The Eighth Mage Read online

  Jeep frowns. “Well, I wouldn’t say it sucks that he got back.”

  Taylar rolls his eyes. “You know what I mean.”

  D’Maeo rubs his sideburns. “Saint Peter actually decided it wasn’t your time yet?”

  I clear my throat. “Actually, I did. But I’d rather not talk about that anymore. I’m back, I’m in one piece, and Shelton Banks lifted the curse on Vicky.”

  Vicky lets go of my hand when I rub my head to drown out the last of the drums. “What about Beelzebub? Did Shelton Banks tell you how to defeat him?”

  “Well, he had enough of the interrogation before I could make him answer that question, so we’ll need to come up with another way to find out more about Beelzebub.”

  Vicky stands up abruptly and turns her back to me. “I can’t believe you, Dante. I told you to ask him that question first. It was the most important one!”

  I shake my head fervently but stop when the annex starts spinning around me. “I know you think it was, but I disagree. Keeping you from getting killed is more important. And more urgent.”

  “No, it isn’t!”

  I throw my hands in the air. “Yes, it is, Vicky!”

  She turns back to me, her eyes fuming. “You don’t need me to beat the Devil. But you do need to kill Beelzebub.”

  Despite her shouting, I keep calm. I knew she’d be angry, but I’m happy with the choice I made. Shelton Banks made it very clear that Vicky is important in our battle against Satan. “Yes, but you’re wrong. You are important.” I look up at the others. “Each of you is. It has been said to us many times that we were all chosen to do this. Keeping the team complete is our best shot at winning.”

  Vicky is still fuming; her nostrils move with every needless breath she takes out of habit. She stares at me until I break eye contact.

  Charlie helps me up, and I brush the dirt from my clothes.

  Maël steps closer. She takes me in from head to toe. “He told you something about Vicky, didn’t he?”

  I nod. “I asked him why they wanted Vicky out of the way so badly. He gave me an evasive answer about her great-great-great-grandmother and the powers she inherited from her.”

  “What?” If Vicky’s frown was any deeper, her eyebrows would melt into one.

  I fold my arms together with a wide grin. “Looks like it’s a good thing I saved your ass.”

  Maël is now scrutinizing Vicky. “We need to find out what kind of powers you inherited. We will need them to beat Lucifer.”

  Jeep beckons us, and we follow him into the kitchen where he taps the book we couldn’t decipher. “I bet that information is in here.”

  Everyone agrees, and I’m about to do the same when something weird grabs my attention. This time, I am certain it isn’t my imagination. My breath catches in my throat, and I point at Jeep’s arm. “Jeep… one of your tattoos is moving again.”

  It’s not only the nasty grin that makes the skull on Jeep’s lower arm creepy. There’s no doubt about it… it is moving. The mouth opens and closes, and the eyes blink.

  Jeep’s expression is a copy of mine, full of surprise and fear.

  Vicky has momentarily forgotten about her anger with me. She apparates to the other side of the table and bends over Jeep’s arm. “How is this possible?”

  Jeep clenches his jaw and closes his eyes. “There’s still a ghost trapped inside. He’s trying to get out.”

  Gisella pulls some shadows to her while Maël rises to her feet and pulls her staff from under her cape. “Can you stop him?”

  Jeep’s head tilts in all directions as he fights the ghost mage inside his tattoo. “I’m not… sure.” His hand presses down on the skull, but that only makes it move more frantically.

  Everyone stands up, ready to fight. Mona, who was preparing some hot chocolate, puts everything down and awakens the sparks inside her. Maël raises her wand and points it at the tattooed ghost. Before she can utter a single word, a shadowlike shape pulls itself from Jeep’s arm with so much force that it’s propelled forward, against the edge of the table. The table moves back, hitting Maël at the other side, making her drop her wand. Jeep is pushed backward. His chair topples over, with him in it.

  Maël scrambles to her feet first. She aims the tip of her staff at the form hovering above the table now. Again, the figure is faster. It shoots down and hits her in the chest. The rest of us pull out or conjure our weapons and aim it at the escaped ghost while D’Maeo bends over to try and grab it.

  The shadow form rises to the ceiling and holds up two freshly grown arms. “Wait! I’m not here to hurt you!”

  Everyone, except for Charlie, hesitates. A grease ball hits the figure square in the chest, and he’s pushed back, slamming against the wall above the back door.

  “Ouch.”

  I gesture to Charlie to lower his arm. Somehow ‘ouch’ doesn’t sound like something an evil mage would say. Normally our enemies growl or shout threats when we hurt them. Still, a simple ‘ouch’ and an ‘I’m not here to hurt you’ aren’t enough to convince me he’s on our side. This might be a trick. He might’ve stayed behind on purpose, in case we found a way to take out the other seven mages that escaped Jeep’s tattoos. Which we did.

  With a lightning bolt still dancing eagerly on my palm, I walk over to him. Gisella’s shadows stay close, in case I need back-up. I make the lightning float up to the ghost’s neck and push his newly formed chin up with the sharp, sparkling tip. “Who are you, and why did you stay behind when the other mages escaped?”

  The shadow takes on a more human shape with every passing second. I can now clearly make out a face of about fifteen years old, with dark, wavy hair and thick eyebrows, plus long arms and legs attached to a slender body. He stops plucking at the grease stuck to his chest and looks down at me. “Hi. I’m sorry I scared you.” He holds out his hand as if he’s oblivious to the weird situation and the lightning almost piercing his chin.

  I place my hands on my waist and wait for him to answer my questions.

  He pulls back his hand and smiles ruefully. “Right. I wouldn’t trust me either.” He nods at the unreadable book that is still lying on the table. “I can help you with that, if you like.”

  Jeep pulls the book closer to him. “No, thank you.”

  “Right,” he says again. “Let me answer your questions first. Who am I, and why did I stay behind, locked in Jeep’s tattoo.” He points carefully at the lightning bolt. “Would you mind lowering that just a bit?”

  With a simple finger movement, I lower the bolt half an inch. Gisella keeps her shadows where they are.

  “My name is Dylan Maylord. I’m from England and―”

  A cheer from Kessley interrupts him. “Yeah! Finally another Brit!” She lowers her head with a blush when the rest of the Shield frowns. “Sorry. Carry on.”

  Dylan smiles, and I have to admit, he seems pretty decent to me. However, looks can be deceiving, so I wait for him to tell us more.

  “I think I wasn’t released before because Shelton Banks’ spell only worked on maleficent beings.”

  Taylar snorts. “Of course it did.”

  I ignore his comment and keep my eyes on the young mage. “If that’s true, then how did you escape now?”

  Dylan’s gaze drifts to Jeep behind me. “When we were all still trapped, Jeep was fighting constantly to keep us there. As soon as the seven evil mages escaped, Jeep’s hold over me started to fade. I kept quiet while he slowly let his guard down and voila!” He opens his arms. “Here I am!”

  “How joyful,” Jeep mumbles.

  Vicky steps up next to me. “I still don’t understand. If you’re not evil, then why did the Keepers of Life trap you?”

  “Well…” Dylan lowers his head. He suddenly looks uncomfortable, ashamed even. “I tend to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, even after death.”

  CHAPTER 3

  The sad vibe coming from Dylan is so strong that I’m inclined to be
lieve him.

  “I was searching for the man who killed me when I came across Jeep fighting the mages, minutes before they were trapped in his tattoos,” he tells us.

  “Were you out for revenge?” Vicky asks, staring him in the eyes to read his feelings.

  The young mage shakes his head. “Not at all. I wanted to tell my killer that it wasn’t his fault. He killed himself because the guilt was eating him up. I tried to tell him sooner, but I couldn’t.” He bites his lip.

  “He’s telling the truth,” Vicky states. Then to him: “Go on. Why couldn’t you tell him before?”

  “I kept ending up in the wrong place, like some sort of bad rerun of my life. When he died and became a ghost with unfinished business, like me, I thought it would be easier to find him and tell him what really happened.”

  When he doesn’t continue, D’Maeo slams his hands together, as if to wake him up. “Well, tell us, what happened? How did you die?”

  “I was out camping with some friends, and I went to take a p…” His gaze meets Vicky’s again, and he blushes. “I mean, to relieve myself. Without realizing it, I wandered onto military grounds. A group of soldiers was practicing.” He shrugs. “Wrong place, wrong time again. I was hit by a bullet. If I had gotten there ten minutes later, practice would’ve been over. If I had taken a different path through the trees, I wouldn’t have ended up walking straight through the only hole in the fence. But I never had the chance to tell the shooter all of that. Guilt took over his life, and he ended it.” He lowers his head and wipes a tear from his eye.

  I frown at Vicky, asking her silently if he is telling the truth.

  “Look at me,” she says to Dylan, and he does.

  The whole kitchen in silent as she reads his emotions.

  “He feels sorrow, regret and guilt,” she says after a minute or so.

  Charlie wipes a couple of left-over nacho crumbs from the table and licks them from his hand. “Why didn’t you use your powers to stop your bad luck? You’re a mage, you could’ve cast a spell.”

  Dylan throws his hands up in defeat. “Wrong time, wrong place. I rarely got to finish a spell, because no matter where I tried to cast it from, my ingredients were blown away by the wind, or there was a giant leak above my head, or… I don’t even remember all of it. And I don’t think I want to.” He shakes his head. “The last time I tried, someone non-magical walked in on me. My best friend.” He blinks away another tear. “He thought I was crazy, a satanist or something. We’d been friends since kindergarten, but he never wanted to speak to me again. And he told everyone at school that I was a freak.”

  “That sounds horrible,” Kessley says sympathetically.

  “It was, so I never tried to cast a spell again.” He lets out a curt laugh. “I don’t even know if I’m any good at them.”

  Jeep is getting impatient, judging by the sigh coming from behind me. “What happened when you saw me fighting those mages?”

  “Well, I was passing by and saw that you were losing the fight. I wasn’t sure what I could do, but I couldn’t just walk by without at least trying to help. And I was dead already, so what could it hurt?” He chuckles. “My powers consist of lifting curses and undoing spells, so I knew they wouldn’t be any good. I had to think fast, so I just dove right into the fight, trying to knock over as many mages as I could, in hopes of giving Jeep the upper hand. I managed to knock over three of them, but when I tried to get up, I couldn’t. Someone…” He gestures at the book filled with deceased mages, “the Keepers of Life, as I found out recently, were pushing me toward Jeep’s tattoo. I was sucked inside, and… well, you know the rest of the story.”

  I extinguish my lightning bolt and gesture at Dylan to come down. As soon as his feet touch the floor, Vicky stops him from moving by placing both hands on his shoulders. She looks him in the eyes once more, and we all await her verdict in suspense, Maël with her wand at the ready.

  Finally, Vicky lets go of Dylan. “His emotions match his story. I think he’s telling the truth.”

  Mona, who’s been hovering around the kitchen counter, pushes us aside gently and holds out her hand to Dylan. “Then by all means, come sit down and eat something.”

  Dylan allows her to pull him along and set him down onto the chair next to Jeep. He looks up at her with a confused expression. “Eat? Why would I eat? I’m dead.”

  Several chuckles rise around the room. I even see a smile on Maël’s face when she sits down again.

  I grin at Dylan before walking back to my own seat at the head of the table. “Trust me, it will make you feel better. And you aren’t the first ghost that needed convincing. The members of my Shield hadn’t thought of it either.”

  Kessley shoots me an indignant look. “You never had to convince me.”

  I tilt my head while I think back and realize she’s right. “I stand corrected. You are a hardcore food lover.”

  A wide grin turns the corners of her mouth up. “I am.”

  Dylan is watching the conversation and Mona’s movements with fascination. “I’ve never seen the living and the dead so comfortable together. I mean…” he shakes his head as if to get rid of his confusion, “I saw and heard a lot when I was trapped inside Jeep’s tattoo, but everything was sort of… shrouded. Fuzzy and unclear. Sometimes I doubted it was all actually real. It was more like a dream. A very, very long dream.”

  Only now Jeep seems to realize how it must have been for Dylan to be trapped underneath his tattoos for so long. Guilt washes over his face.

  Charlie voices our thoughts exactly. “I admire you, Dylan. I would’ve gone crazy, you know.”

  Dylan stares at a stain in the middle of the table. “Yeah… I think I did go crazy at some point. But when I finally stopped screaming and pounding, I was still trapped, so I figured it would be wiser to stay calm and wait for a chance to escape.”

  Jeep clears his throat. “I’m sorry.”

  Dylan turns his head to face him. “For what?”

  “For keeping you locked up.”

  Dylan swats his words away. “That wasn’t your fault. Nobody knew I got caught up in the fight. It was just bad luck, as usual. Don’t worry about it. And frankly…” he bends over to the tattooed ghost, “I’m glad I ended up with you instead of with some boring guy who never experiences anything exciting.”

  The guilt and sorrow on Jeep’s face are replaced by a glint in his eye. He laughs out loud and slaps Dylan on the back. Or at least, he tries to, but his hand goes straight through, and he slaps himself in the face.

  Kessley doubles up with laughter. “Looks like Dylan needs some practice turning solid.”

  The mage blushes. “I know how to turn solid. I just haven’t been able to do so in a couple of decades.”

  “I know, I’m sorry,” Kessley hiccups.

  “It’s the booze,” we say in unison.

  Dylan relaxes again and turns in his chair when the smell of chicken wings fills the air.

  Mona beams at him. “Getting hungry yet?”

  He nods feverishly.

  When Mona puts a basket in front of him and another in the middle of the table, I suppress the urge to grab a chicken wing. I’ve had so much to eat already today, and I need to stay fit. I crunch my teeth when the delicious smell lingers around me and rise to my feet. “I’m cold. I’m going to put some clothes on. I’ll be right back.”

  Upstairs, I take off my pajamas and slip into some clean jeans and a simple white T-shirt. All of my sweaters are still at Mom’s house, so I put a jacket over it. I slip the two notebooks and my athame behind my waistband and stick my Morningstar in my pocket.

  When I walk back into the kitchen, Dylan is still ripping the meat from the bones as if he’s afraid the animal will fly away. His basket is almost empty, and when he’s done, he licks his lips and burps. “Oops. Sorry.” He covers his mouth with his hand. “You were right, that does make me feel better. I forgot how good food can taste.”
/>   I glance at Mona sitting on D’Maeo’s lap. “Food is great in itself, but Mona adds a little magic to hers to make you feel better, give you more energy.”

  “Really? I never noticed that. Probably because I never paid attention when Jeep was eating.” He leans back in his chair and stares at the ceiling. Then he suddenly stands up and reaches for the book we can’t read.

  At first, I think he’s tricked us. He is working for Shelton Banks, and he wants to take his books back. I see Maël and D’Maeo tensing too. But Dylan places the book in front of him and says, “I can try to get rid of the protection on this book for you.”

  I frown. “Gisella tried to lift it already. It didn’t work. The spell on it must be really powerful or intricate. We think it consists of several layers.”

  Dylan rubs his hands together. “That shouldn’t matter. I’ve got the ability to lift any curse or spell, remember?”

  “We could’ve used that power a lot sooner,” Vicky grumbles beside me.

  “Let’s be grateful that we have it now,” Maël comments.

  Vicky nods, and we all concentrate on Dylan and the book.

  He flexes his fingers. Then he lets his hands hover above the book for a second before moving them in circles in opposite directions.

  I watch the book closely. Nothing changes.

  Dylan mumbles something that sounds like a curse and steps back. He cracks his neck, shakes his shoulders loose and rubs his hands together again.

  He repeats his movements. Nothing.

  I hold up my hands. “Forget it. It isn’t working. The protection is too strong.”

  Dylan turns his wrists and hops in place, like a professional kickboxer getting ready for a fight. “Let me try one more time. I’m a little rusty. I haven’t used my powers for a long time.”

  Reluctantly, I let him continue.

  Dylan takes a couple of deep breaths, and although they won’t give him any physical advantage now that he’s dead, they do help him focus. For a while, he just stares at the book. The reflection of it in his eyes changes. It’s as if several copies appear on top of the original. That’s when Dylan starts to move his hands again. He flexes his fingers, lets his hands hover above the book and moves them in circles in opposite directions. Bit by bit, the letters blend together. Dylan’s movements get bigger. The black stain is pulled apart and formed into different letters that spread over the page. I still can’t read any of it.