Taken

Rasta Plaits screamed, convulsing as he crashed to the floor, and the girl fell back, staring in shock. I was already moving away, striding towards the thrower. The skinny kid hesitated, then seeing me coming straight for him he threw at my chest. I sidestepped and the metal ball flew all the way into the wall fifty feet behind. I broke into a run. He flexed his wrists and two more balls dropped into his hands; he threw once, twice, and I dodged both without breaking stride. He had just enough time to get out another set before I caught him by the wrist and pulled him off balance as my right hand slid my knife from its sheath. I dragged the kid up with his arm twisted behind his back and my knife under his chin.

The kid froze. I was standing behind him, holding him by one arm. He couldn’t see the knife but could feel the cold metal against his neck, the point digging in under his jaw. The music cut off and the club was suddenly silent except for the rustle and chatter.

Rasta Plaits was whimpering on the floor. The girl was standing dead still, eyes flicking from me to the knife to the people around. I saw her glance at Luna, who’d gotten to her feet and was a little way to her side. “Don’t,” I told her. I forced the kid forward, feeling him trembling against me. All around, the crowd was silent. “Let’s try this again. We’re looking for Jagadev.”

The girl looked from me to Luna, then pointed at a staircase beyond the crowd, leading up.

“Are we going to have any more trouble?”

The girl shook her head.

“How about you, kid?” I pushed the knife a little bit farther up into his jaw.

“No,” the kid said in a strangled voice.

I looked between the two of them, then dropped the kid and walked away, resheathing my knife as I did. A path cleared for us in the crowd, this time without my having to do anything. Behind us I felt the girl rush to where Rasta Plaits had fallen. The kid slumped over a table, rubbing his neck, and I sensed him think about aiming another shot at my back . . . then decide against it. As we reached the stairs, the music started up again.

“You okay?” I asked Luna once we were out of sight.

“Bruises,” Luna said, rubbing her back with a wince. “I’ll be fine.”

I smiled slightly. “I remember when you’d almost forgotten what it was like to be hurt.”

“Yeah, that changed all right. Seriously, Alex, can’t I ever get dressed up to go out with you without this happening?”

“It doesn’t happen every time we have a night out.”

“Name one time it hasn’t.”

“Um . . . your apprenticeship ceremony.”

“Somebody tried to mug us on the way back across the Heath.”

“Oh yeah.”

“Who were those guys?”

“Adepts,” I said. “Like you, I guess, but dumber.” I shook my head. “This sort of crap is why adepts end up on the bottom of the food chain. They’ve got just enough power to make them feel tough, but not enough to stop themselves getting flattened when they pick a fight with the wrong guy.”

Adepts are a lot more common than mages, ten times more common according to some estimates. Adepts and mages tend not to get on all that well, and to be honest that’s mostly the mages’ fault. Mage society is based on a hierarchy of magical power and adepts are second-class citizens at best. In most cases adepts choose to stay out of mage business completely and mages generally let them as long as they don’t break any rules. “Do you think that’s what this club is?” Luna asked. “A place for adepts?”

“Maybe,” I said. “But that’s not what’s bothering me.”

Luna looked at me, questioning. “What bothers me,” I said, “is that none of the bouncers did anything to break up the fight.”

The balcony at the top of the stairs was big, more like a mezzanine floor, and it was shaped in a wide semicircle that followed the lines of the room. It was better furnished than the lower level, with sofas and low tables, and something about the acoustics made the music a little quieter. It had the feeling of a place to sit and talk and watch the view rather than the frenzy of the dance floor below. A couple of hard-looking security men watched us as we entered, not speaking, and glancing around I could see that they would have had a perfect view of our fight below. Where were you, I wonder?

I knew we needed to go right, but Luna slowed by the railing. “Alex,” she said, nodding down at the crowd.

“Where?”

“The two by the bar,” Luna said. “I recognise them.”

I looked down and saw two men talking with the bartender. They seemed to be asking him questions, and as I watched he pointed towards the staircase we’d used. There was something familiar about them, and I felt as though I’d seen them before. They made me think of police for some reason . . . and that made me remember. “Great.”

“They were asking about Anne,” Luna said. “Do you know them?”

“Never met them,” I said. “Not yet, anyway.” They were the pair of Keepers who would have come to interrogate me had Anne been killed last night. I headed along the balcony. “Come on.”