by K. F. Breene
“Move!” I yelled, yanking Emery with me as I dove to the side.
He hit the ground and rolled, then jumped up like an action hero. I slid on my face and groaned before I climbed to my feet.
Mages surrounded us now, too many to fight. My mother couldn’t help, not if she wanted to keep from shooting us.
“We have to make a run for it,” I said, holding Emery’s arm.
“No. If we don’t stay here, you’ll die. I can see when you’re in danger, Penny.” He held a ball of black survival magic cupped between his hands. “I saw it last night, too. That was why I told Marie to carry you off. If she didn’t, you would’ve died. If we leave this circle, despite the horrible odds, you will die.”
“What about you?”
“I would die right along with you, but not physically.”
“That makes no sense.”
“Please trust me. Stop your magic, and let them advance.”
Shaking, desperate to make one last stand, I held it back. I held it all in. I took Emery’s hand and stilled, my back pressed to his.
“There, now.” The man in the blood-red robe stepped out, Veronica not with him this time. She must’ve been left behind in the house. A smile of triumph twisted his thin lips. “You see? Even naturals can be outdone. Emery, how nice to see you again. I heard you were back to get vengeance for your brother. Too bad you won’t get to see that day.”
“I will. Before I say goodbye to this world, I will see that day,” Emery said through clenched teeth. The clouds rolled and boiled above us. A streak of lightning cut through the sky.
The man spread his arms. “I am right here. So close. But alas, you’ll die just like your brother did.”
“He was going to take your job,” Emery said. “The Chancellor had all but signed the papers. I have copies to prove it.”
I sucked in a breath. Emery clearly had found his proof.
“Yes. But then he went on that fateful trip into dangerous lands. So sad.” The man, who could only be the Baron, put on a frowny face.
“You almost had me,” Emery said, his hand holding mine shaking. “I thought it was Grimshaw. But no, it was you all along. Trying to use Happerhust’s man. Trying to hide behind the other Barons.”
“Trying?” The Baron laughed. “Succeeding, you mean. The old fools have no ambition. If it were up to them, the guild would languish. We’d be no better than a social club. It’s me that has steered the ship. That has done away with all the bleeding-heart do-gooders and put this organization on the right track. Power, plenty, rewards—I have made all that possible.”
“Through torture, murder, and corruption,” Emery spat.
“You think power comes easy?” The Baron gave a rueful smile. “Such a dreamer, like your brother. Useless.” His gaze traveled the circle surrounding us. Another steak of lightning lit the quickly darkening sky, the day losing the battle to night unnaturally early. “But that’s enough chatter. You are sentenced to death, Emery Westbrook, for taking a guild member’s life. Several lives, actually.”
Emery stilled and his gaze drifted. He was having a premonition. “Do not avenge me,” he said to me in a deathly quiet tone. “Promise me.”
“No sweat, because you’re not going to die.”
“Penny, please. You need to stay alive. You’ll have a wonderful future. Live it. Find someone worthy of you.”
“I did. I found you. I will not let him kill you.”
Emery spun and grabbed my face in his hands. He crushed his lips to mine.
He was going to do something crazy.
But that was my role.
I pushed him back, dug into my belt, and grabbed a casing I’d prepared yesterday. His eyes widened and he grabbed my hand, stopping me from cracking it. “Not yet.”
“Ah look, so sweet,” the Baron said. “And if I could control you, Emery, I’d let you keep her in the hopes you’d become a dual-mage pair. But sadly, you’re as headstrong as your brother. Rest assured, though, I have high hopes for her. She’ll do just fine. Maybe I’ll even keep her for my own.”
Emery’s jaw clenched and his eyes lit on fire, but he didn’t turn away from me. He stared down into my eyes, like he was saying goodbye. Like the fool thought I would let that happen.
“Kill him and capture the girl,” the Baron ordered.
I ripped my hand out of Emery’s grasp and applied pressure to crack the casing.
“No—”
A bolt of lightning stabbed down from the nearly black sky. It hit the corner of the property, blasting us all with an electric shock wave. I felt my eyes widen as the natural urge to flee took hold of me.
Another cracked down, closer this time, right next to the porch on which the Baron stood. The circle of mages around us shifted and danced, looking at the sky with pale faces and eyes probably as wide as mine.
“How did—” Emery cut off. His eyes weren’t heavenward like everyone else’s—they were roaming the road.
A small tornado spun down the street, traveling a seemingly controlled path. It dipped in as it neared the front of the house, tearing up the grass and heading our way.
“What…is…happening?” I said in a series of terrified bleats, backing away with everyone else.
The circle of mages turned into an egg and then a haphazard cluster. The Baron yelled for them to follow his orders, but the wind ripped his words away, then shoved at us and pushed us toward the property line.
Another crack of lightning smacked down to my right, fifteen feet away. It fried the man standing there and blasted Emery and me into jogging away.
Panic choked me. Man-made horrors I could handle, but something about natural disasters of any kind had me ready to retreat like my butt was on fire. “We have to get to cover—”
Grisly shapes sped toward us, startling me into a frozen stupor for a moment. The monsters resembled Marie’s shifted form from last night, their swampy skin rendered even more frightful by the light burns marring it. They rushed forward in the near-darkness, wicked claws flashing through the air, cutting through mages. One picked a mage up, lifted him into the air, and then cracked him over a knee.
“Now you can fight,” Emery yelled over the din, launching forward toward the Baron. “Don’t worry about the weather. She has excellent control.”
A shock of evil stilled my heart, erasing my supreme confusion and terror. The Baron had a spell ready, and it was aimed for Emery.
“Watch out!” A jet of white burst from me as a stream of black tore from his fingers. Our magic slid against each other and twirled in the air, keeping its perfect colors, before merging into a plate in front of Emery. Unlike with other magic, my survival magic didn’t retaliate with Emery’s. It formed this perfect picture. The sizzle of the Baron’s aggressive magic drowned out the screams of the mages under attack by the vampires.
Emery dodged the warring spells, punched a mage, and raced to the porch of Veronica’s house. Another bolt of lightning cracked down, perfectly illuminating the fear crossing the Baron’s face. Emery reached him a moment later, smashing a fist into his face. The Baron was flung backward before being caught by Emery again. This time, Emery’s hands went to the Baron’s head. He twisted.
I grimaced and looked away as the Baron’s lifeless body slid to the ground.
The small twister picked up two mages and flung them before angling back, clearing the way for the vampires, who continued to crowd into the yard, fangs and claws working. The twister dissipated as it left the front yard.
“Is it magic—” More lightning, two bolts at the same time, hit behind the house. Then four more. A woman walked down the middle of the street, her arms raised and fire-red hair whipping around her. A mage, previously running in her direction, away from the vampire-created carnage, came to a sudden stop and held out a casing.
The woman’s hands barely moved, her fingers flicking. Lightning shot down in front of her, piercing the top of the mage’s head. His casing fell safely to the ground.
“What the—”
The scene slowed around us. Monsters stilled. Bodies lay strewn across the carefully manicured lawn.
Emery heaved, staring down at the Baron. A tear leaked out of his eye, and he wiped it away. “That was for Conrad,” he said in a hoarse voice.
I ran to him, not knowing what the heck was going on with the red-haired woman, but thankful to her, since she seemed to be on our side, and thankful to the vampires.
I slid my hand down his arm and fit my palm into his. He took his hand back before pulling me into his body.
“I knew the pain wouldn’t go away,” he said, resting his cheek on my head. “But I didn’t expect it to get worse.” He crushed me to his chest.
“You’ve reopened the wound,” came Darius’s eloquent voice. He moved up beside me in human form, and I got an eyeful. He hadn’t a stitch of clothing on him. “And you can finally let it heal. Now, why don’t you introduce me to your Elemental friend.” It was worded like a question but not stated as one.
“Elemental?” I said softly, trying to remember if I’d ever heard of that. It sounded vaguely familiar.
“They control the elements,” Darius said, walking beside us. “They range in power, like mages, and usually specialize in one main element, and possibly a few sub-elements. They can be quite useful, as we’ve seen.”
The woman shifted and stuck out her hip when we neared, a hard gaze directed at Darius.
“Since when are you in league with vampires?” she said with heat to her voice.
“That’s the way it had to go.” Emery stopped in front of her. “Solas, this is Darius. He’s helped us survive the last couple of nights. Darius, Solas is an acolyte. She hopes to rank in the next Placement Games.”
“Is that right?” Darius studied her face. “I am heavily active in the sponsorship of those games. I thought I knew all the big players.”
Solas lifted her chin and a fierce expression crossed her face. “Outside gamblers”—she spat the word—“know only what they are told. It has no bearing on actual talent.”
I grinned despite my fatigue. I liked her fire.
“Clearly.” Darius glanced around the yard, his gaze flicking to the blackened spots and the uprooted areas. “Well, Solas.” He offered her a bow. “It was a pleasure.” He turned to Emery and me. “I will let you chat for a moment, but as the human police will soon arrive, we don’t have much time. I’ll see to Penny’s mother.”
And with that, he was gone, striding away.
“You’re going to have a vampire meddling in your affairs,” Emery told Solas, and from the ease with which he spoke to her, I could tell they knew each other well.
She shrugged. “If he wants to sponsor me, he can be my guest. There is paperwork for a reason. He won’t own me.”
“Keep your wits.” Emery grinned, but the sentiment didn’t reach his eyes.
Solas’s eyes widened. “What’s this? A smile?” She turned her crystal-clear green eyes on me, and I got the feeling I was being measured somehow.
“How did you know to come?” Emery asked, glancing behind him at the others preparing to leave. The sirens blared in the distance.
“You move through the world like a minotaur through a crowd of fairies,” Solas said. “I stayed in the area and listened. Traveling into the guild compound was too dangerous, but a sleepy neighborhood in this rainy town? Perfect.”
“But why? We were even.”
She shook her head and took a step back. “We weren’t even. You were trying to brush me off, and I had too much honor to let you. Now we are even.” Her eyes flicked to me again. “Aren’t you going to introduce me to the one who has cleared away the clouds of your disposition?”
Emery squeezed me again. “This is Penelope Bristol. She has recently learned she’s a natural.”
Solas turned to me and offered a deep bow. “A pleasure. You are a lucky woman, Penelope Bristol. Because now you know me.” Her smile made her eyes sparkle. She turned to Emery. “What? Did you think I meant that she was lucky for landing you?” She laughed and playfully pushed him. “My, no. You are the lucky one, clearly.” Solas smiled at me again and stepped back. “If either of you want to swap favors, please remember me. I’d love to have a natural in my pocket.”
“I am aware,” Emery muttered.
“There it is.” She pointed at his surly expression. “There’s the frown I remember. Now that is the Emery I know.” Her laughter followed her down the street.
“She’s lovely…while also being nuts,” I said, letting Emery turn us in the opposite direction.
“Yeah. It’s what will make her sensational in the Placement Games. She’ll charm the crowd and then destroy her opponents. She just needs to get there. Hopefully Darius will take an interest and make it happen.”
“Huh.” I was too tired to ask more about it.
Up ahead I saw Veronica huddled, wrapped in a blanket. I was running before I knew it, pushing through vampires trying to make her comfortable and wrapping my arms around her.
“Are you okay, are you hurt?” I asked, rifling through her blanket to get at her fingers. Eight, with two thumbs. “Oh good, they didn’t chop anything off.”
“I’m okay. I’m fine. My family is really shaken up, but we’re okay.”
I hugged her again before I heard the wail of the sirens getting louder. It was almost time to leave.
Chapter Forty-One
I had to release my death grip on Veronica so they could hasten her toward her family, who were being hastened away by the vampires. Her mother needed her more than I did, and since I was responsible for all this, I wasn’t welcome at the moment.
“How did Darius find us?” I asked as we made our way toward my house. “I mean, remind me to thank him for saving the day and everything, but we snuck out the window in that house for a reason.”
“I left a note. I knew he’d want to protect his interests.” Emery started to jog, my hand clasped in his. My mother was on her lawn, gun in hand, more bodies on the grass. Beautiful naked people lingered in the street, waiting for Darius. The wail of the sirens rode the breeze.
“You see? I knew you were crazy. Well, you’ve gone too far this time,” Lewis shouted across the street. “I’ve called the cops. And tell your naked friends to put some clothes on, for God’s sake.”
“Do not take the Lord’s name in vain, Lewis,” my mother shouted back.
“Mother, come on, we have to go!” I patted her arm as I passed her before running inside and grabbing her car keys. “The cops are coming.”
“I did not want that old goat to get the last word, that’s all.” My mother gave Lewis a hard stare.
“What sort of person yells at their neighbors about naked people when there was a magic fight outside of his house half an hour before?” Emery asked, staring in that direction.
“Don’t try to wrap your head around it,” I said. “He and my mother make no sense.”
After I hugged Veronica within an inch of her life, then pushed her and her family toward their vampire handlers, who would take them to safety, we loaded into the car. Darius and the rest of the vampires were running toward their hearses at the end of the street. I’d thought those vehicles were full of mages when they’d pulled up, but it had been the vampires the whole time, waiting for enough darkness to go outside. Clearly he had human workers to help him. Darius had certainly wanted to protect his interests, and while I was pretty sure that would be a very bad thing down the road, it was totally welcome in the moment. If it hadn’t been for him and Solas, Emery and I would probably be dead. There had been too many mages, and my hail Mary spell at the end wouldn’t have saved the day. I owed Darius one, and he surely knew it.
Back at the house we’d slept in the night before, I sagged in weariness. We drifted into the living room and fell onto the couches. Veronica and her family had been relocated somewhere else, safely behind a wall of fangs.
“Well that was some adventure, rig
ht there,” my mother said, way more upbeat than she should’ve been, considering the nearly fatal battle we’d just endured. “All the training I’ve done has finally paid off. At the shooting range, the younger guys always snicker at the older woman shooting the heavy artillery, but today I would’ve wiped the smiles off their faces. If only I could have used the semiautomatic. I didn’t, of course, because stray bullets would’ve gunned down the neighbors, but I could’ve…” She sighed. “Next time.”
“We were lucky to have you, Ms. Bristol,” Emery said, sitting a little too straight.
“I hate to say it, but we were lucky to have those vampires.” My mother stretched and kneaded her shoulders. “I wasn’t sure how I was going to help. I couldn’t very well shoot in your direction. My next option was to run a car through them and hope you guys jumped out of the way.”
Emery looked at me, a sparkle of humor in his eyes. “Now I see where you get it.”
I frowned, because so did I.
“But you best be careful where those vampires are concerned, young lady.” My mother lifted her eyebrows at me. “They are not the sort you want to get mixed up with. One second, you think you’re ahead. The next second, they own you. Best to steer clear if you can.”
“That might be a little harder after today,” I murmured, leaning against Emery. He didn’t lift his arm to invite me to lean against his chest. I had the feeling it was because of my mother. “So you knew it was Kempworth going in?” I asked him.
Sadness dragged on his features and he leaned harder into the couch, a little at an angle, subtly inviting me to keep leaning against him. “I was almost positive. I just needed Clyde or Darius to read a couple of letters to verify.”
“And it wasn’t who you thought?”
“Not at first, no, but I suspected something was amiss. What Clyde told me about the letter I brought him made sense, but the people in question didn’t. The two Barons he implicated used to agree on most things. I didn’t think they’d stab each other in the back. Since Kempworth was always at odds with them back in the day, I figured it was still the case.