by Jami Klein
I was busted. There was no way, he wouldn’t report me to the Enforcers after this. I was lucky if they only painted me as a black witch and slammed me back into the anti-magical cuffs.
“This isn’t fair,” I said. Maybe if I hadn’t pushed Stefan away, he’d have been here right now, and this would have never had happened. I did need a bodyguard after all. I should have known I’d be prey until I had a coven to back me up.
Sorry, Stefan.
I knew he couldn’t hear me, though.
Well, if I was going to get the maximum punishment, I was going to earn it.
“Let me into the circle so I can access the pearl of wisdom.”
He struggled in my power and for a moment I felt a flash of fear. Holy cow, he was going to shred me into little pieces. I dug deep and pushed forward. Emile fought back. We strained against each other, and I thought I was going to lose. This was it for me. But then Emile began to sweat. I didn’t even know that was possible with vampires. “I can’t,” he gritted out between his elongated fangs.
I concentrated to pick up what he was thinking. He was so very angry. He had thought I’d be easy prey because of the shackles. I broke out in a cold sweat at what could have just happened. I forced myself to dig deeper into his mind. It was a whirlwind of pain, anger, and hunger, but I found out that he didn’t have the ability to take down the defenses around the pearl of wisdom. I also say that he knew I was going to weaken eventually and then he was going to drain me dry and feed my dead body to the ghouls.
There were ghouls down here?
He surged forward as my shock let my control of him slip. But before he could puncture my skin with his sharp claws, I dodged away as he swiped at me. Unfortunately, I crossed over the runes and the guardian sprang to life.
“Leave or die,” the guardian droned.
There was a familiar cadence about its voice, but I couldn’t put my finger on it.
“Emile,” I shrieked out an order that the vampire couldn’t refuse to obey while I had his mind on lockdown. “Keep him off me.” I dove for the pedestal.
The guardian was faster, but Emile was faster. As the two of them exchanged blows, I grasped the pearl. It was pulsating energy and I shuddered as it coursed down my body.
“How did my father die?” I asked it.
There was a loud crack and I glanced up. The guardian had snapped Emile’s neck. Out of nowhere, he produced a stake and slammed it deep into the vampire’s chest.
I caught my breath as Emile’s body convulsed and then pulverized into ash. The guardian turned to me. Maybe if I stood very still, he’d forget I was there. After all, I was inside the circle. Its orders were probably to keep things from getting in. The guardian shimmered, as if it was about to fade. I didn’t dare let out the breath I was holding. Then, it reached up and pulled off its helmet.
“Dad?” My knees wobbled and I had to hold on to the pedestal for support. This had to be a trick or a projection the pearl picked up from my question.
“What are you doing here?” the guardian asked.
“What am I doing here? You died. What are you doing here? Are you alive?” I went to touch him. My hand went right through him. “This isn’t real. You’re not real.” I looked at the pile of ash sifting into nothing across the floor. Something real had killed Emile, though. I felt a pang of guilt, but ruthlessly shoved it down deep in my head. Emile got what he deserved.
“I asked you a question Lola Marie Bragg.”
I blinked. He sounded so stern and familiar. I supposed it couldn’t hurt to answer his question. It was the closest I was going to get to talking to my father again and I really needed to talk to him.
“When you died, everything fell apart. Mom couldn’t pay the bills. She had to get a second job as a maid in the Highway Hotels.”
The guardian who wore my father’s face looked away in regret and sadness. It was a good resemblance, and I wasn’t afraid of the guardian anymore. Which was probably stupid, but for the moment it was nice to pretend my father was here. “I went a little crazy and skipped school and used my powers against Mom, so she didn’t make me miss the homecoming dance.”
“Oh Lola.” The guardian shook his head in disappointment at me and it hurt more than it should have. I folded my arms in front of me. Talk about head games. I glared at it, but it felt wrong, disrespectful, so I let my arms drop to my sides.
“But that’s not what got me in here. I got away with that and it was pretty awful. I swore I’d never do it again. But…” Rubbing the back of my neck, I rolled it on my shoulders.
“But you did,” he said sadly.
“The hotel manager Mom worked for was abusive. I wouldn’t have known anything about that, except I had biked over to the hotel to help her clean some rooms and I saw him proposition her and threaten to cut her hours if she didn’t do what he wanted.”
The guardian’s hand suddenly had a sword in it and I’d never seen such a grim and dangerous look on my father’s face.
“So I hexed him. Told him not only to leave my mother alone, but double her salary.”
The guardian relaxed. His shoulders shook slightly and there was a trace of a smile on his face. “That’s my girl.”
“So he turned his attentions to me.”
The scowl was back.
“He enrolled me in the Coven school. Paid my tuition in full and bought me a red convertible.”
“Oh Lola.” He shook his head. “You always have to overdo it.”
“Yeah, well when the cops pulled me over for speeding it all unraveled and I was taken into FBMI custody and shipped off here so fast I didn’t even have time to say goodbye to my friends.”
“How long have you been here?”
“A month. It’s been pretty eventful.”
“And now you’re here asking questions about me?”
“About my father. Now, I’ve answered a bunch of your questions. Tell me how to work this pearl so I can get mine answered.”
He shook his head. “I don’t know how to activate it. I just guard it. But I can answer your question.”
“Don’t tell me my father died in a plane crash. I checked. There were no crashes that day.”
“Smart. Too smart for your own good. I was sacrificed by a blood mage because I got caught smuggling an artifact out of St. Petersburg.”
“Florida?” I asked before I remembered this apparition was not my father and he couldn’t possibly be telling the truth.
“Russia.”
“What was an insurance agent doing in Russia?” I quipped. This was a waste of time. I should go. Yet, I knew I would stay here forever and to talk with a guardian who probably took my father’s appearance out of my brain to mess with my head.
Joke was on him. My head was messed up to begin with.
“I wasn’t an insurance agent, Lola. I was recruited out of the Jewel Academy before graduation by the Central Magical Intelligence Agency.”
“You’re a spook?”
“Ghost actually.” He preened.
And that was when I knew I was actually talking to the spirit of my dead father. He made dad joke. Just like my dad would have done. I had a good imagination, but I couldn’t make up that line or how proud he was that he had been able to deliver it.
“Dad.” I gripped the podium. “Who killed you? What’s the mage’s name? Where can I find him? He has to pay for what he’s done.”
“It doesn’t matter. He’s untouchable.”
I didn’t buy that. Anyone was touchable with the right contacts. But I put the thoughts of revenge aside for now. I wasn’t powerful enough. Not yet. But one day I would confront this blood mage and turn his mind inside out. I didn’t care if that made me a black arts practitioner or not. That blood mage tore my family apart and ruined my life. I was coming for him.
“What happened to the artifact?” I asked, wondering if I could track the blood mage down that way.
He shrugged. “Back in another politician’s office I supp
ose. Or maybe locked away where we wouldn’t dare try another extraction.”
“Was that what you stole from the demon?”
“How do you know about that?” he asked, visibly taken aback.
“Like I said, it’s been a busy month.” I forced myself to move away from the pedestal, but I was careful not to cross the runes. I wasn’t ready to say good-bye to my father just yet. “Why are you here? Why didn’t you ever tell me you had gone to Jewel Academy?”
“Those are a lot of questions, baby girl, and we don’t have much time left. If you trigger the spell again, I’ll be forced to guard the pearl again to the death.”
“You’d kill me?”
“You could always throw me another vampire,” he said deadpan.
“That’s not funny,” I said. “I don’t even know how I’m going to explain that.” I gestured to the rapidly dwindling pile of ash.
“You don’t. You keep your head down, go back to your coven and set up extra protection spells.”
I shook my head. “I don’t have a coven.”
“Why not?”
“It’s complicated,” I said.
“You need to get one right away or vampires and shifters like that one will take advantage of your vulnerability.”
“That didn’t go so well for him,” I pointed out.
“He didn’t know what you could do. How long can you keep your powers a secret?”
“You kept yours a secret all your life.”
He looked away again as my barb hit. “I learned how to do that here.” He looked up at me. “Delia. Your cousin. You must have met her by now. Join her coven.”
“Delia’s dead. She raised a demon on a failed love spell and it killed her.” I decided how much I wanted to say and then decided that if I was ever going to get the answers I needed, I had to tell him the whole truth. “It killed her because she couldn’t tell her where you hid what you stolen from it. It told me…”
“Told you? When did you come across a demon?” He looked like he needed to sit down with one of his vodka martinis.
“Same coven. Different idiot. Same spell. Same result. We sent it back to hell.” I hoped.
“We?”
“Me and a few of my friends.” I didn’t want to bring Andrei and Stefan’s name into this, just in case there wound up being consequences for me entering the pearl’s protective circle.
“Keep those friends close. Listen to me, I always thought there was more time. I have so many things to tell you. There are so many things you don’t know.”
“I’m beginning to realize that. The demon told me that it was not going to let you take your secrets to your grave. Is this what he meant? Are you cursed to guard this pearl…?” I looked at the pearl and then back to my father. “Is this what you stole?”
“First of all, I didn’t steal it. I removed a powerful artifact from being misused by forces of evil. And yes, he cursed me to remain with it for eternity. Luckily, he and any other demon can’t get it down here. I might be the last line of defense, but I’m the weakest link.”
“What if he does break through?”
“Then the Jewel Academy and you have bigger things to worry about than this artifact. I never told you I went here because I didn’t want you to know the full extent of your powers or the consequences of using them, like I had done. I did everything I could to keep your off the FMBI and the CMIA’s radar. Now...” He shook his head. “Baby girl, you need to make sure you don’t give them an excuse to bind them to you. If you work for either of them, you go to them on your own terms.”
Like getting revenge on the blood mage that killed my father. I nodded. “Did Mom know you were a spook?”
“No.”
“Did she know about the candy store, your years at the Jewel Academy? Any of it?”
“No.”
“She blocked my number from my phone. She’s cut me loose.”
“Can you blame her?” he asked kindly.
“She’s my mother. She’s supposed to forgive me stupid stuff.”
“Oh sweetheart. She’s not your real mother. Your…”
“Not my…”
But he had disappeared mid-sentence.
Chapter Nine
I stayed in that circle until I got worried that Ms. Barnes would find me there and I’d have to come up with a story that wouldn’t have them sedating me and sending me off to the medical wing.
I guess I went to classes because no one asked where I was. But I don’t remember a thing else about the day. I could barely hold it together while Ms. Barnes trained me how to shelve the various tomes and manuscripts that were returned each day. My duties were on the main floor only and I noticed that Ms. Barnes never took her eyes off me.
I tried not to feel guilty about Emile. I had seen in his mind what he had planned for me. He wouldn’t have stopped at one sip. He would have made me a blood slave, hexing me to remain close to him as his own personal vending machine. That was the good part. The bad part came after I had taken control of his mind. If he had broken free or if he had defeated the guardian, I would have been dead, and no one would have ever found my body.
After work, Stefan was waiting for me outside of the library. I launched myself at him and hugged him tight.
“Who do I have to kill?” he snarled, his voice raspy from disuse.
“Too late.” I told him about my day.
“I’m not going to let you out of my sight.”
I liked the sound of his voice outside of my head. It sounded like car tires on gravel, but it symbolized protection for me. Nothing could hurt me when I heard that voice. Even if I didn’t have a coven. Even if I was forced back into anti-magic bracelets.
“I can’t pay you until Saturday.”
“I’m not doing this for the money.”
“Then why are you doing this?”
He was silent so long, I was afraid he wasn’t going to answer me, and I was staying the heck out of his head because I didn’t want to see something that would hurt my feelings. I was feeling way to fragile as it was.
“I don’t want to find another dead body.”
Even though I was shielding my mind, I got images of his brother and of Delia. I didn’t make the joke that the ghouls would have made sure no one ever found my body. It didn’t even sound funny in my head.
“Okay,” I said. “But if you ever feel that I’m not worth the effort or that it’s all too much…”
He shoved me out at arm’s length so fast, my head snapped back on my neck.
“Don’t you ever say that,” he growled.
“Ow, my neck.” I massaged the back of my head. “I think you gave me whiplash.”
“I think you need to go back to the dorm and get some rest.” Stefan was back to speaking mind-to-mind with me again.
“I just don’t want to be alone right now.”
“Priscilla should be in the room.”
“That’s worse than being alone. Let’s clear up the path a bit more,” I said.
“Just until dark, and then you go back to the dorm. Stay in the common area if you want to be around other people.”
I wanted to argue, but I didn’t have it in me. I wanted to work until I was exhausted and then fall into a dreamless sleep. I raked the path while Stefan cleared it of large rocks and branches. The first half of the path was in pretty good shape. The last half would take a few more days.
“I could do a few more hours,” I said, feeling like a zombie—which reminded me— “Did you know there were ghouls in the bowels of the library?”
“Doesn’t surprise me. It reeks down there.” Stefan hurled a rock into the woods. “But I’ll go there with you, if you feel the need to talk to them too.”
“I think I’m going to stay up top for a while.” I didn’t want to think about the dark corridors of the Archive and Emile. I was pretty sure I’d be seeing those images in my nightmares tonight.
“So, you’re not going to visit the guardian—your dad again?�
��
“I will. For now, it’s a comfort that some part of him still exists in the world. But the price is too high for a few minutes of questions. And I’m so very angry at him for keeping all these secrets from me.” I looked at my palms. They were starting to blister because I had been holding the rake so tightly.
“He certainly left you with a doozy of a question.” Stefan turned me around to face the way we came and gently—for a lion shifter pushed me until I started moving in the right direction. “Do you have any idea who your mom might be?”
“Not one clue. Maybe it’s Ms. Barnes and Andrei’s my brother.”
He snorted and shook his head. “I think Baron Vonwhatsisname would be upset to hear that his wife gave birth to a daughter and he never knew about it.”
“Well, there goes the theory that Andrei and I are twins like Luke and Leia.” I leaned my head against his chest again. “I thought getting answers about my dad would solve all of my problems. It just let to more questions. The CMIA recruited him his senior year. He didn’t even stay to graduate. Do you think there are recruiters here now? Are they posing as teachers or Enforcers?”
Stefan shrugged. “Do you want to work for them?”
I shook my head. “I’m no spy. But I’d like to ask them if the blood mage that killed my dad is going to pay for that. They do that in the CMIA, right? No man left behind. No strike unanswered?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Well, that’s how it should be.” I balked at being guided up the path to the dorms. “Not yet. Let’s stay out a bit more. I’m not afraid of the dark.”
“You should be.”
“I’m not. Not if you’re with me.”
“Maybe it’s me you should be afraid of. When I’m in my lion form, I usually attack first and ask questions later.”
I held his hand. “Then stay with me. Stay human for a little while longer.”
Stefan looked over his shoulders, back to the path that would lead him down to Hellion Falls and where he waited for a demon to fight. I could feel the tug of the woods inside him, like a call to the jungle for his beast. “All right,” he sighed, shaking it off. “Might as well study for your first aid exam.”