Page 78 of Pulling Strings

I returned to the table where the rest of the gang had congregated. Sipping greedily on my drink, I slid into the open seat next to Ripley and his sucker fish of a girlfriend. Luckily, they were too absorbed in each other to pay me any mind.

Grimm’s whistle had drawn more than just me. A line began to form in front of us, cutting through the middle of the room while the party raged on either side of it. Clearly, others had a better understanding of tonight’s agenda than I did because the line leader launched into his sales pitch without so much as a word of welcome.

“Name’s Adler Oakley—”

“Pass,” Avery cut in.

Grimm shot him a look. “Your reasoning, Mister Hale?”

“His name sounds too much like mine. It’s confusing.”

“Adler doesn’t sound like Avery,” Donovan said, his brow furrowed.

Avery puffed on his pipe. “No A names.”

Grimm cleared his throat. “Gentlemen, I will consider your opinions, but perhaps we should base our decisions on what the candidates bring to the table magically?” He turned to the potential recruit. “What powers do you possess, Mister Oakley?”

The man reached into his pocket to produce a stack of folded paper animals. When he tossed them onto the table, the creatures sprung to life, darting across the surface or taking to the air. The display was simultaneously charming and incredibly lame.

“Papermancy!” Adler declared, swinging his arms wide in a grand gesture.

“You made that up,” I muttered, causing Ripley to snort beside me.

An origami turtle waddled its way over to the zombie, and she peeled herself off of Ripley to catch it in her hands.

“Yeah, I’m sticking with pass,” Avery said.

Donovan nodded in agreement. “Pass.”

With a defeated huff, Adler stomped off. The paper turtle fell over, limp, in the zombie girl’s hands. She let out a coo of disappointment and jostled it.

“I can do that, too, you know,” I whispered to her.

She and Ripley both looked at me, a startling combination with his bicolored eyes and her red ones smudged with streaky black makeup.

It took only a niggle of mental effort to walk the turtle past the girl’s wrist and up her forearm while she giggled with delight. I sipped my drink, smiling around the straw. For a flesh-eating undead, she didn’t seem so bad.

As the origami animal marched back down the girl’s arm, I caught Ripley staring at me, unnervingly focused.

“What?” I asked him, breaking concentration to letthe turtle topple over.

“Nothing, mate.” He shook his head and faced forward once more, waiting for the next person in line.

A haggard woman hobbled up, looking like a storybook swamp witch, hunchback and all.

“I am the crone,” she rasped, fluttering her tattered robe.

Donovan leaned around Ripley to whisper to me, “Isn’t that the homeless lady who lives in the alley off Main?”

A mouthful of whiskey sour got caught in my laugh. I sputtered into my glass, swallowing then wiping my arm across my face.

At the other end of the table, Vinton scowled. I flipped him the bird and stood. “How about a round? We can take a drink every time we think this whole thing was a terrible idea.”

“Sit down, Fitch,” Grimm said in a way only a man desperately clinging to control could.

I sat, but not before signaling Pippa and ordering a replacement cocktail.

After the crone came a pair of towheaded twins I recognized before their introduction. Ethan and Ezrah Everett, Southern transplants who’d made a run for gang membership and been denied more than once. Terramancer and aeromancer, respectively.

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