Devon Monk - Hell Bent

Make it into the thing we loved.

“Hold,” Terric breathed.

Took me a second to realize he was talking about the spell. Right. We were supposed to be casting spells.

I did what I could to focus my attention on the spell, on casting it with him. Best I managed was mirroring his movements. Terric drew the spell, I drew it facing him, opposite to him, but frankly magic had me so distracted that, if he hadn’t been leading the charge, I would have given up and fallen into other, much more pleasurable spells.

“Shame,” he said, out loud I thought. Not in my mind. I hoped. “Focus, for fuck’s sake.”

That got a smile out of me. Fine. Focus. I could do that. Enough that I did not do a shabby job completing the glyph for Hold.

“Ready?” Terric asked. He was breathing in rhythm with me, his heart in rhythm with mine.

It felt right. It steadied the hunger inside me. Pushed it away, and filled me with ease. Made me feel whole again. Real again.

“Always.”

Our eyes locked.

We broke magic.

It was like running a knife along the soft, ripe skin of a fruit and feeling it split beneath my fingers. But instead of digging down into the fruity middle, we tore the seal on magic open and released the power. A hell of a lot of power. An explosion of power that had been waiting for us to set it free.

Magic poured into the glyphs traced in the air in front of us. Hung there and burned like fire.

“Hold,” Terric said. “To stop those who would break this sanctuary.”

One thing I had to admit, Terric knew how to set a spell so it stuck.

I waited until the glyphs were burning a hot cherry red before I passed my hand across it, sending it out to wrap the house. It would be visible for a moment or two. We’d done our best to cast a Fade into the spell so it wouldn’t be seen with the naked eye.

Ever since magic had been healed, it had also become much more visible. So the smart magic users now made sure they included something to hide the spells they cast.

The spell wrapped the house from roof to foundation, glowing red for a moment, then fading away beneath the gray of the day.

The sirens were getting closer.

“Block is next,” Terric said, his voice a little husky.

Glad I wasn’t the only one enjoying this.

I got my fingers busy and drew the negative image of the spell as he drew the positive. We both pulled on more magic, poured it into the glyphs, which glowed a deep blue this time.

“Block,” Terric said. “To protect those within this sanctuary.”

He didn’t really have to say anything out loud for the spells to work, but he had studied for a long time beneath Victor and Faith magic. Some of the history of those kinds of spells involves prayer, intonation, mantras. I guess old habits are hard to break.

I waved my hand across the spell and sent it spinning to the house, where it immediately sank into the walls.

“Last is Pain,” Terric said, beginning the spell.

“Let me.”

He nodded and wiped his fingers through the beginnings of the glyph, clearing the air.

I carved the glyph for pain in the air between us, making sure it would wrap and hold and bite and paralyze. I carved it so that if Eli tripped it, he’d be lucky to be breathing by the time the spell ran its course. Terric mirrored my movements, no comment on the viciousness of the spell I was shaping.

The police arrived. We were behind a screen of brush. With the fog closing in, I didn’t think they’d immediately notice the black spell smoldering between us.

And because Terric had done it, as soon as the spell was formed and filled with magic, I spoke too.

“Pain,” I said. “To bring our enemy to his fucking knees.”

“Amen,” Terric said. He wiped his hand across it and pushed it toward the house, where it fell like a hard hail of dark rain, soaking it through.

That, the cops saw. But I didn’t think they knew where it had come from. Until I glanced out at the road, and noticed Detective Stotts looking our way.

“Act natural,” Terric said.

“Seriously? Natural? Like we’re just two guys who happened to have dressed out of the same closet, standing in the rain and fog on an abandoned lot casting magic the likes of which hasn’t been seen for three years? That kind of natural?”

“It’s just Paul,” he said. “He knows we’re on the side of the good guys.”

“Speak for yourself.”

“Terric, Shame,” Detective Stotts called out. “Can I have a word with you?”

“I say we run for it,” I said.

“You have zero survival instinct, Flynn.” Terric started toward Stotts and I followed.

“What are you two doing out here?” Detective Stotts asked.

“Skipping rocks,” I said.

He turned to Terric. Why did people always ignore me?

“Terric?” he asked.

“We came out to see Allie and Zay.”

“So you know they were attacked?”

“We’re the ones who told Clyde Turner.”

“You know I’d prefer it if crimes were reported to the police first.”

“It was a matter of seconds between me knowing they were hurt, to Clyde knowing, to you,” he said.

“Those seconds count,” Stotts said. “I’d like to have them so that my people, our guns, and the law can get here in time to keep things contained.”

“We weren’t even sure that they had been attacked,” Terric said calmly.

“Then why did you tell Mr. Turner they were?”

“What we told Clyde was that Zay and Allie cast magic,” Terric said. Then, a little quieter, “They broke it.”

Paul Stotts was the boyfriend of Allie’s best friend, Nola. No, wait. Husband. They’d tied the knot a couple years back. And Paul had stood by us through the worst of the apocalypse. He knew things about magic and magic users that no one knew back in the day.

He knew things today about magic we still try to keep quiet—namely that Soul Complements can break it.

“Why did they do that?” he asked.

“That’s what we wanted to know. Especially since Allie is . . .” Terric paused. “Has Allie talked to Nola?”

“Are you kidding? She’s planning the baby shower.”

“Right. Since Allie is pregnant, they didn’t want to break magic,” Terric continued. “So when we felt it break . . .”

“You can feel it when magic breaks?”

Terric shrugged. “We did this time. We assumed they wouldn’t have broken it if they weren’t in trouble.”

Stotts nodded, then glanced over at the house. “I’ll need a statement.”

“You know we can’t admit to breaking on record,” Terric said.

“I’ll want something from you, even if it’s just you had a bad feeling and followed up on your hunch.”

An ambulance rolled up, and the EMTs got out and walked up to the kitchen.

Good thing we’d triggered the spells to only react if Eli tripped them.

“Zayvion’s been stabbed,” Stotts said.

“We know,” Terric said.

“I don’t suppose you know anything else about this, do you?”

“No,” Terric said.

Yes, that surprised me. I thought he liked telling the truth and following procedure.

Stotts finally looked back at me. “Shame, do you know anything else about this?”

“Nope. Not a thing.”

“All right.” He glanced up as one of his officers walked our way. “I want to see you both in the station later today.”

“We’ll be there,” Terric said so smoothly, even I had a hard time telling if it was a lie.

Stotts moved up the path toward the house and Terric went the other way to the car.

I glanced back at the house. A movement along the rooftop drew my eye.

There was a gargoyle on the roof. Namely, Stone.