Devon Monk - Magic on the Storm

I shifted my attention to Smell.

I knew Chase’s smell-a musky vanilla perfume. I breathed in through my nose and open mouth, so I could get a taste of the air as well. Maybe just the slightest hint of vanilla, but the heavier smells from the truck stop screwed with the subtleties. I turned another slow circle, sensing for any hint of the way Chase had gone.

Nothing I would swear on.

Shit. I let go of magic.

Shame moaned. Zay was talking to him, telling him not to move. Shame, being Shame, was acting like a smart-ass.

“So you can kiss me? Not on a first date,” he said as I reached them.

“It was Chase,” I said.

Both men glanced up at me. Zayvion cursed.

“Chase hit you with Impact, Shame. Do you remember that?”

“Are you sure?” he asked. “We were just sitting here, waiting for you to show up. Well, not you, Beckstrom; you, Z., and then. .” He frowned. “I thought. I thought I was tired. Did I fall asleep?”

“It was Chase,” I said again to Zay.

“Are you sure?” he asked.

“I’d testify in court. That was her signature.”

“Shame,” Zay said. “Chase hit you with magic. I think she Closed you so you wouldn’t remember.”

“Well, fuck that little bitch,” Shame said. “I’m going to have her roasted for that.” He pushed at Zay’s hands. “Let me up. I’m fine.”

“You’re bleeding.”

“Might be Blood magic,” I said.

“It’s just my mouth where I hit the steering wheel,” Shame said. “Plus I’m angry now. Does the body good. Move.”

Zayvion stood, one hand down just in case Shame needed it to stand. Shame took his hand and pulled up onto his feet.

“Fucking fuck fuck of a fuck.” Shame dug in his pocket for his cigarettes and lighter. His hands shook as he lit up.

“Eloquence, thy name is Flynn,” Terric said from behind us.

Shame didn’t even bother looking up. “Fuck you too,” he said around the cigarette.

Terric was closer now. Close enough to see the details of the scene.

His expression turned into a very carefully constructed, pleasant smile. Okay, that was scary. I knew he was angry at Shame, and I figured he was also aware of the remnants of Chase’s spell. Even a novice could sense it, and Terric was no novice. But that smile made him look like a nice guy, friendly and polite.

Note to self: when Terric smiles that friendly smile, be worried. He was really about to kill something. A lot.

“I’d love some details,” Terric said, still all friendly-like, while handing me a cup of coffee.

“Chase did this,” I said.

Terric’s eyebrows shot up. “Come again?”

“I Hounded the spell that knocked Shame out. It was Chase’s signature.”

“How did it happen, Flynn?” His voice was a little softer when he spoke to Shame, though I doubted either of them noticed.

Shame just shrugged one shoulder and took another drag off his cigarette. “Don’t know,” he said through the smoky exhalation. “She took my memory.”

Terric the nice guy suddenly looked like Terric the killer. He stared at Shame, and Shame finally, finally, looked up, met his eyes, then looked away.

The pain and fear and anger in Shame’s expression disappeared as he sucked on his cigarette, his long, ragged bangs falling to hide his eyes.

Yeah, I knew how he felt. It was hell to lose parts of yourself, to know someone or something had that kind of control over your mind. It made you feel vulnerable, in the worst way.

“Interesting,” Terric murmured. He took a swallow of his coffee, and when his cup came back down, he was Terric the nice, smiling killer guy again.

Well, I saw no need to be polite about this. “This is bullshit. She has no right to do that to him. Do you remember what you and she were talking about, Shame? Did she say anything before she attacked you?”

“I got nothing.”

“Zay,” I said. “Can you think up a scenario that makes Chase innocent?”

“Not at the moment.”

“So we hunt Chase?” I asked, realizing that I liked the idea of kicking her ass a little too much. She’d bitch slapped me something fierce when I’d found Greyson back in St. Johns, accused me of turning him into a Necromorph. She and I hadn’t ever been on friendly terms, and it pissed me off that she would hurt Shame.

I liked Shame. I’d always thought she’d liked him too.

“We hunt Greyson,” Zayvion said.

“Are you kidding me?”

He finally looked at me, his eyes more gold than brown, a different storm of magic roiling there. “Because where we find Greyson is where we’ll find Chase.”

I’m not kidding-that made chills run over my skin.

Magic fluxed again, sucking at my feet like a starved leech. A wave of vertigo teeter-tottered the world, then slowly stabilized. It was a lot like when magic had fluxed and I’d fallen in the bathroom.

The storm was coming closer.

Damn.

“Allie?” Zay asked.

I took a drink of my coffee. Buying time for me to pull myself together.

“Are you hurt?” He raised his hand to cast a spell, probably a form of Sight.

So much for hiding the effects of magic’s fluctuations on me.

“Magic,” I said. “It’s a little. . weird.”

Zay waited, hand still raised.

“I keep getting dizzy. When magic fluctuates, it pulls on me. I’m guessing it’s from the storm, right?” Why it was affecting me and not them probably had something to do with me being the only one stupid enough to tap into a wild-magic storm and get thrown into a coma. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t be a part of the hunting crew.

I looked him right in the eye. No lies for me, Mr. Jones. No sirree. Nothing but the truth. I’m in plenty good enough shape to hunt.

He believed me enough to nod. “If you feel dizzy again, tell me. We’ll be on foot for some of this.”

“Are we wearing wrist cuffs?” I asked.

“No,” Shame and Terric said simultaneously.

Zay glared at both of them. “Yes,” he said. “We are.” He walked over to his car and opened the trunk.

I followed, leaving Shame and Terric behind. That didn’t last long. Even though Shame was hurt, and it obviously concerned Terric, they still didn’t like being alone with each other.

I’d gone out hunting with Zay and Shame only once before. Chase had been there too. We’d hunted Hungers, magic-eating, killing creatures that found their way into our world through the gateways between life and death and preyed on magic users and innocents alike. We’d fought the Hungers and, on the way, found Tomi being used by Greyson, and then Greyson himself.

But that time we’d been tucked away off the main roads, our cars covered by the trees and bushes. It was more than a little strange to be standing in the middle of a parking lot, even this late at night, with an open trunk filled with magical weapons. Most of the weapons could pass off as everyday items.

The machetes, for instance, might pass as yard tools. Lots of wild blackberries and ivy in Oregon meant lots of machetes in Oregon. And the knives could just be knives, the chains, just chains. But there were weird bits in the trunk too. Things that looked ancient. Archaic twists of metal and glass and leather that channeled magic, enhanced magic, did almost anything you could think of with magic, if they fell in the right user’s hands.

It gave me nightmares to think of what they would do if they fell in the wrong user’s hands.

Zay cast a subtle Illusion spell, just enough that people might think we were digging in the trunk for a spare tire or something. Then he started unloading the goodies.

I got a knife, the same one he gave me every time something like this went down.

“Isn’t that your blood blade?” Terric asked Zay.

“Yes.” Zay handed him a set of axes. Terric took them both in one hand, and finished off his coffee, then crushed the cup in his hand.

“What do you want, Shame?” Zay asked.

“Got a flamethrower in there?”

“Take a look.”

Shame threw his cig on the ground and dragged the toe of his boot across it. Then he stepped up and started digging through the trunk like a kid going elbow-deep in a candy bin.

“Lord, Jones, you’ve stocked up. What’d you think, we were taking down a fucking army?”

That perked Terric’s interest. He stepped up next to Shame. “Well, I’ll be shitted,” he said. “That’s an impressive toolbox.”

Zay shifted out of the way. Shame and Terric gleefully dug around in the weapons. They each proclaimed their finds much better than the other’s, and ended up-I am not joking-doing a round of rock, paper, scissors over something that looked like a cherry bomb, swapped a few other things, and actually laughed a little.

Forget the flowers. Forget the cards, or a nice dinner. Apparently deadly magical things were the best way to bring people together.

And they did look good together. I didn’t know how to explain it. Like shadow and light. They belonged in each other’s space. They even moved in unison, strapping on blades, and tucking other gear under their coats with an unconscious rhythm that echoed each other’s movements.

I looked over at Zay. He was watching them too, a thoughtful, sad expression on his face, like he was trying to solve a puzzle that had long ago lost its pieces.

I stretched my hand out and took his. He didn’t look down at me, but he wove his thick fingers between mine, and squeezed my hand gently.

Our fight suddenly seemed like a small thing.

Think they could at least be friends again? I thought.

All things break, all things end , he thought.

Maybe. But some broken things grow again. Like trees. And hope.

Soul Complements? He wasn’t asking me the question, so much as just asking. I didn’t know if that could ever grow between them again.

Shame laughed, I mean a deep chortle, and Terric hooted along with him. I didn’t know what they were laughing about, but it sounded dirty.

Maybe it never died in the first place , I thought. Maybe they just don’t know it yet.

I felt Zay’s quiet acceptance. His willingness to give them time, to be patient. To hope for them, even if they couldn’t hope for themselves.

It made me love him even more.

At that thought, he turned, looked at me, and smiled.

“What were you just thinking?” he asked.

Since I knew I was blushing, I let go of his hand. I’d had quite enough of thought sharing. “Something about trees.”

We hadn’t said we loved each other yet. On-again, off-again magic had destroyed the likelihood of us ever having a normal relationship. It never seemed like the right time to tell him that I loved him. Or maybe it never seemed like the right time to admit it to myself.

How normal could a relationship be when at a casual touch you could hear the other person’s thoughts?

Zayvion stepped into me, put his hands on both sides of my face, his fingers sliding back through my hair. His palms were warm and callused, and I inhaled the sweet, familiar pine scent of him.

We kissed, letting our lips, our tongues, our bodies, say what our words dared not. He didn’t think anything while we were kissing, and neither did I. We didn’t have to.

He ended the kiss with soft, small kisses at the corners of my mouth, and pulled away, his arms still embracing me. He held me against him a little longer. “Be safe,” he breathed. “I don’t ever want to see you hurt again.”

I licked my lips, tasted the echo of him on me, in my mouth. “I’ll be fine. I promise.”