Demon Stone (Ascendancy Legacy 4)

by Bradford Bates

  “You know we don’t fight with magic until later. What’s your fucking deal, Jackson?”

  I didn’t know what to say. I hadn’t called on my gift. There was no way I should have been able to throw her that far. I hadn’t felt my magic flair or anything else. “I, ah, I’m not sure what happened.”

  April must have seen the confusion on my face and believed what I was saying, because she calmed down almost instantly. She put a hand on my arm. “If you didn’t use your gift, then how did you throw me so far?”

  “I’m not sure. It just kind of happened. I was tired of getting hit, and I said screw it. I took the kick knowing I could pull off the throw, but not like that.”

  “Let’s try it again.”

  “Are you crazy? I could have hurt you.”

  “Not by just tossing me through the air. Even when I wasn’t expecting it, I landed just fine. It should be even easier knowing what’s coming. So man up.”

  Shit. I didn’t want to throw her again, but I knew April would never let it go. If I attempted the throw again with anything but my full strength, she would just make me do it again. With a sigh, I prepared myself to toss her across the room. That was if I could. I’d never been able to do anything like that before, and we’d been training together for over a year now. A few deep breaths settled me enough to give it a try. This was crazy, but so was denying April once she got something stuck in her head.

  She ran at me and threw out the same punch. I executed the same move and threw her with all of my strength. She sailed through the air again. This time, she turned her flight into a beautiful front flip before slowing her descent and marching back toward the ring.

  “Are you sure you didn’t want to be a gymnast when you grew up?”

  “Actually, part of my training was in gymnastics and tumbling. It’s great for body control.”

  Of course it was. “So any thoughts?”

  “I think we need to talk to your mom. Sarah might be able to shed some light on a few things. Until then, I think we should keep this to ourselves.”

  I looked around and saw a few people watching us. They must have heard our heated discussion a few moments ago and wanted to see a meltdown. There was really never enough food to feed the gossip mill. “That might be harder than you think.”

  April waved a dismissive hand in the air. “If anyone asks, I’ll just tell them it was magic and we were simulating a werewolf throw.”

  “So what now?”

  “Let’s grab our training sticks, and then we can meet up with Britta and Marcus for lunch.”

  “Sounds good.”

  “I know this might sound weird coming from me, but try to take it easy today.”

  “Words I thought I’d never hear.”

  She slapped me on the shoulder, and we got to work. An hour later, we were back at my place. Twenty minutes after that, we were dressed and headed out the door. Marcus was hosting our little shindig, and he had food coming in. My stomach rumbled, and April gave me a curious look. “What?”

  “I was just wondering if you had been eating more recently.”

  “Not that I can recall, but you know me with food, I’m basically eating all the time.”

  “That’s true. It’s a good thing you have a girlfriend like me to keep you in shape.”

  In truth, April was more than just a girlfriend. She was becoming my best friend. Something about her just made everything in my life fall into place. I wanted her to be around all the time. If she wasn’t by my side, I was thinking about her, and if she was, I was thinking about how to keep her there. Our jobs were extremely dangerous, and I wanted to live every moment that we had together as if it were our last.

  I pulled her close against me and hit her with a smile. “So what does Marcus have in store for us today?”

  “He didn’t say, but I’m sure it will be awesome.” She picked up the pace, obviously as hungry as I was. “And remember, not a word about what happened today until we talk with your mom.”

  “Got it.”

  It wasn’t too much longer before we found ourselves standing outside of Marcus’s door. The sound of Britta’s laughter floated through the opening. It seemed that it was easy enough for them to fall into old habits. Britta had been awesome right up to the point she hadn’t been. Not only had we broken up, but I had found out she worked for the enemy. Now knowing the truth, I still couldn’t help but smile as I heard her laugh. Our group was still stronger together. We just had to figure out how to trust each other again.

  I rapped my knuckles against the door and pushed it open all the way. I shoved April softly in front of me and then followed her inside. I wasn’t sure if I was actually ready for this. There really wasn’t anything quite like having your ex and your girlfriend in the same room together. At least I wasn’t sleeping with both of them. That would have been a show on MTV and probably would have ended with my death. I was still on edge, but we were here to try to mend fences, or at least get something in place so we could work on those fences later.

  “Hey, guys!” April said, bouncing into the room as if nothing had happened between us. “Something smells delicious.”

  She wasn’t kidding; something did smell delicious. As if in confirmation, my stomach rumbled again. What was with that thing? It was like a bottomless pit. Maybe I had been eating more than normal. It was hard to tell. Our schedules flipped all over the place, so I was normally stuffing my face on the run.

  April was waving me over to the couch. I took a seat next to her, and my stomach rumbled again.

  “Maybe we should eat first and then talk,” April said with a laugh.

  “That’s ok with me,” Marcus said.

  “So what’s on the menu, chief?” Britta asked.

  “I wish I could take credit for the meal, but I had this one sent up from the kitchens. Chicken parm and spaghetti, loads of bread, and I have ice-cream and half-baked cookies for dessert.”

  For the next thirty minutes, I couldn’t tell you what was said around the table, if anything. My mind was solely focused on the food and not the people around me. After three full bowls of pasta and a half a loaf of French bread, I finally felt satisfied. I sat back in my chair, happy for the fact basketball shorts came with elastic waistbands.

  Then Marcus brought out the cookies, and I slipped back into heaven. I’m not sure if you’ve ever been blessed with the opportunity to have a pizza cookie, but let me tell you, there aren’t very many places that could have done it better than what Marcus put together tonight. The cookie was warm and gooey, the ice cream was cold, and he drizzled chocolate and caramel over the top. As if the robust dinner hadn't already been enough, now I was going to have to spend another few hours on the elliptical just to break even.

  With our bellies full, we returned to the couches. I could already feel the carb coma weighing me down. Someone else was going to have to lead this conversation. I wasn’t going to be much help. I leaned back into the couch and tried not to drift off. It took me a few moments to notice, but everyone was looking at me. Well, I guess my well-deserved sleep was going to have to wait.

  “It’s time to get everything out in the open. We have to be able to trust one another completely if we are going to continue to work together.”

  All of their eyes stayed focused on me as I laid out what we knew so far. That Britta’s family was indebted to Stillman. That she was in fact still reporting to him even now. Then I laid out the fact that Adam had asked me to do the same thing with Britta, but not until after we had broken up. With everything laid out before us, it was time to move forward as a group.

  “Now that we know what Stillman wants, we can control the flow of information that you pass to him. We can do the same to Adam. Anything Stillman gives you we can pass along. Who knows? Maybe Adam can do something for your family to get them out from under Stillman’s thumb.”

  “Do you really think any of that’s possible?” Britta asked.

  “I do. Adam’s as tough as the
y come, but he would never want anything to happen to your family. Maybe we can put together an evacuation plan for them.”

  “That would be amazing. I can’t risk telling Adam anything that would put my family at risk. As long as Stillman has them, he has some level of control over me.”

  “We wouldn’t ever ask you to,” April said. For the first time that night, she smiled. To everyone’s great surprise, she got up and moved next to Britta and pulled her into a hug. “I’m so sorry that this happened to you.”

  Britta started to cry. “I’m just sorry I had to turn on the first real group of friends that I ever had.”

  Marcus and I shared a look, both of us feeling uncomfortable with the weight of the emotions being displayed in the room. We sat and talked for the next hour. Everyone gradually relaxed, and eventually, it was as if nothing had happened at all. I still felt the sting of what happened between Britta and me, but even that was fading.

  “Hey, before I waddle back to my room for a nap, we should swing by the healers and see how Nitro is doing.”

  “That’s a great idea,” Britta said.

  I got up and started to walk. I imagined this was what pregnant women felt like. “I might have understated things just a tad. I’m actually going to start waddling right now.”

  Everything was pretty calm when we strolled into the healer’s wing. I had a quick flashback to the first time I had seen April naked. It was here, in the showers. I also learned it wasn’t a really big deal for most of the Ascended, but coming from a very human background, their attitude toward nudity still threw me off. Don’t even get me started on having a shifter for a mother.

  It didn’t work like they showed you in the movies. Shifters in the real world ripped their clothes apart when they transformed. That led to a lot of naked people when you happened to go to a pack function. It was something I was learning to deal with, but I just hadn’t gotten a handle on all of it just yet. It didn’t help that my mom and all of her friends looked like they were only a few years older than us. Yeah, come on over. Watch out for the really in shape nude twenty-somethings. Nothing to see here.

  One of the healers saw us walking aimlessly around and came over to talk with us. “Can I help you find someone?”

  “We are looking for our friend Nitro.”

  “Jesus, what do you kids not get about not being able to see him right now? Please leave and tell everyone else that he isn’t allowed to have visitors.”

  “Wait just a second. We were the ones who brought him in. I think we deserve not only a little more respect but a little more information.”

  “I’ll tell you what I told everyone else. He isn’t well enough to see anyone right now. His physical injuries are fine, but his mental wounds are going to take a lot longer to heal.”

  “I could have told you that even before he got snatched,” Marcus said with a laugh.

  The healer just glared at him, obviously not in the mood for hearing jokes about one of her patients. “If you want to see him, you’re going to have to take it up with Adam.”

  “I’ll make sure to mention it when I see him tomorrow.” The healer’s face went slightly white as if maybe she had read the situation wrong. I placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. “I didn’t mean it like that. We are all just concerned for our friend. I know that you only have his best interests at heart.”

  “If that is all you need, I have other patients to attend to.”

  I nodded once, and the healer scurried off. Probably to tell her friends what an asshole I was. All I could think about was what the fiend had done to him. I couldn’t imagine having to fight my closest friends to the death over and over again. The kind of effect that could have on a person would be catastrophic.

  With our time together ending on a downer, I turned to look at everyone. “Get some rest. Read up on your demon lore. I have a meeting tomorrow with Adam, and you know what that usually means.”

  “Yeah, it means we are going on an adventure,” Britta said.

  “You take me to all the best places,” Marcus said, wiping his hand across his forehead and pretending to faint.

  “Trust me, you said. What could possibly go wrong, you said.” April laughed.

  “See if I take any of you with me again. I’m sure there is a better and more appreciative crew out there somewhere.”

  Both of the women hit me, and that made Marcus laugh even harder. Three of the healers shot us nasty looks. It was time to go. I wondered just where we would end up after my meeting with Adam.

  CHAPTER 11

  JACKSON

  When I rolled out of bed, April was already gone. I must have been making up for last night’s lack of sleep to be so out of it that I didn’t even feel her get up. That almost never happened; I was a light sleeper at the best of times. Without my noisemaker and a pill every now and then, I might not even be able to function properly. Toss in a few bad dreams and whatever was going on with my emotions, and I should have been a wreck.

  April kept me sane, though. Her calming presence kept me going. That and the fact she wasn’t afraid to smack me when I stepped out of line. You needed balance in a relationship. Someone who loved you but wasn’t afraid to call you out on your bullshit. April did that for me and more.

  I pulled on a pair of sweats and a hoodie and headed for the kitchen. We had half a rotisserie chicken left in there, and a little leftover mac and cheese. I grabbed the chicken and the mac and closed the door. Only then did I notice the note from April. She probably would have been better off attaching it to the chicken instead of the fridge.

  “Hitting the gym. See you this afternoon.”

  This afternoon, huh? That was a hell of a lot of gym time. She was up to something sneaky, like maybe meeting with my mom without me. The more I thought about it, the less it felt weird. It would be good for them to spend more time with each other, even if all they did was talk about me. I knew April really wanted to ask her some questions, and my meeting with Adam was going to make that hard to do. This way we might be able to knock out two birds with one stone.

  The breast fell right off of the bone, and I shredded some into the mac and cheese before tossing it into the microwave. While it heated up, I set about devouring the rest of the bird. By the time the microwave beeped, I had the chicken disposed of, and that helped to take the edge off of the worst of my hunger.

  After our conversation yesterday, I started to think about what I had been eating and cataloging it against what I would have normally eaten. There had definitely been an increase in the amount of food I had been eating. Could that simply be explained away by my increased use of magic and my training?

  I mean, I had pretty much been on an eight-thousand-calorie-a-day diet since I started training with Marcus and April. I know it sounded crazy, but using our gift burned calories at a ridiculous rate. That, coupled with the workouts and daily beatings, and I had to eat like an Olympian just to be healthy. That being said, looking back on the last few weeks, I was starting to eat more now. At some point, I was just going to have to start eating boxes of doughnuts just to keep from disappearing. What I wouldn’t have given to have had this ability before high school. No more fat kid here, Coach.

  Tossing the remains of the chicken and the tub of mac and cheese in the trash, I quickly washed my hands and headed for the door. I was actually looking forward to my talk with Adam. We had found a way to save the day, but even more importantly, I wanted to ask him about how to fight an archfiend. The last thing I wanted was to put my team in the same kind of position again. We went in unprepared for that level of demon, and it almost cost us everything.

  Henry was working at his desk outside of Adam’s office when I got there. He dropped his paperwork and stood up when he saw me. He limped around the desk and pulled me into a hug.

  “It’s good to see you, Jackson.”

  “You too, Henry. Is Adam ready for me?”

  “Not just yet. He is wrapping up a meeting as we speak.” He gave m
e a quick once-over and a disapproving look. “One of these days you are going to have to let me take you shopping. Don’t you think April would like to see you wearing something besides baggy workout clothes?”

  “I’m sure she would.”

  “Not only that, but are you getting enough to eat? It looks like you’re wasting away.”

  Henry could be like a mother hen at times, but that just made me love him more. It was nice to have someone who didn’t want anything from you and went out of their way to dote on you. “Trust me when I tell you that I’m doing my best to eat as much as possible. If you saw what I ate for breakfast, you’d probably gain five pounds.”

  Henry gave me this half-exacerbated and half-flabbergasted look. I loved his little bit of flair for the eccentric. “You better not be saying I’m fat.”

  “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

  Henry sat back down, looking mollified. He reminded me a lot of my adoptive dad, except he was a little more sparkly. It never bothered me that Henry was gay. Get over it, world. He wasn’t going to change, and it wasn’t my job to make him. Not to mention there wasn’t a better person in the world to go to for girl advice. All of them had cried on his shoulder, and he knew exactly what it took to stay in front of that kind of drama.

  Henry was kind of like my de facto dad since I came here. He babied me when I needed it and kept me in line when I didn’t. I could go to him with any problem, and he always had a reasonable approach to solving it. The fact that he had just called me a slob but in the nicest way possible was just another reason I had grown to love him.

  I took a seat and tried to stay quiet and out of the way so Henry could go back to work. He gave my outfit one more look, shook his head, and picked up what he had been working on when I came into the office. A few moments later, the door opened, and Adam walked out with a very tired and disheveled-looking Nitro. One of the healers hovered just behind him, watching him with a wary eye.