Oscar made his way over to me as a flash of blue announced Zach’s arrival onstage. I closed my eyes and smiled as I heard a voice distinctively off-key. I couldn’t make out the words, but it was her. Penny really had come even after the disaster that was the last tourney she’d gone to. What debacle would she create tonight?
I smiled at Oscar while he nodded up to the stage above. “Aren’t you concerned about Ian and Zach?”
“What am I, their mother? Ian’s gotten lazy. He needs someone who isn’t going to take it easy on him, and Zach needs something else to do with his life than obsess over a witch he can’t have.”
“Like obsess over a witch he can have?”
I shrugged. I could hear Penny, and she was saying something about knees and elbows. Zach’s technique was negligible. “She feels like a sister to him.”
He studied me with his dark eyes, darker from the low emergency lights that were the only things that illuminated that space other than the flashes of brilliance from above. “I have sisters and I don’t dance with them the way he danced with her.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Are you trying to get me upset before the two of us spar? I don’t believe I’ve ever ripped you apart before.”
He smiled slightly. “She’s watching.”
“You think she wouldn’t like it?” I sighed heavily. “You’re probably right. I’ll try to leave you in one piece.”
He cleared his throat. “Is Viney still obsessed with you?”
I studied him. He didn’t look nervous except for a slight twitch of his Adam’s apple. “Less and less all the time. I think a patient mage could make it work with her.”
His eyebrows lowered into a dark scowl. It reminded me of Viney. “Patient? What do you think I’ve been? I know that you don’t encourage her, but watching her…” He shook his head and glanced away into the shadows. “It’s the same in Blackheart. Teddy Prince is their Drake Huntsman.”
“He’s much prettier than I am. I’m very excited to make him ugly, at least for a few hours.”
Oscar winced. “My sisters think that nothing in this world compares to him. No, he’s an angel or a devil, something supernatural. I suppose we’ll all get to see in a few weeks.”
I grinned at him. “It’s going to be marvelous. All those Blackheart mages to fight bloody, no guilt, no regret.”
He shook his head. “When you feel the need to break a mage, can’t you just go to Darkside and play mercenary like you do every summer?”
I blinked at him. What did he know about my summers? He probably had relatives in my companies. “The transition takes some time. I can’t simply bleed off violence in an hour or two.”
“My uncle is in your fifteenth company. Your excellent mercenary skills are the reason I was allowed to transfer to Rosewood. You have near perfect technique and although I am not the chemist I should be, my father has no complaints about my fighting skills even though I waste too much time on ballet and horse riding.”
I grinned and slapped his shoulder. “You’re the perfect mage, balancing Sophis with Chemis and looking devilish good doing it. I’m quite jealous. It’s become glaringly obvious that my lack of Sophistry is an actual problem in my life. Now let’s go and make the girls scream.”
I drew my bare toe over the ground in the shape of a star. Fingers of green followed the movement of my foot, until it glowed beneath me. My veins flashed green as the armor spilled over my skin.
Oscar watched me fascinated at my spellwork, or lack thereof. It would take me four hours to use traditional spellwork to create the mage armor. My way was faster, but not precise. I would have to develop my inner Sophis mage if only so that I could understand Penny’s curse better.
Oscar spoke carelessly. “Penny looked different last night. It was probably the clothes. Stoneburrow created an entire black outfit for her. She actually looked like she might be a tourney player, a real witch.”
I stared at him and for a moment green was all I saw. After that, the support mages said the magic words and presto chango, I materialized on the platform above, my veins sparking green beneath the mage armor.
I looked at Penny Lane where she stood in her silk cloak, too thin for the swirling wind that should have been cold to me, but all I felt was burning. My chest ached where she’d marked me hers and beneath, my heart ached with so much wanting. I needed her. How could she make me need her when she didn’t need me at all?
The swirl of purple smoke that was Oscar rose in a cloud between myself and Penny Lane. I just stood there, staring at her while witches and mages screamed, a roar of excitement when they saw me. Usually I soaked up the applause, but Penny wasn’t cheering. She didn’t say anything, simply stood there with ribbons wrapped around her arms. That wasn’t something Zach had made her.
Oscar came towards me, his purple sword raised. Swords already? He was trying to impress Viney, show her once and for all that he was the mage. Viney would have to admire him for something else, because I did not ever lose fights.
The tourney was a blur, a green flame roaring from my hand to block the fall of his purple sword, sparks of purple and green exploding between us as he fell back. He came at me again, a beautiful scissor attack filled with poisoned darts. I incinerated them with a magic spell fused with a rush of basic chemical reactions while the music pumped through my veins in time to each movement. Oscar’s movements, my own defense and attacks were precise, perfect, but my focus wasn’t on my opponent, but Penny where she stood, gripping her cloak with her white hands. The music was wrong. There should be violins and cellos, less drum and screaming. No, that wasn’t the music but a witch.
I knew her scream. I could feel the panic in my own chest, but it wasn’t my panic. Penny. I turned to see Penny standing in the front of the crowd, pressed against the railing beside Viney. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t move while the panic kept building and building until she collapsed bonelessly in a heap of black silk.
The panic subsided as quickly as it began. I whirled to block Oscar’s attack then ripped him across the stomach and face. He fell back, and I turned back to see Penny. Zach was beside her, wearing but blue mage armor and nothing else.
He picked her up, her body still limp. He was going to step throughside with her. No, he wasn’t. I transfigured to smoke, swirled across the divide and gripped his throat with my barely formed fingers then bashed his face with my forehead, her body between us. Crowds of witches were around us in the stands, my shield dispersed for the tourney.
“Darkside is her death,” I hissed and a flicker of comprehension dawned in his sparking blue eyes.
I gasped as Oscar stabbed me. I spun away from Zach, sparks swirling around me, a sword protruding from my back. Oscar stood on the stage, his eyes sparking purple, his face a mask of intensely crazy. I was going to break him.
I leapt from the stands across the ten-foot gap that separated the stage from the audience, ripping his sword out of my back in that movement. I sliced his skin off with his own sword, but he put up a beautiful fight, using a small dagger that smelled of Darkside to block me. I pulled, slashed, and stalked him across the stage while he crouched and lunged, cutting my legs.
His spells were subtle, enhancements, minimizing the strength of my strikes, mixed with each block and attack. Finally, I felt something far away, something that hurt like grief, angry, agonizing loss, and the world became a swirling green haze. I blew him back with a spell that disarmed his armor enough that when he hit the stage with a thunderous crash, he didn’t get back up.
I stood there blinking while the crowd roared, witches on their feet chanting and screaming my name over and over again. I didn’t feel anything. I stood there while their adulation filled me with absolutely nothing. The support mages pulled Oscar away while I stood, trembling, bleeding, and wondering when Penny would say my name like that. Zach. I would kill him for touching her. And thank him for taking her away from the mob. Which one should I do first?
Ian materialized
in front of me, grinning widely. “Drake? You’re bleeding a lot. I know that you’re trying to get Viney and Oscar together, but letting him stab you so you look incredibly incompetent as well as lovesick is so brilliant. I never would have thought of it. Viney won’t be able to help but find him utterly irresistible.”
“I won.”
He raised a golden eyebrow while his eyes sparked. “And that’s why Zach has the girl.”
I growled at him. He glanced around at the still cheering crowd who watched us both ecstatically. We were the champions. I inhaled deeply before I flashed a smile at the adoring crowds and struck Ian.
After the tourney, when I showered all the blood off my body and let the support mages patch me up, I headed to Lilac Stories. Viney greeted me, arms crossed over her flaming skull sweater.
“Cute sweater. Did your grandmother knit it?”
She snarled at me. “She’s resting. Kept talking about how she had to sleep so she could look cute for her tea party. What is wrong with you? Why would you let yourself be distracted like that? Are you really that pathetic about her?”
I stared at her. Her vehemence wasn’t necessary. “I still won.”
Her lips curled. “You should have annihilated Oscar, instead you patted him on the head and sent him to bed. I’ve seen mages after you’re finished with them. Why didn’t you finish him?”
I ran my hand through my hair. This wasn’t the conversation I needed to have. “Oscar’s a good mage. What happened with Penny?”
Lines of worry furrowed her brow. “I don’t know. Someone could have cursed her. She doesn’t remember anything.”
I nodded and edged around her, but she moved in front of me, her eyes flashing with something.
“She’s resting.”
“I would like a word with Zach. If you would so kindly give me permission, I would be eternally grateful.” I smiled at her and leaned a little bit closer so she could see the green in my eyes.
Her eyes widened, lips parted, and I brushed past her easily. I went to Zach’s room and walked in without bothering to knock. He was lying on his bed, but instead of staring at his Pitch poster as he usually did, he studied a drawing in his hand.
“I’m here to kill you.”
He nodded without looking up. “I have an extremely potent beverage in the drawer. If that doesn’t kill me, it will make me wish it had.”
I went to the desk drawer, pulled out a bottle the color of emeralds without a label and poured myself a glass, then a glass for Zach. I handed it to him before I dropped on the bed beside him, throwing back my drink and staring at his picture.
Through the fumes of the drink, I squinted at the beautifully rendered drawing. In the background an empty field held a crumpled car and a man with a white face and flaming eyes stalked forward with one hand outstretched. In the foreground was a pair of blood streaked bare feet.
“Creepy,” I murmured while my throat burned and I squinted my eyes.
“Penny drew it.”
“I didn’t know she drew.”
He shrugged and turned the paper upside down. “They’re small feet, children’s feet.”
She said that she’d been in a car accident when she was five, lost two ribs from the collision, but that man coming towards her looked like a sorcerer. “Interesting.”
“What did you mean, death in Darkside?”
“It’s something her deliveryman told me. Death waits for her in Darkside. I imagine that’s why he doesn’t take her away.”
“I think he’s a sorcerer.”
I didn’t have to explain anything about him to Zach. Of course not. Zach showed far too much interest in Penny Lane. “Probably, but not that one.”
“We could pool information about her.”
“You go first.”
He shook his head, frowning. “I don’t think she’d like that.”
“But you’ll let me know if I’m about to do something that would kill her?”
He cocked his head as if he was considering. “Since you were so generous illuminating me about the Darkside threat, I’ll be sure to clue you in. You realize the deliveryman could be lying.”
I sighed. “On the one hand, I wish Penny would simply reveal all her secrets, but on the other, it’s awfully amusing puzzling things out.”
He studied me for a long time. “Have you considered other ways of being amused?”
“Other than Penny Lane? What an odd question. Do you have any idea how difficult it is for me to find amusement in anything?”
“Other than beating a fellow mage to a pulp?”
I laughed and slapped him on the shoulder. “It might be amusing to watch, but I would call it more of a compulsion than a diversion. Penny is a diversion from my many compulsions.”
He studied me thoughtfully. “What do you like about her?”
I stared back. It was a strange question for him to ask. I shrugged because I didn’t see how it made a difference. “She’s charming. She’s vulnerable yet strong, innocent yet the sort of person who gets involved in a Creagh massacre. Her hair, her legs, her eyes, particularly the gold specks in them, her fear of cars and her lack of fear of Viney or Witley. The way she looks at you as though she’s seeing who you are instead of who you pretend to be, and doesn’t look away. Her blushes, her glares, her love of Telenovelas and her hatred of owing anyone anything.” I shrugged again. “And you?”
He scowled at me. “I don’t like her.”
I stared back until he glanced away and shoved his hands in his pockets. “If you say so, Zach. Perhaps you feel brotherly towards anyone who feeds you lollipops. I think it’s peculiar that you don’t even notice her legs, though.”
He made a rude sound. “The only legs I’m interested in wear trycelene pants. Penny doesn’t know how to wear pants.”
I smiled blandly. “And yet you tried to dress her in those pants.”
He snarled at me. “She burned them afterwards. Apparently she didn’t like them.”
I stared at him and leaned closer. “She burned them, really?”
“You don’t need to look so pleased. She traded the dress you gave her to Wit.”
“True. She could have traded your suit to any number of witches for a very good price. And yet, she would rather burn it.” I stopped smiling. “Why would she burn it? Does that mean she likes you?”
His eyes widened and he quickly shook his head. “Of course not. She was just angry that I was trying to turn her into Pitch. I wasn’t.”
I studied him. “She thinks that you’re trying to turn her into the woman you’re obsessed with? How uncomfortable for her. She struggles with self-contempt, you know. She actually thinks that her vulnerabilities aren’t adorable. So strange. I don’t want you to give her the idea that she isn’t perfect precisely how she is.”
His soft blue eyes widened and he looked stunned. “You care how she feels about herself. You care about her.”
I grinned at him. “It seems like that sometimes, doesn’t it? How long was she unconscious?”
“She stirred as soon as I left the tourney, then she ran to her room and started drawing. She didn’t talk to me, but when Viney came in and started yelling at her for being so stupid and idiotic, passing out and screaming in the middle of the tourney, Penny stared at her like, I don’t know, like Viney was someone else.”
Poppy, one of Penny’s most closely held mysteries? “Viney found my fight most contemptible. She should be pleased. She was cheering for Oscar.”
Zach inhaled deeply. “Penny was heckling me.”
“And I made her scream. And faint. And draw strange pictures.” It must be connected to her curse, her fear, all of that. I took a photo of her drawing on my phone, handed the paper back to Zach and stood up.
“I thought you were going to kill me.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Are you so eager? You’ll have to wait. I have limited time to kill.”
“Who thinks he can kill time without harming eternity?”
/> I shook my head and left his room. Viney was still standing there, glaring at me. I paused.
“Is there something I can do for you?” I asked.
“Yeah, you can not do that.” She gestured at me.
I looked down at my body, clothed in jeans and t-shirt. I looked up at her. “I’m not sure I can.”
She stepped closer, lifting her chin slightly. “I was cheering for Oscar.”
“I heard you.”
“Then why did you use my obsession to your advantage just now?”
“Because I’m a mage and I thought it would save time. I didn’t realize that we would be having another conversation.”
She glared at me then turned her head to stare down at the floor. “I like Oscar. I’m trying to like him.”
“Good. I like Oscar too. He’s the perfect mage.”
“But you do that and I don’t see how I can ever…”
I put my hands in my pockets as I studied her. She was letting me see her vulnerability because she thought that I would be merciful to her, or hoped I might be. Would I?
I cleared my throat. “I apologize. You’re right. I am used to treating people however I want because I can. It’s laziness on my part, laziness and spite. I have a great deal of respect for you, Viney. I’ll try to act like it in the future. I make no guarantees. I am a mage after all.”
She looked up at me with large dark eyes. Surprise and something else, something sad was in those eyes. I glanced past her to the door. I shouldn’t be looking too closely into her, not when she would always be vulnerable to me.
She finally stepped out of my path and I left her, Zach, and Penny.
Chapter 31
Mage
On Sunday afternoon, four o’clock, I stood at the door of Penny’s room, wearing a velvet suit and holding my top hat. The tea party was utterly charming. Penny and I both wore green. We looked stunningly woodsy together, particularly if you considered the weasel. Before the tea party really started, she had me stand with my eyes closed as she rustled around.
Dread Delight: Rosewood Academy for Witches and Mages (Darkly Sweet Book 2) Page 29
