In the last couple of days, new rumours about her had suddenly been spread on the Magi created DWeb forums on the Internet, saying that Amanda, who many suspected to be the killer of Lucian and who had since risen to prominence in New York, had recently been marked as the Chosen One from the Prophecy of Helene.
There were a few sketchy half truths about some kind of fight on a desert island, but already the story had started to grow of its own accord with several fairly wild additions to the narrative.
Eudoxia preferred to focus on the facts, though, sifting through the talk of nuclear war or worse and try to get to the truth.
The marking of her at least seemed to be true as she looked upon a photo on her desk that showed Amanda on her roof terrace with some kind of new tattoo upon her back that had not been there a month before.
It looked like a fairly big design as well, covering her whole back from her shoulders down to her hips.
She would love to get a much better look at that tattoo to see what it actually looked like. The zoomed in photos they had been able to take of it so far didn’t show the design clearly other than its general shape.
Beside the photo, Eudoxia had printed off a copy of the Prophecy of Helene, which she read through once more.
Many years from now a time will come when the Archons will return.
Guided by the Red Witch they will return to Earth.
You will know these times by the mark of the creator.
Placed upon the body of one of your own.
Mark her soul, with colours of life and Death.
See the body marked by the power of the creator.
Mark her passing into the Abyss
See the Weavers whose company she keeps.
She will be your guide in the dark times ahead.
Be ready to fight, for the time will soon be upon you.
All that I have prophesied will come to pass,
when Ishtar gives birth.
As usual for these kinds of things, the language had been crafted to be suitably vague meaning that it could be interpreted in various different ways.
Did the Red Witch refer to Amanda with her red hair, or someone else? Amanda would be the obvious choice, but it seemed to indicate that the Red Witch would be the one to bring the Archons back to Earth, and if Amanda was actually the one who would fight against them, why would she bring them back?
She supposed that time would tell.
In the meantime, she wanted to check on the renovations that were happening upstairs in the club. The grand opening had been scheduled to happen later this month, and there seemed to be still so much that needed to be finished before that date.
They used what Magic they could and sped the process along of course, but the opening of a club was a public event, meaning that the right wheels in local government needed to be greased, which in turn delayed things.
Never the less, everything seemed to be progressing well, so she saw no reason why they wouldn’t be able to open very soon.
Eudoxia stood up from her chair and after a good stretch of her back and arms, wandered through her living space, pausing to stop at a mirror and check her appearance.
Eudoxia had a skinny frame with dyed green hair, several piercings, and tattoos all over her body. The main tattoo’s being two snakes that ran from the backs of her hands, up her arm’s, over her back and down the length of her legs. She wore loose ripped jeans today with a black fitted top and flat boots which she left undone. Happy with her appearance, she walked out of her living space and closed the door behind her. She could just Port up there, but she felt like a walk and having a look around as she went.
Lucian’s apartment had been furnished in a bright, stark modern way with clean lines and very little fuss to it. Outside in the corridors, although the minimalist look had been kept, it had a more utilitarian feel to it with bare concrete walls and little in the way of furnishings.
They had cleaned up the mess that had been left down here from the fight between Lucian and, from all accounts, Amanda and her friends from the Legacy Coven. They’d moved in, with Elba, Ninette and Tobias each taking their pick of the other living spaces within the five secret levels beneath the club that the Nomad Coven had once claimed as their own.
They pretty much left the lowest level alone as it had only really housed what they could only guess to be Animal pens. The whole level had stunk, so they’d cleaned it with a sweep of Magic and pretty much closed it off preferring to live in the upper part. Eudoxia walked through the corridors that now lay quiet, insulated from the work going on in the club above where she guessed most of her Coven would be anyway.
She hadn’t walked far though when she discovered Elba taking a break in a side room. The large man looked to be resting up after having eaten something, his empty plates sitting on the table that he now had his feet up on top of.
‘Working hard I see,’ Eudoxia said, mirth in her voice.
Elba opened an eye and looked over at her, his eyebrows raising slightly. ‘Just taking five,’ he said.
Eudoxia raised her hands. ‘Just kidding, I’ll see you in a bit,’ she said, smiling.
‘You will do,’ Elba said, closing his eyes again and sitting back.
Eudoxia smiled and walked away from the room. She liked and enjoyed the company of her Coven mates, and working together on this renovation had been a great bonding experience for them, bringing them closer together.
They didn’t want to attract too much attention with the reopening, so they took their time, discussed their options and slowly brought the club back to an operational state while talking with the right people in the city and state to get the right permits and whatever else they needed.
They’d brought over a few Initiated helpers from Egypt to deal with the small details and to help with the surveillance of Amanda.
Walking up through the complex, she eventually passed through the hidden door in the private office and security room at the back of the VIP area before heading out into the club.
She found Ninette just outside the office, making adjustments to the VIP area. She’d been just about to say hello when Eudoxia felt something, a sensation that she knew all too well.
It felt like reality started to stretch around her as if it had been suddenly pulled taught. Imagine being inside a balloon while something pressed in from the outside, until the force of whatever might be trying to break through grew too great for it, and it collapsed, except it wasn’t a Balloon, it was the clubs Aegis.
The tightness in the air suddenly snapped back as the shield fell. The Clubs Aegis had failed, destroyed by someone or something that could now get inside the complex.
Eudoxia looked over at Ninette, who already had an expression of fear on her face as she looked back at Eudoxia.
‘Security room, quick,’ Eudoxia barked and bolted back through the door she had just come through and started to scan the screens before her that showed live feed from cameras around the club.
The door behind them burst open suddenly, causing Eudoxia and Ninette to nearly have a heart attack as Tobias exploded into the room.
‘What’s going on?’ he said, breathless.
‘I don’t know, I can’t see anything up here on the Club levels,’ Eudoxia said. She flicked a switch and entered a code that gave her access to the security feed from the sub-levels as well.
The feed cycled through the many cameras until they saw the body of Elba crash through a glass partition, hit the wall beyond and land on the floor.
‘There,’ Eudoxia said, as she watched a figure Port into the corridor next to Elba and lift him up with its Magic so it looked like he hovered in the air, clawing at his neck in pain.
The figure wore a bulky cloak made from various fabrics, leathers and netting that trailed on the floor behind it. As it moved, Eudoxia noted the mass of tentacle-like dreadlocks and the feminine form beneath the cloak and knew this to be Nymira, the Voodoo Queen of Haiti, Arch Magus and former mentor to Lucian
. She also knew that this meant Elba would probably not survive.
‘Is that…?’ Tobias asked.
‘Nymira,’ Ninette said.
‘I believe so,’ Eudoxia agreed as she eyed the screen, and noticed Nymira talking to Elba. She quickly made a few clicks on the computer and turned the sound on from that camera.
‘…don’t know where she is… ack, eugh,’ Elba gasped as he fought for breath.
‘Are you sure,’ Nymira said. As Eudoxia watched, Elba’s eyes went suddenly wide and he went from grasping at his throat to holding his head. Watching a video feed, Eudoxia couldn’t see the Magic that Nymira used on Elba at that moment, but she didn’t need to see it to know she used it. Nymira would be ransacking Elba’s head, looking for whatever information it was that she needed. It sounded like she might be looking for someone, and given the recent history of this city, Nymira’s connection to it, the rumours that were flying about, and the “she” that Elba had mentioned, it could only mean one thing to her.
‘What are we going to do?’ Tobias asked.
‘Nymira’s looking for someone, and I think I know who it is. Once she’s finished with Elba, she’ll come looking for us, I suggest that we leave here, quickly,’ Eudoxia said.
‘But… Elba…’ Ninette said.
‘I wish I could help him, but fighting Nymira is suicide, you know that as well as I do,’ Eudoxia offered.
Both of her coven mates nodded, so she returned her attention more fully to the security feed in time to see their Coven mates head explode and the Nomad drop Elba to the floor.
Eudoxia turned to her two coven mates and quickly worked her effect, Porting a split second after Eudoxia saw Nymira appear in the room with them.
- A hotel room in Rome.
Alicia suddenly found herself standing inside the biggest and most lavishly appointed hotel room she had ever been in, next to her beloved master Yasmin, with Kez and Nate, Yasmin’s other closest apprentices close by. Yasmin had Ported them all here.
Since realising the truth of Yasmin’s viewpoint, Alicia had been working with Yasmin to unlock the Magic within her, Magic she could now use after joining with the Demon that fateful day in Ireland.
Today, she stood cloaked in living shadow, her body, apart from her face, a pitch matt black, like a hole in reality itself.
The Nomad Magi who pledged themselves to Yasmin, like Nate and Kez, were known as The Dark Knights, and another of their number, Raphaella Tanzi, sat on the edge of the huge bed in front of them, dressed in a nun’s habit.
Raphaella rose from the bed and sank to one knee. ‘My Baal,’ she said, her head bowed in deference to Yasmin.
‘Rise Raphaella,’ Yasmin said as she walked to the window and looked out over the city of Rome and the Vatican just a short distance away. ‘Tell me, what news is there from the halls of the Vatican?’
‘There has been a change in the ranks of the Disciples of the Cross my Baal. Mary Damask has defied the odds and risen to the seat of Witch Finder General and Grand High Inquisitor, replacing Valerio Rossi after his death in New York.’
‘Is that so? Do we have any leverage there?’
‘Not much, Mary has thus far resisted our attempts at control. There are others on the Conclave that we can use, however. Our influence within the group remains strong.’
‘Good, maintain that. We can worry about Mary later if she becomes a problem, we have other issues to deal with.’
Dark Meeting
New York
Jan 10th
Amanda looked about the rooftop once more, checking one last time that everything was in place. She felt so on edge and nervous about this. Her heart pumped hard within her chest and she had a huge amount of nervous energy built up inside of her that made it difficult to sit or stand still in any one place for any length of time.
She’d adjusted the Aegis around the house, shifting the barrier so that it no longer covered the rooftop. Even though she had made sure that all her coven mates apart from Shaun who almost never left the building, were out, she had locked the door that led to the rooftop anyway. Not that Shaun would come up here anyway.
Everything looked good, so she walked over to a set of four seats with soft cushions on them that surrounded a small table and sat down.
She felt like some kind of giddy school girl about to meet up with a boy for her first date. It was ridiculous, it wasn’t as if she had never met Yasmin before, they had spoken on several occasions, but something felt different this time, and it might well be due to the fact that she would be the one to contact Yasmin purposefully with the intent of sitting and talking with her properly.
All their previous meetings had been on Yasmin’s terms and had happened spontaneously, but this time, Amanda wanted to meet with her.
But that wasn’t the whole story, and she knew it. Yasmin was a Nomad, or so the council and the legends said. And even though Amanda felt that some of the legends of Yasmin might very well be embellished or entirely fabricated, she knew she had to be careful. This could be seen as fraternising with the enemy.
She knew this, but she still felt that she had to know more. Yasmin had been good to her. She had tipped her off about things a few times and had saved her life on several occasions now. Amanda didn’t know what to think. Her own personal experience of Yasmin told her that although she clearly had a no-nonsense attitude and seemed to be a very driven woman, she didn’t appear to be the embodiment of pure evil that so many made her out to be.
Yasmin also happened to be an Arch Magus, and from what Amanda knew of that kind of power, it could bring with it a certain amount of hubris and entitlement, which were not very endearing qualities and certainly not qualities that only applied to Nomads. Not forgetting the jealousy that many had of this kind of power, jealousy that often led to rumours and falsehoods being spread about them.
Whatever the case, Yasmin seemed to have some kind of interest in Amanda, and that alone was enough for her to want to speak with Yasmin in a slightly more relaxed and private environment. Why did she keep helping her, what was her interest in her?
Last time she met with Yasmin, Amanda had taken a risk and asked Yasmin to Link with her so that they might contact each other remotely should they need to. Amanda did this because she knew she wanted to meet with Yasmin, she knew that this day would happen, and to Amanda’s slight surprise, Yasmin had agreed and Linked with her.
Having taken a few calming breaths, Amanda concentrated and sent a pulse of Magic through the Link to Yasmin, and waited.
She could feel her heart again, pumping away inside her chest, her adrenaline making it work much harder than usual. She sat there for what seemed like forever, forcing herself to take calm steady breaths as her fingers tapped nervously on the arm of the seat.
Without warning, the Link suddenly opened up, and Amanda felt the keen and unique presence of Yasmin just beyond her own mind.
‘Amanda, what a pleasure my dear. I wondered when you might use this link. What may I do for you?’ The voice filled her mind, sounding like Yasmin might be stood right next to her. She even opened her eyes briefly to double check she still sat here alone, before closing them again.
‘Yasmin, thank you for speaking with me,’ Amanda sent, choosing to keep things formal. ‘I wish to speak with you if you could join me on the roof of my house in New York.’
The Link remained silent but open for a few seconds before Amanda sensed a sudden flare of Magic just a few feet from her. She opened her eyes again to be greeted with the sight of Yasmin stood only a short distance from her.
Yasmin seemed to like looking good, but her usual outfit didn’t seem to be made from fabric at all. Yasmin covered her body in skin tight, Magically created, wet look blackness, like reflective shadows or Magic latex. At her neck, the covering broke up into veins of black that looked like runnels of gravity defying liquid that reached up her neck and even onto her lower jaw.
Amanda could see that a similar thing happened at h
er wrists, exposing the skin of her hands as well.
Yasmin was a slender woman, tall with a sleek cat-like feel to her as she moved. Her angular features had a cruel aspect to them even though her face rarely betrayed any emotion while her lustres dark hair surrounded her head, sweeping back from her face and looking like a lion's mane, regal and powerful.
‘It would be a pleasure,’ Yasmin said and even cracked something of a smile at her as she moved to the seat opposite. Lowering herself into the chair, Yasmin crossed her legs and looked over to Amanda. ‘And to what do I owe the pleasure?’
Amanda looked over at the curious woman opposite, her Magical sight showing quite clearly the strength of the Magic in and around Yasmin. She wasn’t hiding her power, and even though Amanda had grown in Magical strength herself, she wasn’t anywhere near the level of Yasmin yet. That would take decades or even centuries of training and experience.
Amanda adjusted her position and took a breath, her mouth suddenly felt dry and she had a momentary loss as to what she should say now that she had this woman here before quickly regaining her composure.
‘I suppose the main question I have for you,’ she said, leaning forward, resting her arms on her knees, ‘is why are you helping me?’
Yasmin raised her eyebrows slightly. ‘Like I said, I’m just a good Samaritan.’
‘Now you see, I just don’t buy that. I think there’s more to it than that.’
‘And if there is?’ Yasmin asked.
‘I want to know what it is.’
‘Why?’
‘Because I have a right to know,’ Amanda stated.
‘And if there isn’t a deeper reason?’
‘The rumours about you don’t paint you in a great light Yasmin,’ Amanda said, choosing to change direction to try and put Yasmin on the back foot.
Infinities' Edge (The Magi Saga Book 4) Page 4