Caffeinated Magic: Supernatural Barista Academy

by Rylee Sanibel

There were about twenty demons arrayed around them. They were quiet now, a far cry from how rowdy they had been during the feast, and Abby noticed that their ears and noses twitched as they scanned their surroundings for any hint of an S.B.A. ambush.

  All around the group of alert demons lay the destruction caused in their last foray: charred sofas, tables turned to ash, shattered crockery, broken glass and scorched walls.

  “All right, sis,” Casey said in her usual, bright voice which, now that Abby was aware of how deep in she was with the demons seemed to make her words far more sinister than they were at face value, “now it’s your time to shine.”

  Abby looked at her. “What do you mean?”

  “Duh, you’re going to let us into the joint.”

  “Casey,” Abby said, “that is not going to happen.”

  Casey sighed. “Fine,” she said. She motioned to one of the demons to her left and the swarthy figure disappeared, returning a moment later with a couple of human children in tow. The children’s faces were streaked with tears and grime.

  Abby looked from the kids to Casey and back to the children.

  Casey sighed again. “Please don’t make me go through the whole boring process of threatening to do something nasty to these little guys, Abs,” she said. “Here’s what’ll happen: I’ll threaten them, you’ll tell me that even I wouldn’t be so cruel, then I’d have my beautiful assistant tear the spine right out of one of their backs – to your shock and horror, obviously – and then you’d capitulate and get us in. Let’s just skip that whole bloody middle, hmm?”

  Abby looked at her sister and saw that she was perfectly calm and composed.

  “All right,” she said, “but as soon as I do it, you let those two go.”

  “That’s the plan.”

  “I’ll need a shot of espresso.”

  “Okay, but don’t try anything silly, sis.”

  Casey poured Abby a shot of hot espresso from a flask handed to her by one of her minions. Abby knocked it back and almost instantly felt the caffeine flood her brain. She knelt and placed her hands in the middle of the coffee cup that was engraved into the floor—the portal to the Supernatural Barista Academy. Muttering a few words that Spiridon had told her activated the portal, even when it was locked down in states of emergency, Abby felt the tug as space and time started to magically pull at her.

  “Ditch the kids!” she heard Casey yell at the demon holding the two children, and Abby saw the children run out of the café, little feet kicking up fountains of ash as they scurried to safety. Then her sister said, “You’re going too so that you can have the pleasure of watching your friends die. Won’t that be a treat? I’m sorry that I’m going to miss the fun, but I’m sure the boys will take good care of you.”

  Then the world blurred and stretched as Abby and the demon gang were sucked down into the bowels of the S.B.A.

  Abby staggered as she and the group of bandits materialized in the Hopper. The demons were crowing and yelling, sending their battle-cries echoing around the cavernous space.

  A completely empty space.

  Abby looked around. “Where the hell is everyone?”

  Many of the demons flew off in pairs, taking different routes down the twisting passages, screaming out challenges as they went, leaving only a handful with Abby.

  With a grinding of stone, a large panel in the floor slid back and the giant coffee mug through which Abby and other members of the S.B.A. had watched the attack on the coffee shop above rose through the floor. Instinctively, Abby walked over to it and stared into its murky, milky depths.

  What she saw sent fear flooding through her body like an ice-cold frappe.

  There was a bomb sitting at the bottom of the mug, partly obscured by the foam of the coffee. Abby had never seen a bomb in the flesh, as it were, but she’d seen enough movies to know what a diminishing digital timer usually foretold. The neon red numbers that were ticking down with an awful finality, on this timer, were dreadfully clear even through the swirling coffee.

  10…

  9…

  8…

  Then, out of nowhere, Drake appeared. He burst like a train from one of the side hallways and charged into the stunned demons, knocking two of them flying like skittles.

  7…

  6…

  5…

  As Abby watched, dumbfounded, he head-butted another demon so hard that its face crumpled inward and it collapsed, gurgling.

  4…

  3…

  Then, to Abby’s amazement, an enormous white wing burst from the back of his shirt, sweeping another couple of demons away as if they weighed nothing at all.

  2…

  Drake grabbed Abby, pulled her tight into his chest and enfolded both of them in his huge wing.

  1…

  And then there was noise and light and roaring, rushing air.

  Chapter 13

  Abby didn’t realize that she had passed out until she opened her eyes and understood that she was a few hundred feet up in the air. It was frightening and her arms and legs clenched spasmodically, wrapping themselves around the only solid thing near her, which happened to be Drake.

  “Easy!” Drake grunted. “Any tighter and you’ll cut off the circulation to my wing! Besides, I’ve got you. Your arms and legs have been swinging all over the place while you were out cold.”

  Abby managed to loosen her grip just enough to make sure she didn’t leave imprints in Drake’s flesh and said stiffly, “I was not out cold, thank you very much… I was resting.”

  “If only you knew how many bugs have flown into your mouth while you’ve been ‘resting,’” Drake said, and Abby could hear the grin in his voice.

  They flew for a few minutes more. Abby saw that they seemed to be heading back to Rotwood Harbor and, sure enough, when Drake started to descend, she saw that they were making for one of the many long, broken-down piers that stuck out from the harbor like fingers pointing accusingly out to sea.

  Drake glided downward in gentle spirals, barely needing to flap his one wing at all as he rode the air currents. With all the impact of stepping off a stoop, he landed on the longest of the quays and set Abby gently on her feet.

  Abby took a step back from the big man – the person that she had longed to see above all others, and yet who was the last person she expected to see again. He looked weary and was covered in dust and ash and blood. Behind his back a solitary wing, huge and feathered and white, folded and hung still.

  Abby drank in the sight of Drake. Her yearning for him over the past weeks made him look even finer than she remembered. She was still comprehending the fact that she had been about to die –vaporized by that bomb – and Drake had come out of nowhere to save her.

  Had he been waiting there? If so, for how long? Had he been waiting for me or the demons? Did he think I’d come back to the S.B.A., or was it a complete fluke that we happened to be there at the same time? Did he miss me?

  All these questions twinkled through her mind like sparks flying up out of a fire. Instead of voicing any of them, she asked, “What are you?”

  Drake snorted, tilting his head to the side as he looked at her. “Still about as delicate as a kick in the balls, huh?” he said with a grin.

  “If you wanted a little sensitivity, maybe give a girl a heads-up next time you’re going to swoop in at the last second and snatch her out from under the snouts of a bunch of demons just as a bomb’s about to go off. I’m serious. What are you, and how did you survive that blast?”

  Drake stretched his arms out, wincing slightly as he did so. “Can’t you tell?” he asked.

  “Honestly,” Abby said, “if there’s one thing that I have learned since this whole insane episode of my life started it’s that, most of the time, I do not know raven shit about what is going on.”

  Drake gave a short laugh. “Miss Hall,” he said, “I’m an angel.”

  “An angel?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay.”

&n
bsp; Drake smiled at the stunned look on Abby’s face. “You see the wings – the wing, I should say?” he said. “That’s a dead giveaway.”

  “Yeah.”

  “And how I survived the blast is simple. I created a portal and pulled you through it.”

  How in the world did he create a portal in so short a time? Abby thought. There just wasn’t the time for him to cast any sort of coffee spell.

  This musing was squashed out by her next thought. I’ve got a crush on an angel? Just when I didn’t think things could get any goddamn weirder.

  Drake was just standing there, regarding Abby in a way that made her think that the man – the angel, she corrected herself – knew exactly what was passing through her mind.

  It turned out that Drake probably wasn’t endowed with any sort of mind-reading capabilities, because he looked astonished when Abby threw herself at him and gave him a long, fierce hug and then shocked, surprised and confused when she broke away and delivered a stinging slap to him right across his big, handsome mug. He also failed to dodge the follow-up punch to the bicep that Abby delivered as a sort of postscript.

  He blinked.

  “Uh, thanks for the hug,” he said, “but can I ask what I did to deserve a couple of your best hits?”

  “Why the hell did you leave me, man?” she asked. “Why in the hell did you just run off and disappear without saying anything? Not a word! Miss Hightide tried to feed me some ravenshit story about being banished from the S.B.A. for not performing your duties – or something like that. It didn’t make any sense, but nobody would correct her and I ended up feeling so goddamn shitty for weeks.”

  Tentatively, Drake put a hand on Abby’s shoulder and pulled her closer to him, though he looked like he was ready to spring back if she appeared about to give him another clip around the earhole.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “The only person who knew what I was doing was Miss Hightide. We knew there was a traitor within the Supernatural Barista Academy, but we didn’t know who it was. We couldn’t risk anyone discovering what I was really up to in case it got back to them and the demons found out. I’m sorry that you were upset, Abby, really I am.” Drake cleared his throat and looked awkwardly out over the rippling sea. “What I had to do,” he said, “was bigger and more important than what was starting to happen between you and me.”

  “So you were on a secret mission, huh?”

  Drake gave a half-smile and nodded wearily. “You could say that, yeah,” he said. “Miss Hightide told me what she needed to be done and I volunteered for the job.”

  Abby raised her eyebrows. “Well? What was it? C’mon, spill the beans.”

  “Funny you should mention beans,” Drake said. “That was what the whole mission was about.”

  “Beans?”

  “That’s right. Miss Hightide knew that the demons were massing their forces and consolidating their powers to strike a blow at the S.B.A. We were both aware that Vassago is no fool and wouldn’t launch his assault until the time was right, so she sent me off, out to sea.”

  “What the hell kind of bean grows out at sea?” Abby asked.

  “Miss Hightide knew of a very rare, very potent, high-caffeine, sub-aquatic coffee bean that could be harvested from the bottom of one particular patch of ocean floor. The only way to get a hold of them is to have them picked by the mermaids. It was my job to go out there, convince the mermaids of our peril and then negotiate with them so that they would pick the beans for us.” Drake sighed wearily. “Luckily, I have some connections among those strange folk. It took a while, but I managed to get a crate of them. When you and your scaly pals came through the portal, I just had time to crush one up and swallow it. It was that concentrated caffeine that granted me the power to conjure a portal as I did. It would’ve been impossible otherwise.”

  “One bean gave you the power to create a traveling portal that could support two people? Dang, those things must be powerful!”

  “Yes, they are.”

  Stupidly, Abby looked around. “Well, where are they then?” she asked, as if Drake might have an entire crate stashed away in his back pocket.

  Drake looked at her ruefully. “I had them back at the S.B.A. headquarters when you and the demons showed up. I had no idea there was a bomb rigged to a demonic proximity trigger. Not until the last second.”

  “So? What did you do with them?” Abby asked.

  Drake shrugged. “When I saw you I had to choose. I was only able to bring one other object through the portal with me. I had to choose between you and the chest.”

  Abby swallowed, her mouth suddenly dry. “So, the chest – the chest that you went on your voyage to the mermaids for. It’s gone?”

  Drake nodded. “Destroyed in the explosion, no doubt.”

  Abby closed her eyes and sighed out through her nostrils. “Shi–it,” she said softly. She opened her eyes again, looking at Drake standing battered and soot-stained before her. “They might’ve survived –” she began, but Drake shook his head.

  “That bomb would have completely flattened the S.B.A. Miss Hightide would’ve made sure that there was nothing salvageable for the demons. I can guarantee that. Those beans are just atoms now, or else buried under ten million tons of rock.”

  As if this admission sapped the last of the strength that was holding Drake up, the huge angel sagged and sat heavily on a pile of coiled ropes.

  “Oh gods, you’re hurt!” Abby said, stepping immediately over to Drake’s side. “You just saved me from a goddamn explosion and I didn’t even ask you whether you’re okay or not. What the heck is wrong with me, huh?”

  “I’m okay,” Drake muttered. “Just exhausted. It’s been a hectic trip. Not much time to rest. I’ve got a few nicks and scrapes, but nothing is broken.”

  Abby took Drake’s face in her hands, turning it gently, taking in the minor lacerations to his cheeks and forehead. She ripped the cleanest of her shirt sleeves off, knelt, dipped it into the briny sea and used it to dab at the cuts on the handsome face. As she cleaned away the blood and dust that caked the wounds, she said, “I’d really appreciate it if you could do something for me – two things, actually.”

  Drake’s face was only a few inches from her own. “Haven’t I done enough?” he asked teasingly.

  Abby smiled as she carefully pulled a splinter of stone out of Drake’s cheek. “Just do these two things, that’s all I ask,” she said.

  Drake’s breath was as fresh as a pine forest on her face when he replied, “What are the two things?”

  “First, don’t ever leave without a word again. I can keep any secret you tell me.”

  “Okay. And the second thing?”

  “Fucking kiss me already, will ya?”

  Abby dropped the makeshift cloth as she was speaking and leaned into Drake, and the angel took her in his huge arms, cradling her as gently as if she were made of china. As their lips met, Abby felt as if the sun had come up, filling her with light and warmth. She was submerged at that moment, the only tangible things worth bothering about being her tongue and Drake’s tongue, his lips against hers and his big hands against her cheeks.

  After eons had passed, Abby and Drake broke softly apart and stood looking intently at each other.

  “I should’ve asked before,” Drake murmured, his hands on the small of her back, his eyes locked on hers, “but what were you doing there – at the S.B.A, I mean? No one else was there. All the students and Guardians had pulled out. Yet you were there surrounded by a bunch of the foul folk.”

  Abby raised an eyebrow and said, “Well, you missed a lot of stuff while you were off on your secret mission. There were a couple of attacks, I got locked up and then Miss Hightide spirited me away. To cut a long story short, I thought I had to get in contact with the demons so that I could rescue my sister –”

  Drake’s brow had started to crease slightly as Abby talked and now he cut in. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, you were locked up? At the Academy? Why?”

  Abby shrugg
ed. “Turns out that I’m the daughter of some giant raven-cock called Vassago, and the council wasn’t happy ab–”

  Abby staggered as Drake shot to his feet, pushing her roughly away from him.

  “You’re what?” he hissed, his eyes narrowed.

  Abby was taken aback, shocked by the harshness in Drake’s tone. “What?” she said. “I just – I just found out that I am the daughter of this demon… Vassago is his name and Miss Hi–”

  “No! You can’t be!”

  “What? Why? I don’t unde–”

  “Vassago is the rotten piece of raven shit that tore off my wing! He was the one that I battled with over this very harbor! He was the one who maimed me!”

  Abby stepped back from Drake’s astonishing wrath. The huge man seemed to be swelling as he ranted on, his eyes flickering as he was transported into the painful past.

  “And you, you’re his daughter! His spawn!”

  Drake’s hand shot out and grabbed Abby by the shirt front. With a single, furious flap of his wing, he propelled them both into the air, a good forty feet above the jetty.

  “I should kill you right now,” he growled. “All trace of that monster should be wiped from the world.” His knuckles cracked as his grip on her tightened.

  Tears were sparkling in the corners of Abby’s eyes – not out of fear for her safety, but at the ferocious hatred that shone in Drake’s eyes. A vein pulsed in his temple.

  “I – I understand why you’re angry,” she managed to choke. “I get it. If it’ll make you feel better killing me– then go ahead. But if you think it’ll hurt my father, you don’t know him as well as you think you do.” She swallowed and raised her chin over his walnut-sized knuckles. “Just know that I love you, Drake. And I forgive you.”

  Drake snarled and, just for a moment, Abby thought that he was going to end her. Then, to her surprise, she felt herself falling away from Drake, who was looking at her with a mixture of pity and revulsion on his face.

  She hit the water and went under. When she surfaced, next to the pier on which she and Drake had just shared one of the best moments of her life, she looked up and saw the angel flying away from her.