Free Maps, Artifacts, and Other Arcane Magic (Dowser Series Book 5) by Meghan Ciana Doidge

you’ve been liberal with it tonight.”
    Ah, yes. If it couldn’t be about blood for the vampire, then it was all about magic. I wasn’t a hundred percent sure sex was even the same thing for vampires as it was for the rest of us. I was betting it was a combination of sucking and mind games. Pleasant mind games, but feeding nevertheless.
    “I have no idea where to start looking for her,” I said. I was becoming skilled at thinking about more than one thing at a time. Or maybe I was just obsessed about the map. It wasn’t every day that I met my immortal demigod father, then discovered that objects existed with which he could be murdered. Objects I was tasked to collect and return to the safety of the guardians.
    Though destroying them would obviously be a better idea. However, Warner was being stonewalled over that particular notion by Pulou.
    “She took the map deliberately?” Kett asked.
    “Yeah, I think so. Though it might have just been a bargaining chip … to get her hands on my knife.”
    “Or she wants the next item.”
    “Maybe she thinks it contains enough power that she can use it to facilitate her transformation further.”
    “Anything that could kill a guardian would have to be that powerful.”
    “But I’m not sure she can access that magic, being a dragon. Though I obviously haven’t laid hands on the next item myself. And none of this explains what she was doing in the Bahamas in the first place. The statue appeared to be of an adult woman, not a kid.”
    Kett offered this conundrum his version of a shrug — a slight lift of one shoulder. The motivations of others weren’t something that particularly interested the vampire. He was all about end results. I gathered that held true for vamps in general. The ‘why’ was boring to ancient immortals. Only the final prize was worth their time.
    “I just figured out how to read the map,” I said. “But I barely got a glance.”
    “A glance will do,” Kett said.
    “Oh, yeah?” I asked, smiling at his confidence. “What do you propose to do with a glance? It didn’t come with much detail. Just part of a landmass.”
    “We only need a general location. We have a powerful dowser for the rest.”
    “We’d still have to get the map out of my head. I doubt I could draw it with any accuracy. We could go to the far seer, but …”
    “That might take months.”
    “Yeah, and every time he touches me …” I didn’t finish my thought. Kett wasn’t the right person to talk about the future with. Time meant little to him. Or it meant everything … I wasn’t totally sure, actually. But it didn’t scare him in the least. I’d get no empathy from an immortal being whose very existence thwarted destiny … twice.
    Kett brushed his fingers lightly against the inside of my left wrist again. The cool kiss of his peppermint magic filled my mouth. That was all the comfort he had to give, and I’d take every last taste of it.
    “The map,” I said, forcing myself to refocus.
    “San Francisco.”
    “Sorry?”
    “There is an amplifier in San Francisco who will help me catch a glimpse of the map in your mind.”
    “Why not just take me to a reader?”
    “Someone powerful enough to get through your innate ability to shield your thoughts is not someone to trust.”
    “That’s some big condemnation coming from a vampire.”
    Kett inclined his head. “An elder of the Conclave,” he said with a twist of a smile.
    “Oh? A seat at the table, hey?” I wasn’t sure if Kett was actually happy about this appointment or not. I know that Scarlett had refused a seat on the witches’ Convocation for many years, though that might be more about her turbulent relationship with Gran rather than a concern over being mired in bureaucracy. Maybe Kett had similar concerns about his grandsire and paperwork.
    “So I introduce you as ‘elder’ now? Not executioner?”
    “I’m still the latter, but you should never have need to introduce me.”
    Right,