The Cardkeeper Chronicles: Books 1-5 (Complete Collection)

by A. C. Nicholls

  Jason cut me off right then, scooping me into his arms. He leaned in to kiss me, the strong aromatic blend of dog hair and Hugo Boss confusing my senses. I suddenly felt as though I had one over on the receptionist of Hale’s Hotel.

  Taken by the shock of it all, I kissed him back, exploring his mouth with my tongue as he raked his fingers through my hair. Shivers pulsed through me like electric shocks, kick-starting my heart. It felt like this was all a dream somehow, and I would wake from it at any minute… but I didn’t want to.

  Jason pulled away, and I opened my eyes to see him looking sad. His hands slid down to my hips, holding me close to his muscled body. “I’m sorry. That was inappropriate.”

  “No, I–”

  “I like you, Keira. I’ve liked you since the moment you first shot fire into my face. But I can’t act on it. For a werewolf to have relations with a mage, special exceptions would have to be made. Otherwise it could mean my death.”

  I stepped back, breaking his grip. “Then why come back here?”

  “Because I couldn’t keep it to myself any longer.” Sighing, he went back to the top of the stairs, looking back at me. Anger coursed through my veins. But so did regret, because I understood why he’d had to do it. I couldn’t forgive him, but giving him a hard time about it wouldn’t stop the uncomfortable emotions. “I just thought that you should know.”

  Standing in stunned silence, I watched him rush down the stairs. The door slammed on the ground floor, and just like that, we were apart again. I found myself wondering just how long it would be until I saw him again – if I would see him again. It would take a miracle and a lot of strong magic to get through Victor Kronin, and I had no idea if there was a way around the werewolves’ rule.

  As tears pricked the back of my eyes, I turned to go back inside.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  By the time the sun had risen to sweep bright pink across the sky, I stood on the graveled driveway to Jack Hughes’ place. The house, a tattered little bungalow, looked like it had been forgotten in time. Abandoned. The windows were sealed shut with sheets of wood. Graffiti colored the faded white walls of the exterior, and trash littered the small, grass-barren lawn.

  Link, who had only agreed to come with his usual amount of reluctance, poked his head out the flap of my purse, sniffing at the air as he waved a hand around in front of his tiny nose. “Are you sure this is the right place?”

  “Positive.”

  “Then, perhaps, take a look inside?”

  Squatters might be living in the ramshackle place, but I still had to check. At least I had my magicard to protect me, and my immortal strength could best any human.

  I scanned the area, making sure no one watched me and grasped the doorknob, letting the heat exchange into it. When the brass melted and oozed into smoking oil, there was a clanging sound and the door loosened. I was beginning to get the hang of this power – the distance I had taken from the magicard had helped ease me into it. I couldn’t be certain, but I might have passed the point where the soul’s influence could harm me.

  Link dropped back into my purse, steering clear of potential danger while I walked inside and closed the door behind me. The front door opened into one small and dark living room, with little furniture or possessions, and only a mountain of unopened mail by my feet. I pulled the door open again, letting a little light into the otherwise blacked-out room.

  “I think it’s safe,” I told Link, venturing deeper into the room.

  By the looks of things, no one had been here in weeks. Usually a sleeping bag or cardboard bed would be a telltale sign of recent squatters, but there wasn’t a single thing in sight. With the exception of a torn and battered armchair, that was.

  “This doesn’t make any sense,” Link said, climbing onto my leg and sliding down it like a fireman’s pole. “This Jack Hughes, he has money?”

  I nodded my head. “He had the money to book out the banquet room for a murder spree. The bank seems to recognize the address, too.” I rubbed my eyes with the heels of my hands, attempting to gain a fresh perspective. “Something is missing.”

  “You’re right.”

  Frozen in thought, I watched Link traipse across the room, checking out the little details such as the power socket dangling from one rusty screw, and a crinkled Wendy’s burger wrapper. When he put his hands on his hips and huffed, he looked as lost as I felt.

  Desperate for answers, I tried the door on the far wall. It hung open on one hinge, leaning into a kitchen that was too small to be of use to anyone. The counter-tops were pasted with spoiled food, where flies and rats made themselves at home. “Gross.”

  “What’s that?”

  “This place is…” It hit me so suddenly that I no longer cared about my surroundings. It was a wonder I hadn’t noticed it until now, but now that I had, I couldn’t shake it off. It was burned into my senses, just like the bad smell had been until this moment.

  “… Is what?” Link asked, shaking his head.

  I looked back onto the living room, sniffing at the air. Something hung suspended in the dank air – something magic. But it wasn’t your usual shape-shifting or blast of fire. No, this was something different. Something functional. Like a wall had been put up, and I could only pass through it if I knew what to look for.

  My hands came out in front of me, and I felt around the air like a mime. The hunch became stronger as I stepped forward, closer, until my palms met with a tickling sensation that felt like pins and needles against my skin. “It’s a veil.”

  Link frowned, wrinkles folding up his forehead. “A what?”

  Curiosity got the better of me, and I took another step. My skin became cooler, as if I’d walked into a giant refrigerator. My face was next, the cold air touching my nose, and then my cheeks as I walked through the veil and stepped into an alternate version of the bungalow, leaving Link and the rats behind me.

  “Holy cow.”

  It was as if the neighbor’s house has been lifted and deposited on the Hughes lot. A healthy yellow glow lit the room and a burning fireplace warmed my legs as I passed it. There was a bookcase with every shelf filled to the ends, a liquor cabinet with a range of vintage wines. I examined the desk, where page after page of written incantations had been scribbled out with a quill and ink.

  Behind me, a thin, circular sheet of air balanced in the middle of the room. If I looked through it, I could see the previous place where Link stood on the other side, looking around for me as though I had vanished into thin air, but looking around reflected the exact opposite. It was like Hughes had bought a terrible home at a cheap rate, and then decorated within another realm, so as to avoid being disturbed.

  How clever.

  But even clever people couldn’t hide forever. Jack Hughes had helped orchestrate a massacre by gathering the vampires in one place, and I was inside his vacant home. I had to reveal his identity and how his piece fit into the puzzle. I hunted high and low, rifling through his every possession until I found… well, nothing.

  Until I found it.

  I lifted the photograph from the drawer and felt my blood boiling as I stared at the man. I felt dizzy, like when you get off a fast ride. I knew the man in the picture. Stunned, I stared at the sly, sleaze ball of a man, all decked out in his fishing gear and holding a bass.

  That son of a bitch.

  I knew him. In fact, I had known him for years, only by another name. Jack Hughes was a damn alias. A name he had used when dealing with mortals and trying to blend in. It worked, too – even I had let it slip my mind until now.

  Before I could be caught trespassing, I hurried back through the veil, returning to the cesspool of a room. The humid air suffocated me as I leaned into the wall for balance.

  “Whoa.” Link looked up at me, awed and amazed. “That was bloody amazing! You were here one moment, and gone the next. What happened?”

  I struggled to catch my breath, hit by the sudden shock of what I had found. My fingers loosened and the p
hotograph fell to the floor, gliding from side to side like a falling feather. As it landed by my feet and Link gazed down at it, I found just enough wind inside me to say it aloud – if only to make myself believe it.

  “It’s Jasper,” I said, my legs giving way beneath my weight. “Jack Hughes is Jasper Jones, and he’s working with Victor.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Jasper Jones. If I’d had to bet that somebody I knew was working with Victor Kronin, never in a million years would I have suspected it was Jasper Goddamn Jones. I mean, the guy was a sleaze – there was no denying that – but a traitor? The shocking revelation hit me right between the eyes.

  Dalton and the Elders had even told me that they’d questioned him. The truth spell they’d cast on him was one hundred per cent effective, and they claimed to have asked the right questions. But knowing Jasper, he had given only the loosest answers possible, worming his way out of even having to lie. The only question that remained was how had he managed to steal the Chaos card so easily.

  I had to tell the Elders.

  When I returned to the VHS store, I had no idea what to expect. Did Jasper know that I was on to him? Was Victor Kronin standing beside him, just waiting for me to appear so he could destroy me in the blink of an eye? There was only one way to find these answers, and that was by heading inside… and I’d use my magicard to do it.

  A bell rang as I shoved open the door. Jasper’s back was to me as he worked from across the room, shifting boxes. I cleared my throat just loud enough for him to hear, and watched him turn quickly. It was like catching a dog eating from the trash; his head snapped around and his eyes widened as he pushed himself up off the floor.

  “Keira. I was, uh…”

  I looked down my nose at him. I couldn’t help it. He’d never been ‘my kind of person’ but to learn that he was a traitor – that he’d retrieved the Chaos card for Victor – I just couldn’t forgive him, no matter what. Not that I could voice it right now. I had to pretend I knew nothing if I were to get the messages to Dalton and the Elders.

  “I really don’t care what you were doing,” I said, and watched his glassy eyes glaze over. I helped Link crawl up and rest on my shoulder. “I need you to get me in there. Could you create a portal for me?”

  Jasper shook his head. “Not right now.”

  Not right now? “Why not?”

  “The Elders are all busy.” Jasper walked around the counter, picked his duffel bag off the dusty chair and slung it over his shoulder. “You actually caught me just as I was leaving. It’s bad timing, I know, but maybe come back tomorrow.”

  Something was wrong. I could feel it in my bones like the bite of a winter wind. Before he could get past me, I reached out and clasped his arm with a tight grip. It stopped him short. “What are you up to?”

  Jasper pulled away, avoiding eye contact and heading toward the door with an increasing pace. Whatever he was up to, he was about to get away with it.

  I couldn’t let that happen.

  “Link,” I snapped, letting him fall onto my hand. I threw him weightlessly toward the door. He overtook Jasper, leaning all of his petite body into the front door, his stubborn expression speaking volumes. Link weighed next to nothing, but had more strength than a regular-sized mortal. Satisfied, I turned my attention to Jasper. “You’re not going anywhere.”

  Jasper glanced back at me, dumping his bag onto the floor and attempting to scurry past me, but unlike other rodents, this one wasn’t so fast. I seized his arm, twisted it behind his back, and slammed his face into the counter, pinning him there. “I know what you’ve done, traitor. Tell me, what did Victor promise you? Loads of cash? A share of the power?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said, whimpering.

  “You stole the Chaos card for Victor, didn’t you?”

  “No,” he said, the faintest hint of a smile creeping into the corners of his mouth.

  I let the heat feed through my skin, creating smoke in his wrist. I heard it sizzle, and I snaked his arm further up his back. A little extra pain always got them talking. “I’m not messing around. Tell me why you did it.”

  “Okay, okay!” Jasper said as he contorted, twisting into the least painful position he could manage. When I let him go, he sank to the floor with his back to the counter, nursing his singed wrist. “He said he would give me some of his power, all right?”

  “What power?”

  “The… you know, the power. From one of his magicards.”

  Link moved away from the door, hopped up to the counter, and sat above Jasper with his legs hanging over the edge. He looked at me with terror in his eyes. Words weren’t always necessary when it came to Link – I knew he feared for both our lives.

  “Victor has more than one magicard?” I asked, looking back down at Jasper.

  “Well, y-yes. But he learned the magic. These past few years, he’s been killing off mages, stealing spells from them. He said he wanted to grow stronger, to be able to handle more power so he could control the Chaos card.”

  It was a lot of power. The Chaos card wasn’t exactly renowned for offering the most pleasant soul to its host, either. Victor must have been using multiple sources of magic to help adjust to the weight of Chaos. No wonder his personality had been toyed with; too much magic was playing with his mind. “How did you get it to him?”

  “The card?”

  “Yes, the card.”

  “I’m not telling you that.” Jasper laughed, but it was cold and shaky.

  I didn’t use my words this time. My hand exploded into a ball of light, sizzling and burning away, sucking oxygen from the air. I increased the heat and pushed it toward Jasper’s face, watching sweat trickle around the whites of his eyes. “How?”

  “He taught me a spell!” Jasper screamed.

  I simmered the flame, withdrawing slightly, and listened.

  “I have an invisibility card. With that, I easily sneaked into the Dark Room.”

  It pissed me off to hear a man speak so easily of his sins. How could anyone do such a thing and not be too ashamed to admit it? I knew that people were different – that every mind had its own intricate workings – but I couldn’t imagine stabbing anyone in the back like that. “You do realize that you’ve put the world in danger?”

  Jasper looked up at me, eyebrows raised. “What? No, he just wants power.”

  “And what do you think he intends to do with that power, jackass?” Just as I said it, I recalled what Edgar George had said back at the nightclub. “What about the demon?”

  “Huh?”

  “I know he’s planning on summoning a demon. What do you know about it?”

  Jasper turned his head. “Nothing.

  “Jasper,” I said, shaking my palm in his face.

  “I don’t know, okay? Just something about bringing down the Temple of R’hen, and not being able to do it alone.”

  Link’s eyes were on me. I knew I had to act tough, that I was his role model right now. I kept my focus on Jasper. “So… what? He’s going to use a demon to help him fight the Keepers?”

  “Maybe.”

  “He’s insane, and you’re a moron for thinking you’ll live through it all.” I extinguished the fire in my hand, and looked to the back of the shop, where the red curtain hung. “I need that portal, and I need it now. The Elders will decide what’s to be done with you.”

  I let go of Jasper’s arm, watching him grab his hands as he burst into a fit of hysteria.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “I-I don’t think they will,” he said.

  My eyes went to Link, who listened with rapt attention. When I looked back down at Asshole of the Hour, I felt nothing but worry; cold, unbridled worry. “What the hell are you talking about? Why won’t they?”

  But Jasper just kept on laughing.

  I wanted to put him in a straight jacket. No. I wanted to punch him so hard NASA would see his body orbiting the moon. I grabbed him by the collar and haule
d him to his feet, dragging him through the curtain before he could find his balance. I tossed him onto the ground and heard the most satisfying thud. The laughing had ceased, but the paranoia it had raised remained at its loudest. “Open the portal.”

  “No,” he said, curled up into a ball.

  “Open the portal. I won’t ask again.”

  Those dark, serious eyes narrowed on mine. “No.”

  I sparked up my hands – both of them – for only a second, with every intention of burning a hole right through him. If he wasn’t going to help me now, he could damn well suffer the consequences of his actions.

  “Okay!” he yelled, hiding behind his outstretched hands. “Okay.”

  Jasper climbed to his knees, spinning his hands to weave a portal into the air. I watched intently, expecting the worst. But when I saw what was on the other side, I realized that even my imagination couldn’t have matched the intense anarchy unfolding before my eyes.

  “What have you done?” I asked, staring into the portal. The Vault was nothing but a tower of flames, burning like a scarecrow in a field of corn. The one and only door had been smashed open, splintered into chunks of flaking wood. And in the doorframe, a singular robed figure lay face-down in the dirt. “Link, keep Jasper here.”

  “Be careful,” Link said, diving in and pinning Jasper onto his side.

  I hoped he could handle it.

  I ran through the portal, regardless of my own safety and only vaguely understanding what had happened. My instincts took me up the rocky path at a full sprint toward the Vault, where I knelt to the robed man’s side. He was still breathing, but the iron bar lodged in his side told me that he wouldn’t be for much longer.

  It was considered a grievance at any other time, but I pulled back the hood to see a bald-headed man, his eyes barely open as he struggled to stay with it – to stay alive. I noticed his yellow sash; one of the messengers. “Can you talk?”

  ‘Just… a little,” he said, weak and gasping.