Shadow Mage: (Witchling Wars: Luxra Echelon, Book 1)

by Shawn Knightley

  “Kayla? Kayla, are you there?” Fiona’s voice panicked on the other end of the line.

  I placed the phone back on my ear. “Book me a flight. I’ll be home soon. I don’t want to be here any longer than I need to be.”

  “Wait, Kayla-”

  I ended the call. There was nothing more to say. I couldn’t repeat the events that happened. I couldn’t even understand them myself. The way the world around me moved without seeing me, how I saw my own death, dark smokey beings that descended from the ceiling, and the way my body glowed in some weird radiant blue light. None of it made sense.

  I huddled on my hospital bed and held my knees over my chest, shaking at the thought that I would have to remember every single moment of it until the day I died.

  I let the hot tears slide down my nose and onto the sheets beneath me. The nurse would come in again soon to check on me. To tell me what a lucky girl I was. That the hospital had never seen such a miracle. That I might be blessed or that my guardian angel was standing at my side the whole time. I couldn’t listen to it anymore. It wasn’t angels standing beside me. It was something else entirely. Something dark. Something unholy. Something that wanted to watch my pain as I slid into the arms of death without any hope to return. It was evil. And I wasn’t one to throw that word around for no good reason.

  Someone moved in the room. The nurse was probably bringing me my lunch. They had me on a diet of nothing but liquids since the previous night when I showed that I could handle keeping things in my stomach. I didn’t want to drink a whole can of beef broth again. Even the strawberry flavored Popsicle didn’t sound appealing.

  I opened my eyes to see that the room had gotten darker. Had the nurse moved the curtain over the window?

  No. That curtain faced the doorway to my opposite side so people couldn’t see in as they walked by. My sliver of privacy as I wept for the last twelve hours wouldn’t protect me. Not after I realized what was in the room with me. It wasn’t Nurse Ashley.

  My heart raced inside my chest. The heart monitor lit up with lights once I sat up and saw the same shadows descending from the ceiling. They crawled over the tiles and drifted a few feet from my bed. They didn’t form human shapes. They just lingered there like pillars of smoke. Electrical energy filled the air.

  I thrashed my head to the side. The smokey figure struck me right in the face. I let out a yelp and reached my hand to my cheek. The wicked thing split it right open. I nearly screamed for the nurse when another from the opposite side hit me again. Only this time I didn’t fall to the other side of the hospital bed. I rolled right off the side and crashed into the hard floor.

  The tube of the IV snapped off and the needle ripped out of my skin. I gathered my arm in my hand and looked down at the wound from the IV. It looked like something had ripped right into my arms and exposed my vein.

  Blood didn’t come out. The wound glowed bright blue. The pain disappeared. I held my hand over the wound. The same light pierced through the skin over my cheek.

  I looked up at the figure drifting over me. Whatever it was, it meant to harm me. I might have witnessed my death and come back to life but it came at a price. The beings I saw on the other side didn’t disappear along with my near-death experience. They were here to stay. And they wanted to hurt me.

  I scrambled into the wall and cradled my legs up against my chest with my head in my hands. The sound the beings made was deafening. They screeched at the top of their lungs. I could feel my eardrums begging for relief. I slammed my hands up against my ears and tried to dull the pain. It did nothing to help me.

  Another slash. This time it came down at my left arm. The same thing happened again. The wound glowed a bright cobalt blue color. Almost like my blood had changed color. Only my blood didn’t come pouring out. Nothing did.

  ‘I’m going insane. That’s the only explanation.’

  My head hurt from the effort of trying to stop the screeching from entering my ears. I gave up and grabbed onto the sheets of the bed and eventually got my fingers around the plastic side rail. I could stand on my own. I was wobbly and definitely needed to take my time but I might be able to walk.

  I held onto the railing and got to the far end of the bed. The shadows followed me. I couldn’t stand it anymore. I screamed for Nurse Ashley. My voice seemed to echo from the walls and come right back at me, taunting my hallow effort to cry for help.

  I didn’t have a choice. I had to run for it.

  I stumbled over to the door. To my amazement, my legs carried me there. I eyed the nurse’s desk outside my room. I had to get there and tell Nurse Ashley what was going on. That I needed some kind of psychiatric evaluation. This had to be an effect of shock. Of everything I experienced and the trauma of losing my friends. I was having a mental breakdown.

  One of the shadows struck at me again. I reared my head back. This time the slash went down the length of my back. I cried out and bolted for the nurse’s station. I leaned up against it and searched all around me. No one was there. They must have been doing rounds or changing shifts.

  ‘I have to find one!’

  I tested my limits and let go of the desk. I could stand on my own. My head was dizzy and I didn’t look like a beauty queen walking over a stage but I could at least get around. I started by walking. Then when I heard the shadows moving over me once more I ran. My arms pumped by my sides, helping propel me forward. I managed to go down the hallway and turn a corner when I hit something hard. One of the nurses went flying back and crashed into the tile floor. A machine she was rolling about to help her chart vitals fell down to the ground. The glass screen shattered and sent shards tumbling down the hall.

  She sat up and studied me for a second as if I had lost my mind.

  ‘Yes. Yes, I have.’

  The nurse gathered herself up and immediately came to my side. “What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing? Are you alright?”

  I whimpered as she helped me up. “I’m cut!”

  She took my face into her hands.

  “What are you talking about? I don’t see any blood. Where are you bleeding?”

  My face twisted. How could she possibly not see the gashes running down my skin? She had my face in her hands. Couldn’t she see the gash over my cheek?

  I wasn’t steady anymore.

  Her arm came around my waist as my legs gradually lost strength.

  “You shouldn’t be out of bed. Why were you running?”

  The shadows crawled over the floor. The nurse turned me around to take me back to my room. My belly cramped at the sight of the shadows drawing closer. If the nurse took me back they would only attack me again.

  “No!” I lightly whimpered. I was too weak to push her away and too frightened to go back. “Let me go!”

  “You need help, dearest. I can give you something to help you relax.”

  The thought of more drugs in my system made my stomach cramp even harder.

  The shadows loomed over the walls and floated over the ceiling. They were going to rain down over both of us.

  I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t go back.

  “No!” I hollered, bringing both my hands around her arm and trying to yank them away.

  She screamed. Out of all the reactions I might have expected her to have from an unruly patient that wasn’t one of them.

  I fell to the floor the second her arms weren’t there to help support me. It wasn’t until I was already on the ground and I looked up that I saw what happened. A radiant blue light was piercing through both my hands. It cast her away and threw her into the wall directly to my right. She slammed up against a printed picture of the Scottish Highlands hanging on the wall. It fell to the ground only inches away from the machine I destroyed. But only after it struck the nurse right over the head, knocking her unconscious.

  I stared at my hands. The glowing light over my skin grew brighter. I had to squint just to keep seeing what was going on.

  The shadows descended from the ceiling,
coming in for what I could only imagine was a final attack. I raised both my hands in the air to protect myself. The shadows screeched their ungodly earth-shattering sound and darted across the hall. They moved so fast that I didn’t even know what I had done to frighten them off. The electrical energy in the hospital lifted. The gray darkness disappeared.

  ‘I’m not safe. I can’t stay here.’

  I took one hard look at the unconscious nurse, hoping I didn’t hurt her too badly. Then I ran. I ran as fast as my legs could take me. Which wasn’t very fast. I leaned up against the wall, trying to hold onto it as if there was an invisible rail that I couldn’t see. When I finally reached the elevator I slammed my palm into the button to get it to come up. Only the light was still penetrating through my skin. The button shattered into a hundred pieces the second my hand touched it. Almost like I slammed a hammer right into the plastic.

  There was only one other way out. The stairs. I could barely walk or run and I was going to have to use the stairs.

  ‘Crawl. Just crawl down them.’

  I lowered myself only to fall halfway. A sharp pain jolted up from my tail bone. I let my body down step by step like an infant first learning how stairs work. After sliding down the last steps of the floor onto the landing between the staircases I already had enough. I gripped onto the railing and held tight as I walked down each step. I glanced over the side to the final floor below. I was on the fourth floor. Six sets of stairs and three more landings to go.

  I sucked in a deep breath and latched onto the railing the entire time. When I finally got down I was greeted by yet another hallway. I had no idea how to get around the hospital. But I had been inside enough of them to know that they could easily turn into a maze. If I ran into another nurse or a doctor they would see me in my hospital gown and force me to go back to my room. I couldn’t go back there. The shadows would do a full-on assault. And I didn’t even know what I had done to stop them.

  My hands weren’t glowing anymore. In my rush to get down the stairs as safely as I could manage I didn’t see them stop glowing.

  I heard voices in the distance. I darted through a door to my right and shut it as fast as possible, waiting for whoever was coming to disappear. When I turned around to look at where I was I sighed in relief. It was some sort of nurse’s lounge. And there was a long beige coat hanging from a rack within reach. I grabbed it and wrapped it around my body, making sure to button it up all the way so I’d look halfway normal even though I didn’t have shoes on.

  The only person I could imagine looking at my feet would be my sister. She always had her head buried in a fashion magazine.

  ‘No one else will notice.’

  When I heard footsteps going up the stairs I creaked the door open. When they weren’t in sight and no one else was coming down the hall, I let myself out and refused to grab onto the wall again. I stood up straight, tested the waters of my balance, and walked with a quickened step. No one looked at me as I navigated the hospital, looking for signs that would lead me to the nearest exit. The best I managed to do was to find a door to the doctor’s parking garage outside.

  The harsh cold air struck my face the second I was outside. The gashes over my skin burned like a son of a bitch. I grit my teeth and forced my way out. I didn’t know where I was going. I didn’t even know how to get back to my residence. I only knew that I had to get away from the hospital. That was where I first saw the shadows. For all I knew they lurked there around the people with near-death experiences.

  The pavement stung my bare feet. Asphalt brushing up against the soles of my feet wasn’t the most pleasant feeling in the world but it beat the screeching of those shadowy beings.

  I found the opening where cars were coming in and walked through it to get out of the parking garage. It wasn’t until the sun hit my skin and blinded my eyesight that I noticed what was going on. The cold wasn’t irritating it. Only the gashes ripped open. The sun warmed me. In the middle of a Scottish spring. There was no way possible that could happen. I lifted my hands. They didn’t feel the harsh bite of the winter air. I was warm. Not a single goose-bump rolled over my pale skin.

  I made a vain attempt to block the harsh rays of the sun. Never had it been so bright. And the strangest part was the overcast sky. It had to be because I was inside for so long. My eyes needed to adjust. I fought through the haze of bright light and fog, searching for the sidewalk so I could get back to my residence.

  I was knocked several feet in the air. My arms and legs dangled all around me as I fished for something solid. There was nothing except gravity pulling me back down to the concrete. When I saw it looming several feet below me I realized what I had done. I accidentally wandered into the street. A car speeding by hit me and I went flying into the air.

  I just managed to escape the hospital and now I was about to get so badly hurt that I’d end up right back in one.

  My knees tightened, my feet searched for the ground beneath me, and my hands extended out with my palms facing down. The same weird blue light exploded from my palms. I was slowing down. My feet gracefully touched the ground like I was some sort of angelic being setting foot on the earth with wings behind my back. The light spread over the concrete and swirled about my limbs until I was safe from the danger of smashing into the concrete.

  When I looked up I saw a man inside the car. He removed his glasses from his face and got out. His eyes reflected exactly what I felt. A state of complete disbelief.

  The cobalt blue light turned into a darker shade of sapphire before absorbing back into my body. It was gone as quickly as it appeared.

  I turned around and ran. My legs didn’t fail me this time around. I sped over the grass and out of the hospital parking area. I didn’t look back to see if the driver was chasing me or just staring at me like he had witnessed something completely impossible. I didn’t want to know. I just wanted to escape.

  I was left with only one conclusion to latch onto as I moved forward with unrelenting force. There was something evil going on in that hospital. And when I died on the operating table, I triggered it. As long as I was there, it would try to hurt me. I had to get home.

  ‘Fiona better have that flight booked for me. Otherwise, I’m buying a ticket right away.’

  6

  Two and a half hours, four near misses from traffic, dozens of stares from onlookers later, and somehow I was back at my residence. My feet were covered in mud from walking through grass, over the stains of beer from the sidewalk lining various pubs, and dirt from the endless boots tracking all over the sidewalks. Even so, I wasn’t cold. My feet didn’t feel the chill from the stones beneath me, my body didn’t shiver from the brutal Scottish wind, and weirdest of all, the sun was still blinding me.

  I held my hand up over my forehead to shield my eyes. They wouldn’t adjust no matter how hard I tried. Tears ran down my face countless times just from the effort of trying to keep my eyes open enough not to unknowingly walk onto a busy street again.

  I must have looked like some sort of addict. A homeless person who had lost their way along with their mind. Not far from the truth given my home was thousands of miles away and I was definitely experiencing some sort of mental break.

  The door to my residence stood right before me. I could see my reflection in the glass door lined with heavy black beams. I looked like I had gone off-roading in an open vehicle over a mud drenched swamp after a fresh rain.

  My hand unconsciously wandered down to the pocket of the coat. My key fob to get in wasn’t there. It was probably in a garbage waste site along with whatever else was left of the demolished car that took us to the night club.

  I waited until some students came around the corner and used their key fob to get in. Then I veered my head away from security and anyone else that might recognize me. Not that I was particularly recognizable. My hair was matted to the point of almost looking straight, my face was paler than the lightest sea shell I had ever seen, and I could barely open my eyes all the way
. The instant I was inside I breathed a sigh of relief. The sun was no longer intruding on my vision. After only a few seconds of walking in, I could see again. That didn’t stop me from keeping my hand up over my face so no one could recognize me. I didn’t want to see anyone, I didn’t want to get asked a thousand questions about the accident, and I certainly wasn’t ready for the site I was about to see when I walked by the student lounge.

  A large memorial was sitting toward the back right behind the pool table. It was lined with photographs of Annette, Emily, Caitlyn, and even a few of me posing with Annette before we went out together. Candles lined the outside rim of a cross sitting directly below the images. Five students were gathered around it, holding each other and trying to choke back tears.

  I swallowed hard and kept my face down. All there was left to do was to get to my room, pack up my things, and call a cab to the airport. I wanted out of this country. Out of this situation. Out of everything that followed catastrophic events. I wanted to grieve alone without countless students asking me if I was alright. I needed to cry in private where I wouldn’t be expected to join in on the funeral services. I needed my own space to process everything that happened. Even if I had to force my way into getting it.

  I entered the lift and kept my face down, hidden from the two other guys on the lift.

  “Sleep through your alarm, did you?” One snickered at me when he spotted my muddy bare feet. “Wait…” His voice deepened and he took a closer look at me. “It’s you! You’re one of the girls from the accid-”

  The bell to the lift dinged and I let myself off in a rush, refusing to even look in their direction. There was one problem standing between me and getting the hell out of there. My lack of a key to my room. I tried my luck in vain and jiggled the door handle. It didn’t budge. But the light inside my palm did. It zapped the shit out of my hand. I jerked it back and saw a spark light up the dim hallway. The knob’s latch made a clicking sound.