8 | Fabian
Ican’t stop staring at the witch beside me. Giddy at her presence. Her smile is intoxicating, although it’s more strained today than I can remember seeing.
Remember, I scoff to myself. It’s my damn holey memory that’s meant she’s spent the past six weeks hurting. And yet, she’s still willing to come out with me today, to visit the district and see how things lie.
Since I didn’t receive any further panicked phone calls last night, I’m guessing once I knocked enough people out and put out enough fires, things didn’t get off any worse. But who’s to say?
I’ve spent a long time with a heavy sense of responsibility falling mostly on my shoulders. Sure, Z and Roscoe help out, but running the district isn’t something they’re all that invested in. They’re not the ones who grew up with the importance of duty being yammered into their ear at every mealtime whenever my father deigned to show up for those. Every phone call. Every message he sends me, it’s all focused on one thing. The Nexus District.
Every decision I made, even as a teenager, would have a roundabout influence on the district, on the legacy he built.
And for years I went along with it. That was just the way things were and there was no point in arguing.
But recently, those burdens have felt heavier than ever. It was only when the curse kept me sequestered away and messed up my usual routine, I could see things for how they really are. The responsibility of becoming the next leader of the Nexus District is dragging me down, a chain around my neck pulling me into the deep.
And now Felix is dead and my father’s interest in actively running the district is waning. He seems to think it”s time for me to step into the shoes that have been laid out for me since birth.
Except, now I’ve finally got to them, I can see they’re made of paper left out in the rain. They’re mush, collapsing as I walk, and they don’t fit right.
But what else can I do other than wear them?
Fuck. I need to pull my head out of my ass. The lack of sleep and the stress are making me melancholic and filling my brain with terrible metaphors.
Silver and I head down to see Roscoe, who lights up like a jack-o”-lantern at the sight of her. He’s doing a lot better today, no longer inches from death’s door like when I reached him last night.
My magic, plus that of the witches in the med bay, have him firmly on the mend, but it was touch and go for a while.
He’s buzzing with energy after apparently drinking down a potion created by Silver’s sister, Luna. Something that should enhance his healing and help knit him back together faster.
It’s practically a fight to keep him in bed, but as good as he feels, there’s no way he’s up to doing any more than resting today. Silver promises to return as soon as we can. Despite the puppy dog look he shoots her, pleading for her to stay longer, we head out.
The snow from last night is slushy, a grubby gray instead of pristine white as we head through the streets together.
Silver stumbles slightly when she spots the smashed windows and fire damage, the signs of violence and destruction.
“People must have been pretty angry,” she murmurs.
The bill for all the damages around here is going to be steep, and my head pounds at the thought of how much work is going to go into fixing things up. We’ll have to dig deep into the district coffers, even though they’re remarkably dry right now after Felix got his grubby hands all over them.
I know what the Archarcans would think if they saw this place right now. They already see us as a bunch of savages rolling around in our own squalor, and now we’ve resorted to smashing up and setting our home on fire.
The city elites are happy to use us for information-gathering, for bringing in less than legal artifacts they can display in their collections and increase their power. But other than that, we’re dismissed as worthless. A faceless, necessary evil, but they wouldn’t give a shit if we set ourselves on fire and burned to the ground.
We head into Gordo’s shop. He’s been one of our loyal street team scouts for years and his shop has stood in this position for over two decades. Today though, the windows are smashed and he’s grumbling to himself as he sweeps up. He barely glances up and continues clearing up as we step inside.
“Anyone injured?” I ask. The place is a mess, but I can’t sense any blood.
He shakes his head in a jerky movement. “You might not want to be flaunting her about the place unless you want an even bigger mess to clear up.”
My neck prickles in warning as I take a protective step closer to Silver. “How do you mean?”
“People targeted my place because they’d seen your girl here. Remembered seeing her in my shop with the other two.”
“Other two?” I wonder if he means Hanna and Luna or—
“The other two princes,” he spits the last word.
I don’t know how I hadn’t picked up on the hostility that’s rolling off him in waves. But now he’s standing upright and there’s pure vitriol burning in his eyes.
All directed at Silver.
“They remembered her. And then we all saw what she could do last night. The little weapon keeping us all in line. Dirty witch with foul magic.”
He shakes his head, not looking directly at Silver, like she’s not worth looking at, or maybe he’s afraid of her. Not too afraid to be acting like an asshole, though.
I thought I understood what had kicked off the trouble last night. The people of the district are angry. They’re angry with me. With Felix. With how the district has been run under his watch.
Mywatch.
I don’t blame them for that.
They’re angry with the Archarcans too, no doubt, since they”re the ones hell bent on keeping everyone else down. Though, Silver’s also caught their attention, their ire. That’s the part that makes no sense to me. Because it isn’t me Gordo seems most angry with.
It’s her.
She stares at Gordo, his face blank of any expression.
“What are you saying? You think people smashed up your shop just because they might have seen me in here with Roscoe and Zeph?”
He lets out an angry grunt. “Look at the neighbors. Does it seem like they got hit to you? Why else would they pick my shop over any of the others?”
The question is clearly rhetorical. He’s decided that rather than it being a random attack, the looting and destruction have something to do with Silver and I can see by his expression that he won’t be swayed.
I step toward him, anger coursing through me. “That makes no fucking sense at all, man. You can’t just blame Silver for bad things happening.”
“You have magic, Gordo?” Silver asks softly.
He grunts, not looking at her as he tips a pan of glass into the trash.
“Sure,” I reply for him. “He’s got minor elemental magic. Fire, right, Gordo?”
She nods, folding her arms over her chest. “Pretty weak, though, right? Weaker than you’d like it to be, huh?”
He grunts again, and I shoot her a confused look. I don’t exactly know where she’s going with this, but it doesn’t seem the best idea to taunt him if we want to get any further information out of him. Although, I’m pretty sure that’s a losing battle.
“But you didn’t choose to be like this, right? No one chooses their magic or their power level. We’re not the ones that decide if a type of magic is wrong, either. That’s all down to the Archarcans. Although everyone else is happy enough to go along with things, even though it’s not in anyone’s best interest for things to be like they are.”
“They are when you’re dangerous,” he mutters. “When your magic’s filthy.”
That’s the thing about anger. It stops people from thinking clearly. Clouds their judgment and makes them dangerous.
I put my arm around Silver, like I can protect her from his words or his opinions. It shouldn’t matter what he thinks, but Gordo has always been a loyal employee and scout. He gets paid handsomely, and he keeps an eye on things from the street for me.
If this is how he feels, I’m pretty sure what we’ll find in the rest of the district is going to be worse.
Maybe this visit wasn’t such a good idea.
“I’m sorry,” I tell Silver softly as we’re leaving a few minutes later. “It blows my mind he was blaming you for people targeting his shop.”
“Nothing I haven’t experienced before,” she says with a shrug. I can tell she’s not as nonchalant as she seems though. The whole interaction with Gordo had a bitter sting to it and his poisons likely to still be floating through her veins.
“You know,” she continues. “People think the city has two levels–-the elites and then everyone else. But really, there’s another layer. We’ve always been the ones at the bottom. And who do you think is the easiest target to blame things on?”
She lets out a small sigh before slipping her hand into mine and gives a little squeeze that has my chest warming. “Where next?”
“You want to keep going?” I’m surprised, although I shouldn’t be. I wonder if this woman will ever stop surprising me. “Maybe we should go back to The Spire. I don’t think it’s going to be any more pleasant from here.”
“You want to see the damage for yourself, though, right? Then, I’m coming with you. It’s not like I can’t look after myself if I need to.”
My insides go warm at the demonstration of just how well she understands me. I need to see it for myself even if it means getting into the thick of things.
Ten minutes later, I’m regretting not pushing harder at my suggestion to head home.
It turns out Gordo’s reaction is just the tip of the iceberg. Wherever we go, people seem to recognize Silver. And it seems like everyone has an opinion on her.
None of them are good.
We’re deep into the district when shit really hits the fan. I peer through another smashed window of a building, this one burned beyond recognition.
“Hey, isn’t that the cafe where everyone works?” Silver says from behind me. I twist around and see that she’s right, we’re a few doors down from it and the place has been trashed. Including the upstairs windows.
The apartment where Silver’s family was living, where they would have been sleeping last night if I hadn’t picked them up and taken them to The Spire.
Fuck. I feel sick at the sight of it. It was only by chance I picked them up when I did. What if I’d left it a few hours later or until this morning?
“They must have done this after I picked up Luna and the twins. I swear it was fine when we left it last night.” I turn to her and wrap my arm around her shoulders, desperately trying to soothe the pain that the sight of the trashed cafe will have caused.
“At least they weren’t in there,” she replies. Her face is pale as she takes in the damage.
There’s glass all over the place. And graffiti. Toxic words are painted over the walls. It’s hard to tell if it’s a targeted attack, like Gordo suggested, or another random one.
“I shouldn’t have dragged you down here. You don’t need to see or hear any of this shit,” I tell her. I can’t believe I was so selfish. It seemed like Silver was shining a light in the darkness by offering to come here with me. But now I can see that being down here is a shadow tainting her brightness.
I should have come alone.
“Did you really ‘drag me down here’? I decided I’m not hiding anymore, Fab. Never again.”
My stomach does a ridiculous flip at the feeling of her fingers squeezing around mine. Supporting me.
She’s too damn good for me. For this place.
It’s only once we’re trawling down the next street, I notice we’ve got a tail.
In fact, it’s more than one. My neck is tingling like crazy with the sense something isn’t right. The streets are quiet. Almost desolate and it’s creepy as hell. It’s like being in a war zone after everyone has evacuated. The streets in this area can be quiet in the middle of the day, but not like this.
“I think we’re done here,” I say to Silver, wrapping an arm around her waist and increasing our speed. She doesn’t argue, matching my pace and staying quiet.
We head down an alleyway and swiftly duck down another one. Following the shortest route back to The Spire.
But it’s not enough. A group of hooded figures block the end of the alleyway we’re heading down. When I glance behind us, I can see the same has happened at the other end. We’re penned in by people, and a few of them have weapons. Iron bars. Bats. Chains.
No doubt the same shit that tore apart so many businesses and buildings last night.
“What do you think you’re doing?” I keep my tone flat, forcing down the anger that’s rising inside me.
They don’t answer, instead swarming around us, and I tuck Silver behind me. I draw my blood sword and hold it up, but there are too many of them, and I hear Silver cry out.
“Shit,” she mutters in my ear. “My magic’s not working.”
Panic fills me and I rearrange the two of us so she’s against the wall with me standing in front of her.
“Back off!” I shout, wielding the sword.
That doesn’t stop the crowd who have all clearly lost their fucking minds. I’m not about to chop them to bits, too messy, so instead I focus on cutting off the circulation enough to make them pass out.
It shouldn’t have any long-term effects. It’s just enough to cause every one of them to drop as I focus my attention on each of them.
The idiots don’t even back off once the first of them stumbles. Instead, they trample on each other’s fallen bodies, like stampeding beasts.
Silver’s plastered to the wall behind me and once every bastard is down, I turn to her and cup her cheek.
“Are you hurt?”
She gives a wobbly head shake. “No. You moved too fast for any of them to get to me.” Shaking her hands out, she stares down at them, perplexed. “It was nuts. Just when you don’t want your magic to glitch out and mine feels totally... dead. I figured my glamor was on the fritz, but that was something else.”
“How do you mean?” I ask.
She looks up at me, her eyes wide and filled with worry. “My magic. It was like something was blocking it. I tried drawing it out, but nothing happened and when they were using their magic, it didn’t stir at all. Normally, I can’t get it to stay down and dormant.”
“Last night might have drained you more than you realized,” I say, rubbing small circles on her back and pushing aside the soul-deep satisfaction that comforting her brings me. Now’s not the time to get all gooey over her, turning to me for comfort.
It’s hard not to. After all the shit I’ve put her through, our connection seems to still be there.
For that, I’m infinitely grateful.
It feels like I’m getting a second chance. And this one I won’t fuck up.