Magic and Mayhem: A Collection of 21 Fantasy Novels

by Jasmine Walt

  “Not as interesting as I’m about to make your face!” I lashed out, battering her body with my edgeless weapons, but it didn’t seem to bother her as she grabbed my right wrist and with a shift of her weight, sent me tumbling behind her. I hit the ground in a roll, but as I came to my feet, a lance of blood struck me in the forehead. My head snapped backward with the impact, and I crashed onto my back.

  “You’re way too young to even consider challenging me.” Ariel wasn’t even looking at me anymore. She just twirled her hand in my general direction and made her way toward the car. No, I couldn’t let her get to Luc. I struggled to my feet as the lance shattered into a million shards of bloody glass. They hit me, but my spell was more than enough to ward off some cuts. Or so I thought. Instead of slicing into me, the glass congealed along my flesh like it had done to my weapons.

  It writhed up my body as I sprinted toward Ariel. I drove Isis forward as I reached her, stabbing the blade into her spine with all the strength I could muster. And it bounced off. The pain of it reverberated up my arm and into my bones as all of the weird glass blood coating my body swarmed onto my face and covered my mouth and nose. Ariel glanced back at me as I slumped to my knees unable to breathe.

  “That’s right, you need to breathe. I almost forgot.” She grinned at me as everything started to go dark. She plucked Luc’s unconscious body from the backseat and tossed him to the ground next to me. “Pity.” She stepped on my chest with one dainty foot and pressed on my ribs. Even through my magic, it felt like she was about to break my ribs which wasn’t good for obvious reasons.

  Still, I’ve never let little things like suffocation and being crushed stop me. So what did I do? I blasted the gas tank of the car with lightning. The car exploded violently, flinging all of us across the street.

  I slammed backward through the window of a dry cleaner’s shop boasting really good Christmas specials and landed hard on the checkered tile floor with Luc’s body resting on top of me. I sucked in a breath that felt so good, I decided to take another one before I realized how surprised I was to be able to breathe. Evidently, blowing up a car on top of Ariel had broken her concentration. Who would have thought?

  I started to crawl to my feet when the sounds of sirens split the air and jackbooted men with guns leapt out of their cars. They came rushing toward me, guns drawn and pointed at me of all things. What the hell? Didn’t they see the vampire?

  “She did it. She blew up car!” An older Asian man screamed at the top of his lungs. He gestured at me from behind his cheap countertop. I hadn’t seen him a moment ago. Had he been hiding?

  “Put your swords down!” commanded one of the cops, and as I tried to decide if I was going to let them capture me, one of them held up a device I was very familiar with.

  “Don’t taze me,” I said, setting down my swords because it was either that or beat them all to pulp, and I was pretty sure they were more or less innocent. Besides, getting arrested had to be better than dealing with the vampires, especially since the vampires probably wouldn’t attack with so many armed humans around. Probably.

  “Lay on the ground and put your hands behind your head!” one of them barked, and as I complied, they swarmed over me like ants. A moment later, I was cuffed and being pushed out the door. Paramedics were wheeling Luc’s stretchered body toward an ambulance. Well, at least they were prepared.

  Ariel smiled at me from the crowd, waving at me with one red-nailed hand. Then she blew me a kiss. I gritted my teeth, resisting the urge to break free of my cuffs and leap across the space between us. I didn’t because, you know, breaking handcuffs was actually pretty hard. Instead, I glowered at her as they shoved me in the back of the police car. It would have to do. For now.

  16

  “Get up, Callina. We’re letting you go,” the guard said, walking toward my cage. He was a big guy, with bulging biceps and legs large enough to make me think he never skipped leg day. His short blond hair was trimmed close to his head, but then again, all the guards had haircuts like that. Maybe it was a guard thing?

  The door slowly unlocked with a weird whoosh of air and disengaged from the magnetic lock. He gripped the bars with one hand and slid it open, staring at me with bitter blue eyes. “You must have some friends in very high places since we’re supposed to be holding you for a long time after the stunt you pulled.” He looked down at me like he was used to being intimidating. I guess he would have been if I hadn’t fought vampires all night. “Instead, I got a call from the goddamned governor. He told me to release your sorry ass, and not only that, I’m supposed to give you your weapons back and pretend like this never happened.” He smiled at me, but it was really more a baring of his teeth. “Sorry for the inconvenience.”

  I had no idea what the hell he was talking about, but I wasn’t about to argue. If he was going to let me out of here, I was more than willing to let him. He ushered me out of the room and into a hallway. Everything here was metal and concrete, and for a moment, I almost wondered if it had been built by vampires. Then again, steel and stone kept most things inside. Even I’d have had a hard time escaping since I couldn’t bend iron with my bare hands. Well, not very much at least.

  “And I was really looking forward to leaping the wall outside and sprinting to freedom,” I said, glancing at the guard. He seemed to seethe with rage as he turned his stone cold eyes upon me.

  “Is that supposed to be funny?” he asked before shaking his head. “I’d like to see you try it.” He leaned down close to me so his lips were very near my ear, which was some feat because he was almost two feet taller than my five foot nothing. It was sort of creepy, but not as much as the feel of his warm breath on my skin. “We had a werewolf try once. He made it six steps.” He stood up and grinned mercilessly at me. “You’d be surprised how few things survive a belt fed machinegun spitting hundreds of silver rounds at them.” He shrugged. “Then again, we’ve never actually had your kind here before. Maybe you’re tougher than a werewolf.”

  A shiver ran through me as he spoke. The way this guy was talking, it sure seemed like he knew not only what I was, but how to take out a werewolf. But, but that was impossible. There was no way there would be a supernatural prison, right?

  “You’re starting to get it, aren’t you, Hyas Tyee?” The guard spat my title as he pressed his thumb to a keypad beside the door. It flashed with a variety of colors before flashing green. The door hissed open revealing a solid steel room about six feet across. He stepped inside and gestured for me to follow. No sooner had I done so when the door behind me slammed closed and sealed shut.

  The guard strode across the room and pressed his thumb to yet another keypad. This one seemed to take a while before flashing green.

  “Good. We won’t get gassed.” The guard replied, hissing. “I hate when that happens. Always have to get new lungs afterward.”

  “Why would we get gassed?” I asked as the door in front of him opened to reveal a beam of pure sunlight.

  “Sometimes, things try to sneak through. When that happens, the room fills with poison gas. And yes, it does kill people, but at the same time, you don’t want anything in here getting out there.” He jerked his thumb toward the sunlight. “Trust me.”

  “What the hell is this place?” I asked as I stepped into the sunlight and was forced to shield my eyes.

  “Sweetie, you’re on Alcatraz,” the guard said, glancing back at me.

  “In San Francisco?” I asked, following him down a long narrow corridor filled with laser beams. They didn’t do anything as he passed through each beam, but then again, maybe that would change. Maybe it would trigger some sort of crazy alarm that would fill the room with fire.

  “No. This is the real one.” He shrugged in front of me. “No one escapes from here. Not even demons like yourself.”

  “I’m not a demon,” I replied, giving his huge back my angriest stare.

  “Whatever you say,” he replied, moving toward what looked like a plain whitewashed wooden d
oor and swinging it open. He gestured for me to leave. “You can claim your things at the front. Good luck and don’t let the door hit you on the ass.”

  I grumbled as I moved past him. As soon as I stepped through the door, there was a horrible wrenching sound and my brain physically hurt. My stomach lurched into my throat and nausea swelled up inside me. I fell to my knees, clawing for breath as tears streamed down my face and clouded my vision.

  “What was that?” I choked, glancing back toward the guard. He wasn’t there. The door wasn’t there. Nothing but a solid cinderblock wall was there. What the hell?

  I turned back toward the room ahead of me, but it seemed perfectly normal. How the hell was that possible? Where had I been? I remembered walking into the police station and being shoved into an empty room to await questioning. I must have fallen asleep in that waiting room because when I’d woken up I’d been in the cell. Had I somehow been transported to a weird interdimensional prison? Sadly, I sort of hoped so. If I hadn’t been, I was going crazy and that wouldn’t be good for anyone, especially me.

  “What are you doing on the floor?” Danae asked, and I looked back to see her standing in front of me glaring. She tapped the toe of one black high heel against the ground a few times before shifting her hands onto her hips. She was wearing a modest black suit jacket with a tasteful white blouse and a black skirt that fell to just past her knees. It made me think lawyer.

  “I… um…” I muttered, my cheeks heating up as I realized everyone in the room was staring at me. It was only three other people, but it was still weird.

  Danae shook her head, stepping back half a step and looking down her pixie nose at me. “We don’t have time for whatever this is.” She gestured at me with one hand. “I’ve already gotten your stuff. It’s in the car.”

  “Why are you helping me?” I asked, hoping curiosity wouldn’t kill me. It wasn’t like I had nine lives after all.

  “Because I don’t want Ariel to succeed in tapping into the power of the blood moon and turning day into permanent darkness.” Danae shrugged like what she said even made sense. “I may be a vampire, but it’s no fun jogging down the beach at night. There’s not enough people to look. I can’t feed if no one looks.”

  “Um… okay,” I said, getting to my feet, and as I did so, she spun on her heel and walked away. “I’m a little confused as to what the hell is going on.”

  “You and Logan got yourselves captured by the police. They took your friend, the Wardbreaker to the hospital. That’s where we are going now.” Danae sighed and turned around to glare at me. “What’s not to understand?”

  “Okay, firstly where the hell was I because that wasn’t a normal police station. Two, why did they just let me go? Three, how is Logan even still alive? Four, why is Luc still at the hospital? Shouldn’t Ariel have captured him already?” I asked.

  Danae narrowed her dark eyes at me, threw her hair over her shoulder and walked out into the parking lot without saying a word. “I dislike you,” she said, approaching a lime green sports car and gesturing at it with a small black box with red buttons on it. It roared to life as she opened the door and got inside. The upholstery appeared to be made of leather, and as I slid inside, I felt the presence of Shirajirashii nearby. I turned and saw the twin blades lying across the backseat.

  “To answer your questions. I’m not sure how you got transferred into the supernatural lockup. They let you out because I asked the governor very, very nicely to get you out. It wasn’t super fun, let me tell you. Logan is alive because Ariel hasn’t deigned to kill him yet. Luc is still in the hospital because Ariel has been using the staff to keep him sedated.” Danae wasn’t looking at me as she spoke, rather she seemed to be concentrating on the road which was good enough for me.

  “Thanks,” I said, grabbing my swords. Their familiar weight made me feel better.

  “Don’t thank me. Just stop Ariel and we’ll be square.”

  “Okay,” I replied. “I was going to do that anyway.”

  “You have no idea how little that means to me,” Danae said, and tapped a button on her steering wheel. Music began blaring in the cabin, so loud, I could barely think, let alone talk to her, which I suspect might have been the idea.

  I sighed and looked out the window as we drove down the crowded street. There was so much traffic. This place was really crowded, and it was sort of unnerving. Where I came from there weren’t many people, and most of them were always gone on a mission of some kind. Let’s just say, I was used to eating in a mess hall designed to fit a thousand people by myself.

  “So what’s it like being a succubus?” I called over the music, and if I hadn’t seen her fingers clench around the steering wheel, I’d have assumed she hadn’t heard me.

  “It’s not super fun. Usually, I get to seduce gross people for things I don’t really care about.” She waved at me with one hand like I was an example.

  “I thought most of you, um… liked your jobs?” I said, feeling the blush rise on my cheeks.

  “Some of us do. Those ones mostly work in massage parlors and strip clubs.” She shrugged her shoulders.

  “And I’m guessing you don’t do those things?” I asked, worried that this conversation was about to take a train straight into uncomfortable station.

  Danae quirked one perfectly sculpted eyebrow at me. “No. I don’t.”

  “Okay,” I replied, looking away from her so I could stare out the window.

  “It’s not like I have anything against those that do,” she continued, and I groaned inside my head. I had no idea where this discussion was about to go or what my part in it would be, but my desire to have a heart to heart with a vampire about her life choices wasn’t exactly large. “It’s just, I mean okay, sex is awesome, and I feed on it, so you might think I was all sorts of slutty, but really…” She glanced at me. “We’re not all that way.”

  “I believe you.” I smiled at her, and she nodded.

  “Thanks,” she let out a breath. “It’s just weird to explain that I’m a succubus but don’t like sleeping with random people.” She blushed a little bit and looked back out the windshield, which was good because she was driving and there was traffic.

  “It is a little odd, but not out of the realm of possibility.” I rubbed my temples with my hand. “I know lots of people who sleep around and lots who don’t. I’m not sure why it would be different for vampires.”

  “Most people wouldn’t see it like that. They’re always like, ‘oh, you’re a sex demon? Well feed off this,’ then they whip it out…”

  “I feel like you’re going into way more detail than required,” I said as delicately as I could because I did not want to discuss sex with a succubus because, well, it was embarrassing. I hadn’t even had sex and here she was talking about people whipping it out in front of her, which come to think of it… “Who willingly has sex with a succubus?”

  “You’d be surprised what people are into,” she said before lowering her voice to a whisper. “I know this one guy… Let’s just say I don’t think his hair has turned back to its normal color ever since he found out about us.”

  “You fed on someone enough to drain the color from his hair?” I asked, incredulous. “And not only did he live, but he came back for more?”

  “Like I said, some people are into weird stuff.” She flipped on her blinker and pulled onto a side street. Up ahead, a huge hospital stared at me through the window, and even though I hated hospitals with every ounce of my being largely due to the ginormous amount of time I’d spent inside them, I was happy to see it.

  “I’m glad we had this talk,” I said as politely as I could when she pulled up in front of the massive building.

  “Me too,” she replied. “I know you’re lying and uninterested because I can tell exactly how interested people are in what I’m saying, but it was nice of you to try. I’ll remember that.” A look of horror must have slipped across my face as I looked at her. I’d been trying to be polite, and she’d known
I wasn’t concerned in the slightest. It was so embarrassing. “Now get out of my car and go save your friend.”

  “And what will you be doing?” I asked as I opened the door and stepped into the brisk air. It always surprised me how cold it was outside when the sun was shining. It was one of the reasons I’d picked Southern California over say Northern Minnesota. I’d have died from the cold in three seconds there.

  “I’ll keep the car running for your inevitable escape.” Danae patted her steering wheel. “Try to hurry though. I get bored easily.” With that, she leaned over and pulled a paperback book out of her glove compartment. I wasn’t sure what I was expecting her to read, but it wasn’t a book about sparkly vampires, that’s for sure.

  She looked up, catching me staring at her book and grinned. “It was either this or the one about a young girl murdering other teenagers in a game of death. It’s a sad day when the story about fictional vampires has the happy ending.”

  17

  The hospital smelled like bleach and disinfectant, which I guess was par for the course. Then again that could have been because I was currently hiding in a janitorial closet. I cracked the door an inch to make sure the nurse who had nearly seen me sneak in was gone. Not seeing him, I crept outward.

  “You there!” a gruff male voice called, and I spun on my heel, heart hammering. The nurse I’d been trying to avoid stared at me with annoyed grey eyes, his nostrils flaring in annoyance. He took a couple steps toward me, his tight green scrubs pressed against his body as he moved, making it pretty damn obvious he was well built beneath the garments. “What are you doing up here?”

  “Visiting a friend?” I offered, sheepishly looking at my feet. It was actually sort of hard because I was wearing Luc’s trench coat. It was so long, it nearly covered my feet completely. I was using it because it was the only thing large enough to hide my swords. I always had half a mind to ward them with symbols that would make them invisible to the casual observer, but I hadn’t. Mostly because those symbols would slowly drain the power from me and my weapons. It would suck to need them at full strength and find them half empty. So I was stuck to hiding them the old fashioned way.