by Devon Monk
I knew this room had been built long before civilization took root here. Knew this ancient place had been kept secret for thousands of years.
And I knew that the Life magic well pulsed just beneath that layer of wood.
“We have been waiting for you, Mikhail,” a woman said.
No, not a woman. Sedra. Or perhaps Isabelle.
She stood in the exact center of the room, wearing a long white gown and a ceremonial robe, covered collar to hem with blood. Behind her, on five wooden tables, were the bodies of five men with torso-sized metal disks laying upon their chests. Dane’s goons. Stabbed, bled. Used, discarded, dead.
What had they died for? What kind of magic took the lives of five men to cast?
Standing next to Sedra, gun in his bloody hand, was Dane.
Sedra was not trapped, not bound in any way. Other than the blood on her gown, I didn’t see a mark on her. She stood with her shoulders back and chin high, her hair loose around her shoulders, the white of the gown making her skin as pale as alabaster. Her blue eyes burned bright.
“Isabelle,” Mikhail-Shame said. “Your game is over now.”
“No, Lord of Death,” she said, “it is you who will be overcome this night.”
Was it really Isabelle? She sounded like Sedra, looked like Sedra. Acted like Sedra. Well, maybe a little more high-handed, but not much.
Look. Dad cast an odd little Sight spell that felt like he’d strapped a pair of goggles over my eyes and adjusted the lens. I suddenly saw Sedra for what she was.
She still looked like Sedra, but in the same space, stretching out from beneath her skin, was another woman. Dark haired, with wide-set eyes and stronger, heavier features, she moved her head slightly. Like a blur of light behind that movement, I saw another face—masculine, hard cut. Leander.
Isabelle, my father said, and Leander. One body, two souls.
Holy shit. How? How could they possess one body? How could they both be possessing Sedra?
Lives were sacrificed, Dad said, and I knew he meant the dead men on the tables.
“Our game has just begun.” Isabelle-Sedra smiled. “Now is our day. Now all magic will belong to us. And the world will fall at our feet.”
She raised her hand. Her sleeve fell away from her wrist. A disk pulsed a pus-colored yellow there, bloody, burned and raw at the edges, as if it had just been implanted in her flesh.
“You,” Isabelle-Sedra said, both a man’s and a woman’s voice somehow coming out of her mouth, “will not stop us!”
Mikhail-Shame lifted his hand and pulled on so much magic from the well, the floor burned with white light.
He threw a twisting gout of raw magic at Isabelle-Sedra.
Terric heaved a wall of magic up out of the floor in front of Mikhail-Shame just as Dane fired his gun.
The explosion of bullets was too loud in the room, but Mikhail-Shame did not fall.
The bullets hit the barrier Terric held and rattled to the ground, useless.
I was so going to make Terric show me how to cast that bulletproof wall when we got out of this. If we got out of this.
Dane traced a spell with his left hand and threw it, not at Terric, but at the walls of the room around us.
Glyphs caught pastel light, melted, shifted, re-formed, and stepped away from the walls, becoming the watercolor people. No, not just watercolor people. The Veiled. At least twelve solid Veiled formed over the top of disks placed around the room, the disks settling into their throats.
What the hell? We’d fought only seven solid Veiled before. We destroyed two. I think Leander killed three or four of them in prison. But there were twelve now—and I did not recognize any of them.
Zay chanted; so did Roman—a similar cadence, but very different spells. They both twisted at the waist and struck the Veiled with streams of magic that followed their hands like a crackling whip.
The Veiled sucked the magic down. Zay nicked his hand on his sword, and Roman sliced his hand with a knife he pulled out of his belt. Blood magic spun glyphs down the line of magic they cast, wrapping and changing the line of magic pouring into the disks at each of the Veiled’s necks into a solid rope. The two Closers stood, back to back, hauling on the magic, hand over hand, pulling the Veiled closer and closer.
I chanted my mantra, clearing my mind, pushing away my fear, fatigue, pain. I could deal with the horror of this later. Magic can’t be cast in high emotional states. And I needed magic to do exactly as I told it to do.
And I was going to tell it to kick the Veiled’s asses.
The mark of magic in my left hand burned warm. Pike had said that mark was a beacon to the dead. Good. Because I wanted their attention.
I opened my hand and held it out in front of me.
A half dozen Veiled moaned, each face turning our way, mouths open, as if craving the beacon of light that poured from my skin.
I began the glyph for Impact.
No, Dad said, Cleanse.
What?
Cleanse. Use dark magic through Cleanse and it will break their connection to the disks.
I don’t know Cleanse.
The Veiled were fast—inhumanly fast. They rushed.
Dad stretched forward in me and took over just my left hand and arm. I let him and got busy casting a Shield with my right.
The final stroke of Cleanse bit hard into my palm. Black fire poured out, striking the three Veiled nearest me.
They screamed. They burned. They fell to the floor in a rush of color and light until they were nothing but ash. The disks clattered and shattered to the floor.
“No!” Isabelle-Leander yelled.
And then there were hands around my throat, hands that pushed me down to the floor and squeezed.
The man on top of me was not a Veiled. He was Leander. Heavy, real, stinking of Blood magic and Death magic and the disks.
But he had just been possessing Sedra. What, could he come and go as he pleased?
He had a disk in his hand and pressed it hard over my throat, leaning straight-armed down on me.
“Child once dead and now alive, I will break you. I will break the magic in your bones and drink down its sweet pulp.”
I couldn’t breathe.
I felt, or heard, Zayvion yell. Heard Terric yell.
And Isabelle-Sedra laugh.
“Do you see what we can do?” Leander asked. “Do you understand? Isabelle and I are not like you. We pay no price to use magic.”
He uttered a hard word, twisting dark and light magic through the technology of the disk. If I’d had the air, I would have screamed. A spell dug into my chest, as hot as a razor, and hooked on to something deep inside me.
Leander lifted up, his hand clutching the disk that was somehow hooked into the spell that was hooked into me. Hooked into my soul.
No! Dad yelled.
Dad grabbed for me. I could feel his ghostly hands as he tried to hold me, keep me in my mind in my body. I grabbed for him too, my mental fingers slipping from his grip.
Leander only smiled. “Magic will do anything we wish. Anything we ask of it. No price. No pain. You are so little, so weak. And now, you are nothing.”
He yanked on the disk, then brought it up to his mouth and pressed his lips against it.
“Break her,” he said, not to me. To magic.
And magic listened.
I screamed. Pain stole away the world, stole away my mind, as Leander pulled me, up and up out of my flesh, out of my bones, until I broke from everything I was—body, mind, life—and stood in front of him, nothing but a naked soul attached to the disk by a thin silver line.
“Less than nothing.” He smiled and traced a glyph with his left hand.
Never finished it.
A bullet sliced through the air and hit him right between the eyes. Who had a gun?
Leander’s hand clenched around the disk just as Dad stood up, my body fully his now, light magic in my right hand, dark magic in my left, and threw a massive Hold spell at him.
The disk fell out of his hand—no, it fell through his hand—and clattered to the floor. As soon as it hit the floor, I could move again.
I was still tied to the disk by the silver string, still outside my body.
“Do. Not,” Dad said through me. “You will never have her. Not so long as I still breathe.” Yes, it was strange to hear my own voice from the outside. It was strange to glance at me and see me looking more like him than I ever have—his anger twisting my face, cloaking my eyes, squaring my shoulders. Strange to see the magic he pulled through my body and used to Refresh the Hold spell so Leander’s body—his solid, dying form—was held captive.
I tried to run back to my body. To take it for myself. But the silver string tied to the disk would not let me move.
“Allison,” my father said. “Return to me.”
I was trying. It wasn’t working.
I looked around the room for something I could use to cut the silver string.
And saw Zayvion, Dane’s gun smoking in his hand, striding over to me.
If Zay was walking over here, who was taking care of Isabelle-Sedra? I looked past him and saw Sedra, caught in the cage work of magic Mikhail-Shame was weaving around her. She broke the spells he threw almost as fast as he could throw them. The spells were steady and strong, but Shame’s body shook uncontrollably, the glow from the crystal the color of watered-down blood. He was drenched in sweat, too pale. Much too pale.
Terric stood beside him, one fist clenched on his shoulder. I could see the wide band of magic Terric fed to Shame, to Mikhail, and I could see the raw, black pain that he Proxied for Mikhail to use that magic through Shame.
Dane was slumped unconscious on the ground near Sedra.
Roman had his hands full with the remaining Veiled. The ropes he and Zay had cast were bound around the hands of the nine Veiled still standing, and Roman was chanting, his words forcing the Veiled to move as if they were underwater, but not doing enough to stop them completely.
And then Zayvion was in front of me, of my spirit, but looking at my body.
“What have you done to her?” He raised the gun and pointed at my body—at me—at my father.
“Leander tied her to the disk. Break the bond, and she will return to her body. Now, before Leander’s spirit escapes into Sedra again.”
Dad cast another Refresh spell and wove a second powerful Hold around Leander. He was using a shitload of magic. I was going to pay for that for weeks.
Zay turned, close enough to me now that I could touch him. He raised his hand to cast Sight, and I drew my fingers over his chest, then up to his face.
He closed his eyes, his body tensing at my caress. “Allie,” he breathed.
I pressed my lips against his and knew I could fall into him forever. Become one with him, just as Leander had become one with Isabelle.
“Break her free!” Dad yelled.
Zay opened his eyes and took a step back. Just far enough that I could not reach him. Then he cast End. It was an old spell. It took a lot of magic and finesse. Even exhausted and hurt, Zay had both. The disk exploded, breaking the spell and emptying the disk of magic.
I was free. I could move anywhere, be anywhere, at no more than a thought.
“Allie,” Zay said.
“Allison,” my father said, “return to me.” He pushed Influence behind his words. But I was just a spirit. His words could not bind me.
I wanted Zayvion. I wanted to be with him, to be one soul.
I ached for him. Needed him. I took a step closer. Heard his breath hitch in anticipation of my touch.
Then I heard Leander yell.
Zay’s gaze slipped past me and fixed on Leander. And I knew what I had to do. Kill Leander. To do that, I would need my body. I turned and ran, not stopping until I fell into my body.
Heat, air, cold, pain. I inhaled, which hurt, exhaled, which hurt. The Hold spell broke, Dad’s concentration broke, the moment I reentered my flesh. His control over my body was broken too. I was me. Mostly just me again.
Leander’s spirit stood up and away from the body that fell to the floor and dissolved into ash. He had been possessing a solid Veiled.
What. The. Fuck.
From across the room, Isabelle cast a spell. Leander caught it in his hands and channeled it at Zay.
“Zay, no!” I yelled.
Magic cast by Soul Complements breaks all the rules. Leander and Isabelle had just proved that.
And the spell they threw at Zayvion was Death.
No time for Disbursements, no time for thinking. I cast Shield around Zayvion and reached out to him with heart and soul.
As he did the same.
Our magic blended, joined, locking together like fingers sliding between one another, like hands clasping. Our minds, our souls, rushed together in a flash, and I moaned from the pleasure of it. I bit my lip, tasted his mouth, even though we were not physically touching, felt the stroke of his thoughts against mine, within mine, and knew he felt the same sensations, the same luxurious pleasures that I felt.
Leander’s spell exploded against our Shield. I cast Deflect, and Zayvion worked some monster version of End that shifted as it wrapped through the Deflect spell. It shot through Leander, following the magic he had been channeling, leaped and arced a burning line that pierced Isabelle-Sedra’s heart.
She screamed. Leander rushed to her side, then pressed forward until they were occupying the same space, the same body.
Zay and I strode across the room, our steps in rhythm, our breathing in rhythm, our hearts and minds as one.
Two bodies, one soul, magic at our fingertips, at our feet. Soul Complements.
We threw magic—a spell that had no name, raw, pure, channeling our desire, our intent at the remaining Veiled, vaporizing them. Disks rained to the ground.
Then we threw the same magic at Isabelle-Sedra.
Mikhail-Shame and Terric strode toward Isabelle-Sedra. Mikhail-Shame lifted a Blood blade, dripping ruby with Shame’s blood and Terric’s blood.
“You will harm her no more!” He plunged the blade into Isabelle-Sedra’s heart.
She could not withstand the magic Zay and I cast, could not withstand the Blood magic Mikhail-Shame and Terric wielded, could not withstand the knife that severed the cords of her life.
She fell, limp, empty, dead.
I looked for Leander’s and Isabelle’s souls. Surely it couldn’t be that easy.
Mikhail-Shame knelt next to Sedra. He pulled her up onto his lap, cradling her, his head bent in sorrow. Terric stood above him, his knees locked so he did not pass out.
Roman slumped against the wall and closed his eyes, exhausted.
Everything was silent, except for our ragged, rushed breaths.
Allison, Dad said, his voice coming from far away. You must return to your own body.
What did he mean? I was in my body.
Some. But you are too much in Zayvion’s body also. You must return, here.
And with that last word, he pulled. Hard.
The last word had been a spell. I fell away from Zayvion, torn back too fast, pieces of me falling free from pieces of Zay, until I was completely in my own body.
Alone.
Except for my father. Who stood in the center of my mind, blocking me from reaching back out to be with Zay. You cannot be that close to him. Insanity will follow. Just like Leander and Isabelle. When Soul Complements are too close, sanity is the price they pay.
Let go of me, I demanded.
And to my shock, he did.
I looked at Zay, who now stood in front of me, one hand with the gun on my hip, the other on the side of my face, searching my eyes as if he had lost something he wanted deep inside of me.
Allison, Dad said, Dane!
I saw the movement—fast. Dane pulling up on his feet, hands already shaping magic into a spell, eyes glowing with hatred. Isabelle and Leander’s hatred. Possessed by them. They could do that? Dane didn’t have a disk in him.
I grabbed the gun out of Zayvion’s hand. Aimed.
Magic is fast.
Bullets are faster.
I squeezed the trigger. The bullet hit Dane in the chest. Knocked him onto his back.
Zayvion pivoted out of my arms; Roman pushed away from the wall.
I was out of bullets.
But this time, I saw Isabelle and Leander lift out of Dane’s dead body, a shadow man and woman burning bright.
Zay, Roman, and I threw everything we had left at them.
Leander and Isabelle drew magic up through the floor—twisted it and aimed it back at the well. The magic cut through the ground and blew into the well like a bomb.
An earthquake shook the room and the entire hillside.
Mikhail-Shame was on his feet, drawing spell after spell to absorb the impact. It felt like minutes, but I think it was only seconds. Then the shaking stopped and everything was quiet again.
Leander and Isabelle were gone. I was pretty sure they weren’t dead.
Fuck it all.
Dane was dead. Sedra was dead. Roman, Zay, Terric, and I were still alive, if exhausted. Mikhail-Shame let his hands drop to his sides.
“Hell of a thing,” he said hoarsely, much more Shame than Mikhail.
“Shame?” Terric reached for him.
Shame’s eyes rolled back in his head.
Terric managed to keep him from hitting his head, but he stumbled to the floor with him. It was clear he was just as exhausted as Shame.
I walked over toward them, shaky on my feet, but hey, I was moving. Zay followed, step in step.
“He can’t do this . . . can’t hold on any longer.” Terric’s voice was just as rough as Shame’s. A tear tracked the sweat down his face. “Leave him alone. Let go of him.”
He was talking to Mikhail. But I didn’t know if Mikhail would listen.
“It’s over, Mikhail,” I said, putting Influence behind it. Ow. I was going to be sick in bed for a month after this. “We’ve forced Leander and Isabelle out of Sedra, as you wanted. Leave Shame’s body. Now.”