by D. N. Hoxa
I wondered what Julian Walker would think.
He’d probably tell me to use my magic. Except I couldn’t, because to conjure a spell, I’d have to put my shield down. I’d already tried that, and now my left hand was worthless.
Unless…I didn’t.
Words he said once came back to me with a rush. Fairy magic can be anything you want it to.
Even Green magic?
The problem was that I knew no Green spells, nothing to connect me with the environment. The other problem was that I had no other idea than to send a surge of magic underground, then bring it up right under her feet. The other other problem was that I didn’t have time to do pretty much anything else.
With my eyes closed, I fell to my knees. My left arm hung limp beside me, boneless. So I put my right palm on the ground. My magic was still there, bright and wild, demanding attention. I gave it all I could spare, and I sent a surge of it to my palm and out. I used the same energy to activate a spell stone, just to try it out and see if the ground would return it back to me.
It didn’t.
Bright red sparks flew in front of me. My shield broke again. Jane laughed.
Now, I had time to either conjure another shield, or try my stupid idea.
The stupid idea, it is.
It was like trying to activate that ring that had turned me into a beast, except the waves I sent through the ground didn’t stop. I unleashed them, one after the other, then opened my eyes. Jane was no longer throwing spells at me because Jane was looking at the ground between us shake and the stone of it break. Dust flew up as the earth groaned.
Jane met my eyes, a surprised look on her face, and, dare I say, fear?
I called the waves up like I imagined a Green witch would call magic up from the earth. I hoped with all my being that it worked. It was my only chance.
A lifetime passed before everything was set in motion again. When the ground underneath Jane’s feet shook, I cried out in joy. It didn’t throw her like I’d expected it to. My imagination was a wild thing. But it did make her lose her balance, and she fell on all fours to the ground.
Gathering the last bit of strength left in my bones, I shot forward, full speed. I had no knives with me, but I had my right fist. I had my magic. It was going to have to be enough.
I pushed Jane’s head up just enough so I could deliver a fist to her face with all my heart. When I went in for the second, she blocked me, but she couldn’t block my knee on her chin.
Spitting out blood, she began to chant. I conjured my shield when I heard her, but it was too late. The spell froze me in place and made me think of nothing but pure agony.
The spell wasn’t unlike the one I’d filled a Pretter with. I could see that nothing was being done to my body, yet I had the feeling that a thousand sharp knives, so hot the metal had turned red, sliced through my skin without stop.
I squeezed my eyes shut when Jane made it back to her feet. Calling out my beads, I sent them to her face as fast as my mind could work. Since this wasn’t a spell stone, I had no idea when its effect was going to fade.
Then, I felt a knife bury in my gut. Don’t ask me how, but I knew this one was real. A look down at my torso confirmed it. Mad with anger, Jane looked at me and at the knife inside of me, her hand still wrapped around the handle. My knees buckled. She pulled the knife out, and her spell left me with it. No more agonizing pain registered in my brain.
Jane charged at me with the knife again. I threw my right arm back and swung it so fast, she didn’t see it coming. I slapped the hell out of her. It was the kind of slap that would leave a mark on her pretty face.
I grabbed her by the hair again and threw her back against the wall. I had more strength in me than I had thought because she hit the stone hard and the knife fell from her hand. It was obvious Jane had no physical fighting skills. Her talent was her magic, but as soon as she opened her mouth to chant again, my fist broke one of her teeth.
Still, I couldn’t stop her, and the next spell that hit me threw me back five steps. Shit.
The gut wound from the knife burned, but I was still standing, so it must have not been such a big deal. So I told myself, as Jane continued to throw spell after spell after spell, until I was almost at the door.
I didn’t conjure my shield because I chose to take in deep breaths while she got me away from herself. Then, when I felt ready, I unleashed my beads at her face.
Even though they drew blood a minute later, she still chanted and still blocked me from making a single move. I shouted in anger, wishing she’d just start fighting fair already.
When the Yord Guardian swords fell to the floor all of a sudden, we both jumped in fear. A smile stretched my lips as I looked back at Jane. Her control and her focus were slipping.
I threw the first spell I could think of, that of waves of energy, aiming to push her against the wall again. She caught the spell with a shield. When she threw one at me, I called my shield, too. She broke it to pieces. My beads buzzed around her head, and they only attacked her when she began to chant. Like a mad woman, she ran to the side and to the unconscious—hopefully—body of the kidnapped Green witches. She grabbed a Yord Guardian sword from the ground and directed it to me.
I threw another spell her way, and her shield caught it. Something wet slipped down my lips and touched the tip of my tongue. Blood. My nose was bleeding. It didn’t matter, though. I took a step forward and threw a spell at her.
To my surprise, the sword flew from her hand. She walked backwards until she hit the wall. She was scared now, and she wasn’t trying to hide it.
Her lips moved. My beads hit her eyes. The spell threw me back two steps, and Jane’s knees shook under her black pants. She fell to her knees.
She could see it. I could see it. Heck, even you can see it by now: she’d given me an opening.
Raising my right arm up, I closed my eyes and tapped into my magic. Light behind my eyelids, and for the first time, I looked. Before, I didn’t think I ever wanted to see how a blast of magic looked. I knew there was bright light involved, and that was enough for me. But when faced with someone like Jane, I wanted to see it. And what I saw surprised me.
Snakes made of fire started right under my elbow and wrapped all around my right hand. It was like dancing ropes, moving in the exact rhythm the strings of my magic moved. Without words of a spell to shape them, they were raw. Unpredictable. Deadly.
Jane shook her head. It all must have happened fast, but to me, everything moved really slowly. Like the magic inside of me, when it allowed itself to move forward and outward. Like the snakes made of fire, or the dancing ropes that began to extend from the tips of my fingers, moving to Jane. Her chest seemed like a good enough place. A scream tore from my throat. Magic leaving me was like life leaving me. And when it hit Jane, it acted as if she didn’t even have a shield in front of her. The flames barely touched her chest.
A second later she fell to the ground, face first.
The flames disappeared so fast that, for a moment, I considered I’d imagined the whole scenario.
My knees hit the floor hard. In front of me, there was already a pool of blood coming from my nose. Suddenly, everything hurt, but nothing quite like my left arm.
“You said it was no good.”
I didn’t even have it in me to be startled or to jump when someone spoke from behind me. When Bender spoke from behind me. My eyes squeezed shut.
“They’ll kill me if they know.” It was the simple, ugly truth, one he couldn’t deny.
Silence for a second. I could hear him standing up, though with difficulty. To say that I was glad he was alive would be an understatement. I was so happy, I didn’t mind even if these were my last minutes.
“You blasted them,” Bender said when he was in front of me.
I didn’t have the strength to raise my head just yet, so I only shrugged. If he decided to tell on me after all, I preferred that this be the end of me. Prison was not something I’d like. Dea
th sounded better.
Then, Bender limped his way to one of the beasts. They still held their form, except for one man. He’d turned back when I broke the stone around his neck—his enchanted item. That meant that those items were not made by them. They were not made by Jane, either, because their magic would have vanished when she died.
He then got one of my knives from the blood-covered floor, and walked over to the end of the room, and to Jane’s dead body. Without a word, he fell on one knee, raised her head by the hair, and cut her throat.
“What the hell are you doing? She’s already dead!”
Bender smiled sadly. “How were you going to explain the cause of death?”
Shit. He was right. If people found her dead by a blast of magic, they’d know enough to turn to me. Nobody else was in there except Bender, and Bender was just a Bone witch.
“Thank you,” I whispered, though I wasn’t sure he heard because he went back by the door and sliced the throat of the other witch who had been torturing him when I blasted her, successfully eliminating anything that would make people look at me twice.
“We fought. We won. Don’t give details to anyone,” Bender mumbled, then slowly limped to the Green witches sitting in their armchairs at the corner of the room.
“Are they…” I didn’t even dare ask.
“They’re alive, but heavily spelled. It’s going to take them a while,” he said when he checked their vital signs.
“It’s going to take us a while, too.” My left arm was testimony of that. I couldn’t feel it, like it wasn’t there at all
“We’ll be all right, Wayne.” He sat down on the ground with a loud sigh. “We’ll be all right.”
For once, I really wanted to believe him.
Twenty five
The cries of joy coming from behind me woke me from the half-conscious state I kept falling in and out of. Every time my eyes opened, I expected to be somewhere else. Anywhere else except that room carved in stone, but there I was, yet again. Witches of all the covens were around us, taking pictures, filling in reports, exploring the room of the Hedge witches. At least nobody doubted our words when we told everyone what they’d been—not even the ECU. In the end, the leaders had caved and called those assholes in because they were the main authority in our world.
The cries that were coming from behind me were from the parents of the kidnapped Green witches. Though the bodies had been laid on the ground and six different witches were performing healing and de-spelling spells on them, they were all still knocked out cold. Still, the parents didn’t care. Their children were alive, and no matter how long it would take for them to get back on their feet, they eventually would.
I sat on the ground with a thick blanket over my shoulders—courtesy of ECU witch medics, by the request of Bender, of course. A Blood witch performed a healing spell on me, but my arm still felt the same. It was really concerning, especially seeing my beads so…lifeless. They just floated there around my limp fingers, like they had no will to even swirl like they normally did. Just the thought of losing them…
Unconsciousness took me again.
And again, I woke up, this time from a nudge on my shoulder.
When I opened my eyes, I saw Amelia’s face in front of me. A smile tried to stretch my lips, but it failed. Finally, a familiar face.
My aunt’s eyes were wide with fear, her chin slightly shaking.
“Winter, are you okay?” she whispered.
I wasn’t sure how I’d sound if I tried to speak, so for now, I just nodded. I was alive. That was okay enough for me.
“Here, drink this.”
She offered me one of those steel flasks that people used for alcohol. I was almost excited, until I tasted the liquid. Definitely not alcohol, but some sort of tea she made with those herbs in her garden. I drank anyway because I knew that would be better than any healing spell the people around me would perform—because no matter what had happened, I was still just a fairy.
“You’ll be fine,” Amelia said when I emptied the flask.
She sat next to me and put her arm around my shoulder. I leaned against her with a sigh. It felt good to lean.
“They’re dead,” I whispered. My voice wasn’t as bad as I’d feared. It was scratchy and tired, but one could definitely understand me.
“I know, honey. They’re dead,” Amelia said.
The second I allowed myself to close my eyes, I felt my mind slipping from me again. What felt like a blink later, my name was being called. My aunt was no longer sitting next to me. I had no idea how I was holding myself up, but the second I realized that I could feel the tips of my fingers—only barely—all the pain seemed to disappear. I was going to have to ask her for more of that disgusting tea.
“Winter, look at me,” someone said.
When I raised my eyes, I found Theodora Sullivan in front of me, her cheeks wet with tears, her eyes rimmed red but happy, too. She was smiling so much, I could see all her gums, too.
“Thank you, Winter,” she whispered.
Without warning, she planted a kiss on my cheek. It was so unexpected, I fell back a bit and a rush of heat began from the pit of my stomach and fired up my chest. Wow. Who knew it felt good to be kissed on the cheek by strangers?
When she stood up, I saw the rest of the leaders were standing in front of me, too. They weren’t all smiling, but some of them were.
“It’s amazing that you managed to kill these witches all by yourself,” Joseph Davis said, looking everywhere but at me.
When I tried to smile this time, I found I could. “I wasn’t by myself. I was with Bender.” My voice was still hoarse and my throat hurt, but it was better than before. Progress was progress, no matter how small.
“You did a good job, Wayne,” one of the Blood leaders said. “We’re very thankful.”
The surprises kept on coming. I don’t know why, but I’d imagined the Blood coven leaders to be more…arrogant and conceited and just not giving me the time of day. Instead, the leaders of my own coven made me feel worse than they did.
“It was a pleasure.” Not really, but since it was over, I could say as many pretty words as needed. But pretty words weren’t the only ones in my mind right now. Taking in a deep breath, I continued to speak.
“Before they take us all away from this fucking place, I have something to say.”
Almost all the leaders of the Bone coven rolled their eyes, except Catrina Hughes and Monica Raymond—though Raymond could have simply been too old to roll eyes anymore. Still, that didn’t stop me.
“I was going to hold a relatively long and elaborate speech about this, but we don’t have time for long, elaborate speeches. So, here it goes.”
I kept my eyes on Theodora Sullivan’s face. She was the least likely to judge me, and I’d take whatever I could get.
“With all due respect to each of you, it’s time to get your heads out of your asses and take a good look around. We’re only here because the covens worked together, and if the covens had worked together ten years ago, maybe those witches would have died then.”
I realized that I was both younger than all of them and a fairy, but as long as they would listen and not stop me, I was going to say everything that was in my head.
“Secrets never help anyone. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: we’re all witches, for God’s sake. It doesn’t matter where our magic comes from—it just does.”
“You’re a fairy,” Austin Marshall pointed out, but I ignored him, just like all of his colleagues did. Red marked his cheeks when he realized it, too.
“Yes, I’m a fairy. You’re free not to listen to anything I say, but just think about it.” I looked at the faces of the Bone coven leaders. “All this time, you failed your people because of a fucking secret. I’m not saying be best friends or anything, but a meeting here and there, every now and then, would be nice.” God, my throat hurt so badly.
“Are you done?” Monica Raymond said.
“Yep.
I’m done,” I said with an exhausted sigh. It looked like I’d wasted my breath, but I’d at least never wonder what if when I went to sleep at night.
“Good,” she said, then raised her chin a bit. “Because of you, I’ll be able to finally sleep tonight. Because of you, our people will be united once again under one coven.”
What?
“Be glad, fairy. To me, you are now a witch.”
Holy hell, that was the weirdest fucking thing anyone had ever said to me. Ever. Was it a thank you? Was she reproaching me? I was going to ask, but before I could, Monica Raymond turned around, and with her husband by her side, disappeared from the stone room.
I blinked and blinked and thought about it hard, but I wasn’t sure whether to be happy or pissed off just yet.
“I’m taking you home,” Amelia said, her eyes full of tears she refused to let spill, and she pulled me by the shoulder. Someone else grabbed my limp arm and pulled me up, too. It was Bender.
The coven leaders left one by one in the next minute. The Green ones remained with their children, and Bender and Amelia slowly dragged me toward the door.
“Did you hear that?” I asked him as we walked through the old factory.
“Was right behind you,” Bender said, chuckling.
“What the hell did it mean? She completely lost me.” Monica Raymond’s words still spun around in my head, but combined with the look of superiority she’d had on her face when she said them, it just didn’t fit well together.
“It means you’re a good kid, Wayne. It means she’s thankful, but she also kind of hates you for it.”
Huh. That made more sense than anything else I could come up with.
“Finn’s agents?” I asked Bender with half a voice, terrified of his answer.
“Alive,” he said, and relief made me want to stand a little bit straighter.
“And the rest?”
We had had almost sixty witches with us, but I couldn’t see them anywhere when we finally walked outside. The first sunrays had turned the sky a perfect orange, which reminded me of my magic.
“Eighteen lost their lives. The rest are okay. Wounded but okay.”