Magic Kingdom (Dragon Born Alexandria Book 3) (6 page)

“But what if you were to retire?”

She turned the knob to make the water hotter.

“Retire? At the age of twenty-four?” She glanced up at the mirror, the laugh on her lips spluttering out when she saw his face. “God, you’re serious.”

“You are too close to the Magic Council. It’s only a matter of time before they figure out what you are and turn on you.”

“That’s a pretty pessimistic outlook.” The regular fabric cleaner was having no effect on the stain, so Alex switched to the heavy-duty stuff.

“Not pessimistic. Realistic,” said Logan. “You and your sister pretended to be human for over two decades. Twins, hiding their magic. Eight years ago, the Council sent an assassin to northern Washington to chase rumors of Dragon Born mages. All they have to figure out was that you and your sister were living exactly there at that time, and then all the pieces of the puzzle will come together. It’s not a matter of
if
they’ll find out. It’s a matter of
when
. All the evidence is there. You can’t wash it away.” He glanced down at her stained shirt, which had defied even the heavy-duty cleaning solution. “We could disappear, Alex. Now, before they come.”

“No,” she said stubbornly, grabbing a crystal bottle from the cabinet beside the sink. Just a few drops of the pale green liquid inside the bottle could dissolve magic instantly.

“If the Magic Council comes at you with their full power, I will fight them with you, but I’m not sure we will survive.”

“No.” She shook her head. “I can’t leave my family. My friends. The Magic Council will hurt them to get at me.”

“We will take them with us.”

“And if they don’t want to go into hiding?” she asked.

Logan said nothing. Apparently, he didn’t have an answer for that—or at least not an answer he knew she’d accept. Knocking out everyone she cared about and abducting them to some remote corner of the world was not the solution to her problem.

“Maybe we can find a way to make the Magic Council see the Dragon Born are not a threat,” Alex said.

“Maybe,” he replied. “But are you willing to stake your life—your sister’s life—on the off-chance that the Magic Council will abandon a belief they have held for centuries? We may be able to sway a few individuals to our side, but the institution remains.”

“Wow, you’re sure cheerful tonight.”

“I’m not trying to depress you, Alex. I’m trying to keep you alive. Promise you’ll at least think about what I’ve said. I just want to help.”

“Ok, I’ll think about it.” She looked over her shoulder to smile at him. “And if you want to help, you could tell me what gets magic bee blood out of cotton.” She held up her shirt, which despite the potpourri of floral scents now wafting off of its fabric, was still every bit as stained as before.

“I don’t know.”

“I guess you were right.” Alex picked up her ruined shirt, wrapping it inside a plastic bag. “Some things can’t be washed away.” She tossed the bag into the garbage can on the way out of the bathroom, then slid down her pink-stained jeans and chucked them inside too.
 

“This doesn’t bode well for the interior of my car,” Logan commented, the corner of his mouth quirking up.

A laugh burst from her lips, puncturing the heavy cloud of gloom hanging over the room. “Thanks for that.” She wiped a wet washcloth across her leather jacket, cleaning the pink goo away. “Your interior is safe. It’s leather. Like my jacket. Like your clothes.” She lifted the washcloth to his fitted leather shirt, dabbing a splash of pink off his chest. “I should have worn leather today.” She slid the washcloth down his shirt, tracing a pink line over his stomach, every hard ridge stenciled into the leather. “I’m constantly being thrown into battle. I should always wear leather.”

“You throw yourself into battle most of those times.” He took the washcloth from her hands, setting it down on the dresser. “But, yes, you should always wear leather.”

She smirked at him. “I thought you liked lace.”

His fingers slid under her satin straps, tracing them down to the lacy peaks of her bra. “Oh, I do,” his breath whispered against her neck. He leaned into her, pressing her down onto the chair.

Something buzzed beneath Alex’s butt. She giggled. Logan threw her an irked look.

“Sorry,” she said, reaching inside her leather jacket. “The timing was so good, it was funny.” She flipped open the flap of her phone case to read the screen. “It looks like our break is over. We’re being thrown back into battle. Ready to hold off the apocalypse a little longer?”

CHAPTER FIVE

The Human Problem

“IT STILL SMELLS like dead bee in here,” Logan said.

‘Here’ was the inside of his car as they sped toward tonight’s latest magical mishap. After getting the message, Logan had argued with Violet that it was too soon to send Alex out again, but all the other agents were still out dealing with the harbingers of the apocalypse. No one else was available. It was either take the job or let people die.

“That bee stench just keeps going and going,” Alex agreed.

They’d managed to wipe all the pink color off the seats, but that hadn’t taken care of the smell, so Alex had grabbed a bottle of air freshener and sprayed it around inside the car. Unfortunately for anyone with lungs, that hadn’t covered the bee stench. It had just mixed it together with the potently artificial tang of chemical lilacs and oranges. They were now driving with the windows down.

“So what are they sending us to kill?” Logan asked, his voice eerily monotone. He was breathing through his mouth.

Alex’s battle leather crackled as she shifted her weight to turn toward him. “Someone called in about a flock of harpies roosting in a barn.”

“Harpies in a barn. Right. That sounds legitimate.” His words dripped with sarcasm.

“Yeah, I know.”

In all likelihood, they were heading right into a trap. This past week, they’d killed a lot of monsters, captured a few misbehaving supernaturals, and walked into a hell of a lot of traps set by humans doing their utmost to kill them. One night—that’s all it had taken the Convictionites to unravel the peace between humans and supernaturals. Ever since the bloodbath in London, many humans had come to fear supernaturals. Some took it a step further. Hate was spreading, and thanks to the Bloody Friday videos of them all over the internet, Alex and Logan were right in the crosshairs of that hate.

“If they want to entrap us, they could at least try a little harder,” Alex said. “Harpies don’t like to sit in barns. Trees are higher. The harpies’ arrogance dictates that they sit in the highest spot around. Otherwise, they couldn’t look down on everyone.” That’s how you knew a call was a fake—when the person described supernaturals acting so much out of character.

Still, there had been a lot of really weird things going down tonight, so they had to check this out to make sure it wasn’t another case of monsters-going-wild.

“We’re here,” Logan announced as the car rolled to a stop.

He’d parked in front of an old farmhouse with white stone walls, faded green shutters, and a brown roof that slanted up into a high peak. Gnarled, wilted vines had spread across half of the house front, peeling the shutters off their hinges. The roof was peppered with bald spots, places where shingles had split from the rest. The house looked like no one had lived there in years, if not decades.

The barn on the other side of the muddy lawn was in even worse shape. Unlike the barn Alex had brought down earlier today, this one at least appeared stable—but that was all it had going for it. The sun-stained wood walls shone blood-red in the moonlight. Peppered with rust, its metal doors were swung wide open in mock welcome.

“I don’t sense any harpies,” Alex said. In fact, besides the two of them, there wasn’t a drop of magic anywhere within a mile of this quaint little village postcard scene.

“I can hear people hiding inside,” Logan told her.

“Then let’s go say hello.”

She followed the path to the barn, her boots slurping against the soggy ground. As soon as she and Logan entered the barn, the doors slammed shut behind them with a resounding boom. How perfectly melodramatic.

“Oh, it looks like the harpies flew off,” Alex said loudly.

Her voice echoed off the high ceiling, flooding the hollow wooden building. Most of the barn was in shadow, all except for the narrow stream of light pulsing out of the tiny lightbulb dangling from an overhead beam. Glass shattered, and the light winked out, throwing them into complete darkness. Alex rolled her eyes.

She felt Logan dart off in search of prey. Darkness bothered him as much as these flimsy attempts to unnerve them. Alex’s night vision wasn’t nearly as good, so she moved slowly across the barn. Beneath the sweet scent of slowly rotting wood, a hot, sticky stench hung heavy in the air. Sweat. Someone was nervous. Five someones from the irregular hiccups of their pale auras. They were human all right—or at least as good as. There wasn’t enough magic between the five of them to light a match.

Somewhere above, old wood creaked and groaned. Whoever that was, it wasn’t Logan. His feet practically floated over the floor, and he considered breathing while sneaking to be the epitome of unprofessionalism.

Alex drew on her magic, lighting a fire in her hand. Past the crackling orange flames, five shifting silhouettes lumbered forward with the heavy gait of a pack of zombies. If
only
they had been zombies. She was allowed to put down zombies. A pack of jackasses with a mind to kill her—not so much. Apparently, she was supposed to restrain hostile humans without actually touching them. That wasn’t even possible. One of these days, she was going to introduce the Magic Council to reality.

“Vile creature,” one of the humans snarled at her, lifting his knife.

The five of them were closing in on her from all directions, sinister sneers on their lips, hate burning in their eyes. They weren’t toting any magic artifacts, so it was unlikely they were Convictionite lackeys out on the hunt. They were just regular humans, people who needed someone to blame for all of the terrible things happening in the world. Fear saturated their auras like the week-old stench of rotting cabbage.

“Abomination,” spat the woman with the twin braids.
 

Alex flinched at the word. It was the same term the Magic Council used to condemn Dragon Born mages like her.

“Demon spawn,” the other woman in the group said with cold relish.

The Convictionites’ campaign of hate had manipulated humanity. It was that evil organization’s fault, not the fault of people like these. Alex had to remind herself of that. She would go easy on them. But not
too
easy. Their nonsense—tonight of all nights in hell—had interrupted the only free time she’d had in weeks.

The guy with the knife wound up his arm and threw the blade at her like he was some kind of superhero. He’d probably never thrown a knife at anything more alive than a target board before. Alex could see the hesitation in his eyes, and it made his throw as slow as sludge. She caught the knife and spun, launching it across the room. It sank into the barn wall.

“Try again,” she told the superhero.

Hate smoldering over in his dark eyes, he drew another knife. Fueled by anger, his throw was faster this time. Alex hardly had time to duck. The knife shot over her head, missing her by a hair’s breadth. She rose again, glaring at him. Ok, maybe she wouldn’t take it too easy on them. She turned slowly, drawing a circle of flames around her. They stopped in their tracks. One of them cursed.

Steel sang as she drew her sword. “You haven’t really thought this through, have you?” she said to them, shaking out the light on her other hand. The wall of fire was more than bright enough.

She could feel Logan sneaking up on them from the shadows. She kept talking to keep their attention on her.

“How exactly did you plan to attack someone who can do magic?”

In response, they drew their knives.

Alex laughed. “I don’t even need magic to take you out. I don’t need my sword either.”

“Prove it,” one of them dared. “Put out the fire and throw down your sword.”

A few months ago, she would have met the man’s challenge. Even now, she bristled at his words. But she kept the fire up and her grip on her sword. She didn’t have anything to prove.

Wow, maybe you are finally growing up,
her dragon said.

I’m a bit busy right now, Nova. Could you save the snide comments for later?

Her dragon chuckled, then fell silent.

“What are you waiting for? Scared?” the man taunted Alex. He let out a sudden, surprised squeal and fell to the ground.

“I was waiting for him,” Alex told the unconscious man.

Logan struck again. Shadows swirling, he skimmed the perimeter, knocking them out in quick succession. The last man standing reached for his gun and fired. The first shot grazed Alex’s jacket. The second took Logan in the arm.

Swearing, Logan knocked the gun from the human’s hand. “What the hell was that?”

Alex’s magic flames parted, allowing her to pass. She picked up the gun the man had dropped. She sniffed it, then her jacket.

“Garlic capsules?” she snickered, the potent smell tickling her nose.

Logan shook his head in disbelief.

“Why garlic?” Alex asked the unhappy human.

“Because it works against vampires. Rumor has it the Black Plague’s partner is a vampire.”

Oh, goody, that wretched nickname had spread to the humans. The Black Plague was the name misbehaving supernaturals liked to call her. The humans had chosen the more positive name of Paranormal Vigilante for her. But since it had come out she was a supernatural—coupled with the televised disaster that had found her smack dab in the middle of that bloodbath in London—things had changed. It was kind of ironic actually that the humans had borrowed the Black Plague nickname from the supernaturals they hated so much.

“Two things, Wyatt Earp,” Alex said. “First of all, garlic doesn’t hurt vampires. And secondly, Logan isn’t even a vampire.”

“He moves like them. If he’s not a vampire, then what is he?”