Twisted Potions (Hidden Blood Book 2)

by Al K. Line

  "By the ghouls. I'm sorry, this is complicated, but I'm trying to sort it out."

  People like Christoper do my head in. It's fine for him to kill randomly, destroy the lives of others, and he cares nothing for humans. But if it's a wife, a blood relative, or one he has turned and something happens to them, then that's a different story entirely. Talk about double standards. Guess we all have them, but idiots like him took it one step too far, like he was above the rules and only he counted.

  "Too late. They took her. They ate her." He turned from the grave and stared hard at me in accusation. "You let this happen. What's next, eh? Gonna help them dig up more? They ate my wife." Christopher may have been old but I could still read him well enough, and before his blow struck, I was already ducking back. He kicked out faster than I'd expected and I felt his boot graze against my knee. A fraction of a second longer and I'd be crippled, albeit momentarily.

  Then things got dicey. As I stepped back he did the shimmer shuffle and was right up in my face, millimeters away. He snarled again, seemingly one of his few limited facial expressions, and snapped at my face, intending to rip away any flesh he could.

  I head-butted him, put all the force of my nature into it, and I hit the sweet spot.

  Blood spurted like a demented fountain and as he howled and bent forward, the cartilage already creaking back into place, I kneed him as hard as I could in his crown jewels. With an "Oomf," he doubled over.

  Anger rising, frustrated by what the Chemist had done, and worried about my own safety and that of the baby, I clubbed my hands together and swung at his bowed head, connecting on the ear so hard that it split open like a piece of fruit dissected with a cleaver.

  He recovered quickly and was up, flesh repairing, the damage to his man-parts not enough to stop him. Christopher slammed forward with immense might, and we fell backward in a tangle of limbs. My back connected with the headstone and it gave way, snapping at ground level, and we began to fall.

  Now, I'm no expert, but I assumed it would be bad to hit dirt with him landing on my belly, and I knew he'd keep going until he killed me, the final death, so as we careened backward I rolled a little so my side took the impact. He crashed down beside me.

  We sank a little into the freshly dug ground, but we were both up like it was made of bouncy rubber. We studied each other, both knowing this was a fight to the death. He had the perfect excuse to challenge me without feeling the full weight of Oskari's anger for what he'd done. Although he knew I was different and Oskari had his eye on me because of the magic and the position I held, he didn't understand quite what would happen if he killed me. I thought about telling him, but knew it wouldn't make any difference now, so it was game on.

  Centering myself even in the middle of battle, I put my will into my ink and it obeyed instantly. Heat shot down my arm, energy backed up, ready to burst, and then I unleashed it through my fingers in a spasming display that lit up the night. As it struck, Christopher managed to inch to the side, boosted vampire reflexes saving him. His left arm was a mess of bone and hanging flesh, his smart gray shirt burned away.

  He glanced at it then paid it no mind, smiled as the skin and muscle repaired itself, then came back in with impossible speed. His fingers jabbed right at my eyes before I had chance to ready myself let alone react.

  Shiver Me Timbers

  If you've never had a slender finger tipped with a nail filed to a point as hard as steel jabbed into your eyeball then I don't recommend you seek it out as an experience for your bucket list. Christopher's nail hit my cornea, the pressure building as he pushed hard against the eyeball. I shunted magic into the delicate orb but it was too little, too late, and the eyes are such a weak spot on the body that with all my strength I knew my reaction was futile, and insufficiently focused for it to resist, unless I got him off in the next millisecond.

  Magic surged into my hands and hardened my own nails, making the fingers as stiff as thick steel rods, and I jabbed out at his stomach, the movement so fierce and fast that I nearly dislocated my shoulder. I felt tender flesh give way as my hand slid in beneath his ribcage like I was plunging it into icy water, not the frigid insides of this deranged man.

  I reached up, grabbed his frozen heart, and as his body convulsed he spasmed forward and my eyeball popped, squirting liquid onto the top of his head.

  I screamed, he collapsed, and as he slumped to the ground I kept my fist bunched tight so his heart was ripped from his corpse.

  "I'm blind, I'm blind," I wailed, as I shuddered then broke out into a sweat as shock set in. I opened my fist and let the crushed remains of his heart drop onto his back where his body twitched then was still. He wouldn't be coming back from this, but if he had I'd do it all over again.

  In a real panic now, I put my hand to my eye but dared not touch it for fear of making what I knew was bad any worse. I wiped my stained hand on my clothes then brushed both hands through my hair to keep it well away from my damaged eye, or lack of eye, and wondered what to do. Would it fix itself? Of course it would. Right? But how long would it take and would it work when the eyeball grew back? Would I be half blind, have to wear a patch and look like a pirate for the rest of my life?

  I sank to the earth and leaned against Christoper, no colder in death than he had been in life. I was off my game; normally this would not have happened. I wasn't focusing properly, I was pre-occupied and it had cost me dearly. I had to get a grip or I'd be food for the ghouls soon enough, just like Christopher here. There was no remorse, he was a leech, a vampire of the worst kind, but I did feel bad for not feeling bad, if you know what I mean. A little piece of me had died because of what I'd done, and my lack of remorse didn't help matters. Many more bodies and I'd be like him, uncaring and immune to the pleas of the innocent before I fed on them for survival.

  My face began to burn with a vicious heat, my head felt like my brain was expanding, pushing hard against my skull, and that all I had to do was bang it against the fallen gravestone to relieve the pressure. I was tempted, but I stayed there, let the sharp jabs at my face behind the eyes increase, the searing thunder that pounded my head build, until I was sure my whole skull would literally explode.

  Magic thundered through my system on high alert, like white blood cells drawn to a wound, which plenty sure as sausages were. The magic swirled and eddied, activated chakras and shunted more and more magic toward the source of the injury. This felt so different to when I'd broken bones or even been consumed by fire, it was pain on a whole other level. Maybe because of the fragile nature of the eye, or maybe because of my paranoia about being blind, I don't know, all I did know was that it hurt like nothing I'd experienced.

  Then the pressure behind my eyes increased again, screaming at me until I almost fainted, and with terrifying force and a feeling akin to someone shoving a white-hot poker through the back of my head, my other eyeball burst and spewed scalding liquid all over my raised hands.

  What the hell? I was supposed to be repairing myself, not making things worse. Now I was utterly blind and terror took me. I was vulnerable like I'd never experienced before, exposed and almost defenseless without being able to see.

  The pain built, reaching indescribable levels, and then the piercing of the skull sensation again, but this time in two places. Pressure built again behind my burst, missing eyeballs, now surely nothing but a mess of mangled ganglia where they connected to the brain. Skin stretched taut across my face as I screamed, my cheeks felt like they were splitting and my forehead felt like it was being pulled up over the top of my head. And then, just like that, my eyelids blinked and I knew the eyes were back. Raw feeling, full of grit, but there.

  I remained blind. I was like a newborn, yet to open her eyes to the wonders of the world, and then things began to take on form. Blurry, indistinct shapes at first that soon became clear, clearer than they should have been for it was the middle of the night. I could see, and I could see better than I had ever done.

  Awed, exhausted,
and exulted, I got to my feet, stared around in wonder, and smiled like a fool. I understood something then.

  Magic is awesome.

  Like Superman

  Maybe I needed my head seen to. What was wrong with me? I'd just had my eyeballs popped out of my head, and here I was, after going through agony, smiling and thinking how great it was to be consumed by magic.

  This is the sign of the true addict, and something Faz had warned me about. Something I'd chastised him for over the years, telling him to slow down, ease back, stop putting himself in danger and stop getting hurt. He always went back for more, couldn't wait to get back at it now. This pain, this incredible hurt, it's intoxicating, it's overwhelming, and it makes you feel alive like nothing else can. Maybe it's the belief that you can recover from it, that the power you hold inside is strong enough to overcome whatever anyone can throw at you, even though you know deep down that isn't the case at all.

  We can all die, we can all have our hearts ripped out, just ask poor Christopher at my feet, but that's part of the appeal. How warped is that? Life on the edge, battling foes of all description, dropping into strange netherworlds, feeling the magic surge and the knitting together of bone, the popping of eyeballs, the crunch as you slam a fist into someone's nose and hear bone crack, violence of all kinds. It makes something primitive inside dance with joy. Lovely.

  A curse.

  I was filthy, so I wandered back to my car and stripped down, used plenty of wet wipes then wiped my leather down, slipped on a cool clean t-shirt, got the rest of my clothes on and felt refreshed.

  Only then did I think to test my vision properly, to see how good it was and ensure nothing screwy had happened. That my body could do this was miraculous, but hey, the eyes had grown in the first place and that's pretty amazing too. The clear night vision remained. Everything took on a greenish tinge but was crisper than it had ever been before. It didn't stop there though. I could see further, make out details that shouldn't have been possible, and any life I focused on glowed orange, stood out as if I had heat-sensitive vision. Guess I did.

  My phone vibrated in my jacket pocket, a message from Faz, one of many. Of course, I'd been gone all day and through the night, lost to sleep, to the ghoulish lands, to fighting and to madness. He understood, but was still worried, not just for me but the baby growing inside. This was par for the course for enforcers, he knew that better than anyone, and he'd go days without a call or a message to tell me he was all right. And I'd be at home stressing. Now it was his turn and I felt terrible for being so lax. There were also several calls from Dancer. Guess I should stop putting my phone on mute—it's hard to feel it vibrate when you're smashing faces or lost to dreams of peaceful times.

  I did my duty, reassured Faz, told him I was fine, not to worry, then checked in with Dancer.

  "Are you okay? Do you need any help?" he asked, sounding flustered and panicked.

  "What? No, I'm fine."

  "Maybe you should go home, Kate. Take it easy, put your feet up."

  "Why?"

  "You're pregnant, you need to rest."

  "Dancer, my dear friend, my Head, if you treat me like some weak, incapacitated woman just because I'm a few days pregnant then it will not end well, for you."

  "Er, okay, right. Message received loud and clear. Okay," he said, the sound of shuffling papers in the background, "to business then. I have reports, lots of reports, going back to yesterday when I couldn't get hold of you, and I've got a lot of people out working on this now. The ghouls are everywhere, there's more of them every hour, and you need to find the Chemist and stop him before this becomes an epidemic. He's shedding skin like a bloody snake, and these scab children are running amok. Deal with it." He hung up.

  "That's more like it," I said with an evil smile. Time to get back on the case and stop playing around. I made one more call for the clean-up crew to deal with the body, although I knew word would have already spread as that's how us vamps roll.

  I considered calling Oskari to explain, but also knew he was as one with the vampire hivemind and would know exactly why I'd done what I did. Instead, I spent the next ten minutes scanning through the attachments Dancer sent, along with a summary of the latest ghoul sightings.

  Time to go hunting.

  A Heady Mix

  Cardiff has always been a strange place. Full of Welsh from not only the south but the north of this small country within a country. One minute you can hear the unmistakable southern accents of those from neighboring Newport—you knows it—the next you walk past a group of people and realize you haven't understood a word as they're either talking in Welsh or their northern accents are so strong it may as well be another language anyway.

  There are colleges and universities, many parts of the city like Roath and Splott full of student digs, there are areas that are mostly Asian, with some of the best independent stores for groceries and spices, and other parts of the city where entire communities are in self-imposed exile behind high hedges and large gates and nobody walks anywhere. Rich, poor, black, white, brown, pink, and everything in between. And then there are Hidden.

  Lots, and lots, of Hidden.

  I've often wondered if the veils we are all stuck behind because of the magic are weaker here, if the residents have somehow grown so accustomed to strange looking people of peculiar build and questionable fashion sense that they tune us out, see what they want to see without Hidden having to expend much energy hiding themselves. Maybe that's why we are so vibrant here. I've been to other places, seen how Hidden are there, and it's all a little duller, more washed out, like the energy they need to veil themselves takes more from them, makes them weaker.

  In Cardiff and the surrounding areas, close to the magical epicenter of the country, human Hidden have powerful veils, can do things that would probably get them into a lot of trouble elsewhere. And for true otherworldly creatures, their mask of humanity comes even easier. So a fat man in ill-fitting sportswear with hands that little bit too large to be possible, with a head too square and too solid looking to be anything but freakish, isn't noticed, even though behind a subtle veil he's seven feet tall, just as wide, and made entirely of rock.

  Almost like a communal brainwashing. Nothing to see here, everything is normal. You go about your business or carry on with your day. Maybe it's because of the rich tapestry of cultural diversity, or maybe it's the long history of Hidden making this place home, but we thrive here.

  And maybe that's why so many people were freaking out.

  Getting it Together

  I toured the city, getting snarled up in the early morning traffic as people drove, bleary-eyed, to jobs in offices and factories or made the long haul to places outside of the city so they could drive back in again that evening, get annoyed as they sat in traffic, eat, sleep, then do it all again the next day. I knew I couldn't handle such a routine now, would go batty inside a week. Just having to sit in my brand new car, made to go slow because of other drivers, was making me edgy and fouling my mood. My stomach kept cramping and I was getting annoyed about that, as I knew it was just me and my nerves, not anything that could actually be happening. It didn't make it hurt any less, and nothing I did, no magic I sent there, made it any better.

  What I saw through the window didn't improve my mood either.

  Ghouls were everywhere, and their veils were weak. Not enough to make you call the police and report it, telling them that someone had been in a terrible accident and half their face was melted off and somehow their arms had been stretched to the ground, or that their legs were a mess of strange protrusions and their bodies had clearly been on a torture rack, but enough so that people were staring, and this was by people at the heart of magic. The young ghouls were veiled just enough for them to look like Regulars, just very odd ones, their true selves hiding beneath a thin veneer of almost normality that was fragile at best.

  For a start, people were looking at them twice, and the ghouls weren't helping matters. They were out here
, in the midst of things, running and shuffling, moping or chattering in manic incomprehension to anyone they set eyes on, and each and every one of them had this confidence I had never seen before in a creature that, because of the Laws of magic that have stood since time immemorial, weren't able to explore our world for more than a few hours. Why? Because they were here to stay, that was why.

  The Elders had been right. The Chemist had succeeded in birthing children that could remain here. They would not be sucked back to a ghoulish realm whether they wanted to or not, they were a part of this world because of what he'd done to himself.

  His tribe. His people. His children. His way to fit in.

  If it carried on like this, ghouls would be the majority, and as the veil slipped further, and their identity became obvious, something truly awful would happen. It would open up all kinds of problems for Hidden, may even allow Regulars to see us with new eyes, and we'd be revealed and then it wouldn't be long before Armageddon. That, and I was thinking best case scenario, or ghouls would simply remain as they were now, seen but not quite seen, but here in massive numbers. They'd steal bodies, grow increasingly hungry, and before long the murder rate would skyrocket as they realized the only way they could feed was to kill.

  And then I saw it happen. The beginning of the end.

  Call the Fuzz

  I was stuck in traffic right at the end of town. The road curved around as it passed the bus stops on the left and a discount store on the other side of the road. I got a clear view down the high street, not surprised to see people already milling about at just gone nine.

  The bus stop and the fast food chain just around the corner were buzzing with ghouls, drawn to the smell of dodgy meat and the novelty of buses. They shambled, they mumbled, they ambled, and they marveled, newborns unable to make sense of the wondrous sights, smells, and sounds they were confronted with. What was the Chemist thinking, letting them loose like this without teaching them about our confusing world? Surely he knew it would lead to chaos? Maybe that was his plan.