Anna's Hope Episode One (13 page)

The wizard somehow dodged every blow
Luminaria sent his way. He leapt onto the pulpit.

He reached towards Anna, his hand
spreading wide as magic raced over the fingers.

Screaming, she snatched the book,
staggered back, and did the only thing she could think of. She
threw it, right at Luminaria. “Destroy it!”

The wizard reached her and grabbed her
arm, his awful grip eating into her once more.

There was an almighty bang from behind
her.

A massive magical shock wave slammed
through the room.

The wizard was thrown
off
Anna,
and she tumbled back into the lectern, her head slamming into the
wood.

A massive cloud of smoke and rock dust swept
through the room.

She blinked against it, her ears ringing
from the blast.

“Well that was more dramatic than I
thought it would be,” Luminaria mumbled from somewhere near the
center of the smoke cloud.

Anna
pushed herself up. She had to press
her back into the lectern and jam her feet into the floor to manage
it. But with effort, she stood.

She stared down at her feet, at the
wizard.

He was out.

Or so she thought. Just as she leant down to
check him, he snapped forward and caught her hand.

As he did, he began to disappear. A massive,
seething pool of black magic amassed around him, climbing over his
body as he pulled her towards him.

She tried to resist, but he was so
strong.

His torso vanished, his body sinking
through the floor.

She screamed.

The look in his eyes held her place. Not his
grip around her arm, but his look.

Humans have a saying – the eyes are the
doorway to the soul. They’re right. The eyes are the gates into the
soul. And should you know how, you can shove them open.

She felt him pulling her down, down towards
some hell she couldn’t imagine, but one she was about to experience
firsthand.

She could hear Luminaria racing up behind
her, but the cat would be too late. “Fight it, child!” she
roared.

Anna
was the kind of girl who always did
as she was told. Today was no different.

As Luminaria’s plea echoed at the edge of
Anna’s hearing, she resisted.

She closed her eyes, shutting off the
connection. It was hard, but the wizard had been weakened by his
fight with Luminaria.

She pulled her arm back.

Luminaria reached them, and
sent a massive blast right at the wizard’s head. It struck home,
and he tipped back, finally releasing
Anna.

She snapped her eyes open to see his jerk
wide too.

Something cracked.

Something that shouldn’t.

Suddenly Anna was thrown back as a
mysterious force slammed into her.

She fell against the stone, her head
spinning, her vision blurry, her heart racing.

With a bang, the wizard disappeared. She
could feel as that new dark magic vanished, taking the wizard with
it.

She tried to push herself up, but her head
was still swimming. She felt like she’d been hit by a mountain.

“Oh ... well you don’t often see that,”
Luminaria conceded as she leant down and sniffed the spot where the
wizard had disappeared. The stone was riddled with cracks and
covered in dark swathes of singe marks. Residual magic crackled and
spat, dancing erratically over the floor like headless fireflies.
In other words, it was exactly the kind of thing you didn’t
sniff.

Anna
pulled herself into a sitting
position. She held onto her head. It felt like it wasn’t attached
anymore. “What – what happened?”

“Our little friend got away. Strange kind
of magic he practices,” Luminaria licked her teeth, “I’ve never
come across it before. Which is odd when you consider I’m ancient
and positively powerful.”

Anna
tried to get to her feet. She
failed.

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you,”
Luminaria warned as she sat down and glared at Anna. “You might
faint. You have a part of that wizard’s soul, after
all.”

“Sorry?”

“Silly fool was trying to practice soul
magic before he vanished. That’s how he created the portal. It’s
also how he was compelling you to follow him. Problem was, when he
tried to access your soul, he opened up his own. Then I came along
and walloped him in the noggin with a magical blast, and broke off
a section of his soul. It slammed into you. Not something you see
everyday. In fact, I’ll be honest with you – I’ve never seen it
before. But tonight’s been full of surprises, ay?”

Anna
’s head stopped swimming – it started
whirling around like a tornado instead.

She ...
she had a fragment of a dark
wizard’s soul!

She fainted.

Anna
woke to a face staring into her
own.

At first, she thought it was the wizard,
back to finish what he’d started.

She pushed backwards, raising her hands in
defense as she whimpered.

“Miss Summersville, it’s over. You
attacker is gone. It’s me, Wizard Arana.”

She looked up into his handsome face. It was
Aaron alright – the same angled jaw, neat hair, and sparkling
eyes.

“W-what happened?” she
stuttered.

He helped her sit. “You fought off a dark
wizard.” He stood back, once he was sure she could sit on her own,
and stared around the badly damaged chapel.

“No, boy, I fought off the dark wizard,”
Luminaria snapped. She was trotting proudly around a massive crater
in the ground – one she’d created when she’d destroyed the wizard’s
book.

“Indeed.” Aaron raised an
eyebrow.

“How did you get here?” Anna tried to get
up, but as soon as she put weight on her wrist, she
crumpled.

“You’re injured,” he pointed out
needlessly. “And I got here, because there was a massive display of
magic – strong enough to alert our instruments at the MEC HQ.” He
put his hand into his pocket, and somehow produced an icepack. He
handed it to her. “Press this against your wrist. It isn’t magical,
so it won’t irritate your allergies. It won’t be nearly as
effective, though, I’m afraid.”

She accepted it with a small smile.

“How did you access the chapel though?”
Anna held the icepack tightly, thankful for its cold touch. Her
wrist felt like it had been put through hell, and in a way, it
had.

“Through the front door. Once you defeated
the wizard, he lost control of his portals, and I managed to enter
through the same one he created last night in that bar you
frequented with Meredith Pride.”

“How did you get past the vampires and
magicians?”

He raised an eyebrow.

She remembered whom she was talking too.
Aaron would be the strongest wizard in the town, let alone the
country. He sat on the Council of Eight, for god’s sake. A few
vampires and some rowdy magicians would be nothing but a mild
irritation to a man like that.

“My body wizards are upstairs cleaning out
that ... bar,” he said, making it clear he thought bar was a
generous term. Cesspit, was probably more on the mark. “They will
be down shortly to secure this chapel.” He smoothed down his tie as
he turned, angling his head back to stare at the ceiling and
windows.

She swallowed.

Was it really over?

Aaron walked
away from her,
descending from the pulpit to inspect the crater in the main aisle.
With one hand tapping on his tie, he raised an eyebrow.

Anna
pressed the ice pack into her wrist
and watched him.

He walked down the side of the crater, his
Italian loafers crunching over the crushed and burnt flagstones. He
tentatively poked some of the ash-caked stone. “Was it really
necessary to incinerate all the evidence? That book was our only
link to the wizard.”

“I’m so sorry,” Anna sighed as she
crumpled further over her injured hand. She was feeling sorry for
herself. Fair enough, she’d almost been sacrificed to a soul
catcher. If misery were ever justified, it was now.

“From what I gather, you had little to do
with this. The damage,” he kicked a small charred stone lightly,
and it climbed the side of the crater only to tumble back down and
strike his shoe, “was wrought by one Luminaria von Tippit,” he
continued.

“In my own defense.” Luminaria jumped up,
her hackles rising in a strong strike of fur down her mottled back.
She stalked over to Aaron. If she’d been anything other than a cat,
it would have been as intimidating as watching a train barrel down
on you. “If I had broken the terms of my contract and attacked
another with magic, I wouldn’t be standing here right now, would I?
My possession of this fine feline would have ended with a very
audible and very magical bang.”

Pressing two fingers into his brow and
massaging it slowly, he said “I’ve gathered that. My point still
stands: it was mighty inconvenient of you to destroy all the
evidence. Now we have no way of tracking down that wizard.” Briefly
Aaron’s eyes focused on Anna’s injured wrist, before he turned his
head quickly and stared down at the crater.

“No way of tracking down the wizard? Are
you really that dumb?” Luminaria laughed.

“Excuse me?” Aaron raised his other
eyebrow.

“He’ll be back for her.” Luminaria flicked
her tail towards Anna.

Anna
paled, her hand freezing mid-move as
she tried to wipe the soot from her cheeks.

Again Aaron looked at her, but this time
his gaze lasted. “What do you mean?”

“Do I really have to spell it out for
you?” Luminaria rolled her eyes and chuckled scornfully.

“Yes, spell it out.”

“Anna has a part of his soul. He’ll need
that back if he wants to keep practicing soul magic and if he ever
wants to call his soul catcher friend again. He’ll also need it
back to live. He’ll manage for a while, but without his own, he’ll
start to fade away, and so will his power. So mark my words, he’ll
come back for her.”

Anna
drew in a sharp breath, her back
jerking with the move.

“We don’t know that,” Aaron
cautioned.

“Yes we do,” Luminaria interrupted. “You
weren’t there, wizard, but I was. I saw the transfer – I tasted it
too. Strong magic like that tastes like lemon sherbet, cut with jet
fuel.” She twitched her whiskers thoughtfully. “Anyhow, the point
is, you want to catch that wizard, watch Anna. Eventually he’ll
come back for his soul, sooner rather than later.”

Aaron turned to stare directly at
Luminaria. He fixed her with the kind of penetrating look that
reminded Anna he was one of the most powerful wizards in the world.
Though no magic crackled around his eyes, the world still stood
still.

Luminaria didn’t flinch. “Come now, boy,
you know I’m right. Now, I’m quite tired, and I would like a little
bit of milk and tuna before bed. I would also like to be brushed.”
She shook her back, dust falling from her fur. “Come,
Anna.”

Anna
, still understandably overcome,
didn’t move.

This was a lot to take in. She
had a part of that wizard’s soul
, and he’d be back for it ....

She shivered, instinctively rubbing a hand
on her chest.

“Anna,”
Luminaria snapped.

On autopilot, she jumped to her feet.
“Coming.” Still rubbing her chest, she jogged after
Luminaria.

While it would be great to ignore the
possessed cat, Anna already had enough bruises for one
night.

“You can’t just leave. We need to figure
out what we’re going to do.” Aaron turned sharply on his foot to
track them across the room.

“Oh pish, I need food,” Luminaria
snapped.

“I’m not talking to you.” Aaron walked
forward. “I’m talking to Anna.”

Dumbfounded, she stopped. In all their
interactions to date, Aaron had talked around her, not to her. It
was patently clear he thought she was a waste of time.

It was kind of a surprise he’d noticed she
was in the room, frankly.

“Anna?” he asked in a patient
tone.

She stopped and turned slowly.

“Anna,” he said directly, “if Luminaria’s
right, and I think she is, you’re in a lot of danger. You can’t
just return home.”

“Don’t be so condescending, wizard, and
stop pointing out she’s an idiot,” Luminaria snapped, “I’m the one
who does that. You can stop wasting our time too. I’ve dealt with
that wizard once, and I’ll deal with him again. If he comes
knocking on our door in the middle of the night, I’ll make him
knock into it on the way out. I have more than enough power to deal
with such a pipsqueak.”

“And if you don’t have more than enough
power, what then, Luminaria?” There was a real note of authority in
Aaron’s voice. It sailed through the air like a masterfully swung
katana, slicing into its target.

Luminaria stopped. She took a deep breath
that jammed her chest out, and she turned. She considered Aaron
with cold contempt. There was, however, an unusual hint of unease
about her stance. She wasn’t as indignant and confident as
usual.