Twisted Souls: Twisted Magic Book Three

by Rainy Kaye

  “Okay, so…” Sasmita began, “this mage must be the necromancer.”

  “Ya think?” I hissed, jerking my hand toward the undead nearest us.

  “He was responsible for the black plague, among some other epidemics,” she whispered. “When he was brought before the consortium to answer for his crimes, he inflicted a pox on them.”

  “Everyone’s a comedian,” I muttered.

  The corpses began to walk, stiff legged, toward each other, convening in the center of the street. Sasmita and I turned to watch. More clunked down the road. They came together in straight lines.

  “I’m gonna guess that the plague was the beginning of his plan, not the end,” I said.

  The army marched toward us. Their footsteps clunked in solid unison as they surged in our direction.

  Without a word, Sasmita and I turned and bolted. Sasmita pulled ahead a few paces, leading the way. The unified footsteps clomped toward us, heavy and reverberating through the night with unrelenting speed. The sound surrounded us. I tried to pick up the speed as they charged.

  Something clocked me in the back of the head. I stumbled, grabbing for Sasmita but missing. I turned as the army stampeded us, flowing over us like ants. A familiar face swam through the crowd, coming at me. Tilda, the woman from the apothecary. Her skin had pulled and faded, revealing bones underneath. She shot her arm out and grabbed my throat. I swung my fist at her and caught her in the nose. Her head jerked back, her thinned curls, dusted with dirt, bouncing. She straightened and came toward me again.

  I strode backwards, glancing from undead to undead in front of me.

  Tilda lunged at me, painted lips pulled back over her perfect teeth. I caught her by the shoulders. She strained forward, gnashing her maw. I wrangled her back, soles braced against the ground. Around me, the soldiers continued to flow over us, swallowing up Sasmita. Only little bursts of blue magic indicated she was still fighting.

  Tilda snarled, and I turned my head as spit flew from her mouth. Summoning up strength, I shoved her backwards. She collided into another soldier.

  I turned and wove through the crowd. A middle-aged man, in overalls and nothing else, swung at me. I caught his withered arm as I ducked under it and around him.

  “Sasmita,” I yelled, voice hoarse. “Where are you?”

  Someone grabbed my arm. I brought my fist down like a mallet on its fingers just as I caught Sasmita standing next to me. She pulled away, shaking her hand. An undead soldier bumped into her. She shoved past him, and then clenched my arm again.

  “This way,” she whispered, tugging me through the swarm.

  From behind, someone kicked me in the ankle as he trudged into me. I elbowed his gut before pushing him away, in front of me. His red hair caught my attention right before he turned to me with a sneer, half his face eaten away by death, but I knew right away he was Tommy.

  If the Taylors had escaped New Hope, they hadn’t all been spared by the plague.

  A mostly decomposed woman yanked Sasmita’s hair, jerking her head back. Sasmita grabbed the woman’s wrist, nothing more than bone, and flared blue magic from her hand as she shoved. The woman stumbled backwards and then lunged forward again. Sasmita swung, hard. Her fist connected with the woman’s skull. The woman fell back into the crowd, and then toppled to the ground as the army swarmed over her.

  I grabbed Sasmita’s arm so as not to lose her and ducked my head. We plowed forward, swinging and elbowing, fighting off the soldiers that shoved and snapped their jaws, pulled with thinning flesh, at us.

  Finally, we broke free from the crowd. The town had given way to forest, and I didn’t bother to look back as we charged onward through the snow in the direction of the ranger station. The night swallowed up the sounds of the army as the metal stairwell, molded into the rocky incline, came into view.

  My chest caught, and I could barely breathe as I released Sasmita and plowed on farther. She stayed one step behind, to my side, hands glowing blue, locked and loaded for the next attack.

  Bracing my knees, I hurried across the slippery ground and up the small flight of steps leading to the balcony. The door was shut, and the balcony clunked as I made my way toward the entrance.

  Sasmita came up beside me and extinguished her magic. I tried the knob, but it didn’t give.

  She knocked and called through the door, “It’s us. Open up.”

  Thudding issued inside, and then the doorknob jiggled and the door was pulled open. Randall stood in the doorway, wearing just his pants and nothing else. Warmth pushed around him from inside, followed by the scent of burning wood.

  “Saf,” he said. He stepped aside to let us in.

  We bustled inside, and I yanked the door closed behind us.

  “I was going to come back with Sasmita, but then—" He paused mid-sentence, taking us in more fully. “What the fuck happened?”

  Ever stood with her back against the wall, hand on her kukri. She didn’t ease when she saw us. I offered her a small smile, despite the mask, and she swallowed hard, barely moving.

  I let out a heavy breath, scanning the interior of the lookout as I tried to sort my thoughts and figure out where to begin. The building was a single room, with a bed with no headboard to one side. A short bookcase, loaded with books, subbed as a nightstand. A row of drawers sat below the windows on one side, and to the other, a wood burning stove and a countertop with a single burner. A metal toilet was tucked away in the far corner, shielded by a curtain decorated with cartoon ducks that had been pushed back.

  All four sides of the room were made up of windows. Even in the minimal light, I could see forever out across the trees.

  “What did you last know?” I asked absently.

  Fiona sat with her back to me in a chair by the wood burning stove. Even from behind, she did not seem to be the same person anymore.

  I didn’t wait for him to reply. “After the man with the green tunic took me, he used me as bait to try to lure out the mage, which worked. Sasmita managed to show up just in time to save the day.”

  “Kinda.” She scoffed. “Wait ’til you hear the latest, Randall.”

  I grimaced as he looked between us.

  He scowled. “What, now?”

  I sighed, coming up to the back of Fiona’s chair. She did not acknowledge my presence.

  “The dead hath risen,” I told him. “Apparently, our mage is a necromancer who is building an undead army—at least, I’m gathering, because there’s an undead army now.”

  Randall stared at me. Then he nodded once. “Uh-huh. That’s exactly what we were missing.”

  Ever blinked. “Undead? The corpses are…”

  “Animated,” I finished for her, glancing out the darkened windows. “How, I wonder, does one go about defeating an undead army?”

  “Fire,” Randall said, without missing a beat.

  I scrunched my face at him. “Why fire?”

  “Why not?” He shrugged. “Just seems like that would be the thing to take them out.”

  I started to reply. “I guess that—”

  Fiona threw her head back with a screech, rocking the chair back into me. I jumped back as she leaped forward, spinning around into a crouch. The chair fell back onto the floor. A low growl emanated from her chest. She sprang off the floor, landing on the bed at the foot of the mattress, her attention locked on us like she would launch at us at the first provocation.

  My throat tightened.

  “She was screaming when I returned to get Sasmita,” Randall said, barely above a whisper. “I was worried she was going to attack Ever, so I stayed here. We couldn’t really leave her alone, either.”

  “What the hell is going on?” I asked, afraid to glance away, afraid to blink.

  “No idea,” he said softly. “Look.”

  Even though he didn’t indicate anywhere, my gaze dropped to her hands. The markings had climbed up past her wrists, coating her forearms, and streaked up her biceps in thin lines towards her cherry blossom tattoo.<
br />
  Whatever was wrong with her, it was spreading.

  My body constricted, and I rubbed my knuckles with the opposite hand. “You sure you haven’t seen anything like this before, Sasmita?”

  “It almost looks like a poison,” she said, not moving from her spot a few feet from Ever. “I can’t imagine what or…why the rest of this is happening.”

  She didn’t have to explain what she meant. Fiona was changing, inside and out.

  “What’s the plan, Saf?” Randall said suddenly.

  I jerked around to look at him, scowling, keeping one eye on Fiona as leered at us from the bed. “About what?”

  “Fiona is sick,” he said.

  “I can see that,” I said with a flick of my hand, but even as I spoke, I knew what he was thinking. It was the same decision I had warred with on our way back here.

  Fiona needed help, and it was going to take more time than she had to find the mage’s portrait.

  We had to leave.

  Swallowing hard, I turned to Ever. “Do you think your sisters cleared the road of the cockatrice yet?”

  “Honestly, I doubt it,” she said. “As badly as we need to get Skyla to the hospital, I also know my sisters, especially Paisley. They’ve probably been going through mock scenarios, and test running the medallion on something else if they can, before they try the cockatrice. Urgency or not, they know they’re not going to get more than one shot at the cockatrice. Once it sees they have the medallion, if they fail, I suspect it will make sure they don’t leave with it, if they leave at all.”

  “We’ll go back to your camp first, then,” Randall said. “Check out what’s going on, how close we are to trying the medallion. Our only other option is heading down the road empty-handed and seeing if a cockatrice swoops out of nowhere.”

  He stared at Fiona, and then inched toward her.

  She growled but made no move.

  “Shh,” he said, soothingly, as he crept closer to her. “You remember me, right?”

  She swiveled her head to follow his steps, but the warning sounds died on her lips.

  “Remember that time Saf went to her cousin’s funeral in California, and you got bored and wanted to drive to Omaha? So, we went together, but wound up taking an eight-hour road trip to Chicago to try the pizza, instead.” He came to a stop at the edge of the bed. “Then we had such a food coma from eating so much, we napped in the car and when we woke up, it was two am, and we drove back all morning so you wouldn’t be late for work.”

  She stared up at him, no longer predatory, but not her normal self, either.

  He reached down and grabbed the top corner of the blanket closest to him and tugged it up. “You look tired, Fiona. Chicago pizza kind of tired. Get some rest.”

  She hesitated, and then darted forward, grabbing the corner of the blanket from him, and recoiled, pulling the cover up around her. She remained hunched in the corner, blanket in both hands pulled up to her chin. Her gaze darted to me and we locked eyes.

  Something human, something Fiona, flashed behind the madness.

  It looked like fear.

  My heart drifted down farther and farther. She was in there somewhere, my Fiona. The friend I loved, the friend I had set out to save.

  If I had any doubt, I knew we couldn’t waste time looking for the portrait. For tonight, we would rest, taking turns to keep watch for the necromancer’s army prowling around somewhere in the surrounding woods.

  In the morning, we would set out to Ever’s camp and then take on the cockatrice.

  15

  When the others began to stir to start the day, I felt as if I had barely slept, which was accurate enough. Even when it wasn’t my turn to keep watch for the undead army, I had struggled to calm my mind enough to get any shut eye. The exhaustion in my body should have taken over, but it did not. I’d continued to shake myself from sleep, ready to fight.

  By sunrise, there had been no sightings of any threats—not the undead army, not the necromancer, not the men with the tentacle magic, and not Fiona’s snarling self. She had spent the night tucked in the corner with the blanket.

  We packed up the van with our backpacks and extra clothes. With any luck, we wouldn’t be coming back to the ranger station. Once we managed to subdue the cockatrice, we would be flooring it down the road, straight out of Haven Rock, and not looking back.

  I wasn’t sure where we would go from there, but one problem at a time. First, the cockatrice.

  In the van, I took the seat next to Fiona. She was back to analyzing everything with a frigid stare, no longer responding to us but not unaware. Ever sat on the other side of me. Sasmita claimed the passenger seat beside Randall as he crept the van through the empty main street, following Ever’s directions back to her camp.

  No corpses ambled around, but all the dead bodies that had lined the street had vanished and we were sure to find them walking about again.

  My gaze kept dipping to Fiona’s arm, and a little shudder continued to reappear between my shoulder blades. Whatever the marks indicated, it wasn’t natural. She hadn’t been right since we’d rescued her in New Orleans, and this just served as further proof that those men had been up to something with her, even if I couldn’t figure out what, yet.

  For now, I had to focus on getting us through the cockatrice so we could flee this damn town. At least for the time being. It seemed inevitable we would stay away, not after we had come this far, not when we knew there was no other hope out there. We didn’t have anything to offer until we knew where the portrait was, though. In the meantime, Fiona was getting sicker by the day. Our choices were few.

  Of course, Sasmita wasn’t going to give up her quest to collect the blood of the other dark witches and mages. I couldn’t imagine sending her off on her own to confront them while we roamed about nearby looking for answers, but that would be a discussion at the end of defeating the cockatrice.

  When we reached the edge of town and the buildings were spaced farther apart among the trees, I let out a pent-up breath. The undead army could be roaming these woods, but it felt safer here. The streets in Haven Rock were narrow and everything seemed to be one swerve away from tumbling off the side of the mountain. The trees provided a little more room to run, to fight.

  The van jostled along as Randall turned onto an unpaved road that all but disappeared into snow. In the distance, the familiar tents popped up in between the trees, and lazy smoke wove in the air near them.

  “Home sweet home,” Ever muttered as Randall pulled the van to a slow halt to prevent it from sliding on the snow and ice.

  She popped open the door and scampered out before he had killed the ignition.

  The flap on the largest tent flipped as Noah ducked out, knife drawn to his chest. He let his arm drop to his side. “Ever!”

  I scooted over to the open door and leaned out, watching. Randall and Sasmita remained in the front, but Randall rolled down his window.

  Ever picked up her step, wobbling on the snow, and met Noah in a quick embrace. “How’s Skyla?”

  “The same,” he said, worry creasing his forehead. “Stable, but not improving. Paisley and April said they had the pendant to get around the cockatrice, but they were going ahead to try it out first before moving Skyla. They told me about—”

  Ever held up her hand.

  “I can’t. Not right now.” She nodded toward the van. “Our friends back there got the pendant for us, but it turns out, one of them is pretty sick too. It’s different than what Skyla has… We’re going to meet up with Paisley and April and see what we can do with the cockatrice. How long ago did they leave?”

  “About two hours ago,” he said, glancing at the van. “Should they leave their sick friend here too?”

  Fiona scanned our surroundings like she was receiving information from a Head-Up Display. The question was, how was she interpreting what she was seeing?

  I leaned farther out of the vehicle, clutching the door with one hand, and waved the other toward
them. “No, we’re fine. Thanks.”

  Ever glanced between Noah and the van and then back at him. “I need to go with them. You good for a little longer?”

  “Of course.” A fleeting moment of worry crossed his face, but then he squeezed her shoulders. “Be safe, okay?”

  She nodded and turned on her heels to march back toward the vehicle, snow crunching under her feet. As she approached, I scooted back to my spot next to Fiona. Ever crawled inside, slamming the door shut.

  “We need to hurry as fast as we safely can,” she said, leveling her gaze in the direction of the main road, though it wasn’t in view. “My sisters are out there trying to subdue a cockatrice. I know I sent them, but it still doesn’t sit well with me.”

  Randall started the van and the tires spun a few times before finding traction. He navigated the van around in a large circle to point back the direction we had come.

  Even though I hadn’t seen or spoken to Jada in years, a wave of gratitude that she wasn’t here, wasn’t in constant danger, flittered through me. If she had been stuck in this battle with us, I would be endlessly worried; Randall and Fiona had that covered enough as it was.

  Ever had already lost her brother, and her youngest sister wasn’t far behind, it seemed. At least I could be thankful my team had survived so far, even if something was a little off with Fiona.

  Fiona leaned forward to peer out the window, like a cat watching a pigeon.

  Maybe she was a lot off, but we were going to get her fixed up. We would figure out how just as soon as we had the cockatrice under our control.

  The van bounced as it joined back onto the main road, and Randall veered away from the town, toward the exit that would lead to the interstate. Up ahead, the squared mountain rose up on either side of us.

  I looked out the windows past Fiona and then Ever to locate the cockatrice, but it was nowhere to be found. Perhaps April and Paisley had already defeated it. Or perhaps it was tucked into its nest somewhere, if cockatrices had such a thing. Considering it was neither entirely rooster nor dragon, it was nearly impossible to guess what it might be all about, besides turning people to stone if it met their gaze, apparently. Hopefully Paisley and April hadn’t been petrified.