.
I skimmed my fingers over the rough brick and reached out with my magic. As a Stone elemental, I could create, control, and manipulate the element in whatever form it took, from making bricks fly out of the wall in front of me to crumbling cobblestones to shattering the foundation of a house. I could even make my own skin as hard as marble, so that nothing could hurt me. I’d relied on that particular trick a lot these past few weeks.
My power also let me listen to the stone around me and all the emotional vibrations that it contained. People’s actions, thoughts, and feelings sink into their surroundings over time, especially stone, as folks live, love, die, and more. Listening to the bricks that made up the Pork Pit was one of my favorite things to do because the sound was almost always the same—one of low, slow contentment, just like the minds, hearts, and stomachs of all the folks who’d eaten in the restaurant. A good meal was one of the few things that could satisfy even the pickiest soul, and the Pit had served up its fair share of fine food over the years. I breathed in again, letting that soft sound fill me and soothe away all the stress of the day, all the stress, turmoil, and worry of the last few weeks.
Calmer, I dropped my hand and turned to go inside when the crackle of magic filled the air.
In addition to humans, dwarves, giants, and vampires, Ashland also had a substantial elemental population. Magic could take many forms, could manifest in all sorts of unusual ways, which meant that elementals in the city and beyond had everything