Page 120 of Magic of the Damned

“You are all going to die. Some in this fight, others at the hands of the shades and Peter. Lives will be irreparably damaged, and you will be at the mercy of the Awakeners, Peter, and the shades. Fight this out later.” Her gaze slid over the royals who maintained their look of impassivity.

“With them at the helm there will always be problems,” Samuel asserted.

“Can you put your issues aside until this is over?” Nailah suggested.

“How can we when they refuse to address the problem?” he asked, and everyone in the room turned to look at me. The enigmatic human, the root of the problem. Despite not knowing what I was, they knew I’d attributed to some of it, if not all. They got an A for good insight. The royals gave nothing away. Their solidarity was impressive.

“Give me your word that this person isn’t the cause of the existing problems,” demanded one of the New Conventicle vampires. Her auburn hair was pulled back into a ponytail, drawing attention to her cruel, coal eyes. As a result of a recent feeding, her parchment skin held a rosy color. Her narrow face consisted of sharp points that made the smile she attempted to give Nailah even more unnerving.

Nailah struggled to answer in a way that made me think she was bound to the truth. Lies of omission were her only tools to circumvent it. The room waited while her lips parted and closed several times.

Before she could answer, an explosion of magic hit her in the chest. Sailing across the room, she smashed into the wall and crumpled to the floor as plaster rained down on her. I swallowed my scream before I could make my way to her. Areleus was by her side, his fingers pressed to her neck, looking for signs of life. Please be alive, I recited over and over. I needed her to be alive.

The shades swooped in.

Magic streamed into the room with them. Behind the swarm of creatures was Peter, his self-indulgent smile directed at me. I ran, moving out of his line of sight and the shade heading for me. In the sudden chaos, I scrambled toward the exit. Out of my peripheral, I could see Anand at the other side of the room, his spine curved, drawing in his magic—ready to reveal to the others what he was in order to save them. Black illuminated vines fanned from him to inflict their pain and send the shades into a retreat. It didn’t happen. It was the vampires who responded to his magic. Collapsing on the ground, they writhed in pain. Anand quickly retracted his magic, shock skating over his expression. I assumed he’d been unaware of his effect on vampires. Aware that this discovery would make him a target of vampires, I hoped they attributed the assault to Peter. Anand retrieved his blades and ran into the fighting in the center of the room.

Steering around the fighting, I kept shifting my attention from finding safety to looking at Nailah and signs of progress. Several times, I caught Areleus doing the same. There wasn’t any noticeable change in her, and Areleus took his rage out on the assailants. The shades’ arrival had made allies of the New Conventicle, Conventicle, and royals.

A shade threw a shifter through the air and met the animal on its landing, plunging its clawed hand into the shifter’s belly. The dhole proved to be the one to fear. Moving in and out of his animal form to meet his fighting needs, he floated with a swiftness that appeared ethereal.

Areleus lunged at one of the winged shades. His hand pressed into the creature, battering magic into it that made him buck and convulse before collapsing. But his recovery was quick, and he countered with a firestorm at Areleus who was slow to react, shocked that the shade’s magic worked on him.

Dominic had enclosed Peter in a diaphanous shield to stop his advance, but Peter destroyed it with a simple touch. Once the shield fell, a tightly coiled ball of magic soared toward Peter from a witch whose face was screwed tight in concentration and effort. Without taking his eyes off his target—Dominic—Peter made a few movements of his fingers, changing the magic’s course. In the ball’s return route, it expanded, sprouting sharp spikes that slammed into the witch, impaling him and exploding into an opalescent mist that covered him. The witch keeled over, gasping for air, twisting and writhing, lips casting spells that had little effect on the wound in his chest or the convulsions that ravaged him. I risked a glance around the room, looking for a way to get to him or find someone to help. Whatever magic Peter had done had restricted the witch’s magic.

The fallen witch got Madeline’s attention. She headed toward him, her lips and fingers twisting in unusual ways. The mist appeared to move from the witch but kept returning to its target. The fiery wave Dominic lobbed in Peter’s direction engulfed him. For a moment, shock fell over him. I expected the distraction to be enough to destroy the mist that Madeline was struggling to dismantle, but the fire engulfment crystalized then exploded in shards that spread out for several feet, hitting anyone unable to move out of the way in time or put up a protective barrier.

The satisfied smile that curled Peter’s lips quickly vanished when Dominic lunged at him. Dominic’s punch to Peter’s face was delivered so quickly, I realized I hadn’t seen the extent of Dominic’s abilities. A primitive fury drove their fight as they exchanged blows, alternating between magic and physical strikes. Peter was proving to be the antithesis of the studious awkward person he’d presented for years in the bookstore. Skilled in combat and magic, he may have wanted to damage Dominic, but his main objective was to get to me. Each strike and counter defense brought him closer to me, positioning him to remove any obstructions between us.

One of the shades lurched toward me, only to be stopped by Helena grabbing it by its wing and hurling it back and sending it slamming into a wall. Her face was bright with exhilaration. There wasn’t any denying she reveled in the chaos and violence. Scanning the room, she headed to where a vampire and two shifters were losing their battle with a shade. Moments later Helena’s body crashing into the table sent splinters of wood flying. I grabbed the broken table legs that skidded a few feet from me. If the shades were supposed to bring me in alive, they hadn’t gotten the memo. I battered at the creature who struck with a shot of magic that rammed me in the chest, sending me careening back several feet. Recovering at an impressive speed—well, for a human—I was on my feet and swinging my weapons at the shade, hitting him in his exposed sharp teeth. From either pain or shock it shuffled back a step. Dodging the bodies that were being slung as I ran, I couldn’t determine whether they were alive, just that none of them were shades.

I darted out of the door, ignoring the nagging feeling of being considered a coward. What the hell was I supposed to do? Fight people more superior in combat, violence, and magic than I was, to make a point? What would be the point? That I could die easier than suspected?

Weapon in hand, I rushed down some stairs toward the nearest exit from the building, wishing I had something that could do more damage, especially when I found the dhole waiting near the door. My self-preservation alarm was telling me he wasn’t there to protect me. When his eyes remained on its target—my neck—I clutched my weapon tighter, prepared to swing it for all its worth. Pepper spray was tucked away in my pocket and I debated if I should risk losing the grip on my weapon to retrieve it. It was no use in my damn pocket. Should have kept it at the ready.

The dhole charged, zigging past me and lunging into the air, soaring as if he’d grown wings. He tore into the man behind me. Magic, meant for the creature it wouldn’t effect, hit me. Another person brandished a knife. The dhole slipped out of his animal form into an intimidatingly tall, sleekly muscled man, who was a human embodiment of the animal he shifted into. He grabbed the knife and used it on them, breaking it off at the handle before tossing it aside.

Then he dashed past me, meeting a vampire with short hair and bared fangs with a punch so hard, the man’s head snapped back. The vampire delivered several punches to the dhole’s face and a strike to his gut, knocking the dhole back into human form, although he recovered from the fall before my eyes could fully grasp the movement. I was becoming unconvinced he was just a shifter by his movements that matched the vampire’s fluid speed. The vampire grabbed him into a chokehold and wrenched his head to the side, fangs advancing to his neck.

Whipping around, I headed for another exit in the opposite direction. My shirt was grabbed from behind and the wooden leg snatched from me. The human dhole smashed the wood against the wall, giving it a stake-like point.

“Don’t you move,” he commanded with a thick English accent.

The fuck I’m not. He’d just disabled three Awakeners, who were feared by most of the people upstairs, and he had an English accent. I’m calling it: supervillain.

Retrieving my pepper spray, I didn’t risk looking back to see him stake the vampire with his makeshift weapon. My hand was on the door, pepper spray ready, when I was yanked into a firm chest. My height giving me somewhat of an advantage in this instance, I raised my arm, prepared to blindly discharge the spray, when it was forced against my chest and I was bound and whisked away.

When I was released, in my dizziness, I spun and aimed, too unfocused to see the person in front. My arm was grabbed and repositioned.

“Luna!”

Dominic. Relief flooded me at the sound of his voice.

“I have to go,” he said.

“Nailah,” I managed.

“She’s here. My father brought her.” He was about to leave then paused, pulled me to him again, and after another dizzying wave, I was in his bedroom. He moved away from me, hurriedly, pulling a strand of hair from my head. With a quick invocation he erected the barrier.

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