The Magic Read online

  His lip quirked up. “Well, come on, then,” he said.

  My feet didn’t move as I thought about it. Stay here and be safe or go spread my wings and get some books? I climbed on the back of the bike before I thought it through, because I knew no good would come from that. Or no good fun.

  * * *

  The bright sun had us both squinting as we climbed out of the old library, which felt more like a cave.

  Bookie looked at his stash of books and then at mine. “We’re going to have to make a cut. We can’t fit them all in the bag.” He leaned closer and started tapping at the books in the middle of my stack. “Maybe you should get rid of some of the funny ones?”

  “What funny ones?” I held my books a little closer to my chest, the only cover visible being the cookbook strategically placed on top instead of the half-naked man.

  “You know what funny ones. How many of those can you read? They all look the same.”

  “Well, they aren’t.”

  He tilted to the right as he so often did before he got sarcastic. “You’re right. Some have naked men on the cover with women. Some only have naked men.”

  “Get rid of some of yours,” I said, pointing to his stack of books. The first was Back from the Dead, My Personal Story of Ever After, written in white script across a blue cloudy sky. “You want to talk about funny? That looks like a whole stack of crazy if I’ve ever seen it.”

  “I died. I’ve got a lot of emotional baggage to work through.” He gripped his books more firmly. “I’m trying to figure out what happened. Maybe I went somewhere.”

  “Went where? A ditch?”

  “We don’t know that. Fudge says there’s a world beyond this.”

  “Fine, but my books are just as important as your books. I need them to relax.”

  “I do, too.”

  We were both grabbing our stacks as if this were a life-and-death standoff.

  The sunlight was bright in my eyes as I tried to figure out my next argument. Then the guilt hit. He had died. This guilt stuff was for the birds, and I was going to have to figure out a way to shake it off before it ruined my fun.

  “Okay, I’ll get rid of—”

  The sound of a chunk of cement crashing had us both swinging around and looking for the source. I counted four men. Three humans and one Dark Walker, all dressed in the same Newco soldier uniform. One of them was looking awkwardly at his feet, where some cement debris was still rolling to a stop.

  “We aren’t alone,” I whispered, but didn’t need to. They were standing at the end of our path, waiting.

  “Dal, get behind me,” Bookie said, but I was already moving into position in front of him, and managed to skirt ahead before the hand he was reaching out made contact with my arm. It was a good thing that the area we had to leave through formed an alleyway of sorts, with fallen cement and debris from many of the buildings that used to be in this area. It was a perfect bottleneck. They’d have to get through me if they wanted to get to Bookie, and that was not happening.

  One of the human soldiers stepped forward, right up to where the alley started to narrow. “Zarrod wants to speak to you,” he said.

  Zarrod. That was the name of the top Dark Walker Croq had given me. This wasn’t a coincidence, and they hadn’t just stumbled upon us. They knew exactly who I was. Had they followed us from the farm? I couldn’t ask without tipping my hand to where we’d come from. But how else?

  “I’m not much of a talker.” There weren’t enough people alive, let alone ones who looked like me, with flaming red hair, to bother with denials that I wasn’t who they thought I was. Even if I tried to deny it, it wouldn’t matter. They could tug off my right glove and find proof.

  I eyed up their dull grey uniforms and the guns hanging at their hips, but I didn’t think they would shoot me. Whoever this Zarrod was, he—or it—wanted something from me too badly to give orders to kill me. Accidents do happen, though. Even if they shot me, as long as the spell that locked my life with Dax’s worked, I’d make it. Bookie might not. Although nothing was a sure thing. Bookie had made it back from the dead once. Who was to say he wouldn’t be the one walking out of here alive?

  Still, odds favored me. Which meant I really didn’t want to do this next thing, but I might have to if he didn’t listen. “Bookie, I need you to go back into the library until this is over.”

  “And leave you here with them? Are you insane?” I couldn’t see his face, but his tone gave me a pretty good idea of what it looked like.

  “Bookie, please, go back in. I’ll be fine.”

  “No way.”

  I let out a disappointed sigh, because he was going to be really pissed off about this if he didn’t die today. Normally I focused on a visual, so I hoped my aim held true when I tried to lock on to his voice. “I’m sorry about this.”

  “Sorry about what—”

  Midsentence, I swung around with a kick to his stomach that knocked him on his ass a few feet away, hard enough to suck the wind out of him. Hopefully it was enough to put him out for a few minutes, too. There was enough cover on the ground he was now sprawled on that the only way the Newco people could get a good shot at him would be to remove me first. That wasn’t going to happen.

  I didn’t remember dumping my books, but I was facing the enemy and choosing my target with two knives in my hands before they had a chance to take advantage of my half-second of inattention. I waited, forcing them to enter into the narrowest part of the alley if they wanted to get to me. Two of the human soldiers didn’t hesitate to advance, but the Dark Walker hung back with one of the humans. He knew I wouldn’t go down as easily as the human men expected. Lucky for me, they didn’t listen when he told them I was tougher than I appeared.

  A flying kick to the chest of the first soldier sent him crashing onto the one behind him. I jumped on top of the pile of cursing men and buried my knife to the hilt in the middle of the first Newco soldier’s chest, and gave a vicious twist. While he exhaled the last breath he would ever take, I quickly slid the edge of my other blade across the neck of the one pinned beneath me, and the now dead body.

  Two down. Two to go.

  The Dark Walker grabbed the shoulder of the human male in front of him and dragged him out of the way. It seemed like he was getting a little angry at how easily I’d taken down the first two. The lone human left didn’t put up a fight, and gladly stepped aside.

  “You’re coming back with me,” he said, as if he were done playing.

  “Have other plans for the afternoon, but thanks for the invite.”

  I wanted to shake my head as I watched him bend low. Dumbass thought that bulldozing through me was the best way to handle this. Taking aim at his knees, I let him build up his momentum before I went for my own target. I went in low and fast, connecting my shoulder and heaving with my legs.

  He went flying over the top of me, heading straight for where I’d left Bookie. Shit! Who was the dumbass now? I turned around to find the Dark Walker lying in a heap with his neck twisted in an impossible angle, but no Bookie.

  I heard the shot before I felt the pain screaming through my back, and realized I’d made a critical mistake. You never turned your attention away from your current threat.

  So much for not shooting me. The one left must have been terrified enough to take a lethal shot when the idea of going against me alone became the last resort. My hand went to my chest, where the pain was ripping straight through from my back. There wasn’t any blood, though. The bullet hadn’t passed through.

  I wanted to turn and fight, but I was paralyzed with pain. I didn’t realize I had fallen to my knees until the rough landing set off even sharper flares of agony through my chest.

  My shooter’s shadow fell over me, and I just hoped that he’d leave here without going after Bookie.

  The soldier stepped around me, holding the gun with shaking hands as he aimed it at my head.

  Warm blood was dripping down my back as he told me, “You’re going
to stand up and come with me.”

  Did he think I was kneeling out of some sort of weird worship ritual because he’d managed to shoot me?

  “If I could stand, you’d be dead.” My voice rasped from the strain of talking through the pain. I rolled my eyes at the stupidity of the soldier holding the gun on me. I could be dying, and this was the person who took me down? This had to be some sort of cosmic joke. I couldn’t even drum up a flicker of heat in my chest. It was as if all my magic was seeping out of me with my blood.

  “He wants to talk to you, and I ain’t going back without you.”

  “Tell you what. You let me in on what he wants and I’ll give it a good try,” I said, knowing there was no way I was moving right now, but it would be nice to have a few questions answered before I died. I didn’t think the Grounding Spell that Bitters had put on me to keep me alive was going to overcome a shot to the heart region.

  He’d opened his mouth to tell me something when from out of nowhere Bookie choose that moment to appear and hit him over the head with a boulder.

  Chapter 4

  The soldier dropped in front of me, a caved-in area obvious on the back of his skull. The rock dropped from Bookie’s hands as he stared down at the fallen man.

  “I could’ve used one more minute.” I sighed.

  “What the hell just happened? How did you take all those other guys? How did you do that?” He was pointing to the corpses as he spoke, like I’d forgotten I left them there.

  “Luck?”

  He was shaking his head. “I saw you take out the last one.”

  Looked like I hadn’t hit Bookie hard enough. This was why you should never pull your punches. On the plus side, I’d always feared what Bookie would think of me if he saw me in action, a killing machine. I didn’t see any revulsion on his face. Lots of shock, though.

  “How did you do it?” he asked again, so shocked that it seemed to be overriding his normal perceptiveness. Normally he would have noticed I didn’t usually have to grit my teeth to get my words out.

  “I know it’s not something we talk about a lot, but you know I’ve got magic.”

  “Yeah, but I thought it was just hearing an occasional thought or something.”

  “Turns out it’s a little bit more.” I stretched my good arm out to brace my hand against a slab of crumbling cement. This wasn’t how I’d imagined my last conversation going, but it was better than teary goodbyes. Or maybe I wouldn’t die at all? From the way my back felt, I didn’t think I’d still be conscious by now.

  “What?” I asked. His face was shifting into a look closer to the horror I’d expected him to wear when he learned I was a killer, but he wasn’t really looking at me—instead, his stare was glued to a spot on the ground where I kneeled.

  “Dal.” Bookie pointed to where my blood had dripped enough to create a puddle beneath me. I tried to reach a hand back and stanch the blood, but quickly decided it was too much effort. I returned it to the cement in front of me so I didn’t topple over from the lightheaded feeling taking over.

  Bookie came to kneel on the ground beside me, and tugged the back of my shirt down.

  He looked at it and then me, his face growing whiter with each a pass. “Dal, why didn’t you tell me you were shot?”

  Was it stupid that I wanted to see him all impressed by me before I died? Yeah, that would sound pretty stupid. “Figured if I was still alert, it wasn’t too bad.” I really had begun to wonder if it felt worse than it was.

  He prodded the area next to the wound with a tentative touch. “It’s bad. I don’t think we’ll make it back to the farm. I’ve got to get it out, and soon. As it is, I can’t believe it didn’t hit your heart.”

  Bookie was assuming it hadn’t because I was still alive. I wasn’t so sure. The way my heart felt inside of my chest, Bitters’ Grounding Spell might’ve been the only thing keeping me breathing. Spell or not, I felt like shit with this thing in my back.

  “Bookie, you have to dig in there and get it out.”

  “I know,” he said, but he didn’t sound too enthused about it. “Wait here and I’ll find something to use and…” His head was shaking as he mumbled something about sanitizing this or that. Oh no, nobody had time for that.

  “Bookie, I’m losing too much blood. I need you to dig it out with your fingers right now.” My voice was getting fainter. It was almost as if once we focused on the wound, the pain had doubled in intensity.

  His eyes started to crinkle at the corners, and he looked like he thought I might have gone crazy from blood loss.

  “With my hands? They’re filthy. The germs alone will kill you.” He took a step away and began mumbling again, this time worrying over where the bag he always carried around had gotten to. What? Did he think it would miraculously produce sterilized instruments to operate with?

  “Bookie, I don’t have time for you to try and figure out something else, unless you want me to bleed out.” Could I bleed out? What if I passed out instead and there were more of the Newco soldiers around? I might live, but I’d leave Bookie to his own defenses, and knowing him, he wouldn’t leave my side. He’d be a goner for sure. I’d never tell him this, but that rock attack had been a stroke of luck. Bookie had definitely been born a lover, not a war wager, but I didn’t want to insult the guy right now by telling him that, especially as he’d just saved my ass.

  “But the—”

  “You can do this. I need you to do this.”

  “It’s going to hurt like hell,” he said, but he started shaking out his hands, as if that would rid him of the nerves. He stepped forward, nodding to himself the whole time as he kneeled beside me, getting in position to do as I asked with one hand bracing my shoulder.

  “Brace yourself,” he said.

  I tightened my grip on the large piece of collapsed wall I was using to steady myself. I’d expected pain, but not the wave of agony I got. It was already hurting like hell, and all he’d done was dump some of the water from his canteen on it. “Bookie! Start already!”

  “I was just—”

  “Start!”

  “Okay!”

  His fingers started delving into torn flesh, and I gripped the cement edge until it felt like I was going to have cement embedded in my flesh.

  “Dal, it’s too deep.”

  “Bookie, if you don’t get it out, I might die.” I wasn’t sure if that were true or not, but I knew we were sitting ducks right now, even in the haze of pain. I was waiting for more soldiers to show up at any moment. Black spots danced across my vision, and I tried to evict them, but if I lost more blood the bouncers might call it quits. If the shot didn’t kill me, and maybe it wouldn’t, more soldiers might kill him.

  “Dal?”

  “Yes?” I strained to keep my patience with the slow pace he was going, since he thought he might be killing me and all.

  “Dal, there’s a lot of blood here and this is deep, like…real deep.”

  No one would call Bookie stupid, and he had enough medical training to know something was up. “Just dig in and get the bullet. I don’t care if it’s lodged in my heart.”

  I felt his fingers digging around, deeper and deeper as I tried to keep my self upright and the black spots began connecting together.

  “You still with me?”

  “Yes.” I would’ve screamed it if I could’ve pulled it off without completely losing control. The pain was shooting through me like someone had taken a hose and pumped hot lava into my veins.

  Finally, after it seemed like I’d been sucked into a time warp where everything slowed to a near standstill, I felt his fingers slowly pulling out from where they’d been digging around inside of me.

  “Did you get it?” Please tell me that wasn’t for nothing or I might really scream.

  “Yeah.” His voiced sounded almost as weak and faint as mine. Playing doctor had taken a toll on him.

  I took a precious moment and leaned flat against the cement rock as the black spots started to fade. I h
eard Bookie moving around behind me, the sound of some fabric ripping, and then Bookie was pressing a pad of material against the hole in my back. He wrapped it under my arm and then over a shoulder before he tied it off, completing his makeshift bandage.

  Bookie stepped around me and was crouching right in front of me, holding the bullet in between bloody fingers.

  Small and a little scrunched up, it didn’t look like it should’ve caused too much damage. Maybe it felt worse than it was. “That’s not so bad.”

  “It was in your heart,” he said, tone full of righteous indignation.

  Thank you, Bitters, wherever you are! His Grounding Spell linking my life to Dax had just saved my ass.

  “I’m sure you’re wrong.” I tried to push off the rock, but I would’ve fallen backward on my ass if Bookie hadn’t grabbed an arm, looping it over his shoulder. He pulled me up as he stood.

  “I know a heart when I feel one.”

  “Eew, really?” Okay, I might be a killer, but that was a little gross.

  “What the hell is going on, Dal? You killed three people by yourself and now you take a bullet to the heart and you don’t die? You don’t even pass out? What the hell are you?”

  His voice was slowly creeping from concerned to alarmed. But I really didn’t have time for this.

  “If I could answer that for you, I would.” I tried to lean away from him and reach down for a handle sticking out of a dead chest.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I’ve got to get my knives.”

  He propped me up against a nearby wall made up of fallen debris and collected my knife for me. He wiped it off on the pant leg of my first victim before handing it back to me. Had to admit, it was kind of nice to have someone clean it for a change.

  “That one, too,” I said, pointing to where I’d dropped the other.

  He collected it, repeating the cleanup routine. He tucked it into my hip holster for me. I waved my good arm at him, silently suggesting he get a move on.

  “Really?” he asked, as if he were offended by my necessary dictates to ensure our safety.