by CC Solomon
Chapter 24
We didn’t go to the hospital in town, and instead, went to see Bill. Erik wanted only the best for me. Carter brought Blake as well, and Raya also joined us. Faith, Felix, and Charles later made an appearance. No one had heard from Lisa, who I was concerned sacrificed herself for us. I wasn’t certain she was stronger than Joo-won, but the fact he didn’t immediately return when she took him away let me know she had the power to subdue him. I also had hopes that since I did not kill his right hands, he would return the favor. It was a small hope, but a hope, nonetheless. Joo-won could have killed us all, and he didn’t. Curious.
Bill finished patching me up as good as new with the additional aid of magic from the others. I was currently in a murky state due to all the healing magic. Part of me felt like I was floating on a cloud or a body of water. Strong healing magic felt a lot like painkillers. This explained why there was a growing issue of healing magic abuse. It really was a drug. Just not the kind that made you go all primal.
Erik, back in clothed human form, watched me with worry. I rested on the beige couch in the living room of the cozy two-story townhouse. When we first got to Bill and Mae’s place, Bill had to practically wrestle me away from Erik, still a werejackal, to heal me. And even then, Erik stood guard over us. He wouldn’t even let Mae near. Instead, she hovered at the outskirts of the living room close to the foyer area.
Charles, Felix, and Faith also showed up not long after us, and stood near Mae, Carter, and Raya as Bill tended to me under Erik’s intimidating gaze.
I scrunched up my face. “Can you not breathe over me? Your breath is so hot,” I whined.
Erik raised an eyebrow and leaned back.
Charles walked over to me. “Hey Sis, how you feeling?”
Erik threw an arm out, blocking him from coming any closer to me.
Charles looked him up and down. “Dude, that’s my sister,” he stated with a confused look on his face.
Erik kept monitoring me, but he didn’t speak. He hadn’t spoken since before turning into full were form.
Charles leaned around him. “What’s wrong with your guy, Sis?”
“I wouldn’t argue with him. He slapped someone’s head off and ate a whole, entire heart,” I said, shaking my head slowly.
“Seth was hurting her, and they were in the way,” Carter explained.
“Who was in the way?” Felix asked at a respectable distance.
“The Keebler elves,” I replied with a giggle.
Felix frowned and looked at the others in confusion. “So, they were small? Did they make cookies by any chance?”
I laughed harder. “I don’t know, Erik killed them before I could ask.”
Faith scratched her head, messing up her short pixie cut. “Is she high?”
Bill gave a nod. “In a way, on an abundance of healing magic. She’ll be back to normal soon.”
“Where is Lisa, again?”
“She’s with Joo-won still. She says she’s fine,” Felix answered, pointing to his head.
“How do you know that?” Raya asked.
“We’re a special six, and we can communicate telepathically,” Faith explained.
“Raya,” I shouted, propping myself up on my elbows. “You are not the bitch I thought you were. You are the real MVP for shooting Seth earlier.”
Raya squinted her eyes at me. “Thank you… I think.”
“Blake, where were you?” Charles asked, retreating farther from me since my bodyguard was not moving.
Blake, who had been sitting in the dining room, soon appeared in the living room area fully recovered. “So, let me explain. I’m not a soulmate. You have to believe me. Joo-won broke me out of confinement. At the time, he was the best choice since you all turned on me. Then he and his elves tried to sell me on these originals and to join their cause,” she explained.
“And you want us to believe you aren’t on their side?” Faith asked, crossing her arms.
“I’m asking you to trust me. These guys are scary. They aren’t going to let you all live. They don’t play fair, and I get concerned with people like that. I don’t think they mean anything good for any of us in the long run. I did get the picture Joo-won wasn’t really siding with them because he believed in them but because he felt he didn’t have a choice.”
“Blake, you’re a jerk because you punched me, but then you were cool again because you didn’t do what Joo-won said, and yeah, Lisa said Joo-won was doing this because he was threatened or something,” I rambled.
Blake got on her toes and looked over to me past Erik’s shoulder. “I’m sorry for punching you, honey. I was trying to play the part. After I decided I wasn’t going to follow the originals, my whole goal was to be an insider over there and learn what I could. Seth made regular calls to Joo-won and other original allies.”
“We heard him talking to someone on the phone a few times having weird conversations,” Felix stated.
“Assuming we believe anything you say, if you aren’t the female soulmate, do you know who is?” Faith asked.
Blake shrugged. “I tried to find out. She visited. I heard her voice but didn’t get a chance to see her.”
“Did you recognize her voice?” Charles inquired.
“It sounded vaguely familiar, but I’m not sure.”
Amina. Phillip’s voice shouted in my head.
“Well, it’s about damn time,” I said out loud. “Where have you been? You said you’d always have my back. You’re a big fat liar who lies.”
“What the hell’s she talking about?” Charles asked, pointing to me.
I think I’m dying? I need you.
I sat up. “Where are you?”
Hag-
He cut out, and then there was only silence in my head.
“Phillip?” Phillip?
Still nothing from him.
I looked to the group. “Phillip’s in trouble.”
“Where is he?” Faith asked.
I swung my feet off the couch. “I think he was trying to say Hagerstown before we got disconnected or whatever this telepathic communication is.”
“Ok, we’ll go try to find him there. You stay here and finish healing.”
“Yeah, right,” I replied as I made a slow attempt to stand up.
Erik reached over and steadied me by my arms. Most of my injuries were healed from the worst of the damage, but I wasn’t back to one hundred percent.
He shook his head. Still refusing to talk.
“What? I can’t hear you,” I shouted.
He tightened his grip on me, worry filling his light eyes.
I turned to Bill. “Why can’t he talk?”
“It’s the effects of the drug and that battle. It took a toll on him,” Bill explained. “Give him time. He won’t bounce back from the were mindset so quickly now. I’m surprised he’s even back in human shape.”
I turned back to Erik. “I know you’re worried, but I have to go. If Phillip gets himself killed, I could die too. I have to get to him.”
“You know I got to say it, Sis. This could be a set up since we know he’s been up to no good with Chelsea,” Charles stated.
I nodded. “Yep, possibly, but if it’s not and he dies, and then I die, that would completely suck. So maybe if we could stay on our toes and just look into it, that’d be cool.”
“Teleportation would be a bad idea for you right now,” Bill warned.
“I don’t have time for an almost two-hour drive. So, I’m going to have to suck it up.” I waved goodbye to everyone and recited a spell of teleportation. Erik still held on to me. No surprise that he was coming along for the ride, and I was thankful for that. I still felt a little loopy.
When I arrived in front of Chelsea’s apartment, the world decided to spin or was it me? I grabbed my head, as if to steady it. Well, at least I didn’t pass out like Bill thought I would. Small victories.
Erik pounded on her door, but there was no answer. She was our first guess in Hagerstown. Phill
ip only spent time in that town for Chelsea and to do healing.
“Do you hear anything inside?” I asked him.
Erik shook his head.
“What if there’s cloaking magic?” Felix inquired, standing beside me.
Charles and Faith stood behind Erik. It wasn’t that they were all big fans of Phillips, but if something happened to him, they too were concerned that it would affect me. And it was nice to have almost all of us together to fight.
I lifted my hands as if touching the air. “I don’t feel any magic.”
“Me either,” Charles replied with closed eyes.
“Let’s go to the hospital. If he’s not there, someone might know where he could be.”
“Felix and I will find Shayla and Henry. They might know something,” Faith stated, motioning her head sideways for Felix to follow.
Charles recited the teleportation spell again, and the three of us ended up at the front desk of the hospital reception area. I leaned on the counter, shutting my eyes as a wave of dizziness washed over me. I felt Erik’s hand on my back, but I put a hand up to let him know I was fine.
The male behind the counter looked at us with unsurprised eyes. Being in a town of magic meant he got a lot of literal pop ups.
“We’re looking for a Phillip Leal,” I announced.
The male scrunched his eyes in thought.
“Brown skinned guy with magic healing powers,” I added in almost a shout. For all I knew, he could be gone from the town completely by now.
“Yes, Phil,” he exclaimed and slapped his forehead lightly. “Sorry, yeah, I saw him come in about two hours ago. Haven’t seen him leave yet, but sometimes he just teleports out to go to the offsite.”
“What? What’s an offsite?” By now, I was practically leaning over the counter, ready to shake some speedy answers from him.
The receptionist, who’s translucent plastic name tag held a white piece of paper with the name Danny on it, looked up at me with wide eyes. “It’s where we keep anyone paranormal or human with the Sickness. It’s actually two separate floors in a hotel. Paranormal people help take care of the regular humans, and the regulars take care of the paranormals with guards. Phil can go to both because he’s immune to it all. Why is that?”
I sucked in a breath to calm myself. “Danny, where is this place?”
Danny gave us the name and directions, and I sent a mental alert out to Felix, Faith, and Lisa, wherever she was.
“Can you ask them if Phil is there?”
Danny, smartly sensing I was in no mood to waste time, quickly got on the phone and made an inquiry.
“They said they saw him an hour ago. They don’t know if he’s still there.”
Shayla and Henry came to the hospital to help personnel do a search for Phillip. I didn’t want to wait around for them and felt time would be used better if we went to search the offsite.
I had never been there though, so I couldn’t teleport because I wasn’t confident of where it was. Instead, we got a car and drove the mile out of town to the hotel. A few cars were parked in the front, and we jumped out of the car, not bothering to park, instead leaving it in front of the driveway.
We raced through the sliding glass doors to the receptionist area. An older woman with white hair jumped back slightly as we came rushing in.
“Hi, have you seen Phil?” I asked.
She shook her head quickly, eyes confused. “Phil?”
I rolled my eyes. “Phillip Leal.” Geez, were there that many Phillips and Phil’s in town?
She exclaimed. “Oh, Phillip. Lovely young man. Yes, I saw him about an hour ago. He was heading to the Regular levels.”
“And,” I started, looking down at her makeshift nametag. “Martha, where would that be?”
“Floors two and three. Paranormals are on floors nine and ten. Just in case you want to know.”
“Yes, I would have. Thank you,” I replied with as much sweetness as I could put in my smile currently.
I ran to the stairwell, near the elevators to the left of the check in area. Erik and Charles were on my heels.
We searched all four levels. No Phillip. We had just missed him on the Regular levels by a little over thirty minutes.
I stood in the middle of the hallway on the tenth floor, scratching my head. “What if this was all a set up to trap him, not us. What if someone told him to come here, to this barely protected location, and a soulmate or an ally of theirs was waiting to attack him. We killed two of Joo-won’s people. He could have sent some elves to take revenge through Phillip.”
“Wouldn’t Lisa know and tell us?” Charles asked.
“I don’t know. I don’t know,” I said, panic rising in my voice.
Erik put a hand on my shoulder. He frowned but continued to remain mute. I looked up at him and touched his hand.
“Anything can happen in the span of thirty minutes. He could be teleported to some hell dimension where he’s being vivisected or falling down an endless pit getting shanked by dull blades along the way.”
Charles scrunched up his face. “You need to stop reading horror books.”
I dropped my shoulders. “This is not a joking matter. My locator spell didn’t work on finding him, and no one has seen him. The last time we lost someone like that, it was Lisa, and she was in another realm none of us can get to.”
“But it’s different with you and Phillip because, like it or not, you are soulmates. You can’t hide from each other.”
“We didn’t know where each other was before we met.”
Erik moved his hand from my shoulder, and I looked up. He tapped his wrist together, then crossed them.
I shrugged. “I have no time for charades.”
“Relax, Sis. He can’t speak right now. Give him a break,” Charles chided me.
I shook my head. “I’m sorry. Okay. So, what are you doing with your wrist? Shackles? You’re shackled? Tied?”
“Bonded,” Charles exclaimed. “You suck at this.”
Erik nodded, and I wasn’t sure if it was because Charles was right about the bond guess or because he agreed that I sucked.
“You want me to use my bonding magic?”
Erik nodded again.
“Yeah, Sis, just like meditate or something and find him,” Charles said as if it were the easiest thing in the world.
I fought hard not to glare at them both and instead walked down the hall. I sat in an upholstered chair next to a window near the elevators and closed my eyes.
I inhaled slowly and released a deep breath through my mouth. I repeated this several times, and finally, I felt a calmness surround me. Then I thought of Phillip’s face. His soulful puppy dog eyes that made me instantly trust him when I first met him. I thought of his smile and the good he’d done. I by-passed any negative memories of him and just kept my mind on his help, given to me when I was in that prison for paranormals, how he saved Mercy’s life, and how he helped me when I was attacked by a ghost and unseelie back in Ireland. He was a part of me. We were one, we had to be. I should have been able to find … myself.
When I thought of it like that my mind seemed to buzz, no longer from the medical drugging but from my own bonding magic.
And then I saw an image of a room. The floor was carpeted, and there were no windows. There was an open space on the right with a floor to ceiling wall divider folded together in the center and exposing another darker area behind it. I quickly realized he was in a conference room. This hotel hosted conferences and other events in the Pre-World, and the dividers were used to make spaces smaller or larger. He was most likely on the lowest level of the hotel, then.
I opened my eyes and jumped up. “I think Phillip’s in the conference area here,” I ran to the elevator and pressed the down button.
Erik and Charles didn’t ask questions, just followed me onto the elevator.
Chapter 25
We entered the conference space with careful steps. There were many closed doors to the left of the f
loor. I didn’t ponder which one and let my feet guide me to the last door. I reached out to turn the knob, but Erik quickly moved my hand away.
I looked up at him with confusion, and he just shook his head before grabbing the knob himself to turn. I decided to pause my annoyance for now and let him do his thing.
When we stepped inside, we were greeted to a barely lit room holding a few candles in the center for light. The sides of the room were dark, and I assumed since Erik didn’t seem alarmed, that nothing was waiting in the shadows to attack us. I could only see one figure directly across from us near the collection of candles.
I gasped, throwing a hand over my mouth. Phillip was pinned against the wall by some form of binding magic as there were no obvious constraints, but that wasn’t the horrible part. His chest had been opened in a vertical line from pelvis to collar bone. The incision looked almost surgical, and there was no damage to his organs. It was as if someone had planned to do some magic surgery on him. Blood tricked to the floor, but nothing else spilled out. Phillip’s head hung forward.
I rushed towards him.
“Mina, stop,” Charles called. “He’s warded. Look at the floor.
I looked down and noticed Phillip was encased in a semi-circle made by white chalk. Symbols played along the line of the circle.
“You don’t know what kind of ward that is,” Charles continued.
Wards came in many forms. Some were symbols, others were spells, and still, others were powders. Some were extremely strong and long lasting. Others were weak and meant to hold for only a brief time. Other wards kept people in, and some kept people out. Worse still, some wards weren’t just defensive.
There were wards that hurt you if you touched them like some kind of booby trap. Those kinds were rarely invisible, which was the only good thing about them. You wouldn’t unknowingly cross those and end up being set ablaze.
“Any ideas on what kind of wards these are?” I took a step back. Tears welled in my eyes as I looked at Phillip’s unconscious body hanging from the wall. The amount of pain he was in must have been unbearable.
