Forgotten Destiny 4

by Odette C. Bell

  I’d be taken off him.

  And I couldn’t do that to Josh McIntosh.

  So I concentrated with all my might, and I prayed. I was a sorcerer, and my finding magic made me peculiarly able to track down ways to increase my power. I suddenly reminded myself of that.

  So I turned my attention inward, setting my finding magic to spread through my body to find the strength I so desperately needed.

  … And it worked. In my stiff legs, in my locked knees, in my jaw and fingers. There was still strength. And where there was strength, there was magic.

  I pushed it into the spell I held, and finally, finally I felt my legs moving. I turned, my eyes still closed, and I started to stride down the aisles of case files. Though I’d only given this room a brief glance when we’d rushed inside, there wasn’t that much to see. It was just more of the same. It was a huge, cavernous room with a tall ceiling. It looked more like some kind of hangar for planes. It must also be the reason why we’d had to climb down such a long set of stairs to enter the basement. The ceiling was so high up, every step I took echoed like someone beating a drum.

  There were rows upon rows of metal shelves. They were all stacked with archive boxes, and peaking through the handle holes were neatly placed rows of files.

  I’d never seen a magical archive storeroom, but I’d expected it would be different to an ordinary file room. I expected the files would be held in ancient wooden boxes, or at least in some kind of sacred container to ensure the magical residue didn’t build up and do anything naughty.

  This room looked pretty ordinary.

  That’s when Josh suddenly jolted forward and yanked me back. “You’ve got to be careful – there are magical channels dug into the floor. Though I know you like to close your eyes when you’re following your finding magic, if you’re going to do that, keep hold of my arm,” he warned.

  I blinked my eyes open to see that he was right, and I’d been wrong. This was indeed an extraordinary filing room. Leading from every single shelf was a channel that had been dug into the stone floor. The channels darted this way and that, all leading toward the back of the room.

  “They pick up the excess magical discharge from the files, and funnel them to the magical battery in the back of the room,” Josh explained. “Don’t step on them. Considering what happened in the theater earlier, it will kick off one hell of a histamine reaction, and you’ll end up in hospital.”

  “Got it,” I said as I reached my arm out and hooked it around his.

  True to his word, Josh kept his arm firmly clasped around mine as he led me forward. I managed to close my eyes again and center my mind on my finding magic. Every time we reached another channel, Josh would squeeze my arm, and I would take a wide step over it.

  My finding magic led me toward the back of the room.

  Time was ticking down, and I could feel Josh’s tension as his arm stiffened. He didn’t say anything though – he just gave me the space to succeed.

  But could I succeed? Because I was feeling it too. The undeniable sensation that time was like water, and it was slipping through my cupped hands with no chance that I would ever be able to grasp it back.

  My fear threatened to cut through the effectiveness of my finding magic, but just before it could, I remembered what I was doing here. I pushed my mind into finding some way to use my fear to increase my power. I didn’t know if it was possible, but it was worth a shot.

  Though it didn’t happen immediately, I started to… get the sense that I couldn’t control my fear, but I could funnel it toward my heart.

  That sounded crazy, right? Pulling fear into your heart sounded like giving up.

  It wasn’t.

  Though it forced me to feel the gut-shaking sensations of fright all the more – until they were practically too much to endure – at the same time, it increased my magic. That’s what fear was for, wasn’t it? In an ordinary human, fear was there to activate your adrenaline, to get your body ready to flee or fight.

  I embraced that power now, even if it left a slick of sweat prickling across my brow and made my heart beat with all the banging ferocity of somebody shaking a can full of coins.

  I walked faster now, and Josh kept up, continually squeezing my arm when we came to a channel.

  Finally I felt we were nearing something.

  And it was just in time. I was keeping a scrap of my attention continually locked on the opportunity that we could get out of here, and it was narrowing, almost as if someone had a stranglehold on it.

  Finally we stopped in front of a set of shelves. I felt my hand reach up, and the next thing I knew, I clasped hold of an archive box and yanked it forward.

  “Whoa,” Josh said as he darted in and grabbed the box before it could fall. “You have to be careful with magical archive boxes. They could have your hand off in an instant,” he muttered as his own hands charged with yellow-green magic.

  I blinked my eyes open, finally dropping my arms as I stared at Josh. “Do we have it?” Everything about me shook, from my hands, to my gaze, to my voice.

  Josh looked at me out of the corner of his eye as he sat the box down on the floor, careful not to let it rest over any of the channels of discharging magic. “That’s a question I should be asking you. But I trust you, Beth.” He paused as he carefully opened the lid of the archive box, simultaneously muttering something under his breath that must’ve been a spell to placate the magic within.

  I stood above him nervously, my hands becoming cloying with sweat.

  Josh leafed through the various manila folders in the archive box until his fingers visibly stiffened.

  “You have it,” I managed, knowing I was right.

  Wordlessly, Josh pulled out the file and held it in shaking hands. He looked up at me, and his expression seemed to be riven right down the middle. It was a perfect mix of fear and yet triumph. “We have it,” he said through a breath. “Beth, you found it,” he added as his voice shook with pride. “It was filed in the wrong place, and if you hadn’t found it…” Josh trailed off.

  His emotion was changing. From every microsecond to every microsecond. It felt as if he was living his past on fast forward. I felt the loss of him losing his sister then instantaneously the joy of him finding this.

  I stood above him wordlessly, watching like a guard.

  With his hands still shaking and a few tears shimmering in his eyes, Josh began to search through the case file. But that’s when I looked up sharply. You know before how I’d said it felt as if somebody had their hands around our time, and they were strangling it?

  Yeah, well whoever they were, they were here.

  There was a bang from the door.

  It was over.

  Chapter 9

  I jolted backward, gasping and clamping a hand over my mouth.

  Josh swung his head toward the door. It was far away in this cavernous room, but that didn’t stop another bang from echoing out.

  “Shit, we have to get out of here,” Josh said as he carefully closed the file, hooked it under one arm, crammed the lid onto the box, and shoved it back on the shelf. He took a step back, twisting his head from side to side as he obviously gazed at the shelf.

  At first I didn’t realize what he was doing, then when he flicked a faint spell toward the dust lining the shelf until it covered the archive box once more, I realized what was going on. He was covering our tracks.

  When he was satisfied, he turned hard on his foot and shoved me in the shoulder. “Look for a way out of here. Any opportunity. You are our only hope now, Beth.”

  That was a hell of a lot to put on my shoulders. Though I’d been increasing my magic through the judicious use of my fear, there was only so far I could go before I needed a rest. And I really, really needed to rest.

  But I sure as hell wasn’t going to get one.

  I didn’t know these courtrooms, but suddenly that didn’t matter as an impression of what Josh had told me before sprang to mind. I started to follow the ch
annels, twisting this way and that through the aisles as I tracked them toward the back of the room.

  “Where are you going?” Josh managed through a tight breath.

  “You mentioned something about these channels emptying out into a battery. I… I hope it will lead to a way out of here.”

  “Hope?”

  “Do you have anything better?” I snapped.

  “Sure don’t. Follow your finding nose, Beth. I’m right behind you.”

  I did as I was told, leading us toward the far wall. Sure enough, Josh was right, and the channels of white blue magic led to it. Though the far wall was made of stone and was undecorated, the point where the channels of magic emptied into was decoration enough. Sparks discharged around it, and the sheer light of that much magic was otherworldly.

  I skidded down to my knees as I reached the final channel, and before Josh could pull me back and stop me from plowing headfirst into it, I locked a hand on the wall to steady myself.

  I brought my face close to the channel, ignoring the urge to scratch my skin raw as my magical reaction started up again.

  “Are you really sensing an opportunity here?” Josh challenged just as there was another epic bang.

  He winced, turned in the direction of the door, clenched his teeth, and started to mutter something through them. Though I still didn’t know everything about warlock magic, I knew enough to appreciate that he was checking in on his wall spell to see how many more attacks it could withstand.

  I got my answer when he swore harshly. “We’ve got a minute, tops. I don’t know who’s out there, but judging by the fact they managed to get through one of my most powerful spells in a little under a minute and a half, it’s probably a frigging army. So move,” Josh demanded.

  “Oh God,” I muttered. I was following my finding magic, and it was telling me to do something plain stupid. It wanted me to shove my hand into the channel of magic.

  “Oh God what? Beth—” Josh began.

  With a powerful wince, I squeezed my eyes closed, allowing what magic I had to spring protectively over my hand, and then I did it. I shoved my fingers into the channel of magic.

  It was categorically one of the most horrible and yet strangest experiences of my life. Instantly my magical reaction went into overdrive, making my skin feel as if it had been flayed for hours.

  I gasped and shuddered, but I kept my hand pushed against the magic.

  “Beth!” Josh got down to his own knees and began to wrap an arm around my shoulders to pull me back.

  “No – there’s a latch down here,” I stuttered.

  There better be a latch down here. Otherwise I had just put myself through hell for nothing.

  Just before I could doubt my finding magic, my fingers snagged on something. The sensations in my hand were going into overdrive. It was like my nervous system didn’t know how to react to the excess magic. I felt as if I was cold and hot and frozen and burnt. As if I was holding onto a knife and yet a feather. Nothing made sense, and yet, I was aware as my fingers snagged a cold piece of metal.

  I grabbed hold of it and yanked.

  The door far off at the front of the room exploded. I knew it exploded because instantly the magical shield that Josh had cast in place ended with a crackle. I jerked my head to the side to see that blue sheet of power flicker and disappear from all the walls and floor and ceiling.

  “Dammit,” Josh spat under his breath, his desperation obvious.

  There was no need to despair, though. As soon as I pulled the latch, something started to happen to the magical channels. They froze in place, almost as if somebody had covered them with liquid nitrogen.

  “What—” Josh had the time to say.

  “Warning,” an electronic voice suddenly blasted through the room. “The battery has been set to emergency discharge. Shields will be erected around the room. All personnel in the room are to remain where they are, or they will be disintegrated. Warning, batteries have been set to discharge,” the voice repeated.

  I did not stay still. Instead, I shoved toward a hole that was opening in the wall just above the point where the magic disappeared through.

  “Beth.” Josh sounded as if he would explode.

  I wrapped a hand around his wrist and tugged him forward. “It’s an opportunity,” I managed.

  “For what?”

  “Warning, 10 seconds until the battery discharges. 10, 9, 8—”

  “Beth!”

  “… Why is this an opportunity?” I had time to question.

  “It isn’t. You’re going to get us killed. That magical discharge will be able to blast through anything—”

  “That’s it! Get ready to cast a portal spell.”

  “What?”

  “3 seconds, 2 seconds—”

  “Shit.” Josh shoved forward, and it was his turn to wrap a hand around my waist. I felt him charge with magic. In the second we had left, I felt Josh use every last scrap of power he had.

  He didn’t even bother to chant anything under his breath; he just shunted forward, right at the magical battery as it was revealed.

  That hole in the wall opened all the way to reveal a huge glowing ball set back from the stone. It was pulsing with pure white force.

  Josh reached it, saying a single word under his breath just as the battery started to blaze like a flare.

  He reached forward and touched it.

  And then he opened the portal.

  We didn’t sink through it – it wrapped around us and seemed to yank us out of reality.

  I’d portalled before, but this time was different. I would never feel anything like this again. Simultaneously, as the portal spell grabbed hold of us, I swore I was torn apart by the discharging magic.

  It was almost as if I had a moment to pick whether I wanted to live or die – to choose if I wanted my mind to remain back there with the battery, or with Josh in his portal spell.

  I chose to live. At least for another day.

  Chapter 10

  I landed face-first on the carpet in the living room.

  My body slammed into the rug with such force, I hit my nose, and it started to bleed. But a bleeding nose was the least of my problems right now.

  Magic was blazing over me, burning my skin and singeing my hair.

  I screamed.

  I heard a thump as Josh arrived beside me.

  He jerked toward me. “Beth!”

  I felt the magic trying to eat me, trying to pull my flesh from my bones.

  “Beth!” Josh got down on his knees and reached toward me, but as soon as he settled his hands on my back, he screamed and jerked them back.

  I… felt like I was being torn in half.

  Torn in half over and over again. I shrieked at the top of my lungs.

  Though pain completely owned me, I still recognized where we’d arrived. Home. We were in the living room.

  And that’s when I heard thundering footsteps. Somebody reached the closed door and yanked it open.

  Before they entered, I knew who they were. I felt a hand reaching through time and clasping hold of my shoulder. It pushed me forward. Don’t ask how I could force my muscles to move considering what they were going through, but I jerked up, my arms opening wide just as somebody got down to one knee and wrapped their own arms around me.

  “You’re overcharged. You have to discharge excess magic into me. Open up. Now,” Jason spat.

  I wanted to sink into his arms and give into the unconsciousness threatening to take hold of me.

  I wanted the pain to end.

  I wanted—

  “There’s a door in your heart, sorcerer. There’s a door in every sorcerer’s heart. Open it. Let your magic go. Or it will kill you,” Jason begged.

  … A door in my heart?

  A door in every sorcerer’s heart?

  I….

  “Come on, Beth. You can do it,” Josh said.

  I reacted to his voice – to his shaking plea – more than I reacted to Jason.r />
  I plunged my mind into my heart, and somehow I found the door Jason was talking of. I thrust it open.

  Just before the magic could completely burn me to a crisp, I let go of it.

  I felt it flow out of me with all the ease of exhaling air.

  I continued to shake, but Jason wrapped his arms around me harder. With one pressed-open eye, I watched as white charges of magic flowed from me and crackled over Jason’s shirt. They reacted to the fabric, singeing it, but then they reached the skin beneath. They sank into his flesh without burning it. Instead, Jason’s rainbow-colored magic seemed to absorb the excess magic readily.

  I don’t know how long it took. I don’t think my mind could grasp hold of a concept as simple as time anymore. My consciousness kept slipping in and out.

  … In and out.

  “Beth,” I heard Jason say by my ear as he plucked me up. “You’re very injured. I’m going to try to cast a healing spell on you. It will stop your skin from being permanently disfigured. You just need to relax.”

  “Do as he says, Beth,” Josh said, his voice choked.

  I felt Jason carry me over to the couch and rest me down on it.

  I… didn’t feel like I was resting on a couch, though. As unconsciousness still swept around me, like arms beckoning me into an ever-black void, I… felt my feet standing on stone.

  I felt my hands locked on a parapet.

  And I could almost see a storm pressing in from above.

  “… Beth… concentrate… receive,” I picked up Jason’s words, but they were patchy.

  My consciousness was slipping….

  I could feel the hand on my shoulder once more. It was stronger than ever. “You must survive – survive to finally beat the chaos. You must find all seven grimoire sets and destroy them. It is the only way to ensure peace. If the seven sets are allowed to continue to exist, they will only ever bring disaster.”

  I was fully back in my vision now, not even aware of my broken, burnt body on the couch.