Devon Monk - Magic In the Blood

I sifted scents for my father-searching for the notes of leather and wintergreen. I smelled all the common odors of the city-the chemical tang of cars and oil and waste. And I smelled the strangely antiseptic odor of falling rain. Beyond that, the stink of diesel, the rubber of tires, the heavy pine of Zayvion’s cologne, and my own sweat mixed with the cheap soap I’d used in the shower this morning.

But I did not smell my father. Not even a hint of him.

“Now, Allie.” Zayvion wove a glyph-something that was in the Shield family but twisted toward the center in a way I had never seen before.

He pulled magic from the stores deep beneath the city, and it flickered like electric ribbons up into the invisible glyph in front of him, filling it in until I could see the glyph too.

Magic is fast. Too fast to see until it has been cast.

Well, normally that was true. Apparently when I was using Reveal, I could see magic while it was being used.

How cool was that?

Zayvion glanced down at me. The flames over his skin had gone bloodred, tipped with a silver so dark it hurt to look at. I didn’t know if he was trying to keep from casting a spell or getting ready to Shield the hell out of himself.

I stood. Rain and magic dripped from my fingertips and swirled in metallic colors, joining the stream of water pouring into the storm grate. Magic rushed up into me, through me, from deep below the earth, hot and fast, while I remained cool and calm.

“Can you see them?” I asked.

“Get in the car, Allie,” he said.

“Can you see them?” I asked again.

I really needed him to say yes, to tell me that I was not crazy, not losing other parts of my mind besides my memory. I really needed him to say, yes, there are a bunch of hollow-eyed see-through people marching our way.

“Allie-”

I blinked rain out of my eyes. That was all the time they needed. The watercolor people broke forward, moving fast, so fast that I didn’t get my hands up in time to cast anything.

Zayvion, however, did.

The watercolor people hit the Shield he cast around us in an explosion of sparks that would have made a special-effects director proud.

They all stepped back.

Then one of them-a man in clothing that looked like it belonged to the previous century-extended his hand toward the Shield.

Zayvion’s Shield, a ten-foot-tall and -wide lattice of blue glyphing that strummed with power, stretched out and out toward the man’s hand. The Shield distorted until the edges became a fine mist, and finally the vibrant blue magic became a watercolor fog that streamed toward the man’s hand like smoke from a chimney.

The man opened his mouth wide, wider, empty black eyes unblinking, and inhaled. The mist that had just been a Shield spell flew forward and filled his mouth. He swallowed in huge gulps, throwing his shoulders back and arching his spine as he swallowed and swallowed.

All the watercolor people moaned, low, hungry, like a hard wind blowing over an empty grave. They wanted that. They wanted magic.

They rushed.

Zayvion drew a second glyph.

I was faster.

I traced Hold spells with both hands (yes, I’m spellambidextrous; have I not mentioned that before?) and threw them at the mob ahead and behind us.

Magic licked up my bones, pushed against my skin, and unleashed into the spell.

The watercolor people froze.

They did not look happy about it.

I, frankly, was hella impressed.

“Good,” Zayvion said, like I was a pupil who had just figured out how to concentrate so that a Light spell will reduce weight, not illuminate.

“Now get in the car.”

I had to give the guy props. He didn’t sound the least bit concerned that my spell was dissolving into mist even faster than his had. Didn’t sound worried that it too was being devoured by our ethereal company.

And, as far as I could tell, he didn’t seem bothered by the large crowd of new watercolor people who were trudging in slo-mo down the streets toward us.

I was pretty sure they weren’t just stopping by to cheer on their home team.

“Car, Allie. It’s safer.”

I didn’t move. Call me crazy, but I was not going to leave him out here to fight these things alone. Hells, for all I knew the car wouldn’t do me any good. These things walked through walls.

Zayvion finished the glyph-an intricate, thick-lined beast of a thing-and began chanting.

Chanting .

Okay, I’d done two years at college studying magic. I’d been around magic and my father for most of my life and had watched him do all kinds of spell casting. Ninety-five percent of the people in the city use magic.

And I had not once ever heard anyone chant.

Chant.

What. The. Hell?

The words didn’t sound like a language I recognized, but the magic-oh, sweet loves, the magic-poured up out of the ground, leaping to Zayvion’s body, sparking the glyphs and symbols on his skin to catch with a secondary fire so they seemed to shift and undulate across his skin. Magic rolled up his body in metallic colors like the marks on my arm, bright against black fire.

The man was raw, controlled power, and I wanted to touch him. Wanted to be that with him. He drew his wrist and palms together and then separated his hands in one smooth motion. He spoke a word. It sounded a little like “not” or “nunt.” My ears stopped working for a second-nothing but white noise and a high-pitched ringing.

Then the air in front of Zayvion became hard-I don’t know how else to explain it. The space around him, around me, turned into a thick glass wall, and in that glass wall, currents of gold mist swirled and shifted. Just as I almost made out the glyphs the gold formed, it would change into another glyph, fluid, flowing.

The watercolor people slammed into the glass wall, grappling at it with fingers that could find no purchase.

Zayvion spoke another word, and I could tell he was pouring magic through that word. His leaned forward, both palms extended but not touching the wall. He shifted his stance, leaning into something that looked vaguely tai chi, knees bent, one leg stretched back, torso and arms forward, as if he were pushing against a great weight. And still the magic rushed up his body, molding, whirling through the glyphs and flames against his skin, pouring through his hands into the wall. Raw power I had never seen before.

The glass wall darkened in front of Zayvion. A hole-no, a door or a gate-appeared there, so dark, it hurt to look at it. So I looked away to the edges of the wall that were still snaked with gold glyphs.

Beyond the wall, the watercolor people gathered in a huddle. They weren’t moving now, not even their arms. They did not look happy. Worse, they leaned, no, stretched out toward the black gate thing Zayvion was casting, faces and bodies elongating in a manner that defied the laws of nature. Like watercolor flames caught in an updraft.

Another word from Zay, and the dark gates filled with a rushing stream of light, filled with the watercolor people pouring in off the streets around us and funneling into that black hole. Zayvion slammed his hands together in a resounding clap, and the gate thing closed and was gone, leaving the glass and gold wall still standing.

He chanted again and brought his hands together. Another resounding clap that broke the glyph. The wall shattered into a million translucent droplets of magic that fell from above us, around us, and mixed with rain to splash against the street, where it disappeared into the rain, swirling, down the storm drains.

The watercolor people were gone. Sucked into that black door in the wall that was no longer there.

“Wow,” I breathed.

Zayvion tipped his head to the side, working out stiffness. Then he put both his hands in his pockets and turned to face me. Zen Zay. Now that I wasn’t pulling on magic, he just looked like a guy in a knit hat and ratty blue ski jacket.