The Gods Defense (Laws of Magic Book 1)

by Amie Gibbons

  “Like magic’s supposed to do at the alignment,” I said.

  Apollo looked… uncomfortable? Wary almost.

  “Exactly like that.” He met my eyes and I shook my head.

  “I’m sorry, am I missing something?”

  “The power bursting out at the alignment was power stored in pocket realities, bubbles holding magic from long ago, and set on a timer to attack when the beings feeding them died.”

  I could almost see it like a puzzle coming together, but not quite.

  “So there have been gods in pocket realities for fifteen thousand years, slowly being drained, and… what? A group of them finally dies every five thousand years or so, helped along by the alignment?”

  Apollo nodded and Millie said, “In a nutshell.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me that before?” I asked Apollo.

  He took a deep breath. “Because we didn’t know that before.”

  “Before when? When did you figure it out?”

  “When you reached out and helped me find you.” Apollo took my hand, kissing it. “Gods died in the great battle fifteen thousand years ago and everyone past that thought they were just dead.”

  “But they weren’t,” Millie said. “They were in these bubbles off of reality. Yours was programmed to go faster than theirs, which is why there’s anything left of these millennia old guys now.”

  “Right,” Apollo said. “They were imprisoned and slowly bled of energy. And we never would have figured it out if it weren’t for you finding a way to reach out of yours and telling me where to look.”

  “Ummmm, yea.” I shrugged before freezing.

  Holy shit! That’s what Tyler was!

  “Wait, is that why there’s extra magic here? Because these guys have been leaking it? Is that what Tyler is and she escaped somehow?”

  “No,” Apollo said. I slumped. And here I thought I was so brilliant. “The pocket realities only release at the five thousand year mark.”

  “But they’ve been leaking early, you said.”

  “Yes, because a few have popped early due to the extra magic putting pressure on them. But only the weakest ones. And-”

  “That one still doesn’t make sense to me,” Millie interrupted. “Extra magic out here should mean the magic in there doesn’t have as much of a reason to come out, like a gradient. If there’s more salt in one tub, the other one doesn’t have to leak as much in to equalize them both.”

  “We’ve had this discussion.” Apollo rubbed the middle of his forehead. “It’s not a gradient. It’s more like this reality has a capacity, as do the pocket ones. The extra magic isn’t just leaking into this reality, it’s leaking into those, so they pop early. Ours is bigger, so extra magic has more places to go, without destroying it.”

  Millie frowned and opened her mouth, probably to argue the science of it more.

  “Millie,” I said, “just let it go for now, okay?”

  She nodded.

  Apollo said, “This does mean your magic is still in that bubble, like it’s waiting for you, because it hasn’t popped and it still has the… you in it. The same reason the magic trying to burst out is bent on destruction is why yours is still… flavored with Cassandra.

  “Wow, dirty,” Millie said.

  Apollo shot her a look before turning his attention back to me. “The gods trapped in the bubbles were in the middle of battle. It’s bottled negative energy. Yours is bottled psychic and we have a hold of it.

  “That’s the good news. The bad is it means Ravena is either working with whatever set off the alignment curse millennia ago, or he figured out how to make and use these pocket realities himself.”

  I made a face. Neither option sounded good. “So he really did break out?

  “Unfortunately.”

  “Can you guys figure out how to use these pocket realities?”

  “A few of us are working on it now.”

  “Okay, so what else is going on now? Does this information help you guys stop the alignment? Can you take the magic leaking from the alignment and shove it into one of these pocket realities if you figure out how to make them? Who made the one you hibernated in? Can you ask them?”

  Apollo and Millie exchanged a look again.

  “What?” I asked. “What’s going on? And where’s Tyler?”

  “Tyler’s working in the living room,” Apollo said way too quickly. “Which is where we need to be. You’ll stay here, right now you don’t have much magic. We just wanted to be here for you as you woke up.”

  “What? Working to stop the alignment?”

  “No,” Apollo said, holding my hand tighter. “Working to control it. The alignment started roughly an hour ago, right before you reached out.”

  My mouth sagged and the heart rate monitor picked up, beeping with urgency.

  Apollo glanced at the monitor.

  “It’s okay. Keep talking.”

  Apollo sighed. “We’re guessing the influx of power helped boost my psychic powers so I could finally sense you.”

  I swallowed hard, the saliva chalky in my mouth. Apollo handed me a bottle of water on the little rolling bedside tray all hospital rooms seem to have.

  “But if it’s started…” I took a drink of water rather than finish. I couldn’t finish that thought.

  “It means we failed to contain it like we planned,” Apollo finally said. “It’s already pouring out. Only a trickle, but there’s already been one earthquake with disastrous results in California, they’re trying to put out the fire it caused now. There’s been more portals popping open in Wyoming, Florida, Colorado, and New Hampshire, spraying out magic and those seed things you saw. It’s… it’s bad.”

  “But you guys are stopping it, right?”

  He didn’t look at me so I asked Millie, “Right?”

  “They’re trying,” she said, pressing her lips together. “Apparently they miscalculated again. The portals are spraying in magic at an accelerated rate, causing the bubble realities to pop faster and faster, which has set off a chain reaction to the other bubbles. They have gods across the world working on it, but… they’re not sure if they’ll be able to contain and channel everything fast enough.”

  “You can’t be saying what I think you’re saying.” I shook my head, more light headed than I was even in that power sucking mini-world.

  “We actually are facing the end of the human world right now,” Apollo said. “And the defectors aren’t defecting to just keep their powers, knowing we will keep humans alive for the good of us all. That was a decoy, to throw us off from the real plan and to recruit lesser gods.

  “They’ve already started channeling the magic themselves to keep us away from it, but just channeling it at the world, to make this worse. And they have about twice as many in their ranks as we found the other day. That’s how they broke Ravena out.

  “They also shoved a few dozen lesser gods that refused them into bubbles, like you, and have already sucked the power out of some of the weaker ones who died faster. Now that we figured out how to sense these bubbles, some of us are trying to get them out like we got you.”

  I shook my head again. How could this be happening?

  “The defectors, they’re actively doing this to destroy humanity… at least most of it.” Apollo paused. “We think they are trying to destroy most of civilization so gods can rebuild it with gods being worshiped as the center of civilizations, because we’ll be the ones with the capability to rebuild it easiest. None of this gods trying to blend into the human world stuff.

  “It will be a new world order, with whatever gods are left at the end. And they know once this is all over, those of us who did not defect will be drained while they will be more powerful. So if we fail, we won’t risk a war, we’ll be too busy trying to build everything back up. It’s brilliant in its simplicity really. As long as one doesn’t mind a few billion dead humans.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  “Millie,” I said after Apollo walked out. “Is it
as bad as he’s saying?”

  She sat next to me on the bed. “It’s worse.”

  “Shit.” I covered my nose with the triangle of my hands for a moment. I just needed a moment here. “Okay. The bad guys have shoved their own people into bubbles like mine?”

  “Yes.”

  “But obviously we can get people out.”

  “If we can find the bubble. It’s not located in space as we know it. Pocket realities-”

  “Ent,” I buzzed, holding up a hand. “Just, help me understand this without going off into an hour long science explanation.”

  “Not sure I can do that. It’s complicated.”

  “No, I get it. Just microwave, remember?”

  She grinned. I’d always say that during law school when she tried to explain everything down to the last detail.

  “Explain what it does without explaining how it works. Got it.” She took a deep breath. “It’s a bubble, we can access if we can find it. It’s hanging onto this reality, so it’s easier to find than actual alternate realities.”

  “And this whole alignment thing is an influx of magic, meant to pop these bubbles and make them explode all at once?”

  “Yes.”

  “The gods are trying to channel the magic out of these bubbles so they can change the tone. Make the bad magic good?”

  Millie nodded.

  “The bad guys don’t care about this, because they want it to burst out, and they’re trying to suck magic out of the gods they betrayed like they were trying to do to me. But, this doesn’t happen til some die, until then, the people can be saved and the magic can be grabbed. Do the gods know how to do that?”

  “In theory. They need to test it. They wanted to do that with you, but Apollo said no.”

  My head snapped around. “What? They should test me.”

  She grinned, shaking her head. “Apollo threatened to do some pretty nasty things to people if they tried an untested method, basically said they weren’t using you as the guinea pig and if they tried he’d suck out their magic with their crystal thing and turn them over to the mad scientist. And then he pointed at me.” She grinned. “Don’t worry, they have another one they were pulling out when we came to check on you. They can test her.”

  “That’s not fair to whoever that is.”

  Millie shrugged. “You want to keep going?”

  “Yes. So, they figure out how to do that. Then what?”

  “Keep the defectors from getting extra power by rescuing all those people and putting their magic back in them.”

  “And they’re trying to redirect the bad magic, right? They know how to do that still? Nothing’s changed?”

  “Oh yeah, it’s just hard to channel it into something good as fast as it’s coming.”

  I nodded. “I thought so. Hey, do you know where my phone went?”

  She shook her head. “Got lost when you were grabbed?”

  “Okay, thought I’d ask. I have an idea. We have to get Apollo on board, though.”

  “You feeling up to it?”

  I swung my legs off the bed. “I have to. I need my powers back, for one.”

  “And two?”

  “I need to run something past Apollo. Past any of them we can trust.”

  “Because you have an idea?”

  “Yep.”

  “Is this like your last idea?”

  “Yep.”

  “Okay.”

  # # #

  We went out of the room into a hallway of a normal house, complete with pictures on the walls, and I slammed on the brakes as we entered the living room.

  Tyler was working on a computer on a desk against the back wall of the sparse and modern designed living room. Next to her at the long desk was a young man, barely legal if he was a day. He had a laptop and was squinting at it with a frown.

  And they were both chained by their legs to the funky, industrial looking metal desk, next to a pile of gun cases ranging from pistols to rifles to elephants needed to watch their backs.

  “What’s happening?” I pointed at Tyler.

  “Zeus.” Tyler hooked a thumb over her shoulder and Zeus walked in under the arch leading to what I guessed was a kitchen area.

  He wore slacks and a button down shirt and held a cup of tea. Add in a British accent and tweed blazer and he’d be back to the college professor all the freshmen crushed on.

  I swiveled my head between them. “What the hell is going on here!”

  “Your friend has some information she was holding out on us,” Zeus said, taking a sip of his tea.

  “He found out what I was.” Tyler waved her hand. “I’m fine, they’re not hurting me. They just don’t want me to leave…” She gave Zeus a pointed look. “Or help, apparently.”

  “You are helping more by letting us use you than you ever could helping us fight.”

  Well didn’t that statement just tie up his opinion of humanity in a nice little bow?

  I blinked and pinched myself. “I repeat, what the hell is going on here!”

  “She’s helping us track magic,” Apollo said. “She’s just a bit of a flight risk right now.”

  “I’m always a flight risk, honey,” Tyler said with a purr under the words and a wink.

  “Are you sure you’re okay like that?” I asked Tyler.

  Those chains had to at least be annoying.

  She shrugged. “Eh, not comfortable, but hey. I don’t think the boys chaining me up were concerned about my comfort.” She winked at Zeus and he blew her a kiss.

  “Of course I care about your comfort,” Zeus said. “That’s why I used the light chains, with the nice lining, so they don’t chafe your pretty skin.”

  “What are you using her for in the first place?” I asked.

  “To use her to track the wormholes, of course.”

  Huh?

  “They figured out what I am,” Tyler said. “And they're using me and my friend here to track the wormholes that keep popping up. Same magical signature or something like that.”

  It hit me. It was so obvious!

  “The extra magic is coming through those wormholes! They're from an alternate dimension or something. And so are you! I get it.”

  “Alternate reality,” Millie said. “We're in an alternate dimension within our own reality right now. There's a difference.”

  That’s why she got so weird when she made that comment about different realities having different magical rules. I’d just thought she was Millie babbling about stuff out of fiction, not explaining an actual theory.

  “Oh my God,” I said, hands flying with me. “Alternate realities are real. Okay, not our issue question today. So why is that reality spilling into ours?”

  The gods looked at Tyler and she scowled at them.

  “Because,” she said, “people from that world ripped into this one about twenty-five years ago, and they didn’t exactly know what they were doing. The world was dying and they did what they could to get out. They accidentally brought some of the magic from that world with them.”

  “By them, you mean you?”

  “No.” She pointed at me then switched the finger to herself. “I was born here. I’m an American. Can run for president and everything.” She shrugged. “My mom just couldn’t. She came through with the help of someone who knew what he was doing. After that, the people, from what I’ve heard, ripped open that hole and as many as could get through in the few minutes it was open did. I don’t know why these holes are opening now.”

  She glared at Zeus. “I thought until a few days ago that world was completely dead. According to my friend here,”–she patted the young man on the shoulder and he gave her hand a quick nuzzle with his cheek before going back to the computer–”it’s on its last legs, but there’s still some people left.”

  I couldn’t even begin to form all the questions zipping around my mind.

  I went for the most obvious and pointed at the new kid, “So he’s from there?”

  Tyler smiled slow
ly. “Yes.” She turned to the kid and said something guttural from the throat.

  He answered in the same language and my head swiveled between them. “Is that German?”

  “It’s a dialect,” Tyler said to me before switching back to talking to the kid. Then to me, “It’s close enough that we can understand each other, but if you don’t speak near fluent German, it’d probably be pretty difficult to understand his version.”

  “What exactly are you guys doing here?”

  “Helping the gods find the portals and shut them down before they cause any more problems. We have the spell linked to the computers again.”

  “But why are you chained? I still don’t get that.” Yeah, because that was the only thing I didn’t get.

  “She tried to run,” Zeus said, still smiling like he found that absolutely charming. “With an impressive amount of guns and ammunition.”

  “Where did you get all this?” I asked her, waving at the armory.

  “I’ve been collecting most of it the past few years. Got some from that friend of mine who’s a gun photographer. Told him I wanted to get some of the newer, magic models for my collection. There’s one in there you can unfold and set up so a magical being without opposable thumbs can shoot.”

  “How would that wo-”

  “We need to get to work,” Zeus interrupted. “And you,” he said to Tyler, “aren’t going anywhere. We like you very much here, why would you want to leave?” It was clear from his tone he was flirting.

  At a time like this, really?

  “I was trying to arm my people,” Tyler said with a wink back.

  “The location of which, she still will not divulge,” Zeus said.

  Tyler looked at him, mouth quirked in a sexy half smile. “Not on a first date. We made a deal, Zeus. And I will stick to my end if you will stick to yours. My people are off limits.”

  They stared at each other. If we weren’t in the middle of magic-pocalypse, I would’ve felt compelled to leave the room.