“Jensen, watch the hallway,” I said to him. He was just standing around watching everyone, looking nervous.
“Uh, okay,” he said. “What do I do if, uh, if someone’s coming?”
“You tell us that,” I said. I turned to Felicity. “What do you see in this guy again?”
“Hey,” said Jensen. “Standing right here. Right exactly here.”
I ignored him.
He scurried out to watch the hallway.
“How’s it going over there?” I asked Connor.
He was sitting down at the computer. “I’m in,” he said. “I just don’t know what file you want. They’re in folders by dates. When are we talking here?”
Lachlan told him what week we thought it might have happened.
“A whole week?” said Connor. “Uh, I can’t watch all of these. I don’t know which one we want.”
Jensen came back in. “Uh. Someone’s coming.”
“Who?” I said.
“I don’t know. Some lady with a bunch of guys dressed like him.” Jensen pointed at Sid.
“Great,” said Lachlan. “Can you copy them all, Connor?”
“Sure,” he said. “I can put them all in my cloud storage, but it’s going to take a little bit of time to upload.”
“How much time?” I said.
“I don’t know,” said Connor. “It depends on how fast the Internet speed is here.”
From the wall, Sid yelled again. “Help!”
“Shut up,” I said to him, using magic to seal his lips.
“Mmmph!” yelled Sid.
“Are you doing it?” I said to Connor.
“Yeah, yeah,” he said, staring at the screen, clicking on his mouse furiously.
The door burst open.
There stood Darla Tell, flanked by a bunch of men.
I pivoted, dropping all the magic that I had holding Sid to the wall, and throwing it into Darla and the men.
The men all stumbled and fell to their knees.
Darla just stood there, sneering at me.
Behind me, Sid yelled as he hit the floor.
“Felicity!” I cried.
“With you,” she snarled, turning to face the men.
We joined hands. I felt her magic join mine, the power heady and strong. Together, we picked up Sid and the other men. We swept them out of the room, like they were being pushed by a powerful wind. We slammed the door behind them.
Darla wasn’t affected at all.
“Connor?” I called.
“Yeah?” he said.
“How we doing?”
“Well, it’s uploading. Shouldn’t be much longer.”
“You need to have hands on the keyboard?”
“No, I’m just waiting.”
“Then you and Felicity and Jensen need to get Caleb out of here. Now.”
Darla spoke. “What do you think you’re doing, Penny?”
I poured my magic into her, a concentrated thrust, everything I had. I funneled it into her stomach.
She blinked a little, let out a grunt. But she didn’t even stumble. “There’s no need for that, you know. I’m not here to hurt you. I would never hurt you, Penny.”
“No?” I said, glaring at her.
“Have I ever even attempted to hurt you?” she said.
“You killed Alastair and let me take the fall for it,” I said. “So, yeah, that’s kind of doing harm to me.”
She sighed.
“Felicity, Connor!” I yelled. “Get the hell out of here.”
Felicity darted forward, and—using magic—hauled Caleb’s body over her shoulder.
Connor came out from behind the computer to join her.
Darla shook her head. “I can’t let you take a prisoner.”
“Lachlan,” I said, reaching back for him.
His fingers touched mine.
“We got to keep her busy so that they can get away,” I said.
His fingers closed around mine, and our magic surged to life like lightning. It sprang out of us, a white bolt that collided with the wall two feet from Darla’s head. The wall dissolved where the power touched it. A huge hole appeared, and then cracks in the rest of the wall shot out from the hole.
Darla raised her eyebrows. “A blood bond. But of course. How else could the baby have been possible? It had to be a blood bond.”
“You two really need to work on your aim,” said Felicity from the door. “That nearly killed us all.”
“Sorry,” I said.
Darla turned, reaching out with one hand.
Felicity and the others froze.
I squeezed Lachlan’s hand. We let out another bolt.
Our aim wasn’t great this time either, but this time we grazed Darla’s shoulder.
She shrieked, clutching it.
Felicity and the others disappeared through the doorway. I hoped they’d get away clean. They needed to get Caleb to the police. Get the evidence to the police. Lachlan and I would take care of Darla, and we’d meet them there, and this nightmare would be over.
Darla was doubled over, her eyes closed. She straightened, pulling her hand away from her shoulder. It looked fine. She’d healed it somehow.
Lachlan turned to me. “Let’s get this bitch.”
I narrowed my eyes, and together, Lachlan and I pulled our power together, doing our best to harness the storm that passed between us, to bend it to our wills. We sucked up a cyclone of magic, white-hot and blazing. We started to throw it at Darla and—
Suddenly, we were on opposite sides of the room, not touching.
Darla was standing between us, her arms spread.
I tried to get up.
She pushed her palm at me.
I flopped against the floor like a fish on dry land.
“Only one thing to do against blood bonds,” said Darla. “Keep the bonded pair apart. No touchy, no blasty.”
I sucked in a huge breath, gathering fire in my belly. I roared out a ball of fire at her.
She pointed at it and it fizzled, turning blue, then transparent, then fading away in a puff of smoke.
I swallowed. That was bad.
She looked frustrated. “I came here to talk to you, that’s all. But if you don’t want to talk, then I suppose I’ll have to show you why it’s a very, very stupid idea to try to fight me.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Darla pointed at Lachlan. She used magic to lift him into the air.
Lachlan reached out, sending magic at Darla.
She didn’t even feel it. Instead, she twirled her finger in the air.
Lachlan’s body suddenly bent backwards, nearly in half.
He screamed. And screamed. And then it cut off.
And Darla kept bending him.
“Stop!” I said.
She looked at me. She clenched her hand into a fist.
And I was alight in pain—pain I’d never felt before, as if every part of my body was burning from the inside, all my cells igniting and disintegrating.
And someone was still screaming.
But then I realized it was me.
And the pain kept going, so excruciating that I could hardly believe it was actually happening. I hurt like I was dying, like it was worse than dying.
No, I wanted to die, because dying would be peace, an end to this agony.
Then, there, I could almost see death, ahead of me, like a dark, empty tunnel that I could burrow in and—
The baby. I felt the baby, reaching for me with his tiny hands.
Oh, God, what was this doing to the baby? I couldn’t die. I had to stay alive. My body was the only protection that he had.
I stopped screaming. I forced my eyes open. “Stop,” I said. Well, I mouthed. I had no voice. I wanted to scream again. I wrapped my arms around my belly. I pulled my knees up to my chest. I had to protect the baby.
Darla was staring at me, looking me up and down, sizing me up like I wasn’t even human, just some vaguely intriguing plaything.
“
Stop,” I croaked, against the pain that was still burning through every fiber of my being.
She lowered her hand.
The pain stopped.
I shut my eyes again. I hugged the baby from the outside, trying to feel for him again. Was he okay?
And there was a faint answer from him, just a pulse of his tiny being from within me. The pulse was fading, but I knew somehow that it wasn’t because the baby was hurt, but because my ability to feel him was fading now that I wasn’t inches from death.
I opened my eyes and looked around.
Lachlan lay across the room from me, eyes open and glassy.
“He’s not dead,” said Darla. “I could kill him if I wanted. I could kill you both. Very easily. It wouldn’t be a bit of effort. Do you understand that?”
I didn’t say anything.
“Penny, answer me,” said Darla.
“I understand,” I muttered, my voice like broken glass.
“Thank you,” she said. “Now, let’s talk, if you don’t mind.”
I didn’t want to do anything that she wanted. I wanted to be defiant. But I didn’t have it in me. It was misery simply trying to breathe.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” said Darla, coming closer. “I want us to be friends.”
I let out a hoarse laugh. “You’ve got a funny way of showing that.”
“That was because you wouldn’t stop,” she said. “I didn’t have a choice. You forced my hand. You must see that.”
I didn’t answer.
She sighed. “It’s so hard, I have to admit. The things that keep rattling around my brain, they confuse me. I didn’t know where they were coming from, but when you said it to me the other day, I had to admit to myself that you must be right. It’s him. That Cooper man. Somehow, there are bits of him in me, and I can’t tell which is which.”
“You did kill Alastair,” I said.
She tilted her head to one side. “After all this, you aren’t even sure of that?”
I forced myself into a sitting position. “No. I’m sure. I know that you did it. You did it for power. How long have you been head of this organization, sucking up the magic of all of the prisoners here? How long did it take before you wanted a bigger taste? Before you wanted even more power?”
“That’s not how it is, not at all,” she said. “Cooper was dangerous. He had more magic than we could contain. It was seeded into him somehow. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“Dragon sacrifice,” I said.
“Ah,” she said. “Well, I suppose that explains it. No matter what spells we used on him, we couldn’t get it all. I needed to find a way to take the magic, take every last bit. It was for the good of the organization.”
“Sure,” I said. “Telling yourself that help you sleep at night?”
She knelt down next to me so that we were eye level. “Killing him was an accident. Getting these parts of him in me? I didn’t intend that at all. I only wanted to take his power. I only wanted to do the right thing.”
“Well, do the right thing now,” I said. “Let us go.”
“Let you go?” she said.
“You’re more powerful than God,” I said. “So, a little thing like the SCPD shouldn’t be a big issue for you. We have evidence that you killed Alastair. Video evidence. That’s enough to clear us. Sure, they’d come after you for the murder, but you could find a way to deal with that. If you’re really such a good person, and you really do want to be my friend, just let Lachlan and me go.”
She turned to look at Lachlan. “Him. You’re always so preoccupied with him.”
“I’m in love with him.”
She turned back to me. “How about this, Penny? I let him go, and he can clear his own name, but you stay here with me. We’ll have to uproot the Order again, which is sad, considering we just got settled in here, but you and I can be together. Right now, that’s all I think I want. I suppose it’s because of that Cooper man, but I don’t know if I care. Just say you’ll come with me. Please.”
“What if I can’t come with you?” I murmured. If this was the only choice I had or she would kill Lachlan, I supposed I’d play along. I’d get him free and then find some way out myself later.
“Can’t?” she said. “Or won’t?”
“Darla, if what you’re saying is true, then it’s all an unfortunate accident,” I said. “But whatever is making you want me, it’s just Alastair. It’s not real. And I… I hate Alastair.”
“Yes,” she said, sighing. “That is the problem. He hates you too. It’s so very confusing. Wanting you. Thinking of you. Loving you. And… abhorring you.” She turned to me with a sneer. “And you pregnant with that thing’s spawn.” She pointed at Lachlan. “I can’t have that.”
I put my hands protectively over my belly.
She reached for me. “No,” she said in a soothing voice. “Here’s what we’ll do. We’ll get rid of it, and then you’ll be free of him.”
I evaded her grasp. I tried to get up, but my body ached and smarted, still in pain from whatever she’d done to me. I needed to shift. That way I could heal. That way I could fight.
But there was no water nearby. I couldn’t shift. And I wasn’t strong enough to fight her.
Maybe together, maybe Lachlan and I could fight her, but he was unconscious, and I remembered before that touching him while he was unconscious did strengthen me, but not enough to really fight.
Still, it was better than nothing. I started to crawl toward Lachlan.
Darla let out a derisive laugh. “Oh, my silly, silly Penny. You can’t think that you can still save him? Besides, I told you that I would let him go if you stayed. I keep my promises.”
“I need…” I gasped. It hurt to move. “To say goodbye.”
“No,” she said.
“Please,” I said. “You owe me this much. If I’m going to stay with you, if you’re going to take my baby, you must give me just one moment with him. If you really care about me, you’ll let me.”
She hesitated.
I kept crawling, getting closer to him with every step. Fresh agony jolted through my limbs, but I kept going, closing the distance between us. I would reach him soon. If I just kept her off me, kept her confused.
“No,” she said again. “You can’t touch him. You’re bonded, and you must not touch.”
And then searing pain shot through me again, ten times as bad as it had been before, so harsh and awful that I couldn’t scream. I couldn’t even breathe.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
The pain was too much. Too intense. So intense that it seemed as if it was outside of me. Like I was in one place, and the pain was somewhere else.
It was getting farther and farther away.
And that was when I realized that I was inside the dark tunnel from before. The death tunnel.
I started to struggle. I had to get back to the pain, back to my body.
Back to my baby.
Because I could feel him. Could see him too. Not literally or physically, but I could see the bright light of his existence. It glowed warm and pink, and it was a beacon to me.
I reached for that light, grabbed tightly to it, curled myself around it.
And the pain was back. It was coming in hot, throbbing waves that racked my body and made me twitch and jerk spasmodically.
But the baby was okay. The baby was trying to tell me something.
He wanted something.
He needed…?
No, I needed.
The baby sent me the smell, the taste, the sensation of hot blood in my mouth. He was telling me to drink blood.
I don’t have any blood, sweetheart, I thought at him.
And the pain was overwhelming, and I was separating from it again.
No.
I struggled to stay where I was.
The baby sent me another wave of sensations, feelings. A soapy smell, a smell of aftershave and a hint of sweat. Strong arms wrapped around us both.
Father.
Lachlan’s blood? The baby wanted Lachlan’s blood?
We had never done that. He had drunk my blood, but I had never taken his. I didn’t have fangs for one thing. But now that the idea had been proposed to me, it made sense. That was how I could have the power of the blood bond. Sharing blood charged it up. If I couldn’t give my blood to Lachlan, then I could take his blood.
I tried to open my eyes.
I could hardly move. I managed to barely open them a tiny bit. Just to let in little slits of light.
At first, I couldn’t see anything. It was bright and blurry and strange, an alien universe.
But then, slowly, things came into focus.
Darla was standing over me, her body at a sharp angle upward. From my perspective, her feet were enormous, and she stretched up into the heavens, where her tiny head was practically out of sight.
She wasn’t looking at me. She was staring off into the distance. “Damn it,” she whispered.
I shifted my gaze to Lachlan, who was lying only two feet away from me. He was bleeding. A cut in his forehead. It must have happened when Darla dropped him. His head had caught the corner of the desk. If I could get there…
“Went too far again,” Darla said, sounding regretful. “Can’t seem to stop taking it too far. I don’t see how that Cooper managed it so well. It’s as if the power has a mind of its own.” She sighed.
If I moved, she’d see. I only had one shot at this.
“Damn it,” she said again. And then… she turned away. “Got to get someone to clean this up. Compel them to forget about it. Damn it, damn it, damn it.”
I couldn’t believe my good luck. She wasn’t watching me! I rolled over onto my stomach.
The pain was excruciating.
Okay, maybe I wasn’t so lucky after all.
I reached for Lachlan, using my arms to drag myself over the floor.
Darla turned back around. “Penny?”
Fuck.
I gave a mighty heave, dragging my body to Lachlan’s and latching my mouth onto his wound.
“You’re alive?” Darla was delighted. “I didn’t go too far, after all? Oh, thank goodness, Penny, I thought I’d lost you.”
I sucked the salty liquid that was Lachlan’s blood into my mouth, and I felt the pull of our connection immediately. We were tied together by strong bonds, and I was at one with everything. I could feel the inside of Lachlan’s body, his wounds, his sleeping consciousness. I could feel the baby, triumphant that I had understood his message. I could feel everything outside of us as well. The room. The magic that traveled through the walls to the bars of the cells. The way that the magic of the prisoners was being drawn into Darla. The way that this whole building sat inside the warehouse, even though it was bigger than the warehouse. They had… shrunk it somehow, manipulated the molecules…. That was why there were tunnels down there. They hadn’t been built for Sea City after all, just thrust into the ground here. The had forced the ground to accept—
city of dragons 03 - fire magic Page 23
