“No, no,” she said, smiling and waving her gloved hand, “You’re coming to my place which makes you my guest.”
Damien followed his Coven mate to the ATM, recognizable only as a blinking green light sunken into a gray wall a short way down the street. It struck him now just how quiet everything was. No cars. No people. No life. Where the hell was everybody? There had been people at the Bay Beach Bistro and that was out on the beach. This was downtown San Francisco, all tall buildings, exclusive bars, and limousines.
But it seemed to him, as he waited for Natalie to make a withdrawal from her bank account, that they were the only two people on the street—no—the only two people in the whole city. First the quiet of the lonely beach, and now this. If the universe was sending him some kind of sign it sure was pulling all the stops; and here he was, doing his best to ignore it.
“Done,” Natalie said as she stuffed a number of crisp bills into her purse. “It’s this way.”
He followed, hands in pockets and silent.
“I like your sister,” she said, “She’s so sweet, isn’t she?”
“Yeah, she is.”
“Is she your only sister? Like, do you have other siblings?”
“Yeah, she’s my only sister.”
“That’s cool. I’ve got a brother, but he’s studying Marine Biology in Australia so we don’t get to see each other very much.”
“I’m sorry to hear it.”
“It’s okay; he comes back for the holidays and stuff, but I think he may move there when he and his fiancée have their baby.”
“Oh sweet; you’re gonna be an aunt? Congratulations.”
“Yeah, I’m looking forward to it.”
Inside his jacket pocket, his phone chirped and vibrated. Finally, signs of life, he thought. It was a text message from Lily. She wanted to know how things were going and to let him know that she could be with them soon.
“Everything ok?” Natalie asked.
Damien thought about his reply—the one to Natalie and the one to Lily—for a second. He chose to write back and tell Lily not to worry about joining them tonight. That, he thought, would make her and Natalie happy.
“Yeah,” he said when he sent his text, “Just my sister. Turns out she can’t make it tonight at all. Looks like it’s just you and me.”
“And are you okay with that?” she asked.
“Sure,” he said, “I don’t have anything else to do tonight.”
“Oh, so it’s like that, huh?” she said, smiling and nudging him in the arm.
“No, I didn’t mean it like that… you know what I meant.”
Natalie smiled, nodded, and continued on down the street. But out of the corner of his eye Damien caught a flash of green light through the fog. At first he thought it was a street light, but when he turned his attention to it fully he saw something else.
An entire section of the fog had turned green, as if a brilliant green light had been lit somewhere inside and from the space, someone was emerging—a figure in a long cloak, wearing a hood. It was a man, Damien saw, tall and broad shouldered. And though he couldn’t see the face beneath the hood he knew—he knew—who the man was. The ripples of Magick emanating from that sickly green glow were only all too familiar.
His blood turned to ice in his veins and his throat closed up tight, but he grabbed Natalie by the arm, jerked her hard, and forced the word out of his mouth.
“Run!”
Natalie didn’t have a chance to protest. Damien shot down the street with the confused witch in tow, back the way they had come. He stretched his hand before him as he ran, opened his palm, and in his mind summoned down the Power of the Guardian of the East; the element of air. Warm vibrations thrummed within his chest, rippling through his arm, toward his fingers, and out into the world.
From behind there came a strong breath of wind that split the fog apart and cleared a path for him to go through, closing behind them as they went. Natalie ran too, though she didn’t know why and Damien wasn’t in a position to explain. Not right now. She would have to trust that this man was not company she wanted to keep.
“This way,” Natalie said, catching on to the fact that they were running from someone and not just out for a nightly jog. She tugged on Damien’s arm and pulled him down an alley that opened up to their right.
When Damien turned into the alley the wind at his back turned too, blowing hard into the alley and sending the fog reeling into the night. Large garbage dumpsters squeaked along, pushed by the wind, while cats dashed out of their hidey holes—likely sensing the Magick—as all manner of debris kicked up around them. The wind helped them see where they were going, but Damien didn’t know this part of San Francisco. He had pulled Natalie along and begged her to run and to trust him. Now he would have to trust her to know how to get to their destination.
For a long time they ran, turning corners this way and that. All the while the wind remained, fanning the fog away before them and closing it up again at their backs as if to cover their movements. A homeless man awoke upon feeling the wind rock his cardboard house and looked out just in time to catch Damien and Natalie sprinting past. Up ahead, a murder of crows that had been perched on lengths of taught wire stretching from one building to another took flight to avoid the incoming gust of wind. They seemed to be traveling deeper into the heart of downtown, getting closer to people—people they would be safe around.
If they could only reach a nightclub district or a length of bars, they would be safe. But safe from whom? Damien knew the man he had just seen and by virtue of his aura had recognized him as being someone from his past, from his time at the Compound, but it could have been anyone. Brian? No. But maybe Henry, Brian’s son. He was resourceful and powerful. But how had they found him? And… oh shit, Lily! Had they found her too?
He had to call her; had to find a place to rest so that he could call and hear his sister’s voice, make sure she was okay. If they had found him then surely they had found her, and if they had found her… only the Gods know what they would do to her for escaping and taking him with her. Every second that passed deepened Damien’s anxiety until his heart felt like it was slamming against the sides of his throat and his head at different intervals.
Then Natalie made a right turn, and Damien got his wish. They had reached a dead end. Between the two brick buildings on either side stood a brick wall, connecting the two, easily ten or fifteen feet tall; too high for either of them to climb alone, and maybe even too tall for them to climb even with a boost.
Damien fumbled around in his pocket for his phone and dialed Lily’s number.
“Damien, what are you doing?” Natalie asked, breathless.
“I’m calling my sister,” he said, equally out of breath, “I need to know that she’s okay.”
“Lily? But, why her? Can you please tell me what’s going on?”
The phone rang. One ring. Two rings. Three rings.
“Damien?” Natalie asked.
“There was a man,” Damien said, “In the fog. I saw him come out of it.”
Six rings. Seven rings. Come on!
“A man?” Natalie asked, “I didn’t see anyone. I felt something, though.”
“You felt the Magick, then.”
Natalie nodded.
Ten rings. Eleven rings. Lily!
“Hello?” Lily’s voice on the other side of the line felt like a breath of fresh air to a man who hadn’t breathed in all his days.
“Lily,” Damien said, “You’re alright?”
“Yeah, I’m fine, why? You’re out of breath.”
“Listen to me. I think someone’s found me. Someone from the Compound.”
He hadn’t said those last two words aloud to anyone. No one knew of Damien and Lily’s past living as prisoners in a Witch Compound up in Oregon, least of all Natalie who had only just joined the Coven. Whenever he recalled that horrid place in recent nights the memories seemed to almost belong to someone else. They had been distant and hazy, an
d unreliable. But it seemed that by virtue of his recognizing that man in the fog the memories had been jolted back into sharp focus and he could remember their faces again.
Natalie had her eyes fixed on Damien, likely trying to understand what he had just said.
Lily had been quiet for a few moments, and the silence was urging Damien’s heart to thump harder.
“Are you sure?” Lily finally asked.
“I’m sure,” Damien said.
“You need to get to me now. Tell me where you are and I’ll come get you.”
“I… I don’t know where I am,” he said, searching Natalie’s face for an answer.
She thought about it, turned around to get her bearings, and then let off a glass shattering scream. Damien spun around on the spot and saw the man standing at the mouth of the alley, his cloak snapping in the breeze of Damien’s own conjuring, features obscured by the cowl he wore over his head.
The man was silent, wrapped in an ominous miasma befitting a Warlock of the Compound. Time itself seemed to slow to a crawl and the alley stretched and elongated, warping Damien’s perceptions. All he could hear was his heart thumping in his head and the snapping of the man’s cloak in the wind.
Then the warlock moved. Wide-eyed, Damien watched as the man thrust a cupped palm forward and sent a bolt of green energy hurtling across the length of the alley. The light came forth in a beautiful show of jades, whites and yellows and all Damien could do was watch and wait as it came to him; came for him.
Then there was another scream, but before the scream Damien had been pushed. Or had he been pushed after the scream? He didn’t know. Nothing made sense. Time wasn’t working according to any known laws. The next thing he knew he was on the ground. His phone had flown out of his hand and gone bouncing along the gravel floor but he… he was alive, and the light was gone. The ripple it had left in the Currents was there—sickly and foul—but the light, and the warlock were gone.
Struggling, Damien rose to his feet as the wind died down around him. The breeze had been replaced by the sound of thunder grumbling up above, and when he looked he saw green flashes of light pulsing erratically behind the clouds, creating strange and terrible shapes; skulls, teeth, eyes.
Natalie.
“Natalie!” he said.
She wasn’t where she had been a moment ago. Damien did a frantic 360 degree spin and found her lying on the ground, easily ten feet away from where she had been, face down, and not moving.
Natalie pushed me aside, he thought, trembling, she pushed me aside and took the hit for me.
The force of the impact had sent Natalie into the brick wall that had previously blocked them their escape. He rushed to her side, threw himself to the ground, and checked for her pulse. It was there, but it was weak.
“Natalie,” he said, tapping her soft face, “Fuck, Natalie!”
But Natalie wouldn’t wake. Was she concussed? He checked the back of her head but couldn’t feel any blood. That didn’t mean she wasn’t concussed, though, only that she wasn’t bleeding. It was some kind of consolation, but not much. Seeing her lying on the ground, unconscious, skin pale, lips slightly parted, twisted his gut into a knot and made him go cold.
This was my fault.
He craned his head around, remembering he had been on the phone to Lily, and saw the phone on the ground only by the brightness of the display. He laid Natalie’s head gently on the ground, dashed across the alley for his phone, and slammed it against his ear.
“Lily?” he said, panting, “Are you there?”
“Oh my God, Damien, what the fuck just happened?” she asked.
“You need to come and get us,” Damien said, struggling to find the words, “Natalie’s been hurt. She’s unconscious, I don’t think she’s bleeding, but she took a big hit and she’s—fuck, Lily—I think she just saved my life.”
CHAPTER 3
She was starting to go cold. Despite the coat and the scarf and the gloves, Natalie’s hands were freezing cold, and the feel of her skin was continuing to twist Damien’s stomach, wringing it out like a wet rag. How could this have happened? Why did this happen? Where had that warlock come from, and what had he done to Natalie?
The questions came at him fast like rapid heartbeats, but he couldn’t answer them. He had to pick Natalie up, wrap her in his jacket, and make tracks toward the street where Lily said she would be waiting. Carrying Natalie’s dead weight wasn’t easy, especially with the cold cutting into Damien’s exposed arms and neck. But a few words of Power helped to warm his body enough that he didn’t have to worry about the cold, and the adrenaline running through his system afforded him three times his own strength; enough to carry Natalie’s unconscious body to the place he had to get to.
When he got there the street was empty. The fog remained, floating silently like a procession, swallowing everything in its path. Occasionally Damien would hear a car whooshing past. His heart would leap, hoping that the car would stop and Lily would come out. But she hadn’t arrived yet, and Damien’s arms were starting to get weak.
He glanced at Natalie’s body, flaccid in his arms, her head hanging listlessly, and wished for her to wake up and snap out of it when suddenly it looked, for a moment, like her face pinched into a grimace. His heart started to race in his chest. Damien could feel his own pulse banging against his temples but he couldn’t reach for her face to touch it or he would drop her.
“Natalie?” he said, “Can you hear me?”
She was moaning now, her muscles twitching involuntarily. Was she dreaming?
“Natalie please,” he said, “Please wake up.”
But she didn’t, and before he could ask again a car screeched to a halt only a few feet from the mouth of the alley Damien had been hiding in. Lily emerged from the driver’s side, scrambled around the car, and opened the back seat door. She had probably broken a few laws to get here as fast as she had, but he was glad for it.
“How is she?” she asked, holding the door open.
“I don’t know,” he said, gently easing Natalie’s body into the back. “Unconscious, far as I can tell, but I don’t know.”
Arching over her now, after he had folded Lily’s jacket and placed Natalie’s head on it, he brushed her hair out of her face and tapped her lightly on the cheek. But Natalie’s skin was pale and cold to the touch, and she would not twitch like she had done before. She had a pulse—a weak one—but a pulse nonetheless.
“Jesus, Damien, what the fuck happened?” Lily asked.
Damien stepped out of the car, closed the backdoor, and went for the passenger seat. “Some guy came at us,” he said once Lily was inside.
Without skipping a beat, she peeled out and started along the quiet San Francisco streets. “Some guy? Did you see who it was?”
“I don’t know who it was. He was wearing a hood or a mask or something.”
“You didn’t check?”
Damien ran his hands through his hair and sighed. He was constantly checking over his shoulder to make sure Natalie wouldn’t fall off the seat. “The fog was thick,” he said, “I saw his silhouette the first time. Then in the alley, it all happened so damn fast. He threw some magick at Natalie but I think… I think the magick was meant for me.”
“For you?”
“Natalie pushed me out of the way. It happened while I was on the phone with you. I had my back turned and didn’t see him coming. I’m a fucking idiot.”
“No,” she snapped, “None of this is your fault, do you understand?”
Damien nodded, though he only did it to reassure his sister. He wasn’t about to stop blaming himself for what just happened to Natalie. It happened on his watch, while she was with him, so it was his fault. He was the more experienced Witch, after all. And yet, if it hadn’t been for what she did, he would be the one passed out right now under whatever hex that guy had lain.
Would she ever wake up? He dared not think like that. Not right now. But the thought came at him anyway like a bill in the ma
il you wished you could ignore but simply couldn’t. He looked at her again and for a moment she had an almost calm serenity about her; like she was just in a deep sleep and could wake up at any moment. But the thought turned to ash in his mouth when he realized that she wouldn’t just wake up.
He didn’t know how the certainty had come; only that it was there.
When they arrived at the bottom of Lily’s apartment building she helped him carry the Witch up the stairs and into Lily’s bedroom where she proceeded to check the bumps and bruises on her skin. As a trained first aider she would be able to determine whether there was anything seriously wrong with her.
Damien, meanwhile, took the spiritual approach and went about the room lighting the various candles Lily had on display. She loved candles. On the dresser he found a stick of incense and several lilac and jade candles, so he lit those. Then he went around and lit a bunch of fresh tea-lights, scattering them on whatever surface he could find. Finally he plucked a white candle from a drawer Lily had pointed out to him, placed it on the bedside table closest to Lily, and lit that too.
Green, white, and purple; those were the colors of healing, protection, and the banishment of negativity.
“So, where are the others?” Damien asked. It seemed like a random question to ask at the time, but it came anyway.
“When I was stuck working late I called the meeting off. I figured you’d eventually come round, realize that Natalie’s great, and want to hang out with her on your own so I rescheduled with the others for next week.”
If only Lily hadn’t done that things may have turned out differently, he thought. But he couldn’t blame his sister for wanting to set him up. “How is she,” he finally asked.
“Alive,” Lily said, “And stable. She’s breathing ok, her heart seems fine. Besides a couple of bumps and bruises she should be fine… and awake.”
“But she isn’t.”
“No.”
Silence hung. Outside he could hear traffic whooshing past. He wondered where the fuck they had all been when the warlock came.