The Carver's Magic (27 page)

I let out a haggard breath, “I’m sorry I let him hurt you. I’m sorry you got wrapped up in this mess. When I first saw you, I thought that you were just a human, a silly girl who thought if you drank dirty martinis you would look more mature.” I scratch the back of my neck. It was harsh, but true. “Until I found out you were sisters with Beth. Then, I was kind of jealous that Beth had someone like you who didn’t judge what we are.” I smile at a quick memory, “I like how you stick up for us, too.”

Cory hadn’t moved. It is easy to talk to her this way when she is like this, but I would prefer to talk to her when she was awake, even if that meant it would be harder to say the words out loud.

“When I was a kid, I would walk past this guy who always drank from a brown bag,” I shake my head at how long it took me to figure out that he was drinking liquor every day. “I ignored him and he ignored me, until I saw him squirming on the ground. I remember being excited, thinking he was having a seizure. It was the first seizure I had seen. But he was not stiff like I saw on TV, he was whining and talking to people, telling them to get to safety.” I look up to the ceiling, wondering if I should even say this stuff out loud. It really isn’t useful. “I tried to wake him up. He ended up grabbing me and almost choking me until my fire burnt his hands.” I would never forget the look of fear that homeless guy had on his face when I burnt him. He scrambled back as if he knew what I was. “He started following me saying stuff like ‘I know what you are.’ My family already knew that I was different, so when this guy started following me it made my life so much worse,” I frown.

“One day I confronted him. I asked him what I was. And you know what he said? He said, ‘You’re the one who killed them.’ I asked, ‘Killed who?’ And he started crying. He said I killed his family. He said I was a murderer. I was not a good kid, not by a long shot, but I never hurt anyone. I made sure of it because I wasn’t going to do to others what my adopted family had done to me. So I told him I wasn’t the same guy. He said I was and that he would remember my face anywhere.” I shake my head at my ignorance then, “I told him to show me. I told him I could see anything he pictured in his mind if I touched the side of his face. It wasn’t easy to get him to let me touch him, but when he did, I saw everything.”

I stand up from the chair and pace, “In his memory, the person who killed his family looked a lot like me. It was so horrific that I had cast a spell without realizing it. When the man had finished showing me his memories, his eyes blurred to white, then went normal again. When he looked at me I knew he was different. He acted like he didn’t know me. When I tried to stop him and remind him about his family he said he didn’t have one,” I laugh without humor. “I had erased his traumatic memories. And as soon as you wake up I plan to do the same for you, right after you show me everything my father did to you, because I plan to do the same to him.”

Two hard knocks sound at my front door, reminding me where I was and who I was talking to. No one knows where I live, so the one behind the door is about to die. I teleport to the other side of the door and had my fire in hand, ready to end… “Theya?” I open the door all the way. I look her up and down, not sure what to say. I didn’t want to hurt her, but if she was here for Cory, then all my kindness would be lost.

She tilted her head to me, unafraid. “You’re not going to kill me. And now that you’re curious, I would appreciate it if you let me in. It’s taken me days to find you.”

I mentally amend the ward on my apartment so she can come in. She stepped through and walked straight to the kitchen. I shake my head and am about to push the door shut when she says, “Wait, the wolf wants to talk to you about Beth.”

The what?
I whip around and see, sure enough, the poser is walking down the hall toward my door, “What are you doing here?”

The poser stops at my door. I would have expected him to try and shove past. Pity, it would have gotten interesting fast. Ignoring my question, he says, “The Magical Council wants to speak with you. They are waiting in a warehouse a few blocks from here.”

I hear Theya flit behind me towards my bedroom. I want to tell her to stay out of there, but I don’t want this poser to know who is in my apartment, “You can tell them to go to hell.” There is no reality where I leave Cory in my apartment to talk to those scumbags. If I see Antrom again I doubt we would be able to settle our differences amicably. I wanted him dead for what happened with Cory and I am sure he feels the same, but more on the principle that I am the wrong supernatural race.

The poser’s expression didn’t change, “I won’t ask nicely again.”

“You won’t have to,” Theya said beside me. It unnerves me to know she had been there without me sensing her. She had her arms folded across her chest but she looks totally at ease. As if she planned this. Which she may have. I may not know her specific magic gift, but she always seemed to know what was going to happen. “We will go on one condition.”

I looked down at her in a “The hell we will” expression. She didn’t look back at me; her eyes were solidly fixated on the poser. I hear my bedroom door shut. I dropped my hand from the door, turning all the way around as my stomach dropped to the floor, worried I missed something or someone in my house and they were going to hurt Cory.

My jaw and the rest of my energy drop when I see Cory walking towards us with a mug in her hand. She didn’t spare a glace at me, she was only looking at the poser.

Theya continued, “You try our new vegetarian smoothie and we will go willingly.”

What?
I am at a loss for what is going on inside my apartment. I know I am awake. I had to be…right?

The poser’s lip curled, “What’s in it?”

Cory handed the cup out to him, “Wheat grass.”

The poser’s jaw relaxed for a second, “You eat grass?” He didn’t make a move to grab the cup. He is perfectly still and his eyes almost glass over a bit.

Theya rolled her eyes, “We drink it. Now you have to or we don’t go.” She lightly brushed Cory’s shoulder, as if to make this whole crazy conversation into a joke of some kind.

The poser’s head tilts as he looks at the cup. I’ll be damned, Theya’s done it again. He seems to consider it. But then I swear I see something pass by his eyes and he fixes his head straight once more, “I don’t need to make a deal. Shane’s coming even if I have to drag him.”

I open my mouth and Theya chirps up, “Or you could drink it and we can get this done faster.” Not waiting for him to agree, Theya takes the mug out of Cory’s hand and hands it to Dar.

The poser’s eyes flash amber as he takes the mug and downed it like a shot. The glass falls with him when he lands on his knees moments later. He grabs his throat as if there is an invisible leash choking him. He begins thrashing on the ground. Unsure what’s wrong, I grab Cory and back up.

Theya steps up, almost getting slashed from his half phased claws, and grabbed at something on his neck that I couldn’t see. When she finished whatever it was, Dar fell forward gasping for air in between coughing up something that sounded like a fist sized loogie.

After he rights himself on the ground, I feel a current in the air. It is emitting from him and begins to get stronger as he stands up. Theya turned her back on the wolf and looked at Cory as if she didn’t just feel the dangerous vibes flowing in the air. Ones that could be decoded as
you’re all dead
.

“I’m going to need a place to stay. May I stay in your spare bedroom? I will take care of the house and bills until you decide what to do with the extra house.”

Cory nodded but didn’t take her eyes of the wolf, “Um. Yeah. I guess so.”

Theya bowed her head and touched her fingers to her forehead, “Thank you.”

She left just as the poser leveled his eyes on me. He holds them until he sways a bit. He grabs the door frame to hold himself steady. The poser looks around as if he has no idea where he is.

Interesting.

I watch as the recognition lights in his eyes when he sees Cory. I think I see him mouth her name before he shakes his head. Then his eyes glow as he grabs at his chest, “Beth.” His eyebrows furrowed deeply, “She’s trapped.” He looked at me, not for help but for…I don’t know. Clarification? “I don’t know who trapped her and I can’t get her out myself.”

Cory takes a step towards him. I pulled her back and wrapped my arms around her middle letting my magic into her, making her skin just as deadly as mine. If he so much as touched either one of us, he would feel the effects for a long while. Now that I feel even calmer with her safety, I rest my chin on her head, “Cory’s not leaving.”

His nose flares lightly, “I must not have made myself clear.” The vibes around him are unnerving, because again I shouldn’t be able to feel them. And neither should Cory but she stiffed at the same time I did, so I know that this guy was a lot more than some wolf. He must be an alpha. A master alpha or whatever they call guys like him that are seriously packed with juice. “The Magical Council took Beth, threatened to kill Cory, tortured Beth because she’s one of a pair that was fated to destroy the supernatural kind.” His words were clipped but he was putting all his juice into them.

“Fated to end the tyranny of the Magical Council,” I amended for him.

His eyes narrow, “And you know this how?”

“I’m her fated match.” At my words Cory shifts as if something just pinched her. Worried, I look down in hopes that she’s okay.

At his growl I lift my chin back up to see that he is close to shifting in front of me.

“You’re fated to be with my sister?” Cory asks, as she struggles to get loose of me.

I hold her tight and mentally kick myself for not being clear. She growled at me before eventually giving up. “Match, not mate,” I said slowly.

Dar seemed to relax a little but not much. So I added, “I’ve made my choice with Cory.”

Cory struggled again in my arms, successfully jabbing me in the ribs, and this time I was offended. I just announced she was my chosen and she’s trying to get away from me? What happened to the girls that swoon over you after you ask her to marry you?

“I have to help my sister,” She grumbles, still trying to get loose.

I let her go on the other side of me so she is furthest from the Alpha poser, “I don’t think there’s a potion to untrap someone from a magical ward.”

Her eye brows raise as her fists pop on her waist like magnets. “There is a potion for everything,” she hisses. I take a step to her because I don’t like the look in her eyes, but she stops me with a finger in the air and her eyes threatening me, “If you want this to work between us, now that you actually decided you want to be with me, then you will help my sister.”

Like that huh?

“Fine,” I mutter after another few moments of silence. Just Fine!

The poser’s eyes watched us, but says nothing. He is completely detached. I don’t know if he is worried about Beth, or if he is naturally like that. I hold open the front door, amending my ward yet again, “Come in.”

* * *

It turns out there is a possible solution to getting out of a ward.

Cory made me teleport her back to her room so she could “look” through her bookshelf. What I thought was going to be a quick in and out turned out to look like a troll terrorizing a library. But to be fair, the room wasn’t organized when we arrived either.

I left her to look through her books. I shouldn’t have been so shocked to find the kitchen lined with glass jars, I think they were beakers, I don’t know, but I knew this was where she cooked up the potion that almost killed her. I didn’t want to touch anything, but I also didn’t want to leave it here.

If the ward was made for a specific person, Cory explained, then all we had to do was turn her into someone else. She used the poser’s blood and made a potion that would turn Beth into him for five minutes. That should be long enough to get her out.

Sounded simple enough, but of course Cory wanted to go with the poser to make sure Beth got out. The poser and I both object until Cory threatens us with turning us into dung beetles.

“I told you the Magical Council is looking for you and you still want to go?” The poser asks. It is a legitimate question, considering it makes no sense to me either. She is turning into that girl that is walking to death’s door.

Her response is that we wouldn’t understand. I looked at the poser and we
shared
the same look of doubt.

I can’t teleport to Beth because I’m not going to tempt the ward, just in case they made it were I would be stuck, too. And the only other person I know is Sid and I’m not going to even tempt getting her mixed up in this.

Dar took the potion and we all walked out of my apartment. On the car ride to his pack I asked, “Do you think the Magical Council put that spell on you, to get to me?”

“I have no doubts,” he is radiating again.

“Then why did you have Beth unfreeze them?” I ask, because his strategy makes no sense to me.

“If they had Beth trapped, they were going to go after you next,” he mumbled towards the window.

Still confused, I ask, “But you didn’t know what you were doing. You were under a spell. One that I would have overlooked while killing you if you tried to take me in.”

“I know,” He says.

What? “I don’t understand, you wanted to die?”

He looked at me condescendingly, “You can’t kill me Shane.” His tone and expression was firm and unwavering. He must have seen my reluctance to believe him so he added, “Beth gave me her heart when I was seventeen. I have been stabbed, burned, and drowned, and have yet to die. So I figured if you killed me the spell would die with me and when I woke up again I would be cleared.”

Really?

“Beth’s heart keeps me alive,” he almost said that last part proudly, but his tone didn’t inflect much.

“So Cory can’t die?” I heard myself ask.

“Did you give her your heart the Carver way?” He watched me as if looking for my reaction, instead of the words.

“Yeah,” I reply.

I heard Cory’s small inhale. Probably not the best way to find out that I claimed her.