Telly leveled a look at me that was wholly unafraid.

“You have it stashed in a hole under one of these tents? Or was Noel Saint-Hill holding it for you when you smashed him under a fucking car?”

The second boy made a noise. His gaze flicked nervously to Telly’s.

“Was he the first person you’ve killed with your new trumped-up knack? Does injuring women not do it for you anymore? Because you fucking broke my partner’s bones with that stupid paint stunt you pulled in my bar.”

“If you wanted to take me down, maybe you should’ve brought her out here,” Telly said in an even, taunting voice. “Because you’d have a better chance with her fear knack than some long-haired beach bum with a gun.”

A shot exploded. The boys lunged to the side as a mushroom cloud of dust flew up from the cracked dirt near Telly’s feet.

“Holy fuck!” the second boy shouted as he backed into a lawn chair that overturned.

“Bullet trumps knack,” Lon said as my ear rang from the blast.

Telly’s face flashed deep red. He was pissed. He flicked his hand to the side and Lon’s arm followed the motion. He clung to the gun even as Telly was trying his damnedest to pull the thing away—the same thing the boy had done to me in the bar with my caduceus, only Lon wasn’t caught off guard like I was. He strained to keep his grip on it as Telly grunted in frustration. The whole thing looked like a bad mime act.

But just when I thought Lon was going to win the tug-o-war, the Lupara flew across the riverbed and landed in a pile of weeds on the opposite embankment. Why did he give it up? A second later, I had my answer. A familiar unearthly sensation went through me like a herd of stampeding horses. Light burst around Lon’s shoulders as his halo doubled in size and flamed up into a fiery golden oval that covered his shoulders. Twin, ruddy horns spiraled out of his hairline above his temples, curling around his ears.

Both boys froze, eyes bugging. A dark spot spread over the crotch of the husky kid’s jeans. Telly’s mouth fell open.

“Wiped that cocky smile off your telekinetic face, didn’t it?” I said. “No juice required.”

Before he could reply, the boy who’d pissed his pants whipped around and booked it, racing up the opposite embankment. I briefly considered running him down, but we didn’t need him. Right now I wanted to focus my attention on the main problem.

“Your friend bailed on you, Telly,” I said. The sound of his name in my mouth made him flinch, just barely. “Maybe you’ll just kill him, too, when you catch up with him later.”

He ran a jerky hand over his buzzed hair.

“What’s in the bag?” I asked. The backpack lay on the ground a few feet away from Telly.

“Seems you already know,” he answered.

“Who’d you steal it from?” Lon asked.

Nervous eyes darted in Lon’s direction, but Telly didn’t answer. Stupid piece of shit didn’t know Lon could read his mind at this point. He spoke to me instead. “I’ll give you your money back.”

“Yes, you will. But what are you going to do about the damages to my bar? The lost income? And you broke my partner’s bones.”

“I didn’t do anything. Not my fault she was clumsy.”

Fury and adrenalin rushed through my chest. “You’re going to pay for that, you little shit.”

Reaching out for electricity, I marched toward him, closing the distance between us. He was a twitchy trapped rabbit, muscles tense, wanting to bolt. But he couldn’t leave the backpack. It lay between us, and I saw the desperate longing in his face when he glanced at it. I tapped into current somewhere above the bridge and pulled. Prickly heat blossomed inside my cells.

I heard Lon bark my name behind me, but I was so close. Telly and I lunged for the backpack at the same time. We both got our hands on it. Only, my hands were a little more dangerous than his. I pushed kindled Heka through them, sending a lash of it through the metal zipper I was white-knuckling.

Like many other gifted magicians, my body was resistant to electrical voltage. At least, coming in. Going back out was another story. I needed graphite to even out the release, because once it bonded with Heka, it went a little haywire.

I had no graphite.

The shock sent Telly flying. With a yelp of pain, he slammed into the ground and skidded. Exactly the result I wanted. Only, the kickback from the release hit me, too. I knew the moment it happened. Knew I was in for pain and some hair singeing.

My fingers froze around the zipper. Hot pain buzzed through my cells as my body made a closed circuit with the metal. For a moment, the pain was so excruciating, so jarring, that all I could see was white light. My mind emptied. The world dropped away. Everything just . . . rebooted.

I’d done this before. Just had to let it happen and survive it. Wait for the nightmare to end. Would only take a few seconds, though they seemed an eternity. And as the shock lessened, I felt a weird, silent rumble. Like I was standing in the middle of an earthquake. We were in California. It was possible. And I knew the rumbling wasn’t coming from me.

The muscles in my hand were nearly at the point of unclenching. I felt the change when it happened. When the pain shifted. Electric Heka still coursed through me. It was a horrible feeling, but not bright and debilitating like the actual shock. My bones turned to jelly. And as I felt my legs begin to buckle, I smelled Lon. How funny was that? I smelled him. Not his shampoo or his cinnamon gum or his leather jacket. Just him. The scent I could identify underneath all the other stuff. The one I smelled when I woke up in bed and his arm was curled around my waist.