“Took you long enough,” Nikolai muttered. He was sitting across from her, just the low flames of a long-burning campfire between them.
Her entire body recoiled. She jerked herself upright, her feet scrabbling, kicking paths through the soil, before wobbling unsteadily to her feet. The world seemed to be spinning, and Jun reached for a tree, nearly stumbling into the peeling bark as her balance slanted.
The light from the fire didn’t quite reach his face, casting him in shadow. “Don’t bother, I’ll just chase you down.”
She tried anyway. One step back, and then a few more when she found her legs could support her weight.
“You really think you can outrun me?”
A guy his size? Not likely, but there was a chance she could lose him in the dark. She turned. The trees around her were barely visible. She wasn’t a few feet away before her arm was grabbed.
“Get off me!” She yanked back to no avail, his grip as unrelenting as a bear trap. “Please, just let me go.” She was forcibly returned to the fire’s edge.
“Are we going to sit down and talk, or are we going to do this the hard way?”
“What’s the hard way?” She continued to tug against his hold until his next words.
“The other method involves burying you.”
Jun stilled.
At her nod, Nikolai dropped his hold. Jun glared into the fire as she sat, holding her knees. Burying her? What did that even mean? Was he just going to kill her? Or bury her alive? The guy didn’t even have a shovel. “What do you want with me?”
Nikolai returned to the log across the fire where he had been before. “I’m still figuring that out. Depends on how you answer the next questions.”
She nodded, slow and reluctant.
“Can you tell me about your midterm?”
What? Was this some kind of a joke? “I wrote a paper comparing different business models.”
“What happened when you turned it in?”
Jun blinked a few times, finally meeting his eyes across the fire. “Regular class was cancelled. We just dropped off the papers.”
“Then why was yours marked fifteen minutes late?”
How the hell did he know that? What exactly was he getting at? “I dropped it in a puddle on the way to class. I had to go home and reprint it.”
Sparks and ash puffed out as he prodded the remaining fire. “What happened to students with late papers?”
“Cartwright had this policy, turn in the paper late and he would have taken off forty percent. I was going to lose my scholarship. I’d have to drop out or take on debt that I’d probably never be able to pay back.”
This seemed to get his attention, his stare unwavering. “Were you angry at him?”
“No. I wasn’t angry. I don’t know, I was sort of panicked.”
“And this was right before the earthquake, right?”
The way he said it was like he knew. There was no lying now. “I suppose it was.”
“So you were there with him when it happened?”
She recalled Professor Cartwright, his paper-thin skin with tiny blue veins around his hard eyes that were looking down at her as the door closed. Seconds later was the earthquake. He couldn’t have been a few feet away. When she saw him next, his body was unmoving, a corpse spread out on his desk. She closed her eyes from the image of it. “Well, not exactly. He was in his office.”
“Can you tell me about a different time you were that panicked?”
Maybe it was because her dying professor was still in her thoughts or the entire pointless question, but it made her bristle. “I don’t know? What does this have to do with anything?”
“Think.”
It was easier to stare at the low flames than at him as she thought. When was the last time? She hadn’t been that panicked in years. It was hard to remember, partially because a lot of those times were unpleasant memories buried in the hopes to be forgotten. She went through her high school years. Back amongst those linoleum floors and buzzing fluorescent lights. Surrounded by rows of scratched lockers and smudged whiteboards. The memory struck with all of the fury of teenage hormones. Four years later, it was still strong enough to make Jun’s cheeks flush. “It’s stupid.”
Nikolai said nothing, his look expectant, and Jun sighed. “It wasn’t actually anything serious. I just…” Jun trailed off. She took a deep breath, not wanting to be murdered for her silence. “I realized that I had blood” —her face felt even hotter— “on my pants.”
“Whose was it?”
She shook her head. Forget about being murdered, now she was hoping the earth would open and swallow her whole so she wouldn’t have to say any more. Despite the fact that it was just the two of them, Jun lowered her voice. “It was mine.”
“You were panicked because you had hurt yourself?”
How could a guy be this willfully dense? “No, it was just a stupid mistake. I sort of lost track of time.” She took one look at his blank face and realized he really was in fact going to make her say it. “Of the month.”
“Oh.” It took him a full second before it actually hit. “Oh.” He shifted on his log and looked away from her for the first time since the start of the conversation.
Jun looked away as well and wondered if it would feel better if she was simply struck dead now.
“What happened after?” He made a fruitless gesture. “You know.”
“No one noticed because right after the power went out in the school and we had the rest of the day off.”
“Really, now? Did the power go off frequently?”
Jun frowned in thought. “I guess. At least once a year.”
“Then can you tell me about another time the power went out?”
There was the time it went off right as a guy ran into the girls’ locker room as they were changing for gym. The ensuing chaos and shrieking in the dark brought their gym teacher in, who everyone suspected was a perv, but she wasn’t going to embarrass herself any further. It took another few moments for her to dig further. “Students a few grades above me were fighting in the halls. They were getting violent and a few others got hurt trying to stop them. Not even the teacher could stop them. Luckily the power went off when it did.”
“Uh-huh. And did anything worse than the power going out happen while you were at school?”
There had been worse. “Yeah, maybe some old ceiling tiles broke, but it was an old building. Things needed to be replaced decades ago.”
“All of those accidents and not once did you think that maybe it wasn’t a coincidence?”
Jun hesitated, caught off guard. “What do you mean?”
“That every time you were panicked, something happened,” Nikolai said with complete seriousness, a weight in every word. “To get you out of that situation.”
“Hold on. You think I had anything to do with those black outs? The earthquake? You can’t be serious. Those incidents weren’t related to me at all. I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
“All right, then tell me a time that the power went off when you weren’t panicked.”
Okay. A time that the power went off when she wasn’t panicked. The fact that she couldn’t think of a single time, that didn’t mean anything. There had to be one. She reached into her pockets for her lucky charm, her fingers seeking out the soft textures that would soothe away the thoughts racing through her. Her pockets were empty. It must have fallen out during the kidnapping, or it was lost at the bottom of the lake. She couldn’t think of a time when there was an accident around her and she wasn’t panicked. Not one. But that didn’t mean what he suggested. She was unlucky, that was all it meant. Right?
Jun’s heart started beating faster, and she hugged her arms tight against her chest to stop their shaking. There had to be a time. She just couldn’t think right now. Trapped here, with the man who tried to kill her, being forced to think over the worst things ever to happen in her life, of course she was having trouble thinking calmly. Just be
cause she couldn’t come up with anything right on the spot didn’t mean that it didn’t happen.
Nikolai kicked dirt over the remnants of the fire, putting it out. He seemed to have reached a conclusion when she was unable to answer him. Now he stalked closer.
No. She was going to answer. She just needed more time to think it over.
“That earthquake wasn’t the first time people have gotten hurt around you.”
Jun shook her head. “You’re wrong. That wasn’t me. And even so, I wouldn’t want to hurt anyone.”
“But you have.” He said it with such conviction that Jun ducked her head, unable to deny him. It was as if he could see inside her head and know the truth, but he couldn’t have known about… about her.
Jun couldn’t keep an image out of her head. The image of a hauntingly beautiful woman, willow thin and radiant. Someone she would never meet. Someone who only existed in photos, because of her.
She just needed more time. More time to think. More time to figure out exactly what was going on. More time to get away. Her throat was tight, closing up.
“Jun.” Nikolai reached out for her, and he was going to do something to hurt her again. No. She was answering his questions. She was cooperating. Why couldn’t he see that? This couldn’t be happening. She couldn’t think. She couldn’t slow down her racing heart. She couldn’t slow down her breaths or the burn at her eyes. She couldn’t slow down the hand that cut across the distance between them.
No. Please. She needed just a little more time.
Nikolai’s calloused hand pressed against her shoulder and it happened.
A sharp pulse of electricity spiraled between them at the touch of his skin against hers. It crackled within them and radiated outwards in a wave.
Nikolai’s hand dropped away from her instantly like he was burned. He took a few steps away, keeping his distance, and for the first time he looked uncertain as he observed their surroundings. The silence was all around them until he spoke.
“What did you do?”
9
6:53 a.m.
He felt it again, a surge of energy when he touched her. It was obvious that she was on the verge of panic, and when he reached out to calm her down, the magic reacted, just as it had the first time when her thumb brushed against his palm and a current of wild, unnatural energy sparked against his skin. But this time it was stronger.
Nikolai waited for the ground to shift or for something to strike him down. Nothing happened.
“What did you do?” In the surreal silence around them, his voice carried. Not even the insects made a sound.
“I-I didn’t do anything.”
Nikolai took one look at her shaking hands and looked away. Maybe it had been a fluke, but his instincts told him otherwise. Something wasn’t right. It was as if the very forest held its breath, watching.
Of course, the only thing to do now would be to kill her, now that he was sure she was the magician. He hadn’t needed to second-guess himself and take her all the way out into the woods. He hadn’t needed to test her or to question her. If he wanted to do this right, play by all the rules, he would have pulled Jun into his apartment and finished her off. Before she could have a moment to retaliate.
If he had just let her drown then he wouldn’t be in this mess.
Except he didn’t have it in him when he saw her body drifting through murky waters. How her lips had turned blue, parted in a gasp.
He hadn’t stopped to think. Not when he was swimming with her to the shore, and not when he was tilting back her chin, pinching her nose and breathing—forcing her chest to rise, forcing color back into her lips, forcing life back into her.
When her eyelids fluttered and she vomited out the water that was poisoning her, Nikolai felt like he too could breathe again.
Had he gotten it wrong? Was she just a civilian? He’d almost killed an innocent—something he vowed he’d never do. He’d misjudged something, but what?
No. He wasn’t wrong. He’d seen hands shaking like Jun’s too many times before. He must have lost his edge.
The sky should have been bright with dawn, but the light was barely passing through the leaves. Something had gone terribly wrong. But he’d already screwed this all up; he couldn’t afford to be hasty. They couldn’t just stay in the forest without any proper supplies, nor did it make sense to do something that he might regret later.
Pale and hunched into herself, Jun’s lip was faintly trembling. She looked about as dangerous as a newborn kitten. He’d leave it for now.
“Come on, we’re going.”
“Going home?”
There was never going to be a going home for her. Not as long as the others were still out looking for the magician. “Yeah,” he lied, so that she would follow.
It was a straight shot back to the road where the old car was still parked. It was no longer smoking.
Worth a shot to try it. Nikolai grasped the door handle and pulled without thinking. The handle wouldn’t budge. Was the door locked? No. He could see that it was unlocked through the window. It was as if the entire thing was frozen solid—though it wasn’t cold.
“What the hell.” Nikolai braced his other hand against the door and yanked as if he was deadlifting six-hundred pounds, rather than trying to open a car door. Slowly, he could feel the mechanism unlatch.
“What, did my car freeze solid overnight?” Jun asked, watching from where she leaned against the guardrail.
“No. But you must have done something earlier in the woods.” She didn’t respond. Soundlessly, the door inched its way open, though Nikolai was still straining against it hard enough to rip it off its hinges. When he forced just enough space, Nikolai slipped through. He twisted the key where he left it in the ignition—or tried to. There wasn’t enough leverage in the tight space with his palm twisted at an awkward angle. Fine. This was too much effort for a car that was probably still dead anyway.
“No good,” he said.
In the passenger seat, he saw something that at first looked like some sort of plaid teddy bear. When he saw the straps, he vaguely recalled Jun with it in class. Figures she would be the kind of girl with a bear bag. He grabbed it, then yanked. At first the bag felt like it was over a hundred pounds, but as it lifted in the air closer to him it felt lighter. Nikolai paused, gauging the weight. Now it couldn’t be any more than thirteen pounds or so. This wasn’t like any kind of magic he had encountered before.
Nikolai wordlessly handed the bag over to her. “Do you have a phone?”
She shook her head. “It dropped and smashed when you kidnapped me.”
“Oh.” He didn’t know quite what to say to that. “Sorry.” He put his hands in his pockets uselessly. His phone lay somewhere at the bottom of the lake. Not that it mattered that it fell from his pocket, since he hadn’t bothered with a waterproof case in the first place.
“Looks like we’re walking.”
“All the way back?”
“There’s a gas station three miles down. We can see if there’s a payphone. Or maybe we can hitch a ride.”
She didn’t look thrilled about either option, but then again, he couldn’t blame her. In her own words, this was a kidnapping, but she had no idea how much she was a danger to others.
Nikolai started down the path and had to slow down since Jun was lagging behind. Nikolai looked her over for any lingering signs of weakness from the near drowning and noticed that she tensed up under his gaze.
It was going to be a long three miles.
It only took a few minutes for the silence to put him on edge. There was something jarring about the way that each footfall echoed into the distance. Dawn had yet to ease up, with the light streaming in at an angle. It should already be into early morning by now. The forest should be alive with bird calls, but there was only dead silence.
At a bend ahead, a car was stopped on the road, headlights shining their way. Nikolai approached the driver’s side, ready to knock on the window, but stopped. A
t first, he thought the driver was having a stroke since he was staring blankly ahead, his face devoid of any expression. He wasn’t moving at all, just kept a hand on the wheel and the other on the stick shift.
“No way.” Jun muttered.
When he looked back, Jun was pointing toward the speedometer. The needle was pointing at 60. He blinked at the impossibility of what he was seeing. The car and man were completely immobile— frozen in space.
Then it clicked in his mind: the silence and stillness around them. Now that he knew, it was completely obvious. He looked back at Jun, whose face was in shadow, staring at the dashboard in confusion. It wasn’t the car that was stuck, but them.
“Do you see it now?” Nikolai asked. “What you did?” There was no way she could deny magic now.
“How could any of this be real?” Her eyes widened when she finally looked back at him. “Oh… I’m dead. Oh, God. I’m dead. I drowned in the lake. None of this is real because you killed me.”
Nikolai sighed. Just what had he gotten himself into? “Or,” he said slowly, “you used magic and stopped time.”
“This is crazy. I need to wake up.” She pinched her arm and dragged a hand over face. “Come on, wake up.”
“You’re already awake. What you need to do is reverse this.”
“Oh, yeah? And how would I do that?”
“I don’t know, you’re the magician. We’re stuck like this until the magic wears off or you do something.”
She shook her head and mumbled something under her breath, but otherwise remained quiet. They continued along the road, and no matter how far they went, nothing changed. Their pace was slow. Nikolai could have run the distance easily, but he made sure to keep close.
His stomach growled. Time may have stopped, but that didn’t mean his appetite had as well. The last meal he had had was the day before, and though he could go for much longer without eating, he never liked to.
His training hadn’t prepared him for this, but it did prepare him for the worst. One thing was clear—he couldn’t kill her now and risk getting left behind in whatever haze of magic Jun had created. The thought made him pause. What if she left him here? Would he even be able to get out of this without her? Or would time go back to normal if she died? The risk was too great to chance it.
Magician Rising (Divination in Darkness Book 1) Page 7