My friends all stood around a bonfire, laughing and passing around a bottle of something alcoholic, I assumed. Dana was the first to notice me, and she came running over, her feet bare, and her long legs shown off in a pair of short-shorts. She gave me a tight squeeze, and I returned it, hoping I didn’t get a flash of something I didn’t want to see. For the moment, my foresight left me alone.
“Hey,” she said, “how’s our resident vampire?”
“It’s damphyre,” I told her. “And happy birthday. How does it feel to be an old lady?” I wondered if I should have brought anything with me, a card or present, but I’d come empty handed.
She laughed. “Right now, it feels great.”
“No more teens? No more excuses to do stupid stuff?”
She shrugged. “I never was much into doing stupid things.”
Melissa approached. “Nah, that’s our Dana. Too grown up for her own good.”
Laurel ran over to us, her feet also bare on the sand. “Don’t worry. You’re only as young as the people you hang out with.” She frowned. “Or something like that.”
Dana lifted her bottle. “But tonight I get to do whatever I want, ‘cause it’s my birthday!”
“And not just that,” said Kayla, joining us. “It’s your ascendance. Everything could change from tonight. You might have the sort of powers you’ve only ever dreamed of.”
Dana beamed. I didn’t think I’d ever seen her so carefree and happy. I wasn’t totally sure what this ascendance meant, but I guessed it was a good thing.
I didn’t want to ruin the party mood, but I had to ask them about earlier. “So, guys, about that fog this afternoon. Did you notice anything … strange?”
Dana frowned. “No. It came in thick and fast, but that’s not uncommon around here at this time of year.”
Laurel laughed. “Yeah, a lot of the vacationers think they’re coming here to spend their summer in the sun, and basically spend it sitting in a cold, wet cloud.”
I pressed my lips together. “So there didn’t seem to be anything abnormal about it?”
Dana frowned at me. “What are you saying, Beth?”
“Oh, I don’t know.” I felt a little stupid. “I just thought I saw something weird in the fog—like a black, skeletal arm that took a swipe at me.”
“Maybe a crow got disoriented,” Laurel suggested. “And you caught sight of its wing?”
“Yeah, maybe.” But I wasn’t convinced. “Anyway, I don’t want to ruin the party.” I grabbed Dana’s drink from her and took a gulp. Sickening sweetness coated my tongue, and I grimaced. Peach schnapps. Gross.
“So what’s the plan?” I asked.
“We’re waiting,” said Laurel.
“For what?”
Dana gave a secret smile. “We don’t know yet.”
I lifted my eyebrows. “Oooh—kay.”
“Actually,” Melissa said, her mouth twisting, her naked toes toying with the sand, “We wondered if that might be something you could help us with.”
I frowned. “How could I …” Then it dawned on me. They were hoping I’d get some kind of insight into exactly what they were waiting for. I shook my head. “So that’s why I got an invite to this thing.”
“Not the only reason!” Melissa said. “We love you, too.”
I rolled my eyes. “Yeah, yeah. You only want me for my precognitive abilities.” I was only teasing them. That they were hoping to gain something from my being here didn’t bother me. I would help them if I could; I owed them that much.
“So did you get anything?” Laurel asked, unable to hide the excitement in her voice. “You know, when you touched Dana just then?”
I shook my head. “Sorry, no, I didn’t. I can’t control when I get flashes, or who I get them from. Some people are more prevalent to it than others—like I’ve never gotten anything from Riley, or even you, Laurel. I don’t know if some people’s brainwaves are slightly different, or maybe some people’s are more in tune to mine.” I wasn’t sure where I was going with this. I felt self-conscious at the way everyone stood looking at me, expecting me to perform some kind of trick I wasn’t able to produce at will.
Dana gave a shrug. “Oh well, we’ll know soon enough.”
She took the bottle back from me, which I had forgotten I was still holding, and turned to walk down to the water’s edge.
“She’s not mad at me, is she?” I whispered to Laurel.
“Nah, she’s just stressed and pretending like she’s cool with this whole thing. I think any of us would be nervous right now.”
I looked toward Dana’s long, lean back, at the way the breeze lifted her red curls from her shoulders and blew them back from her face. Goosebumps prickled across my skin in anticipation. What was going to happen to her?
Was it in any way connected to my earlier experience in the fog?
Laurel, Kayla, and I settled ourselves around the bonfire. Melissa remained standing, her arms folded across her chest.
“Sit down, will you?” said Laurel. “You make me nervous standing over us.”
Melissa wrinkled her nose. “I hate getting sand everywhere. It sticks to everything.” She gave a mock shudder.
“Just sit,” said Kayla. “We can’t talk to you properly hovering like that.”
Melissa rolled her eyes and said, “Fine, but I’ll know who to blame when I find sand where it shouldn’t be,” and sat down as cautiously as possible.
“No chance of sex on the beach for you then.” Kayla laughed, and Melissa delivered a playful thump to her shoulder.
We all sat together, taking swigs from other bottles of liquor that had been left propped in the sand, and talking quietly. This wasn’t exactly the party atmosphere I’d imagined, and everyone kept glancing toward the ocean where Dana stood.
Kayla turned to me. “So, how’s everything in paradise?”
I guessed she was talking about me and Riley. My cheeks flushed. “Everything is great.”
“Flynn has been asking after you, you know. I think you really crushed him by turning him down for Riley.”
I didn’t know how to respond.
Her brown eyes narrowed at me. “How come you get all the hot guys, anyway?”
I wriggled, uncomfortably, and shrugged. “Maybe it’s a vampire thing,” I suggested. “We’re supposed to be able to attract people in order to feed, but you know I’m only half vampire, so I guess I’m only half as attractive.” I felt like I was boasting about myself, but in reality I was just trying to be practical. Even so, the situation felt awkward.
“Hmm, I’m not sure. It’s not just the big, dark curls, and china-doll face thing you’ve got going on. It’s like they want to protect you, too.”
I laughed. “I’m the last person they should be worried about protecting.”
She lifted an eyebrow. “Well, you did almost get killed a few weeks back.”
“Err, yeah, there is that.”
What was going on? Kayla seemed kind of jealous. Did she still like Flynn? She’d made some comments about him when we’d first started college, but I hadn’t realized they’d been spending much time together. But then, my not noticing these things was hardly surprising. I was so absorbed in Riley, I could have had a dozen guys banging down my door and I wouldn’t have noticed. The thought made me miss him with a deep ache. Barely an hour had passed since we’d last been together, but not being with him was like missing a limb.
Laurel changed the topic. “Hey, look!”
She pointed toward where Dana stood. Her hair had lifted on her head, as if an electrical charge surrounded her, and, on the horizon, a dark bank of clouds was gathering.
Laurel got to her feet. “It’s started.”
The rest of us scrambled up too, brushing fine white sand from our hands and the backs of our legs.
The black clouds rushed across the sky as if called by an unseen force, and now I sensed the electricity that had been affecting Dana. The hairs on my arms stood to attention, and the hai
r on my head prickled and lifted. Again, I was reminded of the fog from earlier, the way the clouds built like a bank against the horizon. Only this time, they were black, instead of white, and stayed in the sky. They moved too quickly, as if a wind blew hard from the east, pummeling the cloud in toward us. The sky grew dark as the remaining sun was blocked, and the flames from our bonfire leaped high, spurting and crackling into the sky.
I felt like I was on the outskirts of the events happening around us as Laurel, Melissa, and Kayla moved together, each taking the other’s hand. All three girls had identical expressions in their widened eyes—wonder and excitement—as they stared out past Dana and toward the huge expanse of black cloud racing toward us.
As I watched, forks of lightning ran jagged across the bottoms of the clouds. I braced, waiting for the following roll and crack of thunder, but none followed. Was that even possible? After earlier events, I figured I probably shouldn’t question what was possible or not.
The clouds grew closer, until they were directly above us. Dana turned back, looking over her shoulder toward us. Her alabaster skin almost glowed in the strange light, and her green eyes were wild with excitement.
“It’s happening!” she cried. “I can feel the energy channeling into me!”
Lightning danced and flickered like an amazing light show. The tension in the air was palpable, the hair on my body standing erect. Nerves fluttered in my stomach, my heart beating too fast. For once, I wished I’d been able to get a glimpse of the future from Dana, so I’d have some idea of what was about to happen.
I didn’t need to wait long.
A sudden fork of lightning burst from the cloud, spiking downward, toward the earth. Only, it didn’t hit the ground. Instead, it hit Dana and her body jerked backward. She didn’t fall, and the bolt of lightning didn’t dissipate. Instead, it was joined by another, firing out of the cloud and hitting Dana in the chest. She jerked and jolted, exactly as though she was being electrocuted, but the lightning bolts somehow held her up, as if pinning her to the sky.
“Dana!” I yelled.
I glanced back at the other girls, trying to figure out what to do. They all stood in the exact same position, clutching each other’s hands and staring with amazement and fear in their eyes. None made any attempt to race forward and help Dana. Should I? I hated to see her like this, but at the same time we were in waters I was unable to navigate. If I did something to interrupt what was happening—whatever the hell that was—would I ruin the thing Dana and the others had been waiting for?
Dana’s body shook and trembled, and, as I watched, her feet lifted from the sand, her toes pointed down, so she was suspended in the air. Her body continued to judder as the lightning pinned her to the clouds above. White wisps began to rise from her chest, and I realized it was smoke. The acrid tang of burning flesh filled my sensitive nostrils.
I whipped back around to the rest of Dana’s coven. “Do something!” I cried. “She’s burning.”
“No!” yelled Melissa. “This is her gift.”
“She won’t have a gift if it kills her!”
The time seemed to stretch on painfully slowly, as if every second were another minute. A third lightning bolt forked from the sky, and Dana’s body slammed backward, toward the earth, as it hit. But then she lifted higher into the sky, almost out of arm’s reach now, her long red curls hanging loose as her head tipped back. I tried to see if she was still conscious. Her eyes were open, but a strange glaze affected them. Was she even still breathing?
Panic crawled up inside of me, and I knew I had to do something. If she rose much higher into the air, I wouldn’t be able to reach her and the choice would be out of my hands.
Turning back to the other girls, I shouted, “This has to stop!”
I didn’t wait for a response.
I ran forward, but something hit me from the side, sending me flying through the air. I landed with a thump on the wet sand at the water’s edge, jarring my hip and shoulder. Cold waves rushed over my body and I scrambled back to my feet.
Melissa, Laurel, and Kayla had dropped each other’s hands, and now stood, facing me, their palms lifted at me in a ‘stop’ sign. What had happened dawned on me. They’d used some kind of spell to push me away from Dana.
“Leave her alone, Beth,” yelled Laurel.
Was their magic stronger now that whatever was happening to Dana was occurring? I had never imagined at the start of this evening that I would somehow become the enemy.
“It could kill her! None of you even knows if this is supposed to happen.”
They glanced at each other. “But it feels right,” said Laurel.
I lifted my hand and pointed at Dana. “What about her? Does she look right?”
I knew she didn’t.
The girls glanced at each other again, and none of them answered.
Their doubt was enough. I had to put an end to this. I took one last look at the three girls, half expecting them to put me to the ground again, and then ran for Dana. I jumped into the air and my fingers wrapped around her naked ankle. The moment I touched her, the electricity that had captured her body found a new outlet and ran through me.
A massive crack sounded in my head and I literally felt my heart stop.
Dana dropped to the ground, and I fell with her.
Chapter
4
My fingers and toes tingled as I lay still on the sand.
Had my heartbeat restarted? I held my breath and waited—I wondered, would I even be able to take a breath if my heart no longer worked? But then I felt it bang hard enough to hit my ribcage and I exhaled a sigh of relief. I wasn’t going to die today. I’d discovered during my eighteen years on this planet that it was pretty hard to kill me.
Dana, however, was another matter.
She lay motionless on the sand, smoke rising from her body. I got no sense of her heartbeat, or of breath leaving her body. I crawled across the sand toward her, my long hair bedraggled and hanging in my face.
“Dana?” My voice was hoarse, my body feeling like it didn’t quite belong to me. I reached her and lifted my hand to place against her chest. The same smoke coming from Dana’s body rose from my own skin.
What the hell was everyone else doing?
The girls stood, clutching each other in fear and indecision.
“Are you going to help us?” I started to cough.
They glanced at each other and then ran over and dropped to their knees beside Dana.
“Oh my God, Dana,” said Melissa, tears in her eyes.
“She’s not breathing,” I said.
Laurel bent over her. “Make some space,” she instructed the others, and tilted Dana’s chin up. She pinched her nose between two fingers and bent to her friend, covered her mouth with her own, and blew a breath into her lungs. I watched Dana’s chest rise and fall, and then Laurel began chest compressions.
“Come on, come on, come on,” I willed beneath my breath. I should have acted sooner. I shouldn’t have waited so long.
Laurel moved back to Dana’s mouth, and repeated the process of pinching her nose and exhaling a breath into her lungs. When nothing happened, Laurel began chest compressions again.
I pressed my lips together, trying to hold back tears, certain this wasn’t going to work.
But then Dana gave a sudden gasp and sat bolt upright. Laurel fell back from her as if she’d been pushed, and Melissa and Kayla gave small cries of alarm.
Dana blinked a couple of times and then looked around at us. “What happened?”
“You don’t remember?” I asked.
She shook her head. “I remember standing on the shore, looking out to the horizon. I remember clouds gathering.” Her brows drew together in furrowed concentration, her mouth twisting. “But I don’t remember anything else. It’s just darkness, and then I opened my eyes and I was looking at you guys.”
I glanced to Laurel, but she gave me a nervous smile and a shrug.
Dana’s face gre
w hard. “Why? What happened?”
I moved back. This wasn’t my place to tell her. This was to do with magic, something I knew very little about.
“Something happened,” Melissa started.
Kayla snorted. “You can say that again,” she said, and was rewarded with a glare from Melissa.
“What happened?” Dana demanded.
“Umm, you were kind of hit by lightning,” Laurel finally admitted.
Her eyes widened. “What?”
“Yeah, but it wasn’t like normal lightning. It hit you and kept hitting you, but in one continuous streak, and then it lifted you into the air.” She appeared awkward in what she was saying, as if she didn’t expect Dana to believe her, despite several of us witnessing the event.
“Oh, my God. So it happened. I was quite literally elevated.”
“Do you feel any different?” asked Laurel.
She frowned. “No.” She flexed her fingers. “I thought I would feel it. Something would tell me what gift I’d been given. But other than being a bit spaced out, I feel exactly the same.”
Kayla jumped in. “Well, Beth interrupted it, so maybe it didn’t have the chance to finish properly.”
Dana snapped around to me. “You did what?”
My stomach dropped. “I didn’t have much choice. You were being electrocuted, and you’d lifted off the ground and were floating upward. If I’d left it much longer, I wouldn’t have been able to reach you.”
Her green eyes blazed. “So instead you decided to stop my one chance of being gifted with a special power? Witches wait for this our whole lives. I might have become someone special!”
“You might have died!” I snapped back. “You almost did!”
“Maybe that was part of it. Maybe I was supposed to die to come back as something else.”
Everyone was staring at me, accusingly. Suddenly, I felt like the outsider again. I should have trusted my instincts and stayed with Riley. A pang of longing for his arms filled me.
Twisted Magic (The Dhampyre Chronicles Book 2) Page 3
