by Sean Stone
“Clara, Arthur, how lovely to see you both again,” Nick said courteously. He looked completely at ease, not in the least bit worried by the army of enemies at the door.
“We haven’t come here to fight you, Nick,” Clara said loudly. She was doing a good job of keeping the fear out of her voice. “Let Eddie go, and we’ll leave peacefully.”
Nick chuckled quietly to himself. Gratitude swelled within me. Even though I was in no real danger Clara believed that I was, and she had brought her minions to rescue me. I hadn’t expected that of her, I really thought she’d abandon me. It was nice to be wrong. “Peacefully,” Nick repeated the word contemplatively. “I think this situation is anything but peaceful. As long as your people and my people are at odds there will be no peace.”
“Then come to the table. Let’s talk this through,” Arthur said. Even his voice sounded strained and exhausted. It was clear that he had no appetite for war. Living in Cedarstone his whole life he’d probably seen enough.
“Is there any arrangement that we can make with you that involves both sides walking away happy? Or do you simply want us all relieved of our magic?” Nick asked. He touched his fingers to a tall blade of grass and I watched as the greenness faded to brown and it crumbled down. Several of the blades around it followed suit.
“It isn’t your magic,” Clara said accusingly. “You stole it.”
“We took it from those unworthy of holding it,” retorted Nick. “Were they worthy they would never have given it up.”
“Nobody gave up their magic,” Arthur said in a disappointed-dad voice.
“You murdered them,” said Clara harshly.
Nick shrugged. “You say potato…”
“How can you have such little regard for a person’s life?” asked Arthur, shaking his head sorrowfully.
“Because he’s a monster,” spat Clara.
That got Nick’s attention. He let out a low noise that sounded very much like a growl. As he fixed his gaze on Clara I saw his blue eyes start to turn red. Blackness traced along the veins leading out from his eyes, travelling down his cheeks and spreading towards his neck. Then he blinked, and his face returned to normal. I’d heard of magic transforming people but that was something I’d never witnessed before. With all the power Nick had I should have expected a pretty severe transformation.
“I wonder,” Nick said ponderously. “How many people would describe you in the same way these days, Clara Winters?”
The corner of Clara’s lip rose in contempt. “We are not here to debate who is the bigger monster. We are here for Eddie. Let him go and there will be no bloodshed.”
“You see, I would very much like to debate who is the biggest monster and when it comes to bloodshed you are welcome to try, but I guarantee the only blood shed will be your own. I killed you once you miserable little bitch don’t you dare think I won’t do it again.” The last words he spoke were said with such contempt that even I took a step away from him. I knew a thing or two about hatred, having hated Rachel for most of my life and I could see the exact same loathing in Nick’s face now. However, like the monstrous appearance of moments ago it quickly vanished and was replaced by a cheeky smile. “As it happens, I’m not holding Eddie against his will. He’s free to go where he wishes.” He turned to me and cocked his head to the side. “Would you like to go with Clara, Eddie?”
I felt like a child being forced to choose between two bickering parents. I looked from him to Clara, wishing there was a third option in sight. Then Nick made the decision easier. “Go,” he said, and then added in a whisper, “make sure you ask her what she really wants from you. I’ve been honest about my intentions, now let’s see if she will do the same. Reach out to me when you want to finish our chat.”
Without waiting for a reply Nick vanished into thin air. I released the breath I’d been holding and then walked down the garden path to where Clara stood waiting.
AOC HQ was ready for war. The front had been cleaned up and looked as if no battle had taken place just an hour or so before. Sorcerers patrolled the perimeter of the building. More were placed on balconies across the building’s front. The lobby was filled with more standing by, ready for an attack. Clara had not taken the day’s events lightly, nor should she. The most powerful warlock who ever lived was her enemy and I doubted that even her entire alliance would be able to defeat him. I was glad he wasn’t coming for me.
Nobody had spoken on the journey back here, except Gabe to ask if I was alright. Other than that, it had been a silent trip. Everybody was shaken and anxious. I wondered what Nick was doing now. Whilst Clara was no doubt coming up with a strategy for his defeat what was he up to? Was he off in his own HQ with his top warlocks discussing how to eliminate the alliance? Or was he just chilling with a glass of Coke, waiting for me to get in touch. He probably drank stronger stuff than Coke.
“Dad, I need all the dynasts,” Clara said as we all arrived in a conference room just off the lobby.
“Clara, I know your instinct is to fight but consider the alternative,” Arthur said quietly. “I spent my life fighting wars and every time one enemy was defeated another rose up to take their place. I don’t want that for you.”
“There is no alternative,” she said pacing frantically.
“Remember what we all came together in this alliance for. To protect our kind. To keep our secret from becoming mainstream. Fighting Nick was never on the cards.”
“Because we thought he was dead,” argued Clara. “This is about protecting our people. Protecting them from the warlocks who murder us and steal our power. Nick is the worst of their kind.”
He didn’t seem that bad to me, but I opted to keep out of this discussion.
“Yes, we need to safeguard against the warlocks, but maybe trying to eliminate them is not the solution. That just endangers us more.”
“So, what would you have me do?” She asked, sounding so much like a girl asking her daddy to fix things for her.
“Invite them to the table. Work out a deal. A truce,” Arthur suggested.
“And what would that deal look like, Dad? Should I agree to peace and every month we send a sorcerer or two to be sacrificed so they can have their magic? Because you know they won’t stop taking our magic no matter what deal we make.”
“We only need to protect those in the alliance.”
“And just leave the rest to fend for themselves?” Clara said with a wry laugh. “When did you give up? When did you lose all your fight? What was it that made you so weak?” she said angrily.
To his credit Arthur did not get angry back. He closed his eyes and let her words wash over him. It was hard to tell whether he was wise and collected or just plain terrified. Either way it was obvious he would not get through to Clara. Fighting was all she seemed to be interested in.
“How can you not see that by making a deal that protects only those in the alliance it would force others to join the alliance. Once the alliance is big enough we could crush the warlock threat easily. Right now, we do not have the strength,” Arthur insisted.
“We outnumber them. You know we do.”
“Did you see what happened today? He has gargoyles. He can control lightning. That was just a taste of what they have in their arsenal I guarantee that that was not their full force. Not by a long shot.”
“We didn’t fight with our full strength either. We can call the rest of the alliance to Cedarstone. We can stand as one and fight. We have more people than they do,” Clara said testily. She was getting worked up trying to convince her dad that her strategy was the right one.
“They have Nick,” Arthur said simply and with that he crumpled into one of the clear plastic chairs at the board table. Clara looked at the defeated man with sorrow. He was only about fifty yet in that moment he looked more like eighty.
“We’ll discuss this when the dynasts are here,” Clara said sadly. “Eddie, come with me. Alone.”
Gabe looked at me to see if I was okay with it. I nodde
d that I was and then followed Clara through the door at the top of the room. She led me in silence to an elevator which carried us to the top floor. The doors slid open to a small lobby which held a few leather chairs and a reception. A young lady sat at the desk tapping away on her computer. She smiled politely at Clara as we passed and gave me only a fleeting glance. Rude. I made sure not to smile at her either. Not that I was in a particularly smiley mood anyway.
Clara’s office was not as large as I expected it to be. It was just large enough for the furniture in it, a desk at one end of the room and two sofas at the other. It also didn’t fit in with the decor of the building. There were no glass walls here, instead there was wooden panelling. The floor was carpeted in grey. The sofas were dark fabric and the coffee table a shining mahogany.
“Have a seat,” she said. Now her voice had lost its fight too and she sounded a lot like her father, tired.
I sat down on one of the sofas, but she did not sit with me. She slipped off her jacket and threw it messily over the back of the other sofa. Then she ran her hands through her glistening hair, removing the hair clips that held it together. With a shake of her head her long blonde hair fell down around her shoulders. She looked so much younger now. She was roughly the same age as me, but the way she dressed and carried herself made her seem much older. Now as she stood with head bowed, hair down, jacket off and her fingers gripping the back of the sofa tightly the stony-faced bitch was gone, and an unsure and frightened girl stood before me. Against all my usual instincts I actually wanted to comfort her.
“Drinks,” she said sharply. She strode to a nearby cabinet, pulled out two glasses and began pouring what looked like whiskey. In the past I would have stopped her and said I wasn’t much of a drinker. Things were different now. It was a habit I’d picked up. Once the drinks were poured she began to bring them over, then changed her mind and turned back to retrieve the bottle. Good call. She placed the three objects down on the coffee table as she fell down opposite me then she tucked her feet up beneath her and began gulping her drink down noisily. I picked my own glass up and sipped it, relishing in the burn as it filled my mouth and trickled down my throat. I used to hate that sensation but now… not so much.
“Nick Blackwood,” she said staring into space. She put her now empty glass down and refilled it at once. She topped mine up too, even though it was still plenty full. She gulped her entire glass down like an accomplished alcoholic. “Nickolas-fucking-Blackwood.” She looked at me and let out a humourless laugh. “Don’t worry, by the way. You’re perfectly safe here.” She twirled her finger at the walls. “All the covens are linked to their dynasts and the dynasts are linked to the building. Totally magic-proof to all outside the alliance. Even Nick can’t break through these defences. If he enters he’ll be powerless.”
I wasn’t worried, but I didn’t tell her that. It was probably better to let her think we were all in the same boat together. She’d be less likely to turn on me. Not that I thought that was likely. She was a bitch, but she wasn’t despicable.
“Have you tested that theory?” I asked her, sipping my whiskey.
Her eyes met mine and a dark look passed over them. “What did he want with you?” she asked bluntly. She usually had more tact about these things. Was it the alcohol or the fear that had changed her manner?
I considered telling her to mind her own business, that was my instinct. It wasn’t like she’d ever been particularly open with me. Seeing her the way she was made me pity her. I never thought I’d say that about Clara Winters, but I guess these are strange times. “I think he wanted to turn me against you,” I said. I kept my eyes on her so I could see how she reacted.
Her eyes narrowed. “And… did he succeed?” She looked tense all of a sudden. Ready to fight me. As if I’d be stupid enough to try and attack her here. I didn’t even have any magic in this building. That must have slipped her mind. I wondered how much the alcohol was affecting her, she was now on her third or fourth glass.
“I came with you, didn’t I?” I pointed out. “Apparently, you chucked him in the ocean to rot?” I asked. I knew that Clara was ruthless, but I never thought she’d be that cold.
“I couldn’t figure out a way to kill him so that seemed like the next best thing. I would like to say that it wasn’t just me who did that. The entire town fought together to throw him in the ocean. He’d made an enemy of everyone,” she said.
“What’s the story between you two? Why all the hate?”
She let out a long breath of air and then refilled her glass yet again. The bottle had less than half left now, and I considered taking it from her. It wasn’t really my place to moderate her drinking.
“A long time ago this town was cursed. The sorcerers were anyway. They had no magic. My dad was, still is the dynast for the Cedarstone coven. He tried everything to break the curse and when it all failed he turned to the last resort. He found Nick, who was imprisoned and under a curse of his own and released him. They made a deal. Nick would help break the curse in exchange for my dad’s help getting revenge on the person who trapped him.” She looked awkwardly into her drink, chewing on her lip. She didn’t want to tell me the next part. I sat silently and waited. “Nick upheld his end of the bargain…”
“Your dad didn’t,” I finished for her. She shook her head slowly.
“By that point he’d realised what he’d gotten involved in. He wanted to back out.” She gulped her drink down and then slammed her glass down on the coffee table. “Nick threw him off a balcony. He landed right in front of me. It was…” She looked into my eyes and silently conveyed the horror she’d witnessed on those moments. I’d experienced an incredibly similar thing not so long ago when I watched Ashley get crushed to death in a traffic accident.
“So that began your feud.”
“It did. I fell in love with a man who turned out to be one of Nick’s spies. He died. Nick murdered people all over town until we all came together to stop him. Not that it lasted. So, now he’s back. What for, Eddie? What’s his plan?” she asked, just a hint of desperation was in her tone.
I thought about what he’d said. He might be the villain in Clara’s story, but she was in someone else’s. Neither one of them looked like a hero to me, or anything resembling one. If I was totally honest though, I’d say that Nick came out looking better than Clara. She was forcing people to accept her rule. She was going after warlocks and relieving them of their magic. Nick was simply standing up to her. But then, that magic had been gained through murder. Still, why did Clara have the right to police things?
“He wanted me to join him,” I said simply. “He wants to take you down. Your whole alliance.”
“How?” This time the desperation was more than obvious.
I shrugged. “You turned up before he could tell me,” I answered. She huffed and looked away. “I’ve answered your questions. Now it’s your turn. Tell me what you want with me. The truth.”
She ran a hand through her hair and looked up at the ceiling. She was really quite beautiful. Her bitchy demeanour always hid that from me. For the first time I was seeing the human side of her. I was seeing what Dean saw.
“You are the only person in the world who can take magic from a person without killing them. I want you to help us de-magic the warlocks. Then we need only release them back into the world and nobody needs to die,” she told me.
“They’d just get more magic.”
She nodded. “We’ll put some sort of spell on them to stop them from getting more. You did it to Rachel. We can perfect that so they won’t find a loophole like she did.”
“Destroy their athames. All the magic is inside them so that would achieve the same thing. No athame, no magic, no killing. No need for me”
“They could hide them. It would be too difficult to find them. Too time consuming. You are the most efficient option.”
“Ha! I have never been called efficient before,” I said, grinning like an idiot.
“There’
s a first time for everything,” she smiled and I saw a little twinkle in her eye. I’d never seen anything like it in her before.
“But more warlocks will always be created. You can’t rid the world of them all and I don’t want to work for you forever. Hell, I don’t want to work for you at all. No offence,” I said honestly.
“None taken.” Once again, she looked away ponderously. “There is something else. Another reason I want to keep you close. The reason I first took an interest in you. The same reason I think Nick has taken an interest in you too.”
I downed the remainder of my drink and put my glass down firmly, not taking my eyes from Clara once. “Go on,” I prompted.
“I’ve always been worried that you would turn… dark. Because of your lineage,” she said.
“My lineage?” I said, confused. My family had no history of darkness. Well, my cousin was an arsehole, but I wouldn’t say he was dark. I’d been put under a dark curse by Rachel, but that was all cured now.
“What do you know about your grandparents?”
“Well,” I said, thinking. “Both sets were dead before I was old enough to remember. The magic came from my dad’s side of the family, although it skipped him, and I suppose me too…” I stopped when I saw that she was shaking her head.
“There was magic on your mother’s side. She just never knew it. When I heard about you, a warlock who could siphon magic with just a touch, I was intrigued. I looked you up and what I found disturbed me more than anything has in years.” I said nothing. I sat totally still waiting to hear what was so disturbing about me. “In 1958 your grandmother, Denise Holloway…”
“I know her name,” I said sharply. I just wanted her to get to the point. I’d never met her, but my parents had told me who she was. It was my grandfather who’d always been a mystery. Grandma had never wanted to spill the secret on that titbit. She used to tell my mum it was a drunken night and she couldn’t remember.
