An hour and a half later, I was crouched in a hedge with Callie and Dizzy, staring at the front door of a house that was about a half-hour outside of Seattle. The area was on the rural side, with the next house probably a half-acre to an acre away, separated by trees and wild grasses. In front of us, a wicked spell twisted and turned, invisible to the naked eye. This wasn’t a mere surveillance spell, like the one we’d encountered at the other house—it was designed for active security. Out in the boondocks, this mage wanted to make sure his homestead was protected. I bet the neighbors knew to steer clear of this whacko.
“What’s the plan?” Callie asked, her hand in her satchel.
I glanced off to the right, where Darius waited in deep shadow. He hadn’t wanted to join us in the spider-web-infested bush for some reason.
“Cut down the spell and charge in?” I asked. “I did the creeping around thing with the last one, and that was the pits.”
“Should we go through the front, or the back?” Dizzy whispered. “The light we saw was at the back.”
We’d taken a tour of the outside, monitoring the complex spell, seeing if it wrapped around the whole house. It did.
“Or we could split up,” I said. “After I slice down the spell, I’ll hit the back, and you come in through the front. Darius can wait at the side. At the sliding glass door. Unless the mage jumps out a window, we’ll have him.”
“This is probably a stupid question, but can Darius hold his own against a mage of reasonable power?” Callie asked.
“Yes, that is a stupid question.” I dug in my pouch. “We can also make the spell go boom. That’d get him all excited. Maybe he’d do something stupid.”
“Whatever we do, we’ll get him excited. I doubt this guy has seen half as much power on his doorstep as what we’re packing.” Callie squinted in the darkness. “Judging by the complexity of this spell, its power, and the way it’s set up, I’m guessing we’ve found the lead mage.”
“I agree.” Dizzy dug into his satchel before extracting a leafy plant. “A mage such as this would want to be in charge. He’d want underlings. It would stand to reason he’s the lead.”
“Happy days,” I whispered. “Remind me to pay a visit to that bartender and thank him.”
“Joe, you mean?” Callie asked.
“I have no idea. I had Darius with me, remember? Shifters don’t play nice with vampires.” I blew out a breath. “Screw it. Let’s do this. You guys wait until you hear a crash, then run for the door.”
Callie nodded and tucked the flap of her satchel at the back so the interior was open and accessible.
I crouch-ran behind the row of shrubbery until I reached the edge and straightened up. I stuck to the deep shadows, and Darius fell in behind me a moment later. “Side door,” I whispered, moving quickly.
Without a word, he peeled off.
The blood must’ve worked. He wasn’t being overprotective. That was good news.
Fire raged within me as I jumped over a rock and made for the back door. Deep down, I also felt that pounding cold, pulsing like a beacon, yelling at me to use it. I wished it would also yell instructions.
I slipped through the gate and around the back, heading toward the porch. Stripes of light glowed between the cracks in the curtains. A wind chime lay, twisted and broken, on the ground next to a beam of wood supporting the roof.
Magic vibrated across my skin, singing the current of the spell. He hadn’t encircled his whole yard, just the area around his house, and not far out. So, he was more worried about B&E than Peeping Toms. Interesting.
What did he do about pizza deliveries?
I pulled out my sword as that cold lump of power inside me started to grow. It ate away the edges of the fire, cannibalizing my power.
What in holy hades? I braced my hand to my chest.
My heart started to beat faster, and I had no idea why. Sweat beaded on my forehead and upper lip. My chest constricted, squeezing the breath out of my lungs, nearly cutting off my air supply.
The cold power throbbed now, pounding outward. Taking over. Stifling.
I squeezed my eyes shut, focusing on the fire. On the power I knew how to control. Otherwise, I’d be a sitting duck for this mage, unable to throw magic of my own, and when my sword ran out of stored power, equally unable to slice through his attacks.
“I feel you.”
I jumped in fright at the horrible rasp that crawled over my skin like a centipede, and spun. Rocks flew out from all around me, focused in their assault. They struck a human man with a crooked smile and unusually widened eyes standing within a cluster of bamboo. The bamboo stalks bowed away from him, creaking, before swinging back and thwapping his body.
Did I do that?
He staggered out, his hands raised to ward the attack away, but his smile grew. He rose into the sky, feet completely off the ground, and shoved his hands backward. His shoulders popped out of the sockets. The cluster of bamboo snapped and cracked before flattening like gale-force winds had blown through it. Then the plants ripped up from the ground. Dirt clung to their roots before the whole lot was flung away by unseen hands.
Holy balls, that was a lot of power. I wasn’t facing a mage, but a demon who had complete control over a human’s body.
I felt my hands fist as an uncomfortable truth accosted me.
It was the demon. The level five. I could feel the strength of his power smacking against me, pulsing in time to the coldness within. Pushing down my fire.
“You are afraid,” the demon-man said in that strange rasp that made me feel covered in crawling insects. “Are you the one I seek? I feel you.”
“You mentioned that. Didn’t you know it’s not polite to feel people without their permission? You can’t hang around with humans if you don’t play by the rules.” I didn’t let my fear overcome me. Instead, I charged.
A push of air hit me, but I was already swinging my sword. The blade cut through the demon-man’s power, my stored fire power slicing into the hard air around him. I came up, my blade aiming between his legs. He flinched as I cut up his thigh.
“What power is that?” he boomed.
I cut through another attempt to grab me, feeling the sword suck at my power. But all it could reach was the cold. It couldn’t draw on the fire.
Did that matter? Could it channel this new power? I had no idea.
“Show yourself,” the creature yelled. Its feet hit the ground and it waffled before turning to run. It had to be running low on power. That was good news.
“I’m right here. Quit running away, damn you.” I chased it, stumbling when my foot hit a divot in the dirt.