Revealing the Truth, page 9
He moves closer to me, walking around me in a circle. “Now, how much physical training do you have?”
“Why?” I ask.
“Because that will help you, too. Our kind rely on our magic too much. If you can defend yourself in a physical fight, that could mean the difference between life and death.”
I release an exasperated breath. “Guess it’s a good thing Maverick liked to keep me in constant classes for self-defense. I take a class twice a month.”
Bohen nods with a smile. “Very good.”
“I also hike, and run regularly as well. We enjoy the outdoors.”
“As all young people should.” Bohen moves to stand beside me, with his legs slightly apart, and knees bent a little as if ready to flee. “Copy my stance.”
I do as he says. “Focus on your magic, feel it inside of you. Command it to do your bidding.” He lifts his right arm and a bolt of bright light shoots from his palm into the wall across from us.
“Wow,” I say. There’s a hole in the wall the size of a baseball.
“You’ll do better. This is half my usual punch. When I was alive, I was powerful. Not your parents, powerful, but in my own right, I am a Warren after all.”
Giddy with excitement, I force myself to calm down and sense the differences in my body. The magic that wasn’t there before.
I close my eyes, looking within myself. It feels like a permanent warmth has settled into my blood, like a hum of energy that just won't go away. I can tell that it wasn’t there before. I feel complete, now. Which is odd, because I never noticed I wasn’t before.
When I’m calm and ready, I open my eyes. “Good. Now direct the magic into your palm, and point it so it will hit the wall.”
Bohen’s words are distant as the thrum of my power courses through me. It’s as if I’ve done this a thousand times before, the magic follows my command. The warm sensation that slides down my right arm and into my outstretched palm, is a rush. This is how it should have been my entire life.
It flies out of my palm and the wall before us explodes outward. The brick turns to crumbled pieces of stone.
“Holy shit. That was stronger than I was expecting it to be.”
Even though I’m panicking, Bohen’s grin is magnificent. “Don’t ever apologize for that. You, my dear, are going to be the person to help us rid Sam and his disciples from this world. Let the magic do the damage. Just be sure to keep it under control.”
“That’s not scary?” I ask him, feeling self-conscious of my magic.
“Not at all. It may be frightening to you for a little while until you can control it. But it’s not scary, it's wonderful. Embrace it.”
There is a sense of pride that washes over me, but it’s not my emotion. From Maverick? This strange link between us. What could he be proud of me for? Does he know I’m a witch?
No. He can’t know that. He’s a human. But I thought I was a human, too.
I cling to my head with both hands. What the heck has my life become? How am I accepting all of this as if it's not a big deal, without even questioning it?
“Because deep down, you knew there was something there. Something missing even if you couldn’t remember it. Now that it’s free it doesn’t seem so bizarre.”
“Mav.” I whisper into my thoughts, hoping he can hear me. “How are you talking to me right now?”
I feel a whisper of a caress on my face. “I felt your pain when your bindings were removed. I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
Just hearing his voice in my head makes me relax. I hadn’t realized I was so wound tight.
“So, you know what I am? You’re not scared?”
His chuckle is music to my ears. “Never, my love. You’re stuck with me.”
“Good. I don’t know what I would have done if you feared me and wanted to leave me.” Just thinking about it is making me queasy.
“All you need to do is talk to me. I have so much to talk to you about, too. Soon, my love. I’ll see you soon.”
I feel his presence fade, not fully, but enough to give me my privacy. Bohen’s watching me with an expression I can’t decipher.
“Are you ready to go again?”
I nod, sending smaller jolts of light out toward a piece of the wall that hasn’t been destroyed yet. One after another, after another. The holes vary in sizes from a golf ball to a softball.
“Excellent,” Bohen says. “Are you ready to see if you can deflect my blows?”
“Hell no!” I say. But part of me feels like I can. Bohen chuckles at my immediate response.
I shrug my shoulders and say, “Fuck it. Let’s try. Don’t kill me, please.”
“Never.”
He tosses some sparks at me. Instinctively, I push back with my magic, one hand to block it, the other sends out my own bright light.
“Again,” I say.
He obliges me, sending multiple bursts of magic at me. One breaks through my shield and hits me in my calf. I hiss in pain, but it’s minimal. I ignore it, and continue to lay out my own assault.
Sending out my power, I will the magic to stop before it hits him, forming a cage around him. He’s surrounded by a bomb and doesn’t even know it.
When he sends his last bolt toward me, I shield it, and order the hidden magic to go off.
And just like I planned, an explosion rocks the earth and the building we are in. “Fuck,” I say. I forgot that I would get hurt if the damn building collapses on me.
I rush out of the crumbling warehouse and wait in the parking lot for my uncle to join me. It doesn’t take more than a minute for Bohen to reach me. His shit eating grin plastered to his face.
“That.” He shakes his head. “I thought you were missing me on purpose. Then I lost sight of it. How did you do that?”
I shrug. “I honestly don’t know, I just pictured it in my head, what I wanted it to do, and it obeyed me.”
“We need to practice that again. And again. And again. You need to perfect that move. Just make sure you’re outside next time.”
I laugh. “Duly noted.”
“Let’s eat. I’m sure you’ve worked up quite an appetite.”
“Since I hadn’t yet eaten anything? I sure did,” I remark, following him back to The Diner.
Chapter
Eighteen
MAVERICK
“So, I picked up some shit coming from Vermont. Looks like a power surge before it went out in the entire block, and then an explosion, making an entire warehouse collapse. From what I can tell, I’d say the explosion came from the same place.”
I peer over my brother’s shoulder as he points to a rough area of where I’m going to search next. “Perfect. Her magic scorched the walls wherever she was. I saw it in her mind. The place looked like a dump, but I can’t say that’s how it was before her magic exploded out of her or not.”
“Do you think that we’ll find her here?”
I sigh. “I honestly don’t know.” I pull my laptop over and show him my search. “I was looking up information on Bohen’s in the supernatural community who would be about her father’s age. We know he died. Get this, the story he told Ella was only a fraction. He was jumped, but he managed to fight back before he was felled. He spent nearly three years in a coma before his body gave up and he passed on.
“There’s more,” I add before Gel can interject. “He likes to hang out at the club beneath The Diner. I wonder if he was working with the people who took her, or if it was a coincidence that she would meet her uncle there.”
“This doesn’t say that he was a Bennet. It says he was a Warren.”
“There was another article I read, Aster and Bohen’s parents were killed on the same day. Isobel’s parents took the both of them in and raised them. That must be why Ella says uncle. The boys had been friends since at least then. Close as brothers.”
“Okay, so we know he likes to hang out there. Can you blame him? It’s one of the only places that he can feel alive.”
Shaking my head from side to side, I consider his words. “True. Okay, maybe he was already there and sensed her?”
Gellevel gazes off into space for a moment. “That sounds more like it. Not that I’m taking him out of the equation, but I think it's more plausible that he could tell that she’s a Bennet witch and he wanted to get to know her. Finding out they were somewhat related was just a bonus.”
My brother, the one who spends the least amount of time amongst the humans, thinks the most like them sometimes.
“Okay. So we assume he’s a good guy. I believe he’s actually training her in control as we speak. She’s afraid I would leave her if I found out she’s not human.”
Gellevel growls. “If you would have told her sooner, she may actually tell you where she is and we can stop this crazy ass pursuit.”
Rolling my eyes, I say, “Yes, yes. We all know I’ve made some mistakes. But I didn’t realize this shit was going to happen before I got to tell her everything.”
My brother jots down coordinates on a piece of scrap paper and shuts off his laptop, shoving it back into his duffle.
I do the same, making note of Bohen Warren, and Aster and Isobel Bennet. I write down Sam, and circle it. I haven’t been able to find him in my searches, but I plan on continuing to try.
We load into the rental car and drive to the hangar. Time to fly to Vermont.
Chapter
Nineteen
UNKNOWN
That surge of power, it was the witch or wizard we’ve been hunting. It’s close by, too. Which makes me question what the fuck is going on.
Who is this person and why are they so close to me? Why does that power feel so strong?
I pick up the phone and dial Alita. She answers on the second ring. “Hello?”
“You two better get back here. This witch’s powers have just been fully unlocked. We need to find this witch now.”
“Your son found out some information on that,” she starts. “Her name is Carmella Bennet. She’s lived in New Hampshire her whole life.”
I grind my teeth together. “Is that all?”
“No, sir.” I fucking knew it. “She’s Aster’s daughter.”
“Aster and Isobel?” I growl.
“Yes, sir.”
Even with my rising rage, I know I’m still ahead of this. “It’s fine. We’ll kill her. One witch is no match for us.”
The phone in my hand cracks slightly under my rage. They really thought to hide their daughter from me? Now I just need to finish what my ancestors have done before me. Wipe the last of the Bennet and Bishop witches off the map. Then we’ll be the most powerful name in the wiccan community.
Chapter
Twenty
CARMELLA
We go in through the alley, and walk directly into the supernatural side of the diner. It’s a little darker in here than the other side, but it’s comfortable.
We find an available seat and I notice the busboy cleaning off tables. He appears to be the only one working on this side right now. He leaves the square dish bucket on the table and turns to us. His hair is black and cut short, he has beautiful sea green eyes. He’s tall too, over six feet from this angle.
“What can I get for you?”
“A Mountain Dew, no ice. And your lunch special.”
He drops his pad and looks at me. “Which special?”
I glance at the menu, not realizing there were multiple specials. “The uh, human one.” A glass of O Negative doesn’t sound like something I would enjoy. Neither does a zebra steak.
“I’ll just have my coffee, Zale”
“Alright, Bohen. The human side is packed. I’m working as fast as I can being the only one out here. May take longer than normal.”
“It’s okay. Don’t worry.”
When Zale leaves, I find myself glancing around at the patrons. Doris was the only one who took my order in here. I didn’t realize the vast differences of beings I would find.
“Every supernatural being in the world can access this place from anywhere in the world. Though the magic works differently in the human diner. You can enter the same time as someone in England and you would never see them. The employees do, because they service everyone. But the customers never see nor interact with anyone not entering from the same door.”
“That’s actually really cool. I wouldn’t have ever thought of that. So, you can get in here from anywhere. Even people like me, who didn’t know they were supernatural?”
“Yes. If you were a recognizable supe, Doris would have offered you this space. But since you didn’t know and she couldn’t sense your power, she never did. Which is why you were only shown the human side.”
“I see.” As I glance around the room, I see people with pointy ears, and what looks like a vampire or two, by the way their incisors glisten when they talk or laugh. “Well, at least I can enjoy it now. It’s oddly cozy in here. Even with the creatures I was raised to be afraid of. It looks more real on this side.”
“That’s because it is.” Zale places our drinks on the table before us.
“Thank you,” I tell him.
“You’re welcome.” He ducks away to get more work done.
I sip my Dew. I wish places had Voltage on tap. It’s my absolute favorite. But regular is good, too.
We sit in silence for a while as I people watch. Or is that monster watch now? Either way, I’m observing them as I sip my soda.
There’s a group to the right in a dark corner. I know two of them are vampires, I spotted them earlier. But I think one of them is a shifter of some sort. He looks buff like the way writers always describe them. The fourth one, I can’t tell from here, but I know he has pointed ears. His brown hair barely long enough to keep them covered.
“How do they all get around out there?”
“With a glamor. It’s a spell or a potion, or part of the magic of the supe. That group you’ve been watching. There’s an elf, a wolf shifter, and two vampires. The vampires only need to keep their teeth up. But the elf needs to make his ears look normal, and take away the powerful vibe he gives off. When he puts the glamor on, he’ll look just like you and me. The shifter, well, that’s what he does. He goes from an animal to a human.”
“Okay, so, out there I wouldn’t know any of them are none humans?”
“You would, now. Because they can’t hide their otherness from other supes. But humans, they never know how much we truly are involved in their world.”
“Well at least I’ll know. Is it like a Spidey sense thing?”
“Am I supposed to know what that means?”
I gape at him. My mouth wide open and eyes blinking rapidly.
Zale comes over and places my food on the table. “Dude, I live in a fish tank and I know what she’s talking about. Spider Man.”
I nod. “What he said. Spider Man. Please tell me you’ve heard of him.”
“You’re aware I’ve been dead for over twenty years, right?”
I throw my hands up in the air. “You’re a lost cause.”
Zale laughs as he stalks off.
“He lives in a tank?”
“He’s a merman. He has to stay wet somehow, right?”
“Why not in the Ocean?”
Bohen shrugs. “I’m not sure. And I’m not one to pry into his business. He’s an employee. He does a lot to help out here. But that’s all I know.”
“A real-life merman. I didn’t know they were real.”
“Honey, almost everything that is ‘made up’ is real.”
“Wow. So, there are mermaids, too?”
Bohen nods.
“When we can, I need you to come to my house. You need to get acquainted with the marvel movies.”
Bohen chuckles, but a warm light fills his eyes. “As you wish, niece.”
I continue my search around the room. At the bar is a lady working on a laptop. Her wavy long dark blonde hair is loose on her back. Beside her, sitting on the counter, is a black cat. His eyes meet mine from across the room, I can’t help but stare into them. It’s like he’s more intelligent than a normal house cat.
Feeling a tad uncomfortable, I break my gaze and start to pick at my food. “Where can I practice without causing harm?” I ask Bohen.
“I’d say the park across the street, but it’s too open. I don’t want the humans to see you. We can go into the woods, but that’s risky, too. Too many unknowns out there. The best bet would be to find another area like we did earlier and try there. We have a few abandoned buildings around here. I can take you if you want?”
I shake my head. “No. I want to train alone, to see if I can get the hang of it without an instructor.”
“You do have control of it. Did you forget what you just did?”
I shake my head. “No. It’s just that I want to try and do it alone. Maybe see if I can come up with more on my own.”
“Eager, aren’t you?”
“I want to make him pay for what he did. I can’t do that if I’m not at my fullest.”
Bohen snaps his fingers and a giant book lands on the table. I jump as I’m startled by the thud and the appearance of the tomb before me.
“You’ll need this. It’s a combination of all three lines. I’m from the Warren line. Your father is the Bennet line. And your mother, the Bishop line. I have no use for it as a ghost, but I’ve kept our three grimoires since the day I came back as a ghost. I combined them and used a little spell to hide it on my person. Even as a ghost, I could be mugged.” He pushes the book of three different lineages toward me.
My eyes water. Pieces of my parents. “Thank you,” I say.
“Read it. There’s history in here from all three lines. There are spells that we each created, potions, and information on how to wield powerful magic. Since you come from the two most powerful lines of magic, you’ll need the advice this has to offer.”
Bohen tenses before he rises from his seat and looks around the room. He bends down, says three words, and the book turns into a plastic card that will fit into my wallet. He scribbles on a napkin. “These are the words to make it appear. These three will put it back to the card form. We must go now. Danger is coming.”
