Hi!

Ok, so I'm curious if anyone actually knew what was going to happen, or had any theories that turned out to be right (or at least close to what happens in this chapter)? All geared up and ready to go?

Read, vote, and let me know what you think! :-)

Lara

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Chapter 33

The cave-like room was a mess, a clusterfuck of auras, musk, and shape shifter power. The stink of sweat and dark magic penetrated, stinging my nose. Violence was potent in the air, tension crawling into my bones like cold mist.

The wolves were cornering one of the rogues, one wolf's jaws buried in his arm. The light, yellowish pelt told me it was Blaze in wolf form. The second rogue was on the floor in a puddle of blood and intestines. The blood on Radulf's feet looked like blood on white sheet. He was the only one still in human form.

I swore. We needed the rogues alive!

Andy walked into the cavern as if he owned it. The wolves' heads turned to him, snarling, baring their teeth. He was walking into a pack that was probably drunk on the fast paced pulse of the hunt. And he wasn't part of them. Not a good idea.

Magic pooled in the tips of my fingers. If this went downhill, it would go fast.

"We need him alive," Andy said. His words were controlled, soft spoken like the soothing hum of a lullaby.

Radulf stepped forward and closer to the rogue witch without looking at Andy.

"We know what we're doing, Varner," he said. "Stay the fuck out of this and let us do what we came for."

He lowered himself to the rogue in a fluid, inhuman motion, crouching. I leaned sideways, peering into semi-darkness, and for the first time I got a good look at the rogue. Short black hair, colored tattoos on thick forearms, and that lost look that spoke of condescending violence in his blue, grey eyes. For a painfully long moment our eyes met.

Walter.

The realization drove an icy spear into my spine.

Why did it have to be someone I knew? The time I spent with the Inri Brotherhood had left more invisible wounds and moral baggage than I seemed to be able to carry.

Walter laughed. The blood on his teeth was too red, as if the blood wasn't even real.

"Long time no see, Anna."

Radulf turned to me. "You know him?"

He saved my life once. Sort of.

I nodded.

"It's not gonna change anything," Radulf said, stomping on the rogue's chest, who grunted with pain. "What were you doing here?"

Walter spit blood. "Fuck you."

Radulf's eyes flashed yellow. Seconds lost in time. Static motion. His teeth, no longer white and human, dripped with spittle as he drew close.

"I said, what were you doing here?" Half growl, half spoken in a human voice.

Walter laughed.

My eyes drifted away from him and towards the back of the cavern. Could there be another magical artifact, hidden beneath layers of magic cloaking the item? I peered through the veils of second sight and let myself fall into lower sub-realities. The temperature sunk and fell as I let my eyes drift through smeared auratic grays.

The room seemed oddly barren of magical residues. If the rogues or a witch had been here, they hadn't used much magic. If a magical artifact was hidden here, I indeed couldn't sense it.

I frowned and let go, blinking against reality. Why this location, if not for hiding something? Why this room? There wasn't much in it, apart from boxes and crates stacked against the wall in the back of the cavern. Had the two rogues come for these boxes?

I walked to the back of the cavern. Someone yelled something and I heard a harsh yelp of pain. Probably from Walter.

I fastened my pace. I was against torture, in any form. I had to think of a way to stop this. Fast. But first I had to know what was in the boxes.

I lifted the lid of one of the boxes, slowly. Then let it drop.

Human weapons. Why would the Raven –

It came like a soft spoken whisper as a warning. A whiff of premonition in the form of a ripple in the auratic set-up. Reality split in two, a rift behind that had me spinning around.

Someone just entered the cavern via portal.

Time moved forward, rose petals drifting down in fast motion. The dark magic seemed to come out of nowhere, spinning into and out of the tunnel like a deadly whirlwind. My hand came up in reflex and the wall of air snapped into place in the mouth of the cavern. Dark magic sizzled against the wall like boiling water colliding with a wall of ice.

Something in the corner of my eyes caught my attention. Walter stirred and flashed bloody teeth in an awkward smile.

Then all hell broke loose.

Walter released a bolt of dark magic that hit Radulf in the chest and sent him spinning through the air. With a scream and yell three more dark witches stormed into the cavern. The magic whizzed around us, wild and unpredictable, as they hurled more dark magic into the cavern. Bolts raced through the air like sharp blades biting into human skin. The wolves evaded and circled their prey, pacing.

I frowned. This was beginning to smack of trap.

Another ripple in the auratic landscape. Short-cut, black hair, skin heavily tattooed.

Joshua. The rogue witch appeared out of nowhere, charging into the cavern like a bull on steroids. Probably on a rescue mission for his brother. And I was in the way.

Time slowed. Seconds ticking away and I watched as Andy stormed past me and threw himself against the rogue, tackling him to the ground.

Motion from the corner of my eye. Walter had moved, rushing towards the back of the cavern, ducking in between the whirl of dark magic. His hand dug into one of the boxes.

I turned and sprinted towards the crates, hand outstretched, ready to stop him if he so much as tried to use a weapon.

A clank, like metal on concrete. Walter had dropped something. My eyes followed the sound as the air exploded with wads of smoke. My eyes watered as the smoke circled in.

A smoke bomb. Crap.

And I knew why Walter was using it: Escape.

I opened second sight, saw the first ripples in the auratic landscape, the slow pulling back of folds in reality that could only mean one thing. I threw myself through the room and towards the dark-red spot at the crates of the boxes. I collided with Walter in the same moment the portal opened.

The travel was the most violent I'd ever experienced. Chunks of zero space seemed to hit me at every turn, bruising my mind and body. I held on to Walter with all I had, fisting my hands into him and his essence. I was not going to get lost in here.

The portal spit us out and I hit the ground hard. I lifted my head, blinking down against spinning cobblestone. Where the hell were we? No junk, no litter or smell of excrements on the ground. The street wasn't in the Red Zone or one of the darker parts of the city where a rogue would have thrived. Where had he taken me?

Motion and noise somewhere in front of me. Walter was standing up on shaky feet, grinning. The blood was still prominent on his teeth.

"You're too late, and you don't even know it. Do yourself a favor and stay out of this," Walter said, before disappearing into a portal.

I stared at the spot he was in seconds ago. This wasn't where he initially wanted to go. Walter just detoured and dropped me here. So where did he portal to? And where was the Raven?

Whatever the Raven planned was going to go down now or had already happened. The rogues definitely stored human weapons in the cavern. That's what Walter and the other rogues were going to retrieve. Why would the Raven need conventional arms?

I exhaled sharply.

Crap. I was wrong. I was so wrong.

Medici had been circling the inner city, targeting one object after the other, like a con-artist moving hand over hand along a thinning rope. The night we teleported on a rooftop, showing up right in front of the Circle headquarters – as if he was testing the waters, see how far he could go.

I stilled. That's exactly what it was.

The null bombs and the other magical objects he kept collecting like rare trading cards. He wasn't only planning to undermine the Circle, he wanted to hurt the Circle where it hurt most. And he could only do that with both, magical and non-magical weapons.

My head snapped up. There was only one place he could go. I stared into the night sky and saw the beginnings of the financial district in the distance. Somewhere within the group of skyscrapers and buildings there was a building that treasured magical artifacts that could turn the tide in the rogue's attempt to throw the city into anarchy and chaos.

The Raven was going to attack the Invisibility Cloak. If he hadn't already.

My fingers found my mother's pendant, trembling. I had to stop this.

* * *

I rolled my shoulders, trying to get rid of the disorientation after another travel via portal. The cold knifed into me as the wind whipped around my face, throwing back the hems of my leather jacket. The headquarters of the Invisibility Cloak looked truly abandoned. The building braved the night like a sleek shadow-knight, abandoned and alone.

I'd landed on one of the rooftops one street over, not far from where the Raven had landed with the Inri Brotherhood the night we watched the three great witches arrive. From here I could see the Invisibility Cloak's headquarter.

If Walter teleported to Medici, whatever was going to happen, was going to happen now or not at all. I stepped into second sight and scanned the area. The rogues probably stole a magical artifact in the apartment complex I and Andy visited. Maybe they stole even more, in other parts of the city, who knew.

If I was right about just one of my theories, Medici would try to use a null bomb and storm the building with human weaponry – something the Circle was not prepared for. Something the Raven probably realized when I told him about the unbreakable magical wards.

Dammit. Was this again my fault?

I shook my head, took a deep breath and scanned my surroundings.

The Circle's headquarter was farther up north, just a few blocks over. The words Spira shone in the distance like a static Fata Morgana. Somewhere below a taxi cab crossed the intersection, and hooded shadow of a man walked down the street, vanishing behind the corner.

It was eerily quiet. The area was suffused with an unnatural silence festering on the edges of the buildings and the corners of the street. The skyline was darkening, the sun's yellow orange glow had long faded, lost its battle against the oncoming night. Darkness had come out as the victor and the elongating shadows would soon vanish in the night. The better to hide in.

A swarm of birds crossed the night sky, like dark breadcrumbs tossed into the air.

I stilled. No, not birds.

Ravens.