by Logan Byrne
“I must’ve been four here, I think, I don’t know. I barely remember this,” I said, with a tiny almost guilty feeling for not being able to recall the memory of that day.
“You were young, you don’t remember a whole lot from when you’re that young. Don’t beat yourself up,” she said, before she set the picture down and we moved on.
The glass in the window above the kitchen sink had been shattered, the small pieces crinkling and breaking underneath our boots. I swore for a moment I could smell my mother’s cooking, her grandmother’s recipe for saffron bread, before the smell escaped me.
“Let’s go upstairs,” I said, and Britta nodded.
The stairs felt a little wobbly and uneasy as we walked up them, neither of us on the same step for fear our weight would be too much for the stairs to handle, until we made it to the top. “This is where it happened, at least for my mother,” I said, from the top of the stairs.
“I’m sorry to hear that. You saw it?” she asked.
“Pretty much, yeah. I had to hide,” I said, before turning left and walking towards my parents’ room. The bed was still there, still made, like no soul had disturbed it all this time. I touched the post of their bedframe, the way I used to, my hand now engulfing the circular wooden ball, unlike when I was young.
“My hand never used to fit over this. My mom used to tell me that one day it would, when I grew up, though I don’t know if I ever believed her. I think I wanted it to happen so quickly, so I could be a big girl, but it never came, for obvious reasons,” I said.
“You should take this,” she said, handing me a necklace that she picked up from my mother’s dresser.
“Wow,” I said, walking over and taking hold of it. “She wore this all the time.”
The necklace wasn’t anything special, just a thin silver chain with a sapphire pendant dangling from the middle. I put it in my pocket, saving it for a proper moment, before the nostalgia got to be a little too much and I left the room.
“This was my room,” I said, as we went the other way. “It’s a lot smaller than I remember.”
“You’re a lot bigger now. It’s a nice room,” she said, looking around at all my toys and books. “Too bad you didn’t keep up on your reading.” She smiled, trying to lighten the mood and tease me, until I sniffled, laughing a little. I knelt down, opening the frame of my bed and seeing my tiny little hiding space inside, my fort, as I liked to have it called. I remembered peering out of it to see my mother murdered.
“Is this where you were?” she asked.
“Yeah, this is it. This is also where the auditors found me hiding when they rescued me,” I said.
“It was smart of you, to hide in here,” she said.
“My mother made me, it wasn’t my idea,” I said.
“Well, she was a smart woman for making you go in here. She wanted you to live,” she said.
“At her expense,” I said.
“That’s what a mother does, Lexa. She sacrifices herself for her children, so that they may live a better life than she did. If you could talk to her, I’m willing to bet that she wouldn’t regret the decision at all,” she said.
The two of us walked back downstairs, ready to leave, before I caught a glimpse of something from earlier. “Wait,” I said, as she took out her wand. I picked up the photo she’d found before coming back over. “I’m good now.”
“Good choice,” she said, before teleporting us back to our room.
I wiped the photo off, restoring some of the silver frame’s sheen, before setting it on the nightstand next to my bed. Britta went to sleep, but my mind was racing too much to settle down, so I lay in bed and stared at the photo of us all smiling.
With a heavy heart and a big yawn, I closed my eyes, my eyelids unable to stay open any longer, before I drifted off to sleep in hopes of seeing them again. I hoped they’d be proud.
18
“You wanted to see me?” I asked, walking into Faus’s laboratory.
“Yes, come over here,” he said, motioning me towards a computer in the corner of the room. “I have what you asked for.”
“The blueprints?” I whispered.
“Yeah. I’ve looked them over a few times, and I’ve been trying to come up with the best way for you to get to the penthouse,” he said.
“He’s all the way up there? This doesn’t sound like it will be easy,” I said.
“No, it won’t be. His office is at the top of the building, and there will be security buzzing all over the place, especially because of the gala. There are five elevators in the building, but I’m going to guess you can’t just get in one and go up to the top floor. Maybe that would work in another situation, but not with the gala taking place,” he said.
“What about the stairs?” I asked.
“Not going to work. There will definitely be cameras and guards everywhere,” he said.
“I forgot about the cameras. Those are really popular with mortals, aren’t they?” I asked.
“Yeah, especially in big corporate buildings like this. You need to go up here,” he said, pointing at the screen.
“Is that?” I asked.
“The elevator shaft,” he said, looking up at me.
“Okay, but how do I even get inside it? Not only that, but how am I supposed to climb up like fifty stories?” I asked.
“Forty-seven, but who’s counting? You need to access it here. There’s a door that goes into the shaft for workers to access for maintenance and that kind of stuff. Once you get in there, you’ll have to use a weightless spell and thrust yourself upwards,” he said.
“Do you have one in mind?” I asked.
“I’m not a witch, remember?” he said.
“Well it’s not like I can ask Mirian or Britta, can I?” I asked.
“You’ll need to go to the library, then, and look through a spell book. It shouldn’t be too advanced. Didn’t you say you and Britta used one outside the club?” he asked.
“Yeah, but I’m not sure if it works going up like it does going down. I’ve never tried that sort of thing, but I’ll figure it out. What’s after that?” I asked.
“Once you make it to the forty-seventh floor you’ll need to exit through the metal elevator doors. They should open with a little pry, or there might even be a release lever in the shaft. There might be a guard up there, though they may just put that person on security downstairs, maybe even guarding the entrance to the elevator,” he said.
“Okay, so I make it up, I get in the hallway, maybe take out a guard, then what? Is there security on his office?” I asked.
“No, not that I know of, at least nothing in the blueprints or documents I’ve hacked seems to point to that. It looks like just a normal office door. They probably aren’t expecting anybody to get up there, ever, so I doubt they went that far,” he said.
“I sure hope you’re right. I don’t want to get all the way up there and have to give a fingerprint or something,” I said.
“Once you’re inside, you need to move swiftly and not move things around, either. He might notice if something is moved, and that will only cause suspicion for you. Sure, he doesn’t know you, or know that you want to go to his office, but he might bring in a CSI squad and find fingerprints or a hair or something like that. You’ll get back down the same way you got up, get back to the gala, and that’s that,” Faus said, brushing his hands together.
“Sounds so easy, almost too easy,” I said.
“Just be smart and have your wits about you, and I’m sure you’ll do fine. Don’t stay too long, and take this,” he said, pulling out a flash drive. “I almost forgot about this.”
“What do I do with this thing?” I asked.
“Plug it into his computer and press this button. It will clone his hard drive and allow us to see whatever files he has on it. Maybe it will give us some good information,” he said.
“I thought you did this already,” I asked.
“Not with this particular computer. He
has it on a closed network without Internet access, so I couldn’t get in. You need to do it manually to access the data, which is why it’s crucial to get this done if you want to take him down,” he said.
“Sure, another thing to be added to the growing list, I suppose. No problem at all,” I said, sighing.
“I can be in your ear if you’d like, and maybe hack into the security cameras. I don’t like you going in alone, even if Charlie will be downstairs,” he said.
“How did you know that?” I asked.
“He told me. He was worried, and besides, he has a big mouth sometimes,” he said, laughing.
“Yeah, you could say that. Well, the gala is tomorrow night. I’ll find out the spells I need today, and you just make sure you stay in my ear tomorrow with something small enough that they won’t see it,” I said.
“Already on it. Good luck!” he said.
The library at the precinct was large and full of information about everything you could think of in the magical world. You could look up spells, past cases, reports on dangerous creatures, including how to take care of them, and anything else you could think of. I knew they had a plethora of spell books inside, and I planned to use every resource at my disposal to figure out how to best break into this office.
I walked into the witch section, seeing leather-bound spell books from centuries past. They were stacked high, every single culture and ethnicity accounted for, from African tribal witches to the Essex witches in England. They had books from South American shamans and aboriginal wizards from Australia. You could find anything here.
I knew what I was looking for would either come from a combat spell manual, or just a basic spells book. The levitation and weightless spells weren’t particularly hard to cast or learn the incantations for, but they still weren’t something I was very familiar with. Britta had used one as we escaped the club, but I wasn’t sure if it would work the way I wanted it to. All it did was make us slow down on our descent, but if I jumped really hard would it work the same way going up? I couldn’t ask her without giving away my intentions and what I was planning on doing with this gala, so I was on my own.
I picked up a book, A Witch’s Guide to Combat Survival. It looked promising. A plume of dust billowed out from the pages as I opened them for the first time in what looked like decades. This library was expansive, but the books must not all be used too often. I went to the index, seeing a list of spells and what they were used for.
“Combat Jumping,” I whispered aloud, finding the most promising bit in the index so far. I flipped to the eighty-ninth page, rolling my index finger down the page as I tried to find an ascent spell.
I found the spell Levio that Britta had cast on us that night, but all it said was that it was a gravity and weightless spell. It didn’t give much more information than that. That was when it hit me. If I could make myself weightless, or at least much lighter, what if I used my surroundings in the elevator shaft to propel myself upwards? There would be a thick cable, and even ledges for the different floors on the sides of the shaft itself. I could toss myself upwards and make great time that way, all without breaking a sweat. It was genius.
I closed the book swiftly, coughing as another dust cloud came out, before putting it back and sneaking out. Whenever I did something like this, getting information for something I shouldn’t be doing, I always felt dirty, like I shouldn’t leave too much of my presence behind. I wasn’t always the studying type, so somebody like Mirian or Britta finding me would mean I would have to do a lot of explaining.
As I sat at my desk later that day, I twirled the flash drive around my fingers, the metal hoop attached to the end mesmerizing me. “Doing okay?” Charlie asked, walking up and sitting across from me.
“Just thinking about tomorrow,” I said, snapping out of it.
“Same. You’re sure you want to go through with this? It isn’t exactly an easy task, you know,” he said.
“Nothing in life is easy, though, and nothing worth fighting for has ever been handed over. I think this is important, and I think the plan Faus and I devised is going to be the best course of action for finally ending this once and for all,” I said.
“Then I’ll help you, but I can’t be implicated if something goes south. I know we’re partners, but this could be bad,” he said, his tone serious.
“Don’t worry, I wouldn’t let anything happen to you. But don’t think like that! We’ll be fine, I’m sure of it,” I said, in a not-totally-reassuring or confident tone.
“Promise me one thing?” he asked.
“Depends on what that is,” I said.
“If you don’t find anything bad, or anything that implicates him too badly, you won’t obsess over this. I don’t want to see you consumed if you don’t get what you want or need,” he said.
“I promise,” I said with a half smile. Truthfully, I was lying through my teeth, and part of me thought he sensed that. He was my partner, and he did know me probably the best out of anybody besides maybe Britta.
It was hard to promise him, knowing what I knew about my mark and the people who came before me. That spirit trip was eye-opening; it showed me what could happen to this time and this world if I didn’t step in and stop it. Knowing I had that burden made it almost impossible to stand idly by while Kiren had free reign of both realms. I just hoped that Charlie would understand that and not push too hard against me. But I would never let him go down with me if I did get caught. I loved him too much.
“Just be smart when you’re out there, okay? I’ll make sure to try to find the club owner if I can and get eyes on him. Taking him down as well would make tomorrow night infinitely better,” he said.
“If anybody can do it, it’s you and that nose,” I said, laughing.
19
“Okay, this is your communication device,” Faus said, handing over a tiny flesh-colored listening device. “It will do two-way communication and allow me to talk to you with nobody else hearing me.”
“You’re a genius, I can barely tell I have this and it’s in my hand,” I said, rolling it around between my fingers.
“Just be careful not to lose it before you go in. It’s important that you both have this, because it will allow me to talk to both of you, and you both will be able to hear each other as well,” he said. “Put them in now before you lose them.”
I slipped mine into my ear canal, even shaking my head a little to make sure it wouldn’t fall out. “How do we know it’s working?” I asked.
“Once I turn it on from my computer, it will be on. I just wanted them in place before you headed out,” Faus said.
“For the final time, you’re sure?” Charlie asked as we stood around Faus’s table.
“Yes, I’m sure. Do you have the invitations?” I asked.
“Right here,” he said, reaching in his tuxedo and pulling out two tickets Faus had drafted from the image files he found on their servers. “Locked and loaded.”
“Now remember the plan, Lexa. You know the blueprints, you know the procedure, and you know the exit points. You both do. I’ll be here to assist you both in any way that I can,” Faus said.
“Well, are you ready?” I asked Charlie, holding my clutch in my hand. My wand was strapped to a garter on my thigh.
“Ready as I can be,” he said, before letting out a deep breath.
I grabbed onto him, teleporting us about two blocks away from the venue. The bustle of New York City, the mortal part, rampaged around us. “This place really goes off at night, doesn’t it?” he asked.
“It’s the city that never sleeps, remember? I think they take that title quite literally,” I said, grabbing his arm. “Remember to call out if people are coming my way.”
“I know, I will. If things get hairy up there, you need to let me know so I can either come help or create a diversion or something. I can’t exactly shift in front of all those people, but you never know,” he said.
“Wait! I almost forgot!” I said, before we crosse
d the corner to the entrance and slipped into an alley.
“What’s wrong?” Charlie asked nervously.
“Here, take this,” I said, handing him a pill. I took one myself, swallowing it without water, before Charlie reluctantly did the same. “We can’t go in as ourselves. These will disguise us for an hour or two,” I said.
“Or two? That’s a pretty broad amount of time, you know,” he said, before our faces started to shift around. “Wow, this is weird.” His face bubbled, his features melting into one another and reforming as he became an entirely different person. He looked at me, shocked.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“You’re…you know…kind of hot now,” he said.
“What, I’m ugly otherwise?” I asked sternly, slapping his arm.
“No, you’re great! I just think of you like my annoying sister, so there’s that,” he said, trying to save grace, even though he’d just insulted me even more.
“Let’s go,” I said.
“Disguises all on?” Faus asked, from his lab.
“Yup,” I said softly. “You can hear me?”
“Loud and clear. The vibrations from your voice are resonating in the device, giving me the ability to hear you even if you aren’t speaking loudly. You could whisper at the most minute level and I would still be able to pick it up,” he said.
“Great, because things might be getting soft for us here soon. We’re walking up now,” I said, as Charlie and I walked up the steps.
There were guards out front, an illuminated entrance shining above the guests who were arriving. There were large stone steps leading up to the entrance, with red velvet ropes guarding off anybody who wasn’t permitted to enter. A large glass window showcased the interior, which was emblazoned with white marble slabs, which towered over the atrium inside. There had to be fifteen others coming in at the same time as us, a group of them inside already mingling and having drinks, before Charlie handed the man our tickets.
