Darkbound (The Legacy of Moonset) (6 page)

t
e
n

Magic can do many things, but it cannot create something from nothing. Love spells are notorious, but impossible. The best you can hope for is an attraction, an obsession, a debilitating
need
that surpasses all other needs. It isn’t love, though.

Magic and Subjugation:
Emotional Influence in the Modern Witch

My locker had been molested by an invasion of puff paint and glitter. Pink and red, mostly, heaped in oozing quantities as one poster had been pressed over top of another, the puff paint barely having a chance to dry and instead acted like a gluey substance, holding them all together like a serial killer’s mosaic of victims.

“Malcolm,” a voice called out from down the hall, “there you are. Come with me, please?” Kelly appeared, face pinched in irritation.

“Thank god,” I exhaled, feeling the tension already pooling out of me. “Where have you guys been all day? I’ve been calling Quinn since this morning. Do you have any idea what it’s like—”

“I know exactly what it’s like,” she said crisply, leading me down the hall. The other students gave a wide berth, maybe it was something in her expression, or maybe she’d done some magic I wasn’t aware of. Either way, we made it through the halls in record time.

She led us all the way back to classroom we used for Coven class. As we walked into the classroom, conversation stopped between a teacher and the two students who were still lingering by her desk.

“Get out,” Kelly commanded, turning to look pointedly towards the door.

It was the chilling tone more than the demand that hustled them out of the room, I thought. Even the teacher didn’t stop long enough to reclaim her purse, she went for the door with single-minded purpose. She didn’t look back, didn’t stop to wonder why a stranger was leading a student into the room only to clear it. She was even so thoughtful as to close the door behind her.

With that taken care of, Kelly spun around, pointing to one of the chairs. “Sit.” But I was not a student, and I definitely wasn’t going to be cowed by some grad school wannabe who thought she was going to put me in my place. I walked up to the teacher’s desk, cleared a spot near the front and sat down at the front of it.

“I don’t know who you think you are, but this isn’t my fault. If you think I did this, clearly you’re an idiot. I hate this kind of stuff. So go find Jenna, get her to undo whatever it was that she did, and leave me alone.”

“Do you really think it’s that simple?” Kelly asked, eyes dark. The lights in the room were off, the only light coming in from outside. “This school is nearly in a panic. One wrong move could set the whole thing ablaze. You remember what that’s like, don’t you, Malcolm?”

“I—” This wasn’t my fault! Why was she freaking out like this?

“You think you’re so special,” she continued, “such a rebel. The witch who wants to be a real boy.” She walked slowly towards me, each step a sharp snap of her heels against the tile floors. This wasn’t where I thought the afternoon would take me, not by a long shot.

“I didn’t ask for this. Any of it. You people dragged me here. If I could leave, I would.” Frustration welled up in me, I could feel myself close to breaking. “They don’t need me, and I’d be better off without them. I could actually stay in school long enough to make friends, maybe have a life. Maybe I could have been class president, who knows? I never have the chance because Jenna hates everything.”

“It’s so hard to be you,” she agreed, her voice low now. Husky.

Oh. Oh no. Oh this was the opposite of what I’d wanted after all.

Kelly reached the end of the aisle, only inches from me. She placed her hands down on my knees, and as much as I wanted to, I resisted the urge to shove myself backwards and away from her.

“I can help you.” Her eyes were earnest, she really believed that she was doing the right thing, but then crazy people always did. She slipped out of her shoes, shedding any illusion of height. “I’m sure you’ve been very confused, Malcolm. It’s okay. I’m here now. I can make you understand.”

“This isn’t you,” I said, wondering how I could talk my way out of this. On a top-ten list of typical adolescent fantasies, getting hit on by the smoking-hot teacher didn’t really work for me. At least not this smoking-hot teacher. Maybe if it was the football coach, but he was in his thirties, so maybe not. “You don’t have to do this,” I added desperately. “It’s the spell. It’s whatever Jenna did. This isn’t you.”

“And this isn’t you.” She traced her fingers in the air, and I felt a throbbing against my skin, like a second heartbeat trying to force its way into my body. It was foreign, uncomfortable, and made me want to run as far and as fast as I could. “But it will be soon. Don’t worry,” she cooed. “I can make it all go away. All the misery. All the confusion. Then we can be happy. You’ll see. I’m doing this for us.”

She continued tracing symbols in the air, and the pulsing around me grew thicker, stronger, like a blood pressure cuff squeezing my entire body. And then, for a glorious moment, it stopped. Everything halted. The universe took a moment to catch its breath.

“Oh I like this,” a musical voice whispered, a symphony of pleasure and bubbling laughter before it ultimately soured, “but I don’t like
her
very much.” Fingers rubbed the back of my head again, pulling tight at the last moment, before the moment passed, the bubble popped, and the squeezing pressure returned.

“It’ll all be over soon,” Kelly promised.

“Miss Davenport, step away from the boy!”

I’d never been so happy to see Illana Bryer in my life.

It took Illana less than fifteen minutes to not only save me from the substitute, but to also return the school to some semblance of chastised normalcy, track down Jenna and reverse whatever it was that she’d done. In the meantime, she made me wait in the English room. Quinn finally showed up with Nick a few minutes after Illana, both of them looking horribly unperturbed.

“So is this the part where you move us out in the middle of the night?” I asked, trying to figure out why I had not one but two Witchers guarding my back in the meantime. “Or is there another threat? Another wraith? A unicorn? A Cabbage Patch doll?”

“You’re not going anywhere,” Quinn said placidly. I would believe him more if the pair of them weren’t lingering by the door like something was about to barge its way in.

There was something wrong with one of Quinn’s forearms. It was distorted, the skin tone not matching the rest of his arm. The more I studied it, the less real it became until finally Quinn noticed my stare and snorted. “Shut up,” he muttered at Nick, who was grinning furiously, before he scrubbed his hand over the space above the distortion. An illusion faded, revealing an arm brace of some kind. Black and strappy, there was a sheath laid into the interior, a knife blade lined perfectly to nestle against the crook of his arm. He pulled the athame out, holding it up as if this were show-and-tell.

“Never leave home without it?” he said halfheartedly.

“That’s MasterCard,” Nick replied immediately.

“Always?” Quinn tried next.

“That’s Snape.”

“Whatever, then. It’s just a precaution,” Quinn said, directing the words to me. “Not that there’s anything to be really worried about, but Illana wants to make sure the situation doesn’t grow any more out of control than it already has.”

“I think it’s pretty much as bad as it can get,” I pointed out. “Or did you miss the part where one of your merry band of badasses tried out her cougar act a decade too early?”

“This was just a lust spell,” Quinn said absently. “Though I don’t know how Jenna managed it. She shouldn’t have access to the kinds of spells that could put something like this together. But anyway, this is nothing. People just wanted to sleep with you. I’m sure that’s not out of the realm of normalcy for you. It could have been a lot worse.”

“There are worse things than hormones,” Nick agreed. “Like that pitiful excuse of an illusion you’ve got going on,” he said, nodding toward Quinn’s arm brace.

“So, want to tell us what prompted this?” Quinn asked, flicking the lights on and off like a child who needed to find
something
to do to keep himself from dying of boredom.

Did he really need me to? Wasn’t it obvious. “Jenna wants new magic. She thinks Eat, Pray, Coven class is her best shot. So she’s buying everything you guys are selling. Because that worked out so well for us last time.”

Neither one of them said anything. Most witches liked the idea of having a coven to belong to and were jealous of those who did. I’d even heard that there were summer programs for high school students specifically geared towards bringing as many kids together as possible for a few weeks just to see if any covens would form.

Illana’s return a few minutes later was perfectly timed, as the awkward silence between the three of us only intensified.

“You’ll be happy to know that your effect on the rest of the student body is at an end.” Illana breezed back into the room, nodding sharply at Quinn as she passed him. Quinn and Nick disappeared out into the class, closing the door just as the bell rang, signaling the final break between classes before the end of the day.

“It’s a bit premature, I’m sorry to say, but it looks like I will be taking over instruction of your lessons now. Kelly feels awful, of course, but we both thought it best if she took a few days to regain her footing. It’s a shame. She’s particularly well versed in aiding new covens control their bond. It’s one of the reasons she was brought here to you.”

“Yeah, you guys have been regular humanitarians, looking out for our best interests. Funny how none of that came up the first two months we were here.” I rolled my eyes. “She’s … what? Twenty-three at the most. How much of an expert could she really be?”

“A double major in Psychology and Criminal Justice, as well as six years spent with the Witchers. The girl may be young, but I would think that you of all people wouldn’t judge her so harshly based on her appearance.”

I felt a flush of shame creep up my chest and into my face. “I didn’t mean it like that,” I muttered.

“Of course you did,” Illana said blandly. “Some children grow up too fast because they have no other choice. Sometimes that pressure creates a diamond.” Illana stared down my challenge, her look conveying regret and disappointment all at once. I never understood exactly what Justin feared from her—she had the ability to make him piss his pants on command. But being on the receiving end of her disappointment … I understood it a little better at least.

“She didn’t teach us anything worthwhile,” I said under my breath, like that was the problem all along. That I was absolved. And maybe I should be, especially after what happened that afternoon.

“You didn’t want to learn,” Illana countered. “And don’t think I haven’t noticed how you’ve yet to stop in at the hospital. I asked you to do something, did I not? Was I in any way unclear?”

And that was it. The breaking point. “Do you think I was just going to do it because you told me?
I hate this.
All of it. I don’t
care
why Luca got involved in the black arts. I don’t
care
that you did us a favor by not smothering us in our cribs. I. Don’t. Care.”

“Do you really think it’s that easy?” Illana was controlled, calm. Surprisingly, she didn’t seem angry at my outburst, or even offended. But her chiding disappointment was more than enough. “You may not see much value in your life, Malcolm, but that doesn’t mean yours is the opinion that matters most.” The strange words, and the strange touch against my head came back at once. I brushed my fingers against the nape of my neck, felt something slide against my skin. Ash on my fingers. There was ash in my hair. What the hell?

“I’m done with all this creepy monster shit,” I snapped. “Do you understand me? Comprende?”

“Your uncle once thought he could speak to me this way.” I swear Illana almost smiled. It was like watching a shark feel joy. “He never made that mistake again.”

By that point I was yelling, but I still didn’t care. “Get it through your head, lady. I’m not Justin. I don’t jump just because you tell me to.” An idea was slowly forming in my head. “You want my help? You find a way to break the Coven bond and get me the hell away from all of this. Get me the hell out of this town and away from all of you people, and I’ll do everything you ask.”

“Is that all?” Illana’s voice was frost on glass. “Would you like the moon on a bauble, for an encore? You ask for the impossible, as you rightly know. The Coven bond survives even death. I can do nothing.” There was something that flashed across her face, a look like remorse. “Even if we could, there is still Moonset’s manipulations to contend with. Understandably, no one wishes to reignite whatever darkness they tied you up into.”

There was a hiccupping sound from the door. I looked away from Illana to see Bailey standing in front of the others, different shades of the same hurt and disappointment on each of their faces.

e
l
e
v
e
n

Charlie Denton took
Moonset harder than anyone.

Sara Bexington (S)
Personal Interview

I couldn’t say why I ended up at the hospital. After seeing the looks on Justin and Bailey’s faces, I left. Fled, really. I felt like a traitor, maybe because I
was
a traitor. All of us fought, but I think it was the first time any of us had really expressed how desperately we wanted the bond between us broken.

I think I was the only one who felt that way and that made it worse.

I had no intention of following Illana’s orders, but when I left the school, the hospital was where I ended up. Their world wasn’t mine, and I wanted nothing to do with it. So maybe one last job and then I could call it quits.

Maybe you just want to know how to walk away,
my mind supplied.

The nurse directed me towards a waiting room on the third floor. Instead of the soothing colors of pale blue and yellow on the lower floors, these floors were a stark, unflattering white with mahogany-colored furniture. It looked less like a hospital waiting room and more like a warehouse break room.

There was only one person in the waiting room, surrounded by a half-dozen empty coffee cups. The television focused on an audience that didn’t have anywhere better to be than a lackluster talk show, while a generic man in a suit interrogated a couple on a stage. The volume was off, so I couldn’t hear whatever fake reality the fake couple was fighting about.

The man’s head was turned towards the television, and I could see that his eyes were open, but they never moved to follow the action. Had he fallen asleep with his eyes open? Was he dreaming about these strange people with their silent problems and wondering how they’d invaded his mind?

The man himself looked grizzled—a face that hadn’t shaved in a week, clothes that probably hadn’t been changed in at least that long. At a glance, he reminded me of the crazy Moonset cultist that had popped up when we first moved to Carrow Mill. There was something about him that I couldn’t put my finger on—something
off
, but the closer I got the more it slipped away.

“I know who you are,” the man said, stirring from his slumped position. What was that saying,
he looked like forty miles of bad roa
d
? He was more like forty years spent on those same forty miles, until they’d ground out every bit of hope and light in him, and left him a vagrant in his own skin.

“Everyone knows who I am,” I replied.

“Yeah, but I know
what
you are,” the man said with a slow, cruel smile.

At least it was exactly the kind of family reunion I’d been expecting. “Nice to meet you too, Uncle Charlie,” I said, keeping my words to a bored monotone.

“You just going to stand their gawking?” he huffed, fumbling through his obstacle course of coffee cups, trying to find one with that last precious sip still intact.

“Not exactly how I expected this to go,” I walked around his mess, finding a seat across from him.

“How’d you think it would go, tough guy?” he asked, squinting down at his cups.

I leaned back, crossed my leg on my knee, and stared at him. “Well, for one thing, I thought you’d be drunk.”

I guess I could see the resemblance a little. But if I was going to look like that in twenty years, I might as well hunt the Prince down and get him to put an end to me now.

He chuffed out a breath that turned into a hacking cough. The tips of his fingers had a yellow, almost orangeish tint to them. Smoker. And from the sound of his cough, at least a couple packs a day.

“Probably would be drunk,” he admitted, “if the coffee here wasn’t so foul it would spoil good whiskey. You know how foul something’s gotta be to make whiskey go bad?”

“Never had the pleasure,” I said blandly. What was I even doing here?

A couple of nurses came off the elevator, chatting quietly as they came up on the nurses’ station. I watched them for a few minutes, effortlessly going about their jobs. What would it be like to just drown yourself in normalcy. To wake up every day, head in to your job, and just … exist. Neither one of them had to worry about dead parents or being hunted for sport. They didn’t know anything about wraiths, or the Abyss, or
Maleficia
.

“Guess the old bat finally convinced you to come gawk at your poor, broken blood, eh? Can’t imagine there’s a lot of sights that make a Moonset bastard look good by comparison.”

The more the man talked, the more his foul odor crept towards me. I shoved my hands in my pockets after wiping them on my sweats. “Not really interested in what you have to say,” I fired back. “Has Luca woken up yet? Said anything?”

“You think if he said anything that I’d still be here?” The man laughed until he choked. The coughing fit lasted longer this time, ending with him hacking up something that he spat into one of the empty coffee cups. I half-expected the cup to start sizzling.

I knew from the rumors going around that Luca didn’t have a great home life. And it didn’t surprise me that my uncle was a bastard. But I couldn’t wrap my head around Charlie’s presence here. “Why
are
you here?” I asked, half-demanding.

“Because that’s what you
do,
boy. When you’ve known this day would come. When you knew it was a mistake to let her keep the baby, because she was still grieving and couldn’t understand that bad blood is bad, no matter how hard you pray.”

Bad blood. His. Mine.

“No wonder he turned out the way he did,” I said thickly.

“What’d you say t’me?” Charlie leapt to his feet and threw himself forward with a speed I didn’t expect. He charged, thinking I’d fall back or run away. In that instant, I knew everything I needed to know about Luca’s childhood. When I braced myself instead of running, he fumbled. The wash of confusion slapped the stupid right off his face.
This is what it was like for him. Submission. Fear. Like a dog that didn’t know any better.

“Maybe Luca never got the chance to tell you. Maybe he never will. But I’m happy to do it for him,” I said, stepping forward. Charles Denton was used to being the intimidating bully. He didn’t like it when someone stood up to him. Especially not someone who had probably thirty pounds of muscle on him. “You’re pathetic.”

I reached forward, and he flinched back, and I don’t know what he saw in that moment, but something
terrified
him. “Do you know why you’re so miserable? Because Cyrus has lived in your head every day of your pathetic life. You carved him out a little space and he made himself at home.”

I would not let myself be dragged down into Moonset’s fate. If the adults couldn’t find a way to make it happen, I would find one myself.

Or die trying.