Wilder Mage (35 page)

The door closed.

“Sable, I didn’t say anything to her, nothing,” Taz said. She sat in Tiarra’s chair opposite Sable, shaking her head. Her maroon-streaked bob clashed with her dark hair, but matched exactly the color of her short vest. She flipped her hand, nails bitten to the quick, at the door. “Really, no one even asked me.”

Sable stroked the lip of the other fine crystal glass, and a single musical note hummed from under her finger. “These are meant for champagne, for a wedding, not for seltzer water,” she said. Sable found herself mesmerized by the tiny bubbles rising to the top of the glass. The stem was cobalt blue, twisted crystal, not unlike the sun catchers in the window of the antique shop.

Another life. Another existence. She looked up.

“I know you didn’t tell her,” Sable said, her voice flat. She jerked her head to the closed door and raised one hand to cup an ear. Taz’s mouth opened into a round “oh.”

Taz was twenty-two, cheerful, and had been ready to befriend Sable from the first minute they met. Sable was hesitant, but they’d struck up a friendship right away, comparing and commiserating about their lives. The other assistants avoided Sable when she spoke to them, shying away or ignoring her. They guarded her, but did not converse. Not like Taz.

The camaraderie was a unique experience to Sable. Always on the run, avoiding attachments, human and wizard, since learning of her abilities made for poor relations. Despite the misgivings, Sable had allowed her self-imposed wall to drop enough to let the punk-haired girl enter.

Taz told Sable she would help her. She said she wasn’t afraid of Tiarra, and she didn’t believe the stories about the head of the Imperium. No one could be that evil.

Sable had many things in common with the young woman. They were about the same age, bonded to Tiarra at nearly the same time. The biggest difference was their magical talents. Taz had only mediocre ability in Water, enough to clear a mirror of condensation, but not enough to empty a glass of liquid. And Taz was different in another way. She was a full wizard, with all her abilities.

“But why?” Taz had asked. “Why don’t you want to have and use all your abilities?”

The explanation had made no difference and only resulted in Taz shaking her head in confusion. Taz could never understand why Sable worked so hard to control her emotions to keep the sentient magic at bay.

Sable left the fluted glass on the tray and stood. The smell of the funeral roses closed in around her, and for a moment, her will crumbled. Sable choked, cupping her hand over her mouth before Taz could hear the sob. She went across the room and stood hugging herself in front of the window. It faced a park, and she stared down at the tiny figures moving like chess pieces on a board. People with dogs on leashes. People with lives and families. Cars honking. Lights at the crosswalks.

The window glass was thick, unbreakable. They didn’t open. Sable had discovered this on the first day. Her nightmare was waiting for her now, her imagination.

Taz came up behind her and patted her shoulder. “I wish I could be a better friend. I just don’t know what to do.” She brightened. “But you know, Tiarra told me that when you turn, I could stay as your helper, assistant kind of. She said you would need someone. ‘An anchor,’ she said.”

Sable felt a tendril of unease, but locating the cause eluded her. “Tiarra thinks you can help me? After I turn?”

“Well, she said that I might help you turn, be a friend, I guess she meant.” Taz giggled. “I don’t wanna break your crayons, but don’t think it’s a girl crush I got going here. Freshettes, like you and me, we need to stick together, is all.”

“You are unique, Tazzer,” Sable said, laughing. She sobered. “But what do you mean about the girl crush? You mean you…don’t want to?” Sable turned her mouth down in a pout.

Taz bumped her sideways and laughed harder. “Maybe some other time, yeah. Jeez, I can’t believe you’ve never done it. That totally wastes my cookies.” She tipped her head. “Aren’t you curious? I mean aside from getting your magic, aren’t you curious about…you know?”

Sable huffed and turned back to the window before answering. “Of course.”

“You got a guy in mind?”

How strange it was that just the memory of his mouth, his breath on her face, and the warmth of his chest under her cheek awakened her magic. Curls of energy flowed around her. She felt them, desired them, but withstood the temptation to touch the magic. It called to her, whispered promises of release and fulfillment. Sable shuddered and firmed her mouth.

Taz peered at Sable’s face. She gave a short laugh. “Yep, I’d say so. Oh, well, my loss.” Taz hugged Sable around her shoulders.

“It is good to have friends, is it not? No matter the circumstances?”

Violently, Sable pushed away from Taz and whirled to face Tiarra. Without thought, Sable clutched the phantasms of her magic in her hands. One look at Tiarra’s smirk, and Sable squeezed her eyes shut. The magic ebbed away from her as she sucked in slow draughts. “Yes, Tiarra? Did you forget something?”

“He is a good man?” Tiarra asked with a nod of her head.

“Who?” Sable had played this game before. She knew the rules now.

A tiny smile tugged at Tiarra’s lips, and then she moved to the table, where her laptop’s screen saver played the same nondescript landscape scenes. The woman pulled the laptop to her, settling into a plush chair of suede. She lifted her shapely legs to stretch them out on the padded ottoman, her black heels gleaming in the sunlight from the window.

Sable waited, her hands at her sides.

Taz shuffled her feet, angling for the still-open door. “If there isn’t anything else, I guess I’ll ooze on along…”

“Oh, no, my dear. You will stay.” Tiarra beamed a brilliant smile at the young woman.

Taz hesitated, but returned it with a tremulous one of her own.

“It just occurred to me,” Tiarra said. “I have a much better tool to force the change on you. That man whom it seems is the cause of my Imperator’s disappearance; you know him.”

Sable felt her mouth tighten, despite everything she could do to hold still. The tones of a cell phone made her freeze even that small motion.

“Contact all operatives in the search area immediately and pull them,” Tiarra said. “Yes, that is correct, pull them, and wait for my instructions.”

Breathe; let it wash away the fear. Don’t move. Stay calm.

“Until you lost the hunters last spring, you were staying with an old couple. We know this. And you worked at a bar. The owner is a man in his late twenties. With a mother. No doubt you’ve developed human ties.”

Sable heard a sharp inhalation and then silence. Then the cell phone again.

“Keeper,” Tiarra said. “A wrinkle has developed in my plan. Listen carefully. Pull the operatives as I said before, but I want them in a five-mile radius.”

She paused to laugh. “No, not around the point where my Imperator vanished. Place them around the last known residence of the
tener unus
.”

Sable heard the cell phone snap shut. She gave in to her stomach-clenching tension and turned to Tiarra without comment.

“Maybe it is time for a visit,” Tiarra said. Her blood-red nails tapped the arm of her chair. She shut the laptop and unhurriedly got to her feet. “Until then, I believe we should go at this problem from a different angle.” Tiarra’s hand cut through the streams of magic that never left her, never died. The trails spat like droplets of water on a hot surface. “Since magic can manifest during emotional outbursts, not only intercourse, I believe it is time to test your resolve. Tell me, what do you see now?”

“Air,” Sable said dully. “Yours is deep blue with sparks.”

And unique. Every track of your elements has its own shadow following it
.

“And now?”

“Red. Water.”

Tiarra swiveled her head, as if trying to catch sight of her magic. “Strange that you can see them, when every other wizard cannot.”

Except for one,
Sable thought.

Tiarra swept a taloned hand in front of her again. To Sable’s eyes, the swirls exploded into fiery chrysanthemums. Again, she heard snapping, popping.

Taz stood, drawing Sable’s attention. The magenta-dyed streak in the young woman’s hair clashed with the red of Water. The door slammed shut, but Taz didn’t start as Sable did. Blue-black Air joined the red Water, and the young woman rose, her feet dangling, her mouth wide in a silent scream.

“Is it not odd how the heart rate increases with every emotion? With passion or fear, in anger or joy, it is all the same, respiration and the heart race. I find it does not matter whether it is the subject that is directly involved or merely the audience. All are affected the same.”

Slowly twirling now, her head twisted to one side, Taz’s eyes turned inward, unfocused on the world around her. To Sable, Taz appeared on display, like a mannequin in a storefront window, turning so the customer could see all angles. The short, rib-length vest billowed as a finger of Air caught it. Her feet pointed down and her shoes slid off, each thump a sharp sound that broke into the room like a gunshot.

“Stop.” Sable felt the word rasp from her throat. She turned to Tiarra, whose attention remained on the slowly spinning figure. Sable positioned herself in front of Taz, her back to the young woman. “She isn’t a part of this. Hurting her won’t get what you want.”

But even as the words left her mouth, Sable knew differently. Taz was the means to an end, which was her friend’s task from the beginning. Taz wasn’t a spy, assigned to pass along Sable’s secrets. She’d accomplished her mission, befriending Sable without reservation or knowledge of her true mission. To create ties, emotional attachments.

The result was to turn Sable into a full wizard by any means necessary.

Tiarra twitched one finger, as if flicking dust. Behind her, Sable heard a sound like that of a rubber band stretched to its limit. Sable turned and the air left her lungs. One of Taz’s arms was back, bent in an impossible position, the buttons of the vest now straining, now popping free. A liquid snap and the arm swung free, but a baseball-sized lump appeared under the vest at the point where the top of Taz’s arm met the shoulder blade. Her head lolled back.

A guttural sound left Sable’s mouth, and she lunged for Tiarra, her hands made into claws. But with the same negligent motion of her fingers, Tiarra stopped her with Air. Irresistibly, Sable felt herself pushed into the chair by the coffee table still holding the crystal stemware.

“I cannot see your magic, but I can feel it,” Tiarra said mildly. “Give in and allow the magic to be released. It is quite simple, actually. You need do nothing but give up your stubborn attitude. Then you can have your friend returned to you. Mostly unharmed, of course.”

Sable heard the smile in Tiarra’s voice. She kept her eyes squeezed tight. It didn’t stop the tears or her ears from hearing the animal-like moans from what was left of Taz.

When the young woman died with a sharp crack of her neck, the delicate crystal glass shattered.

Chapter Twenty-Six

W
here was she?

Justus touched the brass knob and stepped from the cellar into his closed shop. He strode to the front door and took a moment to feel for passing adepts. There were many more than usual, and he had to be careful. The rage that bubbled just beneath the surface of his consciousness looked constantly for a chink in his iron will. He grappled with it in silent, fierce battles, trying to hold it in check, but it ate at his self-doubt, sometimes breaking free. The small copper bulldog that Emmett liked so much was no more, melted into slag when Fire slipped from Justus’s control for only a second. The puddle of metal was at the bottom of the dumpster.

In his office, Justus leaned his elbows on the desk. He hadn’t been able to sleep. Always, he saw her, the change from joy to terrible fear, and then the worst, when the gray eyes went blank. It played in his mind repeatedly until he could think of nothing else, and at night, it was as though he was standing in the middle of the street facing Tiarra again.

The clock showed the time to be a little after three. The afternoon was wearing on.

Maybe he could close his eyes, try to rest his brain and nerves. But not too long. He set a timer for an hour, stretched out his long legs, and tried to relax his taut muscles.

But the last few days ran through his mind and behind his closed eyes.

Macy readily answered his many questions about the Imperium’s operations; Dayne less so, but only because of the lingering effects of the compulsion. Justus asked many questions about locations, personnel, and possible reactions to a “wild” mage.

The Imperium had operatives scattered in every major city, tethered in a loose network of supervisors responsible for their regions. Like senatorial districts of states, politics played a part of any decision. Petty and sometimes divisive, they wrangled amongst themselves unless someone got out of hand and attracted attention—or caused general mayhem. When this happened, the regional director would step in to mediate the problems and, sometimes, to mete out punishment. Dayne, as captain of the Imperium, was head of security and policed the directors.

“Won’t you be missed?” Justus had asked him after several days had gone by.

Dayne had shrugged and changed the subject. The Imperium’s commander showed little concern for returning to his former responsibilities. He’d told Justus of Tiarra’s possible locations, but freely admitted she had no particular residence. He’d told him of the places she may have taken Sable, but they were only marks on a map, nothing concrete.

Justus snarled and fisted his hands again in frustration. He might as well use the map as a dartboard, for all the good the stickpins did, marking the areas of Tiarra’s influence.

Where would she take Sable?

His argument with Bert still rankled. When he had asked the teen to stay away for a few days, Bert had initially refused, his face set in stubborn lines. For a while, Justus wondered if he would do it. But when Justus requested Bert look in on his mother, the teen reluctantly agreed to stay away. It solved two problems, his mom and Bert, and kept them out of the arena.