Mark Teppo - Lightbreaker

I coughed up a last bit of cold darkness-a wracking hack of sound that was filled with the fury of the Abyss-and the flashlight was knocked from Nicols' hand. "I'm okay," I said, the last touch of the Qliphoth fading from my voice.

My eyes were drawn to the spirals of spirit smoke in the center of the circle of power. It's just a taste. It won't be enough to assuage the hunger. It won't be enough. It will just make you want her more. It'll just feed the need.

But isn't that why you are here? The Chorus retreated, sulking and yet still defiant.

I wasn't sure. For an instant, I had glimpsed something that lay behind them. It was as if I had peeled back the edge of the world, and seen an infinite vastness beneath. In that darkness, I had felt the presence of something watching me.

"Drawing on my extensive knowledge of cheap Showtime thrillers, I'm guessing these are magick circles," Nicols said, a freshly lit cigarette dangling from his lips. The acrid scent of his tobacco disturbed the memory scent of lilacs the Chorus kept looping in my head. I inhaled his secondhand smoke through my nose, welcoming the distraction. "Summoning Balefour, Demon King of the Perpetual Abyss, or some shit?"

"He's a prince, actually. Holds dominion over gnats and stinging bugs. Responsible for plagues, mainly." I smiled slightly at his expression. "I'm kidding."

The Chorus locked down, I carefully approached the platform again. "They help focus the energy of the participants. There are specific types of circles for specific rites. It can get very complicated."

"I'm sure it does," Nicols nodded. He wasn't too sure he liked the idea of me having a sense of humor.

"Doug had his soul pulled out of his body in the big one," I said, ignoring his tone. "He wasn't alone. He had help, and she was assisting him. The other circles are protective, keeping the adepts safe. In case, something goes wrong."

Nicols got close enough to peer at one of the corner circles. Following my lead, he hadn't made any attempt to step onto the platform. "What happens if something does go wrong? What happens to the pair in the middle?"

I flinched, reacting to a poke from the Chorus. A shard of memory. One of mine. That instant of shock, blisters rising on my skin. Her fingers sliding inside me, like she was putting her hand in JELL-O. My spirit, frantic and desperate to get away from her. I had tried to run-that same instinct-driven response, like Doug in the woods, had been wild and terrified in my body. When she pulled her hand free, all the light began to spill out. Five stars shining on my chest.

"Sometimes people die," I said, pushing the Chorus back, burning the memory away.

"Sometimes?"

"Yeah," I said. "And sometimes that's the kindest thing."

He exhaled a stream of smoke, and watched as it was sucked toward the center of the circle, drawn in by the tiny mystic stain. Nicols had been smoking a long time, and there was enough of him present in that dusty exhalation to be drawn toward the mystical nexus in the circle. His smoke curled upward, winding about the existing spirit spiral like a sycophant eager to please.

"It's a primal attraction," I said as he looked at me with a raised eyebrow. "Systems gravitate to each other. Very little attraction is chemical. Behavioral psychologists would like you to think that we're driven by pheromonal attraction and a promise of hot sex, but actually it's a lot more. . alchemical."

I crouched near his feet, and looked intently at the inscribed circle. One of Solomon's-the fourth medal of the Moon, in fact, devoted to protection. There wasn't any additional magick woven into its hollow spaces. There should be something, a protective trigger that kept random strangers like us from intruding. One padlock on a cheap door wasn't a security solution. There had to be something else, especially the way these circles were lit up. They were still holding energy, even if they weren't active. This wasn't a casual installation. They had been using it awhile. So, where was the booby trap?

"What's that?" Nicols asked suddenly.

I drew back from the circle. "Where?"

"There. Along the edge." He knelt beside me and pointed to the rim of the platform. "It was just a faint glimmer." Nothing happened as he lowered his finger toward the edge, but when I brought my hand close, the inscription running along the edge glowed, a faint purple luminescence. The esoteric scrip grew bright enough to read as I kept my hand near.

"What does it say?" he asked.

"It's a ward of protection," I said. There it is. I wrapped the Chorus in my arm, and touched the surface of the platform. A bright spark cracked when I made contact with the stone, a chain of light and energy shooting up my arm. The Chorus flexed around the current, absorbing and transforming the force, and all I felt was a tingling sensation up to my elbow. "I don't have the key so it rejects me."

Not the most complicated charm to weave. It would take a little while, but a decent adept would be able to put this together. The trick here was how it reacted to magick. Someone like Nicols would be unharmed if he walked on the platform while I would set the stone afire. Which meant it was unstable-volatile, waiting to do damage. I might be able to unravel it, but if I failed, the whole platform would immolate. Probably try to take me too.

The Chorus whined. No, this is as close as we get.

Nicols flicked his flashlight beam around the room. "Okay, if we can't get to the circle, then what else is there?" His roving spot illuminated the dry walls of the barn, the empty brackets where horse stalls had once been installed. A broken ladder reached only a few feet down from an upper floor.

A distant crunch of gravel interrupted our examination. Nicols clicked off his flashlight, and I hurried to the door to better hear the sounds coming from outside.

The crunching was slow and regular, a rolling sound that had echoes. "More than one vehicle," I told Nicols as he joined me.

We had visitors.

Let's go find out who they are," Nicols said.

I grabbed his arm as he squeezed past me. "We have to assume they're the guys who put this here."

Nicols looked at my hand. "I know that," he said. He pulled out of my grip, and reached in his jacket for his gold shield, which he hung around his neck so it was visible on his chest. "I'm not about to go charging around the building with my gun out. I have to assume they're going to respect the shield."

But what if these guys weren't the sort to care about the sanctity of the shield? I kept the question to myself. The thought probably ran through his head every time he pulled the shield out. Still, getting out of the barn before we got pinned inside was an excellent idea. We had more options outside.

As he walked across the yard, Nicols unsnapped the flap on his holster, and his fingers toyed with the butt of his gun. I followed, the Chorus swelling into a plume of aggression. Headlights outlined the front corner of the house, and illuminated the empty field to the west. As Nicols reached the edge of the light, I hung back, clinging to the shadows still wrapped around the side of the house.

Two cars in the drive. It was hard to tell exactly what they were with their lights-brights on, naturally-but it looked like one SUV and one sedan. They formed a right angle-bumper to tailgate-across the driveway, like an open compass bracketing Nicols' vehicle. In the light reflected from the farmhouse, I spotted five men. A mishmash of clothing styles-leather jackets, jeans, long coats. Nothing uniform. Civilians, then, not law enforcement.

Nicols stepped into the light. He raised his flashlight, and caught one of the men in its beam. "Can I help you?" His voice projected a calm and reasoned authority. He was supposed to be here; they were the trespassers.