Page 25 of The Misfit Mage and His Dashing Devil

A pain seared through my fingers where they covered Walter’s mouth. I groaned, releasing him.

“Don’t kill anyone!” His command circulated through every fiber of my being, and in the last second before colliding with the chancellor’s skull, my arm twisted, missing him by an inch.

Dammit. I stood exposed. Countless mages were running forward, and I had no ability to defend myself. Again. Walter was going to get us killed.

The shocked chancellor recovered quickly, conjuring blades from thin air.

Wait.

Walter said not to kill anyone.

I smirked at the chancellor, backhanding him and throwing him into the artisan chancellor, a light strike which caused mild injury but wasn’t death. Not the satisfaction I craved. Oh, well. It’d do. May their brittle bones break atop each other.

I glared at Walter, covering his mouth again because his need to care for others would be the end of me. His index and middle finger were swollen, turning black and blue, already swirling with crimson healing to aid in his recovery. Had he broken them to loosen my grip over his mouth? Had he studied and learned that quickly how the tether connecting our bodies worked? How I hated this little nerd.

I didn’t care. Didn’t have time to care. Unveiling my wings with Walter in my grasp, I flew high into the sky. The infiltration chancellor zipped behind, chasing us on a broom with fire conjured in his free hand. I turned around, creating my own black flames from the tip of my tail.

“You’re not the only one who can summon elements, mage.” I hurled a blaze onto the streets below. Fiery black cinders cascaded everywhere, though none were strong enough to stick to cars or mortals or the earth itself. It was a superficial strike falling within Walter’s absurd command, but it forced the chancellor to turn back and assist in helping civilians all before glamouring them to forget that magic they’d seen on full display.

Flapping furiously, I carried Walter away into the night sky, searching through the memories I’d kept of the former host for a direction because this world had changed so much in the half century since I’d been contained. Hundreds of years dwelling in it with slow, subtle shifts, and the moment I turned away, it seemed the entire board flipped over into something new.

9

9

Walter

I’d never flown so high. Every muscle in my body quaked, and the only thing keeping me from plunging to my death was Bez. He had a tight grip around my waist with one arm, his tail coiled around my legs, and his damn hand slapped over my mouth. The hold made it impossible to suck in a desperately needed deep breath.

Flying in Bez’s grasp was nothing like flying alongside Ian in the Dimensional Atrium. As much as I wanted to struggle, I worried Bez would drop me. No. He might die if I did. Or so he said. So much had been said. Done. My mind struggled to make sense of the charges thrown at me.

This was Bez’s fault. What the chancellor’s said didn’t add up because there was no way I could’ve done that. Well, I could’ve. Hacking the systems wouldn’t be all that difficult for someone who knew the right people in the sentinel regiment. It’d also require an expertise in magic and technology, which theoretically, I had. But I definitely didn’t have the saturation skillset to manipulate the magic imbued in our systems.

We soared miles over the city, the drop to Columbia Center a terrifying sight, yet the bustling streets and nightlights made for the most enchanting view. Bez whipped between buildings, taking faster and sharper turns than any mage I’d ever seen fly; somehow, we’d zipped past Rainier Square Tower and circled the Space Needle in a flash.

“Where’s that stupid street?” Bez muttered, pausing midair. His wings flapped, creating a gust which held us in place. “Do you see Moray Avenue?”

I scanned the roads below. Of course, I didn’t see the street sign. Everything looked like a blob this far up. I shook my head.

“You’re so useless, Walter.” Bez, the dick, continued flying in circles, searching for Moray Avenue. When he’d finally found the street, he zipped low.

He dived too close toward the road, nearly letting my legs hit the roof of a SUV. “Ooo kose,” I shouted.

Whether he heard me or not, in an instant, he whipped back up into the air and lunged directly toward an apartment building. Every floor up was like those awful theme park rides that lift you up in the air before plunging back toward the ground. One. Two. Three. Each story he passed was a dizzying experience. Seven. Eight. Nine. I closed my eyes instinctively when Bez stopped, awaiting the plunge.

He dropped me, and I immediately thudded against a concrete balcony onto my knees. “What’s your problem?”

“Shut up,” he said.

“I won’t. I demand—”

“Try that command thing, and I’ll rip your tongue out,” Bez interjected, his features furious, wearing the same scowl as the mage who assaulted me. The mage he possessed. “I’ll be fine without it, but I bet it’d hurt like hell for you.”

I stiffened. Bez approached the sliding glass door.

“What are you doing?”

“Laying low for a bit.”

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