Impulse (Mageri Series: Book 3)

by Dannika Dark

  Simon dragged his eyes across the table to Justus.

  “Can we not stray from the fact that I called you here for a reason?” I said in a melodic, soft voice. “Aside from all the speculation, I want to know what else you found.”

  Simon pulled his fingerless gloves off and threw them in the center of the table. He flexed his hands, cracking a few knuckles, and didn’t hear a damn word I said.

  “The list is a neatly typed up document that arranges everyone by their age and human name. Except one person is handwritten, and by their Mage name. That person is you, love. Marco may have discovered you by accident.”

  “We don’t believe in accidents,” Logan interrupted. “Fate.”

  Simon rolled his eyes. “My theory is that your mum escaped before you were born and changed her name so that she couldn’t be tracked. It explains why your human name wasn’t on the list. It also gives a little insight as to why you were born on a plane—now that’s a woman in a hurry to get somewhere. She throws a dart and ends up living in the most isolated corner of the United States.”

  “Hey, it’s not that small of a town,” I said defensively.

  “Marco must have sensed there was something different about you as a human and maybe he was trying to earn brownie points by handing over what he felt was a worthy potential. Samil figured it out at some point if he jotted your name down, but I suppose some facts will remain dead and buried with the sodding idiot…” Simon grumbled. “Why go through the trouble of officially claiming you in front of the Council?”

  “Samil was in Nero’s debt somehow, and making it legal was a way to secure his claim so Nero couldn’t steal me away. Something went wrong in the end because Samil freaked out. You can always dig him up and ask.” I shut my eyes and turned away. “You think that I’m a science experiment?”

  My cheeks heated with embarrassment and pain. I’d grown tolerant of the term “Unique” because at least it implied something special. Nothing felt special about being a Petri-dish project. “I’m a genetically created thing from Breed DNA?”

  Justus hid his face behind a cupped hand.

  Simon spoke in animated gestures. “Nero doesn’t know what’s in the box; maybe he thinks there’s documentation that could implicate him in illegal activities. If he got his hands on the files, it would be catastrophic. The last thing we need is Nero’s money joining forces with an organization on the brink of doing some serious genetic damage. I never imagined they’d figure out how to do it.”

  He turned his attention to Logan. “This is confidential. Even HALO will not know about this because of its delicate nature. Blab about it to Leo and we’ll label you a turncoat.”

  They shared a private look.

  Logan didn’t flinch. “You have my word.”

  “If you betray us, Chitah, then you are not only putting her life in danger, but all of us.”

  Logan growled low and fierce—a sound that was predatory and dark. Simon flinched at his unblinking gaze.

  “We can’t do this alone,” I insisted.

  Justus rubbed his shoulder and his skin made a hissing sound from the friction. “Remi is the only other person I trust at this point.”

  I couldn’t say the same because I’d only met him a couple of times. He was a Gemini and while his loyalty to Justus ran deep, it didn’t feel right bringing him into my business.

  After the bomb dropped, I quietly sifted through the ashes. It was one thing to go my entire life thinking that my father was a coldhearted bastard who left my mother when she was pregnant, but it was a whole other dose of nasty medicine to find out I was nothing but a genetic lab experiment.

  “What makes you think that the record you found belonged to my mother? Maybe you’re mistaken.”

  “Pictures.”

  “How the hell do you know what my mother looks like?”

  Simon reached around and lifted a bottle of wine from a liquor table. “When we flew down with Sunny to find Marco, I did a little background check on you. The name on the file doesn’t match up so she obviously took on a new identity. Lovely lady, but that birthmark on her forehead is unmistakable.”

  I sat back and the hard wood pinched my shoulder blade. “I’m a mutant—is that what you’re telling me? That I’m a fatherless experiment scraped out of some Petri dish?” When my voice cracked, I looked away. “Feel free to get up and leave, Logan. I won’t take any offense.”

  Logan grabbed my chair and dragged it noisily across the floor. In a swift movement, he lifted me onto his lap with my legs hanging over the other side. His rough fingers took a hold of my stubborn chin and lifted it toward his magnetic gaze. “Any questions?”

  It didn’t make things better, but when I buried my face against his warm neck, he soothed me with a firm stroke of his hand against my back. A vibration fluttered in his chest without a sound; it felt like something that was just for me. Logan possessed a unique calming ability through voice, sound, and even his scent.

  Thoughts tumbled through my head like a jar of marbles and after they stopped rolling around, my feet hit the floor.

  “Ghuardian, can I speak to you alone?”

  Justus followed me into my bedroom and I closed the door to give us privacy.

  “I think we should bring Novis into this,” I suggested.

  “Out of the question. What would make you even think to involve a Council member?”

  “Since being thrown into this life, I’ve had to rely on my instincts because I have little else. With Adam, he earned my trust by not forcing it on me. With you, it was lack of options.”

  He rolled his eyes.

  I stood my ground. “This is more than we can take on and I’m afraid if something happens, we won’t have any protection. If you’re not going to involve HALO, then we need to bring in someone with position. Novis can be trusted and might have a better grasp on how to handle this. He doesn’t just sit on the Council; he’s the keeper of the records. That means he’s a man who knows all about confidentiality.”

  Justus sat in the tiny chair by the wall, or maybe it just looked tiny when he filled it. The wood creaked, and he rubbed his scalp with his thick fingers as I continued.

  “I don’t know Remi very well or how much advice he gives you, but we’re the only people that stand in the way of what Nero wants. Four is a small number to know such a big thing. If Nero takes us out, then the experimentations will go on without anyone knowing. Tell Novis everything.”

  His features hardened, as if he were in the middle of conversation déjà vu. I wondered if he met up with Remi and received similar advice.

  The next evening, Novis accepted an invitation to our home.

  ***

  Novis scraped his fingers through his spiky chunks of black hair, scrunching them until whatever gel held it in place came apart. The small cut on his left cheek from the bomb was a permanent scar shaped like a backward L. It marred his otherwise noble features, but his reaction was indifferent when he caught me looking at it.

  “How far does the oldest case date back?” Novis touched the frosty soda can.

  “Twenty-eight years,” Simon replied with a sniff.

  “And how old are you in human years, Silver?” Novis slid his eyes across the table, watching me carefully.

  “Thirty.”

  “Would you like to know what I think?” Novis pointed a long finger at his brow and pushed it up. “Had your mother not escaped, you would have been the first name on that list. Silver, I think you’re patient zero.”

  Simon tripped over his words. “What makes you think she was the first one? This may not be the only list and I doubt that it’s a completed one. The first?” he asked in disbelief.

  Novis turned his attention to Justus, who was tapping his gold ring against the table. “The fact her name was handwritten on that list tells me that Samil at some point in his life was part of the experimentation. He must have acquired the list and records by theft. We know of at least two that Samil has created,
and yet there is something extraordinarily different about Silver in comparison. Perhaps her splicing was the strongest from whatever genetic material they were using. Since her mother escaped before they could test her, they weren’t aware that she was different from an ordinary human. So, future experiments went on using different techniques. The Breed have unfortunately surpassed humans in the advances of science and genetic testing, achieving goals that humans haven’t even dreamed of doing. Until now, I’ve never heard of anyone making progress in this area.”

  He cracked open a can of root beer and gulped down a few swallows, licking his lips. “The first eight names on the list have all been confirmed dead?”

  Simon nodded. “Minus a few I couldn’t locate. It’s a long bloody list.”

  “Their deaths were not an accident. I think the children were born ordinary and they were somehow trying to bring out the Breed in the child, or hoped puberty might give it a kick start. Maybe with the first several they didn’t see any change and had to dispose of them once they were adults. After that, if the infant didn’t show any signs early on that the experiment worked, they simply gave them up for adoption to avoid the guilt of murdering a child or getting caught. I don’t believe Samil had any special gift that made Silver what she was. He does seem to have accidentally stumbled upon a secret formula that if you kill them for a brief period, their first spark will awaken every Breed DNA within their body, something I bet the scientists never discovered. This is all hypothetical, of course, but it does explain why he did this consistently. I spoke with the two you rescued from his captivity, and Samil’s preferred method was strangulation. I’m sure he discovered it by accident.”

  I twisted a lock of dark hair between my fingers and studied the ends. “Every Breed DNA—what do you mean by that? You can only have one egg and one sperm.”

  “You don’t think they found a way to make a cocktail?” Novis contended. “Magic has coursed in your veins since birth and was altered when your Creator charged you with his light. You brought up the point about static, and I can tell you as a Creator that I would be very attracted to that kind of natural power in a human. True, we choose wisely with our progeny, but a Creator is addicted to the power and possibility of light.” He pried the tab off his soda can and flicked it across the table. “I’m not a scientist; I can only speculate.”

  “Why not find a way to do all of this naturally instead of in a lab? Seems like so much trouble.” I slid my hand out and pulled the tab to my fingertips.

  Novis quirked a smile and continued. “No Breed can have children with humans. It is a genetic impossibility for the ones who are able to have offspring, and even they have limitations that often only allow them to have children within their own race. We are fundamentally different from humans. What I do know is that if you pair up Shifter sperm with a human egg, for example, the sperm will devour the egg—destroy it. We are far too strong. That’s why some have been trying to alter the genetics and find ways around it. None have succeeded and it’s always been common knowledge that it is an impossibility.”

  I sucked in a sharp breath.

  “Silver, is there something you want to say?”

  A memory flooded back, and words from the past crept into my mind like blood running beneath the door. Now, with perfect clarity, something that happened on the night Adam challenged Samil suddenly made sense. I needed a moment alone with Novis.

  “Learner, Novis is speaking to you,” Justus snapped.

  “Jesus, you don’t have to yell. I’m right here.”

  Simon chuckled and slouched as if he were melting into the chair. He was one of the most animated men I knew; whether he was talking or just thinking quietly—it seemed like Simon was always moving. His leather pants and the grain of the wooden chair didn’t get along.

  Novis swallowed the rest of his root beer and let out a small belch, stalling as if he wanted to say something else. “I understand why you have kept this a secret and I agree that the Council should be left out of this for now. This is dangerous information to fall in any hands—not just Nero. We’ll conduct a private investigation to track down the lab and end this. Everyone involved will be questioned and scrubbed of their memory. They have no idea of the repercussions, not just in sabotaging the human gene pool in an effort to exterminate them, but they are playing genetic roulette. We cannot conceive of the long-term side effects, or what mutations could occur. What if nature found a way to make us susceptible to human viruses?” Novis squeezed the can until it dented, narrowing his eyes. “We’re hard enough to control in limited numbers; imagine the entire world population being Breed. It would be World War Apocalypse.”

  “Oh, balls,” Simon groaned.

  “Pray tell,” I said. “What could possibly have Simon Hunt’s knickers in a wad?”

  “I have this funny feeling I’ll be going back to Europe; just when I thought I was done with that place.”

  “Guess they weren’t done with you, my friend.” Justus slapped Simon on the back.

  “Laugh it up you sodding bastard, but I made a lot of enemies that left me with the taste of piss in my mouth. Perish the fucking thought that I’ll be the one going. Let them put your Charmer rump on that plane and see how the ladies love you up for the eight-hour flight.” He snorted. “I nominate Justus completely.”

  “I’m trying to learn from my mistakes,” I began, “so I don’t want to do this on a whim without telling anyone.”

  Probably not the best opening line. Justus placed his hands on his lap with his elbows out. He was a big guy with legs that could kick your ass all over Cognito. If the tattoo that wrapped around his arm wasn’t scary enough, then it was the straight face that rarely cracked a smile unless provoked by alcohol or promiscuity.

  “The objective is to shut down the labs, but we also have Nero to contend with. My question to you is: Do you think you can take down Nero, and how long will it take?”

  Simon cracked his knuckles.

  I sighed. “That’s what I thought. If he’s that untouchable, then maybe we need to focus on the one thing we don’t want him to know about. We’ll have to assume he’s having us followed so we need to watch our step.”

  I threw in the “we’s” and “us’s” to include myself in the plan I was about to unveil.

  “Just let it be known that I do not like this idea,” I began. “If there’s an alternative, then by all means, put it out there. I think you should send me home. If my mother is a part of this, then she knows something. It’s a hard pill to swallow believing my mother lied to me, but then again, she rarely talked about her past. She wasn’t the most loving woman, but she was protective. She never wanted me to leave that town. My mom is a difficult lady to understand. We need to question her. I can also tell you with absolute certainty that she’s not about to reveal her life to a stranger if she wasn’t willing to do it with me.”

  I circled my finger over the soda tab and it followed my movement. “Does anyone in this room know of a trustworthy Vampire?”

  Simon coughed in surprise. He didn’t trust Vampires and like many others, he always wore sunglasses in Breed establishments. Vamps had the ability to pull truth from a person. Apparently, Simon was a man with many secrets. But I wasn’t so sure how Justus or Novis felt about them.

  “She’ll never confess anything willingly because she thinks that I’m dead. After we’re done, we’ll erase her memory.”

  A smile lit up Novis’s face. “This one is a fine Mage you have here, Justus. I hope that you are a fair Ghuardian to this Learner.”

  Justus straightened his back and lifted his chin. It was an honor to receive a compliment from a Council member, yet his skeptical eyes skated over to me and my shoulders sagged.

  “Does anyone have a better idea?” I looked at the quiet faces and then to Novis. “Who are the memory-eraser people?” I almost laughed at my choice of words.

  “Vampires can selectively wipe your memories; we’ve used them before,” Justus said
with an ambivalent look on his face. The bristles of hair on his scalp had grown out and picked up a dark blond tint in the light. “Why is this something you feel you need to do?”

  I smiled. “Because it’s my mom. She won’t recognize me, but I know what to say to get inside the house. I know the right questions to ask.” I leaned forward and looked at him sternly. “It’s also important that there’s no funny business and she’s not threatened in any way. I’m not going to sit around wondering if some Vampire is smacking her around. She might know something that’s going to push us ahead on the game board.”

  Simon’s eyes lit up; he loved game analogies.

  “True that,” Simon replied, his British accent shining through. I flicked the soda tab at him and laughed.

  “The sooner we begin, the better,” Novis decided. “I’ll make travel arrangements and get Silver new identification cards. She can’t use her current one for this trip.”

  My alternate identity was Ember Gates, which came with an ID. Our assigned names were unusual so that they would flag the systems monitored by some of our people. If you got in a sticky situation, they would bail you out. Breed had zero tolerance for confinement in a human jail or hospital.

  “Guards will trail behind your car and we’ll do a few switches during the ride to the airport. We have a spray that will throw off the Chitah tracking you and should Nero send a Vampire, we’ll need you to remain absolutely silent. Not a single sneeze.”

  I looked over to Justus. “Are you coming with me?”

  His mouth opened but Novis interrupted. “That’s… not such a good idea.” They shared a private look.

  “I’m still a Learner and Justus has to escort me.” Protect me was the phrase I was thinking, because going out of town with a man I’d never met didn’t settle.

  “There’s no need to send in a parade of immortals,” Novis said, touching the scar on his cheek absently. “You’ll go with the Vampire and get whatever you can from your mother. I believe there’s still work to be done here, too. Am I correct, gentlemen?”