Magic In My Soul

by Kellie Sheridan

  "Dude," Taya said, exasperated. "We talked about this." She turned, looking at me. "He showed up at my apartment this afternoon, thinking you still lived there."

  Instinctively, I took a step back. Out loud, I didn't bother to point out that maybe the best move after that wouldn't have been to bring the guy to my flat, but my expression must have conveyed the words for me.

  "He was looking for help. I managed a truth spell before I brought him over. And," she added, "made him promise to wait until the end of the night to try and speak with you. He doesn't get to stalk his way to the top of the list."

  I relaxed a little, but not much.

  "I mean you absolutely no harm," Simon said, withdrawing his hand and passing Taya the box he'd been holding. "And I am quite content to wait right here until you finish your business for the evening. But I do need to speak with you." As Simon continued to speak, it was impossible to miss the accent hidden beneath his words. Greek maybe? I didn't know for sure, and I didn't want to ask right now.

  For all the headaches that came with it, I'd been looking forward to our first, somewhat unconventional, faction meeting. The plan had been to sit around, play some board games, and just... talk things out. Where we were, where we were going, and all the upcoming headaches we had to look forward to.

  "Are you dying?" I asked, tilting my head a little as I did my best to take in everything about Simon that I could. "Like right now, dying. Because if you're dying, and I wait until the end of the night to see if I can help you, I'm going to feel like a jackass."

  "No, but—"

  "Then come on in. You're welcome to hang out with us tonight, and then we can figure everything else out after."

  I opened the door, stepping aside to let both Taya and Simon inside. Simon entered first, casting me one last pleading look before introducing himself to Tilly.

  "You have everything?" I asked, eyeballing the package that Taya was now holding.

  "Yup! Settlers, Ticket to Ride, Pandemic. And all the unopened bags of chips I had. I ran out of time to order the pizza, but Colin said he'd grab them on his way over."

  "Sounds good," I said, closing the door behind me. "Sorry about the mess everyone. I'd probably have found a bit more time to get organized if I'd realized this would be a whole thing." Somehow, mercifully, I managed to keep even a single note of resentment out of my voice. "But please, make yourselves comfortable." I skipped saying that my home was their home, but I was beginning to suspect having unexpected people in my apartment would be a pretty regular part of being a faction leader.

  After asking everyone what I could get them to drink—wine was nearly unanimously agreed on—I gave myself a second to disappear into my flat’s tiny kitchen to get my head on straight. Yeah, this felt like a wine night. Most nights did lately.

  Before I grabbed the bottle of red I'd planned to open tonight, I picked up my phone and started a text message. There was another kind of pick me up that felt like it could work wonders in that moment.

  Melanie: Leading a faction... Totally gets easier after the first few days, right? (please lie to me)

  I let out a happy sigh of relief when the answer came right away. I tried to imagine what Ethan might be, what he might be doing. I didn’t know much about what his real life looked like, but it was easy to picture him in a big plush chair, plaid maybe. Nothing remotely stylish. But still totally Ethan.

  Ethan: Yes. Absolutely. After things settle down, it's all just cocktail parties and movie nights. Lots of days off, and the pay is great.

  I laughed out loud, the noise covered by the sound of someone else coming in through the front door.

  Ethan: Everything okay?

  Melanie: I think so. Just turning into a busy night.

  Ethan was the alpha of Ireland's only werewolf pack and had returned to his home city of Dublin only two nights ago after having been pulled into all sorts of insanity during his recent trip to my city.

  Ethan: How's Cooper?

  Melanie: Haven't seen him yet. He might be here now, but I'm currently hiding in my kitchen thanks to a couple of unexpected additions. I should probably go be a good host now.

  Ethan: Sounds good. But take care of yourself. And let me know if you need anything.

  Melanie: Will do.

  I almost threw in a smiling emoji at the end but backed out at the last second. The secret smile I was currently wearing would have to be enough. Ethan and his pack had been the best allies I'd had the week before, and he'd already gone above and beyond to have my back, including supporting the creation of the first ever Lesser Magicks faction. Now, I needed to figure out how to do all of this on my own, leaving him to go back to his own life.

  It helped that he'd left one of his wolves behind in Galway. Cooper had quickly become a friend, and thanks to a work-from-home job and a place to stay in the city, he'd been the wolf voluntold to stay behind to keep an eye on the situation until the upcoming summit.

  Between Cooper and Colin, who was here as an emissary from Dublin's vampire seethe, most of my first faction meeting was actually going to be between a bunch of people who weren't actually part of our group. But at this point, having a little bit of actual faction experience certainly wouldn’t hurt things.

  I hoped.

  Yeah, at this point I was basically running on hope. But it was soon to be hope and wine, so that was a step in the right direction.

  A couple of glasses in one hand and a bottle in the other, I forced myself back out to the living room. I didn't have a new table yet—at the old flat we'd used one that Taya's parents had given us—but everyone seemed to be making do anyway.

  Both Cooper and Taya were sitting on the floor, sorting through the box of board games between them, while Tilly had stayed on the couch. She was in the process of peppering Simon with questions. He'd taken over my chair and didn't seem all that enthusiastic about her line of questioning, glancing down at his phone every few seconds.

  I set the wine down on the coffee table right as Colin came through the door, not bothering to knock. Since he had three boxes of pizza in his arms, I was happy to forgive him. Right behind him was Tom once my kidnapper and now in the process of officially moving to Galway as a member of our faction.

  Not having made any specific plans for the night's activities, I was happy to settle on the floor beside Cooper and dig into the pizza, hoping everyone would get comfortable enough to start getting to know each other. As we moved from the first glass of wine to the second, almost everyone seemed to get more relaxed.

  Everyone but Simon, who remained stiffly in his chair, only ever getting up once to use the washroom and never touching the wine. And, as he was the least familiar to me, I kept finding myself watching him whenever I didn't think he'd be looking. He didn't make me nervous, per se, just wary. I'd already had enough surprises to last a lifetime, and whatever he wanted to talk about probably wasn't about what a great job he thought I was doing.

  I suspected he was looking for something similar to what Tilly had requested, an invitation in. I couldn’t tell by looking at him exactly what kind of magic he had, but I'd know soon enough. Still, I knew I'd feel a little better if I could just get him talking, maybe try to suss out what kind of person I was dealing with, if nothing else.

  "Okay," I said, pouring the last of the second bottle into Tom's glass. "Tonight has gone a little off the rails, but I promised board games, so board games we will play!" Taya and I had hosted many a board game night with human friends back when we'd lived together and that had never failed to break the ice. Maybe playing a game wouldn't get Simon out of his shell, but it might help begin the meeting and get us onto the chosen topic of the evening.

  "Where exactly?" Taya said from her spot on the floor, her legs splayed out in front of her as she wiggled her toes. "Your only table is tiny."

  "What, the floor is too good for you now?" I asked, teasing.

  That was all the convincing it took, and before long Taya was happily setting up her
game of choice in a circle between those of us who had already taken up spots on the ground as I tried to find the best way to broach our current standing with the supernatural community and what we could do to better our position.

  By the time she was ready, only Simon had remained seated in an actual chair as he watched the rest of us with obvious unease.

  "Come on." I waved him over, signaling toward an empty spot beside me.

  The man refused to move, his lips pressing tightly together as though desperately trying to hold something in. Or to find the strength to let it out.

  "Could we maybe just speak for..."

  "Hey," Taya said, a giggle in her voice. Getting a bit of a buzz off of just two glasses of wine had never been a problem for her. "You promised me."

  "It's only that," Simon paused, looking around the room before checking his phone and then standing. "It's important that we speak before..."

  Okay, that sounded ominous. "Sure," I said with a sympathetic nod. "Not a problem. Let's just go out in the hall for a second."

  Maybe we'd all be able to move on with our night if Simon could simply get whatever this was off his plate.

  Simon's shoulder visibly sagged with relief as I stood up. "Thank you." I saw his lips move, but I never heard the words come from his mouth. As my eyes followed his lips, my body reacted to the sound of a deafening crash behind me.

  As Simon jumped, I whirled around, bracing for an attack like the one I'd experienced in my last flat. But there was no one behind.

  I was still trying to figure out what had happened when in the corner of my eye, I caught sight of Simon sprinting past me, headed right for my kitchen.

  He made it to the secluded corner room moments before I did, everyone else right behind me. He was already crouched down on the tile floor, a woman's bloodied body cradled in his arms.

  Chapter 3

  “Umm...” It was the only sound I managed to make as my eyes searched the kitchen for some clue to what the fuck was going on. Everyone behind me looked about as confused as I felt. Simon, on the other hand, was focused solely on rousing the curly-haired woman.

  I wanted to know who she was, what had happened? And... how had she gotten into my kitchen? But the first order of business was making sure she was okay. So, at a loss for anything else to do, I knelt down to the floor to see if I could help.

  I leaned forward, reaching out to press my fingers to the side of the woman’s throat. A steady rhythm surged beneath her skin. She had a pulse! It was a good start. But there was still so much blood, too much blood, enough that it had started pooling on the floor and soaking into the knees of my jeans.

  “What happened to her?” I asked. My voice sounded like sandpaper, scratching through my lips. I coughed once, clearing my throat and hoping that when I spoke again, I’d sound like someone who might actually be helpful in a crisis.

  “I’m not sure.” Simon word’s came out with raspy breaths. He was holding onto the woman for dear life as I frantically searched to identify the source of her bleeding.

  “Okay. How did she get here?”

  Simon said something, too quietly for me to hear. By then, tears were free flowing down his face.

  “What?” I asked, harsher this time, my patience finally running thin. Regardless of this woman’s arrival, she was unconscious and dying in my kitchen, and the one guy who appeared to know anything at all was useless.

  “My sister...”

  “She’s your sister?” Cooper asked as he crossed behind us to the other side of the body. No, not a body, not yet. The woman.

  “My sister’s wife.” Finally, something coherent from Simon. “My sister can teleport. She and her family were planning to run… when I gave them notice it was safe. They were all supposed to be here together, but I’m not sure what happened. We were supposed to have more time.” Simon’s hands shook as he spoke but his grip never faltered.

  “Okay, bud,” Cooper continued, “I need you to ease up. Lay her down flat on the floor here. It looks like she has a few small cuts, but it seems like most of the blood is coming from her back. I want to get her up on her side; we’ll see what we’re dealing with and hopefully be able to apply enough pressure to stop the bleeding.”

  To my surprise, Simon did as he was asked. I gawked at Cooper. “Do you know what you’re doing?” I asked, trying and failing to whisper to him.

  Cooper only shrugged, intent on his work.

  “What do you need?” I tried again, remembering this wasn’t the best time to pepper anyone with questions. Hopefully, Cooper would give me something I could actually help with. I was pretty sure I owned a first aid kit but it, a half-empty box of bandaids, and some clean rags were all still in boxes. Somewhere.

  Instead of answering, Cooper continued his examination of the wounds. He hissed in surprise as he pulled up the back of the woman’s bloody shirt. I winced. That had to be a bad sign.

  Right away, he pulled his t-shirt off over his head, revealing a white undershirt. He bunched the fabric up and pressed it against the woman’s back before rolling her back up to face the ceiling so that her body weight would create some pressure to hopefully slow the bleeding. “We need to call an ambulance.”

  “Already called one,” Tom said, an edge of panic in his voice. “They should be here in a minute.”

  I forced myself to take a long breath, trying to stay calm. “Good. Good, this is good. Coop, you’ve got things here?” While this woman, whoever she was, was in the most immediate need of help, she wasn’t my only priority. What kind of trouble had just landed in my flat?

  The werewolf across from me nodded, not taking his eyes off his patient.

  “Good,” I said again. “Then that will give me and Simon a chance to chat.”

  Simon shook his head vehemently. “I’m not leaving her.”

  “You brought this into my home.” My brand-new home. “And I assume you’ll want to go with her in the ambulance. So before that can happen, you’re going to need to get me up to speed... real fast.” I resisted the impulse to clap my hands together a few times the same way my mother always did when she was getting impatient.

  "Go," Cooper said, his gaze darkening as he looked up at us. "I'll watch out for her."

  I'd have given anything in that moment to know what my friend was thinking. We hadn't known each other long, but I had to hope that he didn't see the situation as being imminently dangerous, or else he likely would have spoken up. But I needed answers, and the best way to get them would be without an audience.

  "Taya, are you good to help Cooper?" I asked, locking eyes for a second with my ex-roommate. She'd never been particularly fantastic when it came to handling blood, but we needed the backup.

  With a nod, Taya took my place kneeling on the floor beside the new arrival, leaving me free to lead Simon out to the hall.

  As he slowly shut the front door behind him, I took a moment to study Simon's face. Beads of sweat had pooled at his temples, practically plastering dark hair to his forehead and stubbled chin.

  Assuming everything I'd heard so far had been the truth, this guy was probably several times more stressed than I was I tried to consider that as I approached my next words.

  "Okay, Simon." My words came out slowly, cautiously. "I need some information so we can sort this out. What is going on here?"

  Who is the woman in my kitchen? What the hell happened to her? Why on Earth did you think it was a good idea to come to me?

  I kept the rest of my questions to myself, doing my best to be patient. But, as Simon seemed to struggle to find words, I considered that perhaps a small nudge might move things along. I, too, had a history of freezing while feeling cornered, though I was working on getting better.

  "Let's go from the very beginning, okay? Can you tell me who you are?"

  Simon nodded, the tension in his expression relaxing just a little. "My name is Simon Alexopoulos. My family and I are from the island of Mykonos, in Greece. We, that is, my sister and I
were born with the ability to transport ourselves at will. Lesser Magicks," he clarified.

  Well, that explained the pale-yellow haze I saw floating around him to represent his magick, unlike anything I’d seen before. When it came to the lesser magicks, I hadn’t seen enough to discern much of a pattern. Some abilities, if similar, might manifest as similar hues, but not always. The yellow I saw around Simon was unlike anything I’d ever experienced.

  "For years now, we have been in the service of the Master vampire of Ioannina, while living our lives out of the way of the factions whenever possible." After pausing to take a long breath, Simon continued. "My sister, Leda, met her wife. Iezabel, the woman who was brought here today. A human."

  Uh-oh. I’d only just learned, the week before, of the rules governing relationships between lesser magicks and those without any magick. While there was no universal law, it seemed many of those in power insisted on the strictest level of secrecy. I wanted to believe that the law existed to protect our society from discovery, to keep us safe, but the more I saw, the more I suspected that, above all else, the laws which applied to those with lesser magicks but not the factions were but a means of control.

  "Iezabel is, or was, our mail carrier. Leda has always loved to walk; she says it is when she does her best thinking. Leda and Ieza became friends over the course of a year because my sister was almost always outside, walking around our neighborhood as she tried to work through some of the struggles she'd been facing. As she tells it, it was once she fell in love with Ieza that things began to fall into place. They were never married, but after that first year, they were never apart either."

  By that point in the story, Simon's eyes had taken on a faraway glaze. He was looking at me, but it was clear that his mind was somewhere else entirely.

  "Their daughter, Kassie, was born six years ago. They lived in a small house only a few streets from the ocean. Once our parents died, I moved to the next town over, wanting to be closer to all of them. And for years, it was quiet. It was peaceful. Ieza was aware of Leda's talents, and understood why she was sometimes called away, like I was. But what we could do never truly affected our lives. Yes, my sister and I can go anywhere in the world in an instant, even bringing others with us, but there was nowhere we wanted to be more than home. By keeping Ieza and Kassie away from Nadir and the rest of his seethe, we thought we were keeping them safe. We thought they were a secret."