by Harry Nix
He reached down and pulled off the tracksuit pants that Nia was wearing, suddenly realizing that they hadn't vanished when she'd shifted. He glanced across at the side table and saw Nia's shifter charm sitting there.
“Why aren’t you wearing your shifter charm?” he said, suddenly distracted despite the fact she was now half-naked and pressed against him.
“I was going to tell you later, but it died early, so no more shifter charm for me,” Nia said.
Alex was almost tempted to pick it up to analyze it, considering it still should have had some time left. But then Nia wriggled against him and all those thoughts vanished.
“We need to have breakfast, so be quick,” Nia said.
Although Alex would never have said that their light wrestling was any kind of foreplay, perhaps it had been because Nia was already wet, and he slid into her easily. The werewolf let out a moan before covering her mouth with her hand and then grabbing the pillow, turning her face into it. Then she reached up and grabbed around his back, urging him on. Alex didn't need any more invitations. He pushed her knees up a little higher and gripping her body, started rocking back and forth, plunging into her over and again. The red started bursting out of the air immediately, flying towards him, but his sex magic mana bar was already full. For the briefest of moments, Alex realized he should have used up some of it to enchant a bunch of rings and then recharge later. That thought quickly fled at the sound of Nia's muffled groans. Alex slowed for a moment before grabbing the shapeless T-shirt and pushing it up. It went halfway up Nia's arms and slightly over her head, covering her eyes like an impromptu blindfold. There was something about the look of it, Nia's fabulous body underneath him, her arms up, her eyes covered that drove Alex wild. He pulled the T-shirt off her and then pressed it over her eyes wrapping it around the head and holding it in his hand. Now she truly was blindfolded.
Nia moaned, not bothering to cover her mouth now. She had her fingers clenched in Alex's fur and now he began pounding her fast as he could, the bed protesting all the while. Nia soon groaned, bit her lip, and then finally pulled the pillow over her face, letting out a scream into it. Alex tried to stay quiet, but it was hard. As he came, he growled. For a few moments he ended up holding himself over Nia, her somewhere beneath him, underneath the pillow and the T-shirt, then unexpectedly she shifted back to human while he was still inside her.
He pulled away the pillow. There she was in human form red hair, green eyes, her cheeks lightly flushed. Alex was still inside her and he felt a clench of muscles as she looked up at him.
“Good morning, Mr. Wolf,” Nia said, stroking the side of his face.
“Breakfast!” Juno suddenly shouted from outside the door then went thudding away, laughing to herself.
Alex and Nia started laughing. Alex finally laid down beside Nia on the bed.
“Oh, Ruby probably heard everything,” Nia moaned.
“Something tells me she's heard an alpha werewolf moan before,” Alex said.
“You should say that the front of Juno,” Nia said with a grin. They got out of bed and Alex shifted back to human form, his clothes reappearing. Nia got changed out of the shapeless sleepwear and they stood at the end of the bed, Alex giving her a deep kiss, thoughts crossing over his mind of the hell with breakfast, make Nia his meal instead.
“Come on, we need to go,” Nia said, pulling him towards the bedroom door. Alex went with her, trying to hide the smile on his face. Sure, there were still a lot of things screwed up, plenty of problems, but he’d managed to transform an unhappy mate into a happy and satisfied one and even though it was a small win he was going to take it.
15
“We’re borrowing the car from Ruby,” April protested.
“Yeah, and where did she get it from?” Alex said.
“Don't ask, don't tell,” Ruby said, munching on a bagel.
It was still early morning, just after breakfast, and April and Nia were ready to go. They weren't taking Boris though, but a black car that had mysteriously appeared out the front of Juno's house overnight.
“What if a blood golem comes over the hill. What do you do?” Alex asked.
“Run away as fast as we can and get back here. It's going to be fine,” April said, giving Alex a kiss.
“Yeah, like the nymph said, it'll be fine. So what if we fight a few bad guys to the death?” Nia said with a cheeky grin. She kissed Alex goodbye and then they were gone. Ruby took herself inside, leaving Alex and Juno out on the sidewalk. It was promising to be another warm day as Summer crept ever closer.
“Now you’re all charged up, so to speak, you need to get to work enchanting rings. I need a bunch to sell, plus, while you're busy in the bedroom, I called the werewolves and they’re on their way,” Juno said.
“Which ones?” Alex said.
“I dunno. I spoke to Lydia and Esme. I think they're bringing Jacob. They didn't say who else. Everyone's fine there by the way. So far.”
Alex allowed Juno to drag him inside and then he took himself downstairs while she went off to work with Ruby. Alex enchanted a few shield rings using his natural mana, getting five done in under twenty minutes. He threw the completed rings in a pile and just hoped that none of them would explode. The girls had sold some of the shield rings yesterday to fund new clothes and add to (or start rather) the pile of cash.
Given the ones that they'd made yesterday were still fine, Alex was hoping these ones would be, too. After completing the five, Alex looked down at the various mana bars he had. Part of him knew he should just keep enchanting, slow and steady wins the race and all that. But, of course, the other side of him knew that they needed money and quick, and the fact was that although Juno could sell a lot of the shield rings, having a variety would earn them more money. There was also the little matter of the fact that the shield rings were only holding three charges at the moment. The issue, unfortunately, was that the battery spell within was restricted.
Alex wished that Stephen had just stayed one more day, so he could work on the enchanting and get better results—maybe make some more money. At the thought of the kid he thought about the code change ring. Should he make another and then text it on a normal? Alex wasn’t quite so sure. Ethically he had no problem injuring himself but hurting some normal in experimentation didn’t feel right. Still, getting normals to see past the Great Barrier would be useful…
Alex picked up one of the newly enchanted rings and opened the spell code on it almost without thinking. If he'd just bought this from someone, he wouldn't hesitate changing a three to thirty just as he'd been doing. So why was that a problem now? Alex suspected that he knew the answer: the other rings held more complicated spells. There was some kind of scale in there, adding more charges was somehow changing the battery spell that was inside it. He couldn't edit his own to change from a three to a thirty, not without making the ring a bomb. Alex closed the spells and dropped it back into the pile before picking up a fresh ring. Thanks to Stephen's help, he had enough to dump various spells onto the rings, and also, thanks to Stephen's help, he had a fireball spell.
Ruby had asked why he couldn't send a flame through someone's body that would injure them and Alex didn't have an answer to that just yet, but he knew that he could make a fireball and then throw it as evidenced by the black mark on the back fence.
But first he wanted to try out some of the other manas. He followed the usual procedure, except this time charged it with red. In comparison to natural mana, it seemed ridiculously powerful. The spell screen opened faster, and it seemed easy to drop in the code. It took a smaller slice of the overall bar. Exactly a minute later, Alex had a shield ring fully compiled and charged. This one he took to the other side of the room and set in a clear area, returning to his pile. He opened more code, this time dropping in his homebrew fireball spell. It was slightly harder, the spell within a few characters of filling the space. Along with the recharge and strengthening spells, it all just barely fit but the execute button lit up
and Alex hit compile, watching the code shrink down in it and flicker into a mathematical expression before vanishing.
Alex immediately took the ring to the other side of the room and set it in a clear area before returning to his pile. Over the next hour he used natural mana only, churning out shield rings, and soon he replaced the ones Stephen had taken and made a pile more. It wouldn't be long until he'd used up all the rings are Ruby had brought. Eventually he quit and considering the two new rings hadn't exploded, decided to make a few more.
Alex glanced through the various manas he had at his disposal: natural, sex, pain, nature, and death. Alex focused on using up sex magic. Two of his mates were gone, but Juno was still around. Alex quickly counted up the rings he had remaining. Fifteen to go. Five he cast as fireball, five more he made healing flame, and the final five fire shield.
Once they complied, Alex collected all of the rings, doing his best to keep them separate and went upstairs. Ruby and Juno were at the kitchen table again, and this time Alex got a closer look at what they were doing. Ruby had a cardboard box full of bits of crystal. Some of it looked like smoky quartz but other pieces had strange colors through them. There was a second box full of black crow feathers. Ruby and April were using red thread to tie the crystal and the feather together in a complicated pattern, murmuring as they went, their spell screens flickering above their heads. Once they were done, they would put the completed crystal and feather into a third box.
“I'm all out of rings. Now I have a lot of shield rings in here plus a bunch of healing flame, fireball and flame shield. I think we can definitely get some money for these,” Alex said.
Ruby put a completed crystal and feather into the box and then held out a hand.
“Give me one of those fireball ones,” she said. Alex handed it over and the old lady slipped the ring on her finger before standing up and going outside.
“You better hope that doesn't explode and take off her finger because she's gonna get really mad if that happens,” Juno murmured, picking up another feather and crystal.
Alex moved to the window to watch Ruby use the ring to summon a fireball in her hand. He saw her looking at it and then at the black mark that was still the fence. Although Juno had gone out yesterday to collect supplies to paint over the mark and also fix up the kitchen, it hadn’t been done yet. As he watched, Ruby threw the fireball at the back fence, hitting a different spot, The flames burst out and the wood caught fire. Alex was about to run out there, but then a spell screen flickered above her head and a sudden small localized shower of rain started directly above the fire, quickly putting it out. Ruby then stalked over to investigate the fence. Even from where he was standing, Alex could see that the burn pattern was identical. He turned to Juno, putting his hand on her shoulder.
“Okay, so funny story the other night when we were outside drunk, me and Stephen, I may have thrown a fireball at the fence,” Alex said, all in a rush.
“What? And you were letting me take the fall for it?”
“You seem better equipped to deal with your grandmother,” Alex said.
Juno smacked him on the hand but then went back to what she was doing.
“It's a good thing you’re cute,” she mumbled.
Soon, Ruby came stalking back into the house, spinning the ring on her finger.
“Very interesting burn pattern from these fireballs, very interesting indeed,” she said. She came back to the table and collected up the pile of rings. She took them over to the table and separated them into their individual spells before grabbing a notepad and writing down a few figures.
“I want you to let me sell them,” Ruby said.
“No commission,” Juno said automatically.
“Five percent,” Ruby said.
“One percent”
“Ten percent,” Ruby countered.
“You can't go up in percentage higher than your starting bid. Two percent and I don't put you in that super dodgy old folks’ home that I found down the road.”
“Three percent and I don't tell Alex about the great custard incident,” Ruby said in a sly tone.
Juno shot up from her chair and turned to point a finger at her grandmother. “You wouldn’t dare! That is such a low blow.”
“What's the custard incident?” Alex said, stirring the pot.
“I'll tell you if I don’t get my three percent,” Ruby said.
“Fine, you get three percent, now shut it,” Juno said, turning back to her crystals.
“I'm sure it's not that bad, come on tell me.”
“Sorry, Wolf, deal is done. My lips are sealed… for now,” Ruby said turning back to her calculations.
Alex wandered over to the table and picked up one of the completed crystal feather combinations. He could feel it tingling with power, so he cast Analyze on it, the small screen opening up, revealing a few pages of code.
“What is this spell?” Alex said.
“Sleep spell. These are activated by velocity which means you need to throw them. But once live if you touch them you get hit by a sleep spell that will knock you out for five to ten minutes depending on your resistance,” Ruby explained.
Alex wasn't quite sure why he did it. The thought crossed his mind and before he knew it, he'd tossed the crystal towards Ruby.
“Hey Ruby, catch,” he said.
The old witch turned and caught the crystal. There was a flare of magic and she suddenly crumpled to the floor.
“Oh, she's gonna be so mad when she wakes up,” Juno said.
“I… it was just meant to be a joke,” Alex said, coming over to kneel beside Ruby.
“You might want to make yourself scarce,” Juno said. She stood up and opened a kitchen drawer which was stuffed full of phones. She passed one to Alex.
“Here, take this, I’ll call you later,” she said.
Alex wasn't sure if Juno was joking but he wasn’t going to take the risk, so he took the phone, quickly grabbed his wallet and a few of the rings and left. Once he was out on the street Alex picked a random direction, vaguely heading towards the city and kept walking. It didn't take long before he was in the city proper, still wondering why he'd thrown the sleep crystal to Ruby. It felt like the impulse had come out of nowhere.
Although Alex had left with no real plan, now that he was in the city, he started looking around for any kind of magical shop. Maybe he could sell a few rings, see what else he could buy to learn from.
It wasn't long before he found one, but it wasn’t a pawn shop like Bailey’s had been, with the gloomy interior and broken things stuffed in the window. This one looked upmarket and had various pieces of furniture in the front window: chairs, a coffee table and an ornate bookcase.
“Roma’s,” he murmured, looking up at the sign.
Even from the sidewalk, he could sense the magic within.
He cast Analyze on one of the chairs but whatever spells were on it were too high for him to understand. He just got question marks. Alex went inside.
There was a woman behind the counter with glossy black hair who he guessed was near thirty. Although the shop itself looked quite upmarket with tastefully arranged pieces of furniture all over the place, the woman herself was wearing a large leather apron and was actually whittling something as she sat behind the cash register.
“Come to get yourself some fancy furniture, have you?” she asked, barely looking up at Alex.
“You must be Roma? I have some magic rings to sell,” Alex said.
“That’s me. Give us a look then,” she said.
Alex approached the counter and dropped a handful of rings on it. Roma glanced up and he saw her eyes widen in recognition.
“Sorry, do you know me?” Alex asked.
“I saw your face on a card recently. It comes from a small deck of cards you definitely don't want to be in,” Roma said.
The only types of decks of cards with photographs on them that Alex had heard of were the ones used in war to hunt down terrorists. Alex guesse
d it had worked over in hot and sandy countries so it figured the mages or whoever it was would use it here.
“Where can I get one of these cards?”
“From somewhere you really don't want to go. How about we have a look at the rings and then you think about whether you want to be walking around the city unaccompanied? You do have a pack, right? Never travel alone and all that?”
She went to pick up one of the rings that Alex had placed on the counter, but he stopped her, putting his hand on hers. The moment he did, she pulled her hand away and made a noise that for a moment sounded like a hiss. She dropped what she was working on, and stepped back from the counter, putting her hands on her head and smoothing her black hair down.
“It's okay, it's okay,” she said. Alex realized she was talking to herself.
“Sorry, I didn't mean to touch you without your permission, but if you've seen that card, you know who I am. Alex Lowe, the one and only werewolf mage and you know that people are hunting me. Tell me where I can get one of those cards,” he repeated.
“There's a bar a couple of streets from here. There’ll be one there but you need to realize that if someone has one of those cards, it’s most likely because they enjoy hunting people. The bartender will have one. They work on a commission basis, taking a few percent cut. They’ll give you one or they might just try to collect the bounty themselves.”
Roma finally finished smoothing her hair and returned to the counter. Alex stood there thinking while she picked up the first of the rings and he saw a spell screen flicker above her head. Hers was deep green and murky.
As he watched she picked up one of the fireball rings and cast Analyze, before frowning again and looking back to him.
“How have you done this then? Is this some kind of fake?” she asked.
“It’s a fireball spell—three of them on the ring, and it charges from the wearer,” Alex said.
“I can see it's a fireball spell. What I'm asking is how you managed to get three of them on to a ring and not a wand,” she said.
