Well, shit.

The long-standing hostility in the supernatural community between the Silver Circle of light magic users—of which the Corps forms a part—and the Black Circle of dark mages had recently escalated into all-out war. As a result, new recruits to the Corps were being housed at HQ until they acquired enough skills to maybe not get themselves killed. But there wasn't room for everyone, and old hands like me were expected to fend for ourselves. Which I'm going to start doing any minute now, I thought, hitting linoleum as the back door blew in.

I looked up to see a werewolf in the doorway holding a couple of fast-food bags. "What the—!" he began, but suddenly the air was full of french fries and gunfire, and the newcomer dived for the floor. I scrambled to reach him, my brain screaming, Get in front of him, get in front of him, don't let them kill him! even as he was pulling me backwards into the dubious safe zone between the pantry and the fridge.

"Get down!" I yelled, but the latest spell missed us and hit the ceiling instead, dropping beams and plaster as well as a flood from a waterline. It didn't manage to put out the fire, but it did leave my bathtub teetering on the edge of the abyss.

"Is this a bad time?" Cyrus asked. My boyfriend had plaster in his dark hair and dusting his motorcycle jacket, but his Glock was in his hand and his brown eyes were calm. In fact, he looked more composed than me.

"I don't remember us having a date," I said, dropping my shields for an instant to send a spell at the laundry room door. It exploded inward, and I heard someone yelp. I grinned viciously.

"It's Valentine's Day."

"I hate holidays. Crap always happens to me on holidays." I peered out the window and saw what I'd expected: two shadows fell across the pebbly dirt that passed for a lawn in Vegas, although there was nothing to cast them. Mages under cloaking spells, just waiting for their buddies to flush me out into the open. So not happening, assholes.

Cyrus dragged me under the burning table to avoid a spell from mage number one. He'd taken up a position just outside the dining room door, giving him a good angle on the pantry. "What's going on?" he demanded.

"Delivery guy was an assassin."

"And you fell for that?" He emptied a clip into the mage's shields, forcing him to draw back slightly to conserve power.

"I thought the flowers were from you! I should have known better."

"Are you hinting that I'm unromantic?" He fished a backup 9 mm out of his jacket.

"The guys trying to kill me send more flowers than you do."

"I never really pictured you as the flowers-and-candy type."

The bathtub ended the discussion by taking that moment to kamikaze the kitchen table. The scorched Formica splintered, catching almost none of the tub's momentum before it slammed into my shields, popping them like an overstretched balloon. I had a momentary heart-clench of "Cyrus!" the taste of bile and gunpowder thick in my mouth. But he was okay. Somehow, we both were.

I realized that my shields had lasted for a split second after impact, enough time for him to get a grip on the slick bottom of the tub, keeping it from cracking our heads. That was lucky for more than one reason. A hail of bullets from above and a spell from the side were both deflected by our porcelain-and-steel umbrella.

We crouched near the floor, blind except for a two-inch gap at the bottom. It allowed me to see bullets pelting down like metal raindrops, a cloud of flour sifting into the air, and punctured cans oozing their contents everywhere. So much for the pantry.

I considered our options, and they weren't promising. Going out the back way was to walk into a death trap, but the guy in the dining room had us cut off from the front. I hadn't heard anything more from the mage in the laundry room, but even if he was out of commission—a big if—there was no exit that way.

"I'm open to suggestions," Cyrus said, a little strain creeping into his voice.

I realized why when I brushed against the side of the tub and almost burned myself. The spell had heated the metal like a huge soup pot. "Hold on," I said, resigning myself to trashing yet another portion of my new house. And cast a spell that dissolved the floorboards beneath us.

We landed hard on the concrete floor of my basement.

Cyrus threw off the tub and we rolled to either side barely in time to avoid the spell that crashed down, melting the kitchen tiles we'd brought with us into a gooey puddle. "I need to get to my weapons," I said as he pumped bullets back up the hole.

"And they would be where?"

"In the upstairs bathroom."

"Then why are we down here?!"

"Because levitation isn't in my skill set!" I snapped, running to the tiny basement window set high in one wall. I fumbled with it while Cyrus barricaded the door with an old couch abandoned by the previous homeowner.

"It won't hold," he told me, reloading both guns.

"It won't have to." The rusty lock wouldn't budge, so I borrowed Cyrus's Glock and shot it off. It wasn't like everyone didn't already know where we were.

My shoulders popped out of the window, and I did a quick recon before following them. All I could see from this vantage point was a view of mountains and brush and clear desert sky in one direction, and the sun glinting off a mirror and a curve of chrome in the other. Cyrus's bike, parked in the driveway, just visible around the side of the house. No one was in sight, not that that meant much, but it did beat the alternative.

Then the hushed noise of running feet on gravel sounded for a breath, and unseen hands jerked me the rest of the way out the window. I changed my mind. I much preferred an enemy I could see.

Only I could, a little. There are no true invisibility spells, just ones that redirect the eye or provide camouflage. And neither work at point-blank range. As if to underline my thought, the air flickered around the shape of a fist for an instant, right before it socked me in the jaw.

I reached for a weapon even as my head snapped back, but I'd returned Cyrus's gun, and my clip was empty. So I balled my hand into a fist and managed to get a satisfying punch to what might have been a head or possibly a shoulder. It was hard to tell because, even this close, my attacker was only a vague, indistinct contour—a column of man-shaped water that reflected the scenery around it.

I got another crack to the jaw and a sharp jab to the solar plexus in return. My bum leg gave out, and I fell to my hands and knees, gasping and trying not to throw up. I saw a glimmer of what looked like boots, right before a vicious kick in my ribs sent me stumbling into the house. I hit with a bone-numbing crunch, unable to get my hands up in time to cushion the impact, and bounced off to sprawl on my back. Through the haze of pain and the sound of my own ragged breathing, I heard the scuff of approaching footsteps.

Somehow, I rolled to my knees, lashing out with my good leg as I did so. But I was dizzy and my aim was off, and it failed to connect with anything. And then a numbing spell hit me, reducing my motor skills to zero, and I fell back, hard.

I lay there, aching and jittering, trying to breathe through the pain, and for a moment, I think I grayed out. But it didn't last long, because I noticed when a mage suddenly flickered into view over me. He pointed a gun at my head and our eyes met.

"Jason?" I blinked familiar sandy blond hair, clear green eyes, and a pug, freckled nose into view. "What do you think you're doing?"

"Breaking the curve," he informed me with an incongruous ear-to-ear grin.

He dropped his shields in order to fire, only to have Cyrus's fist turn one cheekbone into mush and send him sailing back several yards. I scrambled drunkenly after him, only half-believing my eyes. "You know this guy?" Cyrus demanded as I knelt beside the limp form.