Phoenixlost

by K. T. Strange

  “Leave… me alone…” the power flowed out of me, and my hands jerked forward, the pure, stuttering electricity flashing across the space between us. It collided with the blade of his sword, and the sound deafened me, thunder echoing out from between us. The blow-back made me stagger, the physicality of it overwhelming me and knocking to my knees. Pain sparked in my bones, my teeth grinding together as my head jerked up then down.

  Squinting through tears, I stared across the space between us; my father seemed to grow larger, his shoulders square and broad, his body glowing with energy. My lips parted, the skin dry and cracked. He reached out and tangled his fingers in the crackle of lightning that spanned the gap between us like it was a physical thing he could touch. His skin lit up, and I gasped as he tugged. It felt like he had a hook right under my navel, and my head dropped, my eyes staring as my power jumped and surged, flowing out of my belly toward him.

  He pulled again, and my knees skidded on the ground, the cement digging at me through the denim of my jeans. He was pulling me with my power. I slammed my hands into the ground and pushed back, trying to crawl away from him while his muscles flexed and bulged, each move of his arm pulling me in toward him. My nails dragged on the concrete, and I shrieked as they bent in, my finger-tips scraped and bloody.

  There was a wrenching pop inside me, and my magic flicked off, severing the connection between us. My arms gave out, and my cheeks ate concrete so hard I felt the bones in my face almost give. God. Fuck. Wolfe’s wordless presence in the back of my mind, a memory of when he’d taught me first how to handle my magic, roared up. I shoved myself up off the ground with one shaking arm, my power spinning out into a half-dome, crackling and threatening in case my father tried to come closer while I was weak.

  Above us, the clouds rumbled, lightning sheeting across the sky. The air seemed to gasp, and then the rains came, drenching me in a heart-beat. The mundanes would never know what was going on unless they stumbled upon us fighting in the fucking parking lot, and I hoped to god nobody did. I didn’t have the strength to protect myself and complete strangers from my father’s insane psychotic behaviour.

  “Darcy, Darcy, sweet Darcy,” he crooned, the notes hanging in the atmosphere like a sickly fog. I struggled to breathe, my whole body hurting. What the hell had he done to me? I could feel it inside, the way my magic shuddered and jumped, barely enough to feed the shield around me, much less fight back. I wasn’t going to go down that easy, though. He had another thing goddamn coming. I grit my teeth, ignoring the aches all over my body as my mind span through the options. I was sure, confident, that I couldn’t talk him out with a strike to the heart. He’d just block me with that stupid magic sword of his…

  If I couldn’t defeat him, maybe, at best, I could contain him- I surged upward and forward with a grunt, my head aching as I fought the sheer energy of my shield, forcing it up and inside out, inverting it like a bowl.

  My father’s voice let out a howl as the visual manifestation of my power descended on him, a bell of lightning surrounding him on all sides. I panted, and the sweat dripped in my eyes, stinging. I blinked it away and wiped my hands on the ragged remains of my dress. I could buy a new one.

  Then I did the only thing I could think of. I tilted my head to the side and watched as my magic squeezed, the shape of lightning contracting, inch by inch revealing ash-white concrete where it’d been touched by the heat of my power. Inside, the shadowy outline of my father twitched, the blade a slice of light that clattered to the ground and evaporated when it hit the ground. Of course, it did. At that moment, I realized that I was stronger than him with the clarity I should’ve had long before. My powers always maintained, even when they touched the ground. Was it my mother’s earth magic, hidden away inside of me? I had no idea.

  Just the thought that I could hurt him in a way that he couldn’t hurt me forced a reckless smile onto my lips.

  “Got you,” I muttered, advancing on him, the roar and buzz of lightning so loud that it hurt my ears, whiting out all sound around us both.

  I needed to end it.

  The light shrouded him, and I squinted to see through it, twisting inside of myself as I thinned it out enough so that we could see each other.

  His face was pale, lips drew tight as he stared at me, his eyes dark pools of shadow.

  “Is this how it ends?” His voice cracked and popped with static as he smirked after a moment. “You think you have the guts to finish me?”

  “It doesn’t have to hurt,” I said, rolling my shoulders back, trying not to think about what he was saying too closely. “I can just turn off the oxygen.” The shell of my lightning was closing in on him, eating up inches of the ground, until his face was pressed up against it, a hair-width away. I was so close I could smell the ozone as it licked at his clothes, sparks threading through his hair. My voice dropped, “turn it off like you just tried to do to me.”

  “All I’ve ever wanted was for you to see sense,” he hissed, the word snaking out between cracks of sound, curling up to rattle in my ears. I glanced to the side, the steady ache in my chest. Had he really just wanted to get his wayward daughter under control? No, never. If control meant murder, then sure. I parted my lips to tell him as much, wish him goodbye, turn out the lights-

  His fist slammed right through the shield of power I’d encased him in, and he wrapped it around my throat, the nails biting into my skin like knives. I gasped, the sound choked and echoing inside my lungs as he lifted, heaving me upward with a strength he shouldn’t have possessed.

  “Idiot,” he spat, blood flecking his lips, the skin paper-white as my power melted away, the lightning flowing to the ground like silk fabric, as he broke my spell. My hands came up, and I clawed at his wrist. My feet left the ground, and I felt the blackness coming for me, sneaking up from all angles. All because I hadn’t been fast enough. I hadn’t been able to finish the job. His sunken eyes leered at me, and he shook me like a kitten, my legs wobbling, shoes barely scraping the pavement.

  I felt it inside me, the weird sucking sensation like I was being pulled in by a straw. I cried out, the sound ripping out my throat, blood and raw. Pain flashed across my vision, my head.

  And just like that, he dropped me, my whole body crumpling as I hit the ground. The rain continued, streaming down, plastering my hair to my head and partially obscuring my vision. My ears were ringing, hearing muffled, as I panted quietly, my whole body screaming for me to move, to get up and run but-

  I couldn’t. There was only a flicker of magic inside of me, humming there quietly, not enough to light up my fingers or even give the barest charge to a cellphone in my palm.

  “What did you do?” My words were thready and weak as I stared up at him.

  “What I should have done before you ran away from home the first time,” he said, his words clipped and matter of fact. He took an unsteady step away from me, and I swallowed. “You will know now what I have felt, powerless to stop your useless flutterings with those… wolves,” the last word was a curse in his mouth, disgusting and filthy.

  He’d taken my magic. All that was left felt like ashes in the pit of my belly. My hands trembled. The one thing I’d hated about myself for so long was gone. Rage and despair were in its place. I stared up at him as he started to walk away, the rain pattering over my skin, cold and making me shiver.

  I’d never really felt the storms before, but now I was exposed and vulnerable. He could turn and kill me, and I wouldn’t be able to-

  “The fuck?” Cash’s voice was ragged, and I turned, my body moving slower than I wanted it to, to look at him. His shirt was ripped, blood-streaked down the side of his neck, and he’d looked like he’d been in a hell of a punch-up. His eyes flickered from me to my father’s back. He tensed about to move-

  “I hardly think so,” my father said, his voice salted and brittle, rusted metal that dragged over my nerves. He flicked up to his fingers, and Cash froze, not even blinking. I knew in a second what he’d done. M
y muscles flooded with energy, and I bolted to my feet, running toward my father, the wordless scream in my throat.

  There was nothing in me, nothing left to stop him, except sheer will and desperation. He was not going to strangle Cash while I languished on my knees. Magic or not, I was going to save him. My father grunted as I slammed into him, my arms wrapping around us both, taking him down to the ground. I elbowed him in the face, and his head cracked, bouncing off the pavement.

  Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth, and he smiled up at me, the light in his eyes flickering. I didn’t for a second believe he was down for the count, he’d tricked me once before, and I wasn’t going to believe it until I saw his eyes turn glassy, his body limp under mine.

  “Don’t you want to be great?” He murmured, lifting his fingers to explore my cheek with the rough pads. His touch set my skin alight with nerves, and I wanted to jerk back.

  “Let him go,” my voice was desperate, and in a moment of panic, I wrapped my hand around his neck, forcing my father back down when he tried to raise his head. Cash made no noise behind me, not even afforded the ability to blink, his chest not moving. I had to hope his heart was still able to beat, even slowly. How long did it take for a werewolf to die if his heart couldn’t pump blood?

  Tears spattered my father’s face, mingling with the rain as I slammed him down against the ground over and over again. He gasped, reaching to grab my hair, tugging me down to him, the crackle of power forcing me against him. My arms gave out, and I flattened over him, his lips finding my ear.

  “Truce, daughter,” he whispered, blood spraying the side of my face.

  He vanished from underneath me, and I hit the ground, nose-first with a cry. Behind me, I heard the wet topple of a body. Cash.

  My limbs barely worked, cold and stiff, even as the adrenaline surged in my belly and made me want to vomit.

  I pushed myself to roll onto my side, trying to get the strength together to get back to my feet. My legs shook, and lightning above crashed, gnawing the sky, clouds lighting up. Another hard wave of rain poured over me, beating me down.

  “Darcy, shi-” Cash’s hands wrapped around my shoulders and helped me, pulling me up. His arm came under my legs, and he lifted me, cradling me against his chest, his hand shielding my face from the onslaught of rain. “We gotta get the fuck out of here,” he said, his words nearly lost in the storm as it rolled on over us, overpowering the air until everything felt electric.

  Except me.

  Inside me, there was an empty, barren plain where my power had resided, the magic ripped out of me by my father.

  I closed my eyes and rested my head against Cash’s shoulder, feeling the steady beat of his heart, reassuring and comforting. It was the only thing to cling to. I’d lost the rest of myself in the storm.

  Six

  “Well, that’s a spectacular way to end a romantic evening if I do say so,” the familiar voice wove through my hectic dreams and pulled me out of it. I was shivering, even though I was dry and buried under a pile of blankets on the penthouse's couch. Wolfe peered down at me, leaning over me close, his hands hovering over my head. “How are you?”

  “I feel like I’m freezing, and I’m on fire at the same time,” I got out from between my chattering teeth. Wolfe snapped his fingers, and Charlie appeared at his elbow, a travel mug of hot tea in his hand. He offered it to me, worry crinkling the corners of his mouth. “Thanks,” I said, taking a slow sip and hoping it would touch the freezing place inside of me.

  I remembered Cash taking me home, the guys cursing when they saw what was left of me, and the ragged, torn state we were both in.

  “Hunters,” Cash had said to them, “got me in the alley, while fucking father of the year-” He’d gestured to me as Finn got me undressed and dried off. Then warm pajamas, and the couch. I’d obviously passed out, and now Wolfe had arrived while I was asleep.

  “He took it,” I said to Wolfe, even as he regarded me with a knowing in his eyes. He already knew. I was wiped clean, the magic gone, burnt right of me. I choked on a sudden thought, sat up, the travel mug falling from my hands. “He has the heartstone!” The panic burnt up my insides as my words' cold water collapsed over the room, flattening everything and freezing everyone.

  Wolfe hissed out a breath and glanced at the pack. My vision was whiting at the edges, and I fought the blankets. I needed to get to my father. I needed to get it back.

  “Shit, no,” Cash said, fumbling at his jeans. They were wet and sticking to his body. Why hadn’t he changed? He dug into his pocket and pulled it out, the chain broken and blackened. I nearly passed out again from the relief.

  “How?”

  He shrugged and glanced around the room. “I felt it call me,” he said, uncomfortable and awkward. “Like… in my chest, it was just… it pulled me toward it, half-hidden underneath a car right by you, Darce.”

  My father must’ve dropped it—a small miracle. I wanted to cry from relief and gratitude for that one thing. Tears dripped down my cheeks, and Wolfe murmured under his breath, smoothing them away with the back of his hand.

  “Shhshhshh.” He shifted me on the couch, curling me into his chest like he was my real father, his fingers stroking up and down my arm. Charlie rescued my tea, the lid having kept the spill in.

  “You okay to hold this now?” He asked, his brown eyes warm and sweet as he bent down.

  “It’s been a day,” I muttered but took the drink, wrapping my fingers tight around it. The heat emanating from it soothed me. “My magic’s all gone,” I said to Wolfe. I kept poking at it, like a tongue running over where a tooth was missing, but the inside of me turned up empty nothingness. Wolfe hmmm’d even as the guys made blank faces at each other.

  “Whaddya mean gone?” Elias demanded before punching Cash in the shoulder. “The fuck you let him do to her?”

  Cash let out a sound, defensive growl and hiss all wrapped into one, turning on Elias.

  “Hold, fuck,” Wolfe snapped, “hold your goddamn tempers.”

  I hunched down in his grip, ready to cry again but not wanting to. My feelings were just going to spill over to the guys and make them more worked up.

  It was my fault for thinking I could actually take my father on and win. Fucking idiot that I was. I should’ve never walked down that damn corridor. Really, if I had to blame something, it was my bladder. I was never going to pee again.

  My ridiculous thoughts were the only thing keeping me from totally hating myself.

  “I’d have made another one,” I said, hanging onto the heartstone, “even if-”

  Even if I was empty of any sparkle. Even if my magic never returned. My brain was stupid but insistent. I could… think my way out any problem, right? I closed my eyes and tried to focus on the deep breaths I needed to keep taking to keep calm.

  “Sweetheart, we’re not worried about a damn heartstone,” Finn said as he crouched in front of me, reaching for me. I let him take my hands, and he stared me in the eyes. Mine were burning, edges with tears, and I just knew that any minute I would start sobbing. I felt empty, like a cracked egg, my insides splattered on the floor.

  “What’s going to happen to me?” I asked, hating how helpless I sounded, how pathetic and weak. I keep touching that place inside of me with my mind, where my powers should be waiting to be called into action.

  Nothing. Blackness.

  I shuddered.

  It’s like the depression is creeping up into me, taking residence not only in my heart but in my soul as well. My father got his hooks into me somehow and took the last thing he could get from me, the only thing he’d given me.

  Finn kissed me, but I didn’t have the energy to kiss back. The lights were all out inside. Wolfe patted a comforting hand on my shoulder.

  “I will admit, I am out of my depth,” he said as Finn bookended me on the other side, his presence large and warm. I leaned into my werewolf, my first love, and tried to sort through the feelings from the shadows that were c
lawing through me. “I have not heard of a witch stripping power from another in this way.” He cleared his throat. “Perhaps we should call Chelsea?”

  “She’s on a meditation retreat,” Ace said, and I blinked at him in surprise. Did he talk to her often?

  Charlie made a sly noise in the back of his throat.

  “More like fucking her guys on a mountain top with wild abandon,” he added. Ace choked and grumbled, shaking his head at his pack-mate.

  “Daria then,” Wolfe stood and reached into his pocket for his phone.

  “Yeah, I’d like to set eyes on Frank if you don’t mind; Luca’s annoying, but Frank’s ours,” Eli added. “So maybe the three of them come out of wherever you’ve been hiding them, and Frank takes his rightful place here with us, with his pack.” Eli glanced at me. “Daria can stay too. It’s not like we don’t have the room. My mind’s not made up on Luca, though.”

  A sudden thought came to me, and I held back an inelegant snort of laughter. The guys all looked at me while Wolfe walked out of the room, speaking quietly on his phone.

  “What?” Finn asked, nuzzling the top of my head. I could hear the quiet thrum of that rumble in his chest, that soothing noise the guys only make when shit’s really bad, or they’re pleased.

  “Hey, I can drink now, right? Enjoy a little glass of wine? No powers mean-” My eyes started watering, and my words stumbled, crumbling in my mouth. Eli lowered himself onto the couch and pulled me half-into his lap. Finn let me go as Eli manhandled me. “Why does everything always suck?” I asked as the guys closed in on me, upset clear on their faces at what had happened.

  “Y’know, I should’ve said to your dad that he ought to know better than to mess with our mate,” Cash’s voice was thick and dark. I looked up at him from the circle of Eli’s protective arms. “You wanna know what happens to people who cross a wolf-pack? Fuck around and find out.” The heat curled through his words, raw anger that almost had me shaking from the power of it. Charlie nodded in agreement, and Ace crossed his arms over his chest, chewing his bottom lip.