Stillbringer (Dreamwalker Chronicles Book 1)

by Zile Elliven

  Fourteen had worked on a cruise ship once. He’d had to pose as a cabin steward in order to get close to a target who had chosen to live out the rest of his life on a boat. Once Fourteen had granted his wish by drowning the mark in a bowl of lobster bisque, he’d had to jump overboard and swim nearly twenty miles back to shore in the dark.

  “She made me stay back, too. So when she told me how disgusted she was by my magic, she’d had to shout it loud enough for everyone on the compound to hear.” Her hand reached up absently and started twisting an escaped strand of long, baby-blonde hair around her fingers. “She told me that I was an abomination who had to be kept away from everyone. Apparently that happens sometimes in the older families if a child is born with twisted magic that can’t be controlled.” Twist, tug, twist.

  “They fixed up a new room for me to stay in, one in a different part of the compound where I could live safely away from everyone else. Emily herded me to the old training house. Until they had a new, better one built, it had been the place where everyone in the family learned how to control their magic. It was a good choice, the wards aimed toward keeping dangerous magic contained were still active. I lived there for eleven years.” Her voice was so soft he had to strain to hear the last part.

  “Your family locked you away for most of your life and then expected you to abdicate?”

  She nodded. “And I would have! I went through their big, creepy ritual with the giant bonfire and the long-winded phrases in Latin, but it didn’t work. The whole family had shown up for it, and when it was done all we had to show for it was a series of fights that kept breaking out because people kept getting too close to me.” Her hair was wrapped so tightly around her fingers they were white-tipped with bloodloss.

  A sharp pain reared behind his left eyebrow as he struggled to understand. “And the people in your society, they just allowed your family to lock up one of its children?”

  Aeyli frowned. “I was pretty young when I was locked up, so I don’t know all the ins and outs of magical society. From what I do remember, the Blaike family is kind of high on the totem pole among the Other. I remember hearing a lot of bedtime stories about family members defeating some really scary creatures. Outside of the Guard—our version of the police—we were supposed to be the best at fighting these things. A family as powerful as the Blaikes doesn’t get asked a lot of questions about their inner workings.” She bit her lip, and Fourteen noticed it was frayed. This was obviously a habit she indulged in often.

  Magical society didn’t sound much different than regular society to him. The weak and innocent always fell through the cracks. He felt the hole in his mind stir uncomfortably, and to distract himself, he asked, “What made your family think the ritual didn’t work?”

  “The spell they cast to divine who would succeed Elanor created a stone that showed my face in it. After the ritual they made me do, the image didn’t change, but instead, it started to glow. It was pretty obvious the universe was clear about its wishes.”

  He digested that for a minute. “How close do people need to be to become affected by you?” They were almost to the cemetery, so he slowed the car down, wanting to finish the conversation before they retrieved her belongings.

  “It isn’t an exact science. It seems to vary from person to person. Some people can be in the same room with me and just be highly irritable, other people can be across a long hallway and want to kill me. It made for a lonely childhood.”

  “I can imagine.” Interesting. He’d gotten about as close to her as a person could get, but the only reaction he felt was more akin to grace than anger.

  “I ran back to my room after the botched ritual, intending to feel sorry for myself for a bit, but I found a note on my bed that said, They are going to kill you. Underneath it was a list of ways to foil various spells. The most useful was the one on tracking spells.” Her hood had fallen back down to her shoulders unnoticed. “So I ran away.”

  He circled around the block looking for a place to park. Even at dawn, parking in Boston was a bitch. “Considering how sheltered your life has been, that couldn’t have been easy for you.” He left the unspoken question hanging in the air for her to answer or not as she willed.

  Surprisingly, she blushed. “I read a lot. Like, a lot, a lot—we’re talking two books a day here, easily. My favorites are fantasies or spy stories.” She squeezed her hands together tightly and hunched her shoulders as though expecting ridicule, but when none was forthcoming, she continued. “When you have nothing better to do with your time, eventually you plan out an escape route, even if you never intend on using it. I don’t imagine the family could have been more surprised than I was that I actually managed it.”

  After pulling his SUV into a good spot, he turned his body to face her. “I’m not.” He reached out to pull her hood back over her hair, and her already flushed cheeks turned deep crimson. When his thumb brushed her cheek, he welcomed the rush of sensation that broke over him. The smell of rain, the sound of a purring cat, and then it was gone. Maybe it was because he was ready for the sensation that he didn’t lose himself completely this time.

  Her shoulders relaxed, and her mouth turned up in a half smile. “It wasn’t as hard as you might think. No one expected me to run because they thought I was just a complacent child who would do whatever they told her to do. I wonder how long it took for them to realize I was gone?”

  He shrugged. “Depends on when they were planning on killing you.” Fourteen realized he had chosen the wrong words when her face turned a sickly gray color.

  “Yeah.” After a long pause she said, “Let’s go get my stuff, okay? The best way to foil a tracking spell is to make a significant alteration to your body—it causes the spell to give a null result. You could shave your head or cut off a thumb, but the easiest way is to completely change your outfit. So the sooner I can get to my spare clothes, the better.” Aeyli struggled to free herself from the seatbelt, once again emphasizing her tiny frame.

  “Wait.” His cold voice stopped her efforts. “You stay here while I look around.”

  He got out of the car and did a quick survey of the scene. As he scanned the surrounding area, he realized he didn’t like how quickly she had just obeyed his order. She shouldn’t be so trusting toward someone she had just met, even if it did make his job easier. They would need to talk about that later. If it had been another one of his colleagues chosen for last night’s job, Rust, perhaps, she would already be dead.

  His stomach became a cold rock at the thought, and once again, the unexpected emotion was nearly paralyzing. This time he welcomed his conditioning when it finally roused itself to remove the feeling. Emotions had no place in the field, and right now he was riddled with them. Fourteen stood still and drew deeply on his training, draining himself of all thought and leaving nothing in his mind except the job.

  Only when his mind was as pristine as a frozen tundra, did he walk over to her side of the car and open the door. “I’ll be right back, you’ll be safe in here.”

  “Wait—”

  He closed the door on her protest and pushed a button on his key fob. He’d made a few modifications to his SUV—one of them being he could turn the car into a miniature fortress with the push of a button. No one could get in—or out.

  Ignoring the sound of her fists pounding on the door, he walked all the way around the cemetery. A first inspection told him it was an open space, walled in by buildings on all sides—one of the random spots of green in the city. It was dotted with trees in the early stages of blooming. It was probably pretty, but he only saw what an assassin would see—exposed branches that left little place to hide. It was still too early for any of the businesses to be open, so it would be easy to spot someone out of place. A lone jogger was doing a lap of cemetery with her dog. She looked benign, but the best assassins always did. Fourteen waited for a long time after she left before deciding the place was as safe as it was going to get.

  When he got back to the SUV, he
pushed another button on his key fob and saw Aeyli tumble out of the back passenger door, falling ungracefully on to the sidewalk. He approved of the fact that she hadn’t sat passively waiting for him and wondered if she had tried to break a window. It wouldn’t have worked, but it would have been the first thing he would have tried. He offered her a hand to help her up, but it was ignored.

  Her hair had fallen out of its bun and was a shining mess over her face and down her back. Hurt, childlike blue eyes projected worry and confusion but no anger. Fourteen would have been furious. “Why did you do that? They have magic you don’t understand. If you don’t have me around, you won’t know what to look for.” She jerked her hair over her shoulder and twisted it until it looked painfully tight. “Do you have any idea what my family would do to you if they knew you were helping me?”

  “I’m pretty tough.” He rapped a fist against the chest armor lining his jacket. “As far as I can tell, magic is just a weapon—one I may not understand, but a weapon just the same. The person wielding it is the real danger to look out for. That’s where I come in, it’s what I was trained to do.”

  “Just don’t lock me in the car again, okay?” Her voice shook with emotion, but she looked him right in the eye. He saw a glimmer of the anger he’d expected earlier. “I . . . I don’t like that.”

  Damn. She had just told him she’d spent most of her life locked up, and he had turned around and done the same thing to her not five minutes later. He rubbed his forehead in frustration. “I . . . apologize. I don’t often think of people as people. Targets, or opponents, yes, but not people.” He extended a hand to help her up, not knowing what else to do. “This is new to me, keeping someone alive.”

  She stared at his hand pensively before finally taking his hand and allowing him to help her to stand. Though he didn’t deserve it, he basked once again in the glow of peace that flowed from her body to his. It was then that he realized he was hooked.

  Chapter Five

  Aeyli

  She knew he hadn’t done it on purpose, but Aeyli was still skittish about having been locked in the monstrosity Fourteen called a car. She tried to focus on the next thing, get her bag, change her clothes, and put on some freaking shoes. After that she would get herself someplace safe, alone. What she had told Fourteen so far should be enough to assuage his curiosity about her world. Now he would be free go his way, and she could go hers.

  They walked to the cemetery where she had stashed her bag. She took a moment to get her bearings and then wound her way through headstones, past the obelisk, and up to the tree she had stuffed her backpack inside and looked up. It was taller than she remembered. She’d had to climb to reach the hole—something that had been a challenge in the middle of the night. This time it was daylight, and she had help, if she asked for it. She was about to ask Fourteen for a boost when he swung himself into the tree with one graceful motion.

  “Where is it?” He looked down at her with his impassive gaze.

  “About three feet higher and a little to the left you should find a hole. It isn’t very big, so I had to jam the bag in pretty tightly.” She was definitely going to miss him when he was gone. Aside from his obvious handiness, he was a treat to look at. As he climbed higher, she took the opportunity to appreciate the way his jacket accentuated, rather than hid, the muscles in his arms. Her throat went dry, and she gave an involuntary cough.

  “Got it.” Fourteen’s voice broke her out of her reverie. He dropped out of the tree and landed on the ground with the finesse of a cat. “Here.” Her backpack, covered with dozens of dancing cats, dangled from his fingers.

  Embarrassed, Aeyli snatched it from his outstretched hand and quickly strapped it over her shoulders so he couldn’t see it. “Thanks. You’re, ah, very good at that, um, tree-climbing thing.” She wanted to stop talking, she really did, but had forgotten how. “Do you work out a lot?” Maybe she would get lucky and she’d have a stroke soon.

  Fourteen looked at her with his customary expressionless face and nodded. For all she knew, he thought of her like a high-maintenance houseplant.

  “Well, that’s—” Fortunately, the tree next to her exploded, saving her from finding a way to escape the conversation.

  She was bowled over by Fourteen as he tucked her body into his chest and rolled behind a headstone.

  The world spun in lazy circles as she fought to regain her equilibrium. She blinked rapidly until she could focus, fighting for enough cognitive function to be able to take stock of her situation. The first thing she noticed was Fourteen, wrapped tightly around her body but unmoving. His hand was pressing her face into his chest, and she had to push it away so she could see. Bracing her arms against his chest, she levered herself back as far as his grip would allow.

  What was wrong with him? She could tell he was still alive, the pulse in his neck was strong, if slower than the situation warranted. Angling her head to look at his face, she saw his eyes were open but unfocused, with a dreamy quality to them. Gods, she hoped he didn’t have a concussion. She had zero experience with first aid.

  She brushed her fingertips along his cheekbone, in a silent apology for not knowing how to help him, and pushed herself out of his embrace as gently as she could. His arms resisted her efforts, but eventually she managed to squirm free. Once she had untangled herself from him, she poked her head around the headstone to see if she could figure out what had happened.

  The tree that held her bag had been split right down the middle. White flower petals were drifting slowly in the air, as if confused by their early release from the tree. She couldn’t see anyone, but she knew that meant nothing.

  Movement at her back made her jerk around to see Fourteen trying to haul himself into a sitting position but failing miserably. He moved like his body was unfamiliar to him and he hadn’t learned how to use it yet. He reached a hand out to brace himself only to have it collapse under his weight and send him sprawling to the ground.

  She crawled over to him and ran her hands through his hair, looking for bumps or blood but found nothing. When a headstone three yards to her right imploded with a sharp pop, she knew she had to focus on their attacker first and deal with Fourteen’s condition later.

  What could she do? Before now, she’d always run away, but that option was gone. The gods only knew what would happen to Fourteen if she left him behind, and it was her fault he was here in the first place.

  Another headstone burst into unholy green flames about three yards to her left. She could feel the blistering heat on her face and thanked the gods whoever was blasting them with spells had such lousy aim.

  “Astin?” She thought if she could just talk to him, explain about Fourteen, she might be able to convince her cousin to let him go.

  “Astin isn’t here, Girl. Your champion blew a chunk of his hand off,” a tinkling voice that had always reminded her of fairy bells informed her. “His chest isn’t looking so great either, bitch.”

  “Are you trying to make me feel guilty, Hel? I don’t remember you being stupid, but things are bound to change after eleven years. He was trying to kill us. What did you expect us to do, weave him a gift basket?”

  “Keep talking, Girl. It’s only a matter of time before we find a way around your shield.” Another voice came from beside her cousin Helen. This one had changed more over the years than Helen’s had, but she recognized him anyway. She wasn’t likely to forget her brother Sterling.

  Aeyli kept her head down as low as she could, trying to see where they were. They were too young to be powerful enough to hide themselves properly. Out of everyone in their generation, Astin alone had the age and the training to do such advanced magic.

  She finally spotted them by the fence. Helen—the spitting image of Aeyli herself—was pacing back and forth in clear agitation, but her brother appeared completely at ease. Sterling stood balanced on the old, wrought iron fence looking more like a teenage boy trying to impress his girlfriend than one trying to kill his older sister. His mo
use-brown hair looked effortless and windswept, but Aeyli recognized the hairstyle from a teen magazine she’d read a few months earlier. Had it belonged to Sterling before it came to her?

  Looking closer, she noticed him making a circle with the index finger of his right hand, then flattening the hand and pushing it out, as if he were stopping traffic. All the grass died around her in a giant circle, but where she and Fourteen crouched, the plants were unaffected.

  “I don’t have a shield.” Though, improbable as it seemed, she was beginning to suspect this was untrue.

  “You’re so funny, Sunny.” A third voice rang out to her left, and she saw her aunt Stella saunter down the sidewalk to join her brother and cousin. Stella’s red dress flared out behind her like a banner and should have looked overly dramatic, but it fit with the long, mahogany hair curling around her shoulders. Stella had always looked like a movie star to Aeyli.

  The old nickname echoed inside her head, drawing out memories of better times, memories of laughter, ice cream, and splashing by a river. Her heart clenched, and a tear fell down her cheek, but there was anger, not sadness in her voice when Aeyli called out, “You have no right to call me that anymore.”

  “Whatever, Girl.” Her aunt’s cheerful voice was more appropriate for chasing down a naughty child rather than supervising an assassination. Stella made the same hand gesture as Sterling had, circling the index finger of her right hand and then putting her hand out.

  The dead plants around Aeyli turned to dust, but once again she and Fourteen remained unscathed.

  “I already tried that one, Stella, and got a big, fat goose egg for my trouble,” Sterling told her, bored arrogance coloring his words.

  Aeyli took the time to check on Fourteen again, who was muttering something that sounded like, “. . . should have seen that coming,” while struggling to pull himself to a sitting position.

  “Stay down!” she hissed at him, and when he didn’t respond, grabbed his hand to tug him to the ground. He flopped over and lay still once more.