A Magical Reckoning: Magic and Mischief Book 1

by N. R. Hairston

  Slowly I came to my feet, the water inside me boiling with my anger. “Nst, est, grol,” I said, speaking in my mother’s native tongue. Using the water inside me I began to rise in the air. “Nst, est, grul, grol.”

  The whole building began to shake, chairs fell to the side, the table flipped over, and Greg shrank back in fear, nothing but pure terror on his face. Leon’s mouth hung open, and he looked from me to Greg as if expecting one of us to have an explanation for him.

  Inside I cracked. Everything slid to the side and then I shattered completely. I opened my mouth and angry breath flew out of it like the wind. It screamed, hollered, and tore apart everything in its path.

  Greg and Leon were both caught up in my whirlwind. Flipping and turning, no ground beneath them, they both tried desperately to find something to hold on to.

  Lips moving, they were trying to talk to me. It was all moot. I couldn’t see past the force of my wind and the violence of my own anger. Using the water in his body, I brought Greg closer. I snatched him by his shirt, his face mere inches from my own. “Nst, grul, mui, grol.” It came out as a howling scream and I watched with horrific satisfaction as his face broke from the fear.

  I wrapped my hands around his neck and forcibly slammed him to the ground. My attention focused only on him, the chairs fell, the wind stopped, and Leon hit the ground with a grunt.

  Straddling Greg’s hips, I raised him up by the throat, his eyes locked with mine. “Nst, grul, grol!” All I knew was pain. “Nst, grul, grol!” All I felt was rage. I smashed his head into the floor. “Nst, grul, grul.” Blood splattered across my face and I heard his bones crunch.

  It had no effect on me and I smashed him again, my hands choking the life out of him. “How dare you!” My scream turned into a howl and the wind began to whip again.

  The chairs, table, and Leon rose in the air and started to spin. I stayed right where I was, holding Greg down and squeezing as hard as I could. The water boiling in me heated my hands and burned through to his neck. The smell of charred flesh filled the air and still I kept squeezing.

  I could hear the officers on the other side of the door banging and trying to get in. I heard a loud boom and knew they were trying to break the door down. I pushed Greg away and he slid across the floor. My hair flew in every direction and with my arms outstretched, I rose in the air again. I flew the door open and the policeman on the other side began to sway as the wind lifted them.

  I howled out my pain. “Nstee, yee, ghu!” and then dropped them all to the floor. Bodies fell all around me as I busted out the doors and disappeared into the night.

  3

  Leon came for me three hours later. Images of what I’d done plagued my mind and I curled up on my couch wanting nothing more than to sweep it all away.

  Often when we got mad, my sister and I would speak in the language we’d both learned as kids. My mother was from the Isles of Ria, powerful people known for their superior abilities and peaceful attitudes.

  I balled my fist into my stomach, hoping to dull the ache I felt there.

  How ashamed would my mom be of me now? I’d let her down and with her mental powers, she probably already knew what I’d done.

  I picked up the phone to call my sister and then dropped it, not wanting to hear the disappointment in her voice. The doorbell rang twice and then Leon was banging and yelling my name.

  I dragged myself to the door and opened it just a peek. He busted in, stumbling through the threshold. “You really think I’m ready to talk to you through a hunk of wood after the way you showed off today?”

  I clambered back to my place on the couch and swallowed hard. “Did I hurt anyone?”

  He shrugged. “Few bumps and bruises. I told them he’d put the whammy on you again.”

  I didn’t deserve his protection. “Thanks,” I said, barely able to look him in the eye.

  He took a seat on the table in front of me. “No problem, but mind telling me what the hell all that was about?”

  I pulled my covers tightly around me. “I lost control.”

  He nodded. “You speak the language of the Isles.”

  “My mother is from there,” I said quietly. “They live there now. Her and my sister.”

  He shook his head in disbelief. “Never thought I’d see a person from the Isles behave that way.”

  I blanched and then hid my face in the corner of the couch.

  He tapped me on the shoulder. “Oh, come on now. I didn’t mean anything by it. I liked it. You really gave him what for.”

  I turned my head slightly. “It’s not how we do things.”

  “Well, I wouldn’t encourage you to do it again, but I understand.”

  I sat up and folded my legs under me. “Did I hurt him badly?”

  His laugh was laced with disbelieve. “She asks as if we’re talking about the weather.”

  “He can’t die. I think we’ve established that,” I said dryly.

  He started to nod then caught himself and stopped. “Still. But, no. He’s already healed and sitting in a cell. Probably won’t be there for long, though.”

  Probably not. “Why are you here?”

  He stood. “Just doing my job.”

  I walked him to the door. “Well, you can go back and tell them that I’m not in the process of killing anyone.”

  I went to turn the knob, but something on the other side, knocked me back, causing me to stumble and almost fall.

  Amber rushed inside, eyes blazing and hand raised. Leon lifted her in the air and used his TK to throw her across the room.

  Her hand never wavered, and falling backward, she still managed to chant. We were lifted and sucked into a black swirling portal. Darkness surrounded us as we tumbled and flipped, hitting hard when we finally came to a stop.

  We landed in a watery cell and quickly came to our feet. The water wasn’t exactly to our knees, but it was well past our ankles. Some had made it inside my ear, causing a switching sound. Yuk. I hated when that happened, and quickly used my powers to remove it.

  I did the same for Leon. He looked at me, mouth opened a little, then nodded a thanks.

  His clothes clung to him, soaking wet. “What the fuck was that?”

  The cell we were in sat inside of a large room that looked like a police station of some sort. There were many people walking back and forth, but no one paid us any attention. Most of them were dressed in red and blue uniforms and didn’t seem to notice the water under their feet.

  Leon took out his cell phone. “Not used to being on the other side of the bars.” He ran a hand under his collar and his voice came out a little stilted. “Got to call the station. My boys will get us out of here.”

  Well, apparently, he hadn’t been paying attention. Amber had sent us tumbling into Langunda. I knew that as sure as I knew anything. I waited quietly for him to come to the same conclusion.

  He frowned at his phone, then knocked on it a few times. “It didn’t get wet. It was deep inside my inner coat pocket when I fell.”

  “Look around.” I waved my hand about. “Any of this look normal to you?”

  His eyes took in the water, the people dressed in uniform, and the way they were all walking through the water as if it meant nothing. “They need a good plumber?”

  “And we need to get out of Langunda and back home.”

  His head snapped around, taking a closer look at our surroundings. I saw the exact moment that reality set in, panic, then steel resolve.

  Relief flooded me. That would make this so much easier. Someone willing to take charge and get us out of here.

  He wiped a hand down his face. “So they’re going to make you help? Whether you want to or not.”

  Well, not exactly what I was looking for, but I could work with it. “Can’t you just sling the doors open and get us out of here?”

  He peered at the bars over, a thoughtful look on his face. “I can try.” He put his phone up, took a few steps back, and then raised his hands. The bars ratt
led and shook, but stayed firm in their spot. He tried again. Nothing.

  Shit. Heat rose from the back of my neck to my face and hands. The room started to look smaller and the walls began to close in.

  I took a deep breath and then another. What were we going to do? I wanted to call out, but if the people on the other side were ignoring us, then they weren’t hurting us, and that was still important.

  I looked at Leon. “Try again.” My voice sounded like it had when I was a nine-year-old child and the kids at school wouldn’t stop teasing me about only having one power.

  The fact that my power was useless only sweetened it for them. “I’m going to tell my mama.” I’d cried, only to have them laugh even harder. I came from a family of pacifists. There was no real danger in me telling my mom.

  I had anyway. She’d come up to the school and talked to some of the other parents. They’d promised to have a word with their kids and even punish them.

  Whatever they did didn’t work, as my tormentors had come to school that next day and were a hundred times more vicious.

  I shook the unpleasant memories away. I was older now, stronger, and in control of my own destiny. I wouldn’t go down so easily this time. “Well then, let’s come up with a plan,” I said to Leon.

  He chuckled with disbelief, and then looked at me as if I’d grown three heads. I pulled my shirt tightly around me. “What?”

  His tone was incredulous. “Are you really that scared of your own ability? After the way you behaved in my holding room? Really?” His eyebrows drew together and he looked truly confused.

  He was no help at all. We were going to be in here for the rest of our lives. I gasped out loud in an effort to control my panic. The walls started to get closer again. I took a seat on the bench and drew my legs under me. It felt like I was suffocating.

  I took a deep breath and then another. That didn’t work and so I took more. Soon I wouldn’t be able to breathe at all. I wrapped my arms around myself trying to curl into a tiny ball and disappear. All I wanted was to go home. Why couldn’t I go home?

  Leon’s voice cut through my haze. “Delia, I need you to stay with me now. I can’t do this on my own. I need your help, okay?”

  I blinked away the blurriness to see him staring down at me. He took a handkerchief out of his pocket and handed it over. “You’re sweating bad. I’ll try the bars again.”

  I took the folded white cloth and wiped my face, pushing damp hair out of my eyes and tucking it behind my ear. It had to work this time. It just had to.

  Leon held his arm out, and again the bars rattled and shook but didn’t give an inch.

  “You’re not strong enough,” Amber said. She walked into our line of sight, Greg at her side. His face was all healed, and he walked without limp or affliction.

  I jumped up, and Greg stumbled back as if I meant him harm. I blinked at him, stunned, and knew his newfound hesitance around me would take some getting used to.

  Amber stared at him for a good hard second, then turned back to us. “All you have to do is help us and you can leave.”

  “Why is the floor wet?” It was a very silly thing to say and I had no idea where it’d come from.

  She ignored that completely and looked at Greg. “Five years in a mental institution and this is the best we get? No fight at all. She has to do better.”

  He nodded. “Let me try.” His eyes flashed blue and he began to chant under his breath.

  My whole body began to tremble because I knew what that meant. He’d make me do something I didn’t want to do again. Make me behave in a manner that my mother and sister would never forgive me for.

  Make me spend five years in a place that ate away at my soul and left me an empty version of who I used to be. He’d… no! I started to scream, and scream. My arms stretched out and using the water in my body I began to rise. I wouldn’t let him hurt me again. I couldn’t.

  The water below began to tremble, my hair stood straight up, and the only thing on my mind was freedom. Still in the air, I held out my hands, making the water bubble and hiss as I raised the temperature in it. Steam started to rise, but since that was made of water too, I swiped it away, remembering to keep it at bay next time so as not to distract me.

  “Delia!” Leon. I cooled the water on our side of the bars but left the rest burning, still keeping the steam from rising.

  All around us, uniformed people scrambled, jumping up on chairs and desk to get away from the scalding. I wasn’t letting them off that easy.

  They meant to hurt me. Every one of them. Force me into something against my will, and be damned how I felt about it.

  Well, I’d show them exactly how I felt about it. With the water at my mercy, I created a tidal wave that I hurled out in every direction.

  The force of it knocked the bars away and I wasted no time snatching Leon up so that we could get the hell out of there.

  The water rose even higher, and Greg, Amber, and the others went down, arms flapping, and screams turning into bubbles as the water pulled them under. Keeping Leon and myself in the air, we fled the room.

  There was a door down the hall and to the right. Once back on solid ground, we ran for it. Leon and I both used our abilities to knock out anybody who got in our way.

  A frantic voice sounded down the hall. “Stop them.” Amber.

  Without me directing it, the wave must have receded. Amber and Greg, both soaking wet, sprinted our way. I kicked the door open, Leon using his powers to back me up. It flew off its hinges with no resistance it all.

  We kept running. Darkness and water surrounded us. It was night here, yet boats and other such water equipment rode up and down the street. The wind chilled me to the bone, my clothes clinging to me.

  I looked at the unfamiliar surroundings, panic starting to set in. “What do we do?” I asked Leon.

  He grabbed me by the arm. “We keep moving.” By now Greg, Amber, and many others were right behind us. Leon threw them back and we ran in a different direction. They were still close until a blue motorized boatcar knocked them out of the way.

  “Get in!” A voice from inside yelled. “I’m from Kelm. I was sent here to get you.”

  Knowing full well it was probably a trap, we hopped in anyway, leaving Greg and the others in the dust. “Thank you,” I said to our mysterious benefactor.

  She nodded. “I’m Klenaya, but no more talking until we get to Kelm. There, Yama will explain everything.”

  Okay then. I sat back in my seat and finally allowed myself to take a breath. Then I remembered who the Kelm were, and what they had planned for Greg’s people, and I started to panic all over again.

  I looked at Leon, sure that he was thinking the same. He waved his hands in a way that told me to chill out and wait. I nodded and turned back around. I could do that. I could wait and see.

  We rode through the water for a while, then Klenaya told us to buckle up and we went flying. I tried not to scream as I was flattened against my seat. Too scared to breathe, the only thing I could do was hold on until we finally came to a screeching halt in front of a large white palace.

  It looked like something a queen and king would live in, and it was probably big enough to fit a whole country inside. Lights shone down on it making it bright and showing off its spotless shine.

  Klenaya cut the engine and got out. “We’ve had our eye on you. We knew the Langunda would make their move, now that you’re no longer in the take away.”

  Leon and I got out as well. “What’s the take away?”

  “Where you were for the last five years.”

  Oh, the hospital. Okay. I gave her the side eye. Greg had said the Kelm were plotting to take over his people. They didn’t seem hostile so far, but I knew better than to trust them too much.

  We got on an elevator that quickly took us to the top floor. The water was a little higher here, but still barely past our ankles. The room Klenaya led us into was solid white, and a pair of miniature toy boats floated our way.
>
  Two men sat on the floor with controllers in their hands. They yelled and jabbed each other as they twisted and turned the devices from side to side.

  Oh. I think I was more surprised than anything when it finally dawned on me that they were racing. I quickly stepped aside, not wanting to impede anybody from making it to the finish line.

  “Children!” Klenaya hissed at them and then turned to us and smiled.

  The guy on the right looked to be about twenty-one and favored Klenaya so much that I caught myself doing a double-take to make sure I hadn’t missed something.

  They both had tanned colored skin, with bone straight blue-green hair that hung loosely around their shoulders, with bright purple eyes, which seemed to lighten without notice every couple of seconds.

  She pointed at him. “My twin Kyle. And our father, next in line for ruler of Kelm, Bale. Aren’t we in such good hands,” she said sarcastically.

  A scream erupted from the floor and Kyle jumped up, dancing, and hopping across the room. “I got it, dad. I got it. First world champion, you’ll never catch up.”

  I looked at Leon and his face read my emotions exactly. What the hell kind of people were we dealing with here?

  The other man was older, a little on the short side with a bald head. He came to his feet with a smile. “Nice to meet you. I’m Bale. This is my son, Kyle, and I guess you know Klenaya.”

  Klenaya sighed loudly. “I already told them that.”

  “No harm in telling them again,” he answered right away and then looked me over. “Let’s go in here.”

  We followed him into a spacious room with black and gold walls, water covering a matching floor. A large table sat in the middle with about twenty chairs around it.

  It looked like something one would expect to see in a castle, and it smelled like peaches and berries, probably because of the multiple fruit bowls sitting atop the table. I looked to Leon, who seemed as impressed as I was.

  Bale bid us to have a seat and then left the room.

  Back a moment later, he walked behind a brown-skinned man, with shoulder-length purple hair. I knew before even being told that this had to be Yama.