by Lizzy Ford
“Thanks, Sean,” she replied with a wave. She shook off the rain in the doorway and crossed to the small booth near the bar that she and her father usually shared.
“Ye want the usual?” Sean asked. A burly redhead who towered over her, his face was flushed from the heat of the warm pub. She’d always felt comfortable around him. He was one of the only people who didn’t shy away from her or treat her like she was a leper. Once, she thought she’d seen the same shimmer of power around him that she saw around her father.
“Yes, thanks, Sean.” She peeled off the thick coat and draped it over one bench before seating herself facing the door, as her father had taught her. Sean brought her a bowl of thick beef stew, soda bread, and a Coke.
“You fall again?” he asked, gaze on her bruised cheekbone.
“Yeah.” She looked away. He said nothing else and moved away.
Yully ate slowly, enjoying the stew enough to start a second bowl. Some of the locals she knew from her frequent visits seated themselves before Sean at the bar. One glanced her way, his gaze lingering. Self-conscious of the effect her gift had on people, she moved deeper into the booth. Normally, she’d leave before it got too crowded; her father preferred she avoided people altogether. With nothing but her troubled thoughts, the cold rain, and a lonely room in the bed and breakfast down the road, she didn’t feel like leaving just yet.
Instead, she started a third bowl of the soup and watched the pub fill with people.
“Enjoy,” Sean said, reappearing from the kitchen doors behind her to place a bowl of warm toffee pudding on the table.
“Oh, Sean,” she said with a smile. “I’ve already had three bowls of stew!”
“It’s from the gentleman o’er there,” he said and indicated a booth near the door with the tilt of his head.
“Could I take it to go?” she asked.
He hesitated, and her senses tingled in warning. Sean smiled finally and whisked it away. Yully watched him, alerted by the same sense of uneasiness she felt around her father lately. She wasn’t sure why he’d care if she ate or took her dessert home.
Unless there was something wrong with it. She looked down at her stew, her father’s warnings coming back to her thoughts. He’d claimed someone would try to kill her, and the man they sought was here. She’d long since thought her father was paranoid, if not crazy. Sean poisoning her made no sense.
It’s from the gentleman o’er there.
She searched the busy pub with her gaze. There were a lot of tourists in town, probably for the autumn equinox, which drew people from around the world every year. She wasn’t sure who Sean was trying to indicate had sent her the dessert.
“Here you go,” he said and placed the small brown paper bag on the table before her. “Have a good night, Ms. Yully.”
“Oh, here,” she said and reached for her purse.
“No worries. The gentleman paid for your dinner.”
“Which gentleman?” she asked. “I’d like to thank him.”
“Right over there.” He pointed to a small table across the pub, and she wondered how she’d missed the men at the table.
“Thanks.”
Sean returned to the bar. Two men sat at the table, one with blond hair and the other like something out of a movie. Cocoa skin, soulful dark eyes, exotic features, and brilliant tattoos over his exposed, muscular arms. His hair was long and black, braided down his back. While it was hard to tell his height when he was seated, he looked to be Sean’s size, well over six feet tall. He sat like he owned the pub, leaning back in the chair in a display of relaxed power. His smiles to his companion were easy and his gaze wary.
He shimmered, like her father did.
Yully’s stomach turned. This had to be the man her father warned her about! She made a show of resting her coat across the table, as if to say she wasn’t leaving, and crossed to the small hall that contained the restrooms. Instead of ducking into the ladies’ room, she pushed through the back entrance, which emptied out into a dark, rainy alley. Shivering, she pulled out her phone to call her father as she made her way towards the street.
“Papa, I think he’s here,” she whispered when he answered. “I don’t know what to do.”
“Are you armed?”
“No, Papa.”
“You’re supposed to carry at least a knife every time you leave the house. In any case, I’m on my way, darling,” he said with disapproval. “You know how to defend yourself, and you can turn even a man into a rock with your magic. You have nothing to fear. Go to the bed and breakfast and wait for me.”
“Yes, Papa.”
He hung up. She shoved the phone and her hands in her pockets to keep them warm as she picked her way through the littered alley.
Chapter Two
Jule had watched the Magician for a good half hour. He wasn’t sure what he expected-- maybe a cold, hard Medusa-- but the young woman Sean indicated was nothing like that. Her hair was fiery red and curly, her frame tall and slender. Almond-shaped green eyes were large and expressive while her skin was touched with honey. She’d barely met Sean’s gaze and her smile was hesitant.
She looked too sweet to be someone about to destroy the fabric between the immortal and mortal worlds, even if he did sense some sort of dark secret in her gaze. She radiated power that even humans could feel. Despite the pub’s standing room only capacity, the table next to her booth was empty. He’d watched Sean subtly steer people away from it.
His own unease grew. The Watcher wanted her dead, and yet, Watchers couldn’t always be trusted to tell their true intentions. He understood it was in their best interest to protect humanity. Why, then, was he starting to feel as if he’d been set up? The Magician looked like a sweet, innocent Natural, one of the humans with extraordinary gifts who could be brought into the Guardians’ organization.
How he wished he had his power! He’d be able to read her mind and confirm she was indeed intent on destroying the gateway between the realms. Instead, he had to do this the way humans did.
The Magician piled her coat on top of her table with shaking hands and walked toward the hallway where the restrooms were. Sean was supposed to serve her dessert laced with a sedative, so they could drug her and take her back to the station for questioning. He had a feeling she wasn’t sticking around and wondered what had alerted her. Sean caught his eye and tossed his head towards the restrooms. Jule rose and maneuvered through the crowd and down the small hall. He emerged into the alley in time to see her replace a phone in her pocket. He moved silently down the alley and had almost reached her when she froze.
“Don’t make me do it,” she said in a soft voice.
“Make you do what?” he asked and stopped just out of arms’ reach.
“Kill you. I have a sort of … magic power that will turn you to stone.”
“Sweetheart, there’s not an evil bone in your body,” he said, amused. “I don’t need magic powers to see that.”
“You’re here to kill me. Why should I not defend myself?”
Stalking an innocent woman in the alley was a cakewalk, until the moment she said something she shouldn’t have known. Jule’s wariness made his senses heighten. Again he felt more was going on than the damn Watcher let on.
“I would think less of you if you didn’t try,” he said in a quiet voice.
She turned, her body tense and her large green eyes swimming with fear and dread. Her flawless face was flushed, her breathing quick. He held her gaze, struck by the aura of power around her. He’d seen it from across the pub. Only standing within its midst did he understand just how strong she was.
“This can go one of two ways,” he said. “You can come with me quietly, or I can drag you out of here.”
“I’m not going with you.”
“Then take the first hit.” He slung his arms open, giving her a huge target. With magic or without, he’d won every brawl he’d ever been in, and he definitely wasn’t afraid to fight a girl.
The woman too
k a step back. He wasn’t surprised when she whirled and ran. He snatched her arm, and she took a swing at him. He ducked her blow and grunted at the elbow that found his midsection. He hadn’t expected her to know how to fight.
An arcing kick forced him to release her. He blocked it and the next two blows and then snatched a fist headed for his face, twisted her arm, and spun her. He wrapped her arm around her throat as he pulled her into his body and held her there with an arm across her chest.
“Please, please don’t make me do this,” she gasped. “I don’t wanna kill anyone!”
“C’mon, sweetheart. We’re gonna have a little talk, then we’ll see who gets to kill who.” He chuckled. She wasn’t going anywhere in her position, and her body shook from cold. If he thought she wouldn’t run or try to kick him again, he’d let her go fetch her coat.
“I am so sorry,” she whispered.
A blast of cold tore through him as she directed her magic into him. His teeth rattled at the raw energy coursing within his body. He wasn’t sure what her gift was or what she was trying to do, but he’d never met a Natural with her unique combination of power and strength. The magic faded, and she tried to pull away.
“You done?” he asked.
“You’re not a rock.”
Fed up with the cold and rain again, he spun her and slung her over his shoulder.
“You’re not a rock,” she said again, stunned.
“I’m probably immune to whatever it is you tried to do,” he said. “Don’t feel bad. You probably would’ve killed a normal human.” He strode toward the end of the alley, wanting out of the rain as much as he wanted to talk to the intriguing woman over his shoulder.
He’d nearly reached the end of the alley when the hair on the back of his neck rose like it did when a Watcher was present, only this was no Watcher. He’d never forget his single run-in with one of the Others, a group of Watchers working to destroy the mortal world in favor of an immortal one. The two types of beings had last brought their war to the mortal realm during the time of the Schism, when they’d almost destroyed the universe.
He turned, not surprised to see the small, grandfatherly man standing deeper in the alley. Unlike the Watchers’ tell-tale green eyes, the Others had unnatural purple eyes. The hum around the Other assured Jule there was only one person in the alley without any sort of otherworldly power. He lowered the woman to her feet and pushed her behind him.
“You’ve gotta help me!” The woman directed her plea toward the Other and tried to push past Jule.
“You want nothing to do with this guy, woman,” Jule muttered. He wrapped one arm around her tightly.
“He’s my father!” she snapped, straining against him.
Holy shit. Suddenly, he understood why the Watcher couldn’t find her. She was under the protection of the Others. If the Watchers and Others both sought this woman, something was very wrong. Jule refused to release her, sensing more danger toward her than to himself. She stopped struggling, apparently realizing how futile it was.
“Jule,” the Other said, taking a step forward. “I see you’ve met my daughter. She knows you’ve come to kill her.”
“Just doin’ my job,” Jule replied. The Magician smashed her heel into his instep. He shifted her without releasing her. “I thought your kind hated humans.”
“And I thought your kind had magics,” the Other said and cocked his head to the side. “What has happened to you?”
“Don’t need magics to kill a woman.” Jule smiled despite his unease, not about to be caught off guard by the creature. He pulled free a knife and flipped it in the air, catching it. The woman in his arms went still as he pressed its edge to her throat.
The Other’s gaze went to her. Jule waited. Others despised humans, but the fact that this one hesitated to abandon the woman to her fate told Jule more than the most discreet of immortals probably intended. The woman’s fate was suddenly of more concern to Jule than messing with the purple-eyed or green-eyed trolls.
He sheathed the knife and pushed the woman away. She darted to the Other and threw her arms around him. Jule crossed his arms and watched. The Other returned the hug briefly. The woman moved behind him, her confused green eyes on Jule.
“Life for a life,” Jule reminded him.
“You’re not an immortal anymore,” the Other snapped. “I don’t need to abide by the rules.”
“You haven’t killed me yet, so you must want something from me.”
“Daughter, go inside. Get your coat.”
The woman hesitated.
“Now!” the Other barked.
In that moment, Jule pitied her. By the look on her face, it wasn’t the first time the Other had raised his voice at his alleged daughter. She hugged herself and hurried towards the door to the pub.
Yully closed the door behind her, shaking out of fear and cold. She started to the table then stopped, unable to dismiss the feeling of the man’s arms around her or what she’d felt when they touched. Her gift of changing or transforming objects into others should’ve turned him to stone. Instead, she’d touched his soul, and it’d laughed and turned her magic away. She couldn’t describe the sense any other way, just like she couldn’t determine why she still felt the connection to his soul.
The conversation between her father and the man who should’ve killed her rattled around in her thoughts as she returned to the door. Cracking it open, she peered out. She was too far to hear them talk. An arc of lightning left her father’s hand and slammed the stranger into the wall.
He crumpled, and she gasped. Her father knelt beside the still body. Suddenly, they both vanished. Whatever lingered from his touch faded without disappearing.
“Everything okay?” Sean asked from behind her.
She jumped and looked up at him. Unable to find her voice, she hurried around him to the table where she’d left her coat. Yully fled the pub for her car and opened the door with cold, fumbling hands. She locked her doors and wiped rain from her face.
Her father said the man came to kill her, yet she was still alive.
She started the car and blasted the heat. Part of her wanted to return to her home that very night, and another part of her feared what she’d find if she did. Her father had disappeared into thin air with the body of the man he called Jule.
She wasn’t going home. If she’d had friends, she would’ve gone to visit one. She drove to the bed and breakfast instead, where the friendly woman who rented rooms had left the back door open for her. Pacing in her room, she tried hard not to think of what her father was capable of doing to someone he thought was a threat to her. At last, she forced herself to lie down and tried not to think of the man named Jule, whose soul still lingered.
Yully slept deep and late despite the events of the night. Her father had tried to call twice, and she tossed the phone on the bed. She’d hoped sleep would remove some of her confusion from her night.
She still felt him.
Yully shook away her lingering fear. She couldn’t dislodge the image of Jule from her mind. His panther-like physique and tattoos gave him all the appearance of a threat, and yet, he’d fended off her blows with gentleness he didn’t have to show. Her father never would’ve shown such restraint. Jule could’ve broken her in two and hadn’t.
She couldn’t stop thinking about him.
“Yully,” the owner of the bed and breakfast, Moira, called through the door. “I brought you breakfast!”
“Thanks, Moira,” she said and opened the door.
“You father called, dear,” the woman said, holding out a tray of sausage, eggs, blood pudding, and coffee. “He’s worried since you didn’t answer the phone.”
“I just woke up, Moira. I’ll give him a call.”
The plump woman nodded and hurried away, like everyone save her father did around her. Yully ate quickly without touching her phone. She didn’t know what to say to her father after last night. The way he and Jule had talked to each other, like long-lost enemies, rem
inded her she didn’t know much about her father. She’d always been grateful to him for accepting her and her gift, but he’d always refused to tell her what exactly he was and how he seemed to be able to read her mind sometimes. Right now, she didn’t want him reading her mind. Instead of calling him, she texted him.
Leaving now, Papa.
She gathered up her things and left out the back door to avoid the small group of people gathered in the dining room for brunch. The drive home was too short, and she reached the large manor at noon. It still rained, but it wasn’t cold that made her hands tremble as she left the car.
She still felt the man named Jule, and he was here. The sense had grown stronger as she drove nearer. It now felt like it had when she was in the alley: as if he were standing beside her. She gazed up at the solemn façade of the manor before jogging up the walkway to the front door.
The butler opened it when she approached, and a maid stood waiting to take her coat. She shed it and her boots quickly, wanting to escape to her room before her father cornered her. She’d made it halfway up the stairwell when his voice rang out.
“My darling, I expected a phone call.”
Yully drew a deep breath and leaned over the railing to see him. He looked small in the middle of the foyer, and he wore an insincere smile like he might any other piece of easily removable clothing.
“I’m sorry, Father. Last night upset me,” she said truthfully.
“I imagine so. That man will never bother you again,” he said. “Remember I’m dining with the McDonalds tonight.”
“Father, may I go with you someday?” she asked. She willed herself not to think of the man named Jule trapped somewhere in the house. His nearness would drive her crazy if she were forced to be alone with him.
“We’ve discussed this. No one wants anything to do with something like you,” he reminded her. Her face turned hot. “You forget yourself, Yully. There’s one creature who can tolerate you, and that’s me. Go rest for a bit. If you’ve forgotten this, you’re tired.”
