Well right now, regardless of that history, he goes on the offensive. Specifically, he aims right at me.
Though Michael is still right there in front of me, Antonio drops to the side, rolls, and comes punching around Antonio’s left.
I’m not expecting it, but I still find the time to dodge just as Antonio springs toward me.
That’s when I realize he’s got something painted on the palms of both his hands. Some kind of symbol.
It’s not an ordinary symbol, though, and it’s not ordinary paint. You see, it’s not technically touching his skin. It’s settled about a centimeter above it, and every time he shifts, the symbol moves with him, changing color and growing slightly, almost as if it’s reacting to the pressure of his hand as he clenches and opens it.
I’ve never seen anything like it, but up this close, I can feel it. And it feels familiar. Specifically, it feels like a net spell.
Though it’s been a couple of days since I cast one, and I’ve only cast a couple, that doesn’t matter. The specific vibration of a net spell is still locked in my soul.
And as Antonio springs toward me and spreads his hand wide, I feel that familiar presence shifting through the air.
Though I know Spencer doesn’t want me to reveal myself, which is the whole point of me going out in a disguise, at the same time, his number one priority is for me not to be captured.
So as Antonio spreads that net toward me, I shove my fingers forward, curl them in, and take hold of the strands.
Though it can take a hell of a lot of concentration to grab hold of an existing net spell, I’ve got that, in spades. I’ve also got desperation.
Because I can only see this fight finishing in two ways. Either we win and Antonio is captured or killed, or we win, and I somehow give him the opportunity to leave.
It has to be the former. If it isn’t, John….
I can’t finish that thought and instead channel the emotions from it right into my spell as I grasp hold of the net starting to filter through the air. As with any net spell, I only see the strands for a fraction of a second. Those luminescent, pure, spiderlike strings shifting through the entire laneway.
Antonio suddenly realizes something’s up, and though he spreads a hand toward me, nothing happens.
That gives Michael all the time he needs to shoot around on the spot and knee Antonio right in the jaw.
Again I yelp, but this time, there’s no hiding it, and I can see Michael look at me out of the corner of his eye.
He does not, however, pause. He follows up on his move by shoving down to one knee, wrapping his arm around Antonio, and hauling him onto the ground. I can hear the thump of Antonio’s skull as it lands against the pavement.
Antonio has his eyes on me, and they’re wide with suspicion. Which is stupid. Antonio is a seasoned fighter, and he must know that if he takes his eyes off a man like Michael for a second, it’s the last time he’ll be able to open his eyes at all.
Sure enough, Michael takes hold of the opportunity, yanks his fist back, curls it in, presses his knuckles together until they’re glowing white with magic, and slams them down toward Antonio.
But just at the last moment, Antonio shifts. He goes from being there, to simply disappearing on the spot.
I’ve seen some pretty crazy magical spells in my time, but this takes the cake. It’s like transportation right out of a sci-fi film.
I gasp, and again it sounds girly, but this time, nobody hears it.
Because the next thing I know, somebody appears behind me and slams a hand over my mouth. Their fingers press in, grating against my skin, making it feel like they’re trying to rip my lips right from my face.
Though my first inclination is to yank my elbow back and slam it into the guy’s stomach, I suddenly realize it’s Antonio. And that’s when I realize that the symbol pressed a centimeter over his palm is now locked over my mouth.
I’ve been in plenty of impediments spells before. From being locked on that sandstone floor in the headquarters Spencer acquired from Senator Rogers, to all of the other numerous times I’ve been tied down by magic.
This is completely different. This feels as if the spell is entering my body.
To be specific, it feels like a net spell that’s about to tie me up from the inside out.
Alarm punches through me. It sails high, riding up my spine and slamming into my hindbrain, telling me I have to put every single last scrap of energy I have into getting free, because if I don’t, I’ll never be able to get free again.
Michael realizes something’s up, and as he twists on his feet to see Antonio behind me, his eyes blast wide. He utters a single word. “Kill,” he says.
That’s it. He doesn’t give directions. He doesn’t tell Andrew that he has to kill Antonio. He’s not telling me I have to kill Antonio, either. It’s just one word.
And that’s when I feel something slice out of the air by my side.
At first I think it’s coming for me. That mammalian part of my brain goes into overdrive as it tells me this will be my last moment.
I can’t dodge, though. Even though it’s only been a few seconds since Antonio pressed his hand over my mouth, that doesn’t matter. My muscles are all tight, feeling as if they’ve individually been wrapped in wire.
But it doesn’t matter, because that scythe is not meant for me. It slices toward Antonio’s head.
Antonio ducks, wrenching me to the side just in time. But as he does so, the scythe slices across my arm.
I’ve been attacked before. Come on, this isn’t my first rodeo. I’ve been stuck in this game for months. And even before I learned exactly what game I was stuck in, I’d been hurt numerous times. It comes with the territory. You throw yourself out on the streets and fight enemy pawns every single night, and yeah, you’re going to come home with a couple of bruised knees and scratches.
But this is different.
The pain that bites through my arm is indescribable. It feels as if it’s pain that has been whittled down and concentrated. Like the very essence of agony itself. And that agony spreads through my arm. It stabs through my side. It plows into me so hard that for several seconds, I think my very head will explode. It’s like somebody’s thrown a flare right between my ears. Light pulses through me, and everything seems to shut down.
This ringing thumping pain vibrates through my skull as if somebody is trying to jackhammer the base of my spine.
But just before it can completely take me out for good, it starts to ebb.
I’m vaguely aware of the fact that blood completely soaks my arm, spreads through my black jacket, and stains my white shirt underneath.
Antonio screams. He wrenches me up, keeps that hand clamped further over my mouth, and backs away.
“Dammit,” Michael spits. “Kill,” he repeats once more. As he does, he lengthens his back, tugs his head forward, and stares at Antonio with two grim eyes. Maybe that’s appropriate, because once more a scythe appears at Antonio’s side, just like an invisible Grim Reaper.
It slices toward him, and though this time Antonio shoves me in front of it, the scythe shifts, changing direction, heading right for his head.
I have a moment. One of those moments that seems to stretch as if time is suddenly malleable, as if you can hold it in your hands, as if you can protect it from changing.
You don’t get afforded many of these moments in your life. When you do, you have to take hold of them.
Literally.
In the split second that’s given to me, I calculate my option.
And there’s only one.
I can’t move. I’m still a magical queen, though. It’s gonna take more of Antonio’s spell before that’s lost.
I use my power now as I sink it not into my own body, but into Antonio’s. I sink it right into his knee, sending it in with all the force of a hurricane. It’s not just that it makes his need jolt, because as it does, it slams into the pavement, the rest of my magic discharging into it. It�
�s a move that, to the outside, would look as if Antonio did it, but it has my force, and it’s enough to knock Antonio backward, forcing him to change direction just as the scythe slices half a centimeter in front of his face.
It catches the side of my jacket, and rips a chunk out of it, but that’s it.
I don’t know what kind of spell this is, but it’s obviously single-use only. Because as soon as the scythe has made one cut, it disappears once more.
Michael bellows again.
He’s charged with magic, but here’s the thing, his force is starting to ebb. That scythe spell is expensive. So he doesn’t immediately shove forward, clamp his hands together, and cast another one. Instead, he gets back to playing dirty.
He launches toward me just as he makes a specific flicking motion with his left finger.
Andrew, who’s remained pretty much silent and still until now, suddenly kicks into gear. He shoves forward, skids onto his knees, and starts taking on the four pawns. He’s quick. Remarkably quick, in fact. It reminds me once more of those darting, bird-like movements he made with his neck. He has the poise, precision, and speed of a bird of prey. Which is exactly, apparently, what he needs to distract all four of Antonio’s pawns as Michael goes after Antonio.
I can hear the skid of rubber-soled shoes as Antonio desperately tries to wrench me up, but I’m heavy. And he is obviously surprised.
I can feel it. There’s a change in his muscle tension, and the way he’s holding me, too. Though I managed to hide the fact that I made him dodge from Michael and Andrew, Antonio would know. He would have felt my magic.
So he’d understand who I am, right?
A part of me wants to know what he’ll do next. After all, I haven’t forgotten what kings do when other kings acquire queens. They go after them. They can’t afford to let their competitors retain so much force. So the hit them exactly where it hurts.
And that tells me one thing. Now Antonio knows, or at least strongly suspects I’m a queen, he should clamp that hand harder over my mouth and plain kill me.
He doesn’t. He continues to dodge, his hand pressed against my lips with the same grip. But two things change. His palm and fingers are covered in sweat now. He’s shaking slightly, too.
It’s clear he’s thinking desperately of a way to get out of here. Michael is not giving him the opportunity to think. Another grating growl splits through the air like thunder as Michael pivots on his foot and throws himself toward Antonio. Antonio tries to dodge, but just at the last moment, Michael somehow changes direction, rolls to the side, and kicks Antonio right in his knee. It’s a vicious move, and it sees Antonio lurch to the side. I can hear the pop and click of a tendon breaking.
Antonio screams as he lurches down to his knee. With his hand still clasped over my mouth, he takes me with him. It’s not just the momentum of his move. It’s the fact that my body seems to be attuned to him. Whatever kind of spell he’s casting on me, it isn’t just a containment spell – it’s a kind of control spell. Almost as if he’s getting ready to use me as a puppet.
And hey, maybe that’s exactly what he’s doing, because as he falls and clasps a hand on his knee in agony, he spreads his spare hand – the one that he didn’t use on me – forward.
Immediately my shoulders jostle, my knees click, and I stand.
I feel exactly like a puppet that’s just had its strings tugged.
If there’s one thing I can move, it’s my mouth, and by George do I force it to gape wide as I gasp. “What the hell?” I begin.
Nobody answers.
Antonio is still on the ground, still with his hand clamped desperately over his knee, but he suddenly ticks his finger to the side.
I find myself pivoting, scooping down, wrapping an arm forward, and launching myself at Michael. The next thing I know, I’m hauling him off his feet and tackling him to the ground.
“It’s a fucking control spell. Get a hold of yourself,” he snarls at me.
Before I can get a hold of myself, I feel my hand clenching into a fist. Magic races over it, and I’m not in control of how much it is or where it comes from.
The next thing I know, I slam it down toward Michael.
Michael has just a split second for his eyes to boggle wide, then he brings his hands up, shoves them forward, and catches my hand.
He has to use his entire body and all his strength to stop my hand from plowing into his chin.
Me?
I must look so damn comical.
Though my body is poised and pressed into action, my face is completely awash with total surprise.
“Get a hold of yourself. It’s a control spell, goddammit. Break it like you would snap a bone,” Michael spits.
Antonio has finally shoved to his feet.
I can see Andrew as he yanks his head toward him, but there’s nothing Andrew can do as Antonio’s four pawns keep going after him more frantically than ever.
When Antonio came across us, he said he had a secret weapon. And hell, this must be it. Because even though I try to break the spell like a bone, just as Michael told me, there’s nothing I can do. My hand rounds into another fist, and it slams back toward Michael.
He catches it again, but this time it’s a costly move; I can pretty much hear his muscles grinding like stone on stone as he uses all of his force to hold me in place.
He’s snarling, his teeth and lips covered in saliva. “Break the frigging spell. It’s in your mouth. Down your gullet. Grab hold of it and snap it.”
In my mouth?
For the first time since the fight began, I finally pay attention to my body.
And that, for a flickering second, makes me think of John – the last lesson he tried to teach me before I turned on him. He told me to throw myself into nature. He told me that of all the players, the queen is the most attuned to nature. That’s what makes her so powerful. Not only does she have the ability to align with nature, but she has the ability to read it. It allows her to learn spells much quicker than anyone else.
It allows her, most importantly, to tune into the natural order and to follow it.
I do that now. I plunge my awareness into my body, really letting it drive down my throat, through my mouth, across my neck.
It doesn’t take me long to feel… some kind of leash. An invisible noose that’s tied right around my throat. Though I can’t see it, I know it connects back to Antonio’s hand. And as he clutches his hand into a fist and shoves it forward once more, I do the same. My fist plows down toward Michael’s face.
Michael catches it one last time, but his arms start to buckle. “Break the damn spell. It’s in your throat. There should be an invisible leash. Grab hold of it and snap it.”
Grab hold of it and snap it….
I can feel it now. And, just as he said, I could grab hold and snap it easily like a dry bone.
Do I do that?
No.
Because I have to do this carefully, don’t I?
If I win, Antonio is dead. If I manage to break this spell, Michael will get to his feet, and he’ll end this.
So even though I could stop it, I don’t. As Antonio shoves his fist forward once more, I do the same, and this time, I put a little more of my own power into it.
There’s nothing Michael can do. Though he tries to catch my hand, it doesn’t matter, and my hand blasts right past his fingers. My fist sails into his jaw, and his head clicks to the side roughly, the back of his skull grating against the pavement.
His eyes have just a second to lock onto me, fill with suspicion, then roll into the back of his head.
“Shit,” Andrew screams.
“Finally,” Antonio breathes in relief as he takes a staggering step toward me, turns his hand to the side, and sends me toward Andrew.
Now. I break the spell.
And there’s an audible snap.
It’s like I’ve just jumped into a bucket of chicken bones.
And yeah, that’s just as horrible as it sounds.
I regain control of myself in a snap, fall down to my knee, and pivot.
I stare right at Antonio. Right into his damn expressive eyes.
And though mind-control and telepathy are two skills I have not acquired yet, I try to tell him with nothing but a look what to do – flee while he has the chance.
“Yes. You did it. Go after him. I’ve got these pawns,” Andrew manages, victory pulsing through his voice.
Antonio has a moment to stare at me, then he does it – he turns on his foot, and he flees.
Me?
I think.
I could go after him. Hell, I could follow him right back to John. I could fall down on my knee and beg him for forgiveness. I could explain what I’m doing. I could wait for him to understand. I could go back to my room and let this horrible game continue as I fall into John’s arms and ask him to protect me from it.
But none of that will work.
So I stand my ground.
I turn on my foot to help Andrew with the pawns, but that’s when they break away, obviously from a silent command from Antonio.
They climb up the walls before either of us can react.
That just leaves Andrew and me.
For several seconds, Andrew stands with his back arched and his head directed upward, obviously looking for more pawns and another attack.
It doesn’t come.
I walk over to Michael, get down on one knee, and check him.
There’s already a bruise appearing over his jaw.
I wince as Andrew joins me.
Andrew does that thing again with his neck, ticking his head from side to side as his eyes practically turn into pinballs. “He’ll be fine. It’ll take a while for him to wake up. And you probably don’t want to be there when he does.”
“What was that spell? I’ve never encountered anything like it.”
“You mean the control spell? Turns you into a doll.”
“Yeah, I got that. How the hell did he do it? I know Antonio,” I don’t flinch away from saying that, “and he doesn’t have that kind of power.”
The Last Queen Book Five Page 3