Hi,

I hope you all had a great weekend - mine was more than great! Okay, guys, things are happening in this one. Anyone saw this one coming? Let me know! :-)

Lara

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Chapter 23

I took a good look around. George and four other vamps – all waiting for Alexander's orders. Servants and subjects. And he considered me one of them.

The fence demarcating Marrok's fortress, a city of shape shifters within the city, was at the end of the street. A real-life jungle of steel and concrete within the city. If I took a closer look, would I be able to make out the yellow glint of eyes peering out of abandoned windows and the line of wrecked cars in front of us? Shape shifters lying in wait, guarding their territory with the sharp sense of a predator on a hunt.

Alexander turned and held out his palm in an inviting mock-gesture. I forced my limbs into motion. Let him believe he managed to turn my head inside out. Let him think he won and that I was going to be his human servant for good.

Reshape the world? Change the parameters? Fine. Maybe I was just going to do that.

But first I had to go to the bottom of Alexander's and Brown's relationship. Find out if Alexander had earned his respect among fellow leaders through blackmail and deceit. Even if I had to expose Brown.

I walked up to Alexander and watched him turn around in silence, staring at his back was we made our way to Marrok. Was I making him the enemy? Did I want to get out of our master-servant-relationship so badly that I was too blind to see what else was going on? I stared at the set of his shoulders, concentrating on the way he held himself. Gauging Alexander's motives was like trying to catch smoke. Not human and yet not dead. Walking the world somewhere in between human lines and demarcations that meant nothing in his long existence. Endless power at his disposal.

I shook my head. No matter what he did or did not do, no matter what lay between us, he had forced this bond on me with the arrogance of a conqueror. And that was something I couldn't ignore or forgive.

I moved on in silence, trying to fit back into my old skin, the me that would see red whenever he forced me to do something for him. But the more I tried, the less it fit. There were other things to consider. This city. My city.

I blinked, stared past Alexander to the graveyard of metal and steel. Marrok's territory. The vamps were shadowing me and Alexander like a ring of noiseless ghosts. Even if we looked the part, we were not paying Marrok a courtesy visit.

We made it as far as to the middle of the street before it happened.

The street lamps exploded, the sound of glass shattering as if caught up in an afterthought. Shafts of darkness spilled into the night, filtering through whatever little light remained in the street. Explosions of sound around us. Popping noises I was well familiar with. Shadowed, hooded figures that glided out of portals opening in quick-beat succession.

Rogue witches.

The vampires stirred, as if someone had breathed life into their rigid forms. They moved into a half circle in front of us like a living, protective shield. Power sizzled along the pavement, blue sparks of electricity biting into asphalt.

The shapes stepped out of the forest of half-shadows, and I caught a glimpse of faces I didn't know. Then, among them, a rogue witch with green eyes. Dark, thin, and gangly. This was the same group that attacked me here once before. My eyes went back to the end of the street and the entrance to shape shifter territory. Was this a trap set up by Marrok?

I pulled on power, drawing a shield of air around me and the group of vampires. Flashes of blue light hissed and danced wherever they touched my walls of air.

The rogue witches appeared around us in a circle-like pattern. Positions that were deliberate, no, in fact precisely planned.

They're forming a pentagram.

I had time to finish the thought and do as much as open my mouth before all hell broke loose. The random sparks of blue crawling along the ground gained speed and raced from one rogue to the other, drawing lines on the street that turned into a complete pentagram.

"Watch out!"

My voice was drowned out by an explosion that happened on more than one layer. Dark power saturated the space in front of us, charging forward towards my walls of air. Then hit home. The impact knocked me on my knees, felt like an oversized bullet biting into flesh. I screamed through the pain and watched how my walls folded in on themselves.

The shadow-landscape around me changed into a kaleidoscope of blurry figures and dark magic. The vampires attacked, Alexander among them. I could almost feel him slice through the air – faster and stronger than anything I'd ever laid my eyes on. They were trying to break through the star-shaped power spectrum the rogues created. If one of the rogue witches fell, the whole pentagram would shatter and with it the dark magic

George remained somewhere in front of me. I could feel his power, the power of the grave, sifting through the air. He blocked whatever the rogues were throwing our way.

The rogue witches didn't have a prayer. There simply weren't enough of them.

I was just about to right myself, get on my feet and do something, when it happened. Another rogue came out of nowhere, charged forward into the street. He was coming straight for me and George. Orbs of electric power the size of volleyballs went hurtling towards us. Alexander's enforcer blinked out of existence, appearing behind the rogue witch instants later.

I stilled. It dawned on me. I glanced back towards the pentagram. It was still intact. There were more rogues than we thought!

A hand descended on my shoulder. I didn't have enough time to turn around, the sensation hit too fast. I froze as the air around me drifted away like a tidal wave just a little short of crushing. Instants later I felt the dark current pull me in.

A portal.

The street in front of me narrowed down, and somewhere in the back I saw Alexander. Almost like he could feel my gaze, the head vampire turned around in the same instant and out eyes met. The last thing I saw before I vanished in the depths of the portal was Alexander's face, his lips parting.

My heart faltered and stagnated. For a moment I thought I saw something on his face – an unguarded expression, something akin to shock. Then darkness claimed me.

* * *

The world ruptured into bits and pieces of darkness. I felt my limbs being pulled apart, my mind flayed, tortured by the oncoming onslaught of the void we were travelling through. Conscious thought gave way to another entity, a black absence of matter, until I couldn't tell up from down apart. By the time it stopped, my mind was bruised and battered.

The first thing I noticed was my own rapid pulse. The second was the pin-drop-quiet. Strong, steely fingers manacled my hands behind my back in an angry grip. Someone shoved me forward roughly, slammed me down on what felt like a chair.

I groaned and tore my eyes open only to be blinded by pale, artificial light. Rough fingers moved over my skin. Someone tied a rope around my wrists and ankles. I blinked, trying to make sense of the vision that greeted me. Slowly, too slow, things came back into focus. Once they did, the blood in my veins stopped.

He was standing a few feet away from me with his hands clasped behind him, his back turned to me. The skyline of New York rose behind him, caught in the window like a still life painting.

"It's been a while, Anna Johnson," he said.

"Raphael Medici." The words whooshed out of me. He was real. He was alive.

Holy mother of all witches.

A slight rustle of cloth. Movement behind me. Guess what, we were not alone. He probably assembled the remaining Inri Brotherhood members to watch the show, whatever it was.

I tried to turn my head, see what and who was awaiting my death. Someone shoved it down so hard, my teeth clattered. I cried out in pain; hated myself for it.

Now's not the time to show weakness, Anna. Don't give him an inch.

I raised my head for the barest of seconds, running my eyes up and down the room. Spacious in the way you'd describe a football field. Bare walls and a marble floor. Nondescript to the point of total blandness. It reminded me of something, but I couldn't put my finger on it. What was this place?

My eyes found their way back to Medici. Staring at the back of one of the most dangerous rogue witches New York had seen, I contemplated my next move. Stumbling bluntly through this wasn't going to get me out alive. If I wanted a chance at surviving, I had to look at my cards, see what hand exactly I'd been dealt and make the best of it. If I knew one thing it was this: For Medici this was a game.

"What do you want?" The sound of my voice took me by surprise. It came out like I didn't really care what it was. Like what he wanted had nothing to do with me and my situation.

"I heard you were kicked out of the Circle," he said without turning.

I tensed. Of course he'd know. Travis probably PMed the whole congregation of Inri Brotherhood members as soon as I stepped out of the Circle headquarters. Maybe he made a nice report, including footing from the scene in Brown's office.

I felt the urge to snort. It quickly faded when I realized it could have happened that way. So the number one question was: Did Raphael know why I was fired? That I was the head vampire's human servant?

I shrugged. "So what? It's over. By now your spy's probably chained up worse than a death-row-inmate."

If Andy went to Brown after I left. Unfortunately I wasn't so sure about that.

He mirrored my movement, shrugging it off as if the information meant nothing to him. "Collateral damage. Do you still think you'll be able to worm yourself back into the Circle's good graces? That leeway you were trying to find? Once the magical community knows why you were kicked out, no one will talk to you, Anna Johnson."

He knew. Damn the three great witches, he knew I was the head vamp's servant!

I felt something in my throat close up. My own breathing was too loud and erratic. I knew exactly what he was trying to do, but there was no denying it: what he said was closer to the truth than I liked. This sounded familiar. It was the same dialogue I had imagined having. Only I'd imagined having it with Alexander.

You don't know yet what exactly he knows. Just get through with this. Play along. Do whatever it takes to come out alive.

"You lied to them. More than once. Looks like you got a little too attached to the head vamp to call your relationship 'friendly', eh? The Circle doesn't like members to get too familiar with vamps and potential opponents. It's fine as long as they're business partners. But it's hard to remain unbiased when you're sleeping with them."

Relief and indignation, a hot-cold shower of fury and panic in my blood. I shoved against it, fought to keep it from showing on my face. He would see a non-answer as a confirmation. I fortified my mind, stared at his back as if my life depended on it.

"Why am I here?" My voice sounded incredibly calm through the deafening rush of blood in my ears.

He laughed softly. "Did you ever wonder why only some of us witches turn rogue? The Circle keeps advertising it as the big bad – a choice a sinner makes without a way out or the chance of redemption. It's a lie. Most members of the witch community can't turn rogue. Some of us are born as witches bound to one of the elements. Now, very rarely, there are others that are born as more. Others that can access more than what their one element offers. You of all people should know."

It was my turn to laugh. "I'm not gonna go rogue. I wouldn't even know how."

"If you are what I think you are, there's no need for you to go rogue."

I went rigid, watching him turn around with wide eyes. For the first time I got a good look at him. Brown hair with strands of silver that looked like threads of washed-out salt. Thin lips. Light brown eyes that once had been alert, but at times barely hid what he was becoming. What dark magic was doing to him.

"I know what you did. What you could be. It took me long to figure it out." He smiled. "That time you killed Michael by using the element of water – I was a fool not to see it for what it was, but I knew once you tried to use fire in the warehouse. You remember? It was when you challenged me to a duel." He smiled.

"I have no idea what you mean." The words didn't come out the way I intended them too. They were rushed and if I could hear the strain in my voice, he would too.

"Using more than one element that's not yours to call? You, Anna Johnson, are one of the few witches that can access multiple elements. And that makes you the perfect candidate for the next Pentagram."