by Jessica Gunn
I really, really did not want to. The Ether Head Circle never sent representatives to the other Circles. Ever. They ruled from afar and everyone listened to them without question. It had been that way for thousands of years, or so I was told during my training period. I’d never once seen any of them here at Headquarters, only watched or listened to Jaffrin call them.
And yet there they stood, two women and a man all in yellow robes that covered their entire bodies except for their heads. Heavy talismans hung off roped belts at their middle, symbols of ether and power carved into the medallions.
Jaffrin stood next to them, now with both hands behind him, right hand clasped over left. Military style. His back was rigid, his focus entirely on the representatives.
He’s scared. And if he is, you need to be, too.
When the three of us finally made it to the platform, no matter how slowly we dragged our feet, Jaffrin made a sweeping gesture again. “May I introduce Ben Hallen, Rachel Rhodes, and Nate Rosen.” He looked at me with a question in his eyes, likely about where the other half of my team was. “Ben, these are members of the Ether Head Circle’s Magik Protection Council. They arrived when the cianza shifted.”
Shifted? The balance had tipped. Nothing had moved. “What do you mean by ‘shifted’?”
The man turned to me. He had a long, pointed nose, pale blue eyes, and a hard face. “We believe Cianza Boston grew in size, moving slightly in a westerly direction, during this event.”
“I agree,” Nate chimed in. He hesitated, then cleared his throat. “What I mean is, I felt the growth. I didn’t know cianzas changed like that.”
“It is alarming,” said the man.
Jaffrin’s lips thinned. He must have known we were part of the so-called ‘event’ that had happened.
It was entirely possible that Kinder was solely to blame, what with the amount of powers she’d stolen and hosted in her immortal lifetime. Or maybe the cianza had reacted to her immortality in general, since that was different than being an ageless demon. Her immortality in combination with Krystin and Shawn’s Alzanian power, as representatives of Good, might have been enough to trigger everything. Then add in the demons in the area, the three of us, and Giyano… Boom. A recipe for an explosion.
Jaffrin shifted his stance. “Kinder’s reappearance in Boston is cause for many a concern, especially with Krystin and Shawn being involved with the Alzan prophecy.”
One of the women, shorter and with a darker complexion, looked directly at me. “And, one might imagine, with a resurgence of the Power.”
My blood ran cold as I looked to Jaffrin. No one who hadn’t been at Headquarters that day was supposed to know about Riley and his magik. No one.
The man lifted his hand. “We can speak of that another time. The delegation is due to arrive soon. It is best we not speak of the Power in front of them.”
Delegation?
Jaffrin sent a pointed look my way. “You may wish to sit for this. There, in the front row. Do not speak unless spoken to.” His hard stare lingered on me a lot longer than expected.
Fine, asshole. I get it. Mouth shut.
The three of us sat, perched at the literal edges of our seats, and waited. One minute. Five. Finally, the walls of the grand hall shimmered and in teleported four individuals—with deep red eyes. Demons.
My fingers tensed around the edge of the marble bench beneath me. Something solid formed in front of my chest, holding me still. I looked to Nate, who shook his head almost imperceptibly.
Jaffrin stood back as the Ether Head Circle addressed the newcomers. The four demons were dressed in what looked like white leather from head to toe, white shirts beneath their vests. Pretty medieval if you asked me. They wore stiff faces, each graced with a tattoo on their right temple. A tattoo of the alchemical symbol for fire.
My breath hitched. Oh, shit. White Flame.
Where Lady Azar had control of Landshaft and her Shadow Crest organization, her brother Cinead, third in line to the throne of Darkness, had White Flame. He led this elite group that served as the royal guard to Aloysius and the royal family.
And if they were here, inside of Fire Circle Headquarters, that meant one of two things: Aloysius himself was about to appear—the fear of which narrowed my vision to pinpricks—or the cianza’s tilt had scared White Flame and Aloysius nearly as bad as it had the Ether Head Circle.
I’d heard of these mediation talks. They didn’t happen often, and when conversations between the Hunter Circles and Darkness happened directly, they usually took place at Hunter’s Guild. The neutral point.
But with the Guild a recent target, and Boston the home of the cianza in question, they must have to decided to come here. White Flame had agreed to meet on our turf.
I gulped. Krystin was missing this. Actually—it was probably best she wasn’t here. I was surprised Jaffrin even let us stay.
One of the demons stepped forward, greeting not the Ether Head Circle representatives but Jaffrin himself. He bowed his head slightly. “Our prince sends his regrets concerning his sister’s meddling in the Fire Circle’s affairs. He’s expressed hope that her agenda will not affect our conversation here today.”
Jaffrin bowed back, a slight motion, but one that spoke volumes. “I wouldn’t dream of it. Cianza Boston affects all of us, as we learned here today.”
“We will forcibly remove any demons near the city’s center until the cianza settles,” said the demon. He paused, seemingly for effect, before adding, “Assuming, of course, that your agents will be similarly removed.”
Jaffrin nodded. “I’ve already received word that the Son and Daughter of Alzan have left the city for the time being. Our other Hunters don’t collectively pose much of a threat, but we will stay out of the city’s center as well.”
The demon nodded deeply. “Good. Then we have but one other glaring problem. One that has been a thorn in both of our sides for many centuries now.”
“Indeed, we do.” Jaffrin finally glanced our way, showing us to the demons. “These Hunters tried today to take Kinder out. They are powerful in their own right, but I do not think we can remove Kinder on our own.”
The demon grinned evilly, looking us over. Then he returned his gaze to Jaffrin with a hard stare. “Then in the name of the cianza, as well as the interest our emperor possesses in seeing the Betrayer deceased, we will work with you on an… agreeable solution.”
His words promised compromise, but the way his tone shifted on ‘agreeable’ told me even the Ether Head Circle might not like what White Flame had in mind.
CHAPTER 16
KRYSTIN
Sound filtered in slowly at first. Movement. Footsteps. A male voice. I lay on something soft, my head supported. I blinked, trying to wade through the fog in my head, thick as a day on the coast of Maine. “What… happened?”
I didn’t expect anyone to actually respond, but Shawn’s voice called to me from the kitchen in our team’s house. “Same thing that’s been happening for days now, Krystin.” He appeared in my line of vision, a phone pressed to his ear.
“She’s awake now. We’ll get out of here soon and let you know where we are, Ben. Okay. Gotcha.” Shawn hung up the call. “Ben and the others are tied up at Headquarters with some epic Darkness business that Jaffrin doesn’t want us anywhere near.”
My head spun. “That’s fine. Not a good idea to be in the city right now.”
Shawn nodded. He slipped an arm behind my shoulders and helped me sit up. “You got hit by the cianza, like I did, but then Giyano did something to you. It slowed down the cianza tremors—or at least, it happened at the same time as they slowed down—and then you were knocked out. Just like you were the last time you came back from seeing him and I found you.”
My eyes narrowed and I smacked his arm away. “Are you stalking me?”
“No,” he said, a hard stare focused my way. “But whether you like it or not, you and I are forced to be a team. So I chose to make sure my shared destiny bu
ddy was doing okay. And you’re not.”
“Neither are you. That cianza hit you too. Don’t deny it.”
“I’m not. We need to get out of here.”
“My mother’s house. That’s the only safe spot I can think of right now. It’s outside of the city, but close enough in case anything goes wrong.” Not that we couldn’t teleportante back from anywhere, but you couldn’t count on anything being guaranteed when demons were involved. Or Kinder.
“I’ve never been there,” Shawn said. “You’ll have to do the teleportante.”
No one from the team had gone to her house before. Ben had only met her the other week because she’d bound Riley’s powers. I’d wanted to keep her out of all of this—to stick it to her and Jaffrin for keeping me on such a short leash my entire life as much as to keep her from becoming a target—but I guessed that wasn’t going to be an option anymore.
I held out my hand to Shawn. He took it without saying another word. And although I tried my best to ignore it, the second our hands touched, that warm light inside of me that flickered to life days ago to save me from Giyano’s attack in Shadow Crest’s lair—it grew tenfold. As if recognizing the other half of itself.
“Teleportante,” I said, and we shifted from the team’s townhome to my mother’s house many miles away.
We appeared in her living room, where she’d apparently been knitting. She set aside her yarn and gaped up at me. The TV blared behind her, showing reports about earthquakes in Boston, and suddenly, everything made sense: my mother had learned how to knit from Grandma, but she never actually knitted anything unless she was angry or stressed.
“I-I didn’t receive any updates from the Fire Circle,” my mother said quickly as she stood. “So I assumed everything was okay, but—the cianza?”
I stepped toward her, though I had no intention of embracing my mother. Her worry wasn’t for show, but neither was it for me. She was concerned about magik and the cianza, the city as a whole. Never her daughter. Not like this.
“It’s fine,” I said. “At least, I think it’s fine. Jaffrin wanted us both off it anyway.”
My mother’s gaze left me and found Shawn, her eyes widening like she knew him. “It’s you.”
“Uh, hi?” Shawn asked.
My mother looked to me. “Jaffrin wasn’t kidding.”
“Jaffrin isn’t really a joker, mother,” I said.
“I’m Shawn. It’s nice to meet you, Ms. Blackwood.”
They shook hands and my mother froze, pulling his arm forward until his elbow was in view. And his scar. “You’re the Son.”
Shawn nodded. “I am.”
“See,” I said to him. “I told you I probably had that same damn birthmark. What’d you do, mother? Cut it off?”
She hesitated for a single moment, then looked at me. “The doctors at Fire Circle Headquarters removed it. To keep you hidden, before you accuse me of having other reasons.”
I chuckled and turned my attention toward the TV. It was too late for that. I already had all the ideas I’d ever need when it came to how much she and Jaffrin had controlled my life, even if they’d had the best intentions. Growing up much closer to the Hunter Circles than Shawn, it did make sense that they’d want to keep me safe. But in doing so, Jaffrin and my mother had created more questions than answers. And a ton more excuses.
“What happened at the cianza?” she asked.
“Kinder attacked,” I answered, watching the ticker at the bottom of the news report: Magnitude 5.5 earthquake shakes Boston. Some damage, no casualties. “The Fire Circle’s most-wanted criminal. Granted, we were hoping to lure her out.”
“Yeah,” Shawn said under his breath. “Just not directly on top of the damn cianza.”
“Our magik started to make the cianza tilt,” I said. “Giyano showing up along with our team and who-knows-how-many demons and magik-enabled Hunters in the area—it all added up. Then Kinder appeared and set off the entire cianza. We’re lucky it didn’t blow. The effects nearly knocked the both of us out.”
My mother came to my side. “What do you mean?”
“Fever and chills,” Shawn said.
“I basically passed out. I felt numb and wasn’t able to move,” I said. “I’ve never felt anything like it.” Not even when I’d taken dharska.
“You were very lucky,” my mother said, then paused. She placed her hand on my shoulder and squeezed once before backpedaling away from me. “Why do you have dark magik in your aura?”
I turned to her. “Issues with a demon. I’m fine.” I didn’t want to see her reaction when I told her it was the same demon that’d killed my father and had nearly gotten me, too. She’d probably freak out as much as Shawn wanted to.
Possibly more than Ben would, if he’d ever found out.
My mother’s eyebrows rose. “It’s familiar, the magik.” She peered closer at me, eyes narrowing. “No.”
“Yes—” I cried out as my body spasmed and the world spun. “Shawn…”
I fell to the ground, landing hard on my knees. Pain splintered up my legs, then starburst from the spot on my chest where Giyano had pumped magik into me. As if it were a delayed response from moving away from the cianza. As if Giyano was here, hidden and invisible, slamming his magik into me all over again.
Shawn was by my side in the next second, brushing my hair out of the way to look at the mark. “It’s Giyano. He’s been feeding magik into her. He did something like that back at the cianza. It stopped the balance from tipping for a few moments.”
“Giyano?” The pain, the heartbreak in my mother’s voice, was like a physical blow. “What have you been doing so close to him? Does he know who you are?”
“Of course… he does…” I said weakly, my breath thinning out. Each gasp of air felt like cold had spread within me. The dark magik crept across my body. I looked down, watching the veins from my hand connect with the mark beneath my collar bone like black tendrils reaching outward. “It’s why he killed Dad.”
My mother’s eyes narrowed. I closed my own, both to filter the pain through other avenues and because I didn’t want to see the look on her face when she realized what had happened. My mother, as a Blackwood witch, saw auras, too. She knew. She knew with more certainty than even Nate with his ether-shaping abilities what had happened to me thanks to Giyano. And she knew me well enough to figure out I’d probably allowed it to happen.
“I wanted answers only he could give,” I told her. Shawn didn’t look surprised. In fact, his expression remained blank. This wasn’t his business and, anyway, he already knew about my seeing Giyano. “About Kinder and what her agenda might be. He’s been fixated on my magik, but I’m not sure why. I didn’t even see him go for me this time.”
“It happened fast,” Shawn said. “No one could have stopped him.”
“But why?” I asked. “What could he possibly have to gain from throwing his magik into me? I don’t even understand how it’s possible.” On this, maybe my mother would have an answer. She’d taught me everything I knew about magik, which was a lot more than most Fire Circle Hunters knew. “Giyano has elemental magik—fire. Mine is ether-based. It should have killed me.”
“Seems like it nearly does,” Shawn said under his breath. “Combined with the effects of the cianza, I’m surprised you got out of there alive.”
My mother’s lips pressed together. “I’m not sure how either of you survived, to be honest. Almost immediately after you were born, the Fire Circle paid us a visit. Jaffrin himself told us to move out of the city.”
“And yet somehow you both thought it was a good idea for me to join a team that operates inside the city? Least of all with Shawn once he was found? How does that make sense?”
My mother’s face remained expressionless.
My head spun in the silence between us. Every passing moment made my knees weaker until finally I had to brace myself against the arm of my mother’s couch.
Shawn was at my side instantly. “Krystin?”
The pain of two magik types warring inside me.
Shawn lowered me onto the couch, our hands brushing. The moment we touched, a bright white light flashed behind my eyes and a familiar warmth inside my chest and at the back of my mind thawed some of Giyano’s power from my system. I squeezed Shawn’s hand. Whatever was happening was coming from him, probably the Alzanian power and our shared destiny, and it was the only thing keeping me afloat.
“What is it?” Shawn asked. “What’s—?”
But the pain swelled in that hand, growing like a ball of white-hot energy like Ben made with lightning, then burst as my body shook into spasms and I blacked out.
CHAPTER 17
BEN
One hour. That was how long the meeting between the Ether Head Circle representatives and White Flame demons had been going on for. Jaffrin’s stance hadn’t relaxed even an inch the entire time, and I was pretty sure I was still holding the same breath that’d hitched upon White Flame’s arrival. You know. If a human holding their breath for an hour were possible, even with magik.
But at the one-hour mark—though it felt as though it’d been eons of tension-filled negotiations—Derek barged into the grand hall. He hurried down the stadium steps to the bottom of the amphitheater, keeping his footfalls light so they wouldn’t echo in the emptiness of the room.
Rachel looked over her shoulder, watching Derek descend, a pensive, worried expression on his face. “That doesn’t bode well.”
“No,” I said as Derek approached the speaker’s platform.
He and Jaffrin stepped off to the side, leaving the White Flame demons to glance at us. I tried to keep my expression neutral, but given what they were and what they stood for—who they’d sworn fealty to—they set me on edge. Maybe Cinead wasn’t his sister, but Aloysius’s whole family had caused mine enough issues by now. Never mind what Aloysius’s split from the Entity had done for the world as a whole.