Mags & Nats 3-Book Box Set

by Stephanie Fazio

  I tried not to look at the blood and unconscious bodies on our floor. I kept my eyes averted from the front door so I wouldn’t have to see the dead man, although the image was clear as day in my mind.

  “I will carry you back out of this house if you don’t come willingly,” Bri shouted as she raced up the stairs after A.J.

  A few seconds later, the two of them reappeared. A.J. held a quivering, but unharmed, Sir Zachary. A.J. also had a wad of folded papers tucked under his arm.

  “Don’t worry, poor baby,” A.J. crooned to the dog. “Papa’s got you.”

  “You need therapy,” Smith told him.

  “Let’s just get out of here,” I said.

  I was the first one out the back door, so when I stopped without warning, everyone else crashed into me.

  “Ah, the Illusionist.” The man leaning against our car smiled, exposing his silver grills. And then the biker guy disappeared from view and was replaced by…me.

  Panic washed over me when I realized what was happening. The Energy Manipulator was here. And he’d just stolen my magic.

  CHAPTER 24

  Get back!” I shouted, but it was too late.

  The Energy Manipulator, still wearing my face, began to laugh. It was an awful, grating sound, made even more disturbing because it appeared to be coming from my mouth.

  The Manipulator’s skin turned silver as he absorbed Bri’s magic. He closed his hand into a fist and punched the van.

  The entire vehicle flew through the garage’s cement wall and crumpled into a heap on the street.

  “Don’t,” I rasped, closing my finger’s around Gray’s sleeve as he started forward.

  “Oh yeah.” The Manipulator shuddered in ecstasy as he absorbed our power.

  I could feel it radiating out of him. It was like an electrical storm contained in a tiny space. There was so much magic inside him that he was going to combust…or kill all of us.

  The Manipulator locked gazes with A.J., and then he raised his arm.

  The was a deafening crack, and then the metal beams of the garage came crashing down.

  We threw ourselves out of the way as they hit the concrete floor with enough force to dent the ground beneath. The Manipulator was laughing as he stretched out his hand toward the house. His entire body vibrated with power.

  Shattering sounds came from inside the house. On instinct, I took a few steps to the side. A second later, our refrigerator blasted through the wall right where I’d been standing. It fell onto the crumpled heap of metal that used to be our van.

  The Manipulator threw his head back and laughed.

  It was horrible to watch this man pervert our magic. Worse, there was nothing we could do to stop him.

  There was more rattling and crashing coming from inside our house, but I barely noticed. A sick feeling went through me when the Manipulator’s body relaxed. He fixed his unblinking stare on Bri.

  “Strip for me, angel,” he said in a soft voice that was and wasn’t like Michael’s.

  Bri’s eyes went unfocused. She started pulling up her shirt.

  Smith and Michael grabbed her arms, pinning them to her sides as she struggled against them.

  “Leave her alone!” Gray shouted, going for the man.

  Before Graysen could reach the Manipulator, the man threw his head back and howled with laughter. The wall at my back buckled. The building groaned.

  And then, it began to topple.

  Bricks crumbled. Wooden beams snapped like they were as frail as toothpicks.

  The Manipulator was using our magic to destroy our home.

  Gray pulled me against him, curling his body around mine to shield me from the debris. It didn’t matter; there was no way to escape the destruction.

  The Manipulator met my stare and smiled. In that one look, I saw my death.

  “Sir Zachary, no!” A.J. shouted.

  The little dog leapt out of A.J.’s arms and ran straight for the Manipulator. The scruffy hair on the back of his neck was raised as he bared his teeth at the enormous man who was holding all of our power.

  Sir Zachary stood on his hind legs so he was at the height of the Manipulator’s knees. I was about to turn my face into Gray’s shirt, not wanting to see what this sadist would do to our dog. But before anyone could react, Sir Zachary barked.

  Except, no sound came out of his mouth. Fire exploded from the dog’s muzzle.

  Gray staggered back, pulling me with him. The Manipulator roared as flames licked up his pants.

  Sir Zachary tipped his snout up and barked again. Fire shot from the dog’s nostrils and engulfed the Manipulator’s torso.

  “I’m hallucinating,” Yutika said beside me.

  “So am I,” I managed.

  There was no other explanation for what was happening.

  The smokeless fire burned so hot I could feel its heat on my skin. The Manipulator was shrieking and beating at the flames. After a few more seconds, he collapsed on the floor of the garage.

  We watched in dumbstruck silence as the fire consumed him. The Manipulator let out a final, nightmarish cry. Then, the flames were sputtering out. All that remained was a blackened corpse.

  Unlike with Valencia’s brother, I felt only relief at this man’s death. He’d murdered before and would have killed every one of us without a second thought. As far as I was concerned, Sir Zachary had done the world a favor.

  I sucked in a breath as my magic rushed back into me. Beside me, Bri’s skin turned titanium again.

  We all gaped at each other.

  “Well.” Graysen cleared his throat. “That was…unexpected.”

  No. The Hansley clan dropping by for dinner unannounced was unexpected. This was—

  “Goddamn amazing,” Smith said.

  That pretty much summed things up.

  Sir Zachary sat in front of us, his tail sweeping back and forth as his warm brown eyes looked to us for approval.

  “Wow,” Yutika whispered.

  “Double wow,” Bri said.

  Michael scratched his neck. “I guess I’m not the only one who gets heartburn from A.J.’s cooking.”

  “I resent that!” A.J. pressed a hand to his chest as though he’d been mortally wounded.

  Yutika gave Michael a bewildered look. “Did you just make a joke?”

  Michael gave her a little shrug, looking pleased with himself.

  A.J. scooped up Sir Zachary and kiss-attacked him. “We’ve got a Mag pooch.”

  “Welcome to the Seven,” Bri said, reaching over to scratch the dog’s ear. “You earned it, buddy.”

  “I think this means we have a new group name,” Graysen said.

  When we all stared at him, he clarified, “The dog makes 7.5.”

  “7.5,” A.J. chuckled. “I like it.”

  “We can celebrate in the van,” I said, my voice still a little unsteady after everything that had just happened. I glanced at the crumpled ball of metal that was our van, and then raised an eyebrow at Yutika. “Provided that you can make us a new one, of course.”

  “Where are we going?” Yutika asked as she drew.

  “You just get us a car,” Smith told her. “I’ll take care of the rest.”

  Yutika’s reply was drowned out by the sound of breaking glass and splintering wood. Our house groaned like it was a living thing in pain.

  “Get into the street,” Michael said. “Now.”

  We didn’t hesitate. We’d barely made it onto the sidewalk before the flimsy supports that were still holding the structure in place failed. Our house collapsed.

  CHAPTER 25

  We spent the first part of the drive shaking and trying to come to terms with what had just happened.

  My throat was burning from a combination of dust and grief.

  Our house was gone.

  “I’m sorry about your house, Kaira,” Bri said, her voice scratchy from everything we’d inhaled.

  I couldn’t speak. I knew how lucky we were to be alive, and yet, that house ha
d never been just a house to any of us. It was home…a place where we’d all felt safe when we’d spent so much of our lives looking over our shoulders.

  And now it was gone.

  “We’ll get a new one,” Gray said, his chalky fingers gripping my arms in a vise. “We’ll make new memories somewhere else.”

  We clung to each other as Michael drove our new van, putting distance between us and the UnAllied. Yutika had created the van so that, from the second we got in, soothing beach sounds filled the speakers. The air was perfumed with calming lavender. And there’d been a pair of fuzzy slippers in each of our sizes waiting for us.

  “Is anyone hurt?” Michael asked. He kept one hand on the steering wheel and the other laced with Yutika’s.

  There were no lingering remnants from earlier in the night when he’d been frozen. Michael was back to his calm, collected self. I was grateful, especially because right now, I was the exact opposite of calm.

  We all shook our heads. Aside from scrapes and bruises, we were all uninjured…at least physically.

  “Does anyone else feel…violated?” Yutika asked. “I’ve never been afraid of our magic before, but he made it all seem so evil.”

  She’d just voiced exactly what I was thinking.

  “What he did was a perversion of your magic,” Graysen said. “Without you being behind the magic, it wasn’t really yours. He was stealing from you.”

  “Get onto 93-S,” Smith told Michael as the highway entrance came up.

  “Where are we going, by the way?” Yutika asked.

  “My dad’s,” Smith replied, his expression darkening.

  My memory of the man we’d all called Older Smith was a little hazy. The last time we’d seen him, I was recovering from a bullet wound that had almost killed me.

  “That’s a good idea,” Graysen said.

  Gray was the only one of us—Smith included—who didn’t seem intimidated by Older Smith. The man was a Level 8 Mender and had saved my life, which explained the deep respect I sensed from Gray at the mention of Smith’s father.

  I turned to Bri, who was holding Sir Zachary on her lap.

  “You doing okay?” I asked her.

  “Aside from killing Valencia’s brother and almost whoring myself out to the man who stole our magic?” She let out a shaky laugh.

  I opened my mouth, but Michael spoke first.

  Glancing back in the rearview mirror, he said, “Bri, I hope you know—”

  “You don’t even need to say it,” Bri said quickly. “I know none of us would ever use our magic against each other.”

  Michael gave her a short nod. “As for the part with Valencia’s brother, you were defending us. You never need to apologize for that, no matter the consequences.”

  He spoke almost harshly, but it seemed to comfort Bri.

  “How about you?” I asked Smith, who looked forlorn without all of his computers.

  I knew he was shaken when he let me put an arm around his bony shoulders.

  “How did they find us?” he muttered. “The security I had on our house made MagLab look like child’s play.”

  “Were any of our devices tampered with?” Michael asked.

  “Not a single one,” Smith replied.

  “Who else knew about the house?” Michael asked me.

  “Just my family,” I said, shaking my head.

  “No,” Graysen corrected, his mouth set in a grim line. “Remwald knew. Maybe he told Valencia.”

  Shit. He was right.

  “I need to check on my family and make sure they’re okay,” I said, as more worry spiked.

  “I can make you a new phone,” Yutika said, glancing back at Smith. “If it’s okay.”

  Smith’s chest puffed out a little as we all turned to him for confirmation. “I’ll make sure it isn’t traced,” he said.

  The worry gnawing at my insides didn’t abate until Ma answered her phone. I kept the call short, just needing to reassure myself that my family was safe. Ma was beside herself that we’d been attacked, thinking that her illusion had somehow failed us. Nothing I said eased the motherly panic I could feel radiating through the phone.

  “Where are you going?” Ma demanded, and then, in the same breath said, “Never mind, don’t tell me. Just promise me you’re going somewhere safe.”

  I promised.

  “You make sure you’re eating,” she said. “I’ll fix up a few things for when it’s safe to tell me where you are. Tell G I’ll bring a lasagna. And I’ll make A.J. that spicy curry he loves. I already have some beef patties defrosting for Michael—

  I listened while Ma rattled off all of our favorite foods. I could hear a clatter in the background as she started pulling out pots and pans. She’d be up cooking for the rest of the night, but I didn’t try to talk her out of it. Cooking was how Ma solved just about all of life’s problems.

  Gray reached out his hand for the phone when I was finished. He tapped in a number, and as soon as the call connected, Graysen put it on speaker.

  “Dr. Pruwist, it’s Graysen Galder.”

  “Do you have an update for me?”

  Pruwist’s voice sounded strained.

  “Yeah, we have an update. Valencia and her people just broke into our house and tried to kill us.”

  Several seconds passed before Pruwist responded.

  “Are you and Kaira alright?” he asked, his voice carefully neutral.

  “We’re alive,” Graysen replied. “What I’d like to know is why you haven’t done anything about the UnAllied.”

  “There are other matters on my mind at the moment, Galder,” Pruwist said icily. “Have you found the murderer?”

  “Not yet,” Graysen said through clenched teeth.

  “Well, then. Might I suggest you do your job, and I do mine?”

  Smith made a growling sound beside me.

  “I’m not sure I made myself clear,” Graysen began, but the interim Director cut him off.

  “Galder, I have a campaign rally coming up, and about two-hundred people needing a few seconds of my time. Don’t call again until you have an update about the murderer.”

  “You’re going to a campaign rally?” I demanded, unable to help myself. “Have you lost your mind?”

  There was a killer picking off members of a group to which Pruwist belonged.

  “I will be surrounded by police,” Pruwist said. “The Nats and Mags in this city are on the verge of killing each other, and not everyone has the ability to protect themselves like you do. Boston needs a leader who can bring them together.”

  “But—” I began, but Pruwist cut me off.

  “Ms. Hansley, if you’re as anxious to remain unMarked as you claim, then I suggest you get back to the real problem at hand. You have three days.”

  My blood turned to fire as a thousand comebacks filled my mind.

  “Threaten my girlfriend again,” Graysen said in a frigid tone, “and we’ll let this killer turn you into a thumb-sucking vegetable.”

  Like William Mallorie.

  Pruwist didn’t miss a beat. “Then a new Director will be elected, and your girlfriend will face the choice of a tracker or execution.” He paused. “That is, if the next Director is magnanimous enough to offer her a choice. Kaira did break the second high law after all.”

  Graysen ended the call. He gripped the phone, and for a second, I thought he was going to hurl it out the window.

  “That went well,” A.J. observed sarcastically.

  “Gray.” I grabbed his arm as a terrible thought occurred to me. “What if he doesn’t honor our agreement without the contract?”

  The contract that Gray had written up, and Pruwist and I had signed, was lost in the pile of rubble that used to be our house.

  “Don’t worry.” Gray gave me an easy smile. “Smith scanned it so we’d have a digital copy.”

  I let out a long breath and waited for my newest bout of jitteriness to subside.

  “Are we still sure we want to work with Pruwis
t?” Yutika asked.

  “No,” Smith and I said at the same time.

  Graysen frowned. “We have no choice. He has no real contenders in the election. He’s going to be the next Director.”

  “That doesn’t mean we can trust him,” Smith persisted. “Didn’t he promise you that he’d help the Super Mags? He hasn’t so much as mentioned them in his most recent campaign ads.”

  A combination of fury and guilt sliced through me at the reminder of the Super Mags. Fury because they were still being caged like animals, and guilt because I’d been so wrapped up in my own problems I hadn’t even thought about them.

  “Ugh, I’m such a moron,” I said, pressing my fist into my forehead.

  I knew better than to rely on the Alliance. Even if by some miracle we found the murderer in time, my problems weren’t over. In my hurry to protect myself, I’d lost sight of what I’d spent the last three years fighting for.

  I looked at Gray.

  “Even if Pruwist honors our bargain, the deal will only last for as long as he’s Director. And it only applies to me.” I gestured to the rest of our friends. “The second high law won’t change for anyone else.”

  Uncertainty flashed across Gray’s face. I wasn’t telling him anything he didn’t already know. It was why he’d been pouring over those books about the second high law.

  “You’re right,” Graysen said carefully, “but we don’t have a lot of options at the moment. We have to work within the constraints of the system. There’s only so much change people can tolerate in a short period of time.”

  “Then we need to stop working within the system,” I said, feeling my cheeks grow warm. “Enough with all the talk and no action. We should have broken the Super Mags out of the lab, and—”

  “If we do that, then what’s the point of having a government at all?” Graysen replied, his voice growing as heated as mine. “This is how it has to work, otherwise we’re left with nothing except anarchy. Look at what happened in California.”

  He was right. California was a wasteland ruled by barbaric Mags who killed first and…well, that was about it. There was good reason why there had been a mass exodus of people from California after the Slaughters.