Chapter
“Black!” Kady screamed, pain tearing through her so deep she lost her next breath.
Black’s body dropped to the ground, shimmering back into the form of a man. He lay unmoving in the dirt.
The helicopter swooped down, snatching up the TFO man. Titian fired his weapon, striking the metal. The copter wobbled, but continued its flight path and within second flew out of reach and across the sky.
The spectral warrior that had been Black’s mother, that had stolen Black’s soul, drifted into the air following the path of the chopper.
Titian fired again, but the helicopter was out of range. He raised a communicator to his mouth and shouted to his team to intercept the escaping agent.
Kady rushed to Black’s side and dropped to the ground, throwing her arms around him. His chest moved up and down, she could feel his pulse in her tight grip on him, but there was no light in his eyes, no spark of his soul connecting with hers.
Where was Black’s soul, or the spectral warrior it had become? She blinked, holding back the tears, and his form appeared, hovering above her, pulsing as its shape grew, a mass of unformed liquid shadow.
“No no no no no no no. Black, you come back to me right now. You can not do this. You can not leave me alone.”
She raised her voice to the sky, seeking to connect with the stolen soul. It shimmered, growing less translucent and more shadowy by the second.
“Black,” she shouted at the spectral forming before her eyes, “don’t do this. You are mine and I am yours. Please, Black, please come back.”
Kady pulled his slack body into her arms and rocked his form, crying out his name, pleading with the shadow to return over and over.
She’d been abandoned by everyone who should have been important in her life, wounded and scarred by the missing connections, stolen from her before she could even remember. She’d survived on her own, building a lonely independence around herself. She hadn’t thrived. Not until Black.
“Please, universe. Please don’t take him from me now.”
The new spectral warrior screeched like a hurt animal lashing out. Deep in her own broken soul, Kady knew he was in terrible pain. She tried to call up her magic, wrap it around him, soothe him in her light. If only she could reach him, maybe she could pull him back from the abyss forming between them.
All she could manage was a warm glow across her skin, that she wrapped gently around Black’s body.
The new spectral screeched again, louder this time, and dove toward her.
“Kady, look out.” Lacey shot a steady stream of magic at the spectral warrior.
“No, stop!” Kady raised her hand, pulling from the depths of her being to call up the magic that had been there only moments before.
Her hand glowed a deep gold, but the magic wouldn’t go, it wouldn’t do her bidding. She wanted, needed to block Lacey’s blue-white defense and protect Black’s soul.
Without his light mixing with hers, adding to her power, she had nothing. Her heart sank through the emptiness inside of her leaving, only a sad, angry desperation in its wake.
The spectral warrior weaved around Lacey’s magic, bearing down on Kady. Topper added her purple light to the battle, deflecting the spectral a fraction of a second before it could hit.
It recoiled, and dove at her, two, three, four times. Lacey and Topper formed a shield over the top and around her. Margreth reinforced the shield with a new ward.
Still, the spectral beat down, frantic to get to her.
“Black.” Kady reached up, holding his body in one arm, grasping for his soul with her other.
She could see the form of his face in shadow, beautiful, but angry, so angry. He clawed at the magic around her.
He wanted her soul. He wouldn’t have to steal it, she’d readily give it to him. She already had. What if she stood up, pushed through the barriers between them, let him take her?
A calm settled over her, extinguishing the last bit of light inside her. What was the light without Black, anyway?
She lay his head and shoulders down, touched her fingers to her lips, and then to his. Standing forced the shields around her to expand. They fluctuated and thinned. As if Black’s spectral understood her intentions, it doubled its efforts to get to her, shattering the ward.
Kady pushed her fingertips through the open edges of the ward, touching Lacey and Topper’s magic.
They yelled, but their voices were muted, filtered through a thick layer of grief. Didn’t matter what they said, anyway. Kady pushed through the swirls of blue-white and purple light.
Take me, Black. Take me with you.
The spectral Black grabbed her hand, burning her from the inside out. The pain ripped through her, weakening her until her knees gave out. Her body dangled in the air, held aloft by the grip Black’s dark soul had on her.
Her thoughts fell away, leaving a misshapen anger behind. She wanted to scream, but her lungs had seized.
“Kaden.” A strong voice yelled out, reaching through the blackness and she was hit from the side. Her body hurtled through the air, being snatched, torn away from the grasp of the spectral.
She crashed into the ground, her glasses falling into the dirt by her head, her eyes flooded with bright New Mexico sunlight.
The air whooshed back into her lungs and a cool light soothed the injuries to her hand and soul.
“Kaden, m’lady, are you all right?”
A man, a buck-naked one, was sprawled out on top of her, running his hands over her arms, face, and hands.
“Get off me.”
Frost and Stark grabbed the man by his shoulders and yanked him to his feet. But, Lacey and Topper didn’t move to help at all.
Kady rolled away, grabbing her glasses in the process and shoved them on her face. Who was this naked man, and why had he tried to save her from giving up her soul?
She looked him up and down, avoiding his package as best she could. He had spiky hair, a short stubby nose, and brown eyes she recognized.
“I’m not a threat,” he said to the men holding him, “Kaden is my mistress. I was only trying to save her.”
Frost looked to Lacey who nodded. They released him and he reached his hand down, in offer to help Kady to her feet.
She shook her head and he sat on the ground beside her. “Don’t cry, sweet Kaden. You can rub my belly if it will make you feel better.”
Rub his belly? The only belly she’d ever rubbed while crying was…
“Percy?”
“At your service, m’lady.” Percy winked and dipped his head in a bow.
She looked at her hands, but didn’t feel the magic there. She couldn’t have done this. Both Lacey and Topper shook their heads when she asked them with a glance.
“But, you’re a hedgehog.”
“When you needed me to be your companion. I am your familiar, I am whatever you need me to be. Now you need a Spock to your Kirk, a Chewie to your Han, an R2 to your D2.”
He spoke passionately and raised a knife into the air. It looked like the knife-like weapon Agent Douchecanoe had pulled on her.
“Be careful with that.” He might look like a muscled, well-endowed naked man, but he’d been a pet up until a minute ago.
“I was kind of hoping it was a light-saber.” He lifted the knife over their heads and pushed a button, but nothing happened. He sighed and let the knife fall to the ground. “I always wanted to be a Jedi, ever since the first time you played the Star Wars movies for me and fed me popcorn.”
Kady wrapped her arms around herself. “That’s funny. I always wished I were a Jedi too. But, now I have powers just as badass as the Force, and they didn’t do me a damn bit of good.”
“But, m’lady, what do you mean? This is the moment you’ve been waiting for your entire life. You have to rescue your Han from the evil clutches of Jabba.”
She shook her head. The tears she’d held back earlier pooled at the edges of her eyes. “The only way to save Black is to free his soul by killing his body. I can’t do that.”
Percy tsked. “Now is no time to let your fear turn you to the Dark side. Look where that got Anni and Amidala.”
She turned away from Percy. She wanted only to hide from the world again. “Get your head out of your butt. This isn’t a movie.”
Percy stood, towering over her. He pointed and shook his finger at her. “No, you get your head out of your butt. You are a witch, descendent of a powerful line of Gypsy witches. They died defending you and your sisters, so that you might live and fulfill your destiny. You are a warrior. Be one now.”
She shook her head, ignoring his words. It was probably a story he’d seen in a movie anyway. Sounded like one. “I’m no warrior.”
Topper came over, patted Percy on the butt and joined her the ground. “Your name, Kaden, means warrior. It is who you are. There’s power in names, so whether you believe it or not, you are a warrior.”
She didn’t feel like she could fight anything. “A name a family I’ve never even met gave me. It has no meaning, and I certainly don’t have any power, with or without it.”
Lacey joined them, making them into a small circle of women. “You have more power than you know. I didn’t put it together when Topper said your name, when we met, but now I know who you are. You come from a long line of witches, your mother was a witch.”
Kady shook her head. “Did you know my mother? Because, I didn’t, and she didn’t give me anything but an abandonment complex.”
“No. But, your heritage is very clear now that Percy has revealed it. Every witch of my generation knows of the tale of the three Ayinin sisters. You’ve been lost to us until now.”
Wait. What? Percy’s story was real?
“Percy? My family died? I have sisters?”
He scoffed. “Of course, you do.”
“Was my father a witch too? I guess, does that make him a wizard, a warlock?”
Kady’s brain was fried. She couldn’t focus, couldn’t get her mind around this story about her family.
Topper shook her head. “Your father was a bear.”
Percy interjected. “You’re the offspring, the first daughter of the Warrior Anatolian Bears.”
“The Gypsy witches have intermingled with shifters for as long as time. That’s where you get your easy use of Soul Magic, and of course, your name. Ayinin kizi, bear’s daughter.”
Bear’s daughter. Was that what had attracted Black to her in the first place?
“Does that mean there are bear people who aren’t aliens?”
“Of course. We don’t see many in Magic. But, we can probably help you find some of your people, if not your family.”
She didn’t care about her family. They had died, abandoning her long ago. The only person who meant family to her had been Black.
“It doesn’t matter. I have no power without Black by my side.”
Percy pushed his way into the witches’ circle and sat on Kady’s lap. “Even if you weren’t a witch, you’re still the only person who can save Black’s soul. His is crying out for you. Go to him, bring him back.”
She pushed Percy off, then stood and backed away from them all. Too much had happened to her in too short a time to take anymore.
“I can’t,” she screamed, all her sadness, frustration, and fear pouring out with her tears.
Percy followed her, prodding her in the chest with his hand. “Kaden Ayininkizi, I was created to be your companion, your familiar and stand with you in times of strife. I watched and waited for you to realize your powers, and did a god-damned happy dance when that crazy alien bear showed up in your life.”
She backed away from him, frantic to find an escape, to get away, hide from the world, from the magic, from the grief.
But, Percy didn’t relent. “Don’t think for one magical minute I am going to stand idly by poking you with my spines while you wallow around crying for the soul only you can save.”
“Percy. Dammit. I can’t save him. He’s gone, my magic is gone. It doesn’t matter where I came from or what any of you thought I could do. Don’t you understand? I am back to being nothing.”
“Nothing?” Percy’s voice boomed, echoing off the rock walls. “You wield the strongest magic of all. The Universe bows to your will. The power was always there, your soulmate awakened it. You were born to be a warrior. Be one, dammit.”
She shook her head, sucking in gasps of breath, staving back Percy’s claims. “I don’t even know how to use the magic without Black.”
“Your souls are already intertwined. Even in his twisted state, he is still yours and you are his. All you have to do is feel it inside. He’s there.” Percy laid his hand over her heart.
She closed her eyes, searched inside for any trace of Black. The tears bubbled over and streaked down her face. She couldn’t feel him, only her broken heart.
Percy lowered his voice and spoke from his core to hers. “You’ve hidden from the world, let it beat you down, told yourself the flaws were within. They aren’t. Greatness is in you. Find the magic inside, Kaden. Search your heart, your soul, your very being. Become who you truly are.”
Kady closed her eyes, letting the tears stream down her face. Her body shook with sobs. She cried for Black, she cried for the family she had never known, she cried for the life she had been denied.
Years of self-doubt, self-recrimination washed away in the flood of emotion. The walls she’d placed around her heart and mind cracked and tumbled, crumbling to pieces.
There were scars on the fresh new layers of Kady, and they would take time to heal. They would always be a part of her. But, scars were more than a sign of a wound, they also meant healing. They meant she had survived, and become stronger.
That was knowledge she could take into battle.
The only battle, the only mission that mattered to her now.
Save Black’s soul, save the world.