The closet was pretty empty except for a folded towel, a small pillow, and a stained red quilt that was coming apart at the seams so the batting inside showed through. Swell.
I took the pillow from the closet and flung it on the bed. I grabbed the blanket and was about to wring it out when someone knocked at the door. Was it that clerk? Had he forgotten to tell Stephen something? Or was it something worse?
The hairs on the back of my neck stood straight up, and my heart began to hammer in my chest as I crept closer to the doorway and peered out.
Stephen was staring at the door, one hand on his pistol. “Who is it?” he called, taking a step toward the door.
“Sir, I’ve brought you some sheets. I forgot that we didn’t put any in the closet,” said a muffled voice from the other side of a door.
Stephen glanced at me, and when I nodded, he pulled the gun free and held it off to the side. Very slowly, he opened the door a crack. Apparently, what he saw didn’t bother him that much because he opened the door a little wider and took a couple pairs of folded sheets.
“Thanks,” Stephen replied and shut the door without waiting for a response or leaving a tip, which was somewhat rude.
“Well, that is a plus,” I said, stepping out of the doorway. I’d barely taken two steps when the sheets exploded in a cloud of white smoke. I threw myself backward, landing hard on the bed and rolling to the floor. There was a thump in the other room, and the door burst open and smacked against the frame.
Dense white fog drifted into the bedroom as I crawled forward on my elbows to get a better vantage point. I strained my ears, listening for sounds, but the only thing I heard were a couple whumps in quick succession. Were they silenced rounds? Stephen wasn’t using a silencer so…
I peered out but couldn’t see anything, not even the stupid couch. A radio came on, blaring the soundtrack to the Lion King so loud, it hurt my ears. Instinctively, I grabbed my ears just as a boot came at me from the fog. I rolled to the side and hopped to my feet as a bedraggled man dressed in faded green tie-dye charged into the room. His head swiveled toward me, and his eyes narrowed just a touch. How had he gotten in here? Had Stephen failed to stop him? Another thought struck me, rippling down my insides and reducing them to a quivering mass of jelly. Was Stephen dead? No… that was impossible…
“Abigail de la Mancha,” he said, voice strained and twisted like it was two separate voices. “You will come with me.”
“Like hell I will,” I replied, curling my hands into fists and holding them in front of me. “I’m not afraid of a little bare-knuckle brawling.”
He didn’t smile, didn’t even blink. He just came at me. I hit him, my arms flying out like the fists of fury they were, pounding his face into hamburger. Unfortunately, it did little to deter him.
“You’re going to have to kill him,” Donovan said, voice like acid in my ears. “Which, for you, shouldn’t be hard. You’re a killer, Abby.” Deep down, I was worried he was right, but there had to be another way, right? I couldn’t go around killing people just because it was the easiest way to take them out once they were brain-jacked by the flit…
“No!” I replied as the man’s hand grabbed me around the throat. He hoisted me into the air, cutting off my oxygen supply. The room started to swirl as his fingers tightened like a vice.
“Do it, Abby.” Donovan smiled, his face peering at me over the man’s shoulder. He touched the bullet hole in his forehead and licked the blood from his fingers. “Just do it, Abby. Stop pretending to be a good guy. Just let it go.” Donovan’s words echoed in my, sloshing in my brain as my blood throbbed and pounded in my ears.
My jab caught the man in the throat, hard enough to smash in his windpipe. Instead of falling to his knees gasping, he slammed me backward into the wall. My vision went black around the edges, and my hands fell to my sides. The man lifted me another inch, his other arm pressing my throat to the wall. His empty, emotionless eyes stared at me. My mind raced, trying to think of something, anything I could do to stop him when he released me and collapsed to the ground.
That’s when I realized he wasn’t breathing. I’d killed him with my attack, and he’d kept trying to strangle me. That meant… that meant I’d killed an innocent person. I fought the urge to cry as I sucked in a breath that was jagged knives and staples. I could deal with this later, right now, I had to grab Stephen and get out of here. And though I couldn’t tell you why, a surge of clarity fell over me, pushing the guilt and horror away so the only thing that remained was the last fading strands of a broken cobweb clinging to my skin.
Bullets exploded through the cabins walls, and I dropped to my hands and knees. I crawled forward as the lamp shattered, spraying glass across the carpet. I dropped to my belly, shielding my head with my hands as glass rained down on me again. After what felt like forever, the bullets stopped. I held my breath and listened. I didn’t hear so much as a peep, and for a moment, I was worried I was being watched.
I crawled forward on my elbows until I reached the main room. The fog was too thick for me to see anything. Well that meant they couldn’t see me either, right? I took a deep breath and listened again. After several seconds of silence, I began crawling forward as quietly as possible.
My hands pressed into something warm and sticky on the carpet. I looked down and nearly screamed. My hands were covered in blood, and what was worse, there was a puddle of it. A horrible thought surged through me as I threw myself forward.
Stephen was lying on his back, blood pooling around him from two bullet holes in his chest… right where his heart would be. My stomach seized up. I fought the urge to throw up as my body sort of forgot how to breathe, and my heart shattered into a thousand pieces of broken glass.
I wasn’t sure how long I was frozen there. I don’t even remember hearing the jackbooted men rush into the room, or what happened in the aftermath of that moment. The only thing I remember was rage, warm and hot on my tongue, filling me up like a balloon and leaving me raw and wild.
3
The moon shone down on me through the branches of the tree overhead like an angry, all-seeing god. Only the moon wasn’t my problem. The flit was my problem, and I didn’t even know how to go about fighting something that could turn everyone and anyone into a weapon. I’d killed a guy, actually killed a guy, who had done nothing more than be around when I got spotted. Worse, I wasn’t even sure how I’d gotten away from the cabin. Had I killed more people?
I swallowed, pulling in one shaky breath that tasted like gasoline and ripped up my lungs like razorblades. My hands were covered in scarlet, and as I rubbed them together, little bits flaked away into the darkness. Dried blood. Great.
Hell, I wasn’t even sure where I was, or why no one had found me. How long had I blacked out? Hours, days… minutes? It had been about an hour before dusk when we’d checked into the cabin… Maybe it was only a few minutes later?
I just… just wasn’t sure what to do. I was alone in a field with stupid pink hair, a billion magic-infused skills I’d never had to do anything to learn, and no goddamned idea what to do. If I’d been a real witch, one with training and experience, I’d know what to do, right? I’d have a plan.
Instead, I was a cheap copy. A hack. I was someone who had never played a game turning on cheat codes before they started. And it showed. It showed in my every decision, my every action…
Still, throwing myself a pity party wasn’t going to help anything. I needed to move, to escape. I needed action.
I took another breath and pushed myself to my feet even as the world around me swayed. I gripped the pine tree next to me and sucked in a third deep breath that smelled like pine trees and sorrow.
“You killed them all, Abby. You ripped their bodies apart with your bare hands.” Donovan smiled at me from the trees. His grin huge and menacing. “Too bad you didn’t do it before they killed Stephen, eh? To be fair, I’m a little surprised they waxed him. They must really want you dead.”
St
ephen… Beautiful, wonderful Stephen… he had saved me from my mother, from his government… He had stolen me away and tried to keep me safe, and what had that gotten him? Shot in the heart by his own people. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair they’d killed him, taken him from me. I swallowed, trying, and failing, to fight off the tears that filled my eyes, blurring my vision. My throat closed up as I fell back to my knees and sobbed.
“Shut up!” I cried, whirling on Donovan’s ghost as my hands gripped the dirt in front of me like they could somehow pull Stephen back from the grave, pull him back into my arms. “Just shut up!”
“Everyone you love dies, Abby. You’re a disease, a cancer…” Donovan’s cursed smile loomed over me like a Cheshire cat grin. “It’s why I had to kill Esmeralda.” With his words, something broke inside me, something that left me raw and wild. The pain of my foster mom’s death rippled through me as I looked around, desperate for someone, something.
Donovan had shot my foster mother, Esmeralda Banks, when she’d tried to save me. They had worked together, and he’d disposed of her like she was garbage. The ground got sort of hazy and hard to see as tears clouded my vision, slipping down my cheeks and spattering on the ground.
“Why are you doing this to me?” I squeaked, my words burning in my throat like lava. He said nothing at all, just squatted down and smirked at me. His face said it all. I deserved this. I deserved everything because I was a horrible person. Because I had killed him, and beat up that little girl, and…
“You could have saved Stephen if you’d been thinking about doing something other than getting laid,” Donovan’s voice was like heavy syrup, thick and cloying. “But you couldn’t even watch for the signs, couldn’t even manage to save the one person who supposedly mattered to you.”
“Go away…” I mumbled into my hands because I was worried he was right. I could have saved him, couldn’t I? I had done it before… “Just leave me alone.”
“That’s right, Abby. Cry. You’re weak. You can’t win.” He faded away slowly until only his piercing emerald eyes remained behind. “You couldn’t save Stephen, and you can’t save yourself. There’s nothing you can do.”
“I can do things!” I snarled as a sudden thought seized me. This was why Gabriella had destroyed two cities— just to show the world that she was a threat. I’d thought she had gone off the deep end, but maybe… maybe she hadn’t.
These people didn’t understand anything but power. And I had power. I had all my mother’s skills that Gabriella had built up over multiple lifetimes as a super badass physical witch. Not only that, I had the knowledge of how to work all her tech and operate her empire. I even had biometrics that could unlock all of Gabriella’s secrets. I could make them stop if I got a big enough stick, right? And Gabriella had a really big stick. All I had to do was get to one of her bases. If I could do that, well, they’d have to listen to me, right?
Donovan watched me for a long time, eyes appraising me. “Are you going to turn your grief to anger? To vengeance?” he asked, raising one eyebrow. “If you are, then I approve.” His grin sent a chill down my spine. “Wrathful destruction is always the best course. Always.”
“That’s not what I’m going to do,” I replied, turning away from him and staring up at the trees. “I’m going to finish this, once and for all. I’m going to make it so they can’t keep taking from me anymore.”
“And how are you going to manage that when you don’t even know where Gabriella’s secret bases are?” Realization blossomed across his face. “But the Agency would know, wouldn’t they, Abby? They would have files on Gabriella, and hey, if you have to break a few agents to get them, well, you can live with that, can’t you?” he slithered closer. “Because let’s face it. When it really matters, you’re an ‘ends justify the means’ kind of girl, aren’t you?”
He reached out and wiped my cheek with one finger, and although he couldn’t actually touch me without phasing through my flesh, something about it was strangely comforting. “Don’t cry anymore, Abby. It’s time you took the fight to them. Showed them what you are.” He smirked, and the sight of it made something harden inside my chest. “The Agency is getting no more tears from you tonight unless you let them.”
I sniffed and wiped my eyes one last time as I turned away from him. Was I really going to go through with this? Was I really going to take on the Agency directly?
Yes.
I was going to do it for Stephen. I was going to take something from them, something that would let them know just what they had taken from me. As much as I hated to admit it, this time Donovan was right. They’d get no more tears from me. No, they’d get a fistful of justice.
Now I just needed to find some agents, and fortunately, I knew how to find some. I just had to show my face, and like magic, the flit would be there to take over everyone and destroy me. The only thing was, I didn’t think I could make the flit talk. It was a demonic parasite inhabiting a person’s body.
No, I needed to get my hands on a flesh and blood agent and convince him that helping me was in his best interest. When we’d been attacked in the cabin, other agents had been in the area, presumably to hunt me down. If they were supernaturals, then they couldn’t be taken over, either…
Hell, they might be out here right now, hunting me. How far away could they really be?
I’d been going about this all wrong. I’d been prey. Now it was time to be the hunter. This time, they’d be the ones left bleeding and dying on the cold unforgiving ground. I steeled myself. Donovan was right. I was a killer. I had killed. It was time to stop trying to play this game with one arm tied behind my back… and with that thought, I could almost hear Donovan cackling to himself.
Hunger rumbled in my belly, and thirst clawed at my throat as I got to my feet. I pushed the sensations of my body down into my toes as I listened for sounds. A twig snapped somewhere far off. It was close, not close enough to be a threat, not yet…
I moved forward, weaving through the bushes and shadows like a jungle cat. I made no noise as I stepped, my feet honed by skills shoved into my brain by an experiment gone wrong and magical abilities I’d inherited from my birth mom. Not only had my inherited magic made me stronger, faster, and more durable than the average person, but I had the skills to use those abilities to the fullest.
A leaf rustled a few meters to my left. I turned slowly toward it, dropping down into the brush. A moment later, the barest edge of a black-gloved hand passed by me, so closely I could have rubbed my nose on it if I’d wanted to do so.
Calm descended over me, filling me with a profound sense of purpose. My body lashed out, grabbing his still moving hand and jerking him into the bushes. I twisted my hips and slammed him down, his helmeted head smacking into the ground with a hard thunk. He was moving, trying to bring around a weapon, but I drove my knee into his ribs, once, twice, three times, four… I lost count.
My blows kept coming, kept hammering him until he stopped moving. When that finally happened, I stopped, my chest heaving, and my knuckles raw and burning. I shut my eyes and listened, straining to hear the sound of anyone or anything, but there were no sounds in the woods. Perhaps this guy was alone, a scout maybe? Or maybe he was just bad at his job.
Either way, he was going to tell me what was going on. I reached into his pockets, rummaging around until I found some zip ties and turned them into handcuffs. It was sort of ironic because he’d probably intended to tie me up with them.
I pulled his gun free of his holster and stared at it. A huge heavy thing that seemed like it could blow away an elephant. I checked to see that it was loaded and pressed the barrel under his chin in case he decided to, you know, not be unconscious. I undid his chinstrap and pulled the helmet off his head. It was heavy. Heavier than I expected given that most of the agency’s stuff seemed to be light as a feather thanks to being magically enhanced.
Sounds filled my ears. People were coming. I stared at the downed soldier and sighed. I wouldn’t have time t
o interrogate him. I needed to get away, get somewhere quiet… An idea sprang into my mind.
Getting the rest of his clothes off took longer than I had expected, but suiting up in it, for whatever reason, didn’t. Sure the pants were too long, and the shirt was too bulky, but otherwise? Well, it just seemed like I’d pulled on body armor a million times before. Bonus, he’d even had some grenades…
I stood up in my new disguise and hoisted the guy over my shoulder which was no easy task, even with my magic-fueled strength. My legs burned and swayed as I found a nice, covered spot and zip-tied him to a tree. Then I buried him under a mountain of debris. I checked my new pistol one last time and pulled the facemask down over my face to shield my features. I smiled and hit the button on the outside of the mask, and the forest lit up in shades of green.
It wasn’t long before I made my way back to the cabins. Sitting in the center of the parking lot were three black SUVs complete with tinted windows and government plates. Fortunately, there were only a few agents crawling around the area like black-suited ants. One of them spotted me and waved me over.
He was tall and thin, reminding me of one of those stick bugs you see in documentaries. His skin was so dark, it was nearly blue in the moonlight. He pulled off his wire-rimmed glasses and came closer, peering at me with alert brown eyes. He wore one of those cheap black suits that made me think of FBI guys on television.
“Report in, agent.” His voice was crisp and matter-of-fact. For whatever reason, it reminded me of skim-milk and rice cakes. He put his glasses back on, settling them on his bald head like he habitually pulled them on and off.
I punched him. Right in the face. As hard as I could. He fell, hitting the ground with a whump. His glasses bent sideways, and one of the lenses had popped out. I dropped down next to him and hit him again. People turned toward me, heads swiveling as their guns rose. I looked around frantically, my gun pointed into the tree line.
The Magic Within: An Urban Fantasy Novel (Found Magic Book 2) Page 3
