Paranormal Magic (Shades of Prey Book 1)

by Margo Bond Collins

  Cold hands.

  A cold floor.

  A cold body. A shiver works its way up me again, prickling all the way to my scalp and across my face.

  So cold…so cold…

  God, help me, I beg silently into the blackness…

  It’s dark.

  Even with my eyes tightly shut, I know that it is dark. Wherever that may be. Is it nighttime perhaps? Or maybe I’m dead and this is hell?

  No. Hell would be hot and I am still so deathly cold.

  I hear feet scraping next to my head. I’m lying down—that much I’m sure of. I can feel my body, lying on its side. One arm, one cheek, one leg, all numb, all somewhat colder, than the other side of me. I know I should be afraid. I don’t understand what is happening to me. Who I am or where I am. Nothing makes sense to me. Nevertheless, I’m not afraid. I couldn’t be even if I tried.

  The frigid cold and the pain that it gives me take up all of my concentration and stop me from being afraid.

  Something hovers in front of my face, something reflecting warmth back upon me. My eyes stay sealed shut, but I feel it.

  Heat!

  My hands reach out instinctively, attempting to grip hold of the heat and pull it to me. Going from being immobile for so long to mobile so abruptly makes me scream out. My body is a furnace of raw pain. The sound escapes from my parched throat in a long, breathy whisper. It’s a garbled sound, more animal than woman.

  I claw for the heat once more—working through the pain, needing to shake this eternal cold from my body—but it’s gone. The heat is gone. The more I scramble for it, the more I feel it retreat. My eyes are still closed, sealed shut to the world, but still I scramble forward to reach the ever-retreating heat.

  I’m on my knees crawling and bumping into things. Moving slowly…too slowly. Every movement is a painful reminder of the arctic cold that has enveloped my body. I try to stand but my legs are weak, like twigs underneath my body, and I crumble under the weight. Each knock and bump my body takes hurts like it has been hit with an anvil. Yet still the cold washes over me, the heat forever retreating. The need to free myself from this pain is ever persistent. The urge to cry in agony and frustration is there but I can’t seem to draw out the tears.

  I need to see, I realise. My eyes twitch behind my closed lids, and I slowly crack them open. Peeling my lids away from the bottom of my eyes, gunk blurs my vision. I blink repeatedly to clear the images. The brightness of the room is momentarily blinding whilst I view the world through these new eyes.

  Colour hits me from every angle. Reds, blues, greys, and purples. They flash in front of my eyes and I gasp…and then blackness swallows me whole…

  … “Sir, she is ready.”

  I wake to a voice. Like a serpent, it slithers into my mind and drags me kicking and screaming back to consciousness.

  That voice. I know that voice. Though tinny and hollow, it is somehow familiar. The words reverberate around me.

  ‘She is ready.’ What does that mean? Are they talking about me?

  The cold is still there. My lungs rattle against my chest plate. They feel full of ice.

  If I don’t move, it can’t hurt me too much. I plead with my body to keep still and be as silent as possible. I can’t even be afraid of the people in the room; I’m too afraid of the pain.

  I feel the motion of people moving, footsteps echoing around me, and then I smell him.

  Can taste his breath on my face.

  Can feel him closing in on me.

  A sigh, almost nonexistent, releasing from his mouth, and then his breath washes over me. So sweet and sickly. I want to gag but hold back the reflex.

  “She is ready?” his voice is close to my face. It sweeps over me like a gentle breeze, steadying my mind. I think I remember him.

  I move a fraction of a millimetre, and the pain throbs through me. I gasp and try to control my movements, but I can’t stop my reflexes, and I hit out against the agony. I can’t think about anything but the pain until I hear his voice again. It’s somehow soothing, and yet frightens me to my very core.

  At least now I am feeling something other than just the cold—an emotion at the very least. That has to be a step forward.

  “Shhhhh. Don’t panic, you’re fine.” His voice. I breathe out a shaky breath.

  “Yes, she is ready.” The serpent’s voice again. “I’ll go get the girl.”

  A moment too long and the heat is back. Warmth radiating in front of me. My senses tingle and burn with the need to hold it to me, and I clamber for it. Arms outstretched, nails scratching at something nonexistent until…

  …they do touch something. Something heated and soft. The heat shoots up my fingers to my elbow in a quick spasm. It’s so hot that I instinctively retract my arm, but then the cold comes back and I cry out and scramble forwards for the heat again.

  Anything has got to be better than the cold. I shiver. My jaw is held firmly shut whilst I try to stop my teeth from chattering together.

  It’s gone. I can feel it here though somewhere, but not in front of me anymore. I chance a look with my eyes, peeping them open a crack. The room is blissfully dark, barring a slight flickering from somewhere. And there is the heat. I can feel it…I can see it. It’s purple and black; like a storm cloud too full with rain, it throbs. I don’t know what it is, and I don’t care. I can feel the heat rolling off it, stretching out luxuriously towards me. It feels so blissful that I want to wrap myself up in it and roll around, smothering it into me. That is all I care about.

  I crawl forwards for it on my hands and knees. I slide across the floor, each movement an agony, each scrape of my body an abyss of pain. The ice-cold daggers continue to stab into every part of me. I sob loudly, the sound raspy and dry. Tears pour down my face—a leak sprung, the dam finally broken.

  I see nothing but the purple and black cloud of heat shifting and moving in front of me. I beg for it to come to me, pleading for anyone to help me. I know I am not alone, yet it feels eternally so.

  “That’s it, baby. That’s it.” His voice, soft like an angel’s.

  Why won’t he help me?

  I crawl forward until, mercifully, the tips of my fingers brush against the heat. They feel singed, scorched and it burns up my arm again. But I am not ready to let it go this time. I must have it.

  I grasp for it repeatedly until I feel it snag under my nails. I scrabble at it, grabbing a handful of the fire. I clamber on to it, bathing in the glory that is warmth. Hotter than a summer’s day. Hotter than an oven. Hotter than the fire that now burns within me. I can smell the heat, burning through me. It moves, it cries out, begging for its release.

  But it is mine.

  No one’s but mine.

  I claw it to me. The sudden urge to taste the heat, to feel the heat in my mouth is so overwhelming. I don’t even consider what I am doing until I feel myself taking great chunks of it into my mouth.

  It is carnage as I rip into it, my teeth sinking into the fluffy abyss. I swallow, gallons and gallons of fire, scorching flames, which leap inside me upon their digestion. My insides turn to dust and I scream out for release from this never-ending agony.

  One minute freezing to death, the next burning up from within.

  I stand, then stumble and fall. Clambering to my feet, the room spins around me. My eyes are unable to focus on anything but the cloud that surrounds me. It is everywhere now. From nowhere to everywhere. The irony isn’t lost on me. I smash into a wall, then some furniture, screaming and begging for mercy. Strong hands clamp down on me. They throw me to the floor and pin me in place as I writhe and flail wildly. A magical juice pours into my mouth. It’s smeared across my face and body. Every part of me it touches, every orifice that it enters, is finally released from the pain and torment that I have been subjected to.

  The sensation is instantly cooling, sedating, and blissfully wonderful, and I swallow it down, rolling around in this magical liquid until time is all but forgotten.

  I am f
orgotten. There is only this giver of life, to whom I will be eternally grateful.

  “That’s enough,” a voice whispers to me, but I don’t want to give it up. It’s mine. They can’t take it from me. Not now. Not ever.

  “Baby, that’s enough for now.”

  I grasp on to the person pouring this essence on me, my eyes are open but unfocused as I lean up and try to plead with them. His scent fills my nostrils, making me gag but calming me all the same.

  “Hush now, baby. You’re okay. I’ve got you.” His voice is like a harp as it plucks the strings in me. I feel soothed and calm and lie back down. His hand strokes across my brow, wiping the tears from my face. The contact pulses through me. Sensations buzz across my skin, like hundreds of feathers dancing across my flesh, and I quiver under the gentle touch.

  “Leave.” His words are cool and clipped, directed at someone else in the room.

  I know I should feel fear, but the relief at not being in agony is too overwhelming. His voice is soothing, and his smell is suddenly so beautiful and intoxicating that it washes over me in waves of pleasure. My body flexes towards him and my skin shivers at the anticipation of his contact. I feel him smile.

  “Leave us now.” His breathing is ragged next to my ear and he murmurs erotic promises to me.

  My hands clamber for his body, tearing the clothes from his back. I cannot see him. The world is a blurry echo of its true nature, but I don’t care. Perhaps that’s what makes this easier. That I can give in. That I can pretend. His nose skims past my ear and down to my neck, and I convulse with the pleasure. Sensations pulse through me wildly, searing up and down my body.

  “Sir?”

  My breasts are tingling for his touch, my body arching and aching to be filled by him.

  “Sir?”

  “Damn it, what?” he shouts and lifts his face from me. His hands still search out my soft crevices and I sigh for release of the pleasure.

  “Sir, you know that you need to wait.”

  A growl, low and malevolent, ripples forth from him and he sits upwards, his hands leaving my skin.

  “It is for the best, Sir. You could kill her.”

  I reach for him but he pushes my hands away. I reach forth again and he grips me and pins me to the bed with his weight, his mouth is suddenly on mine. Sucking and nibbling my lips, his tongue dancing across mine. With every touch and caress, the flames within me die down.

  I claw at him. I need him now. I need to feel his skin against mine, his body locked into me. Soft moans escape me.

  “Don’t, baby. I don’t know how much more I can take before I lose control,” he says against my lips, panting against me.

  I whimper for him. I need him to stop the pain.

  “Soon.” The ground underneath me shifts and he is gone. I cry at his absence, the pain a dull throb within me. A door somewhere opens and closes, and I am alone.

  What kind of torture is this?

  Twenty-Six

  Mia

  I wake. My eyes open slowly and I take in my surroundings. I’m on a large wrought-iron bed, with a soft duvet over me. I know its goose down because I can smell the feathers. More specifically, I can smell the fat goose that they came from. The fear that it experienced before it was killed is sopping through the sheets. I don’t know how I know that the smell is fear, but I do, even through the luxurious gold satin sheet that covers it. I frown. My head is against the softest of pillows; it fluffs around my ears and cheeks. It smells clean and fresh like a summer day, and suspiciously like goose also.

  I sit up to get a better look around. The room is large and opulent. Arched windows dominate one wall, framed by lush red velvet curtains. The colour is so exquisite and piercing that I cannot help the sigh that leaves my mouth.

  I pull the covers away from me, noticing that I am naked apart from underwear. However, this is not my underwear. That much I’m certain of. This looks to be handmade, delicate, and very expensive. Black, lacy panties and matching bra, with silky hold-ups.

  Panic rises in me. What is going on?

  I look about the room for something to cover myself and notice a dressing gown hanging on the far wall. I pull my feet out from under the duvet and lower them to the floor quickly. The carpet underfoot sends shivers up my spine; it’s the softest wool I have ever felt. Tingles run across my body when I stand and let it slowly sink between my toes. As I walk, I marvel in the sensation of the wool separating each of my toes. I wrap the dressing gown around my slender shoulders, shivering at the touch of the soft silk. Every sense seems ridiculously heightened.

  I look about me for some clothes, for some food…for an exit. I don’t know which I want first.

  There are two doors leading off from this room. I try the first but it’s locked, the handle unrelenting under my hand. The second, however, opens into a massive bathroom. Marble adorns every inch of the room: the walls, the floors. Even the bath looks as if it’s made of marble. The room sparkles, the lights too bright, but what catches my attention more than anything is my reflection. I gape, open-mouthed, and stand frozen to the spot whilst I stare at my reflection in the huge, gold-framed mirror on the opposite wall.

  It’s me, but not. My eyes, once blue, now look like blue Tanzanite gemstones set into the smoothest and creamiest of complexions. My hair, normally long and black, now glistens and shines with every move I make as if sprinkled with stars. My hands deftly undo the silk dressing gown, and I let it slip from my shoulders, falling to the floor and pooling at my feet as my hands clasp over my red, heart-shaped lips. My body is smooth and perfect in every way imaginable. My breasts are plump, my legs are longer, and my stomach flat and toned. I haven’t realised that I’m not alone until hands come up around my waist. I turn abruptly, coming face to face with Mr Breckt.

  His hands move to my hair, his fingers slipping through the black strands. A smile is set on his face. He looks happy, content even, and I step away from him, alarmed by both his closeness and my near nakedness. However, it’s what surrounds him that really frightens me.

  There’s a faint blue and white fog that hovers and pulses around his body. It moves with him as he reaches for me, and I reach down abruptly for the dressing gown to wrap it back around me.

  “Don’t cover yourself up. I’ll only have to uncover you again, Mia,” he says with a smile. His hand clasps the back of my head and pulls me to him gently.

  I gulp loudly as I pull away again. I step back from his reach and tie the dressing gown around me regardless.

  “What am I doing here?” My voice is soft and hesitant. However, I notice it sounds different—sweeter, softer somehow. My hand touches my mouth, unsure that the voice is mine. A frown crosses my face as I struggle to comprehend what is happening.

  “What do you mean, Mia? You know why you’re here. I explained everything to you, baby.” He smiles again but I see his uncertainty. I notice his fog has spots of grey in it now.

  Baby? When did that happen?

  I take another step back as I try to recall our last conversation. I remember driving over here. I remember being upset, but I don’t know why. I remember… my face crumples as I remember him at my neck, his body pressing down on me as he bit into me, drinking my blood.

  I gasp, my eyes wide with fear.

  “What have you done?” I breathe out almost silently.

  “Your memory is returning, I see.” He grins at me. “Do you remember our unfinished business, Mia?” He leers and takes a step towards me.

  I struggle to comprehend what he’s talking about. His fog is dripping in grey and purple, the blue almost completely vanished now. It surrounds his body, moving with snake-like certainty. However, he doesn’t seem to know that it’s there.

  I shake my head. I don’t know what he’s talking about. Unfinished business? I stare at him in puzzlement.

  “You and I, Mia. We have needs that must be attended. I will look after yours, and you will look after mine.” He sighs, and his fingers move to his suit
jacket and deftly undo the buttons, letting it fall open to reveal a smart, black shirt and tie underneath. “I’ve waited for this moment for so long.” Purple sparks fly out and I gasp at the sight of them. Mr Breckt turns to look behind him and then looks back to me. “You have no idea how much I want you.”

  I swallow, nausea building in me.

  “What is it, baby? What frightens you?” Mr Breckt is by my side, his hand running up the side of my face in concern.

  I gaze in fear and wonderment at the fog and sparks—grey and purple dancing together, curling smoke around his arms and legs.

  “Don’t you see it?” I reach out tentatively to touch it but it moves away on contact, as if alive. My heart races at his closeness, his arms around my waist.

  “See what?” He looks to where my hand is, confusion etched across his face. “What is it? What do you see?” He knocks my hand away as I reach to grab the smoke again. “Stop it, Mia. Tell me, what do you see?” He grabs my face, pulling my eyes to meet his.

  “I, err…it’s, I can’t describe it. Like a fog surrounding you, but it’s all different colours.” Panic flashes across his face for a split second, before it gets lost in his happiness. He’s smiling widely at me, his green eyes shining.

  “What have you done to me?” I ask again, louder this time. I’m trembling in fear under his intense gaze.

  “I’ve freed you, Mia.” His hand caresses my cheek once more.

  “Freed me? What do you mean?” The fear shudders up my spine as I think about what he could possibly be talking about. My mind slowly pieces together the last part of the jigsaw.

  “Please no.” I whisper.

  “I’ve made you like me, Mia. Now we’re the same—we can be together.” He looks into my face for anything, any emotion other than what he sees from me: terror.

  “I’m…you’ve made me…” I cannot even finish the sentence; it’s ridiculous. This can’t possibly be happening. I think harder about it. Thoughts and images flash across my memory.