Now You See Me

by Debbie Viguié

  Down!

  She heard his warning in her mind and she dropped to the ground behind him as lightning bolts cut through the air above them. She would have thought the smoke would start to thin out but instead it grew thicker. Mal scrabbled to the side and she went with him, the smoke covering their movements. Every two feet, though, she got pulled up short as the material of her dress caught between her knees and the floor.

  Mal finally stopped and she bumped up against him. “What do we do?” she whispered as soft as she could.

  They’re not letting me teleport us out, but I think I can bring something in.

  She wanted to ask like what but knew that it was dangerous to speak out loud at all. The heat from the fire was getting more intense and it sounded like it was crackling all around her. The smoke continued to billow out. It hid them but it also blocked their view of the Tricksters. It was like some terrible game of hide and go seek.

  More like hide and go kill, she thought grimly.

  Mal had his head down and his brow was furrowed in concentration. He rocked backward so he was crouching and slowly brought his hands toward each other. She expected him to clap them together and then throw them outward, conjuring something in the process. Instead a small ball of blue lightning began to form between them. A moment later he threw it through the smoke.

  She watched it arc away, expanding in size rapidly as it cut its way through the smoke. A moment later there was a loud thud followed by a roar that made the hair stand on end all over her body. A man screamed, but the sound was suddenly cut off.

  Something out there killed him, she realized with a shiver.

  Moments later the growling resumed. It was closer this time. She watched Mal closely, desperately hoping he had some way to control the beast. He was listening intently, head cocked to the side. The growling came within a few feet then suddenly stopped.

  The silence that fell was even more terrifying. Opal held her breath. The smoke was pressing in on them on all sides and she couldn’t see more than a foot or two in front of her.

  It’s coming for us next, the thought raced through her mind.

  Suddenly there was a whisper of movement and a moment later a monstrous form hurtled at them, mouth agape, fangs dripping blood. She screamed as Mal threw up his hand. He smacked the animal on the side of the head and it fell right in front of her.

  It was a massive tiger and it exhaled rancid breath right into her face. Its eyes were closed and except for the breathing it was absolutely still. She was frozen, unable to move a muscle, as terror completely took over her mind and body.

  I knocked him out, Mal said inside her mind. It’s okay.

  That’s where he was wrong. Nothing was okay. She could smell the blood on the creature’s breath, and a fierce sort of joy ripped through her at knowing he had killed one of their enemies. It felt like her mind was splintering under the stress and the fear. And she suddenly understood why Mal had laughed after his first fight because that’s what she wanted to do so badly. She wanted to laugh until she cried or passed out, whichever came first. But she couldn’t. There were three more Tricksters out there in the smoke, three more who wanted them dead.

  Mal began to move again and she followed as close as she could, sliding and tangling in her dress. She should just try to rip the bottom of the skirt off. She knew it, but somehow couldn’t make herself do it. Mal stopped suddenly and held up a hand.

  In her head he asked, “Do you hear something?”

  She shook her head even as she strained to hear anything but the cracking of the fire. Then, for just a moment, she thought she heard something else, the whisper of fabric against the floor.

  A hand grabbed her ankle and she screamed and kicked out.

  “Opal!” someone shouted.

  She twisted around and through the smoke could barely make out Hannah, her face contorted in fear.

  “Come with me, we need to get out of here!” she shouted.

  “Ssh!” Opal tried to warn her, panicking as she realized the Tricksters now knew their location.

  “Go!” Mal barked. “Get out!”

  “I can’t leave you!”

  He grabbed her and kissed her hard. A second later he pulled away. “Go with Hannah right now.”

  He threw up his hand and she slid backward across the floor. She let out another scream and tried clawing at the ground but couldn’t stop herself even as Mal was consumed by the smoke.

  “He needs you to be safe!” Hannah was shouting at her, tugging on her arm now.

  “I’ll never be safe,” Opal wailed. Hannah didn’t understand. How could she?

  Her strength was leaving her and Hannah reached down and hauled her to her feet. Opal coughed as she breathed in the smoke, weakening herself further. Hannah put her arm around her waist and ran, pushing and pulling Opal all at the same time.

  A few seconds later they burst out of a side door in the gymnasium. Opal sucked in the fresh air and hacked out smoke.

  “I have to go back. I have to help him,” she sobbed.

  Hannah grabbed her shoulders and shook her. “You listen to me. What you have to do is be safe and let him do what he needs to do. I was trying to find you outside. When I realized you must both still be inside I went in, but I couldn’t see anything. Mal reached out to me, I heard him speaking in my mind, begging me for help in getting you out of there. He led me to you and then showed me the way back out.”

  Opal stared at her in shock. “You could have been killed.”

  “And so could you. You still could. We need to get out of here.”

  A sudden explosion from inside the gym rocked the ground beneath their feet, sending both girls to their knees.

  “Mal!” Opal shouted, knowing that he couldn’t hear her.

  “He’ll be fine,” Hannah said.

  Opal turned to look at her. Hannah’s eyes told her differently. She thought Mal was going to die.

  The door they had just exited through flew open and she jumped, expecting someone to come out. All she could see beyond it was flame, though. The fire was starting to engulf the whole structure.

  Opal turned back to Hannah who was staring in fear at the inferno. “Thank you for trying.”

  Before Hannah could say anything Opal sprinted forward and ran through the open door back into the blaze. She looked around frantically. The smoke was still thick and it was starting to choke her. She had no idea what she was going to do, she just knew that she couldn’t let Mal die.

  An ember hit her hand and she winced. Half a dozen more spiraled into her dress and within a moment it had started smoking. She couldn’t see anything and all she could hear was the roar of the flames. Even now those flames could be consuming Mal.

  “This fire needs to stop!” she hissed to herself.

  She tried to tear off the part of her dress she hadn’t wanted to rip before, but she couldn’t. Her hands were cramping. Fire began to race between the stars on the dress, giving them a terrible luminescence.

  Why hadn’t the fire department arrived yet to put out the flames? There should already be water raining down on the whole place. The building would burn to the ground in a couple more minutes.

  Another ember hit her cheek just as she realized that she could smell her hair burning.

  “Stop!” she screamed the word at the top of her lungs.

  And suddenly water was pouring down in a flood. There was so much of it that it quashed the flames within moments. She tilted her head down so that she could gulp in some air. The smoke was gone as well, she realized. She stepped forward, shoes slipping on water and ash. The water just kept coming, more and more of it until it was up to her calves. Her dress trailed behind her as she pushed through the water. It was dark in the building with the lights destroyed and the flames put out.

  Something dark flashed in front of her and a moment later was gone. Pain seared across her chest and she glanced down. Something had cut her chest open, and her blood was pouring down, soaking th
e top of her bodice.

  28

  Poisoned knife! was Opal’s first panicked thought. The pain was terrible, but moments later she was still standing. It couldn’t be poisoned. She would have collapsed like Mal had. She pressed her hand against the wound, trying to stop the bleeding. She tried to send energy into it, to heal it. The blood kept gushing out, though.

  “Mal!” she screamed. She didn’t care if the Tricksters could hear her, she had to find the man she loved.

  She slogged forward as fast as she could, pushing toward the center of the building. Finally she heard grunts and she moved toward the sound. She could tell she was getting closer, but she couldn’t make anything out in the dark. Suddenly a fireball lit up the darkness, nearly blinding her. Jonas was standing five feet in front of her and he lobbed the fireball at Mal’s head. The water that was rushing down, though, put it out before it even reached Mal who was only a few feet away.

  Jonas reached down and yanked a knife out of his boot and brought it up.

  “Not again!” she bellowed, remembering the knife tipped with poison he had scratched Mal with.

  He jerked around toward her in surprise. Mal lunged forward, knocked the knife out of Jonas’ hand and then shoved him down under the water that was still rapidly rising. He held him under until Jonas stopped struggling and then he waited several more seconds before letting go and standing up.

  He was bleeding from a dozen cuts all over his body and his shirt was hanging in tatters off of him.

  “He’s dead?” Opal asked.

  Mal nodded.

  “And that terrible woman?”

  “Escaped. She took her best shot and then took off. I couldn’t stop her because I was having to focus all my attention on him,” Mal said, indicating the body. “The other guy, the one from the cemetery is gone, too. I hit him pretty bad, but I don’t think I killed him.”

  With a sob she flung her arms around Mal and kissed him as the water continued to pour down over them. He was the one that finally ended it.

  “You’re injured,” he said.

  “Something cut me,” she acknowledged.

  He pressed a hand against her wound and she felt heat flash through her.

  “That’s all I can do at the moment. We need to get out of here,” he panted.

  “I can’t stop the water. I don’t even know how I started it,” she shouted.

  Mal muttered a few words and then threw his hands up and out. The deluge stopped. He grabbed her hand and pulled her back toward the edge of the gym.

  “I can’t see anything,” she said.

  “I can. Hold on a second.”

  He held up his free hand and a ball of light formed over it, casting light over the area right in front of him. There was the tiger, still asleep, laying in water that was almost covering his nose. There was a crackle of green lightning and then the tiger disappeared with a pop.

  “Did he kill that other guy?” she asked.

  “Yes, I found the body right before the woman jumped me,” he said. “Now, hold onto me tight.”

  “You’re too tired, you don’t have enough energy to teleport us both,” she protested.

  “I have to try. The fire department and police can’t find us here.”

  “But Hannah knows we’re inside.”

  Mal closed his eyes for a second and then nodded. “I just let her know we’re leaving and to not let anyone know she saw us. Now, hold on.”

  She wrapped her arms around him as the blue lightning swirled round and round. The pop and rush of wind came and a moment later they were in Opal’s kitchen.

  They both fell to the ground, gasping. As Opal lay there listening to Mal’s rasping breaths she realized how much pain she was in. She knew she needed to move to him, try to share some of her energy, but she couldn’t get her body to respond. She felt as if all the life had been sucked out of her completely.

  Suddenly the lights flickered on.

  “Well, I didn’t expect to see you two for hours and certainly not in this state,” her aunt said, sounding shocked.

  “Help...her,” Mal gasped.

  “I’ll be...okay...he needs...warmth, energy,” Opal said.

  “I know what he needs,” Tanya said, voice tensing.

  Her aunt dropped to the floor between them and put a hand on each of them. She closed her eyes and gritted her teeth and Opal could feel warmth, energy, life itself pouring into her. She gasped, wondering if this was what Mal had felt when she’d given him her energy after the first time he had teleported them both.

  Tanya was on her knees and she began to weave slightly. Finally she let go and fell backward with a groan.

  “What did you do?” Opal asked with a gasp.

  “It doesn’t take a magic user to give energy, it just takes someone willing to do it,” Tanya said, a bit breathlessly.

  She was feeling better, but the cold, wet dress was starting to make her shiver. She needed to get out of it and into something warm. She could smell the blood all over her, too, and it was beginning to make her stomach turn.

  Slowly Opal forced herself to sit up. Mal was laying, head twisted slightly, eyes glassy as he stared at her. His chest was rising and falling quickly, but the breaths seemed shallow. Tanya was pale but looked better than Opal felt. She turned her head and felt something slide against her neck and then hit the floor.

  She looked down at the gold chain on the ground next to her. She stared at it, blinking for a moment. It was unfastened. No, that wasn’t right, she realized. The lock was still fastened. The middle of the chain was broken, though.

  Her hand flew to her chest in horror. The cut started just below her throat. Whoever had cut her had sliced right through the chain.

  “They weren’t trying to kill me!” she gasped.

  “What do you mean?” Tanya asked.

  “The opal. They stole the opal,” she sobbed as the realization hit her.

  Mal’s lips moved, but no words came out.

  “Why? Why would someone take it?” she asked, feeling hysteria rising in her.

  Mal’s lips moved again, but again there was silence.

  “I can’t hear you!”

  There was a burst of noise in her mind but it was gibberish. The noise was accompanied by stabbing pain. “Ah!” she cried, doubling over and grabbing her head. “Stop, you’re not making sense and it hurts!”

  Mal closed his eyes and the noise stopped. For a terrible moment she thought he was dead but then his chest rose and fell again.

  “We need to get you both dry and warm. Take care of the injuries until your bodies recover slightly,” Tanya said slowly. “Then we can figure everything else out.”

  What her aunt was saying made sense. She nodded slowly. “I don’t think I can make it upstairs.”

  “That’s okay,” Tanya said, sitting up. “I can.” She struggled to her feet, clearly exhausted and Opal fought back tears as she watched her.

  “Everything is so screwed up,” Opal whispered.

  “I know, sweetie,” Tanya said. “I know.”

  She turned and shuffled out of the room slowly.

  After what seemed like an eternity Tanya came back, carrying towels, clothes, and a first aid kit. She set them down on the table and then moved over to Opal.

  “Let’s get this wet dress off of you,” she said, starting to unzip the back.

  Opal stiffened. “Mal-”

  “Is unconscious. He’s breathing so shallowly I really don’t want to put a towel over his face. And I don’t have the strength to get you into the other room. We’ll do this as quick as we can,” Tanya said, not unkindly.

  Opal nodded and together she and Tanya managed to get her out of the dress which was burned in places and sopping wet.

  “It was a pretty dress,” Opal lamented as her aunt tossed the garment toward the far side of the kitchen.

  “There will be other dresses.”

  Her aunt grabbed the first aid kit and quickly cleaned up the cut on Opal�
��s chest. The antibiotic ointment stung briefly but once the bandages were on the whole thing felt better.

  “It could have been a lot worse,” Tanya muttered.

  Opal agreed but decided not to mention poison daggers for the moment.

  Finished with the wound, Tanya handed her a towel and Opal worked to get dried off. She kept glancing at Mal to make sure he was still unconscious. Her aunt finally handed her a pair of sweats and some underwear without actually looking at her. Opal was grateful for the tiny bit of privacy and finished dressing as fast as she could. When she was dry and warm and fully clothed again she heaved a sigh of relief. With her aunt’s help she made it up into a chair and slowly began towel drying her hair.

  “Must have been some fight,” Tanya said shortly as she turned her attention to Mal.

  Opal stared at him fearfully, wondering how long he was going to be unconscious. “Do you think we need to call his father?” she finally asked.

  Tanya glanced up. “Is that really what you want to do?”

  Opal shook her head.

  “Okay, then let’s get him cleaned up and leave it to him what he tells his father about tonight,” Tanya said.

  “What can I do?” Opal asked.

  “Not much in your condition. You can hand me things when I ask for them, though,” Tanya said, indicating the first aid kit that was on the table.

  Tanya bent over Mal. She pulled off the tattered remains of his jacket and started unbuttoning what was left of his shirt. Opal flushed, feeling embarrassed to be watching. Of course, she’d probably have been even more embarrassed if she were the one taking off his shirt while her aunt watched.

  When she’d gotten the shirt off Tanya tossed it into the corner with Opal’s dress. “I’m sure that’s not how you pictured your clothes ending up on the floor together,” she joked.

  “Aunt Tanya!” Opal burst out, even more embarrassed.

  “Sorry, bad joke. I sometimes joke when I get too stressed.”

  Just like Mal, Opal thought.

  “I’m assuming I don’t need to have the sex talk with you, though,” Tanya said, looking up at her probingly.