Awakened Spells Box Set

by Logan Byrne

  “Have a good evening, Mr. Pumperschmidt,” the man said, nodding.

  “Mr. Pumperschmidt?” I asked, laughing a little.

  “Hey, don’t laugh! It’s a cool name!” Charlie whispered.

  Still holding onto his arm, we walked inside the building, where a grand atrium traveled all the way up to the top of the building. “It looks a little more menacing in person,” I said.

  “I think it’s cool. Imagine what I could see from up there,” Charlie said, salivating, probably already thinking of shifting and going up there like the little kitty cat he was.

  “I should get started,” I said.

  “Don’t disappear too quickly, it would look bad. I’d say mingle for about fifteen or twenty minutes before disappearing. Somebody might notice otherwise if you disappear right after arriving,” Faus said.

  “What are you doing?” Charlie asked, as I dragged him over towards the drinks.

  “We have to look the part,” I said, before taking some spiked punch the servers were handing out. I took a sip and grimaced. “This is horrible.”

  “Yeah, it kind of burns going down, doesn’t it?” he asked, shaking his head.

  “Do you think all these people are magical?” I asked, looking at the crowd around us.

  “I don’t know, I don’t think so. Some of these people just seem like your average rich mortals. They don’t scream anything else, but then again I don’t think we do, either. I bet it’s a mix of both,” he said.

  “I’m into the security systems,” Faus said, in our ears. “There’s a camera pointed at the elevator access door, but I can freeze it while you’re at it so they never suspect a thing. They don’t even know I’m in their system,” Faus said.

  “Should I go for it?” I asked.

  “Start to make your way in that direction,” Faus said.

  “Go for it,” Charlie whispered.

  I walked slowly over, looking at a guard who was staring at me from the front door, until I slammed into somebody. I stepped backwards, looking up, and my stomach dropped. I wanted to vomit.

  “Are you okay, Miss?”

  It was Kiren. He was standing there, a group surrounding him, as he smiled and looked down at me. This was my first real experience with him, face to face, and he was talking to me directly. I wanted to punch him, pull out my wand and arrest him here and now for crimes against humanity, but I held myself together for the greater good of this mission.

  “I’m so sorry, Mr. President. I tripped and couldn’t catch myself in time,” I said.

  “It’s no problem at all. I don’t believe I’ve ever made your acquaintance,” he said. “What’s your name?”

  “Uh, Pumperschmidt. Katherine Pumperschmidt,” I said nervously.

  “What a peculiar name,” he said, extending his hand to shake.

  “I’ve been ill, I don’t think it’s a smart idea for me to shake the hand of such an important man to our people,” I said, smiling politely. Truthfully, I didn’t know if touching him skin to skin would allow him to know about my mark, and I wasn’t about to take the chance. I was out of my element, and even though my appearance and name were both fake, I couldn’t chance it. Besides, I needed to get to that elevator.

  “Interesting,” he said, smiling.

  “Mr. President, we need you around back to get ready for your speech,” a man in a suit said, interrupting us.

  “If you’ll excuse me, Katherine, I must be preparing for my speech. I hope to speak with you more tonight,” he said, smiling, before walking off with his security detail.

  I scowled, looking at him as he walked away. “Lexa, the cameras will freeze in thirty seconds,” Faus said.

  “Right, on it,” I said, shaking away my disdain for Kiren and walking towards the access door.

  “They’re freezing…now!” Faus said, before I walked up to the door.

  I pulled out a lock-picking set, listening closely as I tried to hear the springs and pins move into place. Using my wand was too risky; maybe this place was booby-trapped against magic. A hex or charm could easily stop those kinds of intrusions, and the last thing I needed was for an alarm to go off and everybody in here to see me trying to break into a room. Didn’t think I could try to pass it off as using the bathroom and getting lost.

  “Got it,” I said, under my breath, as the door opened. The shaft was massive, the industrial feel and bitter cold making my breath visible before I whipped out my wand.

  “Do you have a plan?” Faus asked.

  “Levio,” I said, hopping up with barely any force. I came up off the ground, before slowly floating down. This was perfect. “I do indeed.”

  I jumped upwards, grabbing the top of an elevator cab, before hoisting myself up and looking at the reverse bottomless pit above me. I couldn’t even see the top of this thing, the dimly lit shaft likely never seeing human eyes. “Here goes nothing,” I said. I jumped up as high as I could, over a story high, before grabbing onto the cable. I pulled upwards hard, going up two more stories, before the cable moved.

  “Whoa,” I said, letting go and feeling my feet gently hit the top of the cab. My hair flew backwards as I held on for dear life while I was thrust upwards. My eyes partially shut, I noticed I was getting higher and higher, before the cab started to slow down. “Now is my chance.”

  Using the momentum of the cab stopping, I jumped at the same time, flinging myself upwards like an asteroid flying through space. I grabbed onto the ledge of the forty-fifth floor, two stories away, before looking back down at where I’d come from. That was a steep fall, and one I wasn’t sure even this spell could handle.

  I jumped upwards, the spell starting to wear off, as I barely reached the next floor. “Faus,” I said, moaning as I pulled myself up.

  “What is it? Are you all right?” he asked.

  “My spell wore off, I think. I don’t think I can cast it again or I’ll be too light once I get inside,” I said.

  “Then climb like you’ve never climbed before, Kiren is minutes from his speech,” Faus said.

  “Get on it,” Charlie whispered.

  Taking a deep breath, I exhaled hard before jumping upwards and using my parkour skills that I developed as a thief. Maybe it was a good thing I thought I was a pilt for such a long time. The skills I learned as a thief really had come in handy in this new profession.

  “I’m here,” I said.

  “Door opening,” Faus said, and the elevator shaft door opened just enough for me to slip out.

  “I can hear someone,” I said, walking towards the left, where Kiren’s office was. “There’s a guard here, but I think he’s preoccupied.”

  I could hear a man humming, and the faintest sound of music from headphones as I slyly peered around the corner. He didn’t notice me, sitting in a chair and looking straight in front of him at an aquarium that was built into the wall, just like in my dream. I pulled my wand out from my garter belt and pointed it at him. “Dormio,” I said, the bolt hitting him, before he started to yawn. I guess my spells weren’t as powerful as Britta’s.

  Within thirty seconds he was out, slouched back in his chair as he snored heavily with his music still blaring. “I’m at the door,” I said.

  “Anything there stopping you?” Faus asked.

  “No, it just looks like a normal door,” I said, before turning the handle. The door opened as you would expect, but something didn’t seem right. “This place seems weird,” I said.

  “Like dark?” Faus asked.

  “I…I think I’ve been here,” I said, confused as to how I’d ever gotten here before. I turned on a lamp, the room lighting up, and I gasped, looking all around. “This was in my dream.”

  That night I dreamt of being in Kiren’s office, the night he did his ritual, was it real? I thought it was a dream, an amalgamation of my conscience taking over as my deepest fears festered, but there was no way I could make this up. I had no way to know what his office looked like, down to the fabric on the chairs. I was i
n shock.

  “You have to get moving, Lexa. He’s about to start his speech,” Charlie said.

  “Right,” I said, shaking myself before taking the flash drive out of my garter. I plugged it in, turning on the button as it turned red, the light a progress bar around it. “It’s on.”

  “Great, now look around while you’re there. See if you can find anything damning,” Faus said.

  There was a folder inside his desk titled “Mark,” which I couldn’t help but open. Inside there were pictures of past mark-bearers, including red stamps that said “Deceased” and the dates they died. I looked on in shock, seeing a massive dump of data about the mark and what the powers could do. I tried to scan through them, my heart racing as the vein in the side of my neck started to throb.

  He wanted to wipe out the world with this power. He was going to take it for himself and use it to wipe out bloodlines that weren’t pure and rich with magical power. Any mortals who didn’t have magical genes would either be executed or enslaved, and he didn’t care that much about the magical creatures and beings either. Nobody was safe.

  I searched for any trace of my name, but there was nothing there to indicate he knew about me or my powers. I sighed a little, knowing I was at least still under the radar, which was where I needed to be after discovering his plans for domination. He didn’t know anybody else with the mark, and it needed to stay that way.

  “Lexa, is it done?” Faus asked.

  I looked at the drive, the ring just turning solid, before I pulled it out of his computer. “Done,” I said.

  “Get out of there before it’s too late,” Charlie said. “He’s in the middle of his speech.”

  I ran outside, the guard still fast asleep, before Faus opened the elevator door for me. “Levio,” I said, my body turning into a feather, before I hopped off. I tensed my stomach, the velocity still enough to make me wince from this height, until my feet almost touched the ground. “The lamp,” I said, my eyes going wide.

  “What?” Faus asked.

  “The lamp, the lamp in his office! I forgot to turn it off! I have to go back.”

  “There’s no time, he’s done with his speech. You have to get the hell out of there, Lexa, he’s walking towards the elevators,” Charlie said.

  Panicked, I hopped off the elevator cab and through the door from which I came. As I walked around the corner, I saw him, and he looked at me, with a confused look on his face. I realized there was a little grease on my hands and dress. I kept my head held high, acting like nothing was amiss, before reuniting with Charlie in the crowd.

  “Let’s sneak out before he finds out,” Charlie said.

  I grabbed his hand, covering it in elevator wire grease, and the two of us snuck out and teleported back into Faus’s lab in the precinct. “Here,” I said, handing him the flash drive.

  “I’ll try to get this data sorted as soon as possible,” he said.

  “He saw me, he knows I was up to something. He’s going to connect the dots,” I said.

  “He won’t know, Lexa. You were disguised,” Charlie said.

  I looked in a mirror, seeing my changed face starting to dissipate, before turning back into my own face. “I don’t know, this isn’t great,” I said.

  “Let’s just let Faus get through this, and we can relax and move on with our lives in the meantime. He didn’t know it was you. You’re fine,” Charlie said, hugging me.

  20

  A few days had passed and nothing had happened on the Kiren front. We were never sought out, and Faus was still analyzing the data, but he said he would have it within the next day or two to go over. I guessed Kiren’s hard drive was full of a lot of files, and all of them were heavily encrypted, which made it even more difficult for Faus to get in, but he said he was getting the job done.

  “Are you looking forward to tonight?” Blake asked as he leaned against a vending machine while I looked for a snack.

  “Yes, I am,” I said, smiling. Britta’s birthday was tonight, and we were all going out to dinner and to see a play. It was going to be magical, and something that I thought we all desperately needed. We never got a lot of free time, especially to go out like this, and plus it acted as a little date for Blake and me, which we definitely never got a chance to do.

  “I’m looking forward to holding your hand all night,” he said, smiling.

  “I’m looking forward to kissing you when the theater goes dark,” I said.

  “Oh, stepping it up a little, huh?” he asked, laughing.

  “A girl has to keep control, you know,” I said, as my candy bar dropped from above.

  “I’m so glad we found one another. I can’t imagine not having you around after how close we’ve become,” he said.

  “I know, things will only get better,” I replied, smiling from ear to ear.

  With a pile of food in front of us that night, we sat around the table in the restaurant laughing and snorting as we told jokes and work stories that were hysterical. I held Blake’s hand under the table, something I didn’t get to do too often, before the waiter brought Britta a slice of birthday cake with a candle in it.

  Embarrassing her, we all sang loudly, as her cheeks turned a little red before she made a wish and blew out her candle. “Funny, isn’t it?” she asked.

  “What?” I replied.

  “Making a wish when you’re a witch and have magic,” she said. “Still, a fun tradition. Thank you all for coming out with me tonight, and thank you for being my friends. To us.”

  Britta raised her glass, all of us raising ours and clinking them together before saying we were united.

  Just as things were going great, Mirian walked through the door of the restaurant, flanked by two officers, and approached our table.

  “Mirian. What is it?” Blake asked.

  “Lexa, will you please come with me?” he asked, looking saddened.

  “Mirian, what is it?” I asked, my heart dropping.

  “I don’t want to make a scene here. Please come quietly and I’ll make sure this is swift,” he said.

  “Mirian,” I said, tears welling up in my eyes as the others looked at me. I looked at Charlie, then Faus, both of them looking panicked as Mirian didn’t back down.

  “Lexa Blackmoon, under the authority of M.A.G.I.C., I hereby place you under arrest for the attempted assassination of Kiren Nightstorm,” Mirian said, and the officers came around the table and grabbed me.

  “Hey, let her go,” Blake said, his eyes turning red.

  Mirian swiped his hand, Blake’s body seizing up as he fell back into his chair. “Please, everybody, don’t try anything. You all must know I’m not happy to do this, but the law is the law.”

  I began to cry, tears streaming down my cheeks, as the cops with Mirian took my wand, handing it to him, before handcuffing me and hauling me towards the door. “Lexa Blackmoon, you have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney, if you cannot afford an attorney one will be provided to you. Do you understand these rights as I have expressed them to you?” Mirian asked.

  When I looked over at him I saw the sadness in his eyes. I knew he didn’t want to do this. He was my mentor, a father to me, and he must’ve known I never would’ve tried to do this to Kiren. There must’ve been a mistake, and I was bound and determined to figure it out.

  I was booked, my fingerprints and mug shot taken, as my fellow officers stared at me, almost in shock. Some I knew and others I didn’t. They all knew me, though.

  It was disheartening and humiliating. I was tossed in with other women who were awaiting interrogation or transport to a more permanent facility. I sat there, staring at the cold disgrace the prison bars exuded, before staring down at my hands while I twiddled my thumbs.

  I was going to fight these charges, and I was going to get myself free before anything else bad could happen. Kiren was out of line, and the fact that he could lie and fabricate a threat of this
caliber was beyond reprehensible. There was no proof, and I would be cleared of all charges.

  I just had to be.

  1

  “Look boys, a M.A.G.I.C. auditor is here with us today. What a joy this is,” a man snarled from a cell across the hall.

  “I’d hate to be somebody like her going into prison with guys like us,” another said, giggling.

  “I won’t be going anywhere,” I snapped, looking down at the floor. “This is a misunderstanding.”

  “Yeah, just like mine is, right, Marv?” the first guy asked, laughing hysterically.

  “Yeah, our crimes were just misunderstandings,” Marv said, laughing.

  I twiddled my thumbs, trying to block these guys out, as I attempted to understand how I ended up in prison. How did Kiren get wind of me, and why was he saying I tried to assassinate him? That was a bold claim, even for him, and even though I was fairly new to the force, my track record would work in my favor, not against it.

  Then it came to me. The light. I’d left the light on in his office, which would’ve triggered something to him. He would’ve known somebody had been in there, but how did he know it was me? Did he have cameras, or maybe he took fingerprints? I should’ve worn gloves; that was a mistake on my part. I knew Mirian would be able to get me out of this, to make the commissioner release me and let me get back to work, but I would have to be extra careful going forward. Kiren knew who I was now, and I didn’t want to give him any more reason to put me behind bars.

  “Lexa,” I heard, before looking up. It was Mirian, standing there with keys in his hand—and a pair of handcuffs.

  “Mirian,” I said, relieved, standing up.

  “Please put your hands up to the bars so I can restrain you. We have to go to interrogation now,” he said coldly.

  “But I’m not a threat,” I said, blinding defeat apparent in my voice.

  “I must follow protocol, especially with a charge such as this one. Please just do as I ask,” he said.

  I could feel the pain in his voice, almost as if he were hurting more than I was. He was like a father to me, a mentor, and to think that I did something like this must’ve been killing him. He had to know I didn’t do it—obviously he knew what kind of person I was, but treating me like a common prisoner would’ve been taxing for him, I was sure.