Terry Brooks - Running With The Demon

He looked at her, and there was undisguised contempt hi his eyes. He was enjoying this. "You should have thought about that before. You should have paid a little better attention to your mouth."

He started forward again, and she moved back quickly, still blocking his way. She could feel her control slipping, and her breath came more rapidly. She had promised herself! She had promised Gran! "Danny, don't do this!" she snapped at him.

"Danny, don't do this!" he sneered, mimicking her, and the boys with him laughed.

"Danny, please!"

"Get out of my way," he growled.

He reached for her, their eyes locked, and her magic slammed into him. In an instant he lay sprawled on the ground, his legs and arms tangled, a look of utter shock on his handsome face. The eager shouts of his friends turned to gasps, and Nest stepped quickly away, her face white, her eyes bright and intense with concentration. Danny struggled to his feet, glared at her in rage, not certain what had happened to him, but knowing that somehow she was to blame, and then lunged for her. Her eyes found his. Down he went again, crumpling like a rag doll, as if he could no longer manage to stand upright. He rolled over and over, shrieking unintelligibly, his voice unnaturally high and piercing, his words a jumble of unrecognizable sounds.

Everyone had gone completely still. They stood knotted into two groups, Nest's friends on one side, Danny's on the other, frozen in the swelter of heat and excitement, stunned by what they were witnessing, mesmerized by the spectacle of Danny Abbott's collapse. The park had become a vast arena, carpeted with grass, walled by trees, empty of sound. Magic raced through the air with savage grace and reckless need, but no one except Nest could sense its presence.

Danny came to his hands and knees and stayed there, his head hanging down between his shoulders, his chest heaving. He coughed violently and spit, then drew in several huge gulps

of air. He tried to stand, then gave it up, mouthing a low obscenity at Nest that faded quickly into a whispered groan.

Nest turned away, feeling cold and empty and sick at heart. She did not look at Danny Abbott or his friends. She did not look at Cass or Robert or Brianna or Jared either. "Let's go," she whispered, barely able to speak the words, and without waiting to see if anyone would follow, she walked off into the park.

Nest had been eleven before she discovered she could work magic. She was never sure afterward if she had been able to do so all along and simply hadn't realized it or if her ability had matured with growth. Even Gran, when told about it, hadn't been able to say for sure. By then Nest had lived with the feeders and Wraith for close to six years and with Pick for almost that long and knew there was magic out there, so it wasn't all that weird to discover that a small piece of it was hers. Besides, Gran had been saying she had magic for so many years that, even without ever having been presented with, any evidence of it, she had always half believed that it was so.

Her discovery that she really could do magic was due mainly to Lori Adami. As grade–school classmates, they had developed a deep and abiding dislike for each other. Each worked hard at snubbing the other and each made certain she told her friends what a creep the other was, and that was about the extent of it. But in the sixth grade the war between them suddenly escalated. Lori began to go out of her way to make cutting remarks about Nest, always in front of other kids and always just within earshot. Nest retaliated by acting as if she hadn't heard, all the while patiently waiting for Lori to tire of this latest game.

But Lori Adami was nothing if not persistent, and one day she said that Nest's mother was crazy and that was why she killed herself and that Nest was probably crazy, too. It was winter, and they were standing in the hall by their lockers before classes, stripping off their coats and boots. Nest heard the remark, and without even thinking about it, she dropped her coat and gloves on the floor, turned around, walked right up to Lori, and hit her in the face. Since Nest had never lifted a

hand against her in all these years, Lori was caught completely by surprise. But Lori had been raised with three older brothers, and she knew how to defend herself. Hissing something awful at Nest, she went after her.

Then a funny thing happened. Nest, who didn't know much about fighting, was unsure what she should do. Anger and fear warred for control. Should she stand her ground or run for it? She stood her ground. Lori grabbed for her, their eyes locked, and Nest, raising her hands to defend herself, thought, You better not touch me, you better quit right now, you better stop! And down went Lori in a heap, legs tangled, arms askew, and mouth open in surprise. Lori scrambled up again, furious, but the moment their eyes met she began to stumble about helplessly. She tried to say something, but she couldn't seem to talk, the words all jumbled up and nonsensical. Some of the students thought she was having a fit, and they ran screaming for help. Nest was as shocked as they were, but for a different reason. She knew what had happened. She couldn't explain it, but she understood what it was. She had felt the magic's rush, like a gasp of breath as it left her body. She had felt it entangle Lori, its cords wrapping tightly and implacably about the other girl's ankles. She would never forget the horrified look on Lori Adami's face. She would never forget how it made her feel.

They were suspended from school for fighting. Nest had debated how much she should tell Gran, who was the one she had to answer to for any sort of misbehavior, but in the end, as she almost always did, she told her everything. She found she needed to talk to someone about what had happened, and Gran was the logical choice. After all, wasn't she the one who kept saying Nest had magic? Fine, then–let her explain this!

But Gran hadn't said anything at first on hearing Nest's tale. She merely asked if Nest was certain about what had happened and then let the matter drop. Only later had she taken Nest aside to speak with her, waiting until Old Bob was safely out of the house.

"It isn't as strange as you might think that you should be able to do magic, Nest," she told her. They were sitting at the kitchen table, Nest with a cup of hot chocolate in front of her, Gran with her bourbon and water. "Do you know why that is?"

Nest shook her head, anxious to hear her grandmother's explanation.

"Because you are your mother's daughter and my granddaughter, and the women of this family have always known something about magic. We aren't witches or anything, Nest. But we have always lived around magic, here by the park, by the feeders, and we've known about that magic, and if you live next to something long enough, and you know it's there, some of it will rub off on you."

Nest looked at her doubtfully. Rub off on you?

Her grandmother leaned forward. "Now, you listen to me carefully, young lady. Once upon a time, I warned you never to tell anyone about the feeders. You didn't pay attention to me then, did you? You told. And do you remember the sort of trouble it got you into?" Nest nodded. "All right. So you pay attention to me now. Using magic will get you into a whole lot worse trouble than talking about feeders. It will get you into so much trouble I might not be able to get you out. So I am telling you here and now that you are not to use your magic again. Do you hear me?"

Nest chewed her lip. "Yes."

"Good. This is important." Gran's face was scrunched up like a wadded paper sack. "When you are grown, you can decide for yourself when you want to use your magic. You can weigh the risks and the rewards. But you are not to use it while you are a child living in this house. Except," she paused, reminded of something, "if you are threatened, and your life is in danger, and you have no choice." She looked away suddenly, as if fleeing things she would rather not consider. "Then, you can use the magic. But only then."