by Ella Summers
Shadow Magic
Dragon Born Alexandria: Book 4
Ella Summers
SHADOW MAGIC
Dragon Born Alexandria
Book 4
Copyright © 2021
Version: 2021.08.10
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Contents
Story Summary
Preface
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Epilogue
Author’s Note
Books by Ella Summers
Reading Order: Dragon Born Series
About the Author
Story Summary
“Things used to be so much simpler, back when the Magic Council wanted me dead.”
Once considered an abomination of magic, Dragon Born mage Alex Dering has spent most of her life concealing what she is from the world’s other supernaturals. But now, finally, she and all the other Dragon Born are free.
Freedom is not all it’s cracked up to be.
Between the untimely return of a sinister, long-lost enemy, and Alex’s impending final battle with a centuries-old organization of supernatural haters, she is in desperate need of allies. Unfortunately, the allies she was counting on, the world’s most powerful magic dynasties, have chosen this exact moment to collapse into civil war.
Besieged by betrayals, Alex and her assassin lover will have to fight enemies and allies alike in order to save the world. But, in the end, winning this great war could cost Alex everyone she loves—and everything that she is.
Shadow Magic is the fourth and final book in the Dragon Born Alexandria urban fantasy series.
Preface
Have you already read Role-playing Magic, a Dragon Born novella set before the series? The consequences of the events that unfold in that story are seen in Shadow Magic.
This novella—plus many more stories from other Ella Summers series—are available as exclusive free downloads for Ella’s newsletter subscribers. To receive these bonus tales, join at www.ellasummers.com/newsletter.
1
Explosion in the Cafeteria
The cafeteria smelled of hot vegetable oil, breaded batter, and deep-fried food. Beneath the thick, heavy aroma lay a subtle undertone of chocolate and syrup. Alex drew in a deep breath, a smile lifting her lips. There weren’t many things she enjoyed more than eating. Good food was like a beam of warm sunshine cutting through an angry storm.
“Are you sure you want to do that?” Logan asked her.
“Of course I want to do it,” Alex replied.
She dipped a crusty, misshapen chicken nugget into her chocolate milkshake. A perfect melody of savory and sweet flavors waltzed across her tongue.
“Mmmm.”
The cafeteria at Drachenburg Industries’ San Francisco office had the best milkshakes Alex had ever tasted.
She shot Logan a wink across the table. “And you know you want to do it too.”
“No. I do not,” Logan stated.
He didn’t recoil from the chocolate-milkshake-covered nugget Alex offered him; that wouldn’t have been very assassin-y. However, one of his eyebrows did twitch ever so slightly.
Alex chuckled. “You’re in a good mood today.” She balanced her chin on her hands and leaned across the table toward him, dipping her voice lower. “You don’t usually flirt with me in public.”
His response surprised her. “Does that bother you?”
“No.” Her smile widened. “I know how you feel about me.” Under the table, she slid her foot against his.
His green eyes sparkled. It wasn’t magic, at least not in the usual sense. Logan wasn’t a supernatural like Alex was. He couldn’t cast firestorms or summon blizzards, but there was magic in him. In fact, he’d been made with magic. Designed to be fast, strong, and resilient. Trained to fight—and to kill. Specifically, to kill supernaturals like Alex. His family led the world’s most notorious magic-hating terrorist organization: the Convictionites.
Of course, the Convictionites saw themselves as crusaders on a holy quest to rid the Earth of all evil. That ‘evil’ being magic and all those who wielded it. To them, the end always justified the means, including using magic to destroy magic, and abusing their own flesh and blood to serve their agenda. The Convictionites were the ones who’d created Logan to be the world’s most powerful anti-magic weapon, and they weren’t very happy that he was refusing to play his part. Oh, and they also weren’t particularly fond of the mage Logan had bonded to using blood magic: Alex.
“I love you. That’s how I feel about you,” Logan told her.
Alex leaned in even closer. “And I love you,” she said against his lips, then kissed him quickly. She leaned back in her chair. “But you’re worried about something.”
“Yes.”
“The Convictionites. They’re on your mind.”
“They are planning something,” Logan said, keeping his voice low.
Maybe he didn’t want to cause a midday panic in the Drachenburg Industries cafeteria. Alex’s gaze panned across the men and women seated at the long rectangular tables.
Some wore designer suits and hard leather shoes without a speck of dirt on them, like they never saw the outside of this office. Those were the business folks.
Each one of the women looked like she’d just stepped out of the beauty salon—her hair perfectly blow-dried, her makeup immaculate, her manicure fresh, her pearl necklace shimmering in the midday light that filtered through the floor-to-ceiling glass windows that filled one wall of the room.
The men wore big, fancy watches and really boring ties that were the epitome of sophistication. Their hair was arranged with gel. Some had beards; they looked like they’d been styled with the painstaking skill and patience of a bonsai artist.
The second kind of Drachenburg Industries employee was the scientist. Their dress was casual, more sweaters and capris than suits and ties. A few of them wore lab coats. One guy had put on his shirt inside-out today, but neither he nor anyone else at his table had seemed to notice. All six of them were crowded around a single computer, their eyes locked on the screen. Whatever was on that screen, it must have been really good. Maybe it was a new formula that removed monster guts from clothing. Alex would have paid good money for something like that.
Logan was right to keep his voice low when speaking of apocalyptic affairs. Some of the scientist folks did look like the skittish sort. When Alex had stepped into the room twenty minutes ago, many had eyed her very large sword with something akin to trepidation. And when Logan had arrived five minutes after that, decked out like a one-man walking armory, the number of people in th
e room had immediately halved.
And here Alex had just wanted to grab a quick bite to eat with her assassin boyfriend. After a long morning of exhausting, boring meetings at the office, she had more than earned a food break. She never should have allowed her sister to talk her into taking on a job at Drachenburg Industries, even if it was only for a few days. Somehow, Alex had imagined the job involving a lot less sitting in strategy meetings and a lot more pulling out her sword and hacking at monsters. At least if she’d been out fighting monsters, it would have kept her mind off the Convictionites.
“What are they planning?” Alex wondered.
After a few crushing defeats, the Convictionites had gone into hiding. Their numbers had dwindled since Alex and Logan had exposed their hypocrisy, but Alex didn’t believe for a second that they were giving up. The Convictionites weren’t about to abandon centuries of hatred and scheming. No, they were lying low, biding their time, waiting to make a big move.
“I’ve heard rumors,” Logan said.
Alex’s brow furrowed. “What kind of rumors?”
“The foreboding kind. My sources tell me the Convictionites are planning to strike a heavy blow against the world’s supernaturals. They will hit hard, and they will hit soon. This isn’t over.”
“Yeah, the Convictionites were never going to go quietly into the night.” She set her hand over his. “But we will defeat them.”
“There will always be other threats,” Logan pointed out.
Alex knew he wasn’t being pessimistic, merely practical.
“We will defeat those threats as well,” said Logan. “You and I, the Black Plague and Slayer, we are unstoppable.”
“How romantic.” She flashed him a grin. “You sure do know how to woo a girl, Slayer.”
“Alex, I believe…” Logan stopped, his gaze shifting toward the door. “That could be trouble.”
In the doorway stood a woman in an overly-large blue sweater and a pair of wrinkled white dress pants. One of the scientists, no doubt. The woman took a deep breath, clenched her fists, then marched across the room.
“Lauren Valentine,” Logan said. “She works at Magical Research Laboratories.”
That was a subsidiary of Drachenburg Industries. Their offices were located near the Golden Gate Bridge. So what was she doing here?
“How do you know who she is?” Alex asked him.
She looked and found a big badge partially stuffed into the tiny back pocket of Lauren Valentine’s wrinkly white pants. The text wasn’t even readable from this distance. Now, Alex had gained some of Logan’s abilities, courtesy of their blood magic bond, but she still couldn’t see through clothing.
“So you have x-ray vision now?” Alex asked him. “Like Superman?”
“Superman is a fictional character,” replied Logan. “No real person would ever strut around in that much bright-and-shiny spandex.”
Alex snorted.
“I did not read the information off her badge,” he told her. “I read it in her employee file.”
“Kai let you read her file?”
“No, but I’m not in the habit of asking Drachenburg for permission. When we took this assignment, I decided some background research was necessary. Just in case the Convictionites had infiltrated this organization.”
“How much background research?”
“I read the file of every Drachenburg Industries employee in San Francisco, including all subsidiaries, then committed those details to memory.”
“That’s…” Alex struggled to find the right words. “A lot of reading.”
“I read fast.”
No kidding. Drachenburg Industries had thousands of employees in San Francisco alone.
“I thought it prudent to keep you safe,” he said. “Your sister is engaged to the man in charge of Drachenburg Industries’ San Francisco offices. The Convictionites know this. They know you are often here to see your sister. I wouldn’t put it past them to send in an assassin to take you out.”
“I guess I’m not the Convictionites’ favorite person right now.”
Not after the roughly two million monkey wrenches she’d thrown into their meticulously-laid master plans, plans that had been centuries in the making.
Alex sighed. “So, do the Convictionites have a mole here?”
“Not that I could find.” Logan frowned, like he wished he’d found a mole so he could feel like he was doing something to stop the Convictionites’ plan, whatever it might be.
“So if she’s not a mole, why does Lauren Valentine mean trouble?” asked Alex.
“Her posture. Her face. The way that she’s moving.”
Now that he mentioned it, Lauren Valentine’s posture was stiff. Her shoulders were rolled back. Her mouth was a hard, determined line. And her eyes burned with fiery vengeance. She marched across the room like she was going to war. Alex could almost hear the battle drum thumping out a beat in time with the woman’s steps. Must have been Lauren’s angry magic.
Then Lauren’s mouth, smeared with lipstick, opened. Loud, angry words bellowed out. “Ohhh, husband! Lance Valentine! Stand up and face me, you lying, cheating son of a bitch!”
Chairs scraped loudly against the floor as every person in the cafeteria—businessman, scientist, and scruffy mercenary alike—turned to stare at Lauren. And then their gazes slid over to the scarlet-faced man Alex could only assume was Lance. He was dressed in a very smart, very black silk business suit, but he might as well have been naked from the look of total mortification on his face. The wretched, reeking stench of his fear soured the air.
“Lauren,” Lance said quietly, but of course Alex could hear him.
So could everyone else, for that matter. The room was dead silent. Every word resonated with perfect, undistorted clarity.
“Let’s just go somewhere private.” Lance rose to his feet, reaching out to his wife.
Lauren sneered at his hand like it was the filthiest thing she’d ever laid eyes on. “Don’t touch me,” she hissed. “Not after where else your hands have been.”
“I didn’t—”
“DON’T LIE TO ME!” Lauren’s words boomed and echoed like an avalanche.
“Lauren, please—”
“In fact, don’t even speak to me,” she growled. “I don’t believe a damn word you say. I wouldn’t believe you if you read out the weather report. Not anymore. Not ever again.”
No one in the room spoke. No one moved. No one blinked.
“Lauren—”
“No, Lance, you don’t get to speak. Not after what you did. I get to speak. And you…you have to listen.” Lauren drew several deep, calming breaths, like that was all that was keeping her from grabbing the nearest chair and smashing him over the head with it. “You’re done. Done. You hurt me, and now I’m going to hurt you. I’m going to take you for everything you own. I’ll see you in court.”
With that said, she stormed out of the cafeteria and out of sight. Everyone turned to look at Lance. He made an indistinct sound, something between a mouse squeak and the soft whisper of a closing coffin. Then he power-walked from the room, his arms pumping fast, like a cartoon character.
As soon as he was gone, gossip exploded from every table like a chain of erupting volcanoes.
Alex turned to Logan. “You were saying?”
He didn’t respond immediately. “It can wait,” he finally declared.
Of course, his words only served to pique Alex’s curiosity. “Oh, come on, Logan. You know I can’t stand surprises. I need to know.”
“All right.” A dash of amusement peeked out from behind his stoic facade. “I was going to propose to you.”
“Wait, what? You were going to propose?”
“Yes.”
“As in, propose marriage?”
“Yes.” He took a casual sip of water from his glass.
Alex felt her eyes go wide.
“But after that scene—” He waved his hand toward the spot where Lauren had been screaming at the top of
her lungs only a minute ago. “—the timing doesn’t seem right anymore.” He said it matter-of-factly, like he was strategizing how to infiltrate an enemy stronghold.
“On the contrary,” replied Alex. “Your timing is perfect. As one marriage ends, another can begin. There’s a kind of balance to that that really appeals to me. The universe likes balance.”
“You’re crazy,” he replied with a dry chuckle.
“I know I’m crazy. But seeing that you want to marry crazy me, doesn’t that make you even crazier?” she countered.
His brows drew together. “Is that a yes?”
“Of course it’s a yes, you crazy assassin.”
“Good. A ‘no’ would have made a complete mess of my plans.”
“And you can’t stand messes.”
“Exactly.”
He took her hands in his. When he released them a moment later, the largest red diamond ring Alex had ever seen was staring up at her from her ring finger. She brushed her fingertip across the platinum band, over the gemstone, then down the other side.
“I didn’t even feel you put it there,” she declared.
“Of course not. I’m very skilled in stealthy operations.”
She took his hand and pulled him to his feet. Magic tingled across their joined hands; it tasted like cinnamon and roared like a lion awoken from his slumber.
“Where are we going?” Logan asked her, amused.
