by Jen Pretty
"I could make her come back," he said.
"What?" I asked, suddenly suspicious of the young man. He had a hatred for vampires that were born and bred into him like the oldest vampires still held onto.
"I think I could, with Colvin's help, maybe."
I bit my lip and glanced back at her. I would never force her to do anything. But we didn't know if she was stuck there. Or if she was doing something important. I shook my head. "No, we'll wait."
Oban shrugged, then turned and left.
"Hey, wait," I said. I caught up to him and walked beside him down the hall. "How are you settling in?"
"Okay. Classes are boring."
I chuckled. "I remember."
"You went to school here?"
"Yeah, I was born at the end of the war. It was expected."
"That would suck."
I bit back the laugh that wanted to bubble out. He had been picking up some lingo from the other kids but hadn't quite realized that telling a vampire that something sucked was a bit different than a witch or warlock or a human, for that matter. Not that he had to worry about humans at the Sanctuary.
Alar came around the corner ahead of us, and Oban immediately spun on his heel and muttered his goodbye. I assumed he was skipping class, but avoiding the principal was a sure sign that was exactly what he had been doing.
"Bye," I said in a low voice.
Alar looked up from the papers he was staring at and rolled his eyes as he glared at Oban's back, retreating down the hall.
"That boy, I swear," Alar said. He stepped in front of me and came to a stop. "I'm going to have to get Falcor to talk to him again."
"Again?" I asked.
"Falcor is the only person that can get through to him. If he didn't need to be here so badly, I'd send him to stay with his brother."
"Yeah, He needs this place right now," I agreed. Being around vampires would help him accept us. I was glad that Falcor agreed. Oban had too much power to be allowed to keep his prejudice.
"How is she?" Alar asked.
I sighed. "The same."
Alar's hand clapped down on my shoulder and squeezed in solidarity. I may have been worried about Alar and Selena's relationship when he first arrived, but in the last few weeks had been more than enough to show me how ridiculous that was.
"She'll be back when she's ready."
I nodded. But Oban's words kept running through my mind. If he and Falcor could bring her back, maybe that was for the best. But what would it mean?
"I wish I knew if she was okay," I admitted.
"We all do."
I thought about telling him what Oban had said, but I decided against it. I would wait. We would all wait. She was fine.
"She is fine," I said, my voice sounding much surer than I felt.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
The next weeks passed in a blur. The vampires had all heard what Falcor did in the forest. How he had saved me. It was the thing that had finally broken through the battle lines and soothed the friction between my vampires and his witches and warlocks. It helped that it was a witch he had fought, proving him worthy as the king of Warlocks and witches. Though I had never doubted him.
I watched him now as he visited with Oban. His younger brother was finally settling into the school, but his control of magic was less than stellar. I'd witnessed him funneling magic into Selena and Crow in the forest that day and couldn't help but worry he had done something to her.
"Hey, Nick!" Colvin called out from behind me. I spun to find him heading my way, with his friend Gracie bouncing along beside him. They were inseparable, except for the week they were both grounded for running away from the school. That was long behind us, though. Colvin had regained his happy outlook since Gracie had been saved and was back to the outspoken, busy kid he had been before. His magic had also returned. But with a vengeance.
"Ouch," I said as he slipped his hand into mine and a spark of that magic flicked from him to me like static on a wool sweater, straight from the drier.
He giggled. "Sorry!"
He didn't look too sorry but changed the subject promptly.
"Are you going to town?"
I had been planning to go into the city and visit with Falcor for a few days but had been working so hard on bringing new vampire laws into place that I kept putting it off. Falcor had left his family home in favour of a mansion on a hill not far from the Sanctuary. It made sense, now that he and I were working together so often.
"I was thinking about it. Did you want to come?"
Colvin nodded.
"Me too!" Gracie said, slipping her fingers into Colvin's other hand, so we took up most of the hall. The hall was thankfully emptying as students were rushing into classes.
"Maybe after school," I said, giving them both a look. Selena would kill us all if she came back and Colvin was behind on homework.
Colvin's face dropped, but he let go of my hand and jogged with Gracie to their classroom.
My cell rang just as I got past all the classrooms. I pulled it out of my pocket and found Falcor's name on the screen.
"It's my hero!" I swooned into the phone.
"Oh, fuck off," he griped back. I chuckled and pushed open the door to Selena's room. The sight of her, pale and silent, always struck me as wrong, but I couldn't help coming to talk to her a few times every day.
"What's up?" I asked, plopping down in the chair in the corner of Selena's room where I could keep an eye on her.
"We might have a little problem," he said.
"What's that?" I asked.
"Oban ran off."
I rolled my eyes. "Did you insist he complete his studies again?" Oban had been objecting to learning anything new since Falcor ripped him out of that book. It was like he was stuck developmentally. Though he hadn't attacked a vampire in weeks.
"No, I had been only teaching him to use his magic, which he didn't seem as opposed to as history and English and Math. But I have him on camera last night, stealing a car from the garage and then driving off, right through the security gate."
"Who taught him to drive?" I asked.
"It was one of his rewards for completing his assignments. A very foolish reward."
"I'd say."
"Thanks. Anyway, I need some help looking for him.
"Sure, I can send some vamps--"
"Probably better if we don't alert the vampires at large that my vampire hating brother is on the loose."
I shook my head and rose to my feet. I would have to leave Colvin behind this time, he would be very disappointed, but I couldn't hunt down a rogue wizard with a kid in tow.
"Alright, I'll be there in an hour."
"Thanks. And Nick, maybe don't tell Alar either."
"Roger that." Alar had been adamantly against Oban leaving the school. I stood up for Falcor, so both of us would get an 'I told you so' from the principal of the Sanctuary.
I leaned over Selena's ghostly form and pressed a kiss into her forehead. As I straightened, a soft knock at the door pulled my attention away from her.
"Mind if I come in?" Alar asked.
"Sure," I said, stepping away from Selena.
Alar took my place for a moment, staring down at her still body. "I can still feel a connection to her," he said.
All the air left my lungs in a rush. I felt nothing from Selena now. Even with our connection, it was as if she was dead, and only my faith was keeping her alive in my mind.
"Can you tell if she's okay?"
The door banged open, and a swirl of blue filled the room as Oban came rushing in.
I put myself between him and Selena instinctively, though he had never shown any desire to hurt her. "We have to bring her back," he said, his magic growing and flying around the room.
Alar stepped forward and placed a hand on Oban's shoulder.
"What are you talking about? Just calm down, and we can talk about what’s going on."
Oban's magic still swirled around, looking for all the world like Selena's. It was
like she was there in the room, but I just couldn't see her.
Then a wraith appeared beside Oban. A woman dressed fully in white clothes that looked old fashioned. It took me a moment to realize she was a wraith. I had never seen one without Selena or Colvin around, but the edges of her seemed not quite whole. They wavered slightly.
"Don't listen to him," she said. "He doesn't know what he's talking about."
"The dead have already risen!" Oban said, flinging his magic at the wraith. "We have to send them back!"
Selena had told me about the history of her blade and the danger of the witch killing her, but we had the blade. I had it hidden away where no one would find it until Selena returned. It was impossible.
"The dead haven't risen,” the wraith continued. “But they will if you allow this child to drag Selena back before she has set things right."
"She lies!" Oban screamed.
Suddenly new magic entered the room, followed immediately by Colvin. The little boy's whole body glittered with his magic as he pulled Oban's power out of the air like a vacuum.
"Stop," the boy said, his voice calm. "You’ll not change the outcome like this."
"What are you talking about?" I said, frantic to get everyone to calm down and tell me what the hell was happening.
"She is fighting the battle she was born to fight," the wraith said. "Soon, there will be no need to call upon the crow. Soon either the end will come… or the beginning will begin again."
"Lies!" Oban screamed before launching himself at the wraith. She vanished a moment before Oban touched her, and I finally moved. I slammed down onto Oban as he hit the ground and pinned him there. His magic filtered through me in a rush of power that had the room spinning, but I only had to hold him for a moment before another presence arrived. Someone must have called Falcor because he appeared in the room and began chanting, his voice deep and swirling like thick molasses.
I was caught up in the rapture until Falcor's hand reached out and touched Oban's cheek. The young man stopped struggling, his magic cut off instantly, and he dropped into a boneless heap.
I rose to my feet, looking down at Oban, where he lay as if asleep.
"What the fuck is going on?" I asked everyone and no one in particular.
"It's the end times," Colvin said. He crossed the room, weaving between people to sit at the side of his sister. He took her hand in his and brought it to his lips. "She will bring an end to the crows and the birth of a new pair if she is successful."
"And if she fails?" Alar asked, grabbing my attention away from the boy who suddenly seemed much too old for the small body he wore.
"If she fails, we all fail," he said, then he kissed Selena's cheek and walked out of the room as if it was an ordinary day.
"What does that mean?" I asked, my tone almost begging someone to fill me the fuck in.
"That we pray," Falcor said before he set his hand on his brother’s shoulder, and they shifted away again.
My eyes were dragged back to Selena. Like magnets, the same as the first time I laid eyes on her that day that Falcor had brought her into our lives. "We pray," I whispered.
"To every God who has ever been worshiped," Alar said. Then he left too, leaving me alone with the one soul who matched my own. The one light which lit the darkness for the entire world but also shone so bright she blinded me.
"We pray," I whispered, dropping to my knees for the first time in all my life. I lowered my forehead to the sheets that covered Selena's lifeless body, and that's exactly what I did.
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Six for Gold Copyright © 2017 by Author Name. All Rights Reserved.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
Cover designed by Lilly Dormishev-lavola
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Jen Pretty
Visit my website at www.jenprettyauthor.com
Printed in the United States of America
First Printing: dec 2020
ISBN- 978-1-989798-11-9