Amber- Shadow Witch Read online

  She nodded soberly at the thought and we got back to breakfast…

  Men are so confusing. I got to work and Terry was back to his usual self, not ignoring me that is. We couldn’t talk about it, which frustrated me. I considered slipping into his mind, after all I had that hair in my locket, but decided that was too stalkerish even for me, a spy. I could feel his emotions though, but he was relaxed like the usual laid back guy I knew him as. There was a touch of nerves, but it didn’t show on his face at all, and of course I didn’t know what they were related too.

  I did my best to focus on my work, until he asked if we could get lunch around ten in the morning. I told him yes, but then I couldn’t concentrate right as I ran through all of the what ifs weighing on my mind. He couldn’t wait until it was closer to lunch? Asshole, didn’t he know I was neurotic?

  Okay, so I was a little high strung at times. It’s why I was so jealous of Dawn every now and then, I knew I was overly pessimistic, always waiting for the other shoe to drop, but I couldn’t help who I was. It wasn’t all bad of course, it was one of the reasons I was so damn good at my job. Question everything. It also meant I would never take my lovers for granted, which had to help… right?

  When the time for lunch finally rolled around we walked out to his car. When I opened the door there were half dead roses on the seat. I looked up at him in amazement despite their poor health, because I’d never gotten flowers before.

  He muttered, “Fuck,” then in a normal speaking voice, “They’re part of my apology, but I couldn’t bring them in and didn’t think the sun would kill them quite so fast.”

  With a tiny trickle of magic they perked up, “Umm, thanks,” I said, once again proving how brilliant and sophisticated I was.

  Yes, as a succubus I was a smooth expert at seduction, always knowing what to say and how to act. But dating? Another story altogether. I wondered if I should be letting him off this easy or not.

  “So…” I trailed off.

  He sighed and we got in the car, “I’m sorry. I wanted to stay and make sure you were safe, and you forced me to leave, against my will. Commanded me, I was pissed and I’m sorry I ignored you yesterday, but I wasn’t ready to hear your side of it.”

  That was an apology? On the other hand, I had used my powers to strip his will and send him away.

  “So what changed your mind?”

  His face turned ashen, “I saw the video, Bill showed it to me. I umm, think he might know about us, but he didn’t say anything about it. Anyway, I figured out what must have been going through your mind, if the dragon had changed the MI6 agent and I would have been crushed, or burned almost immediately considering how close we were.

  “I remembered your eyes, you looked terrified, for us. After seeing that mangled and torn apart dragon on the ground in the video, and you so hurt, it made me realize pride was a stupid reason to die, and an even dumber reason to ruin what we have. I hope I’m not too late? I’m really sorry, I should have known you wouldn’t do what you did lightly.”

  Goddess, his apology made me a little wet, and I was happy. I didn’t realize how much I didn’t want to lose him. Of course, it wouldn’t do to let him know that. So instead of following my first impulse to blow him on the way to lunch I used my words.

  “I forgive you if you do me. I kind of panicked.”

  He sounded relieved, “Dinner at my place tonight?”

  “I’d like that.”

  We had lunch and returned to the office, I was feeling a lot better. Of course, that’s when Dawn sent me her nightmarish memories. The fight between Tal and Caph, Ruby’s insane attack, her total and complete mental breakdown when it became apparent war was inevitable. I felt a rock in my stomach as well. I knew my sister, it wasn’t her fault, but her involvement did create a debt of sorts.

  I worked the rest of the day thinking things through, and regretfully told Terry I’d have to skip dinner for a family emergency. Once out the building I took a portal straight to Dawn’s kitchen, Cassie was already there and she was making tea and coffee.

  I asked, “What do you think?”

  She sighed, “Dawn feels a responsibility toward human magic world, and honestly I can’t find a reason why she shouldn’t. Intentions aside we need to deal with the fallout of our actions. Even if the dragons can’t come here anymore.”

  I sighed, “Are we sure about that? They have magic to burn. If they come in far enough out they could fly in. Even if we send out nukes, they could probably magic them, as they are very fast after all. They could also send in a small group and take out the enchantments on the way in, the rest of them could follow and join them right in orbit. Granted, that’s a worst case scenario. We are also assuming they can’t teleport or gate just because Dawn hasn’t seen them do it. For all we know they could come in at Pluto and portal to Earth.”

  She frowned at me in shock at the possibilities, since obviously her paranoia wasn’t nearly as highly developed as mine.

  “So what should we tell Dawn?”

  I shrugged, “I think Rafe is right. I feel good about our defenses, but I wouldn’t completely count on them. We should send Dawn to help magic world fix those crystals. I know she wants too, plus those are all defensive. Did you ever figure out how they access magic from their DNA?”

  Cassie poured us both a coffee, “They can’t control raw magic like we can, otherwise it’s very similar. The problem I think is they never learn how to simply let it inside them. Think of it like a faucet, all of that magic in the atmosphere creates a pressure, all they need to do is open up certain channels and the magic would flow into them. At that point I believe they could cast much like us.”

  I asked, “So what’s the problem then?”

  She shrugged, “Understanding, advanced science doesn’t work on their world. I believe when they cast a spell they are taught to associate certain thoughts to the form. So it takes them a while to cast a spell because they have to speak instead of just running through the thought spell form. I believe the spells are so weak, because they only use what trickles through their natural shielding.

  “It’s easy that way, the spell works, so why try to understand more? Their sorcerers control the elements directly, but that’s because fire is very easy to understand, the elements are so basic they just directly wield them through the magic. That’s really different from spell forms and I could see why they’d have trouble doing both.”

  I shook my head, “So you’re saying there simply doing it wrong? Why wouldn’t someone figure that out?”

  She shrugged, “I imagine if they opened the tap and started absorbing magic, but wasn’t ready for a spell, it could over saturate their blood, even kill them painfully if they let it build up enough. Someone probably did that long ago, so they train their kids to never ever try it. I don’t know if that’s right, but it’s one possibility.”

  “Right, so we keep that to ourselves I guess.”

  She asked, “Should we tell Dawn about everything yet?”

  I shook my head, “No. Let’s stick with the plan, have her help magic world and we can tell her once the scouts are gone. Actually, we may want to wait until the dragons find out our world is blocked now.”

  She raised an eyebrow.

  “Well, we kind of owe Rafe and Caph now. They kept Dawn’s secrets and are in disfavor. They also are in deep shit, and Dawn loves them. We should at least wait until Caph withdraws from the war.”

  She giggled, “That’s… paranoid. Even for you Am.”

  I shrugged and winked, “Why take chances. Dragon world is a threat, but isn’t that clan our family now?”

  She sighed, “Fine, but I don’t like it.”

  I didn’t either, it was still weird keeping secrets from my big sister, “Fine, we’ll tell her our reasoning when she gets here, and let her decide. If she objects we tell her everything.”

  She agreed with the compromise, “That sounds okay, what’s next?”

  “Well, I’ll track dow
n that dragon and see if he’ll leave peaceably. If not I’ll get with the government, and we’ll go after the rest of the dragons.”

  She asked, “Do you need me?”

  “Can you just watch from a distance? If I get into trouble…”

  She nodded, “And when that’s done?”

  I shook my head, “I don’t know.”

  She shrugged, “Me either, although maybe I’ll go to magic world, poke around a bit.”

  I frowned, “Why?”

  She smiled, “You’re CIA, and the government is going to want you around, especially if the dragons don’t leave and there are battles. You’ll be stuck here. I’m just a college student and can work around that easily. I can help Dawn, or something. Plus I’m curious, ever since I got the memory about that room with all the books in it, and of course I’d like to verify my magical theory.”

  I shook my head, she was right of course. I couldn’t hare off and help Dawn even if I wanted to. We settled into a comfortable silence and waited for Dawn to get back.

  Chapter 12

  Dawn came back and was gone again, this time to the human magic world to shore up their defenses. She hadn’t batted an eye at our justification for holding back what was going on here on Earth, so we were still keeping secrets. The startling thing was she came back with Danielle, had Rafe found a way through our defense already and got her earlier today as Dawn thought, or was Danielle on that world before yesterday afternoon?

  I thought about briefing the government, but I wanted to give the silver a chance to back out. Plus, if we had to capture a dragon a red, blue, green, or black would be safer since they weren’t spell casters. They just had their breath weapons and innate magic, which to be fair was quite bad enough.

  I went home and put on a pair of jeans and t-shirt, and then spent some time with my enchantments. This time with lightning in mind. If it was normal lightning, I wouldn’t be worried and could just channel it right into the ground, but there would be all that magic mixed into it.

  I built in a channeling shield anyway, it would work much like a simple lightning rod. I also built shields to absorb and dissipate magic, but I knew if it came to a fight I had to be fast, they wouldn’t last very long. Lastly, I modified my physical protection spell.

  Sure, a bullet’s momentum was easy to dissipate by spreading it out, absorbing it. But that wouldn’t work with a claw that probably weighed near to a ton. I could however redirect that momentum straight down into the ground. So when I was hit I wouldn’t go flying, but I’d probably wind up standing in a small crater.

  Offensively, I couldn’t use gravity until he lost his magic shields, and lightning wouldn’t help at all. The ice whirlwind might, so I didn’t give up on the storm idea completely. I could also summon demon fire with my succubus side and enhance it with raw magic from my witch side. I wasn’t all that confident that would work though, and it would all depend on who lost their shields first. I couldn’t help but feel that was a failure of imagination on my part, there had to be a better way than simply slugging it out.

  The best advantage I had was the time dilation, so I was going in with my magic fully embraced. It would drag things out a bit… but so what. I’d take bored over dead any day. Plus, it would give me time to try and think of a better approach.

  I thought longingly about the makeup sex I should be having with Terry right now and opened a portal to where I spoke to the silver dragon before, right outside of London. I was buzzing with magic and took a deep breath. It would take time for him to detect me and move to meet me, with the time dilation I might be waiting days, or even weeks subjectively, before he showed up.

  It only took him a few hours.

  Speaking was a painful chore, but I managed it.

  I asked, “What have you decided?”

  His voice rumbled without malice despite his words, “It is not my decision witch. My world prepares for war. While they destroy our other enemies, I am to lead my brethren here and keep you occupied, and pave the way for more to come. I will find what is stopping the gates and destroy it.”

  My mouth dropped open. Why was he telling me his plan?

  He continued, “Goodbye witch,” and I understood.

  In his mind I was already dead. I summoned a storm and started pulling down a twister before he finished his last syllable. Instead of summoning water and freezing it I changed my mind at the last second and summoned demon fire and fed it along with raw magic into the funnel. The fire fed on the swirling air becoming a firestorm as it dropped right on his head, engulfing his human form.

  My short moment of hope was broken when he exploded into a dragon. The firestorm continued buffeting the dragon and digging into his shields, but his shield aura dispersed the magic I’d been mixing in, which weakened it.

  The shield I’d built flashed with coruscating energy as his lightning hit it. I felt the enchantment weaken and sent some more magic into it. The lightning was easily handled, it was the magic with it that was the real danger. At least until the shield failed, then I’d be screwed.

  I expected him to pounce and bat at me, but he spread his wings and jumped into the air instead. I was disgusted with myself from the awe I felt, he was huge, and in an alien way, very beautiful. He circled easily avoiding the large twister and hitting me with lightning. It seems such an obvious thing, but I didn’t plan for it so was a little flatfooted.

  Finally I kicked in some flight of my own, and he even started missing me some of the time. I thought back to my training when learning to fight the demon way. The way to win was to focus the fire into a needlelike line of fire just short of plasma. It would also strike the shields much harder in that one spot, to break through.

  I hit him with five concentrated streams of fire while trying to avoid his lightning. They unerringly followed him around, if I could see him I could hit him. We played this game for a long time, then he hit me with a spell. It wrapped around me and my magic and started draining it at an alarming rate. I tried to pick it apart, but my tendrils of magic were simply absorbed.

  I was feeling a little desperate so I fed as much magic into my fire as I could, making it stronger in a last ditch effort. That kind of worked, it punched through his shield and the fire swarmed his body.

  He roared in pain and flew straight at me. My protective spells weren’t worth shit right now and I was about to be swatted. Fortunately, his shields weren’t worth a crap either, and gravity takes only a comparative whisper of magic to the energies we’d been flinging around so far.

  It wasn’t pretty, I didn’t really have enough left to make it super strong, so he kind of collapsed into himself slowly. His roar of pain as I heard his bones splintering was… a sound I wish I could forget. He fell to the ground and I followed a little more slowly, landing on my feet. All of my enchantments and storage crystals were pretty drained, and my personal magic was ridiculously low.

  “Wow, that was intense sis,” Cassie said in a strangled voice.

  I turned in surprise and then just gave her a look.

  The brat winked at me.

  “I was about to help, but I held back when the fire broke through, I knew you had him.”

  I was such an idiot. I was sure I was about to die, of course she would have stepped in. I told her to watch, but since I didn’t feel her… How did she do that anyway?

  “Yeah, thanks.”

  We just looked at each other for a long moment and then broke down in giggles. Then the full blown laughter hit us and we couldn’t stop. Goddess it was good to be alive. But there were five more of them, and I wasn’t strong enough right now to face a baby dragon.

  That thought broke me out of my laughter.

  “I need to feed. They can communicate with home I think. He also knew about the blocking enchantments. We need to get them before they think to either band together, or go after the enchantments.”

  Cassie pulled out her enchantment and activated it.

  “Too late, I think they
are all together now. They’re in the mountains in upstate New York.”

  Cassie waved her hand and a circular window opened up surrounding us, showing them in the clearing. I studied the spell for a moment, I didn’t understand it at all.

  “How does that work?” I asked curiously.

  Cassie shrugged, “The spell reads the light and sound waves at a location I specify, then forms a picture of everything around it and generates identical sound waves here.”

  Now that she explained it I could see what did what in the magic, it was incredibly complicated and would take me months to learn. I’d do it though, this could be very useful in my line of work. I stopped studying it knowing I’d remember it perfectly even if it would take a lot more time to figure out, so I could listen.

  “Allindris is dead, we’re stuck here.”

  I examined them closely, there were two reds, a black, a blue, and a green. Blue and green hair just looked weird.

  A red growled, “But we can still detect magic, I say our only course of action is to find the enchantments and destroy them, once another caster comes we can go home.”

  The blue shook his head in disagreement, “No, we need to find and kill all the witches first. What’s the point in destroying an enchantment they can just remake?”

  The green spoke, “Do you think that will be easy? One witch by herself managed to kill Allindris, who I remind you could have easily taken any of us. Our best bet is to lay low, or use hit and run tactics to keep them occupied. Then when we get communication that they are ready for a full invasion here we hit the enchantments. They may be able to replace them, but by then it will be too late. It’s all a matter of timing.”

  The other red said contemptuously, “That is the path of a coward, if we die in the challenge of battle then so be it. I won’t hide.”

  The green growled menacingly, I thought for a minute they would come to blows.

  “This isn’t a challenge, this is war. There is no place for honor challenges in war, we fight to win, to protect our world, not for personal glory.”