The Trickster's Drum (Godsongs Book 1) Page 2

  And I thought senior English had been hard. Class ended with a monstrous reading assignment she had no hope of getting through. With a sigh she muttered to Rawan, “I’m going to need a miracle to survive this class.”

  Her roommate patted her hand. “You’ll be okay. I’ll help. Want to get his autograph? Crowd’s forming.”

  Sure enough, a mad rush from within and without the classroom had started nanoseconds after the professor’s dismissal. And yeah, she did want an autograph. But she packed her things and shouldered her bag. “I got something I have to do.” Like commit another felony or two. For a moment, her disappointment over Rafael dimmed with the nerve-wracking reminder of her vision regarding what was in the Latin American collection at Zavala College’s library and how she had the job of, well, stealing it.

  “Want company? I don’t have another class till noon.”

  “No!”

  Rawan lifted an eyebrow at her sharp reply. “Ooookay...”

  Think fast... Giselle forced an embarrassed smile. “Not unless you’re up for riding on some handlebars.” Rawan knew her only transportation was a bike—which she didn’t need in order to walk the fifty yards to the library. But she had to get rid of her roommate somehow. Giselle touched the godstone hidden in a pocket of her so-not-cool cargo pants. The weight of the small but deeply illegal stick of granite felt heavy with responsibility. If everything went right, she’d have another one soon.

  “You’ll get another chance to meet him, okay? Don’t be sad.” Thank the gods Rawan seemed to attest her moodiness entirely to that. “And, uh, sorry. Not much of a handlebars kinda person. Text me if you want to do lunch!”

  Maybe it was relief at Rawan’s coolness, or maybe it was nerves that if things went south, Giselle would be marched to some dark government hole for the rest of her life—the library didn’t have cool people who would watch her back like in South Chavez—but Giselle pulled her roommate into an awkward hug. “Lunch sounds good.”

  THE FIRST TIME RAFAEL had played an arena, his manager had ordered him not to look at the crowd. But he had—as soon as he took the stage. The whirlwind of lights and the roar of excitement had electrified him with a dizzying wave of community. Jada smashed the snare, Lance hit the bass, Lyss found her chord, and thousands of people sang. He’d never felt so at one with the world.

  If he could face tens of thousands with a confident smile, how was a classroom of twenty people staring at him so fucking intimidating?

  Didn’t help that all through class he’d kept flashing back to the woman from this morning—Freyja. He wanted to see her again. If Mia, the only person who’d talked to him so far today, hadn’t kept dragging him back to the present, he’d have likely spent the whole class speculating about the goddess and not heard a damn word the professor said—a terrible way to start the semester.

  College. He was finally here. Three years late, sure, and damn if the fresh-outa-high-school set didn’t make his twenty-one-year-old, been-there-done-that ass feel old and jaded. But he’d promised Abuela he’d come back to Texas for this, and here he was at a private college about an hour from the family ranch, matriculating. Detoxing.

  Refinding himself after a couple years getting lost.

  The professor finished up her first lecture, handed out syllabi, and let them out early with an easy bit of reading to kick off the semester. He stood, and Mia rose with him. In the half second it took to shoulder his backpack, their classmates surrounded them, including a few people he could swear weren’t in the class, with markers and a variety of things to sign—notebooks and backpacks and one iPhone.

  After his initial non-reception as a fellow classmate, he’d half expected to be disdained as pop trash by the intelligentsia. He wasn’t unintelligent—he would’ve ended up in some college or other right out of high school if he hadn’t had a contract with a record label spinning his life in a new direction. But Zavala was a good school, his father’s and grandfather’s alma mater, and he had no illusions about how much a hefty donation had helped a late application look better than it was. He was probably not Zavala material, and he couldn’t help thinking everyone knew he’d gotten in on money, not brains.

  But okay, if signing a bunch of autographs helped him fit in, then cool. He would sign shit. Plastering on the publicity smile, he reached for the first marker.

  But Mia put her hand on his, stopping him. “Come on, guys. This is class, not a concert. Let him be.”

  He just managed not to smirk. She sounded so much like Peter—his bouncer, for lack of a better word. A couple people backed away at her announcement with chagrined faces, but most people stayed in place, expressions hopeful and offerings trembling in unsure hands. He needed something to connect with people here, so he shook his head, face getting hot, and grabbed the nearest pen. “It’s fine. Let’s do this today, and then tomorrow I’m just Rafe, your classmate, cool?” The joy that announcement brought was practically tangible and made him relax. “Maybe around Christmas we can do another round if anyone wants to send presents or something.”

  The professor cleared her throat. “Outside, please, Mr. Marquez. Another class will be coming in.” Her lips pursed like she understood the full ridiculousness of fame and, as he’d expected, looked down on him for it. Great. English was his good subject, the one that was supposed to keep his grade point average from plummeting due to—gods, hopefully not—failing math.

  Note to self: secure math tutor immediately.

  The cluster of students, him at the center, moved from the room to the hallway and then to the quadrangle outside, growing two heads for every one he dispatched with an autograph, his regular battle with the hydra of fame.

  His pretty classmate with the bright blue eyes who’d sat across from him didn’t appear in the cluster. She’d looked so sad and frustrated all class he’d once or twice distracted himself from his own worries wondering what was wrong. The school year shouldn’t start with that level of drama. It got his imagination going, wondering what her story was as he signed more notebooks.

  Mia did her best to usher people into a line in the shade of the portico outside the main quadrangle, a gesture of friendship he appreciated, even if she could’ve been a little nicer about it. But his easygoing approach to handling crowds had more than once ended up with his shirt ripped off and, far worse, had nearly gotten a girl trampled that one time in Tokyo. As Peter had explained it, let someone else be the killjoy so he could be friendly. Then everyone left thinking he was cool, and someone whose income didn’t rely on popularity was the asshole. It worked better for everyone.

  “Don’t you have another class to get to?” Mia asked between clenched teeth, staring icily into the steady crowd.

  “We got out early, so—”

  “Rafe, you have a class. And then I’ll make sure you get a lunch.”

  He groaned, equal parts grateful for and irritated at her interference. “I don’t want a manager on campus.” Even if maybe he needed one. Dammit. He just had to make it through the first few days, right? Then his presence would be old news and he could focus on keeping up.

  A crash grabbed everyone’s attention, startling him. A woman tumbled from a second-story window of the library, and the crowd scattered with frightened yelps. Fifty yards or so from him, a blonde in a gold mask—the blonde—landed on her back, hard.

  “Conduit!” someone yelled, and the green went nuts—people screaming, camera phones out videoing—and suddenly the hysteria of too much attention wasn’t on him.

  The air expelled from the woman’s lungs, and her hands flung outward, sending a shard of obsidian bouncing, then rolling along the ground in an unnatural ricochet. Miraculously, it stopped at his feet. The little black stone seem to howl with a power that called to him.

  A godstone. Holy fuck, she’d dropped a godstone.

  He snagged it, shook his head to try to clear the giddy energy, and jogged toward Freyja. “Are you okay?” he called from still too far away.

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nbsp; She turned to him with dazed, frightened eyes, then her gaze shot back up to the window, where another goddess stood, outlined in jagged glass, a cruel smile on her face.

  His mouth gaped open in shock. Macha, from the news this morning. And she appeared to be after Freyja.

  Instinct urged him to run out and help, but the obsidian shard hidden in his palm thrummed with power, giving him a better idea. Rafael couldn’t help the angel of Chavez fight a conduit as dangerous as Macha, not when he was a mere human.

  Obsidian had been sacred to the Aztecs; he was holding the power of a Mexican god just a couple hours after Jorge had lamented the lack thereof. He’d wanted a new direction for his increasingly dissipated existence. Looked like fate had just epically delivered.

  Chapter 3

  FIVE MINUTES BEFORE...

  On the second floor of the library, in a small, dusty room filled with modern art reinterpreting the color-blocked and square-cut look of ancient Mesoamerican art, Giselle swallowed, touching the glass case containing an ancient drum. In pagan times, priests of great power around the world had been blessed by the gods with spells to channel godpowers into stone. Great men and women were chosen to wield these abilities, giving rise to legends from Merlin to Moctezuma, Achilles to Attila.

  But the world changed. Magic was decreed evil, the gods dead, and the truth of the godstones—along with the spells to create them—lost to history.

  Or, mostly lost. Giselle didn’t know the whole story—her mentor wasn’t ready to tell her yet—but it was clear from things she’d said that some conduits had held onto their stones and passed them down through the generations, or sold or traded or lost them somewhere along the way. There had always been a few people who knew enough to record the truth, but only a few.

  Until twenty years ago, when an idiot with a YouTube channel happened upon the godstone of Maui and figured out what happened when you got a little blood on it. But that was a different story.

  According to Giselle’s mentor, the lost godstone of Huehuecoyotl, Aztec god of music and revelry, was a legend among the conduits, dating from the last days of Tenochtitlan, when its powers had been written about in the journals of a Spanish soldier. If her vision was correct, it was hidden inside an ancient drum excavated by Zavala faculty and featured in one of the display cases of the library’s Latin American collection.

  Giselle looked around at the empty room, her nerves getting the better of her. It was one thing to use her powers to patrol areas of town where the police were less likely to be. In some cities, despite immense pressure from the federal government, local authorities wouldn’t detain conduits who worked with the overburdened and underfunded departments. But using the power to steal a second godstone? That couldn’t be ignored. If simply owning a godstone was a crime, stockpiling them was an act of terrorism.

  The room was empty. Now was her moment. After another nervous look around, just to make sure, she pulled out Freyja’s stone and a pocket knife. A shallow slice in her elbow gave her enough blood for the second channeling of the day—the first only required a drop or two, but each successive use without rest required more blood. She touched the rock to the cut.

  As her blood soaked in, her vision glassed over for a moment as cold filled her body, changing her in small but significant ways—her hair grew thicker and weaved itself into warrior’s plaits around her face, her body filled out a little more, her barely there freckles disappeared completely. After a moment, the heavy heat of chain-mail armor over a tunic weighed down her shoulders as leather pants snugged against her hips and legs. A golden mask pressed against her cheeks and forehead, giving her the freedom of anonymity.

  Energy coiled within her, ready to unlock and unleash the borrowed power of an ancient goddess. She still hadn’t figured out all the things she could do with these gifts, but with the help of Andromeda, her mentor and foster mother for the past year, she was growing more powerful every week.

  She traced a combination of runes in the air over the display case lock and activated it with a push of magic. In her mind’s eye, the internal workings turned like she had a key, pins slipping into place and rotating the lock. After that it was easy to slide the door open and grab the drum from her vision.

  Wrinkling her nose in regret for what she had to do, she peeled back the ancient leather on the bottom until it created a hole big enough for a godstone, then shook the drum.

  Sure enough, a slender piece of obsidian, about the length of a butter-knife blade, fell into her hand. The power inside the little thing resonated with her own magic and made her skin tingle all over with excitement. She wasn’t sure what Andromeda’s plans were for it, but whoever got ahold of this was one lucky man—or woman.

  “Plan on keeping that?” someone asked behind her.

  Giselle spun, mad she’d let someone get the drop on her. Blocking her exit, another warrior goddess stood, red hair coifed and perfect, unlike Giselle’s own wild, multi-plaited mess. The goddess carried a spear and wore a red cloak with a large gold broach and fine metal armor—like she was royalty. “Who are you?” she asked—even if she had a sinking feeling she recognized the infamous goddess.

  “Macha of the Morrigan, Lady Freyja. Why don’t you know that?”

  Great. A shiver ran down Giselle’s back. She wasn’t ready for a real fight, not with somebody powerful who knew what they were doing. Pickpockets and alley rapists were nothing for a goddess—even an inexperienced one like herself. But the mysterious woman channeling Macha had somehow avoided capture since the conduits had been outed twenty years ago—nobody knew how long she’d been wielding the stone, gaining abilities and strengthening her connection to her goddess with each use. The woman was deadly powerful. “Why are you here?”

  Macha just smiled and shook her head like Giselle was cute. Then she held out her hand. “Want to just hand it over? Make this easy and I’ll let you keep yours and train up, munchkin. I’ve got no beef with you. Yet.”

  Giselle clutched the godstone tighter. She wasn’t sure what powers the Aztec god granted, but the goddess who had single-handedly burned down the town of Zapata five years prior during the border riots was not somebody who needed more skills.

  Also, the likelihood of Macha actually letting Giselle keep Freyja’s stone was something she placed at around twenty-five percent. So, no way she’d turn anything over. All she had to do was... get past a total badass.

  “No?” Macha asked, head tilted. Then she shrugged. “Show me your stuff.”

  “Uh...” Did Giselle draw her axes? Or blow her one and only combat spell? Fuck...

  Before she could decide, Macha threw her arms out like bird wings, then clapped her hands together in a giant flap. Air rushed toward Giselle with gale force, and she slammed backward into the window, shattering it.

  Chapter 4

  GISELLE STOOD UP, ONE foot then the other, her head aching like she’d... fallen from a second-story window onto her back. Maybe she should just run.

  Macha, at the window above her, stepped out into the open air as black wings sprouted from her back, and she elegantly drifted to the ground. The longer someone possessed a godstone, the more powers they were granted from it, and the more power they could expend before they had to rest or start offering blood in greater quantities.

  Running seemed like a great idea, except... fuck, where was the Aztec godstone? She’d just had it in her hand.

  Scanning the ground, she shook her hair, trying to force it off her face, but the scattered small braids at her temples and forehead, which were supposed to keep it back, continued to fail at their one job. Facing off against Macha, she felt every bit the child playing dress up in the crazed outfit that, unfortunately, came with her power. She might look like a freak show, but still, magic pooled in her shaking fingers, ready to be given form and released. If only she could figure out what to do with it. But a violent menace like Macha shouldn’t get another godstone—she shouldn’t even have the one she already possessed.
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  So instead of running away, Giselle faced her, sure she was about to get her ass handed to her before the far more experienced conduit did whatever the hell she wanted anyway. Giselle shifted her weight, the impossibly uncomfortable chain-mail and leather armor digging into her shoulders as the summer heat baked into her. Vikings hadn’t dressed for Texas in August.

  “Freyja, darling, what fresh little body did you crawl into?” Macha stalked forward, looking hungry. “How the mighty have fallen.”

  Giselle hesitated. “You knew the last Freyja?” Had they been friends? Enemies?

  Could somebody actually give her two words about the secret life her mother had never told her about? A godstone was a hell of an eighteenth birthday inheritance for a kid who’d been in the foster system since age seven.

  “You picked up the wrong rock, little girl. Hand it over and I won’t beat it out of you.” Macha spread her hand out like Giselle would just hand over her mother’s legacy into the woman’s crazy little palm. “Both of them.” She leaned forward, the black of her irises growing to cover the whites of her eyes as magic built inside the Irish goddess.

  Giselle couldn’t win. Her best bet was to lure Macha away from potential casualties—like, crap, Rafael Marquez was here somewhere—and once they were out of range, find a way to escape, Aztec godstone or no. Steeling her spine, Giselle let more magic grow in her hands, turning them blue with ice crystals.

  Macha cackled and lunged.

  Freyja’s magic shot like an avalanche, the strongest spell Giselle had—reducing her godpower by half in one blow. Macha’s eyes grew wide, as if she realized what was coming. Her hand waved out as if to deflect, and a raven appeared in front of her, wings spread to take flight.