Magic After Dark: A Collection of Urban Fantasy and Paranormal Romance Novels

by Margo Bond Collins

  I blinked my eyes and when they didn’t vanish, I quickly projected their images to her, illustrating how their dragon scales rivaled the colors of the sunset, but I could no longer feel her within my mind.

  She was gone and painfully silent.

  The dragons shimmered before me and I could feel the static electricity humming through the air. They wavered and so did my stomach—which should have been impossible considering I was dead.

  Standing before me and where the dragons had been, were four men and one woman. I blinked my eyes again, but this time in confusion and then in disbelief at what I had just witnessed.

  The one standing at point walked towards me.

  “Where are you, Pena?” He asked with his mind and in a familiar voice.

  “I am before you, as you can see,” I answered in kind, then thought to ask him who he was, though I thought I already knew the answer.

  “Time is diminishing, Sister. Where is your body then?”

  “In the dungeon basement,” I replied.

  He took his hands and placed them over his heart and whispered quietly to himself. It appeared as if he were gathering something and I saw that he was. Within the cradle of his cupped hands was the same glowing blue iridescence that had visited me in my dungeon hellhole.

  I looked at his face and then at his hands. I thought about how his voice had sounded in my mind and realized he was indeed my companion. He was my blue iridescence, as well as a dragon and a man.

  He nodded. “Come Sister, drink of my essence and be risen. Be Renascent,” he told me formally and aloud for the sake of the others.

  “I don’t wish to be risen or whatever it is that you’re offering. I welcome death! I’m thankful it has finally found me,” I said stepping backwards, away from his proffered hands.

  “I understand wanting to have your final rest and finding that peace you were denied the whole of your life. But you need to drink. For her sake, you must,” he told me, as he walked forward.

  “Who is she? Who must I drink for? There is only me and I do not wish to.”

  “Your mind seems still, but I’m there with you and I can hear her. She’s very quiet, but if you focus, you will find her. The two of you are connected. You will need each other, but only you can find her,” he explained.

  I didn’t understand his explanation at all. He spoke in circles of nonsense, but I tried to do as he asked and searched my mind. Besides, the longer I was dead—chances were, I’d stay that way.

  My mind was calm and quiet, but I was so used to the constant chaos and the never-ending cries of the lost, that the silence was eerie. I closed my eyes to concentrate, but I heard nothing.

  I felt nothing.

  I wanted to prolong the time since I had died, so I waited a bit longer before giving up the search for her. But then I found her quietly weeping and now that I’d heard her, I could feel her too. Her hopelessness nearly broke my already dead heart.

  It was Mia!

  She was still there, though barely. I didn’t make her up, she was real, my relief was instantaneous. But in that moment, she reminded me of the little boy I’d heard all those years ago. His fear and pain—so real to me—had triggered the episode that caused my parents to have me committed. I didn’t want her to suffer as he had suffered.

  I opened my eyes to see Cipriano’s hands patiently offering me his blue iridescence. I heard her quietly begging to ‘please, help’ and with that heart wrenching plea, I stepped forward to accept his essence.

  I drank, no matter the cost or potential consequences. We had been together for years. I would find Mia and deliver her from whatever hell she was consigned to.

  For a brief moment, I felt nothing except a profound sense of peace and wellbeing.

  Then I knew nothing at all.

  Chapter 6

  A benefit of being so cold was that my metabolism had dramatically slowed. My body had needed less oxygen to survive so there would be minimal damage from my dead time—if any at all.

  After Cipriano shared his life force with me, my essence had returned to the dungeon and reentered my body. I had risen, Renascent, but had not been fully healed. I was alive, but my body remained weak from malnutrition and malicious neglect. Unfortunately, my mind returned to its usual state of chaos.

  Oddly comforting, though loud and painful.

  I was in the asylum basement when Cipriano materialized before me. His beautiful blue iridescence glowing in his hand so that we could see in the pitch-black dungeon. Three of the others materialized around me—transforming from mere shadows to men once again.

  What a cool ability to have I thought inanely and shook my head at all the strange and wondrous things I’d witnessed since dying and being Renascent.

  Cipriano bent down to gather my slight frame into his arms and carried me away from what would have been my final internment. The open sky was much preferable to that dank hell. First, we would have to find a way past the guards and the staff.

  “The others are clearing a path for us to leave this place unmolested.”

  Too late for that, I muttered within my mind, then blushed when I realized he probably meant leaving without anyone trying to stop us. I was thankful I hadn’t projected that thought to him.

  I realized he had heard my wayward thought when he said, “And they will pay for that as well!” Retribution evident in his voice.

  Cipriano knelt down with me still in his arms and placed me gently on the lawn in the courtyard.

  “Sister, if you please, rest here a moment with Ian. We have one more thing to take care of and then you will be rid of this place for good,” Cipriano said, but stayed kneeling.

  I looked at him questioningly.

  “If you would permit me, I would be honored to seek vengeance on your behalf,” he said or asked, depending on how you wanted to classify it.

  He was like a warrior of old seeking my permission to do battle.

  I nodded because I didn’t trust my voice to work. I couldn’t say it within my own mind either. Besides, I wouldn’t be able to hurt a fly at the moment, if ever.

  Nodding back, he placed his fist over his heart and bowed his head for a moment before standing. He and the others transformed back to shadows then disappeared within a blink, blending with the natural shadows cast by the moon.

  I looked up at Ian and asked, “How…how do they do that?” I stuttered though my mind, as I tried and failed miserably to formulate my thoughts into some semblance of order. I had seen so many amazing things it was hard to grasp it all.

  He chuckled and said, “Quite disturbing, is it not?”

  Ian nodded when I realized he had heard me with his mind, but he confirmed it by saying, “Yes, I can hear you too. We all can. You are quite loud, Pena,” he finished with a smile and a wink.

  “Why do you call me that?”

  “We are Gypsy, among other things, but in our culture Pena means sister. So you are and shall be.”

  These five strangers were treating me as if I had value, as if I were something more than nothing. I had no idea how to respond to this anomaly and so I didn’t respond at all.

  I pulled my knees to my chest and wrapped my arms around them. The threadbare gown I wore hung in tatters and did little to protect me against the cool night air. My lack of body fat didn’t help the situation.

  Warmth enveloped my shoulders and brief, hazy flashes from Ian’s life fluttered through my mind, as I felt his warm jacket settle against my filthy skin. I allowed myself a moment of selfishness to enjoy the thoughtfulness of his gesture and the warmth his jacket provided. With regret, I shrugged it off and handed it back to him, saying as I did so, “Thank you, Ian, but I can’t accept your jacket. It wouldn’t be right.”

  I’m too filthy, I thought to myself.

  “No, Sister! You are not filthy and you will cease in thinking so!” he said, as he settled the jacket back around my shoulders.

  I hadn’t meant for him to hear that last part. I really
needed to work on not projecting my every thought, but I was too weak and too tired to censor myself or argue about the jacket. Without Cipriano shielding me, the voices were roaring out of control and a bit louder than usual.

  Luckily, I was still sitting on the grass because I was blindsided by disorienting vignettes of death that suddenly flashed in-and-out of focus within my mind. I saw the others—in their dragon forms—circling Dr. Hanley and the asylum guards. They were standing within the inner courtyard where the dragons had placed them.

  I couldn’t direct the visions because they were coming from Cipriano I realized. The mental scene switched to panning the buildings surrounding the courtyard. I saw the many faces of the deranged pressed against the glass—silent witnesses—waiting and watching, knowing this would affect their fates as well.

  The scene returned to Hanley and the guards, now bloody and covered in deep gashes. The dragons were toying with them, like the cat does the mouse. There was no sport in it for Cipriano and the others, so they cut the chase and went straight for the killing blows.

  My next vision was from above. I saw what appeared to be a dragon’s claw slash across the throat of one of the ten guards. A spray of blood arced outward as his body twisted and fell. Eyes widened in shock, he clutched his throat as blood bubbled out from his gasping mouth.

  Each of the guards followed in a similar fashion. I witnessed to the entire death scene within the landscape of my mind. The dragons killed them all and without remorse.

  Hanley was the only one left standing. He was bleeding from multiple gashes, including a bone deep laceration across his forehead that bled profusely into his right eye. I couldn’t hear what he was saying, but I could feel his fear as he begged for his life.

  I was in Cipriano’s mind watching and feeling everything. He said nothing and I felt nothing from him—only from Hanley. I reached out to Cipriano to stop his killing blow and stood to make my way towards them.

  “He’ll not be happy that you saw that side of him,” Ian stated when I looked up at him.

  As weak as I was, it was slow going, so Ian picked me up and carried me. Once we were almost there, but still out of eyesight, he placed me on the grass. I took his jacket from my shoulders and handed it back to him and said, “Thank you, for its use, Ian.”

  With my chin up and my head held high, I walked the rest of the way on my own volition. I saw that the staff and the guards, who had repeatedly abused me and their authority, were dead and laying around the courtyard—dismissed. I ignored their bloody bodies and walked towards Cipriano.

  The dragons were acutely focused on Hanley and so was I.

  He was looking between Cipriano—in his dragon form—and me, as I walked up and stood next to Cipriano’s side. Without Ian’s jacket, I was freezing, so I locked my knees. I would not shiver and I would not fall over. Period!

  I stared at Hanley, as I refused to acknowledge my weaknesses—courtesy of his heinous dungeon deprivation treatment.

  A flash of red hazed through my mind just before I saw Cipriano’s dragon claws lash out with macabre silence to rip the good doctors heart right out of his chest. He collapsed, as if in slow motion—a puppet with its lead strings suddenly cut.

  I looked around at the carnage then down at my most recent tormentor and finally at Cipriano. On shaking legs, I turned to face him placing the death scene at my back. He looked at me briefly with his expressive grey eyes, then bowed his dragon’s head—in apology, understanding and vindication all at once.

  I stood before Cipriano, his head was still bowed. He continued to hold Hanley’s beating heart within his claws. It was an offering of sorts—vengeance sought and justice served. I looked at him, as he waited for what I would do.

  A sensation that could not be named and a compulsion that would not be denied crept through my body, consuming me like wildfire. I reached out my hand to touch Hanley’s beating heart. It was still warm and wet, and resonated evil from where my two fingers were pressed.

  Reaching out with my other hand, I placed it along Cipriano’s massive jaw and gently raised his face to mine. When our somber eyes met, I nodded my head.

  He closed his claws around Hanley’s heart and crushed it with his talons, letting it fall to the ground below—unnoticed.

  Compelled beyond reason, I simultaneously took my bloody fingers and wiped them across the glyph on my back. Until recently, I hadn’t known that it even existed. Hanley had carved the glyph into my back when I was eight years old during a failed reaping ceremony.

  “Stop, Sister. Do not!” I heard Cipriano yell through my mind.

  He was too late. On some instinctual level, I knew I needed Hanley’s Druid blood for the dark magic that it contained. I didn’t want to be tied to his evil power, but this moment felt ordained.

  The glyph began burning. I could feel his dark magic seeking to possess me, looking for a way to turn me from good to evil, but that would never happen. I would use his dark magic to my benefit, I would use it to find and defeat other drampires.

  I would not be used. Never again!

  Still not trusting my voice to work, I spoke to Cipriano with my mind and simply said, “Thank you.”

  “I’m sorry you had to witness their deaths. I should have protected you from that,” he replied quietly in the same way.

  “No one has protected me since I was eight years old and you sought justice for the wrongs perpetrated against me,” I paused to point to the faces in the windows, “and to all of them. They deserved to die for the atrocities they subjected us to. We were helpless and in their care—with no recourse. They abused us from their position of power. I’ll not mourn for them,” I replied with a definitive nod. “What will happen to all the patients left inside?”

  I couldn’t stand the thought that they might suffer because of me.

  “They will not be made to suffer and least of all because of you. I’ll send someone I trust to come and assist them. We will find proper treatment programs with true hospitals to care for them. Nothing like this one.”

  “Thank you,” I said and collapsed where I stood.

  Chapter 7

  The excitement of the rescue, my confinement, dying and having risen Renascent had finally proven to be too much. Luckily, Cipriano swooped me up into his dragon arms before I ever hit the damp ground.

  When I awoke, a short time later, I was cradled in his human arms as he rested on the grass. I looked at him wide-eyed and slid off his lap. I was no longer comfortable with demonstrative acts of kindness. I didn’t know how to process them, as they were so far outside my usual experience of psychological and physical abuse.

  “I’m really not the fainting type, but thank you for catching me.”

  Well, except in the face of extreme trauma and stress, and then I tended to pass out, but that didn’t count, I told myself.

  “Will you tell me your name?”

  I didn’t want the name my adoptive parents had given me. Names had power. My parents and the doctors had stripped all the power from that one, so I had decided to choose another one for myself.

  “That’s a great idea. Be Renascent—reborn—in this moment. Define yourself. Don’t be defined or confined by them.”

  “Sage advice,” I told him, “it’s weird that we can talk this way, but thank you for shielding me from the other voices and their pain. I needed the break.”

  “I cannot talk to everyone in this fashion. You are unique in that.”

  “What are you?” I asked, then hesitantly added, “besides a dragon?”

  “I’m just an old warrior on a quest to find his lost brother.”

  I could easily believe that he was a warrior and a leader of people. He was tall and muscular and carried the mantle of responsibility with ease. He had grey eyes and longish dark hair that had a white streak running from his right temple.

  “Those stories you so generously shared with me as I lay dying, were they all true?” I asked. They had helped me to focus on somethi
ng besides the pain and my impending death.

  “Yes, they were. Just a few snapshots from my long life.”

  “I loved the freedom I felt when flying over the mountains and skimming the lakes. I haven’t had that sense of joy in more years than imaginable.”

  “I know, Pena. I’ve been searching for you for a while now.”

  “One day blended with the next—add in all the drugs they fed me, it’s really hard to know how much time passed. But why were you searching for me?” I asked, looking around as I waited for his response.

  I noticed there were piles of ash around the courtyard that hadn’t been there before. I wondered where they’d come from. Fascinated, I watched as handfuls were lifted up and carried away on a gentle wind. I looked back to Cipriano, thinking he would have answered my question by now.

  “I apologize for being rude. I promise to listen for your answer,” I said, embarrassed for having been less than attentive.

  “Pena, there is absolutely no reason to apologize. I was merely waiting to see if you would answer your own internal question about where the piles of ash had come from.”

  I tilted my head to look at him and thought about what he was trying to convey. I looked around the courtyard again—to see this time. The grass was devoid of dead bodies! I swung my gaze back to Cipriano and he succinctly explained in just two words.

  Dragon fire.

  I nodded, that made sense, I guess, “But why?”

  “We can’t justifiably rip these men apart and then leave them for normals to find.”

  “Normals?” I asked, interrupting.

  “Normals are what we call people without any kind of magic in their soul. They can’t shift to any other form and are stuck as humans. So in other words,” he shrugged his shoulder and said after a pause, “normal.”

  “I see. So like me. I’m basically normal, except that I can hear and feel people. I don’t have magic in my soul or I would have used it long ago to escape from this hell on earth.”