The mid-demon was off his meds. “Come one,” I urged, seeing Logan holding the door open for us.
I slipped past the door, my heart racing as I prepared myself mentally for what we were about to face—a full-on warzone, if it was anything like Lars’s apartment.
How do I always get mixed up in this kind of mess?
I barely noticed the dimly lit foyer as we rushed toward the basement stairs. The air smelled faintly of cigarette smoke and bleach.
Vince pulled the basement door open and put a finger to his lips. Then he pulled out a silver gun and stepped through, followed by Liam, Naomi and Logan.
The angel-borns’ tread down the concrete stairs was annoyingly silent, like cats, making me wonder if somehow they had mastered the spell of levitation.
Me, well, I didn’t excel in stealth and my boots clunked loudly on the steps, winning a glare from Vince. I gave him a “what” look, since speaking would have thrown him over the edge. I would have packed my toad slippers if I had known.
Reaching the bottom, my boots hit the ground in an echo, and heads turned my way. Even Faris gave me a look as though I was ruining his vest party.
Screw this.
I pulled off my boots, set them on the floor, and gave Vince a look. But the dark man was smiling back at me. I was a Dark witch. If I could walk around barefoot for the rest of my life, I would.
Toes wiggling, I spindled a dark curse on my lips and trudged forward, my feet silent as they pressed on the cold hard floor down a dark hallway lit only by small red emergency lights tucked high up on the walls. The air was cold and thick with a musty smell. I couldn’t sense any dark magic or any wards, but that didn’t mean there weren’t any.
We rounded a corner and Vince lifted his hand. I flinched, and as a collective, we all halted. Vince flattened himself against the wall, and my heart leaped in my throat as he vaulted around the corner. I heard the dull, heavy sound of a closed fist hitting flesh. There was a strangled cry and then the sound of something heavy being pulled like a large bag of dry dog kibble. Then nothing.
Vince reappeared and motioned with his fingers for us to follow him.
When I cleared the edge of the wall, a man lay on the ground. His eyes were closed and his wrists tied together with black tie wrap. An EAM member.
We were moving again.
We reached a light-yellow door, which I was sure, once upon a time, had been white. Vince tried the knob, turned it, and pushed the door just enough for him to peer inside. He met Logan’s eyes and nodded before pushing the door slightly further open and gesturing for Liam and Naomi to go forward.
I followed Logan and the others as we crept inside, Faris right behind me, while Vince was stationed at the door.
Faris gave me a vulpine smile, and it stirred something inside of me. Some wild, reckless, primal piece of me had always loved the danger of a job like this. An adrenaline junky? Perhaps. But I knew one day I’d get tired of this. One day I’d want a peaceful life without danger—one that wouldn’t get me killed.
I smelled the musty, moldy scent of old things long abandoned as well as a few traces of cigarette smoke and perspiration. Halogen lights hummed and buzzed from the low ceiling. The room was large and stuffed with individual blue cubicles and chairs like it had once been the operation of a telemarketing firm. In a basement like this, it had been something shady, no doubt.
Shelves and filing cabinets lined the walls. A room without windows was depressing. I could never work here. A couch and some chairs sat in a corner next to a coffee table littered with magazines and boxes of Chinese takeout. More books and boxes cramped the shelves. The cubicles were cluttered with notebooks, folders, coffee mugs, a couple of picture frames, and some dead plants.
Across from us were doors that led to another hallway.
Muffled voices came from behind one of those rooms. The tempo of the voices rose. They were arguing.
My stomach rolled, and my pulsed thrashed. I took a careful step forward, sending out my witch senses, and then the hairs on the back of my neck immediately rose.
I felt it.
A fine cloud of magic hung over the entire room. Dark energy hissed and oozed through the air, as if sheer power and magic had been extracted into an invisible haze. It was powerful. It was dark. It was ancient.
I knew what that was.
Hello, Magicae Lucis.
I smiled. The book was here.
CHAPTER 19
My heart was skipping along fast. I looked at Logan, his eyes on me as I whispered, “It’s here.”
Logan gave me a firm shake of his head. “Hurry up,” he whispered back. “Grab it and let’s go. I’ve got you covered.” He turned to face the rising voices.
I pressed my lips together. Easy for him to say. I had no idea what it looked like or where the book might be in this large space of a room, covered in a mess of papers and forgotten objects. All I knew for sure was that the book would be old, the spine probably peeling away.
My bare feet sticking to something I didn’t want to think about on the cold floor, I tiptoed forward to the nearest cubicle. My hands moved over papers, trying to see what lay hidden underneath.
“… no,” said a voice severely. “He forbids it.”
“Why do we even have to listen to him?” said another voice, and I felt myself inclining my head to hear better.
“He could kill you,” answered the same severe voice.
The other voice laughed. “He could. I’m easily replaced. Just as you. My death would be but a brief moment as I shall be resurrected.”
Not this again. Talk about crazies.
I moved over to the next cubicle and began another search.
“I will not contest the statement,” said the same other voice, a little louder and more annoyed. There was more but I couldn’t make it out.
“Inform the others,” said another voice. “I will see to acquiring an appropriate body. We must make sure the death is of maximum advantage.”
Yikes.
Liam crossed the room, his feet silent as he made his way to the other side and flattened himself on the wall right next to the hallway. A large gun hung in his hand, and it was pointed at the door.
My shoulder and neck muscles stiffened with tension. They were readying the last pieces of the spell. They were going to break the last seal.
Book. Book. Book. Where are you, you stupid book!
I whipped my head around, searching. I could feel the pulsing of magic, but I couldn’t pinpoint it.
The voices grew louder.
If they came out of that room, a war would start. And I was right in the middle of it.
“I’ll help you look on this side,” whispered Faris and he gestured toward the right side.
I gave him a nod and kept looking.
I didn’t have time to do a tracking spell, and without a tangible piece of the book itself, it wouldn’t work.
I found nothing in this cubicle apart from a clutter of paper and an old coffee mug with mold at the bottom. That was disgusting.
Moving on. I leaped to the next cubicle. Nothing.
Then the next. Again nothing.
I looked over at Faris, seeing him giving me a shrug. No luck either.
Six cubicles left. It had to be in one of them. Or it was behind that door Liam was eyeing.
Just as I pulled my gaze from the angel-born, I saw it.
Resting on the ledge of the cubicle nearest Liam was a black leather-bound book.
The leather glistened like it was brand new and had never been used. The magic inside the book kept it looking that way, most probably. Even from the distance I could make out red lettering, but couldn’t read it. It didn’t matter though. I knew the letters would spell Magicae Lucis.
I had found the book. It would all be over soon. I was going to burn it.
Smiling, with my spell ready, I pushed off my toes and made for the book.
A gun went off.
I hit the floor and r
olled under the closest cubicle. I took a breath, drew in every bit of will I could summon, and whipped my head back. The sound hadn’t come from the offices. It had come from the main entrance.
Five men in dark clothing rushed in, their faces set in determination and their lips moving in curses.
I felt a pulse of power stir in the air just as my eyes found a bald man aiming a ball of blue magic at Logan.
Raynor. What the hell was he doing?
Logan, recognizing him, started shouting at Raynor and his group of witches, his gun pointing at them.
Well, that didn’t go as planned.
The door to the office burst open, and a tide of EAM cronies came dashing out, guns blazing. They charged, one of them passing within a couple of feet of me without ever slowing down or taking note of my presence.
Bullets hit my cubicle and I flinched, flattening myself to the ground until my lips brushed the disgusting cold floor.
If I survived this, I was going to kill Raynor.
The sound of bullets and gunfire tore up the room like a thunderstorm, leaving my ears ringing. Under the assault, I could barely hear my thoughts.
Logan…
Carefully, I lifted my head and looked behind me.
Flashes of blue and yellow light rippled through the air like fireworks. Logan, meanwhile, had opened up on one of the EAM members—a woman, from the little I could see from my vantage point on the floor. The woman fired almost as quickly as Logan. She had obvious training and the discipline necessary for this kind of combat. Her bullets smacked into the wall and surrounding furniture, tearing through drywall and plaster and nearly tearing holes in the angel-born.
I caught sight of Naomi staggering to one side. Obviously, she’d been hit. She ducked under a fallen cubicle and I lost her.
Raynor tossed blue fireballs at the EAM crowd from across the room. The EAM guns barked as they shot at him. Maybe they’d do me a favor and kill him. Stupid witch.
A fireball hit one of the EAM members, plucked him out of the air, and slammed him into the ceiling. He dropped back down and fell into a senseless sprawl on the floor. The gun flew from his fingers. His eyes were wide and lifeless.
While they were all busy trying to kill themselves, I still had a job to do.
I rolled my head and spotted Faris, who’d ducked under the cubicle at my right. He saw me and gave me a finger wave.
“The book!” I shouted, pointing.
Faris shook his head and raised his hands in question. His mouth moved in what I could tell was a “what,” though I couldn’t hear him over the blasting of firepower and magic spells.
“There! Over there! The book!” I tried again.
Faris gave me a thumbs up. He looked to both sides of his cubicle, as though he was about to cross a street, and crab-crawled over to me, beaming as he plopped to the floor and flattened himself next to me with his chin resting on his hands.
Swell. This was going nowhere fast.
It was hard to hear any sound over the impact of guns and screams of pain.
“You have no idea what I just said. Do you?” I shouted to him.
“What?” he asked again. “I can’t hear you?”
Clearly. I took a deep breath and tried again. “The. Book.” I enunciated slowly. I waited to see the words sinking in this time.
“The book. Gotcha,” said the mid-demon, though it was more like reading lips at this point.
I moved my hand and pointed to the cubicle two rows ahead of us. “The book,” I repeated. “There. It’s there.”
Faris smiled. “The book,” he repeated.
Oh boy. “Watch my back,” I told him, not sure he’d understand, but I didn’t have time to play a game of charades.
“Okay,” answered Faris, glad we were finally making some progress.
Right. Adrenaline surged and I shoved myself to my hands and knees, readying to leap to the next row of cubicles. Faris did the same next to me.
I gritted my teeth until they creaked, took a deep breath, and vaulted forward.
My knees slipped on the floor as I crashed headfirst into the lower panel wall of the cubicle. Ow. I needed to work on my landings.
I pulled myself around as something smashed into my back, and I pitched forward again. Strong hands grabbed me and pulled me to my knees.
I blinked into the face of the mid-demon. “I told you to watch my back. Not break it!”
“I miscalculated the distance and my leaping skills,” said the mid-demon. “I got a little carried away.”
I crawled forward. Carefully, I pulled myself up and looked over the cubicle’s modular wall. Dust clouded my vision, but when it cleared, I saw it.
The Magicae Lucis lay at the exact same place, begging for me to grab it.
Okay then.
About twenty feet separated me from the book. My heart raced.
You’re mine, book.
Something flashed by me, and then a male witch appeared, bounding over chairs and overturned cubicles. His hands were extended with magic dripping from them.
Blood flew from his leg when the first bullet hit. He faltered, staggering. Shots rang and then blood gushed from his chest. His legs went out from under him and he crashed into an empty chair. The witch’s upper body was a mass of blood and shredded flesh, his expression shocked as he rolled off the chair slowly and crumpled to the ground.
I pulled my eyes away as the last of the light faded from his eyes. I felt sorry for him, but far more witches would die if I didn’t get my hands on that book.
Dust and debris fell around me like snow. The halogen light bulbs exploded with sharp little detonations and showers of powdered glass. I aimed for the next cubicle and shot forward, Faris following quickly behind me.
Ten feet. Almost there.
Yellow light exploded around me, flooding my vision. I made to move, but Faris tackled me to the ground, just as a blast of wind nearly knocked me over. Curls of steam came up from where a spell had hit the cold concrete. Puffs of yellow smoke began to froth. Crap. That could have been me.
When the light subsided, I realized the shooting had stopped. My ears rang, but I could hear voices. Logan. He was shouting orders to stand down. I stood up slowly, using the cubicle as a shield.
As my eyes adjusted to the light, I noticed two things: First, the EAM members were on the ground, dead. And second, the Magicae Lucis was gone.
CHAPTER 20
“You bald idiot!” I howled, my temper flaring so much I couldn’t even see straight. “What the hell were you thinking? We had them. We had everything under control.”
“That’s not how it looked to me,” replied the big witch with his arms crossed over his chest. I was surprised he could reach with all that muscle. The four remaining witches stood behind him like a wall of equally large muscle. Where the hell did he find witches who looked like him? The witch gym?
A feral snarl escaped me, and I rushed to stand in his face as I lifted myself on the tip of my toes. “I had the book. I just had to reach out and grab it. I’ve lost it because of you.”
Raynor’s jaw tightened. “I don’t know what book you’re talking about.”
That’s it. I pushed him hard in the chest and he stumbled back, surprised. “You stupid, stupid, witch.”
Raynor’s face creased in pure fury, blue magic dancing about his fingers. “You shouldn’t have done that.”
“What are you going to do about it?” I tapped into my rings, golden magic twirling around my fingers. Right back at you.
Raynor clenched his jaw, and I glared back at him. I’d never pulled my magic on him before, but right now he was asking for it.
The brute witch let out a rueful laugh. “I don’t take pleasure killing little girl witches,” he said, and his minions chuckled behind him. “But you’re making it real tempting.”
I took a step toward him, my anger, fear, and exasperation all mixed in together in a toxic combination. I was losing it.
“Little girl
witch, eh?” I nearly snarled. “Well, how about I start with frying your balls… because… let’s face it… they’re really ugly. And if you don’t use them to procreate… what’s the point?”
Faris laughed. “Touché. I need a drink.” The mid-demon turned on the spot, throwing his gaze around the room as though he thought he could find a bottle of something delectable hidden in this mess.
I felt hands on my arms. “Take it easy, Sam,” said Logan, and I let myself relax a little at the worry in his tone as he pulled me back slowly. I noticed they’d covered the dead witch’s face with someone’s jacket.
I’d been so close. If only I could have moved to grab it a few seconds before, none of this would have happened.
“It’s all his fault,” I told Logan, my body trembling with pent-up adrenaline and rage. “I could have destroyed it by now. He’s screwed us all. Now we’ll never get a second chance.”
“You screwed yourselves,” said Raynor, that supercilious look about him again. “You’re not even on this case. I should have you arrested.”
Faris laughed again. “You really don’t know when to shut up.” Raynor glowered at the mid-demon. “I’m just saying.”
Logan stepped into my line of sight. “What’s he talking about? Are you not on this case anymore?”
Great. More humiliation. “No.” No point in lying. “I’m not.”
“See?” laughed Raynor, his familiar Malark screeching in laughter. Before the night was over, I was going to squish that bug and feed it to Poe.
Logan leaned closer. “What happened?”
“It’s not important.” The Dark Witch Court and I had finally gotten a divorce, and somehow I knew it was the best thing for both of us. No point in trying to force something that was never meant to be.
“Face it, Samantha,” said Raynor as he wiped some debris from his leather jacket. “You don’t have what it takes. Be a good little witch and go stir your cauldron. Leave the cases to the real witches.”
He laughed. The witches all laughed at me, all of them together, casual and offensive. They didn’t seem to care one of their own had just died and was still sprawled on the floor.
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