Page 84 of Transfiguration
Luca closed the door but remained close to it because it hurt too much to move. He waited, and Nate headed his way.
“Hart was good,” Nate said. “Hiding you.”
“What?” Luca asked.
“Kept you close, so everyone thought it was his power, not yours. And Blake or Mueller masked you when you were out.”
“I don’t have any power…” Luca said as Nate slid up beside him. A web of immobility hit him like he was suddenly stuck in concrete. Luca couldn’t breathe.
Nate’s eyes glowed. “Quick cast, is my specialty, remember? You’re going to make a magnificent vessel. Once we collect the first four, we’ll summon a manifestation to take down the light and dark Pillar. Think of all the magic you’ll have at your fingertips. Controlled by us, of course, but still magic just the same.” He lifted his hands and daggers appeared out of nowhere, floating in the air and pulsing with magic. “You’ll have to transition first. Human is useless, the demon tears it apart too fast, even a witch is too weak to contain all the power we plan to give it. We’re about to make you a god. You’re welcome.”
Luca gasped as the daggers pierced him, slamming him backward into the door, pain erupting in a thousand ways, and stars snapping through his vision. He fought to hold on to consciousness, but it snapped him out of space and time, as the pain overwhelmed him.
He blinked back to his strange ghost form, realizing he was standing in front of Rou’s house now, the door blown wide. Kaine, Bella, Nate, and his bound victim, gone. Behind him, the front of the house smoldered. Luca turned and raced toward the house, the gaping hole in the front of it meaning he missed something big.
A ring of cult members encircled the house, their chanting making his head hurt. Would they keep him out? The pulse of magic throbbed against his senses, the wards completely gone, and no sign of the fae meant that bastard was doing something, maybe making Kaine do things. Luca followed the feeling, fearing what he’d find and feeling helpless. If he was dead, a ghost, what could he do? He didn’t even know where his guys were. Would they hear him?
The back of the house was no less damaged than the front. He’d missed a battle, quick and dirty. The blast of something busting out walls like they were made of paper. Luca entered the arboretum to find Kaine and Seiran facing off, a line of green power being pulled from Seiran to Kaine. Was Kaine draining Seiran? Where had Seiran come from? Had they been downstairs? Did that mean Sam and Con were, too?
Seiran reached for Kaine, but Kaine remained expressionless, wrapped in that red energy not unlike chains around him, yanking at the green stretch of earthen power. Seiran didn’t really seem to fight at all.
“Stop this!” Kelly said, kneeling beside Jamie, who lay prone and still. Was he dead? Luca couldn’t see Jamie’s ghost anywhere. Maybe being dead didn’t mean he could see other ghosts. Kelly wasn’t moving, only crouched over Jamie as if he’d been frozen in mid-movement. Luca knew that spell, a binding thing that made it nearly impossible to breathe. That bastard was a one-trick pony, wasn’t he?
Where was Gabe? Where were Sam and Con? Luca slid past Kelly, reaching out to touch the strands that bound him. Again, they stuck to him, but he had to pull hard to get them to release.
Kelly gasped, his gaze searching around him as though looking for who touched him. But the second Luca freed him, Kelly slammed the weight of water down over Nate like a tidal wave. Nate vanished for a few seconds, but Luca saw the binding spell slap back down, wrapping Kelly up like a vise until he fell to his side, barely able to breathe. The water dripped away.
Nate stood unhurt, but soaking wet, expression irritated. “I was going to knock you out for the end, but now you can suffer.”
He moved across the space, tracing symbols in the dirt, unalarmed by Seiran’s ongoing battle with Kaine. And that was the key, wasn’t it? Seiran would never hurt Kaine. Somehow, Nate was using Kaine. Was it the red strands?
Luca couldn’t get closer as a barrier surrounding the duo kept him out more than any of the wards had so far. He frowned, able to see strands to pull, but not able to advance further, or touch them at all. Was it fae magic? It didn’t look any different from every other strand of woven color he could see. He glanced back to where he’d woken and found Bella sitting beside the bramble, petting a spider the size of a dog. Holy fuck.
She tilted her head in his direction, and he glanced at Nate, who was still making symbols. Con would understand all of this better. Luca was not the one who solved magic mysteries. Give him a bank sheet and business profile and he could tell you a thousand things, but all of this was like a foreign language to him. He made his way to Bella’s side, avoiding the lines Nate drew and monitoring Seiran’s movements. The Pillar had locked down his power, shielding rather than fighting at all. Kaine struggled to pull more from him, and Seiran built some sort of cocoon around himself of earth. A mix of rock, plants, and dirt rising like he could create a physical barrier.
Luca reached Bella’s side, surprised by the rolling colors coming from beneath the bramble behind her. An incredible amount of energy pooled beneath the surface. He slid down next to her, keeping her between himself and the giant spider and reaching back to scoop up a little of the magic rainbow, surprised by the pulse of it in his fingers. It reminded him of running his fingers through the frosting in cake, and felt the energy cling to him, sinking deep as if each touch was an added dopamine hit.
“What do I do?” Luca asked, wondering if she would hear him. He swirled his hands in the power and pulled it. It felt so good, like waking up after fantastic sex snuggled with his guys and feasting on chocolate cake.
“Take it all,” Bella whispered. “Wait for Con. Break the array.”
Was the thing Nate was building the array? Luca watched as Nate finished his drawing and dragged the bound woman and Kelly to spots within it. Nate didn’t move Kaine or Seiran, rather having drawn the surrounding symbols to fit with them inside. He drew another empty array, studying it for a minute before walking away to sketch out another.
Luca kept pulling at the power and rainbow bits until there wasn’t anymore he could take. It was a lot, giving him strength, making his limbs feel some weight. Was he visible? He could only see the vaguest of impressions of his hand in front of his face. No one else reacted at all.
The pressure in the room changed, popping and filling with a deep sense of menace as some sort of rift opened like a tear in reality. Out stepped a man Luca only knew from pictures, and he was dragging Sam behind him.
THIRTY-SIX
Matthew. His eyes glowed black with red undertones, like cooling lava. The surrounding weave pulsed with darkness, blackened, as if the very presence of its energy burned magic itself, touches of ash holding him together. Unlike the rest of the living beings in the room, Luca couldn’t see actual strands. More that he was a void, or death of magic itself.
Was this a demon?
Luca’s gaze went to Sam’s still form. A tie between them was faint, but Luca could feel some sort of bond formed. Had Sam made Luca his Focus? That couldn’t be right. Maybe he’d done it to save Luca? But the bond didn’t feel like that looping of power he’d always thought bound a vampire and their Focus together. Maybe it was weak? And Luca didn’t remember accepting the bond, which he knew was part of it. He frowned, trying to study the lines as he still felt the wrapping of Sam’s power from the distance.
Sam was bleeding, eyes closed, expression in a grimace. There was a binding spell around him. Matthew dragged him to one of the empty pieces of the array, dropping him into place. Fire blazed up over Sam instantly, making Luca jolt from his spot. He wanted to race to him.
Bella slid a warm hand over his arm, and Luca paused as comfort flowed over him, providing clarity and strength. He watched Sam engulfed in flames that became chains, holding him down, pumping energy into the array. Kelly’s bonds were much the same, ripping strength from him into the drawn lines. The bubble of earth around Seiran tightened, the man himself long vanished beneath it, but now blood seeped from the mess of earth, dragging power from him, and bleeding him to weakness at the same time. Kaine remained still, gaze unfocused, expression bland, as if he were staring off into nothing, waiting for his end.