Mob Sorcery 2 - Ch1

If you're here before Mob Sorcery launches on Amazon, the chapters for Book 1 are under the title "Lowlife Enforcer." Use the UFFantasy tag on Patreon to find them all together. They'll be deleted once the book goes live on Kindle Unlimited due to Amazon's exclusivity requirements.

A quick note before we start. I'm writing this series as a sort of "Patreon serial", so this chapter starts off immediately following the previous chapter. In the eventual book 2 release, there'll be a bunch of edits to the opening chapters (particularly this one) to adjust the opening for the book audience. The changes will mostly be minor, such as starting a little later in this chapter or adding extra narration to remind readers of stuff from Book 1.

Chapter 31

Dinner ended up being steak, and pricey ones at that to make up for what Nicki missed out on. With two carnivores and a harpy eager to dig into as much meat as possible, the waiter handed them a bill eagerly. No doubt he keenly awaited the immense tip that would accompany the absurdly expensive meal.

Fia and Nina took pity on Vince and argued over who would pay the bill, but left him to pony up for the tip. If the Lionettis weren’t paying him well, he’d be grumpy about even that. He could feed himself for days on the tip alone.

With Nina around, Nicki beat an early retreat rather than try to fly Vince home. Fia offered her a ride home. Despite claiming to dislike cars earlier, Nicki took the wolf up on her offer.

That left him to ride home with the lion, and once home, they did some more riding.

Come morning, he might have wanted to do even more.

“Vince, quit it, I need to get ready for work,” Nina whined as she tried to climb out of his bed.

“Work from home,” he said, holding her around the waist as she pretended to try to escape his clutches.

“Very funny. The surveillance shit on my work laptop would notice you railing me.” She pushed him down on the bed. “Down, boy. I’ll be back tonight. Be a good boy, just like I had to be a good girl all weekend.”

“You were not a good girl. The entire reason we’re sleeping together is how upset you got on Saturday because I didn’t spend the day with you.”

She huffed and stalked out of the room, tail lashing back and forth. A great opportunity to admire her ass.

Unfortunately, he only realized his mistake when the water started running. He cursed and rushed into the bathroom. Nina tilted her head at him, midway through lathering up her obscenely long hair.

“I thought you banned shower sex?” she asked.

“I did. There’s only enough hot water for one shower in the morning, and I’m sticky as hell.”

Vince managed to squeeze in a shower around the handsy lioness, mostly by offering her his share of the hot water tonight.

Afterward, Nina retreated to her room to dress, and he decided to be nice and make some breakfast.

After poking around in the fridge and cupboards, he found some waffle mix and their battered waffle iron. They lacked maple syrup for some reason, even the fake kind, but had honey, cream, milk, and even eggs. So he thickened the premade mix with some milk and eggs, put it in the iron once it had preheated, and waited for the first one to cook.

“You’re making waffles when I need to get to work,” Nina grumbled as she wandered into the main room, fiddling with a pair of white gold amethyst earrings.

She was back in her office lady attire, wearing a matching charcoal suit jacket and pencil skirt. Her bust spilled out from her white business shirt, although Vince knew she buttoned it up tightly at work. She’d bitched like crazy once about being told off for being “too sexual” simply for having some buttons undone. A pair of sheer black pantyhose covered her long legs, but she remained barefoot for now.

“You usually don’t get in until nine,” he said, glancing at his phone to confirm that it was well before 8AM.

Sure, she had some travel time, but Nina’s office was right on the subway line. That was the entire reason they still lived here, as it reduced her commute to under thirty minutes, including walking.

“Everyone else has been doing overtime over the weekend. I should get in early and catch up,” she said.

Then she let out a loud sniff and stopped dead while looking at her shoes on the rack in the corner. Her tail whipped back and forth, low to the ground and her ears perked up.

“Waffles,” he whispered in an exaggerated tone.

“Oh, shut up,” Nina muttered, her ears drooping. “I’m whooping your ass if I get chewed out for not getting in early.”

“Aren’t they going to bitch you out for not coming in this weekend anyway?”

She flounced on the couch and kicked her feet up. “Probably. Fucking hell, why do I still do this stupid job? Going back to the Prefect’s Lounge and chilling with Fia reminded me…”

“Reminded you of what?” he pressed.

“Of why I enjoyed being an enforcer.” She sighed. “Unfortunately, it also reminded me of why I got out. The killing part is a real bummer after a while. Nothing like dealing with a furious teenager fighting for her life, and you know that your job is to murder her and everyone she knows and loves.”

Vince said nothing, He continued making the waffles, ensuring they both had one. At the same time, he started prepping coffee for both of them using their crappy coffee maker.

What could he say to her when it came to this topic, of all things?

Just as Nina had flown far above him in the world of enforcers, she took jobs he never got offered.

No, he realized. He’d been offered exactly that job last night. Gawlik had asked Vince to do what Nina had refused to.

And, much to Vince’s frustration, he wondered if he’d accept that job for the amount of money that Nina likely walked away from.

“Kaziern offered me a job like that,” he said while serving up the waffles.

“I heard. Retirement money.” Nina ran a hand through her hair. “I’m guessing you mean in the million-plus range?”

“I never specifically asked, but Gawlik made it clear that I wouldn’t need to worry about working as an enforcer again. Hearing the actual figure might have been too much for me.”

She nodded. “I get it. Money makes us do fucking stupid things. Like stick with an awful fucking job with awful bosses in an awful office, when I have a new boyfriend that wants to fuck like rabbits all week.”

“I think I’d break if we did it all week.” He handed her a plate and settled next to her.

They ate in a comfortable silence for a few minutes.

“Nothing seems to have really changed between us. Other than the sex.” He frowned. “And showering together. We’ll need to sort out the hot water situation properly.”

“I’m game to shower together all the time,” she purred while curling his hair with one finger.

“My point?”

She huffed and let go of his hair. “We’ve been close for years, Vince. And getting closer. Honestly, I kind of expected this to happen because one of us got drunk and we just fucked.”

“But neither of us ever made a move.”

No answer. Well, he didn’t have a good response either.

“I… liked how stable things were,” she admitted after taking a sizeable bite of her waffle.

With hers nearly finished, she eyed his half-finished plate. He pushed his across, and she took a hefty chunk of his waffle.

“I think we were both that way. It’s kind of hard being the guy running behind on rent and still a fraction of the enforcer you were,” he said, staring at the blank TV.

“You downplay yourself too hard. It’s why you’ve been doing shit gigs for Quintus until now.”

“Remind me again who tried to scare me away from this current job?”

“Remind me again who made the news for fucking with the cops, got confronted by two power players in the city last night, and is up to their neck in weird city politics?”

Vince rubbed the back of his neck. “It’s a good paying job.”

“Only so long as you don’t get fined into oblivion. I strongly recommend leaning on your wolfy ‘boss’ after you pull all this shit off and getting some backpay. The fact you haven’t hired a bunch of other goons to help you tells me that you’re way underpaid for this.”

“That’s normal for this sort of job?” he asked, and winced at the look she gave him.

“Abso-fucking-lutely, Vince. Most people can’t pull a dragon out of their hat and nuke a company load of enforcers, even if they could punk you one-one-one.” Nina flicked his nose. “So don’t talk yourself down. I can suplex you through the planet but I wouldn’t pull the stunts you have against such large numbers. It’s a numbers game, and that includes your paycheck.”

He bit his lip. “You have a huge whack of savings tucked away from your old enforcer work, don’t you?”

She snorted. “Huge? Hell no. I spent like fucking crazy, Vince. Work hard, play hard. Lots of drinking, tipping lots, expensive infusions and gear. Plus, difficult jobs required expensive planning and sometimes hiring other people, like I just told you. Police fines still sucked. I have money tucked away, but even after five years salaried, I’m nowhere close to a house deposit. Everything costs stupid amounts here.”

“Right. Sorry.”

She hit him in the arm. “You should be. Fuck, to think the only reason we haven’t been together all these years is that you wanted to be the breadwinner. Now you might be, with these mafia wolfgirls keen to throw cash at you. Like I said, talk to that boss of yours once this is all over.”

“I still need to finish the job without getting fined into oblivion or murdered by the Golden…” He froze.

The temperature of the room dropped several degrees. Which was impressive given neither of them knew water or ice magic.

“Vince…” Nina said slowly.

“Houou’s backing Kaziern. You should have realized,” he muttered.

“I already knew.” She huffed again and glowered at him. “Just wondered when you’d admit it. I still have contacts across the city, you know? Independent enforcers and corporate. One of them asked me about you.”

He gulped. “And?”

“I told her not to be in the squad that responds to you. She got the message.”

Vince wasn’t sure if he got the message. “Nina, you’re not registered—”

“Shut up. I’m allowed to help you. We’re… well, I don’t know if we’re dating or what we call it. Partners?”

“That sounds like we’re a crime-fighting duo.”

“We could be.”

“Nina—”

“Oh, shut up, Vince, and let me eat your waffle.” She did, in fact, eat the rest of his waffle. “Anyway, nothing’s changing between us. Yet. You’re hotter stuff with others than I thought, though. That was annoying before, but I like it now. I can only imagine what the pride might end up including.” She slumped against him and purred.

Then almost immediately shot to her feet. “Shit, I need to get to work.”

Once Nina left, Vince cleaned up and checked his messages.

Only one, and it was from Nicki, asking if he was staying home today. He told her to go to her regular job.

Which left him to his own devices, and he puttered about the apartment while considering what those were. Cleaning allowed him to sort through the events of the past few days and his objectives. He also put together a shopping list and sent that off to Nina, as she’d be able to pick everything up on the way home.

Damn, he felt domestic already. No work for a day and he turned into the model house-husband. He really needed to convince Nina to stay home more often.

Hell, why was he so against her getting involved in his enforcer work? He spent all his time needling her about how unhappy she was with work, but when she tried to pick up her gauntlet again, he pushed back.

Was he the problem here?

By the time he finished cleaning the place up, his mind had cleared.

He’d captured one of three locations his job required, and needed to seize the remaining two. To do so, he needed to take them both in one night, or else all hell would break loose. Either the police would get him, or the Golden Path would.

Moving before the conference officially started was unwise, due to the increased police presence. So he’d lay low for a few days. No doubt Alessia or Fia would give him a heads up once Albion had quietened down.

Sure, he could fuck around for a few days, but he’d bumped against his limits recently. His duels with Pola had been closer than they should be given her relative incompetence at magic. She relied entirely on brute force and hadn’t even used a magic focus, yet had kept him on the backfoot in both fights.

Not to mention that fight with Juliet.

Vince had fought immortals before. Every demon he slew counted as one, but they came in all shapes and sizes. While he lacked much knowledge in demonology, experience had taught Vince that large amounts of fire magic worked pretty well against demons. At least, it did against the weaker ones.

But a vampire? He barely knew where to start.

Rumors about how to kill them, their weaknesses, and their origins were a mess across the net. Googling them told him everything and nothing.

Hell, some of the more conspiratorial rumors in enforcer circles were that the more powerful vampires intentionally spread misinfo about their own kind. As with all things magical, the more one knew about it, the easier it was to fight. Mages hoarded secrets, demons used the legal system to protect themselves, and vampires ran online troll farms.

Not that there were all that many vampires. The one myth Vince and everyone else knew was false was that being bitten by a vampire turned one into a vampire. They didn’t even run blood banks, although they did apparently consume blood, even if Juliet had used some form of magic to “feast” as she called it.

So with a vampire after him, Vince needed to dig up some new magic to defend himself. He had enough infusions to keep him going for a while, but worried about his fundamentals. Things would only get worse once the Golden Path struck. They’d potentially send in enforcers as capable as Nina.

His dragon was his trump card, but if he couldn’t cast it in time, he’d be dead meat. Fia had pointed out that his weakness was melee. Vince relied too heavily on his barrier and just standing back while taking everyone else out with powerful spells. Even against Juliet, he’d needed somebody to buy him time.

He needed to buckle down and learn an actual melee spell. Not put in a couple hours of study and ignore it afterward, but truly dedicate the next several days to spellcraft.

His decision made, he got ready to leave. Learning a new spell involved practicing it over and over, and it often fizzled out. A failed fire magic spell could burn down the apartment. No way he’d practice here.

Right before he left, his phone buzzed with a message from Nina.

I got some stupid talking to about how I lack “team spirit” because I didn’t come in over the weekend. None of the others who stayed home got that talk, Nina said. Maybe I should be job hopping. It can’t be worse than here.

He sent back some sympathetic messages. The lack of emojis or gifs in her message suggested Nina was genuinely upset, and not just venting. This week would be a hard one.

Maybe he should hide the beer, but she’d just buy more. At the very least, he’d need to keep her from hitting it too hard.

After leaving, he wandered along the quiet streets by the tenements he lived in. A nearby bus stop took him to where he wanted to be, after a longer trip than he preferred. The bus was as rundown as one might expect. The advertising slapped on the outside looked pristine, while the bus sputtered, and the interior TVs recommending ambulance chasers probably saw more maintenance than the engine.

He alighted at a park after a good while. While Aulfair possessed a beautiful waterfront and some scenic plazas, the outer edges of the city remained a concrete jungle. Public greenery took some getting to.

Even so, this park had always proved useful to Vince. It centered on a natural lake and contained the last remnants of the old forests that the city had replaced. Some old pines separated the larger picnic areas from the quiet space.

He ignored the families and joggers out for the morning and made his way into those pines. A brass statue of three sorcerers and a pair of dragons towered over him as he passed it. He vaguely recalled their names from history lessons in school.

The founders of Aulfair, supposedly. Three long dead sorcerers, and a pair of dragons. Vince knew one of the dragons still lived here, lording it up in his castle outside the city. The other had vanished decades ago. Nobody knew where she’d gone.

Well, somebody probably did. Dragons didn’t vanish. Especially not around the same time that Immanuel rocked up.

Once secreted away behind some trees, Vince sat on a bench and began scrolling through the old fire magic reference book on his phone.

“Man, this thing is terrible,” he grumbled. “Maybe I should buy a new one.”

Learning a new spell broke down into a few steps. First, he needed to find the spell he wanted or come up with a clear image for his own. In order to cast any spell, he needed to know what the result would be. Without that, he might as well just pray for divine intervention.

Second, he needed to learn how to cast the spell. This might take a few minutes to a few hours depending on the complexity.

Sure, summoning a blade of fire around his arm sounded easy, but so much could go wrong. What if he replaced his arm with fire? Or summoned a jet of flames that torched the trees around him?

His experience with fire magic left him relatively confident that the trees would remain safe. He’d done most of his dragon spell training here, although he’d cast it the first time around non-flammable stuff.

The third step involved tweaking the spell and nailing down his mental image and incantation. These steps needed to be done at the same time, as he needed to ensure he was casting the correct version of the spell. An incantation was the best method of nailing down the spell.

Every time he modified the spell for some minor reason, he needed to change the incantation. He’d gone through a lot of incantations for his fire cage while trying to make its size adjustable. Some books he’d read advised leaving the incantation until later for this reason, but he felt this made the learning process harder.

Finally, practice. Cast the spell over, and over, and over, and over, until he ran dry. Then do it again. Day after day, for months, ideally.

Vince had found no substitute for hard work when it came to reducing incantation speed. When he’d first learned his meister-tier spell, casting it took over ten minutes. Getting it down to thirty seconds took a solid month between jobs. He’d wanted to get it down to fifteen seconds.

Spells also required mental upkeep. He questioned if he could have cast his dragon spell without his fancy new focus.

Hell, he worried about relying on the cane when learning spells. It would speed things up, but might cripple him if he tried casting spells without it.

This was the hellish process Vince needed to put himself through over the next few days in order to learn some sort of melee spell. Or something to protect himself against a fast and strong opponent like Pola or Nina.

While he lost himself in thought, his phone buzzed. He saw that Fia was the sender.

Where are you at? she asked.

Brushing up on magic for the rest of the job, he sent back.

You didn’t answer my question. Alessia wants to talk. Also, I might be able to help. I think both of us could brush up on our magic after that little tiff with the vamp.

That was true, and if Alessia needed to talk, he assumed Fia planned to give him a ride. He sent her his location, then turned back to studying.

Twenty minutes later, while buried deep in a video demonstrating a portable flame shield spell, he got surprised by something hot being pressed against his cheek. He reached for his cane reflexively.

Then he saw Fia smirking at him, two takeaway coffees in hand and what looked like a bag of pastries sticking out from her handbag. She dressed a little differently than usual. Cuter, with a violet cardigan beneath her black coat.

“You don’t plan to learn that spell, do you?” she asked, turning her nose up at the video he was watching.

“Something like it might be useful. A mixed defense and offense spell that won’t get in the way,” he said.

She clicked her tongue and sat next to him. He took one coffee while she unpacked the pastries. Cinnamon rolls. The sort covered with a diabetic-inducing amount of frosting.

“Are you eating both of those?” he asked.

“I will if you won’t take one.”

He took one before she wolfed both down. “Is there any vice you don’t indulge in? Drugs, cigarettes, sweets, alcohol, sex—”

“The last one,” she said drily. Her ears twitched and her tail hit him in the back. “I’m not an easy girl. Too much to worry about to date, and fucking random guys seems pointless.”

“Same reasoning as why you need your job to mean something?”

Fia paused, mouth open in front of her roll. Then she closed it and twirled the pastry. “I’ve never thought of it that way. Maybe. I had my wild days, I’ll admit. A lot of wolves do. Except Pola and Alessia, I guess. The princesses are untouchable, except by their own hands.”

“Um…”

“Yes, I meant it that way.” She smirked. “But there’s an allure to the idea of waking up in somebody else’s bed, in their arms, and knowing that they’re your mate. Not just some guy you fucked because you were horny, but the real deal.”

“You’re a soulmate girl?”

“I believe in love, or at least that I can like somebody for a hell of a lot more than chiseled abs and a square jaw.”

Vince felt out the shape of his jaw. His jaw felt squarish, he supposed.

Chiseled abs he did not have, however. He blew people up with fireballs rather than hurl them into the sun.

Fia shoved him. “For a guy who ignored Pola the other day and fell straight into the arms of his lion roommate, you’re awfully flirty.”

“I’m a fire mage. I can’t help but turn the heat up wherever I go.”

“Yeah, like that.” She looked at him with lidded eyes. “But if you were really interested, you’d have done something.”

“Am I not doing something now?”

“Pola is sufficiently unrailed and very pissy about that fact. I don’t think she understands where she went wrong, no matter how much I tried to explain that not everyone appreciates being treated like a piece of meat.” Fia paused. “Also, I guarantee you that your next ‘job offer’ is probably going to be taking her on dates.”

“I’m an enforcer.”

“You’re the first guy Pola has shown genuine interest in. Alessia will drown you in money to get you to return that interest.”

He nodded slowly. “I can accept being drowned in money. Is that what Alessia wants to talk to me about?”

Fia rolled her eyes. “No.” She paused and bit her lip. “Maybe. She’s sufficiently disconcerted by the possibility one of the branch families is working with Kaziern and that the lions have deep enough pockets to afford one of the priciest assassins in the city just to eliminate you.”

“I’m not dead yet. Can’t say I’m used to an employer who might renegotiate a contract in my favor, though.”

“Everyone who fights Juliet either dies or ditches the contract,” she said flatly.

“Alessia put some awful teeth in the contract if I cancel,” Vince said. “Not to mention all the money I already spent. Pola would skin me alive.”

“Based on what I saw yesterday, she’d bump into the wall that is Immanuel.” Fia flicked his nose, causing him to recoil. “I don’t think you’ll bail, but debt is better than death. Alessia’s the cautious sort. She’s also very aware that her deal with you doesn’t require you to lift a finger if, say, Kaziern attacks Lionetti Tower or one of the branch families attempts a coup.”

Well, shit. He had to admit he hadn’t thought of that.

If Fia hadn’t told him, he would have happily defended the Lionetti’s turf for free.

Which caused him to narrow his eyes. “Why are you providing me advice like this? If Alessia wants to meet me to discuss business, you should be helping her convince me to do it for as little as possible.”

A smirk rose to her face. “Oh? Is that what you think my role is? I think you’re confused. My role is twofold: to be a capo and to act as your handler. The former is about bossing around other enforcers and operating parts of the family’s criminal businesses. What do you think the latter is about?”

“Helping me take out Kaziern?”

“Yes, but no.” She shook her head with a sigh. “I wonder if anyone listens to what I say, honestly. This job is about building a long-term relationship. I want you to run with us after all is said and done. It’s Alessia’s problem to handle money, and mine to handle you. So, let’s go for a ride and see the boss.”

- - - - -

Commentary: So, this block of chapters went through multiple iterations. It's been quite painful to work through and I haven't worked out exactly why. When I decided to commit to a book release, I needed a place to actually end the book, so made some changes to suit that (and also add some action to a really dry period in the story). But this meant I needed to edit stuff I'd already written, and I also wasn't entirely happy with how smoothly things were going. Kaziern really felt like a "starter villain" in a videogame, where Vince just vaporizes them, and that really makes the Lionettis a bit of a joke.

There'll also be a fair bit of time for Fia. Nina actually takes a backseat for much of the first third of the book, due to the focus on the Lionettis. She still plays an important role, though.

Anyway, we're working back through these. I expect there'll be about 10-12 chapters before I cut over to Spellblade.