by brett hicks
Francesca screamed as several watery beams pierced through her left shoulder and seared her to the bone. I didn’t have time for a victory dance, because three blades of varying sizes and shapes came at me at once.
My outstanding vision seemed to slow the motions down to a crawl and I twisted and contorted just enough for the blades to miss me. I kicked the one to my right in the knee-cap and he dropped and screamed in pain.
A freezing blade grazed my shoulder in passing and I bit back a grunt of pain. The melee seemed to only be intensifying. I parried and dodged blows and I punched and kicked between attacks and defense.
The battle was a three-way stalemate.
“Stop now or I’ll kill your little lupine bitch!”
The shrill tone of Francesca stopped me long enough for one of the goons to connect a glancing blow to my back and rend my flesh open with the burning freezing pain of the winter blade.
I yelped in pain and Francesca’s smile widened at the sound. She held a long dagger of ice to Naomi’s throat. She sneered at me with her cruel twisted faerey arrogance and self-importance.
“You’re going to let them subdue you or your little bitch is going to have a brand-new crimson smile below the twisted frown on her face.”
She purred the words and spoke like she was the master of the universe suddenly, just because she had a hostage.
I heard Naomi scream in raw pain and my heart nearly stopped beating. I thought that Francesca had made good on her threat. The world seemed to slow to a crawl around me now. I dodged a swinging blade and I spun around another attacker, pushing him into the larger opponent.
I saw Naomi clearly now and long ginger hair was pouring from every part of her body. Her bones were snapping like kindling. She screamed and then, she howled. Not a howl of pain, but a very lupine howl. I felt the yellow surge of autumn power flowing into her, infusing her every bone and her every muscle. Power and magic that had been deprived her, her entire life. I felt the moon orb dimming as Naomi drew out all the magic I had thrust into the orb.
The restraints shattered like glass around her and the massive five-five ginger wolf pounced on Francesca and her throat was torn from her neck in what would have been an imperceptible speed to anyone without my red eyes.
The moon dropped to the ground and it withered and began to fade into the light breeze of the night’s air. Off in the distance, I heard howls rend the sky. Pack song rang vibrantly through the air and hung like a noose around the necks of the three living faereys.
I kicked out at the lead guy and I slashed at the smaller goon beside him. The third one tried to get up and rush me, but the pissed off vampire had recovered and she tackled him to the ground and hugged him like the world’s largest and hungriest tick. She bit deep into his jugular and she gnawed and ripped at his neck tissue. She drank greedily and she didn’t stop until her wounds were closing and his body was completely limp and grey, having lost all the nearly luminous color and glow that is natural to our species.
“I guess I better man up here, or these two are going to make me look bad…”
I muttered to myself and I rushed in and ducked below a thrush and I rammed my knee into the leading faerey’s groin and he lost all breath. I smashed my forehead into the bridge of his nose as I came back up to my full height.
The second goon rushed and I threw my blade at him making him duck. My second blade caught the blade of the leading Moch Sidhe attacker and he grinned victoriously at me.
“Checkmate, bitch.”
I smiled wickedly and I let the second guy get a little closer before I pushed out my magic and it formed into another water blade and buried itself into his chest. His eyes were wide as saucers as he looked down in disbelief at the sword in his chest.
The blade did not stop there. He began to scream as his chest and all his flesh began to glow red and steam began to pour off him in every opening. The blade was boiling him alive from the inside.
The last one stumbled back suddenly very wary of the blade in my hand. He looked around to the bloody ruins of his friends and he began to breathe in rapid shallow bursts. His grim reality seemed to set in very quickly. He was no longer in control, he was now the prey.
“No, please…”
His frosty eyes were begging and pleading with all the desperation of a condemned man. I felt him walking over as I held the sword just in front of the young Moch Sidhe’s chest and throat.
“You have to kill him; he has seen your true eyes, daughter. You cannot leave him alive, even glamour would not be enough.”
I scowled at him and I snapped, “Excuse me if I have a bit of a hard time wanting to commit cold-blooded murder. His friend was self-defense; this would be in cold-blood. Look, he dropped his sword, he is surrendering.”
Maris scowled and huffed in frustration.
“Very well child, but this will not be easy and we might likely be forced to kill him later. None can see your eyes and live. I trust your two friends here enough to spare them that death sentence, but not this one.”
I felt the rush of yellow lupine magic and I knew who else had followed the howls to us.
Jace stared on with piercing eyes. His yellow eyes were wide with shock as he took in the ginger she-wolf prancing over to him. She proudly strutted herself like the powerful lupine she was always born to become. She was possibly more powerful than her brother. Jace hitched his breath and he murmured, “Alpha female.”
Twenty-Eight:
Jace looked at me and his eyes widened further as they connected with my glowing bright red irises. Something akin to realization shown on his face, but he went blank a split-second later.
“You can link your illusions to Casey’s power of compulsion. Cross-species links are not without side effects and risks, but if she channels your illusions, she can reshape his memories.”
Maris looked over at Jace with a new respect and also a deep weariness.
“How could a pup like you possibly know of the old ways?”
Jace shrugged casually.
“My granddad is Alpha and over a thousand years old. He is steeped in the old ways.”
“This is a grave risk to her well-being. This cur is not worth the potential risks to her sanity!”
Casey stepped forward and she gave a determined thin smile.
“I will risk the side-effects, but this bastard better end up curing cancer or something equally awesome!”
My dad stepped forward and he murmured something lowly into Casey’s ear and she turned pink. Then she bit into her own wrist and Maris cut his own open and they pressed the wounds together and they began to chant in the ancient tongue. Mists and power swirled and poured into them and surged through them. Magic permeated the world in such a thick and tangible manner that it felt like we were in the middle of the ocean.
Power built and built around us. I felt the hairs on my arms standing on end. The storm of magic surged through Maris and then into Casey. She crouched down and she held her eyes right in front of the cowering Moch Sidhe.
I saw a rush of colors of every imaginable shade and then a few I was sure faerey had invented on its own. The stream of power shot through the young Moch Sidhe’s head and spread through his body. I heard snippets of what Casey said to him. She told him that my eyes were amber and that he had not seen me conjure blades. He had only seen me wield a mysterious weapon.
He began to recite back to Casey everything she had told him verbatim.
***
A very confused and excited ginger masculine form rushed past me. His eyes locked on the baby-blue eyes of his sister in her lupine wolf form. The rest of the teens and the adult staff from the pack crowded in around her and they took turns rubbing against her fur in a gesture of greeting.
Jace had to stick with his people and I noticed his father standing off to the side taking in the grizzly scene around us.
Casey came over and hugged me and whispered into my ear, “Eyes, glamour, now!”
I pull
ed on some of the red strands of mist and wiped them over my eyes in a casual gesture and envisioned my human amber eyes. No sooner had I done this then I heard a loud authoritative feminine voice behind me.
“What in the name of all the gods have you gotten into?!”
I turned and my eyes widened at the sight of the silver-blonde football coach. Drusilla sauntered up to me and she narrowed her gaze.
“You missed practice again.”
I bit my lip and managed not to say “Sorry.”
“I know.”
“You killed no less than two of your classmates from the looks of things.”
I nodded and said, “I know that too.”
She huffed and arched her brow high into her forehead.
“Well, are you ever planning to tell me what in the name of Hades happened to you? And why exactly you found it necessary to kill these little winter brats?”
“Francesca caught me in a mushroom ring. I lost a day of time and then I rush back when I heard that she had lured my friends to the winter fields.”
“Did you kill both of these two?”
I shook my head and swallowed.
“I freed my friends and a big fight basically broke out and I stabbed one, one was mauled to death and the last was drained of blood by a vampire bite.”
“Did you have to kill the one you killed, Ms. Edwards?”
I nodded and I expelled a long breath.
“I was fighting two bigger guys with large swords. I didn’t have enough time to try for a less lethal blow. I swear it is the truth.”
Drusilla nodded and she fixed me with a firm look.
“While I do not condone such excessive violence, I will relay my honest belief in your version of events. You are young Ms. Edwards, and your words were too precise to be lies or bent truths. Go to the autumn hall and get some rest. You owe me and tomorrow I plan to collect with a vengeance, Ms. Edwards.”
I sagged in relief; I was apparently not off the girl’s football team, yet. I wasn’t sure what was going to happen next, but I was worried about my fate here. However, if I was being completely honest, the relief was hollow. I looked down at the burned up and blistered body of the boy whose name I never learned. I looked at the short life my own hand had snuffed out and I felt repulsed and sick.
I had become a killer; I was truly a monster now. My new normal was a faerey blend of normal at best, sanity optional.
Lupines pilled in and the rushing crowd of winter faereys was roaring in anger at the bloodied bodies of their kin. Baleful and vengeful looks lit the many different faces of the mixed species crowd forming.
Naomi’s wolf prowled forward and vibrating growls shook the ground and jostled my bones in my body. The cacophony that followed as other lupines began to shift and shred through clothing, stalking right behind Naomi’s wolf. She was powerful, just about Jace’s equal in every perceivable way. She was an alpha female without any doubt and the pack knew this, too. Only Jace could stop them from following her lead right now.
He didn’t seem very inclined to do that. His eyes were pools of pure murder begging for release.
Coach blew her whistle and the many wolves whined in pain. The winter faereys stopped their slow progression towards the autumn teens.
“Go back to your dorms, now!”
Drusilla bellowed in a commanding tone that sounded very similar to Jace’s father’s tone on the field. Dylan stepped ahead of the crowd and he pointed towards the dorms of winter.
“Go, whatever has happened here will be revealed to us very shortly. I promise that I shall give your full answers to what has occurred here!”
He was one of them, but he was reasonable and rational. He was the very best of his breed of Moch Sidhe. He stood with all the authority of a king at his age of fifteen. Jace moved closer to Dylan and he gestured further in the distance.
“Go home, now! I will stay and communicate with the winter prince. He will not dare to harm me and I will not harm him.”
Jace looked directly into my eyes and repeated himself.
“Go, all of you.”
Geeze, okay I get it, pal!
Twenty-Nine:
Jace stuffed Naomi in with me and Casey for the night and to my shock, I watched a third bedroom sprout from the wall. The castle seemed to add on as needed; apparently, physics was very relative and suggestive here in the faerey dimension.
Being an alpha made all the teen boys crazy in the neither-regions. Jace sat outside our door with his hands over his barrel-chest and he dared the horde of crazed lupines boys to try to go through him.
No rest for the wicked, or the fury it would seem.
For the time being, Casey and I were now sharing our dorm with the most dominant female in the pack. Naomi had been extremely shy due mostly to her status as an omega while she couldn’t shift forms.
By the time I was at my morning practice with Jace’s beta female, Roxanne—Roxy for short—Naomi was talking with a lot more confidence. She joined us for training and she wasn’t flinching and constantly shuffling on her feet. The alpha wolf inside her was asserting itself. She didn’t seem to suddenly hate her new vampire roomie though, which Casey found to be quite relieving. The pack agreed to let Casey join us in their super-secret hidey-hole. Bleeding with a pack member seemed to be a very important bonding experience for them.
While not wholly sunny to me, they had warmed up a lot. Considering that it was considered a lost magic, to force a shift. For the time being, the pack would not be looking to snap my neck it would seem. I doubted they would ever like how close I was to their alpha, but a girl has to pick her battles.
Speaking of his grouchiness, he was napping under a tree nearby in his wolf form. The huge hulking grey-white beast that was Jace was snoring loudly for all to hear. After the pack calmed down, Jace finally crashed. He had been up for two days straight, first because I was missing and then because of Naomi.
“Focus over here, faerey girl!”
I caught a glancing blow to the cheek dodging too late. I jabbed lightning fast and juked several more blows. Jace had been very perceptive in his pairings. Roxy was fast, so fast that I had to push myself to keep up with her and she had a lot more inhuman training to draw on. I was mostly making things up as I went along right now. I knew that I couldn’t keep doing that, so I was trying to take training seriously. Especially considering how everything had gone down the night before. If I had been better trained, then maybe I could have found a better way to save my hide.
This was still week-one of my faerey life and I was already dealing with death. I couldn’t help the sense of foreboding that was permeating my flesh and bones.
“You should have swept for her leg and feinted with your left at the same time.”
My father’s smooth voice cut through the practice session. Jace peeked one lazy eye open enough to make out my father and then he closed his eyes again. With the alpha’s reaction, the others re-focused on their training.
Roxy came at me and I dodged and I felt my legs being kicked out from under me. I swore and I flipped end-over-end and landed in a crouch. I then launched up with an uppercut so powerful and fast that it should have only ever existed in the realm of a fighting game.
Roxy thumped down hard on her back and she coughed. I paced over and offered her my hand. She smirked at me and I saw respect in her eyes. Lupines like violence and putting them on their ass is considered bonding, sort of like how normal girls braid each other’s hair.
“He gave you good advice, just don’t try it so soon after I heard it.”
She snorted and made a motion like she was taking notes. I rolled my eyes at her. Roxy was a born dominant wolf, so she had every bit as much sass and fire as I did. I would imagine she is what would have happened if I had been born a lupine.
We heard another thump nearby and Casey was doing a little happy dance as her sparring partner was on the ground. She was unabashed in her obnoxious behavior and I wouldn’t have her any oth
er way!
***
After training was over, my father waited for the others to leave the forest. He had a lot on his mind from the look he was giving me.
“Sweetheart, I’m sorry that I couldn’t tell you all that you wished to know and that I pretended to be cold to you at first. I thought it might help if the blood-traitor was an asshole to you.”
I walked into his arms and leaned my head against his chest. He was being a jerk this week, but he is still my only daddy. Maris raised me by himself and for some inexplicable reasons, hides all knowledge of the mother who bore me. He bears the burdens of his silence and his solitude.
“I’ll forgive you once you buy me a new faerey model smartphone.”
Maris chuckled a rich masculine sound of amusement and he stroked his hand lightly through my hair.
“I cannot tell you much, but you are beginning to resemble her in every way. She would be proud of the woman you are becoming. Troubled times are ahead of us my daughter and I have much to teach you if you ever hope to see your mother.”
I felt as if lightning infused my blood. My entire body roared with power.
“She’s alive?”
Maris nodded and said, “At least to the very best of my knowledge, but she is not free. I cannot say more and no one is to know she had you.”
“Why are you telling me this much, couldn’t it be pried from me?”
Maris laughed loudly and musically and sighed.
“My child, you replicate ancient magic and god magic, I am not afraid for the sanctity of your mind. You will repel all who try to violate your mind.”
I leaned into his chest more and snuggled up soaking up some much needed daddy-daughter time. We had barely even spoken since the morning he drug me off to this new magical world.
I snarked while we stood in the autumn woods.
“Bring it on…”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Brett studied English Lit in college. He has been writing full length manuscripts for about ten years consistently now. He lives in Richmond, VA on the East Coast. Writing is not a hobby. It is something he does as soon as he wakes up in the morning. Brett grew up an "outsider" socially. It has gifted him a unique perspective that he endeavors to capture to its fullest in his work every day.
