Shadow Mage: (Witchling Wars: Luxra Echelon, Book 1)

by Shawn Knightley

  One foot led the other. My eyes were glued to the carpeted floor until it turned into tiles. When I brought my head up as I approached the doorway to get a cab outside, a strange yet familiar face greeted me.

  William stood tall in the large doorway. His hands were tucked neatly in his long coat pockets. His glasses sat on the bridge of his nose, watching me as I watched him. He no longer looked frightening to me. He was a man trying to make the best of an impossible situation. I made it harder for him.

  I was tempted to approach him with my head hanging low. Only I didn’t want to appear weak. I straightened my back and kept my arms folded, refusing to let cowardice take control and look away from him. I already looked like a weakling given I tried to run away. I could only imagine what he must think of me. Some ignorant little girl who dodged reality and tried to run for it. The reality he wanted me to accept wasn’t one I wanted to hear. It was terrifying. Surely he had to know that.

  I stopped just a few feet away, waiting for him to speak. He didn’t say anything immediately. He observed me from head to toe, taking time to look at the slashes trailing down my body. His eyes squinted once he realized what had happened. They came for me again. Only he wasn’t disappointed. There was a flicker of empathy in his face.

  “Were you really one of the first ones to hold me in your arms?” I asked him quietly.

  “Yes,” he answered. “The mid-wife handed you to your mother. She held you for five minutes straight, stroking your cheek as you rested on her chest. Then she let me hold you.”

  I sucked in a deep breath. “I didn’t want to believe you.”

  He let out a light amused laugh. I wasn’t talking about my birth anymore and he realized it without missing a beat. “I know. Few people would. The truth can be right in front of one’s face. But if they don’t want to see it they will tell themselves anything to disprove it. Even the most treacherous of lies.”

  I shook my head, trying to fight back the waves of emotion striking at my insides and turning them from ice cold to burning hot.

  William approached me and placed both his hands on my shoulders. I didn’t say anything. All I could do was look up at him. He shut his eyes. I could see him trying to focus. Within seconds, a light tingling feeling traveled down through my shoulders and into my fingers. It drifted through my spine and down my legs, making them tingle until I was warm again.

  “What was that?” I asked him.

  His eyes opened and he removed his hands. “We’re cold-blooded beings, Kayla. Your body won’t feel the brisk Scottish air anymore. When you feel the cold, it usually means a demon has drawn near. It may seem like a burden but it can be quite useful in knowing when they’re close. Particularly for those of us like Liam and me. We can’t see them the way you can unless they take human form but we can feel them by how our body responds.”

  “No one saw me on that plane. My…my… magic. It was invisible. It freaked out and it…” I trailed off. Even after what I just experienced it still sounded completely insane coming out of my mouth. “It nearly brought the plane down.”

  “That’s why you mustn’t run away ever again,” he said calmly, trying to communicate to me that he wasn’t angry or upset with me. Even so, there was an urgency in his deep voice. A need for me to understand the words coming out of his mouth and remember them well. “My son has had training since he was a boy in controlling his magic. I started when I was four. Your mother started at three. It’s a way of life for us. Like learning how to walk. You need to learn how to crawl. I will help you. But you must promise me that you won’t try to leave again. Surely you must know by now that I don’t mean you any harm. Nor will I ever lie to you. I will answer any questions you have. I only request that you ask them slowly. Too much at once will overwhelm you.”

  Now it was my turn to stifle a laugh. I nearly took a plane down with innocent people inside it. I think it was relatively safe to say that I was already overwhelmed.

  “Come,” William said softly. “Let’s get you home. I’ll fix those cuts and you can have some coffee. Although, it’s not fresh anymore. You missed breakfast. I will prepare some lunch in a few hours.”

  I walked alongside him as he led me out to his car parked nearby. He opened the door for me and I got in, making sure that I fastened my seatbelt this time around. It was a detail I doubted I would ever forget again.

  William kept his eyes on the road. I stared down at my feet as he turned onto the motorway, wondering if I would ever feel the least bit comfortable in a car again. He saw the way I gripped onto the latch hanging from the door and slowed down, earning him a few people blaring their horns at him as he entered the slow lane and let others pass him.

  Once we were back, William led me through the back end and into their upstairs living space. Liam, fortunately, was in his bedroom with his headphones on playing a video game on a set of dual computer monitors. He barely noticed when William closed his door shut to give us some privacy. I looked about the space as he went to the kitchen to pour me a cup of coffee. Every little detail fascinated me. Endless books were laying open on the coffee table and the end tables to the sides of the brown couch. One glance at them and I could see that some must have been hundreds of years old. The print inside looked like they might have come from an old printing press. Some words had “f” where there should have been an “s.” A sign of the age of the script. The archeology student inside me was intrigued.

  Were they spell books?

  I heard William place my mug in the microwave, heating up the coffee and giving me time to look around with my eyes. The shelves were covered in various vials filled with bright sparkling liquids of every color imaginable. There were no pictures, paintings, or plants laying out. Only books and vials making the place look like a science lab. There was a large leather chair next to a table at the back end of the room along with a heavy curtain and a stone fireplace big enough to stand in.

  I leaned into the couch and tried to appear as if I wasn’t snooping with my eyes when William came back in the room and handed me the cup of coffee. He wasn’t wrong. It didn’t taste fresh but it would do.

  “You said you would answer any questions I have,” I said to him, tracing the rim of the mug with my thumb.

  He sat opposite me in one of the recliners and set both his arms on his knees. “Indeed.”

  “What was it Liam gave to Annette?”

  His brow furrowed.

  “Annette Kelly. My roommate from the car wreck. I was here to pick up her prescription. Whatever it was, it caused her to nearly pass out at the club the other night. Then she started foaming at the mouth in the car right before the wreck. Please tell me it wasn’t some sort of poison.”

  “Poison?” William repeated the word sounding a little insulted. “We don’t sell poison here, Kayla. The last thing I need is the authorities looking through our things. We’re very careful in what we give to the average patient who sees us as nothing more than a holistic pharmacy.”

  “But you said this place was more. You sell things of a magical nature to patients on occasion, don’t you?”

  William studied me for a moment then disappeared downstairs. When he came back up he had a thick stack of papers in his hand. He turned through the pages. It was a stack of thick computer-printed receipts. Some sort of sales record.

  “Kelly, Annette,” he repeated her name once he found the sheet he was looking for and began examining its contents. “I prescribed her an elixir for morning sickness.”

  I nearly choked on the coffee in my hand. “Morning sickness? You mean she was-”

  “Pregnant. Yes, it appears so.”

  I set down the coffee and tried to process what he was saying. It was less outrageous than the idea of magic being in my blood but somehow it was still startling. Until I put the pieces together. Annette said she was leaving. She wanted to go clubbing and have one last night of fun before she went back home. This was why. She was seeing someone. Or worse, she may have had a one n
ight stand with a stranger. She claimed she made a mistake and she had to fix it. Was she going home to have the baby then come back? My mind was a maze of questions, each answer only leading to yet another question. Who was the father? Who had Annette been sleeping with? Why would she risk drinking after realizing she was pregnant? Was she really that irresponsible?

  I leaned back into the couch. “Did what you gave her have magical properties?”

  “Very little. It shouldn’t have caused her to foam at the mouth or have any adverse reactions. Unless…” He trailed off.

  “Unless what? Finish your sentence.” I managed to sound much more demanding than I intended. If not a little rude. But I had to know.

  “Unless the baby wasn’t entirely human. The fetus may have rejected the elixir.”

  My jaw dropped.

  William wrung his hangs together uncomfortably. “Edinburgh has been under attack for the last two decades, Kayla. You were your father’s first success. The breeding of a half-witchling half-demon and your safe delivery proved it was possible. Demons have been taking human form and tricking young women into carrying their seed for twenty years. They appear completely normal when they want to. We still don’t know how they managed to take human form.”

  “You mean they could be walking among us and we don’t even know it?”

  “Along with their offspring, being half-human and half-demon. Humans don’t know it,” he corrected me. “You and I on the other hand do. Only you will learn to be much better at spotting them than Liam or I ever will be.”

  He got up and rounded the coffee table. Then he pulled out a long stick from inside a pocket deep within his trousers. That was when it hit me. The stick his son held wasn’t just a stick. It was a magic wand. Like something out of a bad movie or a children’s book. William pointed it directly at the gashes running down my body. I forgot they were even there.

  “The reason why your skin glows blue when the demons try to hurt you is because of your magic. After you died, it formed a protective layer under your skin. Demons fear you. They’re trying to expose you by revealing your magic. There was a time when that method worked beautifully. Shadow mages would be caught and burned alive at the stake or hanged all across Europe. Even in the colonies. Their magic evolved to stay well hidden. But given you’re half-demon, your magic might not have all the natural abilities that our kind are accustomed to possessing.”

  I watched with wonder as a ray of blue light poked through the tip of his wand and eased over my skin, sealing the seams of my skin shut as though nothing had ever happened. “It doesn’t even hurt anymore.”

  “The pain will subside more and more as your body grows used to magic running through it.” He rolled over my forearm and took a peek at the ink etched into my skin. “What is this?”

  I glanced down at my tattoo. “It’s a copy of a necklace with a key attached I have back home. I gave it to my sister before leaving.”

  William’s hand came up to brush against his chin as though something amused him.

  “What?”

  “I recognize it,” he confessed. “The necklace once belonged to your mother. She stopped wearing it after the Roganach-Ciar kicked her out.”

  He tucked his wand back into his trousers and put a foot or more between the two of us, honoring any sort of boundaries that still lingered. “I want you to know something, Kayla,” he said calmly. “You might not be able to leave Scotland for a very long time. Perhaps forever. But you’re not a prisoner in this house. You’re welcome to stay here as long as you need housing, three meals a day, and a bed to sleep in. If you commit some decent amount of hours to help with the shop downstairs I will get you on the payroll so you can have some spending money. Just know that you’re not a prisoner of this house. You can come and go as you please. Although, you might over time find it more suitable to go out at night. Our kind tends to have difficulty with sunlight. It’s not unbearable but can be uncomfortable.”

  My mind instantly went back to the hospital and the way the sunlight hurt my eyes when I finally made it outside. Everything seemed too harsh and rough. Even with the overcast clouds over Edinburgh, I felt like I was standing under a sea of hot lights.

  “You will grow a better tolerance to it over time. Along with not feeling the sting of the cold any longer. A consequence of our meddling, I suppose.”

  “Meddling?”

  “We’re a very particular brand of witchling, Kayla. The witchling world is very hierarchal. Not all witches have the same level of ability or skill. Not even the same level of magic. Given you have witchling blood you will be expected to follow in line with witchling laws, which I will teach you.”

  “What brand of witchling am I?” I asked.

  “You’re a luxra. A very middle-class sort of witchling, I guess you could say. We’re not the weakest of witchlings as far as magical potency but we’re not the royalty of our kind either. The luxra are known for dabbling in darker forces. Forces that threaten the world daily but most consider beneath their dignity to mess with. There’s much to learn. I will make sure you have enough knowledge to take care of yourself. But for the time being, please keep a low profile. You’re not forbidden to leave. I only ask when you do that you please be careful and wear this.”

  He walked over to one of the shelves hanging on the wall and took out a small vial linked to a chain. A long glass dropper sat inside a clear vial sparkling with blue liquid. William took the dropper and filled the vial with about a tablespoon worth of the liquid. Then he sealed it shut and handed the necklace to me.

  “Always wear this under your clothes,” he said.

  The second I took the chain into my hand I could feel the power within the liquid pulsating. It contained an energy that was unlike anything I had ever touched. “What is it?”

  “The remnants of magic from a very powerful luxra witchling. Keep it on you at all times. Other witchlings and demons will be able to sense it. It won’t prevent them from stalking you but it will keep the more hesitant ones away.”

  I scoffed and placed the necklace around my neck, holding the vial in my hand and admiring the dazzling liquid as I sat there. “Hesitant ones? From my limited experience, they don’t lack self-assurance.”

  “Because you were defenseless. By the time I’m done training you, very few demons will be so bold as to directly attack you. They will only seek you out in large numbers. It will take time and it will take discipline. But if you’re willing, I can help you make sure that you can live the most normal life possible for a luxra witchling. And as a shadow mage.”

  I let out a sigh of relief. “Normal sounds good.”

  “Just remember that normal doesn’t mean what it used to. The luxra lead a very different sort of life. Your life will be different and it will be difficult. We can manage the difficulty as it comes at us.”

  I peered up at William and let the necklace lay over my chest just above my heart. An air of comfort wrapped over me, making me feel for the first time since the accident that perhaps I had a chance of sitting for ten minutes straight without feeling like the world was coming to an end.

  “Thank you,” I said meekly, feeling ashamed for having run away in the first place.

  In my defense, it wasn’t an easy pill to swallow. Everything I knew about the world had changed. I wouldn’t have the life I wanted. I wouldn’t lead archaeological digs in exotic foreign lands, I wouldn’t become a highly respected professor at an Ivy League school for my field, and I wouldn’t go home again. I had to make do with what life had given me.

  William reached into his coat pocket and pulled out his cell phone. It vibrated in his hands. “I wondered when I might hear from you?” he answered. He squinted his eyes at the sound of the voice on the other end. “Yes, I found her.”

  My heart skipped a beat. He was obviously talking about me. But with who?

  “Here she is,” he said, handing the phone to me.

  I took it with hesitation and sucked in a deep bre
ath before placing it up to my ear.

  “Miss Waggener?” a familiar voice spoke.

  “Yes?”

  “It’s Dr. Stewart. You gave us all quite a fright with your sudden disappearance.”

  My eyes shot up to William’s. He was having a difficult time not smiling at the shock written all over my face.

  “Uh…”

  “Miss Waggener, I understand the anxiety of your circumstances but you mustn’t do something like that again. I’ve gone to great lengths to keep your condition and your miraculous recovery a secret. Please don’t make my job any more difficult than it already is.”

  William nodded his head to me. His expression told me one detail that evaporated the stress building up inside of me in an instant. Dr. Stewart was a witchling. Or if he wasn’t one, he knew of our existence.

  “I’m…I’m sorry,” I stammered. “I didn’t know what was going on.”

  “Neither did I. William had to fill in the blanks. I’ve never known a witchling to have his or her magic dormant in the past. But I suppose there’s a first time for everything. With your permission, I’d like to stop by and check your vitals. Perhaps do some blood work and make sure you’re still on the road to recovery.”

  “Yeah, I guess that’s alright. Just check with William, I suppose.”

  “Oh, that bugger is used to my visits. He gives me the occasional potion when a human is in desperate need and I can get away with administering it. You could say that he and I go way back.”

  A smile crept over my face. He wasn’t a witchling. But he benefited from knowing one. “Thank you for taking care of me at the hospital, Dr. Stewart. I will always be grateful.”

  “It was my pleasure. Have you managed to contact your loved ones yet?”

  “Yes. But I need to do so again. I reached my sister but not my parents.”

  “Hopefully one of you will get through to them eventually. I’ll come by in a few days after you’ve had time to rest and run a few tests. Please try to take it easy for a while, Miss Waggener. Witchling or not, you need rest just like everyone else. Don’t become complacent like William and walk around thinking life is all about work.”