I knelt beside the illusionist.
“Mira.” I touched her shoulder lightly. “I’m sorry. But I need to see …”
“I’m dying,” she whispered.
A sharp pinpoint of pain exploded in my chest. I tried to push the feeling away. I didn’t know Mira well enough to mourn her, to get caught up in this moment and let it distract me. I had a city to protect. People to protect, who did matter to me. Except …
“You promised me something, Jade,” Mira whispered.
I had. Almost flippantly, I had made her a promise.
“Revenge.” I touched her shoulder again. “If I couldn’t get you home.”
She turned her head, painfully slowly, to look at me. Her eyes were a glassy, milky green. “Tell me again … how my brother died. We came here, born to serve. Born to survive …” Her hand twitched. She was trying to run her fingers through the black sand she’d manifested. “But it doesn’t feel right here … the magic doesn’t …” She lapsed into a lyrical language full of vowel sounds that I couldn’t understand.
I didn’t know what she was trying to say. I didn’t know what she wanted to hear from me. I wiped my cheek, realizing only then that despite my resolve, I was crying. I should have been tearing through the illusion and carving Reggie’s heart out. But I was afraid that if I destroyed Mira’s last bit of magic, I would kill her.
She touched her chin to the back of the hand I was still resting on her shoulder. “Tell me of my brother, please. And I will pretend it is him holding me here for this moment. In our favorite place …”
Desperately trying to figure out what she wanted, I tried to remember as much as I could about the elf I had casually murdered in the park three months before. “He was tall …”
“Yes,” she murmured.
“And strong. And quick. Brave to have stayed behind to protect you, despite being injured.” I paused, thinking through the conversation and the blows I’d traded with Mira’s brother. “Sharp tongued.”
Mira shuddered, sighing. But I was fairly certain she was trying to laugh.
“He didn’t cry out. Not even allowing himself a single moment of pain.”
“He died well.”
“Yes … his magic tasted of the air a moment before a storm hits, paired with cedar and sap.”
She whispered something that I thought might have been a name. Her brother’s name.
Then the cushion of the black sand underneath my knees turned to hard pavement, and the sound of the surf faded away.
Rain joined the tears on my cheeks.
The illusion fell away.
Mira was dead.
Reggie was crouched on the other side of the illusionist, her head bowed and her gaze on the dead elf between us. The roundabout was otherwise empty. The warriors were out of sight — presumably having headed out to try to hold off my companions. But I didn’t need help to deal with an elf who didn’t know any better than to wear a cloak that dragged around her ankles.
“I’m not a murderer,” I said. “But if you have a version of hell in your world, if it’s even accessible from here, I’m going to enjoy carving out your heart and sending you there.”
Reggie met my gaze. Then she nodded. “We shall see.”
Her magic hit me full force, a torrent of power that instantly began to suffocate me. And in the moment it took for me to fight through that magic, trying to thunder and rage its way through my skin and into my bones, Reggie reached down.
She ripped the gemstone out of Mira’s forehead.
She pressed it against my own.
Lightning lashed through me, burying its roots deep within my brain. I screamed as I tried to wrench away from Reggie’s hold. She climbed on top of me, pinning my arms even as the hurricane of her magic streamed through the gemstone cutting into my skin.
Driven by the onslaught, the thunderstorm, the gem burrowed into my forehead.
A shadow appeared before me. Freddie was attacking Reggie, latching onto her face. She tore him off with her free hand, somehow managing to pin him to the ground with a crystal knife only inches from my face.
I screamed, but in frustration. Using the sharp focus the anger brought me, I reached out with my alchemy and wrenched the knife out of Freddie. The blade exploded into a fine crystal powder.
“Go, Freddie,” I cried, getting my feet underneath me in an attempt to buck Reggie off my chest. “To Mory. Take care of Mory.”
The shadow leech disappeared.
I turned my full attention to Reggie, reaching out with my unleashed alchemy and trying to take hold of her magic even as she tried to invade my mind. My power battered against hers, as hers battered against mine. But I was the stronger —
Rough hands yanked my legs straight, pinning each to the ground. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t physically shake Reggie off me.
The telepath began to mutter, chanting. And with each utterance, another tendril of magic was coaxed from the gemstone, then painstakingly anchored in my brain. Another. Another.
I tried to counter the magic with my own, tried to close off the pathways being carved through my mind, but I would shut down one only to miss two others. My sense of self, my sense of my magic, my abilities, began to wane … swallowed … supplanted …
Unable to bear the pain any longer, my mind shut down. It closed itself off, taking my consciousness with it.
12
Cold … rain sprinkled my cheeks … my neck … my aching forehead.
I opened my sore, dry eyes, looking up at a dark, cloudy sky through sticky eyelashes. I was lying on hard pavement. I could feel the smooth edge of a concrete curb underneath the fingers of my left hand. I tried to lick the raindrops off my lips, but my tongue felt as though it were glued into my mouth.
A tall, pale woman stood over me. She bared sharp, pointed teeth. “Rise and do your duty.”
I opened my mouth to answer … but then … I didn’t speak. Couldn’t speak?
“Rise,” the woman hissed. No. The elf … she was an elf.
A hurricane swept through my mind, thundering a wave of pain through my skull, my neck, down through my limbs. I arched up, twisted away, trying to get away from the pounding pressure. Words were torn from my throat.
“Yes … my … liege …”
The pain abated. Achingly. Slowly.
Panting and shaking, I found my feet. But unable to stand, I crouched by my lady’s side. She touched my head. Another command ran through me. Unspoken this time. Telling me to heel.
I stayed where I was. I did what I was told. I didn’t want to invite the hurricane back.
The pavement was wet with rain. A huge shiny steel bear and a cub were at my back. More elves stood arrayed to either side. Their blood armor was a smear of white against the darkness surrounding them … me … us. But they were hurt, favoring wounds.
One elf was dead. Lying only a few feet away. Her … magic … was crumbling. Falling into tiny flakes to be washed away by the rain … minuscule flakes of … nothing.
My chest felt heavy at this sight, then tight. I bowed my head so I didn’t have to see the pretty elf crumble. I pressed my palms to the ground, spreading my fingers. Something red dripped onto the back of my hand, mixing with the rain, sliding across my skin …
Was I bleeding? From my forehead? And why didn’t my skin glow, as the others’ did?
The lingering pain in my head was distracting. I didn’t want to try to think.
Footsteps approached.
Four separate sets. Magic rumbled underneath my hands. The energy traveling through the pavement was different for each of the newcomers. There was something I was supposed to know about the power approaching. But I still couldn’t quite … figure out what it was —
My liege brushed her fingers against my head, as if checking that I was there, that I was ready. Ah, the newcomers were enemies of my lady.
I looked up. My wet hair was tangled around my face, obscuring my vision.
The newcomers
had paused about a dozen feet away.
At the center forefront stood a tiny blond woman. She was the most dangerous. Though what I based that assessment on, I didn’t know. Instinct. And the long blade that brimmed with power in her left hand.
At the woman’s side stood a tall, broad-shouldered, dark-blond male. He was staring at me, not deferentially at my liege as he should have been. He held a knife that teemed with power, urging me … to do what?
To the right, but slightly behind the first two, stood a green-haired woman wearing thick golden cuffs that brimmed with magic. And a pale-faced, pale-blond man, who held no weapons of power.
All four of the strangers stared at me.
Shocked. Concerned. Fearful.
Why?
“Jade?” the green-haired woman whispered, pushing her way in front of the other three.
My lady laughed.
The sound scurried down the back of my neck and through my limbs. I shuddered to rid myself of the feeling, pressing my hands to the pavement on which I was crouched. The asphalt cracked. I’d pressed too hard.
“Not anymore,” my liege crowed.
Energy — epic amounts of power — boiled around the four strangers. I could practically feel the thickening of the air between and around us.
No. That was magic. Their magic unleashed. And it didn’t … hurt, didn’t try to hold me at bay or command me. That was important … there was something important about that feeling.
“Dragon slayer,” my lady said, tapping me sharply on the head. “I need them alive.”
“What have you done?” the broad-shouldered male snarled.
“Take them.”
The hurricane rampaged through my mind. Again. It spurred me forward, it demanded … obedience …
No.
Forced. It forced my obedience.
I lunged, knowing that the pain would abate once I fulfilled the command.
One of the weapons held on the chain around my neck gleefully desired the utter destruction of the tiny but dangerous blond, so I let it loose with a flick of my wrist. It spun toward her with a flash of silver.
Dashing forward on the rain-slick pavement, I slammed my fist up underneath the green-haired woman’s chin. Knocking her out of the fight before she’d even seen me move.
Avoiding an arcing blow coming from my left, I spun away, reaching up and pulling the necklace I wore over my head off in the same motion. I snapped the chain out to its full length as I turned to face the broad-shouldered man. With the side of my hand, I knocked away the knife he held raised against me. Then I stepped closer, lassoing him with the chain.
The tiny blond fell, cracking the pavement in a wide radius all around her. The centipede I’d unleashed upon her writhed across her chest and up toward her neck.
The green-haired woman flew backward, slamming against the concrete foundations of the building to the left. Then she tumbled, falling insensible to the ground.
The male I held fast with the necklace struggled against my hold, attempting to speak even as I choked him. The skin of his neck reddened. His hands were burning as he tried to rip the chain from his neck. He fell to his knees. I tugged him back against me, holding him fast.
The pale, weaponless blond watched his companions fall without reacting, without taking his gaze from me. His eyes were bright red.
“I said alive,” my liege said.
A tornado backing her command flashed through my mind. I immediately loosened my grip on the chain, returning it to my neck. The broad-shouldered man collapsed forward, making no attempt to break his fall.
Stepping over him, I retrieved the centipede, returning it to my necklace before it could enter the tiny blond’s brain through her ear. She moaned but didn’t otherwise move.
Calling my sword to me, I stalked toward the pale man. A vampire, I now saw.
He didn’t move, simply continuing to regard me. Again, if he carried a weapon, I couldn’t sense it. But I could see his magic glistening in every cell of his body, and I knew without any doubt that the best thing I had to counter him was my katana. My sword was a murderer, a slayer. Like me.
But that wasn’t what my lady had commanded. She wanted, she needed, the newcomers alive for some reason.
It was difficult to speak, to form words. But I didn’t know how else to communicate, to explain why I would dare to hesitate to fulfill her commands. “This one I would have to kill to subdue.”
“No matter,” my liege said.
The other elves shifted around us, circling back behind the vampire, then fanning out. But the pretty elf still lay on the wet ground only a few feet from me. She was almost half washed away. I tried to angle my head so I couldn’t see her, but in order to still keep my attention on the vampire, I couldn’t turn far enough.
Five elves in blood armor loosely circled the vampire. Three appeared badly wounded. Their skin was as pale as his, but tinted green. I glanced down at the hand I had wrapped around the hilt of my sword. My skin wasn’t as pale as either of them.
Wasn’t I an elf?
The vampire closed his eyes, though he didn’t appear to be in pain. “Jasmine,” he said. He wasn’t speaking to the elves … or to me. “Jasmine. Heed me now.”
Power was laced through his words. But it wasn’t directed toward me or my liege, so I didn’t feel the need to react.
A golden-haired woman, another vampire to judge by her magic, stumbled out from behind the building I’d thrown the green-haired woman against. She moved jerkily, as if she’d been pulled forth by his command.
As I was commanded by my liege?
As I was controlled?
“Go to Pearl,” the vampire said, speaking to the woman he controlled without looking away from me. “Pearl must know that Jade has been compromised. Watch over the others. Go now.” The power in those last two words practically knocked the second vampire back. She stumbled away.
“Take her,” my lady said, but the command wasn’t for me.
An elf warrior slipped by us, pursuing the golden-haired vampire. His departure lowered the elves’ number to four plus my liege … though why that was important, I wasn’t certain. I hoped the female vampire was swift on her feet. Though why I would care about that, I also didn’t know.
“She answers to you,” I said, addressing the vampire. “The golden-haired one, who you called Jasmine.”
“Yes,” he said. “She is mine. As I am yours.”
Then he knelt before me, placing his hands on his head.
Confused, I raised my sword. I didn’t understand why he would kneel to embrace death. But I was ready to deal that death on my lady’s command.
“Take him,” my lady said. Again, the magic in her words wasn’t for me.
Two of the elves behind the vampire surged forward, grabbing his arms. I sheathed my sword, turning back to my liege’s side.
The vampire threw off his captors without apparent effort, lunging forward to grab me. Pressing his hands to either side of my face, he pulled me toward him.
I expected him to snap my neck.
I expected him to kill me.
But I didn’t call forth the knife strapped to my thigh, though I could feel it urging me to protect myself.
Because I welcomed death. Welcomed the reprieve to the relentless storm that threatened to consume my mind and control my very soul.
He kissed me.
His hold was impossibly hard, yet his lips were soft against mine. Cool magic slipped through the tempest simmering in my mind. His magic. He wielded some sort of telepathy, like my liege. But he wasn’t trying to hurt me or command me.
He was trying to dampen the hurricane, to quell the tornado.
I parted my lips, breathing him in …
He tasted of peppermint.
And freedom.
“Remember, my love,” he whispered. “Remember who you are.”
An elf wrapped his arm around the vampire’s neck, while two others got a hold on his arms and shoulders
, yanking him away from me.
The vampire let me go, but the elves were struggling to drag him away. He was too strong for them to easily subdue.
I wasn’t an elf.
I wasn’t a vampire.
“Then … who am I?” I whispered, brushing my fingers against my lips and feeling his magic lingering there. The storm in my mind had eased, but it wasn’t fully dispersed.
“Jade …”
I could hear the truth twined into the magic he wielded. Power that allowed him access to my mind … and maybe my heart?
“Jade Godfrey.”
Jade Godfrey.
Yes.
I was Jade.
And Jade didn’t heel or heed … anyone.
I whirled around. Another elf shouldered past me, piling on to subdue the vampire …
Kett.
The vampire’s name was Kett.
And Kett could deal with the elves.
I had only one thing I needed to do.
Already calling my jade blade into my hand, I lunged for my liege.
No.
Her name was Reggie.
She tried to block my strike, but she wasn’t anywhere near fast or strong enough. I drove my knife home, hoping that her elf’s heart was situated in the same place mine was.
She gasped. But instead of fighting me off, she grabbed the back of my neck with one hand and slammed the palm of her other hand to my forehead. She drove her magic and the power of the gemstone farther back into my brain.
“Stop,” she commanded.
I twisted the knife, fighting the pain streaming through my head. I tried to pull back my hand, to deal another blow.
Reggie’s breathing was labored, greenish white spittle forming on the edges of her lips. “Heed me, dragon slayer.”
Then I couldn’t move my arm any further.
I couldn’t speak.
I screamed but made no sound.
“Step back,” the elf said, coughing up blood.
She held me fast with the power of her mind, but she couldn’t actually make me move. I could still taste Kett’s peppermint magic. I clung to that taste … to the feeling of belonging …
Reggie snarled viciously. She pressed her hand to her chest, next to where the blade of my knife penetrated, coating her fingers in her own blood. She smeared that blood across my forehead, across the gemstone. The magic carried within it bit into my skin, further cementing the stone — then shooting multiple strands of magic back into my brain at once.
Misfits, Gemstones, and Other Shattered Magic (Dowser 8) Page 23
