by Alex Steele
I began shaping the katana with my mayhem magic while keeping my eyes glued to Jacobs. He had something up his nonexistent sleeve. Something that was making him overconfident. That was never a good sign.
“It definitely should, Jacobs. It scares the hell out of me,” I said as the katana formed in my hand. Even without looking down, I knew the eye would be there, staring out of the darkness. I couldn’t let that distract me though. Maintaining the shape of it was going to be hard enough during this fight, if I even could.
You’re learning, the mayhem magic whispered.
Jacobs’ smile widened. “Time for dinner, boys.”
He launched toward me almost faster than my eyes could track. I lunged forward, twisting to my left and swinging the katana in a wide arc toward his head. The blade skimmed along his shoulder — missing by less than an inch — as he slipped past the strike.
I followed up with a blast of fire from my other hand, thinking I could catch him off guard. The flames hit him...then rolled over his skin without hurting him at all.
There was no time to think about what I’d just seen. The other werewolf swiped at my head. I ducked just in time and thrust the katana forward. It grazed his side, drawing a line of blood. He threw his head back with an enraged howl and staggered backward.
Moving fluidly, I twirled the blade in my hand and thrust it straight back, catching Jacobs. He roared and batted the blade away a little too slowly, tearing open his thigh. He seemed to be caught by surprise that the hit had landed.
Just to test my theory, I sent a fireball hurtling at his face as I retreated. It blew past his snout without so much as singeing a hair.
Interesting, the mayhem magic said, perking up inside of me.
“That bracelet can only help so much,” I taunted, letting the mayhem magic grow within me. It wanted out, and I was tempted to let it have its way.
“We need to capture them, not turn them to dust, Blackwell,” Swift shouted in warning. She stood between three werewolves, using the length of her mace to keep them at a distance.
“Mine are immune to magic, so that might be hard,” I shouted back.
“Figure something out!” She charged in, with a lightning-fast swing of the mace. It smashed through one of the wolf’s legs and snapped it like a twig.
I was forced to turn my attention back to my own problems when Jacobs charged me. I ran forward and slid under his wide swing. With two quick steps, I slipped behind him and slashed upward. He was faster than I expected and lunged just out of reach before spinning in place and leaping at me.
Mayhem magic surged around me, blocking his wild attack just in time. Jacobs slammed into the shield. The other werewolf swiped at my exposed side. I met the swing of his arm with my katana. The edge cut through bone and muscle like butter and his arm fell to the concrete. He stumbled back, blood rushing from the stump.
I dropped the shield as Jacobs moved to ram it again and kicked out with my foot, catching him in the knee. There was a disturbing popping noise, but he still didn’t go down. I danced back out of his reach, then swung the katana like a baseball bat, aiming the flat of the blade at his head.
He blocked the strike with a meaty forearm and attempted to grab the blade bare handed. Mayhem magic flared out at his touch and he howled in pain, skittering back and clutching the wounded appendage to his chest.
Rage burned in his eyes. “What the hell is that?”
“You got me, buddy.” I adjusted my grip on it, wondering if I could manage to reshape the katana into a blunt object and still maintain my focus.
He didn’t give me long to consider it before he attacked again, forcing me closer and closer toward Swift. His pack had us surrounded, which wasn’t my favorite position to be in. We were outnumbered and they didn’t fight like idiots. They knew how to work together.
“Now!” Jacobs shouted.
A loud pop echoed through the air, followed by a blinding flash of light. Swift shouted something incoherent. I stumbled away, my back hitting the brick wall. When I could see again, I found my partner on one knee, her mace gone, along with her magical signature.
“My magic is—” she cut off her explanation when she had to dodge the lunging strike of one of the wolves. Even without her berserker magic, she was strong and fast. She fought back with unbridled fury, her fist connecting with the werewolf’s jaw and forcing him back.
I could feel it too. Something had shifted in me. But one thing had not. I let the mayhem magic loose and it poured out from me in a dark wave, filling the entire alley. Play time was over.
Each person stood out as a bright point in my mind. I couldn’t see anything, but I could feel it all. They were trapped like flies in honey.
It would be so easy to kill them. All I had to do...all I had….
Do it.
“No!” I began pulling the magic back into myself as I stumbled toward Swift. My feet felt heavy, as if the mayhem magic was fighting my movements.
I finally found Swift and grabbed her by the arm. A bubble cleared out around us and she gasped in a deep breath.
She blinked at me in shock. “What the hell did you do?”
“Can’t. Explain. Get. Ready.” I squeezed my eyes shut and yanked the magic back into myself with a shout. It hit me like a battering ram and drove me to my knees. The world spun around me.
I felt Swift move, but I couldn’t see straight. Ground. Sky. Wall. I gasped for air, belatedly realizing I was laying on my back.
A werewolf sailed over me, body limp, and blood trailing from its mouth. The smack of fists hitting flesh filtered through the buzzing in my ears. Swift was fighting them, without magic, alone. I had to get up and help her, but I couldn’t risk using the mayhem magic again right now.
I forced myself upright. A snarl from my right shocked me into action and I rolled out of the way, barely dodging an attack from Jacobs.
Spit foamed at the corners of his mouth as he charged again. His attack was wild and unfocused, like he’d gone feral with rage. I dodged again, rolling up to my feet this time. Before he could charge again, I attacked, catching him in the back with a solid kick.
He stumbled and swung his arm back. I blocked the strike and kicked him in the kidneys, then decked him in the jaw with a hook punch. The blow dazed him. I took the opening and showered him with strike after strike. He stumbled away, barely trying to defend himself anymore.
There was a second pop, and all at once, the strange emptiness was filled. Whatever they’d done to our magic ended abruptly. Fire bloomed around my fist as I swung one last, devastating punch at Jacobs. It landed on his temple and he went down hard, reverting back to human form before he hit the ground.
I looked back to check on Swift. She stood, mace in hand, over two other werewolves. The alley was littered with them. A couple looked dead, the others were simply unconscious or wounded.
I readjusted the cuffs of my suit. “This is better than therapy.”
Swift grinned at me, her hair wild around her face. “You’ve got that right.”
“Can you call the locals to get all these idiots transported to lockup tonight?” I asked as I knelt next to Jacobs.
Swift nodded and pulled out her phone.
Jacobs twitched slightly as I checked for a pulse, making sure I hadn’t hurt him too badly. Unlucky for him, he was still alive.
She rejoined me. “They’re on their way. Did you happen to see whatever they used to knock out our magic?”
“Nope. It’s odd though. It didn’t affect my mayhem magic.”
“That is strange. It’s different, but it’s still magic. It shouldn’t be immune to those sorts of things”
“Magic dampening cuffs worked on me before when I was struggling to control it. If this isn’t something new, why would that have changed?”
“Perhaps…” she trailed off for a moment before lifting her eyes to mine. “Perhaps it’s grown stronger somehow.”
I rubbed my jaw with the edge of my hand. “
Do you think losing my katana could have strengthened it?”
She lifted one shoulder and pursed her lips, getting a distant look in her eyes. “Maybe.”
“There’s something you’re not saying.”
Sirens cut through the silence of the alley as the local police approached.
“It just doesn’t make sense.”
“We agree on that much.”
I rose to my feet. A small, reddish disc lying on the asphalt caught my eye. I walked over and crouched beside it. It looked familiar.
“Do you recognize this?”
Swift came closer to see what I was pointing at, then nodded. “That’s one of the stolen items from…” she hesitated, pulling out her phone to flip through the case files. “The second robbery.”
“That connects Jacobs to this case in a more concrete way.”
“Sure does. Let’s hope it’s enough.”
Eight
Jacobs was waiting for us in Moira. The London agents had confirmed his transfer with me this morning. As eager as I was to go interrogate that son of a bitch, there was something we had to do first.
“It’s just that no one will tell us what’s going on.” Alyssa, Chief Bradley’s daughter, sat across from us. She had a white-knuckled grip on the handle of her teacup and the tea inside shivered from the tension. “How can they keep us from visiting? He hasn’t even been convicted yet. I don’t understand it. I just...I don’t get it.” She clamped her mouth shut after that, eyes tight with unshed tears. There was anger there too, and fear.
I didn’t want to say what I’d come here to say, but holding them in suspense was wrong. Bradley wanted me to take care of them, and he’d made it clear he didn’t want them to have any more hope than he did of his eventual release.
I set my tea down and took a deep breath. “I think he may be refusing to see you.”
She jerked back with shock, sloshing tea over the rim onto the saucer and her fingers. “Dammit— sorry, sorry.” Her eyes filled with tears then. One slipped over her bottom lashes and she brushed it away firmly. “Why?”
“He doesn’t believe there’s any chance for an acquittal.” I glanced at Swift and she nodded once in encouragement. “This is...there is no good way to put this. The Mage’s Guild wants him gone, and they’re going to make it happen, justice be damned.”
Helpless rage shone in Alyssa’s eyes. “We have to stop them. Right? You can...you can save him.”
“He doesn’t think so. He ordered me not to try.”
Her shoulders stiffened. “And you’re going to listen to him?”
Swift leaned in and reached across the table, pressing her hand to Alyssa’s arm. “The Mage’s Guild is going to convict him. That would leave one option. We could break into wherever he’s being held and help him escape.”
“Then do it!” Alyssa snapped. “He’s innocent!”
“Your father would be a fugitive after that, and so would you. And Matilda. You’d have to go into hiding or the two of you would be used as leverage against him, if not killed outright to punish his defiance.” Swift sat back. “That is why Bradley is ordering us to stand down. He’s trying to protect his family.”
Alyssa buried her face in her hands, harsh breaths cutting through the silence. “So I have to sacrifice my father to keep my daughter safe? To save myself?” She shook her head once, as if she could deny it. “That’s a miserable choice.”
She was right. It was miserable. It wasn’t even a choice. It was yet another defeat in a war we already seemed to have lost. I thought back to the ledger — now lost in the rubble of the old IMIB building in Moira — that had sat in the bottom drawer of my desk. This corruption within the Mage’s Guild, within everything, was slowly eating away at the world. Would there be anyone good left when it was done?
A door cracked open and a pig-tailed head poked out. “Mommy?”
Alyssa stood and turned to face her daughter, the emotions wiped from her face and replaced with a smile. “Yes, baby?”
“I’m hungry.” Matilda looked nervous. She could tell something was wrong, but wasn’t old enough to understand what.
“I’ll make you lunch. Run to the kitchen, okay?”
Matilda nodded, slipping out of her room and sprinting to the kitchen like we were the boogeyman.
Alyssa smoothed her hands down her blouse. “If you can’t...if that’s all then, I need to get her lunch.”
Swift nodded. “If anything changes, you’ll be the first to know, okay?”
“Okay.”
We let ourselves out, closing the front door quietly behind us. It was sunny today. Just a few puffs of clouds in the sky and a gentle breeze. Despite the chill lingering in the air, it was as good as the weather got in London this time of year. I’d rather it was raining. The sunshine felt out of place.
“We have to do something, Lexi. I can’t stand this. I can’t let them do this—” I cut off my words and shook my head, unable to look at her.
“We’ll fight them. Bradley said there were others that could help us, maybe they can help free him too. Either stop the trial, or get him out if he’s convicted.”
“He’ll never forgive us if Alyssa and Matilda get hurt trying to save him.”
She glanced back at the little house. “We’ll find a way. We have to.”
Nine
“How do you want to play this?” I asked, leaning against the two way mirror as we watched Jacobs in the interrogation room.
Swift tapped her fingers against her crossed arms. Her mouth was set in a tight frown. “He thinks he’s smarter than us. Or that he knows something we don’t.”
“Well, that’s true enough. He might know who our murder suspect is.”
“More than that, though.” She jerked her chin at him. “He’s relaxed. Lounging in the chair. Looks well-rested. We literally have four dead bodies from yesterday, all murdered without provocation, and he’s not worried. There’s something wrong with this whole thing.”
She was right. He was way too confident considering the circumstances of his arrest.
“Then we should get whatever information we can out of him as soon as we can.”
She lifted one shoulder noncommittally. “I’m not optimistic.”
“Now who’s having a pity party?” I punched her arm lightly. “Come on, we can crack this guy.”
We walked slowly around to the door of the interrogation room. This was our one shot to find something on this guy. Swift had been more bothered by Jacobs getting away that first time, but I certainly wasn’t a fan either. I didn’t like to lose.
She put her hand on mine, stopping me from turning the handle. “Don’t insult him.”
“What?”
“I think our only chance is to treat him like he’s some big, bad criminal. If he brags, we might get something, but we’re not going to intimidate him.”
I held her gaze for a moment, then nodded. “Alright. I’m much better at bad cop though.”
Her lips quirked up into a smile. “No doubt about that.”
I pushed the door open and strode in, keeping my eyes glued to Jacobs like I was worried about what he might do. He didn’t even twitch. His posture stayed relaxed and his breathing even.
When Swift shut the door, he finally acknowledged us, glancing back over his shoulder to wave at her.
“No coffee?” he asked, with an exaggerated pout.
“Coffee machine is broken. My apologies,” Swift said with so much sincerity I almost believed her. She walked behind him to his left side and leaned against the wall, putting him between us. “You sleep well, Jacobs?”
He leaned back in his chair a bit and nodded. “Of course. The IMIB is always so hospitable when I come for a visit.”
“Then I’m glad we could convince you to visit this time,” she said with a bright smile.
He snorted and sat up straight. His amused expression turned calculating as his eyes fixed on me. “You two have me in this box. What do you want?”
He rolled his eyes. “Not it.”
“Oh, we know,” Swift said, regaining his attention. “Actually, it looks like this murderer might have run off with something that belonged to you.”
He didn’t seem to like that. His hand twitched slightly as he curled it into a fist.
“Oh? And why do you think that?” he asked nonchalantly.
“I know it’s rude, but I was eavesdropping on your little meeting yesterday. The one where you killed that other shifter pack.” I crossed my arms, tapping my fingers restlessly against the sleeve of my jacket as if I were nervous.
He leaned forward and rested his elbows on the table. “So you saw how they attacked me then? Terrible business, but everyone has a right to defend themselves.”
“Strange, I must have missed that part. Maybe you can jog my memory.”
He scoffed at that.
Swift walked slowly behind him. “What were they supposed to be selling you, Jacobs?”
Jacobs tilted his head back so far the chair began tipping back. He looked up at Swift with a grin. “Do you even care about the murder? Or are you just pissed I got away once before, girlie?”
She leaned toward him, expression still perfectly blank. “It haunts me every night. I even cried about it. How can I sleep while the big, bad wolf is prowling around...selling drugs. So scary.”
So much for not insulting him.
He let the chair fall forward with a loud clank, the chains wrapped around his legs rattling against it. “Thought so.”
“Look, we can get you back to your little friends sooner, or later.” I walked over to the table, stopping just out of his reach. “Who—”
The door flew open and two magisters swooped in. One went straight to Jacobs, leaning down to undo his cuffs. Between the two of them, I could clearly see the cocky grin that spread across Jacob’s face. He’d known they were coming for him somehow. He’d been waiting for this.
“Guess it’s sooner, Blackwell,” Jacobs said with a chuckle.
