Magi Saga 1: Epic Calling (15 page)

This close to her, the whip crack sound as Yasmin Ported out felt really quite loud, while the slight surge of air that rushed to fill the void Yasmin left made her habit flap about her legs. She smiled to herself at a job well done, she would be rewarded for this.

Raphaella glanced at the clock on the bed side table, her other visitor would be here soon. If Yasmin was going to follow this up now, that meant she had probably Ported to New York. It would be just after two in the morning there. Wondering what her master might be up to in the big apple was fairly pointless, she doubted she would ever find out what she did. Anyway, she had a guest to entertain in here at any moment.

She expertly removed the nuns habit, leaving the headdress where it was and adjusted her bra and knickers in the full length mirror. He would like this outfit.

A discreet knock sounded at the door then, just loud enough to be heard in the room, her visitor had arrived. She approached the door, unlocked and then opened it, before standing back to let her visitor in and allowing him to see her revealing outfit.

‘My word child, you look radiant.’

‘I’m glad you approve Cardinal, but I’m even better to touch.’

Raal Sadis strode into the small dark room on the ninth sublevel of The Pitt Nightclub. Lit by a bank of flat screen monitors that filled one wall, the display on the clock in the midst of them glowed 2:14am. Two men sat in here, one before the screens, using the controls to flick between cameras, the other at a table in the middle of the room, fingers to his forehead in deep concentration.

‘Maddox, what’s going on?’ Raal asked.

Aneurin Maddox turned from the screens to look at Raal, he was thin but wiry with a shock of wild hair on his pale skinned head, quite the opposite of Raal’s muscled bulk. Raal was black, bald, and tattooed all over, with wicked looking tribal shapes that even covered his face.

‘We’ve got a breach, a Magi passed the outer detection field moments ago, the signature Ekua picked up felt huge.’

Raal looked to the Man sat at the table.

‘Is that right Ekua?’

The robed figure sat at the table raised his head from his fingers. Ekua was a deep Caribbean black, and in the half light of the room, his eyes shone with an intensity that was slightly disturbing. He looked at Raal and nodded.

‘Well, can you get a fix, either of you, who is it? Just a passer-by or something more serious?’

‘We’re having trouble tracking them, whoever it is, they know how to stay hidden.’

The air around them all suddenly became tense, and then snapped. It was just a feeling, there was no sound, nothing to see, but if you were a Magi, you could feel it, and the feeling was unmistakeable. Raal felt it keenly, as did his two companions.

‘Shit, was that…?’

‘…the outer Aegis, it just went pop. Someone’s in the club.’

Raal looked round at the bank of monitors, each one showing a different view of either the inside or outside of The Pit Club. He could see the queue outside the main entrance on the Manhattan sidewalk, there was no disturbance there, just the usual revelry and the bouncers doing their job. Inside the club the cameras scanned the crowds over its seven main levels that descended from street level, showing a sea of people enjoying themselves, with no obvious disturbance, this Magi was being careful not to make a fuss but didn’t seem to care if Raal and his Coven mates knew they were here. Whoever it was, they were powerful too, it took someone truly skilled to break through an Aegis that quickly. 

Next to him he could feel the Essentia flowing about Maddox and Ekua, both of them using their Magic to try and locate the intruder, sending their senses out into the club and hunting for that magical signature.

‘Someone is definitely here, I can feel it. Just one person I think, but they’re concealing themselves from us. Whoever it is, they’re good,’ Ekua said.

Raal had a sinking feeling. One person had managed to get inside the club in seconds, pull down their Aegis like it was nothing, and all the while remaining effectively hidden. No, Raal didn’t like this one little bit.

‘What’s going on?’ crackled a female voice over the intercom. It was Lex Nona, Raal could see her on one of the camera’s in the VIP lounge. She was looking straight into the camera nearest her with her finger pressed to her ear piece as she asked the question.

‘We’ve got a breach, a Magi, they’re in the club,’ Raal answered.

‘Who is it?’

‘No idea, they’re shielding themselves from us.’

‘Crap. Do you need any help in there?’

‘No, stay where you are, keep an eye out, we’ve got it covered from this end.’

The air seemed to stretch taught once more, latent energy building up, trying to resist the power straining against it. It lasted for barely a second before they felt the Essentia snap for a third time.

‘Holy fuck,’ cried Raal.

‘Got ‘em. Here look,’ Maddox said, pointing at a screen showing the corridor leading to the VIP lounge on sub level seven, one floor above them. The black clad figure passed through the doors at the end of the corridor, doors which had been sealed by an Aegis, the Magical barrier that this intruder had just pulverised and popped like a soap bubble.

The intruder looked female, her figure just a black void in the shape of a comely young woman, her pale features framed by a mane of long black hair. She strode into the VIP lounge on the floor above Raal like she owned the place.

Raal felt the surge of Essentia as she called on her Magic again, and the entire room full of people, everyone in the VIP lounge, dropped suddenly to the floor. The Music in the Lounge also stopped as the DJ fell onto his decks. The Magical attack left one person, Lex Nona, stood there, her own personal Aegis having saved her from the effects of the Magical attack.

‘Oh shit, it’s you,’ Lex said as she saw Yasmin from across the room, her voice ringing with alarm through the intercom. Maddox boosted the gain to hear the Womans reply, but Raal didn’t need to hear the answer to know who it was. Yasmin was well known in Nomad circles and she had paid visits to Lucian before. Raal watched the screen as the confrontation unfolded.

Yasmin smiled and continued to walk towards Lex. ‘Yes, it’s me. Lex is it? I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure before.’ Yasmin’s voice could be heard clearly in the security room, the equipment in the club was state of the art.

Lex looked confused as to what she should do, and just stood there.

‘It’s polite to answer when spoken to my dear,’ Yasmin purred.

‘I’m sorry, yes, it’s good to meet you. I mean, ahem, an honour. So, um, how can I help you?’

‘Drop your Aegis please,’ Yasmin answered, in quite a matter of fact tone. Raal winced; he knew Lex had little choice here.

‘Excuse me?’ Lex answered.

The force of energy that flooded from Yasmin and threw Lex against the far wall was intense; Raal could feel it quite keenly. Lex’s Aegis flared and crackled with energy on the screen as Yasmin’s Magic slammed home, before pinning her to the wall, a few feet from the floor. Lex’s Aegis continued to ripple with golden threads of energy that sparked and hissed.

Yasmin walked towards Lex. ‘Don’t question me girl, do as I say or I pull down your Aegis myself and rip your brain out to find the information I need.’

Lex, gritting her teeth in pain, relented and the golden energy that had been there, surrounding Lex, protecting her and struggling against Yasmin’s Magic, died and disappeared. Raal felt the surge of Essentia from Yasmin and knew what she was doing. Raal concentrated and Ported from the room to the floor below.

Two levels down from the VIP lounge in a large room, lit with half-light and furnished in a modern style with black leather chairs and couches, glass and steel tables and light grey walls, Raal appeared from nowhere. Lucian stood nearby, shirt off and in deep concentration. He’d obviously felt the magical disturbances of the past couple of minutes and looked concerned. Two female voices called to Lucian from an adjoining room partitioned off with frosted sliding glass doors and walls.

‘Lucian, come back to bed, we’ve barely gotten started with you.’

‘Yeah, come on, you can’t leave us hanging like this when we’re so horny.’

Lucian ignored them and turned to face Raal. Lucian was African American with dark ebony skin that gleamed in the light, his hair was a mass of snake like dreadlocks and even in this dim light he wore a pair of sunglasses.

‘Wha gwan?, Lucian asked in his Haitian drawl of an accent.

‘We’ve got an intruder, it’s Yasmin, she’ll be here any moment.’

‘She’s already here,’ came Yasmin’s voice from the shadows as she stepped into the light.

Raal spun round, ‘Fuck.’

‘Lucian, it’s good to see you again,’ Yasmin chimed.

‘And you Baal Yasmin, always a pleasure.’

Raal pulled his knife, he didn’t like this at all. Yasmin glanced down at the polished blade for a moment before looking back at Lucian.

‘Tell your over enthusiastic lap dog to stand down before you find yourself down one coven member Lucian. I won’t ask twice.’

‘Stand down Raal, this is not the fight for you,’ Lucian said quickly.

Raal grimaced, he most certainly didn’t want to fight Yasmin, she was more powerful than him by several orders of magnitude. Such a fight would only go one way, but Lucian also happened to be Raal’s mentor, so he felt it to be his duty to protect Lucian.

‘So, why you come to my home, Baal? What can I do for you?’ Lucian asked using the Nomad honorific for a Superior, his Caribbean accent drawing out the ‘aa’ sound.

Raal could feel a build-up of Essentia coming from Lucian, his master was fuelling his Aegis, raising his defences. Just as he registered this, Essentia flared from Yasmin, a spike of energy that hammered at Lucian’s shield. As she did this, a yellow light flared just in front of Lucian, flowing over his Aegis where her Magic clashed against it. Then as his Aegis fell before the greater power of Yasmin, the light shattered into fingers of electrical looking energy that flickered and danced briefly round his body.

Lucian jerked and cried out something unintelligible. The glass partition next to him shattered but held in place, spider web cracks snaking across its surface while the shadows around Lucian and Raal shifted, the strong magic warping the fabric of reality. As Raal watched, Yamsin’s Magic reached into Lucian’s mind, as if hunting for something.

‘What? What are you doing?’ Raal cried, and went for his knife again as Lucian went limp as he started to float a few inches off the floor, but an invisible force slammed Raal sideways, lifting him off his feet and pinned him to the wall two foot off the ground on the far side of the room.

Yasmin eyed him from where she stood looking utterly relaxed, she had warned him once, he supposed he had that coming.

As he watched from where he struggled against the wall, Yasmin looked back at Lucian and wandered lazily forward to where he stood, his face contorted in pain as he tried to resist Yasmin’s considerable power.

The two young girls in the bedroom had been watching in horror as the events unfolded around them, they now screamed as Yasmin came into view from behind the semi frosted glass. Raal felt Yasmins magic envelope the two young women in the next room, and then, a moment later, the screams stopped.

Turning her attention back to Lucian, Yasmin seemed to concentrate for a moment, before a slight smile played over her lustrous red lips. Then there was a sudden surge of Essentia as Yasmin ported away in a snap.

Lucian fell to his knees and Raal landed awkwardly as he dropped too. Raal was soon at his Mentor’s side, helping him up.

‘Is she gone?’ Lucian said, straightening his shades.

‘I think so, I’ll get Lex to give the place a once over.’

Lucian stood up and shook his head. He walked over to his bed and looked at the two dead girls. Their eyes were red with burst blood vessels and pointed in different directions while blood trickled down from their eyes, ears and noses.

‘Well shit bitch, what you have to go do that for?. I damn well hope you got everything you wanted.’

The figure looked down upon the alleyway, standing in the same place she had done roughly one month ago when she had watched Amanda walk along the street below only to be attacked by the Scion Horlack.

Now she waited for another visitor, one she knew would be here any time now.

A few weeks ago she had watched Vito as he had investigated the alleyway for the Disciples of the Cross. He’d poked and probed, but he’d found little of interest and went on to more conventional lines of enquiry.

Tonight’s visitor would be different; this one was no novice, far from it. So she stood in the shadows of the water tower and waited

She didn’t wait long.

Essentia flared several meters into the alleyway, invisible to the Mundane eye, but to a Magi, it was as clear as day. She couldn’t hear it, but there would have been a small whip crack sound that accompanied the sudden appearance of the black clad figure.

Shadowy black energy flared around her like a living cape as she walked along the alley, stopping as she reached the site of the attack by Horlack.