Earth Awakened, page 12
Blondy backed up. “Sir, I—”
“Leave.”
Blondy took another step back, glancing at her. “I was just—”
“I’ve heard enough.” Tachun’s tone was hard, strong. “Get out.”
The guard gave another glance back to her, opening his mouth as if he wanted to say something, then closing it when he thought better of it.
Interesting. She didn’t know professors could order Mageguard around. Maybe Tachun was special. Either that, or Blondy knew that what he was doing was wholly wrong and he could get in big trouble for it.
Or maybe Blondy was a little scared of Dark Mages.
She crossed her arms, watching him leave.
“Are you okay?” Tachun came to her side, eyes widening as they narrowed in on the colorful display of her forearm. “He didn’t…”
“No, he didn’t. This is from the cuffs this morning. Mostly.”
He raised an eyebrow, his gaze flicking over her. “I would say mostly not, unless the cuffs bit the rest of your body, too.”
Right. He was a Dark Mage. Like Axariel, he could sense injuries.
“Yeah. Some stuff happened.” She dismissed it with a shrug, then made a gesture to where Blondy had exited the cafeteria. “Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but that was assault, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, it was.” Tachun, too, glanced toward the exit. “He isn’t supposed to do that.”
But he had.
She reached to the side and picked up the drink from the piece of counter she’d left it on.
Hmm.
“He must not be an Earth Mage, or else he would have sensed you coming.” She hadn’t felt him coming, either, but that was because the cat wasn’t sharing with her right now.
“No. He’s Water. Will you press charges?”
She should. She really should. People shouldn’t have to deal with this kind of crap.
But, considering all the crap she’d pulled and walked away from, it’d be really petty to drag someone else down for something so minor as a finger push.
Then again, he had been an asshole about it.
“No. I think he realized that he was barking at the wrong horse.” She sighed and shook her head. “That was dangerous, though. The cat could easily have done something.”
“And she would have been well within her rights to do so, in my opinion.”
“Yes, well, I think I’ve done enough damage to school property for one day.” She smiled. “Now, Professor—as much as I appreciate the rescue, I do find myself admiring the coincidence. Did you have something to speak to me about?”
He smiled. “Yes. I wanted to check up on you. Do you have time for a chat?”
“For you, Professor? I think so.”
Chapter 13
“So, the meeting with Gobardon didn’t go well,” Tachun concluded, shaking his head. “I’m sorry. I’d hoped that would provide a solution.”
They’d taken her meal outside around the back garden, away from prying eyes and out of the hair of the cafeteria staff who were trying to close up for the night, and she’d updated him about the incident with Gobardon in his oddly fortified warehouse.
“Yeah, I just hope I don’t get charged for property damage. He seems the kind of asshole who would do that.”
“I don’t think you’ll have to worry about that.”
She let out a small breath. Truth be told, she had been worrying a bit. She’d heard too much about the power rich assholes like him could exploit to get what they wanted, and she didn’t doubt he had some very high-powered lawyers on hand that could make her life very difficult.
Christ, she wasn’t even a permanent resident.
Professor Tachun sat back, hooking his elbows over the back of the seat. The chairs they’d found in the back garden were a mix of forgotten architecture, a matching series that resembled large river stones that seemed to be a one-off for the artist who’d designed them because she hadn’t seen this particular type anywhere else. The back garden itself seemed oft-forgotten, too. In the three months since she’d discovered it, she hadn’t seen anyone actually sit down and stay.
It was a dead corner.
Except for the smokers, of course. Their butts littered the gravel pathways with a surprising abundance—likely due to the lack of ashtrays around.
Beside her, Tachun shifted.
“I’m a little worried about you, McKay. What I did to you this morning… that’s enough to send anyone to the hospital for a few days.”
“I was in the hospital,” she said. “They dragged me out.”
“Yes, I know, and they shouldn’t have. But Dark Magic isn’t like other Elements. It’s not like a burn that you can diagnose and apply cream to. It tends to linger, eat away at you on the inside.”
“Well, if I have the choice, I’d rather you didn’t attack me again—it was rough, definitely, like getting mentally hit by a truck—but I am grateful you were there to stop me this morning, and I am grateful that you had the ability to do so.” Her grin was more of a wince as a flashback of the dream came back. “I’d rather get taken down and completely messed up than cause any harm to an innocent.”
“Yes, I understand that, McKay. And I agree that it was a better outcome than what could have happened.” Tachun paused. “But that is not the point that I am trying to make.”
Oh.
She frowned. “What is it?”
He didn’t reply immediately. Instead, he stared off into the distance, toward the edge of the forest and the skeleton of the industrial building that was being constructed in the distance. A thick fog wreathed its limbs and crowned the nearby forest. The sky was an impressive display of cloud. Thick and roiled, layers and layers of it curled in. Against that, the fog was a ghostly smudge of pale gray. Closer to the city, it was highlighted by the streetlights, but once it grew farther out, the light seemed to suck from it. Like looking at the squiggly trail of a tendon on a carcass.
“Light and Dark…” he hesitated. “We aren’t each other’s opposites. We are two sides of the same coin.”
“Yeah, I heard.” She frowned. “Light heals and Dark takes it away. Right?”
By his expression, and the way he hesitated, she was not right.
“Well, that’s the popular conjecture,” he said. “But it is sadly inaccurate.”
Oh.
“Light Mages have long been celebrated as magnificent healers, as they well should be. What Axariel can do is a gift, and she has worked long and hard to achieve it. She has dedicated her life to the healing arts, and that is something worthy of the accolades she has received.”
He trailed off, his eyes turning into a squint and his lips pursing together. McKay waited.
She sensed there was a ‘but’ coming. And Tachun did not disappoint.
“However,” he continued, using the polite, academic version of ‘but.’ “There are areas she lacks in which a Dark Mage would excel.” He turned to her, gaze dropping to flick over her expression and body language. “How is your mental health these days?”
Fuck. Suddenly, she did not want to have this conversation.
She considered the burger in her hands and wondered how rude it would be to just jam it into her mouth so she couldn’t speak for the next thirty or so seconds.
Unfortunately, she was terrible at bluffing.
“You don’t have to answer,” Tachun said lightly. “I can already tell.”
“Look,” she said. “I just came out of a war—”
“Yes, I’m well aware—mental health isn’t a graded assignment, McKay. I’m not here to judge you. I’m here because I’m worried about you.” He sat back with a sigh. “You know, people here like to talk about the Transition as if it were a single point—a single patch of roughness that is now over—but it is not like that at all. As a Dark Mage, I feel the way it lingers in people, how it echoes and resurges and cuts and scabs over once again. There will always be the Les Amerands of the world, and there will always be a weakness they can exploit, but it doesn’t have to be that way for you.” He locked eyes with her. “Your mental health is not a battleground. You don’t have to keep fighting the same fight. Not alone.”
Not a battleground? Hah. Not according to her PTSD—that was often a battleground. Literally.
But he did have a point. Even if she couldn’t see what it was yet.
She swallowed hard. Her throat felt dry and crusty. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that, if you’re willing, I know someone who can help—someone who has studied for it.” He gave her a look. “The human brain is a complex organ, and treating it is, generally, a long, drawn-out, complicated process, but a Dark Mage can discover in a single reading what it might take traditional therapy years to figure out.”
She hesitated. Her mouth opened, closed.
Inside, it felt like he’d scraped the sides of her heart with something metallic.
She swallowed against the lump that formed in her throat. Her fingers had made shaking claws where she gripped the burger. It took her a minute to get her throat and mouth working enough to speak. Professor Tachun waited, casting his gaze once more to the skyline and its ribbon of fog.
“Your friend—he’s a Dark Mage?”
“She is. She also contracts with the only Psychic Mage in town for extreme cases.” He paused. “I don’t think you’ll need that, though.”
McKay winced.
From what she’d heard, Psychic Mages specialized in rewriting thoughts. And locking people into their own mind.
“Look, it’s not just the war. I doubt she’d want a case like me. I’m bitter, and I lash out, and—”
“She would most definitely want a case like you, McKay. Despite popular opinion, most Dark Mages are out to help people, not hurt them. Our magic is deeply personal. We can’t just walk away from someone in pain. And, despite what your mind may be telling you, you are worth it, McKay.”
Her jaw slackened, but she managed to keep her lips closed. Where had this guy come from? After a line like that, she knew half a dozen chicks who would line up to court him.
“All right. Does she have a card?”
He pulled out a wallet from his pocket and produced one. “Here, take this one. I can get another from her.”
“Thanks. I appreciate it.” She wiped off her hand, gave the card a glance, and slipped it into her jacket pocket.
“You’re welcome.” He paused. “However, I’m worried about you now.”
“No, no, it’s okay. I’m fine.” She took another bite of her burger and swallowed it almost immediately. “No need to worry about me.”
“Look me in the face and tell me you haven’t had suicidal thoughts today.”
She froze. Her jaws clenched.
She didn’t look at him. She didn’t have to.
“That’s what I thought, and you can blame my attack for that.” He relaxed back down, his face a grimace. “It will ease off after a little while, but the next day or two will be rough. Do you have any friends you can call? Someone you can stay with?”
She opened her mouth, but hesitated.
Jo. She could call Jo. She’d let her stay over before. She’d been a bit off-grid lately, training for her new security job, but she’d let McKay stay over.
She had a big test tomorrow, though. If she stayed there, she’d be interrupting.
Shit.
Jo would kill her for even thinking that—she was the type of person to help a friend with open arms, no matter the cost or inconvenient timing—but McKay didn’t want to add stress to her.
There was Cris, too, but she was also busy. She didn’t need to be put on suicide watch duty.
Fuck, man. I’ll be fine. I’m not going to kill myself.
But—where would she go? She couldn’t stay here.
Professor Tachun was watching her. Waiting.
She swallowed. “I—”
Her cell phone rang. Relief flooded through her… then was immediately stifled when she pulled out her phone and read the caller ID.
Kitty.
Well, I did tell her we were still friends. It makes sense that she’d check up on me.
“Go on, answer it,” Tachun said. “I have some more time.”
Great. Now she was infringing on his time, too. He’d already been gracious enough to check up on her—and save her from Blondy.
God.
She pressed the answer key on her phone and brought it to her ear. “Hello—”
“Pancakes,” Kitty said.
Er.
“What?”
“I want pancakes, and I think you’ll find that, when you look deep into the depths of your soul, you also want pancakes.”
McKay realized her jaw was open. She squinted, looking out into the distance where the fog wreathed the new construction. Some lights closer to the city made gritty yellow halos that caught at her eyes.
The entire image before her, with the lights and the fog and the grit, and the dark shading of the clouds and the forest, felt like her soul right now. And not all of that had to do with Dark Magic.
“Pancakes?” she asked weakly.
She wasn’t sure if she’d heard that properly.
“Yes, pancakes. Giant, fluffy, dessert pancakes with shitloads of syrup, whipped cream, and ice cream. And sprinkles. Sprinkles are important.”
McKay paused, her gaze drifting toward the half-eaten burger on her lap.
Well, Tachun had told her to find a friend. Kitty would work.
If nothing else, it would get her out of this situation.
“Yeah, I could go for dessert,” she said.
“Fantastic. Where are you? I’ll pick you up.”
“Finnevar. I just packed my things.”
“Cool. Leave them there. I’ll pick you up in ten.”
Kitty hung up. McKay listened to the dead line for a second before she lowered the phone back to her lap.
“I guess I’m going for pancakes with Kitty.”
Tachun chuckled. “After the day you’ve had, I think you deserve it.”
“If it’s awkward, I can just leave. Jo’d have me over if I asked, though I’m not sure I want to bother her at the moment.” She gave her head a little shake. “At any rate, you don’t need to worry about me. I’m not going to off myself.”
Her left hand curled as she said the last. She’d come close, once. As a Dark Mage, he’d likely felt the cuts where she’d tried before. They’d healed over well enough to pretend they were something else, but they were still there.
But that was in the past, and she was beyond it.
Despite what her thoughts pointed to today, she was at no risk of actually acting on them.
He gave her a nod and made to rise. “I’m glad to hear that, McKay. It sounds like you are in good hands—or at least in good distraction.”
“Distractions work,” she said.
“That they do.” He gave her a thin-lipped smile. “You’ll call my friend?”
“At some point, probably.”
“Take care of yourself, McKay.”
“You, too, Professor.”
Chapter 14
“Ten sons of angels,” Kitty said. “My mouth is so happy.”
“So is mine.” McKay’s expression slipped—Kitty did come with some interesting swears, and that was one she hadn’t heard before. Did it even count as a swear? “This was a good decision. Thank you.”
“I pride myself in my life choices,” Kitty said, then winced. “Well, most of them, anyway.”
McKay lifted her milkshake glass in a salute. “Cheers to that.”
Kitty flashed her a smile and copied her. “Cheers.”
She took a sip—chocolate-banana-peanut butter, slathered in whipped cream that she’d already decimated into small chunky flecks that mixed in with the rest of the drink—and sat back to admire the spread before them.
There’d been a deal on. A lavish, sugar-filled, all-you-could-eat deal that had her both questioning the late-night dining decisions of Mersetzdeitz’s locals and praising whatever genius had decided to offer a super late-night dessert bar in the center of town.
God, it probably raked in the money. Just steps away from one of the main bar scenes, located in a quiet alley with a picture of a giant, ice cream-topped pancake and a piece of cheesecake, she could easily see ex-bar patrons stumbling in around three when the bars started to close. It would explain why the kitchen had zero signs of shutting down, and why a new waitress had just come on shift at—she checked her watch—nine-thirty p.m.
Good for them. I hope she makes good tips.
Given that she was literally handing out dessert to everyone, McKay couldn’t see why she wouldn’t. Even if people were too drunk to tip, there would always be those drunk enough to just stack the money.
Actually, she’d definitely done that before. As a drunk, she was always very nice to the waitstaff.
Everyone else, however…
Well, they could sort themselves out.
“This was definitely a good life choice,” she said.
“Yep. So, what are your plans for the night?” Kitty asked. “You said you’d packed up. Why? Did you get evicted?”
McKay grimaced. “No, not yet. Technically. But I can’t stay there. Everyone’s giving me looks, and I had another run-in with that one Mageguard again—”
“You want me to fix him for you?”
“No. That won’t be necessary. Besides—” A smile twitched her grimace into something brighter. “Professor Tachun caught him the last time. I have at least one witness who will testify to the assault, likely two.”
Kitty’s eyebrows shot into her forehead. “He assaulted you?”
“No, not really. He backed me into a machine and pointed a finger into my chest. Baby assault.” McKay shrugged. “Certainly not what Gobardon tried with me today.”
“God, I know.” Kitty’s tone turned into a scowling hiss. “What a fucking asshole.”
“Fuck, man. Why are you friends with such a…” McKay grimaced.
“Prick?” Kitty supplied. “Man with a pincushion up his ass? The reason France sharpened its guillotines?”
“Yeah, all of those.”
