by Krista Walsh
The terror of losing herself was swept away in her desire to destroy everything in her path. Her breath caught in her throat — she couldn’t remember how to breathe. Her head spun, and stars burst in front of her eyes in her effort to channel more magic down the chain to strengthen her hold. The stars turned to spots that lurked on the edges of her vision as her consciousness wavered.
The room filled with smoke as green-hued lightning shot from her palms, and the blue walls were patched with black where the lightning struck. Her skin tingled with the surge of magic running through her veins.
The balance of power shifted. The pressure around her heart and lungs eased. The demons fought harder to keep up their attack, but their power waned.
Her thoughts floated in the bliss of her new magic, but a hand covered hers and brought her attention back to the room. Through the haziness of her vision, she recognized the tissue-thin skin covered in wrinkles and liver spots. Harold’s strength entered her, traveling with hers to tear the negative energy apart. His silver magic soothed the burning sensation created by the green power she’d taken in, absorbing the dark magic into his own and leaving her golden magic untainted by the demons’ touch. As the demons’ power leached out of her veins, shame replaced it.
Her horror at what she’d done made her lose her grip on the chain, and only a quick change of focus prevented her from interrupting the spell.
Later. Deal with that later.
She clenched her teeth and focused hard on keeping the chain attached. The task became easier the more energy she released into the air. Above her, grating moans and sharp wails cut through the sounds of her labored breathing, and she twisted her head toward the ceiling to see the partially reformed demon spirits tumble to the ground.
And then she stared in wonder as the victims of the Morgrin dynasty poured out of the rooms where they’d hidden, their shimmering figures falling on their torturers with a vehemence Daphne had never seen in them before. The demons screamed and tried to fight back, but Daphne’s spell continued to drain their strength.
She screamed as Arthur finally broke through the remnants of her power and grabbed hold of her heart. The air left her, and her hands went numb.
Leaving Harold to guide the disentanglement spell, she used her last amount of strength to force Arthur out of her. As soon as he hit the floor, Mary Ruth fell on him, her eyes glowing with wild anger. Her ghostly fingers reached for his face and dug beneath his ethereal skin.
Footsteps echoed on the stairs, and Daphne twisted her head toward the stairway.
Hunter drew to a halt on the top step. His face went pale and he stared at her and the spirits in frozen disbelief. Through the confusion of her thoughts, Daphne imagined what he must be seeing — a semi-translucent battle, ghosts fighting ghosts. His gun was drawn, but he kept it aimed at the floor. She wondered if he saw them as clearly as she did or if he only made out the shimmering lights around the edges of a mass of energy roiling in the center of the room.
On shaking legs, Daphne rose to her feet and stretched both hands out before her. Free from the drain of the disentanglement spell, her magic swirled through her body and set to work repairing the damage the demon inside had caused. The golden energy swept up all the green magic still lingering in her blood and took it in, each new boost spreading a larger net of guilt and shame over Daphne’s conscience.
But she couldn’t waste her power on herself. She pulled her magic away from its instinctive task and pushed it down her arms into her palms. Tapping into the energy of the room, she forced her power into every gap between the demons, flexed it to widen the space, then stretched it like a net until every remaining blob of energy was trapped within the golden fingers of her magic.
The victim spirits stepped back and, like the audience at an execution, watched as the final remains of their enemies were snuffed out in a puff of smoke.
The atmosphere in the room cleared, and Daphne breathed more easily. Her heart hammered in her throat, and sweat had soaked through her shirt, but it was done. And she had survived.
Relief and exhaustion took the strength out of her legs, and she collapsed in a heap on the floor.
***
Daphne drifted through a haze and wished her mind would decide if it wanted to sleep or wake up. She didn’t have time for middle ground. Her mouth felt dry and her joints ached, but her emotional pain was worse than the physical.
She groaned at the thought of what she’d done. I almost undid all that work to move forward. Could have broken so many promises.
Hot tears spilled down her cheeks and she drew in a ragged breath.
It didn’t offer much relief to know that Harold had stopped her in time. Without him, she would have lost herself in that power and kept digging deeper until she was dead or everyone around her was. She owed him everything.
Rubber-soled shoes thudded at a rapid pace against the wooden floorboards and stopped beside her. Someone knelt down, and a warm hand rested on her back. The heat cut through the chills chasing her blood, and she clenched her teeth to prevent them from chattering.
“Daphne, are you all right?”
Hunter’s voice shook with barely controlled panic. Daphne sent her gratitude to the gods that he hadn’t been hurt — either by the demons or by her.
The urgency in his words dragged her mind closer to the room, and she blinked her eyes open. The weight of his hand was a comfort against the emptiness inside her now that the demon was gone. She imagined slashes on her insides that matched the ones on her back.
She shook the image away. The demon hadn’t been a physical entity. The damage he had done would heal.
She prayed the damage she had done to herself wouldn’t take long to heal either.
Daphne eased herself into a sitting position on wobbling arms. Hunter’s hand remained on her back, balancing her. His hazel eyes were wide and filled with concern as he scanned her face.
“I’ll be okay,” she said, hoping she was right. “I just had the wind knocked out of me.”
“By what?” he asked. “What exactly happened? You asked me to come and I thought it was because you’d found something. Then I walk into a light show and find two people on the floor and you facing off with — correct me if I’m wrong — a bunch of ghosts.”
“I’ll explain everything, I promise. Help me up?”
“Are you sure?” he asked, and the worry warmed her enough that her tremors eased. “You look like death.” He stumbled over the final word.
Daphne’s throat closed, the voice in the back of her mind reminding her she could have ended up in a place worse than death. “I feel like it, too, but I’m sure.”
She tried to tuck her hair behind her ear, but her hands were too numb with shock to find the locks that tickled her. Hunter beat her to it and brushed away the loose strands, his fingers stroking her cheek.
For a moment, she thought they’d broken through the wall that had come between them, but then his expression smoothed into stoicism, detachment taking over. He dropped his hand, and they were right back where they had been.
Heaped on top of her pain and exhaustion, the pang of disappointment was difficult to contain, but the slow, aching process of getting to her feet provided an excellent distraction.
Daphne squeezed her eyes shut to clear her vision, then took stock of the room. Her stomach dropped. She took a deep breath and focused on not being sick. More tears ran down her cheeks and a low moan escaped between her lips.
Both the guardian and Emmett remained motionless on the floor. They’d given their all to help her achieve her goal, and now they were dead. Tears stung her eyes, but she struck them away and swallowed the ball in her throat. There would be time for emotion later, once she’d cleaned up her mess.
“You stay here,” Hunter said. He removed his hand from her back, and the chills returned with a vengeance. She watched dully as he moved to Harold’s side, knelt down, and pressed his fingers into the old man’s throat to check for
a pulse. With a deep sigh, he bent his head.
“He’s gone,” he said.
Daphne’s throat tightened in a painful choke. Unable to stand still any longer, she turned her back and limped over to Emmett. Gods, this is all my fault. Crouching down, she took his hand in hers and gasped at the warmth in his fingers. She drew in a breath of sudden hope. She couldn’t suppress the tears that trickled down her face. Even in her stupidity, she’d protected him in time.
She brushed her fingers over the rabbit-like softness of his shaved hair as she sent power into his chest. Her magic was sluggish, her reserves nearly empty, but after a moment it trickled down her arms, through her palms, and into him. Her great-grandmother had been renowned as a healer and would have been able to fix all that ailed him. Daphne only had the basics, hardly anything more than the ability to give Emmett’s system a nudge to do its own work, but hopefully it would be enough to give him the strength he needed to find his way back.
He groaned and twitched, but his breathing appeared to come a little easier, so Daphne left him to sleep. Digging deep for the courage to turn around, she stood up and faced Hunter.
He had raised his attention from Harold, one hand frozen on the man’s chest, the other caught mid-air. But he wasn’t looking at Daphne. He was staring in awe at the crowd of ghosts that had appeared in the hallway in front of them.
Mary Ruth stood at its head, looking more like the quiet creature she’d been with Daphne than the raging spirit of a moment ago. Her nightdress billowed in spite of the lack of breeze, and she smoothed it down with the palms of her hands. A smile lit up her face with such peace that Daphne’s breath caught with the beauty of it.
“We’re leaving,” she said. “You were right — it’s warm and light, and I’m not afraid.”
Daphne’s words escaped her and, in spite of her grief for Harold, she smiled in return, grateful that no matter what pain the demons had caused or what consequences she would face in the morning, she’d accomplished her mission. The victims who had waited for someone to hear them were finally free.
Daphne and Mary Ruth both stepped forward, meeting in the middle beside Hunter. Mary Ruth stretched out her hand, and Daphne reached for it. The woman’s energy tingled over her skin.
“The darkness is still there,” Mary Ruth said, and her voice dropped to a note of warning. “It’s still calling, and although we might be safe from it, I worry that you are not. Stay vigilant, Daphne Heartstone, and be wary. Whatever is waking won’t take long to rise from the depths.”
She leaned forward and kissed Daphne on the cheek, a touch that felt like no more than a slight draft. Then they were gone. The hospital fell silent. Daphne closed her eyes and shifted her mind to the other plane, but the hallway was empty. Nothing remained of the fight but the four of them.
Hunter cupped his neck and sat back on his heels. “I don’t understand what just happened, but you and I are going to have a very long talk very soon.”
Daphne released a breath. “Sure. Maybe after a bottle of bourbon or two.”
She knelt down beside the old caretaker and took his hand. Hunter had closed Harold’s eyes. He was already cold, yet a hint of his silvery magic lingered, slowly drifting away from him to disperse in the air.
Again, the desire to absorb it rose inside her. How easy it would be, and at no cost to anyone. One little taste, just to take the edge off her exhaustion.
The power edged toward her, ready to pass through. She could take more than a taste. She was already a formidable sorceress, but with a guardian’s magic, she would be super-human.
She closed her eyes and took a breath.
Then blocked the magic before it entered her system.
Harold had stopped her from making the worst decision of her life. He’d already given enough. She wouldn’t repay his kindness by relapsing into the power-mad woman of a year ago.
She placed his hands on his chest and brushed her fingers over his ancient brow. A once-powerful being, he had aged and deteriorated under the weight of his perceived failure. For over a century, he had lived alone, watching, waiting for his opportunity to complete his mission and believing he never would.
You won in the end, guardian. A tear trickled down her cheek before she had a chance to stop it. Exhaustion was breaking down her attempt at restraint. Your job is done. Rest now.
She forced a half smile, shifting her gaze up to the now-empty ceiling to dry her eyes.
She looked to Hunter, who was pulling his cellphone out of his pocket.
“What are you doing?” she asked, getting to her feet.
“Calling the paramedics,” he said.
A flash of panic pushed away the heaviness of her fatigue. “You can’t.”
He raised an eyebrow, but his thumb paused over the number pad. “I can’t? Why not? Daphne, I don’t know what’s going on here, but we have an injured teenager who needs care and a deceased senior citizen.”
“I know,” she said, her mind racing to sort out her thoughts. “I know how it looks, but please, take five minutes and listen to what I have to say. Then Emmett and I will leave and you can make your phone call, all right?”
Hunter’s free hand stretched toward Emmett. “You’re just going to take him home? He’s lying unconscious on the floor. He needs medical attention.”
“He doesn’t,” Daphne argued. “There’s nothing they can do for him. You saw with your own eyes what happened in this room. You think that’s going to be easy to explain? The doctor will look for what’s wrong and find nothing. He was struck down by magic, Hunter. Doctors can’t help. He needs rest and a bucket of my mother’s herbal tea.”
Hunter mouthed the word magic, disbelief written on his face, and then he brought his phone to his forehead and released a growl of frustration. “What the hell have you brought me into? I’d think it was hallucinations due to hunger or sleep deprivation if I didn’t have a dead man on my hands.”
“I know,” she said, and held up her hands as though he were a wild animal she needed to calm. “And the truth is not much more believable than that, but it is the truth. Please, just hear me out.”
He groaned again, but slid his phone back into his pocket. “Three minutes.” He removed his jacket and draped it over Emmett’s torso to keep him warm.
Daphne nodded and licked her lips, her dry tongue scraping over them without much effect. “I’m a sorceress. The magic in my bloodline on my mother’s side goes back to the dawn of civilization and probably before, and I stand as the latest and most powerful of my line. I can manipulate the elements and energies of everything around me. Before last year, I was neck-deep in some of the darkest arts you can imagine, and as a result, I was an asshole. I got you into trouble, I took stupid risks. All of those things you suspected me of doing — getting into your office, stealing evidence from locked cabinets — I did them with magic.”
Once her confession had started, she couldn’t stop herself. She spoke without registering Hunter’s reaction until she ran out of breath. He stared at her blankly, forgetting even to blink.
She released another breath and squeezed her hands at her sides. “But a year ago that all changed, and I swore I wouldn’t go down that path anymore. So now you see the new me. The magic-infused sorceress doing her best to help people in need.”
Hunter remained silent, so she continued. “You wanted to know why I couldn’t leave Jack’s case alone, and what you saw tonight is the reason. There were hundreds of victims here who were killed by the same kind of demon that killed Jack, all of them trapped here, some of them for over a century. And the ghosts of the demons were trapped here with them. So I set them free. I couldn’t leave them stuck here with that darkness, unable to move on to whatever comes next. So, yes, I went against your orders, I spoke to witnesses I should have left alone, but I promise it was not to be a pain in the ass. It was to set things right.”
She took another breath, her eyes stinging with disheartened frustration. A brick wall wou
ld have shown more reaction to what she was saying than Hunter, and she prayed she wasn’t wasting her time and risking her reputation for nothing.
“That’s why I asked you to come out here tonight. Because how in the hell could I have told you all of this and have you believe me? It sounds insane. But now that you’ve seen for yourself, you know I’m not making it up. And I need you to believe me, because on top of everything else that I did here tonight, I also solved Jack’s murder.”
Finally, Hunter’s brow furrowed. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that Charles Ancowitz is the same kind of demon as those I destroyed here. The demon is in the Ancowitz bloodline the same way that magic is in mine. Charles must be able to change form into the demon when he makes his kills, devouring the souls of his victims. He stole Jack’s spirit. It’s why de Lancy wasn’t able to find a cause of death. And Charles’s demon saliva seals his victims’ mouths shut to keep their ghosts quiet, so they can’t speak to people like me after they die. People who will listen.”
Hunter had fallen silent again, so she gave one final effort. “I want to bring Charles to justice — legally — but I can’t do it on my own. I need your help. I know it’s a huge risk for you, and you have no reason to trust me, but I’m taking a risk, too. Telling you any of this is breaking the biggest rule of my kind, but I’m doing it for Jack’s sake, and for Emmett’s, and goddamn it, for mine as well, because I hate knowing that I let you down for so long when you were a good enough man to put up with me. I know I owe you a thousand times over, but maybe this can be a start.”
Daphne clamped a hand over her mouth, partly to stop the spiel of her words, and partly because she felt her emotions breaking through her exhaustion and didn’t want to cry.
She should have waited to talk to him until she’d rested and recovered. Her legs were trembling from the fight as well as her fear of Hunter’s reaction, and she wished there were a chair to sink into. She wished she were at home watching her British crime shows. She wished she were anywhere else but under his appraising stare.