Shattered (the Spellbound Series Book 2) (3 page)

              “It’s cool, you don’t have to lie. Come on, Allie, let’s get out of here.”

              “Where are you guys going?,” I ask. There’s a little more venom in my tone than I’d intended, but I can’t help it. Lily using
my
nickname for Alyssa struck a nerve.

              Alyssa shrugs, and says, “The after party,” as she climbs onto the back of Lily’s motorcycle. She puts the one helmet over her own head before saying, “See you around, Santos.” Alyssa wraps her arms around Lily’s middle, and they take off down the street.

              As the rumble of the motorcycle’s engine fades, I take a deep breath, and try to put Alyssa out of my mind. I have a boyfriend, why should I care what she does? I shouldn’t. I
don’t
. I readjust the messenger bag over my shoulder, now laden with cards and presents, and focus on the mental image of my apartment. I blink once, and the streets of the West Village have been replaced by the familiar light blue walls of the same room I’ve lived in for nineteen years. I dump by bag onto my bed, and walk out to the kitchen for a glass of water.

              On my way back to my room, I freeze just before passing the living room. It looks empty at first glance, but upon closer inspection, I can make out a figure silhouetted by the light pouring in through the window. The only two people that live here are me and my mom, and my mom is at work, so whoever this person is doesn’t belong here. I don’t even think; I fire a concentrated burst of energy at the intruder, and hope it’s enough to knock them out.

              My spell stops short a few inches from its intended target, and vanishes entirely. “Impressive, Heather,” mutters a masculine voice. “But unnecessary. I’m not here to fight.”

              I start to panic a tiny bit, and ask, “Who are you?”

              The man turns around, and the lights flicker on as our eyes meet. “My name is Michael. And I’m your father.”

3

“What?” I take a few steps back from the stranger in my living room. That was the last thing I’d expected him to say. “You’re lying,” I mutter, for my own sake as much as for his. “My father died in a car crash.”

Michael walks past me, towards a shelf stocked with pictures of my mom and I through the years. He pauses to carefully inspect one of my baby pictures, and asks, “Is that what Regina told you?”

“It’s the truth…”

“Have you ever seen photos of the funeral? Or news reports of the accident? Or even a grave?” I stare at Michael silently, my eyes widening as I realize that I’ve never encountered any of the things he’s mentioned. “It’s a fallacy,” he continues. “I expect your mother either couldn’t bring herself to tell you the truth, or doesn’t comprehend it well enough to explain.”

I’ve seen and done so many strange things in the year and a half since discovering my powers, and while this is hardly the strangest, I can’t quite wrap my head around the idea of my father being alive. Not after thinking he’s been “dead” all my life. All the same, I can’t deny the plausibility of Michael’s claim. When he turns to face me, I notice for the first time that his eyes are the same shade of green as mine. I fold my arms over my chest, and ask, “Can you prove that you’re really my father?”

In response, Michael asks, “Do you still have the necklace I left to you?”

I nod, and ask, “What do you want with it?”

“Bring it to me, and I’ll show you.”

I walk back to my room, and grab my necklace from the headboard of my bed. When I return, Michael reaches into his shirt and pulls out a necklace identical to mine; a pendant shaped like a single feathered wing, studded with emeralds along the top from the rounded end to the tip, swinging from a sterling silver chain. “These are the only two necklaces of their kind,” he says, “I made them for us the moment I knew you were coming into this world.” Michael yanks the chain from his neck, and says, “Close your eyes,” before clamping our hands together, the pendants pressed between our palms.

Almost instantly, a blinding white light emanates from where the necklaces touch, and I close my eyes as quickly as I can. The light shines through my eyelids briefly, and then is replaced by fleeting visions from my past. One moment I’m reliving my first kiss with Nick, right on the water by FDR Drive. The next, I’m nine years old again, and Rachel’s mom is driving me to the hospital after I broke my leg jumping off a swing. The memories keep rolling like rapid fire; my high school graduation, my first loose tooth, my first and only struggle with chickenpox, my mom singing me to sleep as a toddler, the first time I used my powers. Finally, I see Michael kissing my sleeping mother on her forehead, and whispering, “I love you both,” before vanishing into thin air.

The visions cease as abruptly as they began, and I blink a few times as my eyes readjust to the light. As he comes into focus, I regard Michael more carefully than before; he’s tall and sturdily built, his muscles just barely discernible under the fabric of his dark blue suit. His hair and skin are so close to being the same shade of gold that it’s hard to tell where one ends and one begins. He doesn’t look very old, but the lines creeping from the corners of his eyes and the lines on his forehead stand in stark contrast to the rest of his flawless skin. If he really is my father, then I barely resemble him at all. All I’ve inherited from him are my eyes.

When it becomes clear that Michael is waiting for me to speak first, I ask, “How did you do that? Are you a spellcaster?”

“Not exactly.”

“Then what are you?”

“That doesn’t matter. What matters is what you are.” Michael removes his hands from mine, and I look down at my palm. Where there had once been two separate necklaces with separate pendants, there is now only one of each. The two wing shaped pendants merged together into one set of wings, spread open as if ready to take flight.

“And what am I?,” I ask cautiously as I inspect the jewelry in my hands.

“Nephilim.” I stare blankly at Michael until he continues, “In modern times, you are called a Conduit, but in the old days, we called you by a different name… Nephilim.”

“Okay… Weird.” I slip the winged pendant into my pocket, and take a few seconds to think. Michael says he isn’t a spellcaster, but he seems to have powers that are at least similar to mine. So if he’s telling the truth, that begs the question; what exactly
is
he? I’m still having doubts about everything he’s claiming, but I need to get more information before I decide whether to trust him or not. “Say I believe you. Say you’re actually my father… Why come to me after all these years? What is it you want from me?”

Rather than answering directly, Michael says, “I assume you’ve been told that there will only ever be two of your kind, correct? One champion of Heaven, the other of Hell?”

I nod slowly; I do remember hearing about this roughly a year ago, just after my eighteenth birthday. According to legend, there will only ever be two people like me born, spellcasters with powers beyond our wildest dreams, called Conduits. One of us was born a representative of the light, and the other of darkness. Beyond that, though, I have no idea what a Conduit does, so I say, “Yeah… your point?”

“The other Nephilim is thriving, and has already been contacted by their own father. Unlike me, my brother will likely take unconventional steps to enhance his child’s development. The time for the Nephilim to meet on the battlefield swiftly approaches, and you must be the one that survives. Otherwise… it could mean the end of countless lives.”

“Okay… again, what does any of that have to do with me? You seem more than strong enough to take on the other Conduit… Nephilim… whatever.”

“It’s forbidden for me to intervene in this contest, beyond offering you guidance. Besides, this is precisely why you were born. It is your destiny.”

“It’s my destiny… to kill someone I’ve never even met?”

“Essentially, yes.”

“Yeah, sorry… Not happening. Besides, I don’t buy into all that destiny crap.”

“Excuse me?”

“I don’t accept that I was born for any particular reason. I make my own destiny.”

Michael looks at me as if I’ve slapped him across the face. He must not have expected me to have a mind of my own. “You are the Nephilim,” he says. “As such, it is your duty to-“

“It isn’t my ‘duty’ to do anything.”

“Why will you not accept? You’ve been blessed with glorious purpose, you should be falling over yourself to accept the help I came here to offer you.”

“Help with what? All you’ve done is show up, say you’re my father, and tell me I have to ‘fulfill my destiny’.”

“You’re much too strong to reach your true potential under the tutelage of a mortal. If you were to let me teach you, I could have you in top fighting form in a matter of months. Teach you secrets that would prepare you for the challenges you’ll face.”

I take into consideration everything Michael has said thus far. He seems to genuinely want to help me in his own demented way, but I’m being seriously put off by all the sudden talk about destiny. And besides, I’m the strongest spellcaster I’ve ever encountered, I’m sure I can handle things by myself. So I tell him, “Thanks, but no thanks. I’ll make do on my own.”

“There may be consequences for refusing my aid… Choose carefully.”

“I’ve chosen carefully. We’re done here.”

“Then on your own head be it. I’ve done all I can, for now.” Michael gives me a rueful smile, and says, “Under different circumstances, I’d be proud of the strong willed, resilient young woman you’ve become. But right now, it just seems like you’ve turned out a little too much like me.” Then, there’s a brief flash of blinding light, followed by the sound of fluttering wings, and when the light fades, Michael is gone.

***

My conversation with Michael was an informative one, but I can’t shake the feeling that there’s something I’m missing. Key pieces of the story that haven’t been told, gaps in my knowledge of what little he
did
explain. And considering the fact that I still don’t really know who or what he is, I’m not sure I’m willing to trust that anything he said was true. But, for all I know, he actually
could
be my father. Or, he could be a random stranger who forced his way into my apartment. It doesn’t matter to me either way, as long as I find out which version of events is the truth.

I’m roused in the morning by the sound of my mom’s keys jangling in the lock, and without even waiting for her to put her bag down, I ask about my father’s death. Between breaths, she feeds me the same story as always; a drunk driver crashed headfirst into his car, and neither driver survived. The only bit of my father to make it home was his necklace, the completed version of which has returned to its proper place, hanging from my headboard.

It’s when I ask my mom to see a picture of him that I start to get suspicious. She hesitates at first, then leads me into her room, and pulls a pamphlet out of her bedside drawer. It’s dated nineteen years ago, displaying the details of a funeral dedicated to the memory of an Adam LaLaurie. I’m sure I’ve seen this pamphlet before, when I started asking questions as a kid, but somehow this doesn’t feel right. The name sounds alien, and Adam doesn’t look like someone my mom would go for. In fact, I look even less like him than I do Michael.

I ask why we’ve never heard from anyone on his side of the family, and it takes my mom a little too long to answer. I’m not even listening to her explanation; it’s becoming clearer and clearer that one of my parents is lying to me, but the question is which one?

The only other person I can go to for confirmation on any part of Michael’s story is my mentor, Krystal. She’s far too busy these days for me to just drop in, however; evidently, being the head of the Caelestia clan actually requires work on her part. So I wait a couple of days until I’m scheduled to see her for the second of our biweekly training sessions, which she still makes time for in spite of her responsibilities.

I arrive at Nick’s condo around noon, but since Nick’s at work, and Landon hardly even remembers where home is when his work is in a gallery somewhere, the place is empty save for me and Krystal. Before we start training, I ask Krystal what she knows about Conduits. When she asks why, I fill her in on my conversation with Michael, only leaving out the part where he claimed to be my father. Krystal listens silently, her expression shifting from curiosity to confusion as the story unfolds.

“I don’t know much more about Conduits than anyone else,” she says, “so you’re asking the wrong person, I’m afraid. And I’ve never even heard the other term he used for them – Nephilim, right?”

“Yeah, Nephilim. Are you sure there’s nothing else you can tell me?”

“Sorry, Heather. I’m sure the Guardians would know more than I do, but getting to their realm and back is a hassle.”

Part of me wants to pretend Krystal had never suggested their help. The Guardians are ethereal beings who rule over a realm parallel to our own. They’re echoes of spellcasters who’ve long passed, ghosts of the most powerful of our kind to have existed and decided to leave bits of themselves behind. Among them are powerful figures from mythology, and the recently departed alike. All young spellcasters have to pass through their realm on an arduous journey to unlock their full potential and become official members of their clans, myself included. And I’m in no rush to go back; the horrors of my last visit are still fresh in my mind.

“They already claimed they didn’t know much last year,” I whine in protest.

Krystal shrugs at me, lost for a solution. “If all else fails, there’s always Google.”

I groan inwardly at Krystal; I’d been hoping she would be a lot more useful.

As I trudge towards the door so we can head up to the roof and train, Krystal motions for me to stop. “My turn,” she says. “I heard about what happened on your birthday.”

“You mean the part where I turned nineteen?”

“I mean the part where you beat the hell out of three spellcasters in a subway station.”

My heart catches in my throat. I’d completely forgotten about that encounter. Didn’t even consider it important. “Yeah… what about it?”

“Heather, you need to be more careful. You could have been seen! Someone could have taken a video-“

“And it would have been laughed off as a hoax. No one’s going to believe it if another video pops up, you know that.”

Krystal rolls her eyes, but she knows I’m right. A year ago, during the battle at Grand Central, someone had taken a video of the chaos and submitted it to one of New York’s news channels. As a result, millions of people saw hardcore evidence of spellcasters and werefolk, watched as they killed each other, and suddenly, the entire supernatural world was on the brink of being exposed.

For a good week or so, everyone was either fascinated with, or terrified by, the aspect of the new class of people dubbed “metahumans”. It’s a nicer word than freak, but it carries pretty much the same meaning. Then a forensic analyst named Vincent Rivera came on the news a week after the video debuted, and pointed out several “flaws” in the footage that made it seem as if it had been tampered with. A few more videos have surfaced since then, mostly of vampires doing what they do best, or werewolves transforming, but they’re never taken seriously. Like with the original video, there’s one believer for every hundred skeptics.