Chapter 11 #4
Though my comment was soft, something stirred through the air. Something that felt like anticipation. I shivered and drew a knife. There might be no immediate threat, but I still felt safer with its weight in my hand.
Mathi nodded and moved right. I went left and touched the blade’s tip to the door handle; no light flickered down the fuller. Which didn’t ease the tension in me, because if the magic didn’t lie here, then it was waiting somewhere else. Somewhere less obvious, perhaps.
The room beyond was a vast empty space with a dais at the far end that stretched the entire width of the room.
The windows above the dais were standard metal-framed ones, but so dirty the light bleeding in was basically brown.
There was a small hall and a set of stairs on my side of the building, while on Mathi’s, there was a solitary door.
He indicated he was going to check it. I nodded and walked toward the hall, pressing my back against the main room’s wall before peering around the corner.
Three more doors—two on the left, one on the right.
Lightning now sparked from the tip of the knife I was holding, sending flickers of bright light dancing through the shadows. There was definitely magic in this building, even if I had no sense of anything untoward in the immediate area.
I carefully eased around the corner and approached the first door.
After touching the knife’s tip on the handle to ensure there was no magic, I warily pushed the door open.
The room beyond had obviously been an office at some point, because in the section I could immediately see, there were a couple of old desks and a rather ratty-looking four-drawer filing cabinet.
I whipped the wind around the door to check if anyone waited on the other side of the room, then quickly followed it in.
Again, nothing more than a couple of old desks and more filing cabinets.
I walked across to the nearest desk and brushed my fingers along the wood.
Its song was faint and broken, and only spoke of the past. After getting a similar response from the other desks, I walked out, went to the next room and repeated the entry process.
This room was empty, as was the one on the opposite side of the hall.
I turned and retreated back to the main room, but as I walked in, the knife in my hand burned brighter, and the air began to pulse with the thick warmth of magic.
Whatever it was, its source was upstairs.
The inner tension ratcheted up several more degrees. Mathi reappeared from the room on the other side of the building. I raised the knife, sending jagged shards of lightning spearing into the gloom that held this place hostage.
He walked over, then leaned close and whispered, “Investigate or run?”
I hesitated, and in that moment, the decision was taken from me.
Magic surged, and behind us, the front door slammed shut.
The air that lightly stirred around me briefly whispered of movement—men, running toward us, making little sound—then the press of magic intensified, and the wind stilled.
I reached for the air again, but it slid away from my touch.
How that was possible, I had no idea, nor did I have the time to worry about it.
“It’s a trap. There’s a witch or a mage up there, along with a good dozen men.”
“Then let’s get out of here.” He grabbed my free hand and pulled me into a run. “Can you punch one of the front windows out?”
“From inside? No. The air is being sucked away from me. I’ll try from outside.”
“Do it. I’ll keep them off us.”
When we reached the door into the foyer, he stopped and drew the gun from under his coat.
I called to the wind that swirled with almost angry force around the outside of the building and punched it toward the nearest window.
Glass shattered, and thick, deadly shards thudded into the plaster to the right of the door.
But there was no escaping for us yet—the network of metal grilles that had held the eight panes of glass in place remained in the window.
I swore, recalled the wind, and ripped them away.
“Right—”
The rest of my words were lost to the bark of Mathi’s gun. A heartbeat later, he knocked me sideways. I hit the ground hard, and pain shuddered up my arm. I swore, heard something thud into the wall just above our heads, and quickly looked up.
Not bullets, as I’d presumed, but darts.
The sort of dart they used to bring animals down.
They weren’t trying to kill us; they were trying to capture.
Mathi rolled away from me, his gun barking again. I scrambled upright and darted through the doorway. More darts followed my movement, thudding into the outside wall and dropping to the floor.
“Go, go,” Mathi said urgently as he followed me through and slammed the door shut. It stopped the darts; it wouldn’t stop the men. I might not be able to grab the air in this place, but I could still feel the vibration of movement, and they were coming at us fast.
I turned, took several quick steps, and leapt for the window.
I gripped the sill, swearing again as the glass still caught in the putty tore into my skin.
Mathi shoved me up the rest of the way, and I half fell, half jumped down to the concrete path on the other side, staggering forward several steps before I caught my balance.
As Mathi followed me through the window, the door into the foyer crashed open. I caught the wind and formed a barrier across the entire front of the building—just in time to catch the darts that chased him through.
“Go, go,” he said as angry faces appeared at the window and the front door crashed open. They couldn’t get much further thanks to my barrier, but still...
I ran for the car and jumped in. Mathi followed me through, landing heavily on my legs before I could pull them away.
Henrick immediately took off, turning left so sharply we were both flung across the rear seat.
Once Mathi had pushed back upright, I did the same and saw the men running from the side of the building.
One of them was on the phone. This wasn’t over yet.
“Henrick,” Mathi said. “Get us to the fae hospital ASAP.”
My gaze shot to him. He was pale and sweating, his skin holding a weird, almost waxy sheen. “What’s happened? Were you shot?”
“A dart in the arm, I’m afraid.”
Alarm surged, but before I could say anything, Henrick said, “Your assailants give chase, sir.”
“Lose them.”
I twisted around and looked through the rear window.
There was a big black van behind us, and it was going every bit as fast as we were.
The driver and his passenger were little more than pale blurs, but even so, I could see the latter was on the phone, no doubt calling up reinforcements.
It was tempting to cast the wind their way, but there were too many other cars on the road now and I didn’t want to risk causing an accident.
I turned, helped Mathi into his seatbelt, then pulled on mine. He really did not look good. I had no idea what they’d used on the darts, but surely it couldn’t be deadly. If they’d wanted us dead, they’d simply have used guns.
“Mathi?” I touched his cheek, trying to catch his attention.
His gaze slid to mine. “I feel... strange.”
His words were slightly slurred, and the alarm strengthened. I’d seen many of these effects before, in both my brother and in Cynwrig. “I think you’ve been hit with Dahbree.”
Dahbree was basically a rare but deadly truth serum, and if they were using that, then whoever was behind this assault wanted us to sing like birds before they got rid of us permanently.
Had Carla gone rogue, or was there someone else behind this? Macsen’s family, perhaps?
The Merc turned right sharply, throwing me hard against the seatbelt. I swore and looked behind us again. The van wasn’t losing any ground; whoever drove the thing appeared every bit as good as Henrick.
Another sharp turn. Horns blasted, and the squeal of tires filled the air.
I twisted around again; one car had rear-ended another, while two others now faced in the wrong direction.
The van swept around it all, briefly driving into the oncoming traffic, causing more chaos as drivers tried to evade him.
One vehicle, however, turned sharply and came straight at us.
It was another black van.
Henrick yanked the Merc left so hard she briefly went up on two wheels. We crashed up onto the pavement and into the parking area of a large warehouse. The vans followed, leaving more chaos behind them.
The man in the front seat of the first black van was still on the phone.
“Henrick, orders are being relayed via that van behind us.”
“Are they now?” His gaze flicked to the rear vision mirror briefly. “Hold on tightly, because we’re about to impact.”
I swore and pushed back into the seat and headrest. A heartbeat later, the Merc came to an abrupt halt.
Tires squealed, and black smoke swirled down either side of the car, then we were hit, hard.
The car lurched forward sharply, momentum Henrick used; the Merc’s engine roared as we pulled away to an accompanying symphony of tearing metal and breaking glass.
I looked behind us again. The entire front of the van had been pushed in; steam rose from the grille, and the bumper had been partially torn off.
Their windshield had also shattered, so I couldn’t see how the van’s occupants had fared, but hoped like hell the guy with the phone had at least been taken out of action.
“Don’t worry, Ms. Bethany,” Henrick said calmly. “The car is reinforced to withstand that sort of impact.”
“I’m not worried about the Merc; I’m worried about there being more of them.”
“If there are, we shall deal with them.”
I should have been reassured by his calm confidence. I wasn’t.
I held tightly onto the grab handle and watched as Henrick sped around the back of the building, through a short weed-encrusted space, then into the parking area behind another warehouse.
As we bumped out onto the road and accelerated away, I turned around again.
There was no sign of the other van—just a line of buildings on one side and thick vegetation on the other.
But just as my heartrate began to ease, it appeared.
I swore.
“Indeed,” Henrick said. “They are very persistent.”
“You want me to call in the IIT?”
He hesitated. “It might be wise. At the very least, they can escort us to the hospital.”
I bent, grabbed my phone out of my purse, and called Sgott.
“I take it this is no social—”
“No,” I cut in quickly. “We’re in Mathi’s car, being chased by black vans. Mathi’s been darted, I think by Dahbree or something similar. We’re currently on—” I paused, and Henrick immediately said, “Stadium Way.”
I repeated that and added, “I have a tracker—”
I didn’t finish the sentence. I didn’t get a chance.
Henrick’s sudden, violent swearing had me looking around sharply.
A black van—a different black van—was coming straight at us from out of a side street.
The Merc slewed violently sideways, the tires and engine screaming, but this time, there was no avoiding the collision.
The van punched hard into the side of the car, throwing us about like rag dolls and rocking the vehicle up on two wheels.
The air bags exploded, filling the air with a thick smoky smell.
“Bethany?” I heard Sgott yelling. “Talk to me.”
I wasn’t holding the phone. I had no idea where it even was. But I nevertheless croaked, “We’re hit, bad, help.”
I had no time for anything else, not even to call the wind for help, because we were in the grass and rolling, over and over.
I hit my head, felt warmth trickling down my face, and a sudden twist of pain in my leg. The car settled upside down, and the groaning began, some of it mine, most of it the car’s. For what seemed an eternity, that’s all I heard. That, and the desperate, fear-filled pounding of my pulse.
Then, from somewhere close, a woman said, “Fuck, did you idiots hit the elf? You were told to leave him alone.”
I didn’t hear the reply. I did hear the distant wail of sirens. Sgott. He would save us. Save me.
“We’ve no fucking time for excuses,” she growled. “Get the woman out and fast, before the fucking cops get here.”
I knew that woman. Or, at least, knew her voice.
It was Carla.
The realization finally had me reaching past the haze of pain for the wind, but before I could direct it against her or anyone else, darkness surged and swept consciousness away.