Magical Redemption

by Jaliza A. Burwell

  “Try it,” he said. “Try using your power.”

  I briefly thought about what I wanted to do, but before I could finish the thought, it was happening. The water flowed up and swirled through the air, doing a dance. I directed it with my thoughts, and the water listened to me.

  “It’s instant,” I whispered in awe. “I barely have to think about it and it’s doing it. Holy Goddess.”

  “Try to do more,” he said.

  Ready to see where my limit was, how much I could do, I kept the water going, and I reached out for the vines nearby. They shot out into the air, slithering around as the water curled around it. It became harder, my focus split, but it was holding.

  A loud banging noise broke my concentration a moment later, and the water and vines fell into the river. When I looked at Dwight, he had his hands pressed together. He had clapped to distract me and it had worked.

  He smirked. “You’ll get better with practice. I have no doubt you’ll master this quickly. You already have strong control because of your magic.”

  I laughed at his silliness, my cheeks warm from his confidence in me. Wanting to be closer, I scooted until I was next to him. His arm wrapped around me and pulled me into his side. Once I was comfortable, I rested my head on his shoulder and sighed in contentment. Peace became a new friend as we sat there and stared at the waterfall. This really was a nice place.

  We sat there in silence, enjoying the peace for at least an hour before Dwight spoke up.

  “I’m sorry,” he said softly, squeezing me into his side.

  I tilted my head so I could look up at him, confused by the apology. “For what?”

  “I should have seen the signs. It’s my job to see them.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?” I tried to pull away from him, but he wouldn’t let me move.

  He sighed. “After a big mission, I force my security specialist to take a week off to recuperate. Each one of them have a special place that is just theirs and there’s no relation to work there. No assignments, no training, nothing. It’s their safe place, their little haven. They work in an industry with a high turnover rate and I don’t want them burning out. I do everything I can to keep that turnover low. I didn’t do that with you because you’re a lab technician, not a security specialist. It was one thing after another with you between keeping Shanton safe when he first visited and then going through caves to protect them. The breach at Biomystic didn’t help, and while you didn’t work afterward, you were still around. You weren’t relaxing. You never asked for time off, and I just shrugged it off, thinking you were fine because you were a lab technician, not one of my specialists. You didn’t need it. Then when the incident at the park happened, I chalked your reaction up to guilt and anger. When you suggested tracking him, I should have listened to you. I shrugged it off again, thinking you were becoming obsessed and grasping at straws. I shouldn’t have done that. I should have worked with you, trusted that it wasn’t stress talking.”

  He jaw tightened as his anger rose. By how hard he focused on the waterfall, I knew a chunk of that anger was at himself. Some of it had to be aimed at me too, but he was being careful to not bite my head off. He wanted to. I could tell. His hand had a steel grip on my shoulder, just bordering on pain.

  “I should have forced you to take an official vacation, no work, no training, just rest. I failed as your boss and you reached your breakdown.” He waved his free hand in the air to encompass everything around us. “You should have had time to absorb what you had to do for those jobs, to accept them, maybe talk to someone if you wanted. I didn’t push for that.”

  “I’m not in the middle of a breakdown.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “You are. You’re too close to it to see the signs, but I see it all the time. You’ve made irrational decisions, you’re obsessing over Padraig and hunting him down, you’re pushing people around you away, not confiding in anyone. You’re making hasty decisions.” He held his free hand up. “I know it’s not all this. You did come to me. Shit, now that I think about it, you called before you came out here. Didn’t you? And I completely dismissed you.

  “I’m not having a breakdown,” I argued lamely.

  “You just went through the awakening, without the full picture and without a healer nearby. You did it in a cave.”

  I narrowed my eyes as anger rose. “You don’t think I should have gone through it?”

  “I didn’t say that. I think it’s good that you went through it, and I’m relieved you’re alive. But we could have done it in a safer environment, not inside a cave on hostile lands with Padraig circling around, not without a healer, or without the full picture.”

  He made good points, and I hated that. What he was telling me was almost on par with what Shanton was saying. Didn’t that mean I needed to pay more attention to what they were telling me? I mulled that over. I did come out here without much thought on the repercussions. My thoughts and actions felt like they’d been going at a speed I could barely keep up with. Desperation had become too much of a constant friend and all I wanted, still wanted, was Padraig dead. Henzie was dead because of him. Ami was suffering through all the stages of grief because of him. All those people at the park.

  A sob escaped me, and I curled into myself.

  “Laila?” Dwight was trying to pull me into him but I refused to move. “Talk to me, what’s wrong?”

  “I-I lived,” I stuttered out. “At the park. I lived. They didn’t.” The annoying tears escaped.

  “Oh, no, honey, don’t think of it like that.” He scooped me into his lap and held me against him as I cried. I felt silly. I worked so hard to not let it bother me like this, but now the dam was breaking. “Sh, you’re okay.”

  “I know I’m okay. But they aren’t. I couldn’t save them. I could save myself, but I couldn’t save them.”

  “It’s not like that. No one is angry at you for living. You did what you could and you didn’t know what was going on. You couldn’t have done anything. From the sound of it, if you weren’t strong enough, you’d have ended up like those two elementalist guards Shanton told us about. You did what you had to do to live. Don’t regret that.” He was growling at the end as he held me close.

  Dwight continued to rock me as I cried into him. Words of kindness poured out of his mouth as he reassured me. I still couldn’t get what had happened out of my mind, all those people shells, robbed of their magic, leaving them with nothing. Was that the breaking point he was talking about?

  “I’m so sorry, Laila.” He kissed my head. “I should have seen the signs and helped you through all this. I overlooked everything you’d gone through since working at Biomystic because you’re a lab technician and rarely out in the field. But it doesn’t mean you don’t have trauma. I should have seen the signs.”

  He continued to apologize as I tired myself out crying.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  After I finished crying, Dwight brought me back to our makeshift camp at the caves. The others were hard at work and had everything packed up and cleaned. All signs of our stay had been wiped away, including the carved symbols on the rock walls.

  I didn’t know how Hale and Tek got rid of them and knew they weren’t going to tell me even if I went on my knees to beg. After that, we set up a fast pace to catch up with Siitha. Tek wasn’t saying anything but there was an urgency to him as we hiked through the forest to get to my kitty.

  That only added to my own urgency, and we didn’t stop until well after night fell. We were up and going again before the sun had a chance to rise. Having the Blackfoot brothers made everything faster. They knew exactly where to go, where all the dangers were, and how to stop the danger from trying to turn us into a meal.

  As we hiked, I used every opportunity I had to flex my powers. It was weird, having powers swirling around inside of me instead of just magic. The color of my magic used to be a light lavender, and it still was, but with the mix of energy it was paler, nearly white.

&
nbsp; There was also a constant hum coming from me that I needed to get used to. Magic was something that was settled inside of me, but with energy, it acted more like atoms, constantly moving through my body. Sometimes, I found myself scratching or didn’t realize I was doing it until one of the guys grabbed my hands to stop it.

  Hale assured me I’d get used to it as time went by. I wasn’t so sure about it. But if there was one thing I was good at, it was adapting. So while I ignored how my body felt, I practiced control when I could.

  That was why I smiled as Davies climbed over a rock and with just a thought, I lifted him off the ground and brought him over it.

  “Don’t do that, Laila,” he grumbled. I laughed, knowing he was only embarrassed because there was a weird squeak that came out of him when I did it.

  I did the same with Elliot too. Elliot just smiled his thanks when he landed.

  “How easy is it?” Venni asked.

  “It’s just a thought now. Then again, what I’m doing is elementary. Anyone Level D or higher can do that with their magic. The real trick is what happens when I try to do something that is more my level.” I rubbed at my neck, wiping away the sweat forming at the nape.

  “Any discomfort using power?”

  I smiled at Venni’s worry and bumped into him. “I’m fine. I promise.”

  “I still think we should have given you more time to rest.”

  “Tek and Hale are nervous. From their emotions, something big is going to happen and soon. We don’t have another day for me to sleep in.”

  “Can you read emotions now too?” Alijah asked, joining us.

  I shook my head. “No. I can feel Nature’s reaction by the way the energy and magic in the air is moving. She’s nervous. Tek is picking up on that.”

  “We’re about half a day from the elementalists’ lands. Do you think Padraig has given up on getting to them?” Alijah frowned as he asked.

  I shook my head. “No way. He’s waited a while to get his revenge. I doubt he’s giving it up just because he can’t make it through their wards. I think he’s trying to find a source to give him more strength. It makes me nervous about the device. I don’t know what they’re using, and I doubt he’s completely tapped into it yet. That means there’s a big kick of magic in it. He doesn’t want to or can’t tap into it without it exploding. He’s a walking bomb right now.”

  Alijah growled. “And he’s going to keep on shoving more magic into it if he can.”

  The group stopped, and Hale and Tek motioned for us all to gather together.

  “This is bad,” Hale said. “We are approaching a settlement that only a few know about. They are protected by very powerful beings. The behesiff is still tracking, and it looks like Padraig is moving in on them.”

  I gnawed on my lip before asking. “Who is it? Who lives in the settlement?”

  Hale and Tek exchanged glances. Hale ended up being the one to ask. “Have you heard of pterippi?”

  I wasn’t the only one to shake my head.

  “They are winged stallions. That is their secondary form. They walk around as humanoids though and have built this village for that form.”

  “Winged stallions.” I tried to picture it.

  “Oh!” Davies said, and he looked a little too excited as his expression brightened. “Pegasus!”

  “What?” Venni asked.

  “A famous winged horse that lived among the Greeks for a long time. He was their hero. There’s an old documentary on him. The Greeks mourned his death for years and put up a monument in his honor.”

  Hale nodded. “Correct. There is another herd of them living in Greece. We have the second biggest herd here. The males and females live separately, the males are warriors, and the females are innocents. They do no harm. Because of this, very powerful beings, on par in strength with the elementalists watch over them. Their village is ahead about two miles.”

  Moaning, seeing where this was going, I asked, “And they are made of magic?”

  Hale nodded. “Yes.”

  “Fuck. That means if Padraig gets his hands on them, he’s going to have what will amount to a supernova in his hands.”

  “And if he harms them, the primordials protecting them will destroy this land in retribution.”

  “Primordials?” My eyes widened. “Is this the village Shetz warned me about?”

  “Who is Shetz?” Dwight asked.

  I rolled my eyes. “Calm down, Black Dog. He’s a pixie. I stopped by a village when I realized how far out I’d come. He helped me get supplies. He and another warned me about beings who would destroy everything if a settlement out here was touched.”

  Hale raised an eyebrow. “I will need to visit them if they know about the pterippi.”

  Oops. I may have gotten Shetz’s village in trouble. I couldn’t really work up too much worry. That was the risk his village ran for being greedy with everything, including the information they were sometimes willing to sell for a hefty price.

  “Come, we will circle the settlement and see if we can cut Padraig off before he makes a grave mistake.” Tek walked off with Hale following.

  “Hopefully we can take his head too,” Shanton said.

  I wanted to agree with him, but that felt too bloodthirsty.

  The two miles didn’t take long to cover, and Tek led the way as we quietly picked our way around a barrier I felt, but couldn’t see, which was rare. I felt the hum of it whenever we got a little too close, felt how it prepared to attack if we got any closer and relaxed when we backed off. But I never saw it.

  Tek knew what he was doing as he kept us at a safe distance away from the barrier. I had guesses to what it could do to us, but that was one experiment I wasn’t willing to find out about.

  “Your behesiff is just up ahead. The barrier messed with his senses so he lost track,” Hale said. He barely finished talking before Siitha was jumping through the bush and tackling me.

  “Aw, I missed you too, big guy,” I said, rubbing his head as he purred against my touch, his tail whipping about furiously. The others cautiously stayed out of reach of the barbed tails. Once he calmed and was done licking my face, Tek began the hike again to continue to skirt the barrier.

  We were only walking for ten minutes when he stiffened and said something in Shawnee to his brother. The two of them turned to face something and Siitha was by their side, growling softly, haunches raised.

  “Leave.”

  The voice boomed through my head, and I winced at the power behind the words. There was compulsion in it. Elliot and Davies looked sick to their stomach. Without thinking, I raised my hand and imagined a barrier around us, meant to filter words.

  “Leave.” The deep voice echoed through my head again, but it wasn’t as bad. Elliot and Davies crumpled to the ground. Venni and Rhett were at their side, helping them back to their feet.

  “We are not here for your pterippi,” Hale said.

  That was how I realized the voice we were hearing wasn’t being said out loud. It was all through our heads. The ground rumbled before trees shifted and moved.

  “What the fuck?” Davies said.

  I was speechless as the knobby, twisted trees melted into what looked like vines and then reformed into a human shape. But that was all that was similar to a person. While the creature had two legs, two arms, a head, and hands, it looked to be made from the branches and roots of trees. Branches fanned out from its back and the head looked like a crown of branches sticking up from a tree trunk that was in the shape of its head. It stood tall, at about ten feet.

  Fear settled inside of me, clawed to get free, and I had to painfully swallow to keep bile from coming up. I’d never been this scared before. Though the creature had a head, there wasn’t a face.

  “Elementalist,” it said in my head, and I winced. “You are not welcomed here. Do not break the treaties created.”

  I stepped forward on shaky legs. Even without eyes, I could feel all its attention on me. “I don’t mean any disrespec
t,” I squeaked out. Shanton and Dwight stood at my back for support.

  “Leave.”

  “I can’t do that.”

  The ground shook and the roots making up his body shifted as it turned to face us completely. It lifted up an arm and the hand, with long fingers curling upward, and created a small fireball. I had a strong feeling my ward would not hold up against that kind of magic.

  “We mean no harm,” I said hastily.

  “We are on the hunt,” Tek spoke up. “One has escaped and is now circling your settlement. We are here to dispatch him before he does harm. We will not approach the settlement.”

  “We will be watching. Approach the ward and you will perish. The one you hunt will not touch ours.”

  “I wish that were true, and in most cases, I’m sure it is. But he has a device capable of stealing magic. There is no telling what he can do with it.”

  There was a hissing noise that scraped at my brain. I winced, squishing my eyes closed as a lame attempt at stopping the pain.

  “We will find him.”

  “Our elementalist is claiming Blood Retribution,” Tek said, and I glanced at him with big eyes. Whatever those words meant sounded bad.

  “We see. Her Retribution is granted. Fail and we will step in.”

  Tek bowed. “Thank you, Primordial.”

  “Hunt. We will be watching.” With those words, the vines and branches untwined and settled into the ground, completely disappearing from sight.

  “Holy fuck,” I said staring at the spot the creature had stood. “That’s them?” I shuddered.

  “Yes.” Tek’s voice was tight.

  “What did you do?” Shanton asked. “Why would you claim a Blood Retribution?”

  “What does that mean?” I asked over him.

  “It means you seek revenge against the man because he has killed one of yours. It was the only way we could safely get out of here. They normally aren’t so close to the settlement without cause.”

  “What kind of cause is it normally?” I was kind of afraid of asking.