Magic & Memory

by Larsen, A. L.

  Lu looked more closely at the space they were in. It was an empty room, maybe ten feet by twelve, with featureless concrete walls, a concrete floor and a high concrete ceiling. The only light came from a single bare bulb suspended high above them. “There’s no door,” she said, her voice rising in alarm.

  “There has to be, we just can’t see it. There’s a lot of magic at work here, shielding me from being able to contact Alastair. It’s probably altering our perception as well.”

  “So we’re totally trapped in here! We can’t get out!” A wave of claustrophobia washed over her and Lu struggled to stand, but her legs wouldn’t hold her.

  Joey pulled her into his arms. “Shhhh,” he whispered against her hair. “It’s going to be ok.”

  Panic overwhelmed her, and she struggled against him. “No! I can’t be in here! I need to get out, now.”

  Joey held her firmly and shifted her so his face was just inches from hers. Then he said in a quiet, soothing voice, “It’s ok, Lu. You aren’t afraid of small spaces. This room feels spacious and comfortable to you.”

  She tried to fight but her arms were pinned at her sides. “What are you doing? Stop it!”

  His voice still brushed over her. “You feel fine in here, you’re not claustrophobic.”

  “Stop it!” she yelled again, thrashing around in his arms.

  Joey sighed and let go. “God you’re stubborn. You should have let me compel you, it would have helped.”

  “You didn’t even tell me what you were doing, you didn’t ask if it was ok with me!” she yelled.

  He leaned against the wall. “Well, yeah. If you tell someone they’re about to be compelled, it doesn’t actually work.”

  “Don’t ever do that to me again,” she said through gritted teeth, crawling a few feet away and leaning against the wall opposite him before wrapping her arms tightly around herself.

  “I didn’t know what else to do. I’ve never seen you panicked before.”

  “I’ve been panicked since the moment I met you,” she exclaimed. “Almost nonstop. During that time, I’ve been chased out of my home by werewolves, had warlocks try to bring a house down on top of me, gotten in the middle of a vampire battle, and been dragged from a hotel room by still more werewolves. Where in any of that have I not been panicked?”

  “You don’t show it though,” he said. “This was the first time I thought you were going to lose it.”

  She glanced around at the cramped space. “You did it, didn’t you? You succeeded in compelling me. This doesn’t feel so claustrophobic now.”

  “I don’t know if I succeeded. I think you’re just too busy being pissed at me to be scared right now.” Joey twisted the ring on his index finger absently.

  After a while she looked down at herself. “Whose blood is all over me?”

  “Yours. You got cut pretty badly when you were dragged through the motel room window.”

  Lu raised an eyebrow at him, and regretted it immediately as her head throbbed in response. She said, “I suppose you stopped the bleeding.”

  Joey nodded solemnly.

  “Why don’t I feel worse? That seems like a lot of blood to lose.”

  Joey broke eye contact, studying his ring. “I did something that you’re probably not gonna like. And I’m afraid to tell you, because you’re going to be mad. Plus, it may make you throw up, and that wouldn’t be good for you.”

  “What? Tell me.”

  He looked up at her. “You were dying, Lu. You were drifting in and out of consciousness, and your pulse was becoming faint. So I did the only thing I could think of.”

  “Just say it, Joey.”

  He sighed and told her, “I fed you. And it obviously helped.”

  “You fed me? What does that mean? What did you -- oh God.” Lu felt queasy and pressed the back of her hand to her mouth.

  “See? This is why I didn’t want to tell you.”

  “You fed me your blood?” she asked. “Can you even comprehend how disgusting that is to me?”

  “Well, it was that or watch you die, which I wasn’t willing to do,” Joey told her. “I’m kind of surprised it worked, actually. I know it heals other vampires, but I had no idea if my blood would heal a human.”

  She thought about it for a while, and eventually said, “Well, gross as that is, thank you. I guess I owe you my life.”

  “I’m just glad it helped,” Joey said with a shrug.

  After a while Lu said, “So, tell me you have a plan for getting us out of here.”

  “I wish I did.”

  “Why is Augustine bothering to hold us prisoner, anyway? Why didn’t he just let the werewolves tear us apart?”

  “He likes having bargaining chips, ways to coerce Alastair into doing what he wants.”

  “You really should have killed him when you had the chance,” Lu muttered.

  “Ya think?”

  “So how long do you think it’s going to be before Alastair figures it out and rescues us?”

  “Who knows? In the past Augustine was much more straightforward: kidnap Alastair or someone he cares about, and torture them in the hopes of breaking Alastair’s will. Ok, he’s still got the kidnapping thing going on, obviously, but the rest of this mind game is something else entirely, and it may take Alastair a while to see what’s going on.”

  “Do you think Augustine’s going to torture us?” Lu asked, her voice wavering slightly.

  “Me, for sure. You, probably not.”

  “Why not me?”

  “Because given how sadistic Augustine is, you’d die way too fast to be of any use to him.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Lu awoke suddenly, her head resting on Joey’s stomach. He lay perfectly motionless. The first night in their cell she’d shaken him in a panic, thinking he was dead. Which, technically, he was. But by now, sometime in the middle of their third day held captive, she was used to the stillness of his sleep.

  The room they were in was silent, unchanging. No one ever checked on them. There was no night, no day, just the ever-present glow of the bare light bulb. Lu would have had no idea how long they’d even been in there, except that Joey was somehow attuned to the rising and setting of the sun somewhere beyond these walls.

  She heard something then and sat bolt upright. She strained to listen and again it came, just the faintest sound. She shook Joey’s shoulder, hard.

  After a few more shakes he muttered, “I’m still not dead, Lu. Not any more than when I went to sleep.”

  “Joey, wake up! I think I heard something.”

  He sat up then, his short hair sticking up all around his head, his eyes barely open. He rubbed at them with the back of his hand as he mumbled, “What did you hear?”

  “Kind of a rustling sound.” She paused, listening intently. And again she heard it. “There!”

  “Mmhmm. Definitely a rustling sound. Can I go back to sleep now?” Joey started to lie back down, but she caught him by the shoulders and gave him a little shake.

  “No! That’s the first sound we’ve heard since we’ve been in here. I want to know what it is.”

  He closed his eyes and shifted around so he could lean against the concrete wall. “It’s fabric. Denim, specifically. Someone’s moving around out there.”

  Lu turned and hit the wall repeatedly with her palm. “Hey!” she yelled. “Is anyone there?”

  “That’s not gonna help,” said Joey, eyes still closed. “Whoever’s out there must work for Augustine. It’s not like he imprisoned us in a public place.”

  He slid down until he was once again lying on the hard concrete floor, and Lu leaned against the wall where the sound had come from. She studied Joey as he curled up and wrapped his arms around himself. He looked so vulnerable and young, younger even than the fifteen years he’d been alive.

  Joey was growing weak. Every day he faded a little more, and Lu wondered how long he could go without food. How long he could resist biting her.

  “You’re rea
lly hungry, aren’t you?” she asked him quietly, and he nodded. “How much longer do you think you can hold out?”

  He pressed his eyes shut even more tightly than they already were, knowing exactly what she was asking. “Another day or two,” he said. “Then I won’t have a choice, the instinct to feed will override everything else.”

  “Why don’t you drink a little now, to ease your hunger? Then maybe it won’t get to the point of losing control.”

  “Taking even a little might kill you. You lost so much blood when you were abducted, and I doubt giving you my blood totally made up for that. Besides, I really don’t know if I’d be able to stop once I started drinking.” Joey looked up at her, anguish in his eyes. “I wish I had a stake to give you so you could keep yourself safe.”

  “There’s no way I could stake you, Joey,” Lu said. After a pause she asked, “Is it harder to hold back when I’m closer to you?”

  “It’s the same. This room’s so small that it’s totally filled with your scent.” A tear spilled from the corner of his eye, cutting a path through the dried blood and dirt on his face. Lu moved across the cell and put his head in her lap, gently stroking his hair.

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” he whispered.

  “I know.”

  They were quiet for several minutes, Lu staring blankly in the direction the sound had come from. After a while Joey muttered, “This is so not how I wanted to spend my twenty-first birthday.”

  “Is that today?”

  “If today is December twentieth, and I think it is, then yeah. Or I guess it would have been my birthday. You know -- if I was still alive.”

  “Happy birthday, Joey. I’m so sorry you have to spend it like this.”

  “Actually, aside from being imprisoned, starving, and worrying about turning into a mindless killing machine, it could be worse.”

  Lu grinned at that. “You’re such an optimist.” She leaned down then and kissed his cheek.

  Joey sat up and smiled at her. “What was that for?”

  “It’s a really cheap birthday present,” she said.

  “Not cheap. Excellent.”

  They leaned against each other as Joey wiped his tears with the back of his hand, smearing the blood and dirt on his face. After a while Lu asked, “Do you think Augustine locked us up together on purpose, so you’d end up killing me?”

  “Everything Augustine does is intentional, so I know that’s why he locked us up together. That absolves him of guilt as far as he’s concerned -- it makes your death my fault, not his. God I hate him.”

  Lu stared vacantly at the wall across from them as time crept along. Minutes passed.

  Maybe hours.

  And suddenly, the walls weren’t there anymore.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Lu and Joey both jumped up with a startled gasp. The cement room had vanished, revealing a perfectly ordinary-looking office with fluorescent lighting, rows and rows of empty desks, and papers scattered about. Beyond the desks, banks of windows revealed a sprawling view of San Francisco.

  And kneeling a few feet in front of them was Augustine, clutching a small leather book.

  In the next instant Joey was launching himself at Augustine, growling as he knocked him onto his back. His fangs were fully extended, his hands around Augustine’s throat as he hissed, “Where is he? What have you done with Alastair?”

  Augustine effortlessly freed himself, and in a fraction of a second had Joey pinned to the carpet with one hand. Joey struggled wildly, and Lu started to run at Augustine to help her friend.

  “Stop!” Augustine cried out. “We don’t have time for this! Alastair has been taken from me, and I need your help to find him.” His voice shook with grief.

  Joey stopped struggling and said, “Seriously?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why should I believe you?” Joey hissed.

  “What would I possibly gain by lying to you?” Augustine sounded exasperated as he let go of Joey and stepped back.

  “Who took him?” Joey said as he leapt to his feet.

  “I have no idea.”

  “And how exactly do you think Lu and I can help?”

  “By contacting Bryn Maddock and getting him to work a locator spell with all of us acting as conduits.”

  “Why don’t you use your warlock? I assume the kid that attacked Bryn’s house is working for you.”

  “He was working for me, but not anymore.” Augustine reached into the pocket of his light blue button down shirt and pulled out Alastair’s red cell phone. “Here. Call Bryn. I assume this reaches him since it has his mark all over it, but of course it won’t work for me.” He tossed the phone to Joey, who stealthily pushed a couple buttons on the phone as he caught it.

  Joey said, “Is this all some elaborate plan to snare Bryn? Are you starting a warlock collection now? You probably have Alastair stashed somewhere, don’t you?”

  “No! I just need Maddock’s help with a spell. It’s the only way to find Alastair.”

  “Surely someone else could work a locator spell for you. Hell, you could probably even do it yourself,” Joey said.

  “Oh I tried, believe me. I just spent the last forty-eight hours trying to work a locator spell on my own, and failed miserably,” Augustine admitted, stuffing his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “And if there were any other warlocks of Maddock’s magnitude that I knew of, I would of course have gone to them. But you know as well as I do that almost no one is as powerful as Bryn.”

  “Except for that kid. Where did you say he went?”

  “I have no idea.”

  Lu chimed in then. “When was Alastair taken from you? Assuming you’re telling the truth about that.”

  “Three days ago. The morning after I had both of you removed and brought here.”

  “Had us removed,” Lu smirked. “Sounds so bloodless when you put it that way.”

  Joey held the cell phone in front of his mouth then and said, “Hi Bryn. Hopefully you were able to piece together some of what’s been going on based on what you heard.” He’d already dialed the warlock so that he would overhear the conversation.

  Bryn’s alarmed voice came clearly through the speaker. “Joey, why on earth are you in the same room as Augustine? You shouldn’t even be in the same area code!”

  “Totally not by choice. So do you think anything Augustine was saying is the truth, Bryn?””

  “Absolutely. I completely believe he failed miserably at working a locator spell.” He sounded amused for just a moment, but then grew serious as he said, “What did he mean by had you removed?”

  “Augustine had Lu and me abducted by werewolves, and up until a few minutes ago we were sealed up in a prison cell.”

  A few choice swear words came over the line.

  “Will you help me find Allie, Bryn?” Joey asked. “Could you work a locator spell that would tell us where he is?”

  “Of course I’ll help you. It’s been ages since I worked that spell, and it’s far from simple. But we have the advantage of several people with ties to the missing person, so that should help considerably.”

  “That’s what Augustine said, that he needed us to act as conduits or something,” Joey said. “I suppose that means we need him too, then. He has as strong a tie to Alastair as any of us, so I shouldn’t kill him until after he’s helped us work the spell.”

  Augustine laughed at that. “As if you’d be able to kill me! It’s all you can do to hold up that phone at the moment. Whereas I could tear your throat out in less time than it took Lu to draw her next breath.”

  “I’d like to see you try,” Joey growled.

  Bryn’s voice over the speaker was low and full of quiet authority as he said, “Joey may be weakened, but I can burn you where you stand, Augustine. And lord knows I’ve wanted to for centuries. So you will do nothing further to harm either Joey or Luna, or I will not hesitate to end you.”

  Augustine held his head high, as if Bryn could see him. “You’re
bluffing. Not even you can kill someone from a distance.”

  The warlock’s voice was eerie in its perfect calmness as he said, “Care to find out?”

  “Look,” Augustine said, backing down, “We’re wasting time. Alastair’s already been out there with God knows what for three days. Are you going to help us, or not?”

  “I’m going to help Joey and Luna, of course. Whether or not I allow you to be involved remains to be seen. Joey, take me off speaker,” Bryn said then, and Joey pushed a button and held the phone to his ear, taking a few steps across the office.

  After a couple minutes, Joey clicked the end button and slid the phone into his pocket as he said, “Bryn said he worked a quick spell to make sure you can’t harm Lu and me, but I’m not sure what he did.”

  “He’s bluffing again. He can’t work a spell on me from a distance,” Augustine said. “But I’m not planning on harming you anyway.”

  “Yeah, and I have every reason to believe you,” Joey said sarcastically as he stared Augustine down.

  “So when is Bryn getting here?”

  “He’ll meet us in a couple hours,” Joey told him.

  “A couple hours? Seriously? He has something better to do this afternoon than save the life of his oldest friend?” Augustine huffed.

  “He’s in his car, driving back from a business meeting in Sacramento and stuck in traffic, if you must know,” Joey said. “And he doesn’t want to use magic to get back to San Francisco, because he says he’ll need every bit of his energy to work the locator spell.”

  Joey was looking off to the side, and took a couple steps toward a low office partition. “What the hell?” he mumbled, cocking his head. Then he bent to pick something up off the floor.

  When he turned toward Lu he was holding the body of a boy in his arms. The boy’s face was bruised, swollen and bloodied, almost to the point of being unrecognizable.

  Except to someone who’d spent years loving him.

  Lu jumped off the desk she’d been resting on and gasped, “Oh God! Ted!”