“At least you have an excuse now for being such an idiot! That guy clearly had no idea what he was doing.” Her sassy comment was an unwelcome attempt to lighten the mood.
“Not cool, Lizzy,” I intoned with no enthusiasm.
“Yeah, I know. It’s just...there’s nothing that can reverse it. I thought maybe I could help you get some answers about your mom. It didn’t even cross my mind something might have happened to you. You must feel like your world just ended.”
“Apparently, my world ended seventeen years ago.” The testy remark wasn’t meant as a jab toward Lizzy, but she dipped her eyes down to the comforter, regretting she had ever suggested such a stupid idea in the first place.
“I’m sorry, Adrian. This was a bad idea. But...to be honest, I’m surprised it hasn’t already manifested. Perhaps your Nullifier ability has been delaying the process. Don’t give up yet.”
As much as I wanted to believe there might be a way out of this, everything seemed hopeless right now. My world was just turned inside out. What did I have to live for now? I had no idea how long I had left before I went to sleep one night and woke up with my mind completely erased, my body taking on the life of a new owner. The worst part is no one would even mourn my passing. They’d have no idea it was no longer me inside my own body, but this asshole who stole it would get to live in it however he wanted. And I had a feeling he wasn’t a fun loving philanthropist who was going to change the world with his unique magic abilities.
I rubbed my fingertips across my forehead, raking them through my sweaty hair, then let out an obnoxious yawn. “It’s late, Lizzy. I’m going to bed.”
“Adrian—”
I slammed the bedroom door behind me. I was tired, but I knew I’d never be able to go to sleep, so instead I went downstairs in search of a cupcake.
I opened every cabinet in the kitchen. This place was fully stocked with everything you could think of...except cupcakes. Go figure, the world continues to work against me. I raided the liquor cabinet instead, which was probably a better idea anyway because there weren’t enough cupcakes in the world to make me forget what my life was destined to become.
I settled on a bottle of whiskey. Just straight up whiskey. I didn’t need a mixer to water down my sorrow. I gazed out the window in the living room and, despite it being the middle of the night, I could see clearly right down to the lapping water on the beach so I decided to drown my sorrow while going for a lonely midnight stroll.
The full moon reflected against the rippling ocean and created deep shadows around the dunes of white sand around me. A gentle breeze brushed my hair as the sound of palm trees rustled in the distance. But the most elegant part was the mesmerizing haze of greens, purples, and blues blazing across the silent sky. The swaying bands of color danced in and out, twirling in the space between the twinkling stars. It was at that moment I came to the conclusion we weren’t on Earth. To my knowledge, there were no places on a tropical beach where you could view the brilliant aura of the Northern Lights.
I removed my sneakers, digging my feet into the cool, smooth sand and clutching my knees to my chest as I stared off distantly into the infinite horizon. The excessive gulping of whiskey mixed with manic hysteria burned on its way down my throat so much that I gagged and nearly threw it all back up. It didn’t stop me, though. I kept going until half the bottle was sloshing around my convulsing stomach.
Lizzy’s words kept repeating in my head. Adrian, you’re dead. Everything that had ever meant something to me had been ripped from my hands. My family. My career. And now my own life. How stupid was I to think that maybe I deserved better?
I wondered how much of my life since that day had actually been mine. Was it really my decision to become a cop? All this rage that constantly bubbled inside...whose was it? Did Adrian like cupcakes, or was it this other man? I had no idea who I was anymore. All I knew was that these past few weeks have destroyed what I used to call my pitiful, empty life. I wasn’t a hero. I was dead.
For a moment, I contemplated walking into the ocean and letting it sweep me away. If I died, maybe he would die as well. I’d rather end my life by my own hand than give up my body to someone else. But I also knew he was a skilled healer. He healed me when I was only a few breaths away from dying. If I died, he would probably find a way to keep me dead and take control.
Another swig from the whiskey bottle and the floodgates burst open. Tears streamed down my face and I was suddenly thankful for the loneliness. No one needed to see a grown man sobbing like this. I cried so uncontrollably it felt like my brain was being shredded apart from the inside, because essentially it was. Emotional pain seeped out of every pore. An anguished scream came out of my mouth so raw that I might as well have been breathing fire. I gulped for air that wasn’t there, and just let it all out. Years of pent up anger, grief, fear, and hope converged in a tangled rollercoaster ride of emotions.
Eventually the whiskey kicked in. The rest of the night after that was lost. I woke up to the toasty sun beaming down on my sandy skin, a decorative pillow under my head and a lightweight fleece blanket pulled up over my shoulders. Under me was the thin padding of a bench that decorated the front porch of the safehouse. Did I somehow manage to make my way back? My stomach dropped at the thought maybe I blacked out and my body had been taken over. But given the circumstances, it had to be Lizzy.
I steadied myself up from the bench, rubbing at the stiffness in my neck from the awkward sleeping position. My throat felt like sandpaper scratching against my innards every time I swallowed and my stomach threatened to empty its contents onto the front porch. The intense pounding rivaled a jackhammer going off in my head.
I stared at the ornate French doors that led into the beach house. Did I really want to go back in? I didn’t want to face Lizzy. Or go back to the apartment where Blair and Eli were. Pushing open that door felt like accepting my fate. But sooner or later Lizzy would come searching and I knew I couldn’t avoid this forever, so I turned the handle and forced myself to go inside. I hung my head low, my sandy, scruffy hair dangling in front of my forehead hiding my bloodshot eyes.
I entered the kitchen to the sound of fingers tapping furiously against a keyboard. Mixing bowls, flour, and half the kitchen was sprawled out in an unorganized mess from one end of the counter to the other.
“Rough night?” I pried, noticing she was still in her pajamas, her hair a tangled birds nest. She glanced up from her laptop, eyes dark and sunken in. The black eyeliner smeared around her eyelids only made it look even worse.
“I could say the same to you.” Her fingers went back to whatever they were previously working on.
I examined the kitchen. Then my eyes wandered back to Lizzy. “Did you even go to bed last night?”
“No. I went to your room after you left but you didn’t answer. So I came downstairs and thought maybe I could try my hand at those cupcakes you always eat to ease my mind, but...uh...that didn’t work so well so I turned my attention to doing some research in our military database. I figured there’s got to be a way to fix this, some new thing I didn’t know about. I combed through hundreds of research documents and some of them seemed promising. Check this one out, it—”
“Lizzy, just stop...” I interjected. “You said so yourself there’s no way to undo this. The sooner you accept reality the sooner we can all move on.”
Lizzy angrily shook her head, her baleful stare threatening my words. “Why is it you’re always willing to jump in front of a bullet to save someone else, but you refuse to do a damn thing for yourself? The Adrian I know wouldn’t stand for this and would demand justice!”
“The Adrian you know is dead, Lizzy! Just...give it up already. Move on to something else. Don’t waste your time.”
The laptop slapped shut with a loud click. The stool scraped across the tile floor as she stood.
“I will NOT give up! I refuse to lose someone else I care about!” Embarrassed by the unexpected words that just blurted out of
her mouth, she then appended, “I mean, our jobs as military officers require us to save lives too, you know.”
Ignoring her frazzled tantrum, I snapped back, “Lizzy, you lost me the day you decided to take me in. Whether this had happened or not...do you really think I’d stick around? You don’t live here. Eventually, you’ll go back home and I would have gone on with my life. This team thing we have going on here...it wasn’t supposed to last forever. And the sooner you accept that, the easier you’ll make this for everyone.”
She growled under her breath, fuming with rage. “Fine. Go ahead and be a self-serving jackass. You’re not doing anyone any favors by pushing them aside. You may not accept my help, but you can’t stop me from giving it. ”
“Do what you want. Just don’t expect me to give a shit about it. I’m going upstairs to take a shower. I feel sand rubbing in places there definitely shouldn’t be sand.” I waved a hand as I trudged up the stairs to take a shower, never looking back.
The rest of the day was long and uneventful. I ignored Lizzy, she ignored me. She went on with her research while I decided to slum it on the couch watching some weird movies I’d never heard of before. Every now and then I’d catch her spying on me, like I was going to spontaneously combust and turn into this new person. Which, who knew, I might. I had no idea how this worked.
The next morning I woke up to a persistent banging on my bedroom door.
“Go away,” I slurred, then tugged on the comforter burying my head.
“I won’t. I’m coming in.” Lizzy sent the door wobbling on its hinges as she stormed in, stopping halfway between my bed and my only exit.
“Get up! We need to train.” Her unrestrained voice was not something I welcomed first thing in the morning.
“What’s the point? I’m literally a dead man.” I sunk deeper into the bed, wishing I could disappear.
“But you aren’t yet. And I have to believe if there’s anything that can stop this, it’s your Nullifier ability. There’s a reason this spell hasn’t taken over yet. Your ability may have something to do with it. So stop being a pathetic excuse for a man and let’s train to get stronger. Together.” She ripped the comforter off the bed, then held out her hand in an accepting gesture which I promptly swatted away.
“OK, then we’ll have to do this the hard way. You have three seconds to get your lazy ass out of bed. One...”
“You’ve got nothing on Blair,” I instigated.
“Two…” She was crawling on top of me, straddling me on the bed.
“Lizzy...get off...what the hell are you—”
“Three! Time’s up.”
She whisked out her hand, throwing a bubble at my head.
“This isn’t gonna do anything but irritate me.” I tried to remove it, but it was stuck firmly in place.
“You best not speak. Or your air will run out much quicker than expected. If you continue to misbehave, I might decide to take things a step further and fill your little fishbowl with water and drown you until you give in.”
“Lizzy, get this thing off me.” My hyperventilating was causing the bubble to fog and distort my vision. I couldn’t think straight.
“Don’t worry. I won’t kill you. I’ll just keep torturing you until your seconds away from death. Then, you’ll heal. Because you always do. And we’ll try this again until you give in.” A devilish smirk appeared on her face, then she jumped off the bed and leaned against the door watching me struggle.
“Keep doing that, and I reckon you only have about a minute left before your brain starts shutting down.”
I rolled off the bed and onto the floor, trying to loosen the bubble even just a little bit for a tiny wisp of air. Sweat started beading on my forehead, tears squeezed out of my eyes.
“Lizzy!” I wheezed out in panic. The sensory overload was overwhelming. I was breathing in, but no air was entering my lungs. My mind was racing a mile a minute, head pounding, but at the same time everything seemed to slow down. The desperate feeling of needing oxygen, and knowing help was feet away but watching you suffer instead, brought on extreme panic. My lungs and heart felt like they had been set on fire, like my insides were cooking in boiling water.
I’m done with this. His words were shrill and deafening in my head. My body started glowing orange like a blazing meteorite. The heat intensified as the magic within my body seeped outwards.
“Adrian…” Lizzy cautioned.
The thunderous roar that came out of my mouth would have been destructive enough to terrify death himself. I wrapped my fingers firmly around a bed leg, and crushed it with a single hand. Lizzy backed up closer toward the exit in case she needed to make a run for it.
“GET OUT OF MY HEAD!” I smacked my hands to the side of the bubble, trying to shake the voice out of my throbbing head. The windows rattled, a lightbulb shattered.
The bubble popped under the pressure of the corrupting magic pooling inside and air rushed in. Magic exploded across the room, knocking everything to the floor. I couldn’t breathe in fast enough. I stared at the wooden planks below me, heaving in and out for a few minutes before my heart stopped racing and my vision restored.
“Adrian...who exactly is in your head?” Ignoring the destruction, Lizzy crouched down next to me, putting a comforting hand on my shoulder as I continued to recover.
I rolled onto my back and scooted up against the side of the bed. “I guess there’s no use hiding it anymore. That voice has been haunting me for years now. The process is farther along than you think it is.”
Lizzy dug her fingernails into my shoulder, then grabbed my t-shirt and pulled me up off the floor. “Oh. Well, then. We have some catching up to do.” Her poor attempt at a genuine smile wasn’t all that comforting.
“I guess. Let me get changed. I’ll be down in a few.”
For the next few days, Lizzy and I trained to enhance my Nullifier ability. Her thought was, the more magic that was thrown at me, the more my body would get used to it and learn how to defend against it. Which, in turn, may also fight against this curse I was given.
We started off small with a screwdriver. She...somewhat gently...threw it at me and instead of simply swatting it away, I willed my mind to absorb her magic. I had just started to get the hang of it when Blair called.
“Time for you guys to come home.”
And time to once again come to terms with reality’s ugly existence.
Chapter 28
B efore we left, Lizzy and I agreed that I would be the one to tell the team about what happened, and I would do it on my own terms. She only agreed to interfere if things started getting out of hand and I became a danger to their own lives. After all, we had no idea if the Black Mark knew about what happened that night. Maybe this is why Nolan was after me. Leaving them out of the loop could be dangerous, especially if I started taking on more of this man’s personality and skills.
We left the comfort of the warm sun and returned to the arctic cold. Back at the apartment, Blair, Eli, and Porky were all there waiting for us as we crawled through the mirror. I was still pretty bummed out about my fate, but I had to put on my best “everything’s just fine” face or they’d notice immediately something was wrong.
As it turned out, the police never came knocking. In fact, by the next day it seemed things had already died down. They must have figured I immediately bolted from the city, and with no family or friends to run to I could have literally been anywhere. I bet they never thought I fled the planet. Suckers.
Well, joke’s on them. I was an idiot, so I came running back. But now I had to be on high alert any time I stepped out of this building, since I was sure anyone patrolling the area would still be searching for me.
“I see you put your time to good use. Lizzy had been training with you?” Blair nodded to the bruises on my arm where she repeatedly hit me with a magical screwdriver.
“Yeah, well, it’s not like I would have used that time to soak in the sun on the pristine beaches of wherever the hell we
were. That would just be moronic.”
There might have been some semblance of a minor lip twitch on her face. Was Blair...smiling? No, that couldn’t be right.
Lizzy stayed behind in her room while the rest of us left. When we were out of reach from prying ears, Eli steered me toward his bedroom, jabbing me with his elbow and teasing playfully. “Soooo...how was it being alone with Lizzy for five days?” I wanted to slap that facetious grin right off his chiseled jaw.
“It was awful,” I replied vaguely. “But I didn’t murder her...so be grateful for that.” The seriousness in my voice took Eli for a bit of a surprise as he contemplated the thought. He knew how much she annoyed me.
Truth be told, it could have been a lot worse. Although I’d always be skeptical of ever truly trusting anyone fully, Lizzy seemed like she was at least trying...in her own unconventional way. But Raven’s warning still bothered me.
I wasn’t ready to tell them about what we discovered while hiding there, so I intentionally removed some...minor...details about our stay. If Eli found out, he’d probably want to turn me into his lab rat. Blair would feed me to the wolves. I needed to assess their true intentions toward me before I made any decisions to reveal something as disturbing as this.
Trying to change the subject, I noticed Eli’s hair was a little bit different. “I’m liking the new hair.”
“Huh?” He cocked his head at me and narrowed his eyes, patting his spikey hair to make sure it was still as he left it. “What are you talking about?”
“It’s totally blue now. When I left, it was like...half blue, half black.”
“Umm...how hard did Lizzy beat you over the head while you were there? My hair is completely black. Always has been.”
How to Hunt a Menacing Magical Shadow Page 22
