Lady of Misrule (Marla Mason Book 8) Read Online Free Page B

was out of the monster-slaying business, so she hoped it was.
    A coil of the floating darkness reached out toward the streetlight, and the light blinked out. In the sudden darkness, Marzi couldn’t tell exactly what happened – there was some motion, perhaps, and maybe a muffled gasp, but that was all. She kept watching, waiting for the group to appear again in the light cast by the streetlight on the next corner, but they didn’t. The darkness wasn’t that complete, but... she couldn’t see them at all.
    She put her nose against the window, trying to get a closer look, but her breath just fogged the glass. Cursing under her breath, Marzi picked up the black silk robe Jonathan had given her for their fourth anniversary and pulled it on over her pajamas. She slipped on her flip-flops and started toward the door, then paused and picked up the revolver resting beside her drawing table. It was a toy, a vintage cap-gun from the ‘50s... except once, in a showdown, it had been more than that: a more potent weapon than any mortal firearm. If there was any magic left in the thing, it wasn’t evident, but holding the pistol always made her feel stronger, more brave, capable of anything. After all, hadn’t she once done the impossible, and slain something very like a god?
    She tucked the gun into the pocket of her robe but kept her hand on the grip, then unlocked the door. Their little apartment – they called it “the pigeonhole” – was technically the finished attic of the café she co-owned, Genius Loci, but she didn’t have to go through the café to get outside; there was an outside entrance with a set of wooden stairs leading down to the street, so she stepped out onto the landing and looked down. The extinguished streetlight was back on now, and its light revealed absolutely nothing. No shadow, no twenty-somethings walking along, no signs of anything... except, was that something glinting in the gutter? Probably just broken glass or the shiny inside of a torn potato chip bag, but...
    Marzi went down the stairs, hand on the toy gun’s plastic grip, and continued over the sidewalk, across the street, to the far side.
    The thing glittering in the gutter was a set of keys, and now that she looked there were three other sets, too. Among other things. Several debit and credit cards and driver’s licenses, but no wallets, except for one made of duct tape, and it was falling to pieces. What looked like the rivets and buttons and zippers from a couple of pairs of jeans. A set of eyeglasses, and a four-ounce stainless steel flask engraved with the initials RF. A couple of rings, a pair of hoop earrings, a silver necklace with a tiny leaf pendant, and a scatter of coins.
    “What’s up?” a voice said, and she whirled, drawing the gun.
    Jonathan, wearing his own robe, held up his hands and raised an eyebrow. “Don’t shoot, marshal, I’ll go peaceful-like.”
    She tucked the gun away, shook her head, and pointed into the gutter.
    Jonathan squatted, peered at the litter without touching it, and whistled. “Well. That’s weird. People drop stuff, but... is that a zipper? How do you drop a zipper?”
    “I had a bad dream,” she said. “Woke up, went to the window, and saw some people walk by. There was this thing... a shadow, but moving, swimming through the air like a sea snake... then the streetlight went out, and.... I think the people disappeared. Or something. I came down, and found this stuff. Now you know what I know.”
    Jonathan grunted. “And your hypothesis is... killer shadow?” He didn’t sound incredulous, and she loved him for that. Then again, he’d seen a few impossible things in his time with her. They’d met in the midst of that nightmarish summer when she’d discovered the true malleability of reality, after all. She’d very nearly lost him to it.
    “The thought crossed my mind. Maybe they did just drop this stuff. Maybe it’s, I don’t know. An art piece. Art students are always doing