Because I'm a glutton for punishment and I think I can work on more than one thing at once, you win.
Hopefully I will too. Anyway, here's a sneaky peaky at the first draft of Chapter One for Infernal Highway, my sequel to City of Shadows. Hopefully out in the summer.
The ceiling’s got more cracks than a meth head’s mirror. I count them for the third time tonight, pretending it’s some kind of meditation bullshit.
It’s not.
It’s just me trying to keep the goddamn ghosts at bay.
The ones in my head are louder than the ones outside, mostly because the ones outside are real, and they don’t give a fuck about my mental health.
The ashtray’s overflowing, and the room smells like a bar after last call.
I tell myself I’m done with all of it. Magic, monsters, the endless parade of shit that goes bump in the night.
I’m retired.
Retired means you get to sit in your underwear and drink until you forget your own name.
Or at least that’s what I thought.
Then the phone rings.
It’s not a friendly sound. I stare at it like it’s a snake coiled on the table. My hand twitches toward it, but I hesitate.
Let it go to voicemail. Let whoever’s on the other end deal with their own problems.
I’m out.
Done.
Finished.
But I pick it up anyway. Because apparently, I’m a glutton for punishment.
“Garrett,” I growl into the receiver, because answering with “hello” is for people who still have hope.
“Blake.” Murphy’s voice is off—too stiff, too careful. Like he’s walking on broken glass and trying not to bleed. “We’ve got a situation.”
I take a drag from my cigarette, letting the smoke fill my lungs before I exhale it slowly. “Murphy, if this is about your fucking fantasy football league, I swear to Christ…”
“It’s Graves.” He cuts me off, and there’s something in his tone that makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Ethan Graves. One of my old trainees. Kid’s got balls of steel and a brain to match. Or at least he did the last time I saw him.
“What about him?” I ask, though I already know I’m not going to like the answer.
“He called me an hour ago. Panicked. Like, full-blown, hyperventilating, can’t-put-a-sentence-together panic. They were on a raid, some warehouse down by the docks. Supposed to be a routine Vice/Narcotics bust. But they found something.”
I close my eyes, pinching the bridge of my nose like that’ll somehow stop the headache that’s already forming. “Let me guess. Not drugs. Not guns.”
“No,” Murphy says, and his voice drops lower, like he’s afraid someone might overhear. “Something else. An artifact. Graves didn’t say much, but whatever it is, it’s got him spooked. And Blake, you know Graves. That kid doesn’t scare easy.”
“So, what do you want me to do about it?” I ask, even though I already know the answer.
Murphy hesitates, and for a second, I think he might actually let it go. But then he says, “You know what it is, don’t you?”
I don’t answer. Because yeah, I probably do. And that’s the problem.
The cigarette burns low between my fingers, ash crumbling onto the cracked linoleum floor. I don’t even remember lighting it. The room smells like stale smoke and regret, a cocktail of my own making. The ceiling stares back at me, pockmarked with water stains that look like faces if you squint long enough. Tonight, they’re laughing.
Murphy’s voice cuts through the static in my head like a rusty blade. “Blake, listen to me. Graves isn’t some rookie with an overactive imagination. You know him. Kid’s got nerves of steel. If he’s freaking out, it’s because he saw something real.”
I take a drag, the nicotine doing fuck-all to calm the storm brewing in my gut. “Real,” I repeat, the word tasting like bile. “Yeah, Murphy, I’m real familiar with ‘real.’ You remember how that worked out for me last time? Spoiler alert: not great.”
“Don’t give me that shit,” Murphy snaps, and I can hear the edge in his voice, the one he gets when he’s trying to keep it together but the cracks are starting to show.
The cigarette trembles in my hand. Fuck. My aura’s acting up again. The lamp on the table flickers, casting jagged shadows across the wall. I swear under my breath, stubbing the cigarette out harder than necessary. “Normal died a long time ago, Murphy. You of all people should know that.”
He doesn’t answer right away, and I can almost see him pacing, the limp from that goddamn knife wound slowing him down but not stopping him. “I’m not asking you to suit up and play hero. I’m telling you to listen. Whatever Graves found, it’s tied to the shit you’ve seen. The stuff we never put in the reports. The stuff that makes people like us drink too much and sleep too little.”
I lean back in the chair, the springs groaning like they’re about to give out. “And what do you want me to do about it? I’m retired, remember? Crazy old Blake Garrett, off the grid, out of the game. Let the fresh-faced kids handle it.”
“Bullshit,” Murphy growls, and there it is—the tone that says he’s not backing down. “You’re not out, Blake. You’re just hiding. And whatever Graves stumbled into, it’s not something some greenhorn cop can handle. You know that better than anyone.”
I close my eyes, but that just makes the memories worse. The blood. The screams. The things that shouldn’t exist but do anyway. “Not my problem,” I mutter, but the words feel hollow, even to me.
Murphy’s quiet for a moment, and then he says it, low and deadly serious. “It’s not just a case, Blake. It’s something wrong.”
The lamp flickers again, then dies with a soft pop. I sit in the dark, the silence pressing in.
Murphy doesn’t have to say more. I already know he’s right.
And that’s the worst part.
Because when Murphy’s right, people die.
“Wrong?” I snort, lighting a cigarette with a flick of my lighter.
The flame dances too long, like it’s mocking me. “Murphy, everything’s wrong. That’s the goddamn job description. What’s so special about this one?”
He hesitates. I can hear it in the static of the line, the way his breath hitches like he’s holding back something he doesn’t want to say.
That’s when I know it’s bad. Murphy doesn’t hesitate. Murphy’s the guy who kicks down doors and asks questions later.
If he’s hesitating, it’s because he’s scared. And that’s a problem.
“Graves said he found something,” Murphy finally says, his voice tight. “Not drugs. Not guns. Something... else. And there was this... symbol. Carved into the floor. He said it looked like—”
“Like a spiral with a line through it,” I finish for him, my voice flat. The cigarette falls from my fingers, landing on the carpet with a hiss.
I don’t move to pick it up. My stomach’s already churning, bile rising in my throat.
I know that symbol. I’ve seen it before. In my nightmares. In places I’ve tried to forget.
Murphy’s silence is deafening. “You know what it means,” he says, and it’s not a question.
“Yeah,” I mutter, staring at the cigarette smoldering on the floor. “I know what it means.”
It’s the sigil of the Legati Magis. The black Mages. The ones who don’t just dabble in power—they fucking drown in it.
And if they’re leaving their mark in Ashboro, it’s not just a case. It’s a warning.
A declaration of war. And war with the Legati?
That’s not something you walk away from.
It’s something you survive.
Barely.
“Blake,” Murphy says, his voice low, urgent. “Whatever this is, it’s big. And Graves... he’s not cut out for this. You know that. He’s a good kid, but he’s in over his head. You’re the only one who can—”
“Stop,” I snap, cutting him off. My hand’s already reaching for my jacket, hanging on the back of the chair.
I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to walk back into that world, to drag myself through the blood and the nightmares again.
But I don’t have a choice. Not when the Legati are involved. Not when people I care about—people like Murphy, like Graves—are in the crosshairs.
“I’m coming,” I say, shrugging on the jacket. It smells like old leather and gunpowder, like the life I tried to leave behind. “But this isn’t a favor, Murphy. This is me cleaning up a mess before it gets worse. And when it’s done, I’m gone. You hear me? Gone.”
“Loud and clear,” Murphy says, and I can hear the relief in his voice. “I’ll send you the address.”
I hang up without another word, staring at the phone in my hand. The screen flickers, the battery icon blinking red.
Of course. Things always break around me when I’m pissed.
I toss the phone onto the table and grab my keys, my fingers brushing the hilt of the knife I keep in my pocket.
Old habits die hard.
The warehouse loomed like a fucking tomb at the end of the street, all cracked brick and rusted steel. The air around it felt heavy, like it was pressing down on my chest, and the streetlights flickered like they were too scared to shine full brightness.
I don’t believe in bad omens, but I’ve been around long enough to know when one’s staring me in the face.
I parked my car half a block away, engine sputtering as I killed it. The thing had been on its last legs since I got it, but tonight it sounded worse than usual.
Probably me. My aura’s been extra unstable lately, like my brain’s a live wire and the whole world’s a goddamn conductor.
I stepped out, slamming the door shut, and the car alarm went off—three short, angry beeps before it died with a pathetic whimper.
Great.
Just what I needed.
Ethan Graves was pacing near the warehouse entrance with a cigarette dangling from his lips. He looked like shit—pale, sweaty, eyes darting like he was expecting something to jump out of the shadows and eat him.
His tie was loose, his shirt untucked, and his hands were shaking so bad he almost dropped the cigarette when he saw me.
“Blake,” he said, his voice cracking like a teenager’s. “Jesus Christ, man, I didn’t know who else to call.”
“Yeah, I got that from Murphy,” I said, scanning the warehouse.
My gut was already tight, the kind of feeling you get when you know you’re walking into a shitshow. “What the hell happened here, Graves? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
He laughed. “A ghost? I wish. Whatever’s in there... it’s not dead, Blake. It’s worse.”
I didn’t like the way he said that. Worse. Like he’d seen something he couldn’t explain, something that had crawled out of the Venecium and decided to set up shop in Ashboro.
I’ve seen that look before—on rookies, on vets, on people who thought they’d seen it all until the world showed them how fucking small they really are.
Graves wasn’t just nervous. He was shaken.
“Start talking,” I said, keeping my voice low. “And skip the bullshit. What’s inside?”
He took a drag of his cigarette, the tip glowing red in the dark. “We got a tip. Big drug shipment coming through. Routine raid, or so we thought. But when we busted in... it wasn’t drugs. It wasn’t guns. It was.”
He stopped, shaking his head like he was trying to dislodge the memory. “I don’t even know how to describe it.
A crate, reinforced, locked up tighter than Fort Knox. And the symbols on it, man. They were... alive. Like they were moving.”
My stomach dropped. That’s not just magic—that’s old magic. The kind of shit the Legati would kill for.
“Did you open it?” I asked, already knowing the answer.
Graves flinched. “No. But someone did. And whatever’s inside... it’s not human, Blake. I don’t know what it is, but it’s not human.”
Fuck. This was bad. Worse than bad. If the Legati were involved—if they’d brought something out of the Venecium—then this wasn’t just a raid gone sideways. This was a ticking time bomb, and I was standing right next to it.
“Where’s the crate now?” I asked, my hand instinctively brushing the hilt of the knife in my pocket.
“Inside,” Graves said, nodding toward the warehouse. “We tried to secure it, but... things got out of hand. Fast.”
I didn’t need to ask what he meant by “out of hand.” I could feel it in the air, that electric tension that comes before a storm.
Something bad had happened here, something Graves couldn’t explain because he didn’t have the words for it.
But I did.
“Stay here,” I said, turning toward the warehouse. “And if I’m not back in ten minutes, call Murphy. Tell him to bring the big guns.”
Graves grabbed my arm, his grip surprisingly strong. “Blake, you don’t understand. Whatever’s in there...it’s dangerous,”
I shook him off, my jaw tight. “Yeah, well, so am I. And I’m tired of playing catch-up with these assholes.”
I didn’t wait for his reply. I just walked toward the warehouse.
The first shot cracked like a goddamn whip, and I didn’t need to see where it came from to know the shit had officially hit the fan.
Graves froze for half a second, his face pale under the flickering streetlight, and then we were moving—no words, no plan, just pure fucking instinct.
“Stay behind me,” I barked, pulling my Smith & Wesson from its holster. The weight of it felt good in my hand. Familiar.
Graves hesitated, his Glock trembling slightly in his grip, but he nodded.
Kid wasn’t green anymore, but he looked like he was about three seconds from pissing himself.
Something in that warehouse had him spooked worse than a cat in a room full of rocking chairs.
We hit the side door hard, and the chaos inside hit us harder.
The air was thick with gun smoke and something else—something sharp and metallic, like the taste of blood on your tongue.
The warehouse was a goddamn warzone. Crates were overturned, bodies littered the floor, and the sound of gunfire echoed off the steel rafters.
I ducked behind a stack of pallets, Graves right on my heels.
A stray bullet pinged off the metal next to my head, and I cursed under my breath. “What the fuck is this?” I growled, peeking out just long enough to see a gangbanger in a red hoodie take cover behind a forklift.
He popped up, fired a wild shot, and disappeared again.
“They’re after the crate,” Graves shouted over the noise, his voice tight with panic. “They don’t care who gets in the way.”
“No shit,” I muttered, scanning the room.
The air felt charged, like the moment before a lightning strike.
A cop went down hard, clutching his leg, and I saw Graves flinch.
“Stay focused,” I snapped, grabbing his arm. “You freeze, you die. Got it?”
He nodded, swallowing hard, and I could see the fear in his eyes.
Fear was good. It kept you sharp. But, too much of it would get you killed.
I’d seen it happen before, more times than I cared to count.
I moved low and fast, keeping to the shadows as I worked my way deeper into the warehouse.
The place was trashed. Broken glass, shattered wood. Blood smeared across the concrete.
Like some twisted Pollock painting.
My boots crunched on spent shell casings, and the smell of cordite burned my nose.
And then I felt it. A low hum, barely audible over the gunfire, like the sound of a power line on a quiet night. It wasn’t loud, but it was everywhere—in my ears, in my chest, in the marrow of my bones.
“Blake!” Graves hissed, pointing toward a cluster of crates near the center of the warehouse. “That’s it. That’s the one.”
I followed his gaze, and my stomach dropped. The crate was reinforced with steel bands that looked like they’d been welded by someone who’d never heard of OSHA.
Symbols covered its surface—not Cyrillic, not Arabic, not anything I’d ever seen before.
They weren’t just carved; they seemed to bleed into the wood, pulsing with a sickly, otherworldly glow.
My aura prickled, unstable and raw, and I could feel the air around me crackling with energy.
“Fuck,” I breathed, my grip tightening on my gun.
My scar burned, the brand Baldr left on me screaming in warning.
I didn’t need mystic mumbo jumbo to tell me this thing was bad news.
My balls had already filed the paperwork.
I crouched beside him, my gun warm in my hand. “You look like shit,” I said, because what the hell else was I gonna say?
Hey, kid, you seem like you’re about to piss yourself.
No. That’s not how this works.
He didn’t even flinch. “Feel like it,” he muttered, his voice tight. “Blake, this isn’t—”
I grabbed him by the collar and yanked him lower, just as a bullet whizzed past, splintering the crate above our heads.
“Save the fucking confession for later,” I snapped. “Right now, stay alive.”
He nodded, but his jaw was clenched so tight I thought his teeth might crack.
I watched him out of the corner of my eye as I scanned the room. Graves wasn’t green anymore—he’d seen enough blood and bad decisions to know how this song and dance went.
This had him rattled. And that made me nervous. Because if Graves was scared, I should be terrified.
The crate pulsed like a goddamn heart.
Not in a metaphorical way—like, literally.
I could feel it thrumming through the soles of my boots, up my legs, and straight into my chest.
“Blake,” Graves said again, his voice sharper this time. “You see it, right? You feel it?”
“Yeah,” I finally managed, my voice rough. “I see it.”
And I did. But seeing it didn’t make it any less of a problem. In fact, it made it worse.
Because now I knew why Graves had called me.
And why Murphy had sent me here.
Graves was next to me, crouched behind an overturned table that looked like it had been used for more than just coffee breaks. His face was pale, sweat gluing his hair to his forehead. He kept glancing at the crate like it was going to sprout legs and chase him down.
“That’s what I was trying to tell you,” he muttered, voice tight. “That’s why I called Murphy.”
I didn’t look at him. My eyes were locked on the crate, on those fucking symbols carved into the wood.
They weren’t Latin or Norse or any language I recognized, but they felt familiar.
Like I’d seen them in one of my nightmares—the kind where I wake up with my sheets soaked in sweat and my hand halfway through summoning a fireball.
Gunfire erupted from the catwalks above. Bullets chewed into the table, sending splinters flying. I ducked lower.
The air smelled like cordite and desperation, and the noise was deafening—shouts, screams, the metallic ping of bullets ricocheting off steel.
Then I saw him. Some gangbanger, skinny as a rail and high as a kite, broke cover and bolted for the crate.
His eyes were wild, like he’d just hit the jackpot on a scratchy.
He wasn’t thinking about the cops or the bullets or the fact that he was probably about to die.
All he cared about was getting to that crate.
Graves saw him too. He shifted, raising his Glock, but hesitated. Kid was young—maybe eighteen, maybe less. Graves had always been soft like that.
I wasn’t.
Before the kid could get within ten feet of the crate, Graves fired.
One shot, clean through the chest.
The kid dropped like a sack of shit, his face frozen in surprise.
For a second, everything went quiet.
Then the chaos started up again, louder than before.
“Shit,” Graves muttered, lowering his gun. His hands were shaking. “He was just a kid.”
“He was a kid with a death wish,” I snapped, scanning the room.
More bodies on the floor now—gangbangers, cops. People who probably shouldn’t have been here in the first place.
The crate sat in the middle of it all, untouched, humming like a live wire.
Graves opened his mouth to say something, but another burst of gunfire drowned him out. I cursed under my breath and tightened my grip on my gun. This was about to get ugly.
“Murphy said you’d know what to do,” he muttered, voice tight. His hands were still shaking, the grip on his gun too loose for comfort.
I didn’t answer. Graves didn’t need to hear what I was thinking—that Murphy was a fucking idiot for sending me here, that I didn’t know what the hell I was doing, that whatever was in this crate wasn’t just dangerous—it was *wrong.*
My fingers brushed the edge of the crate, and I felt it. A pulse, slow and deliberate, like it was testing me. My scar flared, sharp and hot, and I clenched my jaw.
“Blake—” Graves started, but I cut him off with a look.
“Shut up.” My voice was low, rough. “You called me because you knew this wasn’t your pay grade. So let me do my fucking job.”
I didn’t wait for him to respond. My hand gripped the edge of the crate, and the pulse intensified, vibrating up my arm.
It wasn’t just humming now—it was singing.
A low, guttural sound that made my teeth ache.
My scar burned hotter, and I could feel the magic in me stirring, restless and hungry.
I pushed it down. Not here. Not now.
Then the first bullet shattered the windshield of a squad car outside.
“Shit,” Graves hissed, ducking instinctively.
I didn’t move. My eyes stayed on the crate, but my ears were tuned to the chaos outside.
Engines roaring, doors slamming, boots on pavement.
Too many.
Too organized. This wasn’t some ragtag gang of idiots looking to make a score.
This was a fucking army.
“Blake, we need to move,” Graves said, voice rising.
“No shit,” I snapped, finally tearing my hand away from the crate.
The pulse lingered, a phantom ache in my fingers. “You think I don’t know that?”
Graves opened his mouth to argue, but another burst of gunfire cut him off.
I grabbed his arm and yanked him behind a stack of overturned crates.
The warehouse was clearing out—cops retreating, gangbangers scattering like cockroaches.
“Listen to me,” I said, my voice low and urgent. “This isn’t about drugs or turf or whatever the hell you thought this was. That crate? It’s a fucking magnet. And everyone who wants it is about to come crashing through that door.”
Graves stared at me, his face pale. “What’s in it?”
I didn’t answer. I didn’t know. But I could feel it—wrongness, power, something that didn’t belong in this world.
My scar burned hotter, and I clenched my fist. Magic or not, I was getting that crate out of here.
“Stay here,” I said, shoving Graves back. “And don’t do anything stupid.”
“What the hell are you—”
I didn’t wait for him to finish. I moved, low and fast, toward the crate.
The pulse grew stronger, more insistent, like it was calling to me.
My scar burned, and I could feel the magic in me rising, restless and dangerous. I gritted my teeth and pushed it down. Not yet.
Another bullet whizzed past my ear, and I hit the deck. The doors burst open, and they flooded in—black SUVs, men in tactical gear, faces hidden behind masks.
They moved like a fucking machine, too precise, too coordinated.
I glanced back at Graves. He was still behind the crates, his gun drawn, but he looked like a kid playing dress-up. I didn’t have time to babysit.
“Blake!” Graves shouted, his voice barely audible over the gunfire.
I didn’t answer. My hand found the edge of the crate again, and the pulse surged, sharp and electric.
My scar burned white-hot, and I could feel the magic in me straining against the leash.
“Fuck it,” I muttered.
I didn’t have a choice. I gripped the crate tighter and whispered the words, low and quick. “Moveo. Transfero.”
The crate shifted, lighter than it should’ve been, and I hauled it up.
My scar burned hotter, and I could feel the magic coursing through me, raw and untamed. I didn’t have time to think about the consequences.
“Blake!” Graves shouted again, but I was already moving.