"Don't do this, Matty."
"All I'm asking is two minutes to place a call. That is hardly unreasonable. In fact, I believe that I have the right to do so."
At least I thought I did. My knowledge of arrest procedure was based on what I'd seen on TV, and American shows, at that. I may have been rather wrong, but I still wasn't going anywhere without making that call.
"I can't let you do that," he said, raising his stave.
"You can if I order it," I said, my eyes narrow, my voice cold, "Who's your oath to, Agent?"
He paused in his movement, his eyes on me.
"Oh, you're kidding!" he said, lowering his rod.
"No, and be cool, will you? I'm incognito!" I said in a hiss.
"Prove it! Right now!" he said, his hand twitching.
I focussed and my signet appeared on my finger, I lifted my left hand surreptitiously for him to see. He swallowed.
"God, I'm sorry, Matty- I mean Lord Shadow," he said, hastily holstering his stave.
"Not so loud! Look, Faust isn't getting any relief from me, and the others aren't going to argue. I'm going to call Lady Hopkins and get her to call your boss, get this sorted. In the meantime, I'll come with you, if you can just keep this quiet."
"Of course, my lord," he said, bowing slightly.
"Oh, don't start that bollocks!" I said, which made him start, and then laugh.
"Sorry, never knew an Archon before they were terrifying. But then you always were a little scary, this does rather explain that," he said with a grin.
I called Hopkins, but got her voicemail. I shrugged and sent a text instead; she was rarely more than a minute away from her phone; I shouldn't have to wait long before she dealt with all of this.
>Slight cock-up, did something bad to Faust, not entirely my fault, please bail me out. Braak's arresting me.
"You dick, she'll kill me!" Braak said.
"If you were worried about that, then you shouldn't have arrested her little brother," I said with an evil grin as I sent the text off.
"Oh, I just knew this was going to end badly," he muttered.
So I ended up in an interrogation room, with all my stuff taken away. Thankfully I was still dressed...
They'd slapped on a set of Spelleater manacles, though, for all the good they'd do.
After being left in there for about an hour, Braak came in with a rather thick file which had my name on it.
"Been in here a while, you know," I complained.
"Sorry. Paperwork."
"Agent Braak, you're looking nervous."
"No, it's just that I'm under pressure here."
"Why?"
"I told you that the Primus gave the orders!"
"Alright, alright, keep your pants on," I said, smirking.
"Okay, why don't you tell me what happened between you and Lord Faust?"
"Never met the man," I replied glibly, figuring I may as well get some amusement out of this mess.
He sighed. I checked my watch; Hopkins should have been here by now, where was she?
"Can I see my phone?" I asked.
"Why?" he asked worriedly.
"Because I've had troubles lately with people messing with it. I just want to make sure my text got through."
He scratched at the back of his head, looking away. He should never go undercover...
"You bastard," I commented.
"Not me, support team," he said, going pale.
"Leaving now."
"At least answer my questions first! I'm in serious trouble if you don't!"
I grumbled, but stayed in my seat.
"Alright, but make it quick, I'm now getting rather annoyed," I said, leaning back and rattling the manacles, "And kindly remove these, they're chafing."
"Sorry, regulations," he said, opening the file.
"Shouldn't I have a lawyer?"
"You don't need one, it's just an interview," he said, looking away again.
"What's going on, Jeremy? You know I'm not an idiot."
He looked meaningfully at the recorder on the desk between us.
Ah, we were being closely monitored.
"I'm afraid I must insist on representation. That's my right, and I'm exercising it."
"Those are rights for Pureborn, not Magicians."
"I'm fairly certain that those rights are universal. And if they aren't, then what are my rights? That should have been something you mentioned when you arrested me, surely?"
"The laws are different when the case involves an act of Magical Terrorism," he said; his eyes downcast.
My mouth fell open, "What?"
"You're being detained under the Magical Clause of the Terrorism Act."
Well, that killed whatever amusement I might have been feeling stone dead. That really wasn't good. This was the sort of interview that ended with the subject stuffed into a deep, dark hole somewhere.
"I'm going to count to ten," I said softly, "and if I'm not convinced that there's a lawyer on the way before I reach five, then I'm gone before I reach nine, understand? One."
"Mathew, be reasonable, you can't just leave!"
"Two."
"Look, just answer some questions, get your side of the story on the record-"
"Three."
"What do you think you're going to do, fight your way out of an SCA station?!"
"Nope. Four."
"There's a full squadron of Battle Magicians in this building, you going to fight them all?!"
"There are two Magicians in this building of any strength at all, including you, let's not be dramatic. Oh, four more now, coming this way. Five."
"Alright! I'll get your lawyer," he said, darting away.
"And that's ten," I said as the door shut.
I applied my Will and the manacles broke, dropping to the table with a clatter. I sent my Shadows into the light fixtures, and the room was plunged into darkness. I chuckled and opened a gate into the Shadow Realm. I almost made it when the door slammed open, and the room filled with Magical Light. The Gate closed.
"Oh, crap, this close," I muttered.
Two Magicians darted through the open door, running for me. Both were men, taller than me and fit. Neither looked friendly, their expressions hateful and nasty. I wasn't inclined to let them get their hands on me.
I called Will and tossed one back into the far wall. The other one called his own Magic and deflected my attack while I conjured a bank of shadows between us. I had my shields up and Force assembling for an attack while he was still trying to tear his way through.
I cast a Force Lance, and it ploughed through his minimal defences like they weren't there, flinging him back, screaming as his newly broken shoulder hit the wall next to his comrade. Another Mage came in, a woman, just as tough looking, with a white scar running down the left side of her face. She threw lightning right at me. My shields took the hit, barely flexing, and I snorted as I retaliated, another wave of kinetic energy tearing her shields down before a Sleeping Spell dropped her to the ground.
The door had clicked shut behind the woman, so I gestured it blew outwards, slamming into the wall of the corridor. I walked out to see Braak and Faust standing together along with another Magician, a Sorcerer this time. He was the one generating the light, which had somehow cut through all the walls in the building , banishing every potential way into the Shadow Realm.
"Could you turn the light out? I'm trying to nap in here," I said.
The trio gaped in shock; horror in Faust's case. The latter probably wasn't helped by the sounds of pain coming from the room behind me.
"Subdue the suspect!" Braak ordered.
"Really?" I asked as the Sorcerer ran towards me, light flaring around his form. Faust was already sprinting for the door, sensible fellow.
I dropped my Shadows. Against a Light Mage, they would be worse than useless. I cast Mage Sight and closed my eyes as he started concentrating all that energy down into a beam that would have cut me in half, were it not for my shields.
He took a couple of layers away, and I retaliated with more force, which he caught neatly on a Light Shield. I replied with Dispels, which blasted apart a couple of his constructs. A follow up Force Lance tore the rest down completely.
The building was on fire by this point, from splash damage caused by his Light attacks. I gathered up all that heat, which neatly put out the flames, and hurled it back at him as a condensed ball of fire that exploded against his hasty Will barrier. The defence was flimsy enough that the impact still flung him back and into Braak, propelling them both further down the corridor in a tangle of limbs and not a few bellows of harsh language.
The Light Magician was down for the count, but Braak was back on his feet in an instant, sucking in vast amounts of gravitational energy, to the point that the building was starting to shake.
"Jeremy, stop it. You're only awake right now because you know where my stuff is."
"I can't let you go, Mathew."
"Do I need to show you the ring again?"
"Go back into the interrogation room," he said, his hands glowing orange.
"How long have you been working for Faust, Agent Braak?"
"Thirty-five years. Back in the room. Now."
"On the side? Or is it a matter of an inside man type thing?"
"Both. Last warning."
"Quite right, Agent Braak. Your last warning. Faust's a paper tiger now, he's harmless, I made sure of that, ripped his Magic right out of his skull. I, however, am very definitely not harmless. And neither are my very protective brother, sisters and Wardens. So, even if you do get me back in there, you're going to have to pay for it. With interest. Give it up."
"Nobody knows you're here, Mathew. Just undo what you did to Faust, and this can all be over."
"He said he'd kill everyone I loved," I replied softly, "even if I thought you could kill me, I still wouldn't fix him. Now get my things, and get the hell out of my way, that's a command from your Archon."
He cast his spell. I was ready for it, a Dispel neutralised it, but the ground cracked and the walls split as all the gravitational energy tore at the fabric of the building. I sent Shadows, and he put power into his shields, which didn't help much, I was coming at him from too many angles.
He called a bust of light that threw my Shadows off, and lashed out with gravity again, a ball of it tore three of my shield layers clean off, and the ground around my defences buckled under the sudden pressure of increased gravity.
A bit of roof concrete fell on the top of my shields, and I used my Will to toss it at Braak with a great deal of force, along with a Shadow Lance that tore his shields down, leaving him vulnerable.
But Braak was no slouch, he had a Will shield in place, and deflected my Force before it could knock him down. I followed up with more Shadows, and they slammed into his Will-dome, draining him horribly. I heard him shout in defiance as his Well finally drained down to nothing and my Shadows yanked him off his feet to sprawl in front of me, sweating and exhausted.
He gasped as he slowly rolled over, gulping as he met my eyes.
"Just kidding?" he offered.
Twenty minutes later, I staggered up the steps to Blackhold, tired, hungry and in need of a change of clothes (that station hadn't smelt nice). It was just after six, and I was working myself up into a particularly mood. Braak was a bad guy now? And on top of that, they'd hacked my bloody phone! That was just...wrong. Magicians were not supposed to have that card up their sleeve! Braak told me that he'd removed the virus, but I was hardly going to trust that two-faced son of a Slime-Toad...
Anyway, I got through to Hopkins as soon as I was clear, who promised Wrath, with a deliberate capital W for Braak... and a solid chunk for me as well on account of that whole Faust brain-blender thing. Apparently I wasn't supposed to attack powerful, politically connected noblemen in their own homes without provocation, who knew?
I walked through my front doors, nodding to the Wardens on duty before making my way towards Tethys' study, which was empty. Since Cassandra and Demise weren't in immediate evidence either, I headed to my room, thinking to change and shower.
I'd barely finished before Tethys came in wearing a silk robe that barely covered her wonderful thighs and left an expanse of leg interestingly exposed.
"Felt you," she said by way of an explanation, moving in close to me.
"I came home to return your ring," I said with a smile, "You wouldn't believe the afternoon I've had."
She wrapped her arms around my neck and held me very close and very gently.
"Missed you," she said quietly.
"I was here a couple of days ago," I said, running my hands gently up and down her back.
"Too long," she said, "You won't believe the things I had to do to Kandi and that new Warden to distract myself."
I chuckled, just enjoying her closeness. Something had definitely changed between us since that day. You'd think it would have created a bit of a rift, but the opposite was true, if anything. Knowing exactly where we stood with one another had taken a lot of the mystery away, but had revealed a better sort of closeness that I found myself treasuring far more than any physical encounter. She pulled back a little, her eyes meeting mine. She smiled that naughty little smile of hers I liked so much.
"Hey!" Kandi said, suddenly appearing at the door, "That's just not on!"
"Oh! Sorry, Sweetie," Tethys said, colouring slightly.
Not that I really noticed, I'd had to avert my eyes to the ceiling on account of the fact that Kandi was stark naked and her hair was dishevelled from whatever activity Tethys had... left unfinished.
"Hi Kandi," I said.
"Hi Matty. Now kindly get back to what you were doing, it's hardly fair to just drop everything because he's back in the general area, you know!"
Tethys sighed and giggled as she took in the direction of my eye-line.
"Alright, I'm coming," she said.
"So was I," Kandi muttered as she left, "bloody men, interfering in a perfectly nice evening..."
"And now she's mad at me," I said, looking down at Tethys once I was sure Kandi was gone.
Tethys snorted, "Sorry. I'd better get back to it, or she'll pout for a week."
"See you later," I said, after I took her left hand and slipped my signet back onto her pinkie, which made her smile, "and tell Kandi I'm sorry for disrupting her evening."
"No doubt she'll be in later to express her displeasure," she said, kissing me once, lingeringly on the cheek before leaving.
I sighed and finished dressing.
Evening found me dozing in front of my colossal television after having eaten myself into something of a coma. God bless my cook, that woman was a genius...
Kandi flopped onto the sofa next to me and dropped her head onto my lap without preamble, perhaps a little harder than usual. That woke me up quickly.
"Sorry about that," I said.
"Hardly your fault," she replied.
I stroked her hair, back and shoulders and she relaxed by inches until she was sighing happily.
"She hasn't left me alone in days, and then you show up and she drops me mid- you know- it makes a girl feel second string."
"What can I do to make it up to you?"
"Help me make her jealous?" she asked with a smile.
"Any time you like," I said, tickling her ear.
She giggled and slid herself up a bit, settling her head in the crook of my arm, wrapping her arms around my torso and curling up her legs.
"You know she loves you, right?" I said.
"Sure," she replied.
"But...?"
"But what's the future there? I mean, I love the fun we have, it's wonderful. But one day, I'm going to get old, and I want someone I can grow fat with."
I laughed at that; it was more or less how I felt about the ideal long-term relationship.
"Tethys will always be as beautiful as she is now. In another ten years, she won't be interested in me anymore. You see any old girls hanging arou
nd her?"
"Well, that's just dumb. First things first, the amount of time you've spent around me, and in this house, has likely slowed your physical aging to a crawl, you've got decades before anything even remotely starts to sag. Secondly, there aren't any old women around Tethys because she gets them married. She told me all about it; every girl she's loved finds someone, she sees to it; so, don't be ridiculous there, either. As for growing old and fat, have at it, I'll ride that grizzly train straight to a coronary with you, and fix you up when we get there."
She laughed and smiled wonderfully up at me.
"Really?" she asked.
"Yes to all of the above."
"Well, then I suppose I shouldn't worry too much," she said, nuzzling against my chest.
"No, you shouldn't. Seriously, I thought it was blondes that were supposed to be du- Ow, Ow!" I squawked as she bit some rather sensitive things.
"What was that you were saying?" she asked sweetly.
"Nothing, nothing at all," I said, rubbing at the tooth marks on my chest.
"That's right," she said with a grin.
We sat like that for a while, watching the TV, chatting a bit.
"You know I'm very fond of you, too, right?" she asked.
"Of course. Likewise. I don't know what I'd do without you."
"Well, I'm not going anywhere."
"Good."
Tethys came in a bit later, after Kandi had fallen asleep, and sat on my other side, dressed in a set of white silk pyjamas. She put her arm around my shoulders and leant her head against mine.
"I think I've been rather hard on her since that day," she whispered, "I've been... I've felt a bit odd, since."
"Are you okay?"
"Oh, it's nothing bad. Just stupid memories I'd gone to the trouble of burying digging their way to the surface. I blame you."
"Sounds about right."
"You just had to give me that look, didn't you? You couldn't just let me be naughty, you had to spray your girly feelings all over it."
"Are we still talking about the same thing?"
She bit by ear affectionately, making me smile.
"My point, is that you've made me think about things, how dare you?!"
I smiled and squeezed her hand.
"You've stirred up a mess in my head, and it's making things very hard on poor Kandi, have you no shame?"
Heart's Darkness Page 15
