Angel Magic, page 12
part #2 of Sirangel Series
But even as the pain of her magic sizzled across my body, with the same intent as Petunia’s attack, my bare thighs didn’t burn like my forearm had before, and panic widened Naomi’s eyes as she realized her touch wasn’t incapacitating me as intended.
“You have to kill her,” Quinn called. “Kill her before she kills you.”
I’d never killed a single living thing before, not even as a siren. Understanding that killing anything was against my nature, Mulunu had excluded me from the teams that hunted other sea creatures.
Naomi sensed my hesitation and sneered. “You can’t do it. You’re not strong enough.” She shoved her arms against my legs, releasing more green through her palms.
But she was wrong. Compassion wasn’t weakness; it was strength. And it didn’t interfere with doing what needed to be done.
Naomi must have seen the determination settle across my face. She bucked with more physical strength than I gave her credit for, and she almost threw me—almost.
I leaned so far against her that my chest nearly pressed against hers. She continued trying to disable me with bursts of her magic. I dug my knees into her arms until we both winced…
I had to use magic. My power. Siren or angel, I didn’t care. But I needed it right now.
Quinn grunted behind me, probably struggling uselessly against his bindings. It was all on me.
“You have no power.” Naomi’s face scrunched into feline menace, mimicking Petunia: lips bared, teeth on display, and eyes squinted at me. “You have no way to kill me.”
“Hasn’t this all been about you wanting my power?”
“But you don’t have it. You can’t reach it.”
“You’re wrong.” My voice was surprisingly calm, my mind as tranquil as a gently lapping sea. I allowed my gaze to lose focus as I sent my attention within.
Naomi convulsed beneath me, trying to throw me. I tightened my muscles and reached for that power within me that every member of the rebel faction of supernatural creatures apparently desired.
My body bore down on the witch even as my focus went otherwise inward. My wings stretched wide behind me, my left one intact once more, perfectly bonded to my shoulder blade.
When I called for it, power sprang forth deep within my center, gurgling and bubbling like a stream of endless magic—all at my disposal. Ahh, there it is. My magic. It’d been there all along, waiting for me to find it, to need it, to accept and embrace the power as an integral part of myself.
For the first time in my life, I felt strong, so strong that I had no doubt right then that I could achieve every single thing I set my mind to. It was also the first time I felt connected to my father, Raziel. Before, he’d been nothing but a vague image from stories my mother told. I’d had no sense of what he might actually be like. Now, I understood why angels avoided Earth. I comprehended how limitless their power truly was.
This angelic power within me didn’t interact with my external reality. It created it.
To angels, the earthly realm was a fiction they could alter with a mere thought, a wisp of their magic.
And so that’s what I did. I was as immovable as a boulder atop the witch. I envisioned the life force leaving her body in a rush so she could do no more harm, not just to Quinn and me, but to anyone. I pictured her energy weaving itself back into the greater energy of the world, all life, the universe, her body dissolving into its basic components, into particles so minute they too could join the infinite energy of the universe.
My legs and arms smacked against the floor, jerking me from the well of magic within me.
Blinking as if I’d just been startled from a deep slumber, I brought my head up and took in my surroundings. The deep dark of night, interrupted only by the dim light of a single lamp, coated every surface in the room.
I looked down. Naomi wasn’t beneath me anymore. Not a single thread of her crimson red outfit, nor a chip from one of her blood-red nails. No echoing clacks that followed her high-heeled steps across the house, which suddenly felt empty and cavernous. Not even a strand of her light blond hair marred the dark brown finish of the floor around me.
The lifeless body of the cat drew my attention toward the armchair she and Naomi had once sat in together. I didn’t deliberate, I directed a concentrated thought at the feline body, limp against the leather, as if the cat were only sleeping. I envisioned the cat’s body breaking down into its most essential components, those parts then fluttering away to return to the constant mass of energy that made up the universe and all life within it.
Bright, pale golden light erupted around the cat’s body. The mass of mottled fur flecked into a million grains as fine as the sand of the whitest beaches. The grains rose and hovered, until each individual one burst with golden light. Like a million stars in a clear night sky, the infinitesimal fragments rose upward in the sitting room, until they disappeared into the ceiling and beyond.
A deep sense of beauty and peace filled me as the last stars vanished from the room.
Finally, I turned toward Quinn.
He stared at me from his place in the chair, still bound against it.
His eyes were impossibly wide, his mouth hanging open. “You … you...”
I nodded. “I did.”
I rose to my feet and stood firmly upon them. My wings still spread wide, I stretched them so they almost touched the opposite walls of the room. “I claimed my angel magic.”
The shock upon Quinn’s face slowly morphed. Finally he grinned, his eyes alight, the deep shadows from Dimorelli’s ill treatment all but gone. “You sure did, baby. You did it.”
I’d really done it.
“Now unbind me so we can get the hell out of here.”
I pulled my wings flush against my back and moved to release him from that chair. I couldn’t wait to get out of there.
15
Undoing Naomi’s magic was as simple as undoing Naomi herself. With a single intention that the bindings that held Quinn should disappear, they vanished in a flash of bright gold light—as if they simply ceased to exist.
Quinn rose immediately to run to my side, but then he stopped at arm’s length, studying me while he circled his neck and shoulders and swung his arms side to side to return the blood flow to them. Finally, he closed the distance between us, stopping when we were almost touching. “Are you all right?” His eyes scanned the length of my body again.
“I-I think so.” Hell, how should I know? What I’d just done … what I was capable of, it wasn’t normal. Not even a speck of Naomi Nettles or her familiar remained.
As if he were privy to my thoughts, Quinn’s gaze flicked to the place where both had perished. “What you did … it’s incredible. I’ve never seen anything like it.” His words were soft with awe, a reverence that I hadn’t earned. The angelic magic I’d tapped into had originated someplace far greater than me. It wasn’t meant for the Earth; it couldn’t be. It was too powerful.
“There’s nothing left of them,” he said, and when I cringed, he added, “You did the right thing. Hell, what you did was totally amazing. You do understand you had to kill her, right?”
I nodded my head slowly; it felt unusually heavy, as if every strand of my violet hair weighed a pound.
“And you know you had to kill the cat too?”
Again, I nodded, but it was as if something were moving my head for me, and I was a mere observer of my actions.
“You did what you had to do, nothing more. You did exactly what I would have done if I’d been capable. It was driving me crazy not to be able to break free of her bindings to protect you. Her magic is—was—top of the line. Not even Uncle Irving would have managed to escape.”
“Q?” I’d never called him by Irving’s nickname for him before, and my voice must have come out dreamy, because his eyes narrowed and focused on me.
“What?” He was circling my body, checking me out from behind.
“I feel strange.”
“Well you look fine, just as beautiful and fully functional as usual. I mean, your eyes—you know what? Never mind.” He rounded to stand in front of me again. “Your arm and wing look totally healed.”
I nodded. “I think it happened when I used my angel magic, if that’s what it was.”
“Oh, it had to have been. How’d you do it?” He hesitated. “You know what, never mind. You look dead on your feet. Let’s get out of here.”
I nodded again, my head feeling oddly airy inside. He flicked a final concerned look at my face, but when he wrapped an arm around my shoulders, I leaned into him, content to let him lead us away from this place. “Are you sure we can just leave? There’s nothing else holding us here?” I asked.
“Naomi was confident in her skills, and with good reason. Those bindings should have been enough to hold us. There’d be no need for her to put up other protections to keep us locked inside.” But there was a hesitation in his assurance. He cast nervous glances toward the corners of the quiet, dark house. “It’d be great to search the house and see if there are any spells or magical objects that we could take and use to protect ourselves, but I’m afraid she might have booby-trapped them, assuming we could even find them. I don’t have the skills to spot a warding or enchantment before it’s triggered.”
“I certainly don’t either.”
“Actually, I don’t know what you can’t do. You just took out one of the most skilled witches in North America.”
I swallowed a thick lump of apprehension. “So we can just leave, right?”
“Yeah, I think so.”
A lot was riding on a “think so.”
Our steps slowed as we reached a backdoor that led to the outside. Quinn drew me behind him, as if to shield me with his body. “Be ready.” But ready for what, I had no idea. I pressed against Quinn’s back, tucking my arms between my chest and his back.
He touched the door handle with a fingertip, yanking it backward as if the brass surface were hot. When nothing happened, he tapped the handle again, then wrapped his hand around it. He pulled it open while looking over his shoulder to grin at me. “We’re getting out of here, baby.”
He stepped through the open doorway first … and green ignited like a flash fire, pulling him entirely into the middle of it and trapping him like an insect caught in a spider’s web.
Quinn’s face contorted in agony. I reached for him. “No! Don’t touch me,” he yelled. I yanked my hands back. “It’ll grab hold of you too.” His words were slurred, his eyes already glazed over as he resisted the pain that threatened to overwhelm him. His entire body shuddered—wave after wave—as Naomi’s green magic rolled through him.
I clenched my hands at my sides. I had to get him out of this!
Okay. It was as easy as whatever I’d done to, ah, kill Naomi and Petunia. I’d modified Naomi’s magic before, enraging the witch when I’d redirected us to an in-between plane instead of the Menagerie, where she’d intended to take us. I’d dissolved her magic that had bound me to the chair. It should be simple as kelp pie to break this spell.
But when I reached for my ability to do it, I discovered I had no idea how to go about it. When Petunia and Naomi had attacked me, I hadn’t really thought things through. I’d acted from a place of emotion, not rational decision. It had been as if my body had gone through the motions while my conscious mind hung out somewhere else, enjoying the view.
I bore down the entirety of my will on the green magic that held Quinn in its grasp. You will dissolve. You will disappear. But wait! Just the magic, not Quinn. Crap. What if I made Quinn disappear that way?
I glared at the green light that was thick enough to appear viscous and gooey. It undulated in slow, dripping waves. I urged the green magic to vanish. Go away, I projected to it, tracing my gaze across every bit of the coating that stretched from corner to corner of the threshold.
Quinn’s eyes rolled back; his head drooped against his chest, lolling to one side.
“Oh, pluck it.” I backed up to get a running head start, and then I ran at Quinn with all the speed I could muster. I wrapped my arms around his torso and tackled him, launching us through the doorway.
The green light sputtered behind us as we crashed outside in a tangled heap, half on the cement steps that led up to the door, half on cement pavers. Pain jolted up both arms as Quinn’s weight and our momentum tugged on my joints in the wrong way.
Quinn’s head knocked against the ground, but I yanked him forward so he didn’t hit that hard. I laid him down gently and pulled my arms from under him, rolling on the ground next to him. My legs rested on the steps, my upper body on the pavers, but I had to catch my breath before I could move to better situate us.
The door up the stairs was back to being an innocuous opening. Whatever it was that I’d done, thank God it’d worked. No light shimmered or beckoned. I’d changed or broken or interfered with Naomi’s magic again—for the last time, I hoped.
I sucked in another breath and turned to look at Quinn. He was already staring at me, though he looked dazed, his eyes sweeping everywhere without focus.
I scrambled to my knees and leaned over his face. “Q?”
“Selene,” he whispered.
“Are you all right?”
“With you, always.”
I smiled, though he sounded like a drunken sailor.
“You’re so beautiful. Your eyes are glowing.”
My smile fell. “W-what did you just say?”
“Your pretty eyes … glowing like a full moon. I could stare at them all night long.” He sang, “All night lo-oong.”
“What do you mean, my eyes are glowing?”
Quinn smiled. “My pretty sirangel. Want to go on a date with me?”
“Of course I do, but what do you mean about my eyes?”
“They’ve been glowing since you did your angel magic.”
I stilled completely.
He swept my long hair away from where it hung across his face, rubbing the soft strands between his fingers. He sniffed them. “You even smell pretty. Like a fresh, soothing ocean.” He brought my hair to his nose again, face dreamy as he inhaled.
“My eyes, Q. Focus.”
“I can’t focus on your eyes. They’re so bright, I can’t. Same color as your angel magic. Bright, happy gold. Bea-u-ti-ful.”
I sat back onto my butt while Quinn burst into a song of his own composition. The rendition wove in my full moon eyes, my vine-like purple hair, and a body and face that made dreams come true.
Had Quinn not just told me my eyes were glowing like a light bulb, I might have been able to enjoy his oddly drunken moment. I ran both hands through my hair while I waited for the effect of Naomi’s spell to wear off, grateful it hadn’t affected me. If it wasn’t Quinn’s drunken imaginings and my eyes really were glowing with my angel magic, then I was in big trouble.
But no … they definitely weren’t his drunken imaginings. He’d begun to mention my eyes before, then stopped himself, probably not to worry me—So big trouble it is.
I hadn’t been able to access my angel magic just now to help him, and I certainly didn’t know how to control it. It seemed likely that I’d activated my angel magic, but if it still burned inside me, potentially mixing with my siren magic, that was the makeup of a volatile situation, and I’d already had enough of those to last me a good lifetime.
But I felt all right—better than ever, actually. The pain that had shot through my arms at the awkward landing was already gone. My wings moved better than ever before. I actually felt as if I might have some real control over them now, like maybe I could even fly for real. I also had more control over my legs than any time since Mulunu had magicked me onto Irving’s front step.
In fact, all the way around, I felt better than ever. Stronger, yes, but more confident, more capable, like I wasn’t just some bumbling girl hoping not to make too many mistakes and relying on others to fix whatever problems I caused. I felt … in charge. An odd sensation considering I had no clear idea how I’d controlled my angel magic, nor much of an idea of what I could do with my siren magic beyond my song and sporting a sparkly mermaid tail.
I ran my hands through my hair again, untangling the ends, staring off into the dark night. A half moon illuminated the low hills and trees of the valley we were in. I perked as I sensed the rushing water of a stream nearby, and as I strained my ears I convinced myself that I could actually hear it.
At least we were safe for now. Naomi and Petunia were dead and Antonio Dimorelli and his goblins couldn’t find us here—I hoped. We had time to figure things out. Once the effects of Naomi’s magic wore off Quinn, he’d help me understand why my eyes were glowing and how I could get them to stop doing it.
There was nothing to do but wait. I leaned back and lay next to Quinn, taking in the endless sky dotted with enough stars to bewilder the imagination. As he sang of my bewitching beauty to the crisp night, I allowed myself to enjoy the calm. If experience had proven anything, it was that we didn’t get nearly enough of it.
I took Quinn’s hand in mine and focused on his words. The boy sounded like he was in love with me. Though it made no logical sense, I suspected I loved him too. We’d come at the bond between us in reverse. Love first, understanding why later.
As he belted lyrics about the siren who stole his heart and flew away with him on wings of light, I pondered what kind of magic might bond us to each other. A shooting star ripped across the sky, and I wished for more moments like these, and that love would be enough to conquer everything that came at us.
16
When Quinn finally tired of putting his drunken declarations of admiration and love to song, he fell asleep right where he lay, half sprawled across the steps to Naomi’s house. It couldn’t have been comfortable, but he drifted off into slumber with a contented smile on his face. I didn’t have the heart to wake him, no matter how desperate I was to put distance between us and anything to do with the witch. I supposed after sleeping in a small, hard, cold cell for two months, concrete out in the open wasn’t all that bad. After all he’d endured during his captivity, he deserved some contentment and rest.
