Kate Daniels 04.5 - Magic Dreams

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    “Magic Dreams” previously appeared in
Hexed
, published by Berkley Books.
    This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
    MAGIC DREAMS
    An Ace eSpecial / published by arrangement with Ilona Andrews, Inc.
    PUBLISHING HISTORY
    Ace eSpecial edition / July 2012
    Copyright (c) 2011 by Andrew Gordon and Ilona Gordon.
    Excerpt from
Gunmetal Magic
by Ilona Andrews copyright (c) 2012 by Andrew Gordon and Ilona Gordon.
    All rights reserved.
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    a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,
    375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.
    ISBN: 978-1-101-59255-7
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I PEERED THROUGH the windshield of my ‘93 Mustang. The Buzzard Highway stretched before me, a narrow line of crumbling pavement vanishing into the dusk. Below it ran the Scratches, a twisted labyrinth of narrow ravines gouged out of the ground by magic three decades ago, when our world began to end. The old road skimmed the top of the ravines, rolling far into the distance, where the sunset glowed gold, red, and finally turquoise. There was something vaguely wrong with this picture, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.
    The Buzzard Highway took no prisoners. Step too hard on the accelerator, turn the wheel half an inch too far, and
Boom! Pow!
Fiery crash! To the bottom of the ravine you went. Only Atlanta’s best and craziest raced here.
    That’s why I liked it. When a girl weighs a hundred pounds soaking wet, her glasses are thicker than Sherlock Holmes’s loupe, and everybody under the sun makes fun of her because she’s a vegetarian and blood makes her vomit, she has to do
something
to prove that she isn’t a wimp. The wild, deafening chaos of the Friday-night Buzzard race was a strictly no-wimps-allowed kind of fun.
    It was so peaceful now. So quiet. Just me and the Mustang. I had named it Rambo. It was a sweet car, built from the ground up for one purpose: to go fast. We understood each other, Rambo and I. Rambo liked to kick ass, and I made sure it had a chance to show off.
    My body was so light. It was an odd feeling, almost like I was swimming or floating through some feathery cloud.
    A familiar face appeared in the windshield: pale skin, dark eyes, the long tattoo of a dragon wrapped around his neck, snaking its way down under the blue tank top. Kasen. Decent enough guy as wererats went. He operated a tow truck and liked to hang out and watch the races at Buzzard Highway. They were good for his business.
    Kasen’s lips moved, but no sound came out. He looked kind of funny there, sideways, flapping his lips in silence. What is it you want, silly person?
    Kasen was
sideways
.
    The sunset behind him was sideways, too, the highway