I closed my bedroom door. Her steamer trunk with the padded bench on top rested at the foot of my bed, the lid lifted open, cards, costume jewelry, and mementos scattered across the littered floor. I reached into the bottom and moved some ancient T-shirts around until I found the hidden catch and pried a nail file underneath the false bottom. I lifted the hidden panel only Mom and I had known about. Two packets of papers encased in thick envelopes lay on the layer between the two bottoms. Dickhead Riley’s men should stick to picking fleas out of each other’s hair. Bounty and treasure hunting certainly wasn’t their forte.
I walked into my bathroom and locked the door. Avoiding my ravaged face in the mirror, I opened the thicker and larger envelope, my hands shaking. Older than dirt vellum paper with a slight dusty, musty smell met my gaze. A strange language covered the pages with drawings, maps, symbols, and what looked to be recipes. My heart palpitated. I’d just hit the motherlode of my missing life in the lost pages of the book that held the keys to the Forbidden magical world. The Illuminaria. Carefully, I shoved the packets flat on the bottom of a zippered tote bag and stuffed a few of Mom’s T-shirts around them. Mind spinning into a vortex of excitement and dread, I rejoined my new wingmen.
Chapter 9
Ronan and Adam were swiping through Melisande’s tablet at the dining room table. I set the alarm on my cell, plunked my bag by my side, and they moved the tablet closer to me. Typed manuscript pages with diagrams, maps, and symbols, eerily similar to the pages I just saw, flashed on the screen. Ronan scrolled past so much text, potions, spells, and what appeared recipes and diagrams my head spun.
“She really did have a translation? I thought she was yanking your chain.” I gripped Ronan’s wrist to slow his scrolling.
“Enough to be lethal,” he replied. “Not all of it, though.”
“Hold up!” Adam exclaimed, stopping Ronan’s finger from swiping to the next page. The new page on the screen bore a decorative flourish at the top and a number eight chapter header. He read aloud, “‘Note: A cataclysmic earthen energy-based event could trigger a failure in the magic securing the Rifts and allow Forbidden magic to flow over the earth once again, triggering latent magic in descendants of the fae or sorcerers who may have escaped the Abolishment or those not counted among the Forbidden, those who may have an inkling of magic in their blood without knowledge of such. However, such an event is unlikely, and without the formidable magic of at least a pair of Forbidden sorcerers, the doorways to the Realm of the Void should remain secure.’” Adam scrolled to the next page. “That’s the Earthquake Cluster event.”
“It says two sorcerers. Why would your dumbass father have you open the Rift alone? It’s like he deliberately had you screw it up.” I continued reading over Ronan’s right arm, then stopped, a dawning revulsion pinching my heart. “Wait a freaking freakshow minute. He knew what he was doing without the need of two kickass sorcerers! Was he really using your blood with his alchemy, Ronan? Or did he have the blood of another Forbidden? Whose blood?”
Adam and Ronan ogled me, the truth drawing down the horror on their faces.
The tablet fell out of Ronan’s hand, clattered onto the table. “He siphoned enough blood out of me to supply a blood bank. I always assumed it was my blood he used in his potion.” The pallor of his face gave truth to his father’s blood-thieving activities.
I rubbed the vein in the crook of my left arm. “Did my father give him my mother’s blood?” Had my father stolen her blood when he left, put it on ice, and sold it to Riley all those years later? Or my blood?
Ronan lifted his eyes to my face. “I…I don’t know.” He rubbed his head, his confusion seeming to drain him. “My father’s brilliant. There’s no way he’d attempt to open the Rift with just my telekinesis and alchemy based on my blood.”
“Then he used someone else’s blood in his alchemy,” Adam said. “Someone not quite strong enough. Not as strong as Aria or you.”
“My mother. Who else? Maybe he’s had her blood since they all knew each other in college.” I drummed the table so hard, my fingers ached. “Has he captured any other descendants?”
“Not that I know of. He pretty much has focused his biggest attention on you. And me. Not that he wasn’t searching for others.”
“Because we’re the strongest? But not our mothers?”
“Appears so.”
Well, screw me screaming and the other Forbidden descendants born of the Earthquake Cluster-Fuck-it-to-Riley’s Hell.
I leaned over Ronan’s arm and continued reading aloud, “‘If one Forbidden sorcerer uses strong sorcery to attempt to open a Rift, he may incur cracks in the original magic and cause faulty magic to leak out over Earth. This magic may be unpredictable and may cause death to the sorcerer who attempted the opening…and possibly to others—’” I clutched my hand to my throat. “Your father tried to kill you.”
“That’s another reason I want him dead.” Ronan shoved out of his chair so hard, the chair toppled over backward and clattered to the floor.
My alarm chirped, sending me slipping halfway off my seat, dropping a crumb of reality back into our numb minds.
With the few minutes we had to spare and my ravaged stomach aching the whole time over Zoe’s plight, we rejoined Fin snoozing in the SUV.
“Didn’t you bring enough clothes in your other ten suitcases?” Ronan grimaced at the stuffed tote bag at my feet in the back seat.
I gave him a black look. “I need something a little lighter.”
Ronan grunted. “You do know it gets cold in Seattle, right? And it’s February?”
Even though I lied, I ignored the man who seemed to know nothing about women and fashion. Bypassing the latest chapter in our manifesto de lunacy, I asked, “With all the bounty hunters on my tail, why would your father send Melisande? Didn’t he trust the others to bring both me and you back?” I refused to admit that Ronan might be working on his dad’s side until I saw more proof. Breaking into Melisande’s tablet went a long way, though. Hell on high, I needed someone to believe in. May as well be the barbarian.
Ronan tugged a red smartphone out of his pocket. “We’ll find out.”
My mouth rounded in my newest flycatcher parody. “Were you a pickpocket in a former life?”
The SUV’s beefy rumble drowned out the lull in the cab. Ronan grunted like a caveman playing with a box of matches from the front seat. He scrolled through Melisande’s smartphone trying to decode her passwords. In vain, by the one-syllable grunts he spewed forth.
Finally, I waded into the silence, fear for Zoe paralyzing my thoughts. “What’s your plan?”
“Ian usually works alone, but I wouldn’t count on it. Sometimes my dad’s men team up.” Ronan stuffed the phone into his jacket pocket. “Adam will cover us in the wings. I’ll negotiate with Ian. You’ll stay with me.”
Clutching my purse to my stomach, I studied the side of Ronan’s head, liking the way his dark locks layered in a windblown tousle.
“Do I knock them out all at once or one at a time?” I asked almost too eagerly, as if knocking out people was the norm.
Ronan checked his gun again. Was I that boring or was he that anal? He lifted his head. “They’ll have bio-energy detectors and deadeners. They’ll sense and kill your magic.”
My eyes rolled back into my head slot machine style. “If we have the same ability, don’t you know how to toss out brain waves to shield from bio-energy tools? I can get by a 6000D.” The 6000D was the newest detector/deadener used at airports, government, and military sites. Supposedly, no ESP bypassed one without detection. Deadeners killed innate energy and dampened aural energy. Sometimes the tools were so strong and people so weak, the electrical waves they emitted knocked people out. Did I mention that NUW equaled paranoid? For some weird reason, I oozed by any detector undetected.
Ronan rubbed his jaw. “With full strength, I can bolster my aura to shield my brain waves from the older models, but they might detect Adam if he’s channeling
my energy. You’ll have to drop any block you can erect to invoke your telekinesis.”
I fluttered my hand in the air. “I hate to short out your memory board, but you forget I can do more than one telekinetic spell at a time.”
“Shit.” Ronan slowly ran a finger on the inside of his leather shoulder harness. It seemed weird hanging out with guys parading guns as fashion accessories. At least I wasn’t in the ’hoods of Oakland.
Adam lowered his sunglasses and regarded me in the rearview mirror. “Hope we’re never on your bad side.” He turned the SUV down a side street of older businesses, a less traveled route toward the university.
My grin broadened, but my nervous, cold heart didn’t enjoy the rash of selfish pride. I huddled into my jacket. “Sooo we locate Ian, you give the signal, I knock him out and anyone else working with him. We snatch Zoe, then bounce to smack down on Richie Senior and fix the Rift.”
A puppet string seemed to yank Ronan’s spine arrow straight. Adam hissed out his breath and tossed his sunglasses on the dash. Even Fin scooted away, regarding me with her doggy eyes as if I was a pariah from the Void.
My grin faltered. Ronan’s aura attacked me in waves of pins and needles perforating my skin. Not that it did much good, my aura ascended to defend against his lack of control.
I observed his flinty profile and Adam’s deer-in-headlights reflection in the mirror. “What?” I rubbed my neck, struggled to deflect Ronan’s tainted energy. The prickles intensified. By Ronan’s reddening sourpuss cast, he struggled with it too. Fin growled and the hackles mounted on her neck.
“Stop the car.” Ronan reached for the door handle.
Adam swerved out of traffic into the parking lot of a skyscraping residential building. Ronan flung open the door and jogged away before the vehicle stopped rolling.
The barbs on my skin eased. A strong blast of cinnamon-vanilla wafted from the vents. I took shallow breaths, using the air freshener to focus on my diminishing pain.
“Better?”
“Yeah, but it’s getting more intense each time.”
“The Rift’s screwing with his power.”
I massaged my temples, wishing I could rub out the woodpeckers pecking for dinner in my head. “Is it affecting me because I’m supposedly one of the Thirteen?”
“Your guess is as good as mine.” Adam squeezed my knee, his fingers feverishly hot.
“Wonderful.” I traced the prominent blue veins on his opaque hand, stark against my dark jeans. “Why’d you two freak out?”
“Our meld of magic whipped up a static funnel. Weird.”
“Oh. I didn’t feel anything.” Weird was my middle name, and changing the subject was quickly becoming my game. “So there’s got to be a reason why Ian came to the U.”
Ronan paced the half-empty parking lot, one hand fisted at his side, the other fingering the scabs on his neck. Thirteen parking spaces separated us, enough distance for now.
Adam glanced at his watch. “Riley has the university on a dead zone list. It makes it the perfect place for a paranormal ambush.”
“What the heck’s a dead zone?” My stomach caved in waiting for the answer.
“Dead zones naturally kill magic. Best guess is that it’s due to dead ley lines and the earth or people can’t emit energy.”
Son of a dead zone bitch.
The SUV’s engine spluttered, shuddered, and croaked. I picked at a ragged cuticle, flipped the fringe on my retro suede jacket. Color me cursed. Adam clicked the engine button off and on, receiving a metallic grinding for his effort. He punched his finger on the screen of the diagnostic computer, scrutinized the readouts.
A breeze whipped a sheet of paper at the side of Ronan’s head. He grabbed at it, trod into a puddle of freshly dumped coffee. Curses chased after the paper and he stomped his boot on a patch of grass. Poor guy. Hexes come and go when you play with me.
The engine rumbled into a smooth purr. Adam cast me a quizzical look, and I gave him a thumbs-up. At least I had a positive attitude about my unfortunate destructive tendencies.
Thankfully, my skin had quit poking me to death. I rolled down the window and beckoned to Ronan. Quiet and tolerant as a mute mummy, he clambered into the front seat. Adam drove into traffic, his fingers dancing across the computer. I fidgeted in my seat, the creaking leather grating on my last happy nerve. My heart rate sped up the closer to the university we traveled.
Ronan interrupted my troubled thoughts. “Sorry ’bout that.”
Without thinking, I combed my fingers through his silky hair, caressing his cool neck, leaving a trail of gooseflesh that traveled up my arm and warmed a jagged path to my heart. Why tall, dark, and barbarian of all people? It wasn’t as if Ronan was attracted to me, but something existed between us. When his aura wasn’t trying to off me, it was calming, akin to a soul deep tie. A connection I wanted to test drive around for a while. There might even be Belgian chocolate at the finish line…or Adam. Another note to self: zap my brain cells when I get home.
“Again, what’s our plan?” Before my hands did something stupid, I switched to ruffling Fin’s short fur. She nudged my hand for me to scratch behind her ears.
Too much going on and I was getting lost in thought. A scary place, I might add. I had so much to learn before I went off half-cocked on my own. Zoe was my first priority.
Ronan stared forward at the thickening traffic. At the rate we traveled, Zoe would be a vengeful ghost by the time we got to the university chapel. First haunting: Aria Elle Walker.
“Count on multiple trackers and we go with Aria’s plan.” Ronan sounded like he was biting off words and spiting them out. “If the university’s not in a dead zone, can you spread out your aural block? My jacked-up magic may not slip by detectors.”
Inwardly, I gloated. “Probably.” Linking our auras was the only way to do it. “Adam too?” My good aura and Ronan’s residual power should be strong enough to tackle Adam’s taint.
“Why’d I know you were going to say that?” Through glittery silver-flecked eyes, he tossed me a sideways calculating look. Fin’s tail whisked up a breeze. “How many can you knock out while shielding us?”
“With the way my power’s been acting, a few within ten to twenty feet.”
“How close do we have to be?”
“Maybe two to three yards.”
“How exactly do you knock them out?” Adam swerved to avoid a driving-impaired lane changer. He slapped his palm on the horn, letting it blast for a few seconds, the loud honk drowning out the indecision wailing in my brain.
I nibbled on my lower lip, tempted to chomp on a fingernail, and smoothed the fir on Fin’s neck. Did I have a rent-to-own deal with Satan, or what?
Adam busted out laughing. “After all this, you distrust me?” His laughter held such warmth, I felt like an idiot savant for holding back.
I didn’t trust Adam any less than I trusted Ronan. My secret telekinesis had been such a private part of my whole life. Now I had two strangers with whom to entrust my most precious secret. One already knew what it meant to be a freak of nature. Both were sinking into my soul with an awakening that left me reeling. I resisted the urge to dip my fingers into Ronan’s soft, thick hair again.
Adam flicked on his right blinker. “If it bothers you that much—”
“No. You’ve exposed your whole being to me when you didn’t have to. I respect that.”
“You’ll kill us if we tell anyone?” Ronan chuckled.
He laughed! Did a blizzard blast hell last night?
“That’s the deal.” If they betrayed me, I could always drizzle them with curses for the rest of their lives. Eventually, I’d figure out how.
The mere thought of how my telekinetic energy had morphed and expanded last night sent my brain spinning. I tried to bury the thought, but it kept rising faster than a hungry zombie. Could I control my power better? What if I failed? What if it had happened because of Ronan’s proximity?
As casually as I could manage,
I said, “It’s an instantaneous telekinetic hypnotism. I mind bend them into a deep sleep. I can’t explain it. I just think someone asleep and he is. Lights out, Snoozeville. Ya know, brain wave to brain wave.” An odd tense vibration shifted the aura bubble around us. “Well, it’s not like I’ve done it a lot.” I wiped my sweaty palms on my pants. “Not counting the two, you know the ones I accidentally, not on purpose…killed.” I almost choked on the word and it left me reluctant to ever use my abilities. If my life was threatened again, I’d have to focus harder to restrain my power to prevent a deathblow.
To think they feared me, tiny Aria Elle Walker. Didn’t Ronan’s telekinetic talents work the same way? I’d tax his brain about it later. Hopefully, it wouldn’t hurt much.
“Um, guys, what’s the deal if it’s a dead zone?”
“You still got your zapper?” Ronan pulled out his gun and did his anal check again. “What do you feel? Do you still have your magic?”
It still seemed weird calling my ESP “magic.” It scared me, because it solidified the fact that not only was my telekinesis illegal, I was a criminal. The government may not have originally written the laws to distinctively forbid ESP as Forbidden magic, but they would now if they knew about us.
I patted my hip for my stun gun hanging on a belt loop. Magic rumbled inside me, ready for action. I tossed out a feeler of aural energy and Ronan’s hair stood erect as if the roof was full of static electricity. “Yep. I work.”
Adam laughed and Ronan smoothed down his hair, shaking his head and grumbling to his other selves.
Adam parked behind the university’s multi-purpose court. A sterling moon slivered the northern sky, granting little illumination. An amethyst sky gobbled the tail of the sun and twilight’s first stars glittered. An occasional student and security droid wandered the near-deserted campus.
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