by CD Coffelt
“What happened?” Sable asked.
“I think he’ll be okay. Just let him simmer for a while.”
From a distance away, Justus heard the boy’s hoarse voice. “Get the fuck away from me.”
Macy appeared from the ring of brush, one arm around Dayne’s waist, looking back over her shoulder. “What’s wrong with him?”
“Spirit. She hit him with Spirit. I-I don’t know what happened,” Justus said. He nodded at Dayne. “What about him? Is he in control of himself?”
“As much as I need to be, Wilder,” Dayne said.
He straightened, but Macy kept one slender arm around him, watching him fiercely. He smiled at her and nodded. She released his waist, but stood close.
“I think you’re going to need me in a little bit,” he said to Justus.
Magic crawled along Justus’s arms. Mages, closing in, not attempting secrecy.
“The adepts,” Dayne said. “They’re coming in for a look-see at you and the prize they were promised.”
“Where is Tiarra?” Macy said.
Grimly, without forethought, they faced outward and together formed a loose semi-circle, their backs to the center.
“Um, gone, I reckon. At least from here. I told the magic to make her disappear, and it swallowed her up.”
Dayne’s brow gathered into a knot. “You ‘told’ the magic to do something. What the hell does that mean?”
“When I want or need a certain effect, the magic chooses the form. It gives me what I want. Comes up with the means, and that’s okey dokey with me. Most times.”
“Most times,” Dayne repeated.
Justus shrugged. He noted the number and location of the approaching adepts. Some came singly, as if sneaking late into class. Others came in pairs, swaggering like the hip kids crashing a party uninvited. They came from all directions and with their magic gathered around them like mantles.
Justus eyed the advancing throng. “The magic chooses how to do it,” he said. “I stand back, give it an idea, and off we go. I leave the solution up to the elements. Simple as that. Isn’t that how you do it?”
Dayne rolled his eyes, then traded a look with Macy. “No, Wilder. I have no idea what the hell you’re talking about, but let’s leave this discussion for another time. Company is coming.”
The approaching adepts shuffled through the dry grass. The husky stems snapped and hissed as they broke.
“But doesn’t your magic do what you ask? Come when you call?” Justus asked.
Dayne snorted and squinted in the direction of mumbled voices. “Like, ‘Here, boy. Here, boy?’” His laughter broke off as three figures stepped into the clearing. “Nope. It just don’t work that way with me. I throw it; I don’t have a conversation with it.” Dayne cleared his throat. “Now, if you don’t mind, we need to have a confab with these adepts. But first, a little light on the subject.”
Dayne pointed skyward and a comet tail shot from his fingertip. It burst into a small yellow sun, lighting everything below. The adepts, some shading their eyes, some smirking, stood around them.
Justus felt more irritated than alarmed, a mood that grew the more he considered the ring that now enclosed them. So easy to take them out, to blow each mage back into the bush where they came from. His hands clenched at his side as his impatience mounted.
Nerves tingled as a flood of anger saturated his senses. And he gave the emotion free rein, unlike during his fight with Tiarra. Not even when she’d threatened Sable did he let it go as he did now. The rage he felt with the mages closing in was nearly sentient.
Sentient.
An icy tendril caused Justus to shiver. Awareness. Of the sleeping horror that now stirred within him. He tightened his will around the elements. And his wrath. Afraid to move, it took all his concentration. Dimly, he noticed Dayne step from their circle toward one of the adepts.
The hunter spread his fingers wide, palms out. “Why are you here?”
His voice, though soft, carried around the clearing. The adepts stirred and looked at each other, and then a woman of middle years, long gray braids trailing down her back, took several paces forward.
“We are to kill or capture the wild mage, that one there.” She gestured to Justus standing silent. “By command of the head of the Imperium.”
“Who is not here,” Dayne said smoothly. “As Imperator of the Imperium, I am directing you at this time. All of you are to stand down until further notice.”
“He holds the elements,” the woman said.
Every eye was on Justus. He held himself still and waited. Sweat stung his eyes, but he didn’t brush it away.
Dayne didn’t spare a glance. He maneuvered to stand between Justus and the woman. She held a loose stance that spoke of danger and talent, but exuded calm. Others were not so composed. Some fidgeted. Others nearly bubbled with eagerness to prove themselves.
“Stand down,” Dayne said again. “The fight is over. The wilder is under my jurisdiction. Since Tiarra is not present—”
Sable snorted.
“—I am in command,” Dayne said. He held his element, like a candle flame, flickering low, but ready to explode.
“Where is she, then? I can tell she is far away, but not where. Shouldn’t she be here?”
“You presume to ask? Perhaps you wish to question her when she returns. Make her tell you her business. I’m sure she’d be delighted to inform you.”
The woman took a step back and gave a short bark of a laugh. “No. Never mind.” She shook her head and her braids danced. “I’ll pass. We will stand down.”
The woman nodded to the group behind her and walked back into the shadows. Others hesitated, murmured, some arguing, but in the end, they all followed her. Dayne released his Fire element, and it snuffed out. The night reclaimed the clearing.
The hunter sighed, as if weary. Macy moved under his arm and shouldered his weight onto her body. Air whirled and supported her as she steadied Dayne.
“Time to go,” she said, eyes only for her husband. “See you back at the house?”
Justus shrugged.
They followed the other adepts.
Justus heard sirens in the distance, a harbinger of complications to come. He wondered how the humans would react if they learned the truth.
Eventually, the wizards living among them would need to come out of their castles and office buildings and join the world.
The time was right.
When he was ten, his mother had said that, and his father had shaken his head.
No, it is too dangerous, for you, for him, he’d said.
Justus started in surprise at the memory seen through a child’s eyes, of their yellow-gold kitchen with simple flecked countertops. His parents, now aware of him listening, ended their serious adult conversation and asked his advice on an afternoon’s jaunt in the countryside. Still, he’d seen the silent looks his parents had exchanged over his head, grim.
Frightened.
Now, the memory slid into his consciousness with no more enlightenment than he had as a boy.
With the wail of the sirens closing fast, Justus heard another sound, familiar, but terrifying. His mother’s voice, frail and questioning, calling for him.
Justus stumbled as he turned, searching for his mother. He felt the sickness return to his belly when he didn’t see her at first. Then he saw the strange man he had met at his mother’s house, Paul, helping her along the trail. Her voice, at once wavering but insistent, brooking no argument.
“Justus. Justus, where are you? I need to see you.”
“Damn it, Mom. What is this? What are you doing here?” Justus hurriedly ran to his frail mother.
“I got her,” Paul said.
Justus slid to a stop. Paul had one arm around his mother’s waist, steadying her. She looked at Justus and gave him a tremulous smile. “I’m okay,” she said, her voice louder. “Just a bit shook up.”
“Easy, Raissa. Nothing broken? No cuts?” Paul asked.
“No, I’m all right. But I believe a bath is in order.”
Justus laughed shortly. Trust his mom to come up with the right phrase, even for a circumstance as weird as this one.
“Well, boy, those people, the strange men, they came to your mom’s house and made us go with ’em,” Paul said. “That kid too. Bert.”
Justus took his mom from Paul and hugged her tight.
“It was frightening,” she said. “I don’t know why those men brought us here.” She clutched her chest briefly.
“Mom, you need to go to the hospital.”
“No.” Her stern tone stopped his terror like a thrown light switch. “No, I am not going to the hospital. I am fine, just a little shaky still. No.” His mother patted his arm and smiled at him. “I am going to be fine. Are you hurt? In any way?”
After assuring her that he wasn’t injured, he gave his mother’s hand back to Paul. The man seemed stronger, sturdier than he appeared, and readily took her hand. Paul bent his head and murmured a question. She nodded. The couple started down the darkened trail.
Justus watched their progress. With the sirens closing, he didn’t have much time, but there was something touching in the way Paul held the leafy branches of a maple tree so his mother could pass. The older man bent and spoke low, inaudible words to his mom, and Justus heard the equally soft reply. It struck him then. Her voice. It was…different. Not quite the same as in his memories.
At another time, he would have laughed it off with an excuse that his mind was playing tricks on him and his memories.
Her voice seemed different from the day in the yellow kitchen. But Paul’s voice seemed…familiar.
No. Magic must be messing with his mind. He shook his head again.
Sable had stood behind him during his reunion with his mother, silent. Strangely silent. She was staring hard at his face.
“What is it?”
She didn’t reply, but instead reached out, slipped two fingers under the black chain around his neck, and pulled the ward stone from his torn shirt. The air left his lungs when he saw the broken stone, a third of the size it used to be. The horizontal break jagged just below the hole where the chain passed through.
Sable rubbed the muddy-colored stone between her fingers. “Should we try to find the rest of it?”
He clenched his teeth. “Wouldn’t do any good. The magic is gone.”
The symbol of his father’s legacy. Gone. The last of his childhood, and along with it, the fixed magic, the foundation of his shields and strength, evaporated as well, leaving nothing but the small bit of stone attached to a black chain. Sable dropped the ward stone. He fingered it silently. His eyes snapped to her when she gasped. Her wide eyes were on him, her voice nearly inaudible as she laid her palm on his chest again.
“I feel your signature,” she said.
He felt as if a serpent coiled around his heart, constricting the beats to slow, painful thuds. Every adept in the Imperium would feel his magic signature and know when he was near. That was how the mages knew he held magic. That was how they knew what he was.
Justus Aubre could hide no longer.
In his mind’s eye, Spirit twisted and stretched. It yawned, silver teeth glimmered, and its eyes opened lazily.
Sable licked her lips.
When did she turn so pale, he thought distantly. When his true signature touched her, or when Spirit began slithering into his awareness? His jaw hardened into a tooth-grinding snarl as he forced his will into action.
He surrounded the element, smothering it, shielding it from outside influence and his signature. Pressure built from inside the prison, pushing, questing along the edges. It subsided after an immeasurable time, crouching like a stalking panther, waiting for an opportunity.
Justus tested the prison and was satisfied that it would hold. At least for now.
When he came back to himself and his surroundings, it was as though no time had passed. Sable, still in the act of shuddering, jerked, then blinked.
Justus forced a grin onto his face. “You okay with that? My signature?”
“Uh, yeah. Humpf.” She bit the inside of her cheek. “Just for a second there, I wondered…well, nothing.”
“What?”
She licked her lips, then grimaced. “Something dead. It was like blood and death. And ash.”
He didn’t speak.
Sable pulled his arm and twined it around hers. “Come on. Let’s follow your mom. Bet they’re ready for something stronger than a glass of milk.”
Chapter Thirty
Questions followed, from the cops, from his mom and Paul, and Dayne.
Some had answers. Most, not so much.
The cops arrived with suspicious faces and hard voices. Paul was the surprise guest there, giving them a quiet word, making phone calls that drew shocked looks from the lieutenant in charge of the investigation. She wore a plastic smile for about two seconds after listening to whoever was on the other end of the phone call that Paul made. Then she stiffened and yelped a “yes, sir” into the phone.
“I know some people,” Paul explained with a grin to Justus.
His mother disturbed him most. She asked silent questions, her head cocked and eyes narrowed, making promises for a thorough chitchat when they were alone.
The cops were long gone when Macy decided to raid the foodstuffs, bringing out a loaf of bread, chips, the shredded cold roast, tangy mustard, and horseradish. Together, they set to making a meal. Justus dealt the plates like a deck of cards, Sable and Paul laughing as they stirred a pitcher of tea. Dayne had pulled a set of mismatched glasses from the cupboard, and ice soon clicked into each. The find of pickles brought the sound of crunching soon after.
Paul and his mother took their plates into the living room and shut the door. Dayne sat at the table chewing a roast beef sandwich, his eyes closed as he munched. He swiped his mouth with the back of his hand. Macy tossed a paper towel his way.
“Got a question for you,” he said between swallows.
Justus tightened his mouth, but didn’t look at the hunter. “Just one? Really?”
“For now. But it’s a big one. Quality makes up for quantity.”
He made a rude sound. “And so, Captain Climax, what is it?”
“Where is she?”
The fork of cottage cheese stopped two inches from Sable’s mouth. She laid it on her plate and looked anywhere but at Justus. Around the table, all activity stopped.
Justus huffed and fingered the ring of condensation on the table. “Guess I don’t need to ask who you’re talking about. Your boss is far away. Not dead.”
“You opened a door?”
“No, more like I ripped the fabric of this world open and kicked her ass into the seam.”
“Not dead, you say.”
“No.”
The soft negative didn’t come from Justus. Sable still looked at her plate and the lumps of cottage cheese. She twitched and met Dayne’s eyes. “No,” she said again, stronger. “She isn’t dead, but somewhere in a crowded square.”
Sable closed her eyes and her face slackened. “Bright colors,” she intoned. “Flutters of fabrics, smells, spicy, hot. She was confused at first, but now she knows where she is. But not how she got there. Lots of people are moving past her. Shopping.”
She sucked in a long breath and straightened. Opening her eyes, she looked fierce now, pushed her plate aside, and focused on Dayne.
“She knows caution and how to be cautious. Next time, she’ll be better prepared. And I…” Sable looked at Justus. “I am not free of her. This I can tell you.”
No one spoke for a long time after that.
Dayne volunteered to take Raissa home after her querulous assurance that she was fine. Paul asked for a ride back to his car. Before he got in beside Raissa, Paul glanced back with laser beam intensity. As if he could see everything and resolve any issue.
Sable placed a chaste kiss on his mouth and looked at him. Creases of weariness closed her eyes t
o narrow slits. “You okay?” she asked. At his nod, she half-smiled, gave a brief wave, and trudged up the stairs to her loft apartment. She turned at the landing to face him.
“Be here in the morning?”
“That’s not much of a wait, but yes, I’ll be here.”
She gave a tired smile and started to turn.
“Sable.”
He took the steps two at a time, skidding to loom over her in the darkened stairway. He pulled her against his chest, where she folded against him like a second skin. Justus buried his face into her hair, breathing in her sweet scent, feeling her warmth on his soul. Fiercely, almost brutally, he found her mouth. Sable gave back every emotion, every movement, as if they were dancing, each accentuating the other. Deep and then deeper, he explored her body as he’d never dared before.
Her signature, tamped down and manageable, rose like the heat of a hot summer day. He forced her away, panting like a bellows.
“We’ll figure this out.” His guttural voice came from the back of his throat.
Sable’s teeth flashed from between her reddened lips. “I know.” Her voice was a match to his. “We’ll have to, won’t we? Otherwise, this on and off switch is gonna kill us.”
She hesitated and started to lean toward him again, but caught herself. His arms trembled with the need to close the space between them again.
Sable stepped back, gave him a humorless smile, and then disappeared behind her door.
Justus clumped down the steps and into the kitchen. He had to do something. Anything to occupy his mind before he backtracked and ran up the stairs. He shut off the lights and stepped outside.
Above his head at the peak of the house, her window held nothing but shadow. Justus gulped drafts of the morning-scented air, then turned and strode into the night. A streak of fur announced Zephyr’s presence, but he ignored the cat. The dark swallowed him, and his black mood became a fitting companion.
A hint of light caressed the east, foretelling the sunrise. He ignored it.
The rustle of near-soundless pads followed him. He didn’t look back.
Birds fluttered, then stilled as he passed, but nothing stopped his progress as he neared the far side of the corral. The horses were gone, sleeping or on their own mission somewhere. He walked on.