Titus flailed as if in mid-seizure. He gritted his teeth in a silent scream until the force of his will could no longer stop me, and he collapsed facedown at my feet.
Then every particle of energy within a forty-foot radius obeyed my call. The beasts beyond Titus also hit the ground, jerking and shrieking. Every bit of the surrounding energy flew to me. It hit me all at once, like a crashing wave of water, crushing me with massive force.
I fell to my knees with a scream, unable to withstand the pressure suffocating me. I couldn’t hold it.
Finally, the weight passed through me, and I gasped for breath. I surveyed the damage while pulling in ragged breaths. The beasts lay still on the ground, and Titus lay dead at my feet. The blood-soaked patch of dirt alongside the highway glowed with magic energy. My attention shifted to the downed beasts. One second, they were hideous demons; then the animals shivered with magic, and seven mutilated human bodies lay around me, drenched in blood and drained of magic.
Eight men were dead. The realization hit me with delayed horror. I killed all these people.
Fifty feet away, outside the circle of destruction, Silas stared at me, his jaw clenched and nostrils flared wide. Blood covered his shirt and soaked his sword arm. “What have you done?”
Ripper slipped from my fingers onto the ground. I bent over and retched.
Titus moaned and pushed himself to his knees. How is he still alive? He scrambled for my knife. I watched him move, unable to respond before he grabbed Ripper and stabbed it into the back of my leg. Pain flamed up my calf, and I screamed. I tried to move away, but Titus fisted my hair and dragged me upward, forcing me to hobble to my feet. He held Ripper’s edge tight against my throat, my own blood dripping from the blade. The gash in my calf burned and gushed hot blood onto my jeans.
“Resist me, and you will die,” Titus growled in my ear. He positioned me as a shield between him and Silas. His ragged breathing matched my own as he dragged me off the road and toward the police cruiser.
“Let her go, Titus!” Silas yelled, his voice carrying across the death-strewn highway.
“You’re fighting a losing battle,” Titus called back.
Silas raised the tip of his sword, shifting closer with each step. “We both know you won’t kill her,” he said. “You need her powers.”
“Are you willing to gamble her life on that?” Titus asked with a growl.
Silas shrugged. “You cocked up your Transference. Twice.”
Without warning, Titus kicked my wounded leg, and my knees buckled. I cried out and landed hard on my knees next to the officer. Radmall slumped against her steering wheel, unconscious but still breathing. Relief flooded me. I hadn’t killed her when I lost control. I latched on to that, letting it comfort me, as if her single spared life could make up for the eight I had stolen.
Titus shifted behind me, pushed the officer back into her seat, and in a sharp downward movement, thrust Ripper into her chest.
“No!” I screamed.
Her eyes popped open. She gasped, a wet gurgling sound escaping from her lungs. Her hands flailed against Titus’s grip, while blood blossomed dark and inky across her uniform. Titus ripped the blood-slicked knife from her chest. She jerked, and he buried his palm in her blood. Energy streamed from her into Titus, and his aura flared bright with the black magic.
Her head lolled to the side. She was dead.
The air began to thicken, squeezing my lungs as I fought against Titus’s grip, which tightened painfully around me. My stomach lurched as he started to pull us away with magic.
Silas ran toward us. He was half a dozen steps away, but it might as well have been miles.
The part of me that refused to die finally woke up. I threw my elbow into Titus’s face with a satisfying crunch. He grabbed me around the waist and punched me in the gut.
Silas rammed into Titus, and I ripped free of Titus’s grasp. I landed on my back just as Titus vanished the same way he had appeared.
I looked down and saw Ripper buried in my stomach. Titus hadn’t punched me; he’d stabbed me. Pain exploded everywhere, and my vision went black.
Chapter Six
I awoke in a surprisingly comfortable bed, nestled under a pastel floral comforter. A television with bunny-ear antennas rested atop a small wooden dresser, next to a round mauve lamp. Above the dresser, a generic landscape print in coordinating beiges and soft pinks hung on the wall. I was in a motel room.
The blinds on the single window were closed, but pitch black showed around the edges. A squeal and the clank of ancient plumbing in the wall caught my attention. Someone turned off a shower behind the bathroom door. Silas.
The fight resurfaced, and I remembered the terrible pain in my side before I’d blacked out. My hoodie and shirt were both shredded and stiff with dried blood and mud. Pushing aside the tattered fabric, I held my breath as I examined my stomach. But instead of a fresh gash, my wound had healed to a jagged white pucker nearly four inches long. The scar seemed months old. I touched it gingerly with my fingertips and felt no pain. I explored the torn fabric on my calf. The gash was gone, and my skin was smooth and whole. Silas must have healed me with magic the same way Titus had healed his neck in the alley.
It should have relieved me to wake up alive, but my mind went immediately to the people I’d killed. I couldn’t even remember how many there had been. Seven? Eight? A sharp pain in my chest replaced the one in my side. I was a mass murderer.
With a lurch of alarm, I thrust my hand into my jeans pocket. I sighed when my fingers closed around Marcel’s charm. I hadn’t lost it in the fight.
Silas came out of the bathroom, rubbing a towel through wet hair. The fresh scent of shampoo and soap floated across the air. His chest was bare and damp, and jeans were slung low on his hips. The bright light of the bathroom highlighted tattoos covering his arms and upper torso. The left side of his abdomen had a trail of them reaching all the way to his hip, disappearing into the waistband of his pants. Each one was an intricate, layered symbol that flowed into the next. They were almost multi-dimensional.
The muscles of his stomach flexed under naturally tan skin as he bent and pulled a shirt out of a plastic grocery bag on the floor. He threaded his arms through the sleeves, and I saw more markings across his back—scars. They were scattered and random except for a group of four lines that ran parallel across his back like lashes from a whip or claw marks. With broad shoulders that narrowed to a trim and muscular stomach, Silas was built for speed and agility. He had the physique of someone who used his body rather than the too-bulky bodybuilder muscles of a gym rat.
Something fluttered low in my belly. Get a grip.
Once he was safely dressed, I sat up on the old bed, and it squeaked.
He spun as fast as a rattlesnake. “You’re awake.”
“Thanks to your magic healing.” I cringed at myself. His abs had apparently melted my brain.
“How do you feel?” He grabbed a water bottle from the plastic bag, twisted it open, and handed it to me.
“Lucky,” I said. Without his help, I would be dead.
A pang of guilt hit me. It was wrong to feel lucky when I’d just murdered so many. All those people, naked and broken on the road. Dead.
Silas knelt at the side of the bed and pushed the tattered fabric of my shirt aside. His warm fingers examined the wound, moving gently across my skin. I drained the water bottle to cover my shiver. It was not okay to act like a schoolgirl with a crush. A nice body and a little magic healing weren’t an excuse for urges. I reminded myself that I couldn’t trust him, and he would be more than willing to hand me over to the Council if the Fate plan didn’t work out.
I searched for something to talk about that didn’t involve him touching me. “Did you use all our cash on this motel room?” My tone sounded more accusing than I’d meant it to.
He glanced at me and back at the wound. “You were bleeding to death in the back of the vehicle. I assumed you’d want me to find shelter and save your life.”
“Right,” I grumbled, feeling sheepish and irritated at the same time.
“If I were an actual Healer, you wouldn’t even have a scar.”
“You get what you pay for,” I said with a small shrug.
He gave me a confused look.
“A scar’s not so bad,” I clarified. Then because we were being way too nice to each other, I added, “You said the Brotherhood needed me alive to do the ritual thingy. But your friend Titus tried to kill me back there.”
“Titus wasn’t trying to kill you.”
“Someone should tell him that.”
“He needed a distraction so I wouldn’t follow his flare when he skimmed out.” He frowned. “It worked.”
I chose to ignore his disappointment over saving my life. “Skimmed?”
“It’s a way of traveling from one place to another. It takes a high level of magic. More so within Earth. Even I wouldn’t attempt it in this realm, yet Titus did it twice.”
I sat upright in alarm. “Are you saying he can show up anytime, anywhere?”
“He’d have to track us first. I drove over a hundred miles after I healed you so he couldn’t follow the flare. As long as neither of us start manipulating a lot of magic, they shouldn’t be able to find us.”
I let myself relax against the headboard again.
“It will be some time before he can repeat it,” Silas added. “Titus had to steal the life energy from the officer to fuel the second skim.”
Officer Radmall. I shuddered at the memory of the thin veins of magic drawing from the woman to Titus like a magnet. Then there’d been a shift of pressure before he pulled the disappearing act.
“Draining life energy requires a blood connection. That spell would get you executed in Aeterna, but without access to the Citizen Source or any magic here in Earth, their only power is likely from sacrificial magic. They’ll kill as many Mundanes as they can get away with and store their life energy.”
Titus’s aura had been black-tinged. The sacrificial magic must have been the cause of the terrible feel of the Brotherhood’s powers.
Silas shifted on the bed, his gaze suddenly intent on me. “I’ve never seen energy pulled out of someone from a distance. I did not know that was possible.”
I looked away, not sure how to respond.
“How did you do it?” he pressed.
It made me sick to think about the deaths of the beasts, who had actually been people. When I closed my eyes, I saw the events again on a never-ending loop, and my stomach lurched with remembered pain. “I wanted to stop Titus. I was just as surprised as you when... that happened.”
A ragged breath escaped as I recalled Silas’s horrified expression. When I’d killed those people and drained their power, their energy became part of me. I’d stolen it from them just like the Brotherhood had stolen their sacrificial magic. Nausea twisted my stomach.
Silas leaned in. “Tell me what happened.” He was so close that the heat of the shower came off his skin. I bit my lip.
I didn’t even know what had happened, but I tried to explain as best I could, ignoring his closeness. “I think Marcel’s memories taught me how. When they take over, I remember things from his life... it’s like he’s in my head.”
Silas’s eyes widened. I swallowed around a dry throat and scooted away from him until my back rested against the faded floral headboard.
I took a drink of the water and tried to explain. “Sometimes his memories sort of bubble up inside me. And his anger. Titus sets me off because of Marcel’s hatred toward him. They—the memories—showed me how to take Titus’s magic. I lost control and honestly didn’t know what I was doing.”
Silas’s expression got back under control, but I couldn’t tell if he believed me.
“I didn’t realize they would change back... into people,” I finished lamely.
“They were Shifters.”
“Shifters?” I realized that at some point we’d managed to stop trading questions. It was a relief just to get answers without bartering for every single one.
“Shifters, Humans, Fae. We’re each distinct enough to be our own species.” He exhaled and shrugged. “Although very few in Aeterna are only one race anymore. Those particular Shifters were Rakken. The Rakken used to be an elite unit of the Guardians, but Titus has bastardized the concept. He magically altered their Shifter forms, and if he’s following the old system, Rakken spend more time in this form than their human ones. It makes them more lethal, but also harder to control.”
“How do you know all that? Are you...”
“Am I what?”
“Human?” I suddenly wondered about his perfect physique. Maybe it was some kind of Shifter trait, and he was also one of those demonic beasts.
He laughed out loud, a sharp, sudden sound that made me jump. “Does it matter to you? Would you not have protected yourself against a Human?”
I blinked at him. I had to admit that I would have killed those men regardless of what form they were in. At that moment, I would have done anything to stop Titus and save my own life. The realization didn’t make me like myself any better. “I’m a mass murderer either way.”
“Your guilt is a good sign. When you stop caring about the deaths on your hands, you should worry for the state of your soul.”
“Are you speaking from experience?”
“I’ve lost count of the deaths I’ve caused,” he said matter-of-factly.
A little spiral of fear curled up my spine.
“Battles, challenges, executions—it blurs together, eventually. More blood than is justifiable across multiple lifetimes. But I still care. Or I tell myself I do.” He rubbed his forearm, lost in his own thoughts for a moment. “I am Human, by the way. But I have a brother who is half-Fae and many Shifters I call friends.”
We were both silent for a long moment as I pondered the definition of humanity. Maybe I’d lost a little of my humanity for having taken so many lives. But even Silas, who admitted to so much blood on his hands, maintained his own sense of right and wrong. Humanity was complicated.
I twisted my hair back into a quick braid, but the memory of the dead bodies wouldn’t pass. “I didn’t mean to kill them.”
“The Brotherhood are trying to kill you.” His hand rested briefly on mine, and the intensity of his expression pulled me in. “The way you protected yourself was scary as bloody, fratching hells, but you need not carry guilt for your actions.”
He held my gaze. The distance between us seemed to shrink, and I wondered if I had misread him all along. Father Mike had said he was dangerous, an enforcer for the Council’s will. But he was also uniquely qualified to understand the guilt I felt. He talked about all the death he had caused then comforted me almost in the same breath.
“This is a lot to take in,” I said, gesturing broadly in the air. “Last week, my biggest problem was whether I’d make enough rent each month. I pulled under-the-counter shifts to make ends meet, and volunteered at the shelter to give back when I could. It wasn’t glamorous, but I liked my life.” I sighed. “I just, I can’t believe I’m here, talking about... Shifters... and magic like it’s real.”
“Magic is real,” he countered, not unkindly.
I sighed and picked at the label on the water bottle. “Yeah. I figured that one out on my own.”
“You truly have no family to... help you? Support you?”
“It’s just me. I basically grew up at the shelter. A bunch of foster families before that. Father Mike is the closest thing I have to family.”
I wondered if he’d already made it back to the Aeternal Council and made his report. I had no idea how long it took to travel to a magic pocket realm, but I hoped he was working on his promise to find me again. I needed someone I could trust on my side.
“I don’t mind, honestly,” I said. “I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself, and I don’t need pity because I’m a sad, lonely orphan. My life hasn’t been like that.”
“I don’t p
ity you,” he offered. “It takes strength of character to find your own path.”
I swallowed thickly. “More personal experience?”
His mouth twisted wryly. “I have, on occasion, forged my own path. But no, I was talking about you. The way one handles unexpected challenges reveals a lot about their innate character.” He was completely focused on me, and the nearness of him suddenly seemed totally overwhelming.
I wrinkled my nose and quoted, “‘Life’s a bitch, and then you die.’”
He blinked at me then let out a loud laugh. The sudden noise broke the tension building in my chest, and I grinned back.
“And then you die,” he agreed. The corners of his eyes wrinkled with rare humor. His face was close, and his hair was damp and tousled from the shower. I had the urge to run my fingers through it.
I swung my feet off the bed. Time to escape to the bathroom.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“I need a shower. I look like I was dragged through at least a mile of mud.” Not to mention the dried blood and shredded clothing stuck to my skin. But mostly, I needed to get away from whatever kept fluttering in my stomach in response to Silas.
His mouth twisted downward. “You need to rest.”
“I feel fine.” My side didn’t hurt, my leg had healed, and I was full of energy. I just needed to get away from temptation.
“You’re not tired?” Silas frowned, and I imagined sucking his full lower lip between my teeth.
Stop it.
“Better than ever,” I insisted.
“I expected you to be unconscious for longer. Recovery from a healing usually takes hours, sometimes a full day.” He glanced at the clock. “It’s been less than five hours. Are you feeling any other effects?”
Surely, I’d imagined the way his voice had dropped. Other side effects? Check. Shrugging, I focused on a shower. A cold one.
His signature grimace crossed his face, but he let me pass. “I purchased you new clothing with the money in your backpack.” He pointed at the shopping bag on the floor. “But if you consider it a misappropriation of funds and you’d prefer to go about naked—”
Fate Forged Page 6