Anna's Hope Episode One (5 page)

“Yeah?” Meredith asked, voice still light
even though they were in a dark room with a magician who'd just
said so with all the glee of the damned.

“We're all out of wine, ladies,” the
magician said.

There was a flicker of light. Said light
came from the magician's hand as he brought up a candle.

In an ordinary non-magical situation,
bringing a candle to a fight was pretty funny. When a magician was
the one holding the candle, however, all humor curled up and
died.

The specific kind of candle the guy held
tightly in his white-knuckled grip made Anna gasp. It was a caller
candle.

It didn't grab your phone and start
dialing numbers in a panic. No, it simply sent out a message on all
dark magical frequencies, attracting whatever may come.

It was the kind of candle you brought if you
were suitably evil and wanted to call some friends around, but you
were too cheap to pay for a text.

Once lit, the candle would summon every
demon, ghost, ghoul, or plain bad dude to your abode in a heart's
beat.

The one good thing about the candle was it
threw some light into the room.

It was enough to see Meredith's pallid
expression. While she had a hand squeezed behind her back, a few
licks of blue-white magic collecting up her fingertips, she didn't
act.

“My friends will be here shortly, witch,”
the magician snarled, “so I wouldn't bother attacking. I'd save
your magic. It might buy you a few more minutes of your worthless
little life.”

Meredith stared darkly at the man, her
once attractive face contorting with anger. “Where the hell did you
get a candle like that?”

“I borrowed it off a friend. A powerful
one. One who has no use for a meddling little bounty hunter like
you.” The Magician’s lips curled so hard against his teeth, it
looked like they’d shatter the enamel.

Despite the danger of the situation, Anna
had just enough spare brainpower to think 'ha'.

She was in the room too, but the magician
was acting like it was just Meredith.

Was Anna that invisible?

“Oh my, can you hear it? It’s coming for
you.” The magician smiled. The kind of smile that would see any
person locked away for life. It had all the creepy of Jack
Nicholson combined with the frantic energy of a wasp honing in on
its target.

It was exactly the kind of smile you ran
away from, not toward.

Meredith clearly didn't know that lesson,
though, as she pushed forward and rammed her shoulder into the
magician.

There was a scuffle, and the candle fell
to the ground. Even though it rolled all the way to the opposite
side of the room, it kept burning. That was no normal wax, and it
was no normal flame. Both were being sustained by the magician’s
power. The only way to snuff the candle out would be to snuff the
guy out too.

Anna
had to help. Pushing the pain of her
burning, tingling skin to the back of her mind, she ran
forward.

She didn't get far.

Something landed outside the open
window.

There was a scratch of claw on glass and a
rustle as something moved past the wood.

The blood drained from her face in a
heartbeat, just as a flash of heat burst up her back.

A demon was in the room.

She knew it was a demon, not only because
her allergies were going into overdrive, but because she heard the
specific whoosh as its black web wings unfolded.

Before Anna could think, she reached
Meredith, hooked a hand over her arm, and yanked her to the
side.

Though Anna was quite thin and hardly a
muscle-bound witch, she managed to muscle Meredith out of the
way.

Just in time.

The demon's tail lanced out of the darkness
with all the speed of a bullet.

It swooshed past her hair, ruffling it and
sending it tangling over her eyes.

Meredith, despite her towering heels,
punched to her feet and ran towards the demon.

Not away, towards. What was this woman
on?

Before Anna could push to her feet to
offer a hand, somebody pulled her back.

It was the magician. Showing speed that
belied his gaunt form, he looped a spidery arm around her throat
and yanked her towards him. “Let her deal with that. You can come
with me,” he offered.

Anna
yelped. She instinctively shoved her
shoulder back, pulling her torso forward as she tried to ram her
way free from his grip.

Though the guy let out an “ooph,” he
didn't let her go.

So Anna Hope Summersville did some
magic.

It was honestly something she tried to
avoid. If sensing magic was bad for her allergies, practicing it
was havoc.

Whenever she called up the raw potential
in her veins, it felt like her blood turned to acid. So much pain
accompanied any display of her own power, that Anna only ever did
it when she had to.

Now, she absolutely had to.

Magicians didn't practice magic like
wizards, and to be honest, weren't usually as powerful. It took a
true master to learn the intricacies of magicianhood, and most boys
didn't have enough brain on their shoulders.

Anna
balled her hand into a fist and sent
magic rippling up her wrist and into her palm and
fingers.

Though an ordinary witch could throw a
fireball without so much as a grunt, Anna felt it - every damn
spark - as if her skin really was on fire.

With a massive half-grunt half-scream any
body builder/ action hero would be proud of, she rammed her
fire-riddled hand into the magician's chest.

He crumpled, the surging magic leaping over
his black shirt, and burrowing between the buttons and weave until
it sunk into his skin.

Singed flesh wrought the air as the guy lost
his grip on her, stumbled, and staggered to one knee.

Anna
had just enough light and time to
note his expression. He looked at her with clear surprise
slackening his cheeks and widening his pale brown eyes.

He hadn't thought she could do that,
right?

A lot of people were surprised by her power.
Just because she had allergies, it didn't mean she couldn't
practice magic. Nor did it mean she was weak.

It was true that the stronger the spell, the
more it hurt her - but that didn't mean she didn't have the power
and prowess to practice it.

Because of her allergies, Anna had been
forced to put more effort into learning magic than your average
witch. She'd studied extremely hard to find a way to practice that
didn't leave her as a puffing, blotchy, itchy mess on the
floor.

Some would ask - considering her condition -
why she'd never quit and sought out a mundane life instead.

The answer was simple: her heirloom
contract.

It wouldn't let her. Luminaria
v
on Tippit's
agreement with the Summersville family forced each member to look
after Luminaria in every way they could. If Luminaria got into
trouble, and Anna somehow held back on protecting her, she'd wind
up very broken and very sore.

She couldn't hold her magic in reserve, not
when it meant not doing everything within her power to help
Luminaria.

Also, to be honest, Anna couldn't give
magic up. Even though it clearly hated her, and her body even more,
she couldn’t turn away from it.

For a girl like her - one as drab and
plain with as boring prospects - magic was the one thing she could
hold onto. Okay, she wasn't the best witch out there, but she was a
witch. And that meant something.

So she'd stock up on hankies, eye drops, and
cooling cream, and she'd keep being a witch.

Well, she would if she could get out of
here.

Just as the magician fell to his other knee,
she saw him reach a hand around his back.

She could feel dark magic. Her allergies
flared as it ate through the room.

Though the calling candle was still on the
opposite side of the room, the magician suddenly made it
blaze.

She snapped her head towards it, the blaze
of light like a small bomb going off in the corner.

The magician had one second to look up at
her, his eyes narrowing in dark delight, before he jerked back and
... disappeared.

He didn't fall, roll, and quickly hide
behind a handy couch. Nor did he lurch up to his feet and dash for
the door.

No, in a flash of dark magic, he was
gone.

It was some kind of transportation spell,
one that left the air heavy with a dark, pulsing energy.

Anna
pressed a hand into her chest, pain
shooting through her ribs and down into her back.

Her skin would be bright red from the
insidious rash climbing her chest and neck, and her limbs tingled
so much it felt like they'd detached themselves and plunged into a
pool of ants.

Magical allergies usually only resulted in
mild discomfort in the presence of irritants. Sometimes, and with
some people, they could become exquisitely severe.

While Anna wasn't about to collapse from
anaphylactic shock, she was feeling less of the so-called
discomfort right now, and more of the abject agony.

There was something different about the
magic that magician had just cast. Something she'd never
encountered before, and something that was sending her allergies
haywire.

Despite the fact she was sure her muscles
were on fire, she forced herself to turn.

Just as she reached Meredith, the bounty
hunter managed to dispatch the demon by roundhouse kicking it to
the face with a flaming, magical heel.

The demon, suitably put out, gave a
blood-curdling cry and crammed himself back out of the window,
metaphorical tail between his legs.

Meredith pushed back a non-existent stray
hair from her perfect soft curls, struck a pose, and smiled.
“Nothing like a demon fight to get your blood pumping. Are you
alright? Did that loser get you?”

Anna
dropped her hand from her chest and
took a calming breath. “I'm okay. But I'm sorry to say we lost him
- he disappeared. It was ... weird. He practiced a kind of magic
I've never seen before.”

“What do you mean? I would have thought
you'd come across plenty of magicians in Vale?”

“It's not that. He didn't practice magic
like a magician. It was ....” She trailed off as she stared around
the room, looking for inspiration to describe her confusing
thoughts.

It was then that she noticed the candle was
still burning.

In fact, as she stared at the
flame, she
realized something.

It wasn’t a normal caller candle.

This feeling – the scratching, hot pain
making its way through her ribs – it was coming off the candle,
wasn’t it? Whatever strange magic the magician had practiced, he
was still practicing it, because his caller candle was still
lit.

Wordlessly
, she picked her way over to
it.

“Hey, what’s up?” Meredith fell into step
behind her. “We should probably make our discreet exit the same way
the demon did, before things get worse. I imagine our friends back
in the bar heard our fight, and are on their way to lend a hand to
the side of evil. Anna …?”

She didn’t answer. The closer she came to
the still-burning candle, the more her stomach knotted with
nerves.

Reaching it, she leant down, placed a hand
next to but not on it, and brought her face level with the softly
burning flame.

This close, her blood felt like insects as
it clawed its way through her body. This new magic was hell on her
allergies.

Still, she didn’t shift back. She locked her
knees in place as she leaned on the dusty floor, and she
concentrated.

She may not be the best witch out there, but
her ability to sense a vibe was second to none.

“Ah, Anna? I think I can hear that vampire
swooping down the corridor. Unless you’ve got some handy stakes
tucked into your ankle-high frilly socks, I think we should
leave.”

Anna
finally felt it. The tendril
connecting the candle to its master. A trace of magic, so dark and
evil, it made her back convulse with fear.

She jerked up with a move that saw her bang
her side against the wall.

“Just leave the candle – we can’t snuff it
out. But if we get out of here, it won’t matter. No one is going to
care if a caller candle calls any more deadbeat evil goons to a
deadbeat evil goon bar. Come on, Anna,” Meredith insisted, leaning
down and latching a hand around Anna’s elbow.

“Wait,” Anna managed, “he’s … he’s still
in the building.”

“What?”

“That magician, he’s still in the
building.”

“I’m not going to ask how you
know that, but it doesn’t matter – he’s not our target. Our target
isn’t even here. And we shouldn’t be here either – seriously, that
vamp is just around the corner. Oh, damn. Too late.
He’s here.”
Meredith spun on
her pinpoint heels, bringing her hands up as she did. Blue magical
flames licked high over her curled fingers, matching the mean glint
in her eye.

Anna
was distracted. She shouldn't be -
Meredith was right, and a vamp was literally right outside the
door.