by D. N. Hoxa
I pulled my hands back fast, sure that they would be stuck to him, but they weren’t. My hands were right in front of me, and snowflakes, big enough to see in detail, were all over my fingers. Their beauty took my breath away, and it terrified me at the same time.
My God, I was really doing this. I, Nova Vaughn, a twenty-year-old bartender from Mississippi, could make snowflakes on my fingers in the middle of July.
Something exploded on my chest and my mind went numb as I shook my hands and jumped to my feet. I had no idea whether to cry, or laugh, or take off on all fours and never look back. But I knew what I could do. I could go talk to Luke.
“I need to leave,” I mumbled to Nash and with my head down, I rushed for the door.
“Nova…” he said, but he didn’t follow me, for which I was thankful. Right now, I needed to be alone. I needed to give myself the chance to think about what I could no longer keep from myself. I could only ignore my own eyes for so long.
Being close to Luke was going to be a good start.
Chapter Eighteen
The knock on my door awoke me the next morning. It was a young man with a shy smile and cute freckles all over his face, holding a tray with my breakfast on it: a bowl of cereal, eggs, milk, and a large red apple.
I flinched. I never liked apples.
I took the tray anyway, and ate everything on it because I was going to need all of my strength for the day. It was early, seven a.m., and the day was going to be long.
While I ate, the boy with the freckles came back again. He offered me a black plastic bag.
“From Officer Terrin,” he said, and with a nod, he took off down the hallway.
Clothes. Terrin had sent me clothes. Four pairs of yoga pants and five tee shirts. Underwear, too, which brought heat up to my face at the thought of him buying them for me. I was thankful, but I decided I was never going to bring that up with him. Ever. You just didn’t talk about underwear with strangers, especially when they were men.
After a long shower, I got dressed in my new clothes and tied my wet hair back, away from my face. The bruises and cuts all over my body and face didn’t bother me in the morning as much as they did at night before I went to bed.
Staying there with Luke, who looked paler and thinner every time I went to see him, helped me think and come to terms with my new reality. “Don’t take life too seriously,” he always said, and for the first time ever, I was going to live by that advice. I wasn’t going to take anything that was happening to me seriously until I absolutely had to, and I was just going to accept it, and move on.
I didn’t bother to go downstairs to the new training halls. I just made my way up to the second floor and to the old one. I thought I’d have some time for myself to warm up, but when I got there, Nash was hitting a boxing bag with all of his strength—and he was shirtless. He didn’t even hear me come in, so I let him continue.
Just like he promised, he’d brought all kinds of things up in the room: two bags, three weird looking, yellow dummies with holes in them, four different kinds of knives, seven guns, three kinds of swords, boxing gloves, and a bunch of other things I couldn’t even name. I went to stand by the wall and watched how his body moved while he continued to throw fist after fist at the bag hanging on the ceiling.
The skin on his back glistened with a fine layer of sweat and his muscles moved in waves every time he threw a punch. It was hard not to stare, especially since I knew what his face looked like, and what his voice sounded like.
Three minutes in, and I was done. Having my stomach in butterflies all the freaking time wasn’t a good idea because I’d just eaten—and an apple, no less. Straightening my shoulders, I cleared my throat loud enough for him to hear.
Except, Nash didn’t turn around.
“I was wondering when you were going to stop staring at me.”
Does the floor have an opening somewhere? ‘Cuz I’d like to fall in it and disappear right about now.
“I wasn’t staring at you. I was waiting for you to finish,” I mumbled, but I knew it was a lie, and he apparently did, too. Fuck. I should have just told him I was there the second I walked in. Of course he heard me! Even I would have heard someone walk in.
Finally, Nash turned around, a bright smile on his face as he looked at me. “Then you don’t mind if I don’t put my shirt on?”
Oh, hell. Talk about being in a tight spot.
With my hands on my hips, I sighed. “Yes, Nash. I do mind. Can you please put your shirt on?”
I wasn’t going to waste an entire day of training over pride. I was being an adult here. Making rational decisions. Accepting that he was distracting like that was a very mature thing to do, thank you very much. I wasn’t even that embarrassed when Nash laughed and grabbed his white shirt form the floor to put it on.
When he did, I could breathe a bit easier. And now that we got that out of the way…
“I’m ready.”
“Have you thought about it?” he said instead.
“I have,” I said reluctantly. “Nothing has changed. I want to learn how to fight, that’s all.”
“I’ve thought about it, too.” He walked over to me like he was on a goddamn runway. I didn’t need the distraction that he represented—but I needed him. Go figure. “In one week, you won’t be able to handle yourself in a fight, not even if you could heal your wounds with magic. But, you can train your magic, Nova.”
“I don’t want to train my…” Nope. Could not say it. The word got stuck in my throat. “I just want to train physically.”
“Think about it. In one week, if you can’t show Ross that you can do something against devamps or anybody else, you’re out. If you train your magic, which I think can be done, that’s all he needs to see,” Nash said with the same excitement as the day before.
“Can we please get to the part where you try to hit me and I try to hit you back?” The conversation was really wearing me out, and we hadn’t even started the day yet.
“You are wasting your time.” Was that anger I detected in his voice just now?
“Thanks for the confidence, buddy. Now, train me, or let me train myself.” Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t want to be a bitch about it, but the sooner we got this conversation over with, the sooner we could get to the important stuff.
With half a smile on his face, Nash shook his head like he couldn’t believe what I was saying. I resisted the urge to explain myself further. I didn’t need to tell him that I needed time to trust in something I couldn’t see and could hardly feel. He probably had years at his disposal to get to know his fire, and to name it a guest. And I didn’t need to tell him that my whole life depended on me learning how to fight so that I could have even some semblance of a chance to kill Red Tie and bring Luke back from his coma.
No, all he needed to know was that this was what I wanted to do. And for now, he seemed to accept it.
“Take your position,” Nash said and stepped back to give me some room.
“Thank you,” I whispered as I took my place, already perfectly aware of every movement of his body.
Even before it started, I knew it was going to hurt like hell, but I also knew that I was going to take it all. I’d promised Luke I’d do my best the night before, and I’d be damned if six days from today, Ross didn’t welcome me to his team with open arms.
Chapter Nineteen
My jaw hurt when I tried to chew on the food in my mouth, so I just chased it down with orange juice instead. I had no idea where Nash got the trays, same as the guy with the freckles that always brought breakfast to me in the mornings, but I didn’t want to ask. The less I knew about this place, the easier it would be to let go and forget about it once this was over.
If this was ever going to be over.
Two and a half days later, and I was more hurt than ever before, my body covered in bruises. The only reason I was able to even move was because Terrin brought me some pills to numb the pain.
My whole body hurt, but as
long as I was standing and running around, the adrenaline drowned everything, and I only felt like shit at night when I went to bed, because that’s when the nightmares started, with Red Tie starring as the main character. I saw him every time I closed my eyes and nothing at all helped in getting him out of my head.
I was exhausted, hurt, and more than a little depressed, because exhausted and hurt were not the worse parts.
With every passing hour, I was starting to really believe that Nash had been right all along. One week was not enough time to learn how to fight. I could barely block a hit. I couldn’t throw a decent punch if my life depended on it—and it would. I had no idea how to get my body to move faster because it just wouldn’t, and my muscles were vibrating more often than not throughout the whole day.
I couldn’t believe I was even thinking it, but the closer we got to the deadline, the more training my magic made sense.
“How would you do it?” I asked Nash, who, to his credit, had never again come to the training room without his shirt on. And now, every morning when I found him there, already training, I let him know I could see him, so that he didn’t think I was staring.
But I was. Training with him meant having him close to me all day long, looking into each other’s eyes, touching even in inappropriate places…even with all that aside, it was impossible not to notice how good sweat looked on this guy. Not saying that I was proud of my thoughts, but it was the truth.
“How would I do what?” Nash asked. He had no trouble chewing and swallowing because I’d only hit him about seven times in two and a half days. God, I sucked at this so badly.
“Train my magic.” Ugh. It felt like I was pulling back up everything I’d already eaten to say those words.
Nash’s eyes sparkled. With him, the saying the eyes are the window to your soul was very true. Everything he felt was reflected in his eyes, so when he tried to hide how excited he was that I was even asking about this, he failed miserably.
“By attacking you,” he said with a grin.
I rolled my eyes. “No, I mean really.”
Nash shrugged. “Yes, really. You say you can’t control it, right? It only comes alive when you’re in contact with active magic.”
“What’s active magic? And how many more kinds of magic are there?” I remembered Ross had mentioned it before, right after I froze Palmer’s laboratory, but I hadn’t thought to ask because saying magic was just too much at the time. Now, after I said it the first time, every other time seemed to get easier.
“Active magic means that the magic comes alive visibly and in waves of energy. Passive magic, on the other hand, is magic that cannot be seen and that doesn’t change in substance when used. It doesn’t explode, so to speak.”
“Mages have explosive magic, right?” The balls of light counted as pretty explosive to me.
“Right. That’s active magic. I have it. Shifters, too. At the time of use, our magic changes in its core, becomes pure power, while pixies, changelings and vampires are passive. They cannot gather their magic like we can. They can’t manipulate it, but their bodies hold it, always at the same level.”
“What do pixies do? And changelings? Vampires—better yet, can someone shift into a fox?” I’d seen a large orange furred fox when fighting with the devamp servants, and I had a sneaky suspicion that it had been Lucian.
“Pixies are one of the best fighters out there. Their bodies have still not completely adapted to Earth, so they weigh differently. They hear differently, from what I heard. They also live a lot longer than most impari. And changelings, too. They’re immortal, in fact. Except for that, they aren’t known for much, except being very loyal when they truly love or respect someone. And as for shifters, yes, you can turn into a fox. Lucian is one.” Nash smiled as if he’d read my freaking mind. “There are also wolves, jaguars and berserkers—bears.”
“Holy cow,” I whispered, more to myself than to him. Imagine someone turning into a freaking bear in front of your eyes…
“And vampires are…well, vampires. I’m sure you’ve heard the stories. They suck blood, they move fast, hear and see better than most, but something about the virus that transforms them leaves a screw loose in their heads,” Nash continued, amused by the stunned look on my face. “It’s a pretty awesome world to live in, once you get used to it.”
“How long have you been here?” I asked despite having decided to stay out of his private life. The need to know was sometimes overwhelming, and since we were already talking about it…
“Nine years,” Nash said, looking down at his hands. “I was fourteen when they took me in.”
“That must’ve been horrible,” I mumbled. I wanted to ask him why and how and all kinds of questions, but I held myself.
“It’s in the past now,” Nash said, shrugging like he didn’t care, but I could see it in his eyes. In the sadness that suddenly darkened them.
“My parents died in a car accident when I was one,” I said reluctantly, because to me, when other people shared their stories, it made me feel better. Less alone. It was the only way I knew how to make Nash feel that way, too. Besides, now that I’d actually seen the accident happen in the test the Scientia conductors did on me, I desperately wanted to get it off my chest by just telling someone that it had happened. Maybe I’d feel better after sharing a bit of myself with him, too. “Luke’s parents took me in. His mother left a couple years later, and since then, my uncle has never been the same.” Heart pounding in my chest, I could almost see the face of Uncle Henry, his dark eyes and his square face. The way his brows narrowed when he was angry—which was all the time.
“I’m sorry, Nova,” Nash whispered, and when I looked at him again, the sadness in his eyes was gone. I wanted to give him a smile but I couldn’t just yet because the mountain of memories was still holding me under.
“Don’t be. It’s just the hand we were dealt. We made the most of it, too. We were going to run away from here that night. The night they came.” Shivers washed down my back at the memory. I squeezed my eyes shut to chase away the feeling, but not the image, of Red Tie. No, I wanted to remember every line on his face until my heart bled. It was the only way I was going to keep myself motivated.
“You had no idea about any of this?” Nash asked, and I shook my head. “That’s actually pretty amazing. I mean, before they made me a salamander, I was just human so I couldn’t have seen even if an impari had been right in front of me.”
“What made you decide to become like this?” I asked, half hoping to drown my pain with his, even knowing that it was wrong.
“Death,” Nash said. “Devamps killed my parents and my older sister.”
Fuck. Even though he’d turned his head the other way and I couldn’t see his face, I still felt the pain coming at me in waves from his skin. I closed my eyes and breathed deeply to chase away the guilt for having asked him. Because his pain didn’t drown mine. It amplified it instead.
“I’m so sorry,” I said, but I already knew that no amount of sorry could make him feel better about this.
“Like I said, it’s all in the past,” Nash said.
“So that’s why you joined the Senior Order.” It was easy to relate to him, because I’d accepted whatever had come my way ever since Luke fell into the coma, all in hopes that it would somehow help me save him.
Nash nodded. “It is. I want to kill as many of those creatures as possible.” That made two of us.
“Tell me about the Senior Order.” Until then, I hadn’t wanted to know anything because I wanted to be able to forget all about this world as soon as this was over, but now that I was there, talking to Nash, thinking about what Terrin had already told me—I couldn’t deny it. I wanted to know more.
“A very powerful institution,” Nash said, but I’d already figured that. “Three mages make the Order. The most powerful people in the world, some say.”
“More powerful than demonic vampires?”
“No, not really,” he said, smili
ng and shaking his head like what I’d asked was ridiculous.
“So how come the devamps aren’t after them?” It made sense. Those creatures wanted power—didn’t everyone?—and if they could get it by taking down the mages that essentially ruled everyone else in this world, why not go for it?
“Because of the three other mages that protect them,” Nash said, his eyes sparkling again. “They are the only three mages that have broken the barriers of magic and have become attack mages.”
“Barriers of magic? What the hell does that mean?” I could hardly understand the concept of magic, and now it had barriers to break, too?
“It meant they’ve managed to bend magic to their will. Most mages—hell, all mages are defense mages by birth. Through training and commitment, each grows their magic in their own way, but defense magic has limits. To become an attack mage is to break them. To train so hard that you need no spell and no stored energy to manipulate the magic that exists in you.”
“Wow…that’s some next level shit.” I couldn’t even begin to try and imagine what Nash was talking about. I should have read more books when I was younger, like Luke did.
“Next next level shit,” Nash said, grinning. “They’re practically untouchable.”
“But why aren’t they after the devamps themselves? If they’re such a threat, why not eliminate them themselves?”
“Because, like I said, they are the Order’s personal bodyguards. They’re sworn to those people, connected to them in ways even I don’t understand. And frankly, I don’t think the Senior Order even wants to send one of them after the devamps, because nobody knows a devamp’s true power, or its extent. We’ve never caught one, dead or alive, to study.”
“In other words, they’re afraid that their untouchable attack mages can suddenly be touchable.” It sure sounded that way to me.
“Exactly,” Nash whispered. “But do not ever say that out loud.”
“Good thing nobody’s around to eavesdrop.” The old training room seemed to have been forgotten by everyone else in the building—except us. We were the only people in there, and I liked it that way, but I also realized that this wasn’t fair to Nash. And since we were sharing—and taking a longer break from training than was necessary—I figured I might as well say something about it.