Ruby fever epb, p.12
Ruby Fever EPB, page 12
“How do they differ?”
“Halcyon magic attacks certain areas of the brain,” the Keeper said. “Specifically, the amygdala, which assesses environmental threats, and the hypothalamus, which has the power to trigger the production of stress response hormones. Instead of initiating the making of cortisol and adrenaline, which allow us to quickly respond to threats, the affected hypothalamus sends signals for the production of dopamine and oxytocin, causing their target to enter a happy, relaxed stupor. The damage halcyons cause is temporary, and their power is effort-based.”
“Meaning they consciously exert an effort to induce calm?”
“Precisely.” The Keeper nodded. “The magic of a false halcyon also attacks the amygdala and hypothalamus, but primarily targets the frontal cortex, and instead of triggering hormonal responses, it permanently damages the physical structure of the brain. The attack is performed mentally, but if it succeeds, the damage to the mind is mirrored by the physical trauma to the brain. The results are predictably horrific.”
The memory of being struck by Kaylee’s magic was still fresh. Like me. LIKE me.
“Is it emotion-based?”
The Keeper smiled. “Yes. Very much so. A halcyon is calm and logical. A false halcyon is an unstable creature that throws all of themselves into their attack with the passion of an upset toddler. They commit completely, they are fueled by their emotions, and they cause irreparable damage. Like true halcyons, they can induce a temporary state of euphoria, but at the end of it, their victim loses most of their cognitive abilities.”
When I had thought that Kaylee was trying to turn Alessandro into a happy idiot, I’d had no idea how accurate that thought had been.
The Keeper touched my phone gently. “In Peter’s case, the dominant emotion was rage or hatred. The primary directive behind it was very simple.”
“Die?”
“Yes.”
What about Wahl? “What if someone was grazed by a false halcyon attack? Is there any hope of recovery?”
“Yes. Like all magic users, the false halcyons vary in power. If the accidental target was coherent after the attack, the damage is likely slight. It’s much like touching a hot stove. The longer one keeps their hand in the fire, the more severe the burn will be.”
I let out a breath. Wahl had been coherent. He’d been happy and smiling, but coherent.
“False halcyons are notoriously erratic,” the Keeper said. “There are a handful of Houses who still practice that magic, but their members undergo very rigorous mental conditioning from an early age. It’s one of the few kinds of magic considered to be undesirable due to the difficulty of controlling it. Most families took steps to breed it out.”
So Kaylee awakened as a mind hammer, which Luciana would have hidden at any cost until she could get her daughter some training. The Caberas were a noncombat House. Kaylee could be seen as either a critical asset or a huge hindrance, depending on how the rest of the relatives took it.
I could now say with 100% certainty that Kaylee had killed Pete and likely attacked Linus. It was almost elegant: first, Luciana would have put everyone at ease with her halcyon powers and then her daughter would’ve smashed their minds. Except Linus was a siren. His magic had warned him.
I still didn’t understand how Kaylee had evaded the turrets. I would figure this out before the end.
Now I knew who and when. I still didn’t know why. Did Arkan order them to do it and then tied up loose ends by killing Luciana or was this something else? I would have to figure this out on my own.
There were only a few points left to clarify.
“Hypothetically speaking,” I said, “if a family had produced halcyons and only halcyons for over four generations, why would a repeat application of the Osiris serum result in an awakening of a mind hammer?”
The Keeper leaned back. “Michael, the Fata Magum, please.”
Michael retrieved a box from a shelf, brought it to the Keeper, and resumed his post three steps away. The Keeper opened the ornate wooden box and took out a small six-sided die, red like crystalized blood. Greek letters were carved into the die and inlaid with ivory, one per side.
The Keeper held it up to the light and the die sparkled. A ruby?
“The fate of the mage.” The Keeper showed me one side with the Greek letter Z. “Zeta. Sacrifice.”
He turned the die to display a different side. “Beta. Demon.”
Another turn. “Lambda. Growth. The three fates awaiting those who risk the serum. Death, distortion, or power.”
Those who took the serum died, became warped by it, or gained magic, from which they then acquired wealth and power.
The Keeper held it out to me.
I reached out and he let the die fall into my palm. Six sides, three unique symbols, each occurring twice.
“Make your roll.”
I let the cool smooth cube fall from my fingers. The die landed on the table, rolled and stopped. Zeta.
“Death,” I said.
“This die was carved in 1865, for the second wave of Osiris recipients,” the Keeper said. “Countless would-be mages held it in their hands and rolled it just like you did before making their final decision. A great many of them walked away after making their roll.”
The die glinted on the table.
“Why do you think some people died and others didn’t?” the Keeper asked.
“Nobody knows. It’s magic, not science.”
“But if you had to hazard a guess . . .”
I had read a couple of books on Magic Theory, but most of my current reading focused on practical applications. “There are five leading theories, most of them agreeing that the serum kills those without latent magical powers. Various factors have been considered, such as diet, exposure to the flu pandemic, and so on. The records from that time are understandably murky . . .”
The Keeper raised his hand and I fell silent.
“Yes, but you are a Prime, the highest rank of a magic user who has used your power since birth. I want to know what you think.”
“I think that in all three cases the Osiris serum does exactly what it was designed to do. It searches for latent abilities and makes them manifest. It’s not that those who die aren’t capable of magic, it’s that it is too powerful or too destructive, and their bodies cannot handle it. It is the same with the warped. The magic twists them because their power is too great to be contained. Perhaps those who survive intact and become mages are not the strongest, but the weakest. Nobody can predict what the die will show.”
The Keeper smiled. “Exactly.”
I felt like I had just passed a test.
“If we apply your theory to someone who was born without power, despite their bloodline, and chooses to roll the die, what is the serum to do? The subject has the magic of their family but is incompatible with it. So the serum must look for something other than that power, some hidden traces of other talents from other bloodlines gifted to the subject by previous generations. Perhaps these talents are too weak to express themselves, yet the secondary application of the serum helps them rise to the surface.”
So, there was a false halcyon talent hiding somewhere in Kaylee’s bloodline, too weak to manifest without the boost of Osiris serum. The two types of magic were closely related. It wouldn’t be unusual if sometime long ago there was marriage that resulted in an offspring carrying propensity for both. Their family could have gone generations without discovering it.
It made sense. My sisters and I all had the same parents. I carried hereditary traces for both Arabella’s and Nevada’s powers. Ten generations from now, one of my descendants could manifest as a truthseeker and never know why. That’s why genetic databases keeping track of magic bloodlines were doing such a brisk business.
“I like the way you rolled the die,” the Keeper said. “You didn’t blow on it, you didn’t shake it or toss it. You simply let it fall. Rolling that die and truly accepting the consequences is a choice none of us in this room had to make. Our ancestors made it for us and paid a great price for it. We honor their bravery through abiding by the covenants they created. The ban on unauthorized use of the serum is such a covenant. The covenants must be upheld at any cost. Those of us who understand that fact hold our duties sacred. We don’t tolerate any interference, do we, Michael?”
“No, we don’t,” Michael said.
Chapter 7
The elevator doors shut, and the cabin carried us down.
“Let’s not do that again,” Mom murmured.
“Agreed,” Cornelius said.
“I thought you’d stay in the lobby,” I murmured back.
“I tried. The Keeper came and got me in person.”
An audience with the Keeper wasn’t difficult to get, but I couldn’t think of any occasion where he’d come down and personally invited someone up to his office.
Those of us who understand that fact hold our duties sacred.
Like the Office of Records, the Office of the Warden guarded the current social order. Both institutions had to be incorruptible, because we protected the foundations of our society. As twisted and dysfunctional as it was, it was better than the free-for-all where the strongest ruled without limitations. We’d tried that during the Time of Horrors, and it’d almost ended humanity.
The Keeper saw me as a colleague of sorts, someone who, like him, placed themselves between order and chaos. He treated me and my mother with courtesy. Sadly, courtesy didn’t mean assistance. If we were attacked in the parking lot in front of the building, the Keeper and his creepy sidekick wouldn’t lift a finger to help us.
We reached the lobby and collected our weapons and Gus. I handed the Rattler to Mom. She checked it, and we walked to the glass entrance together.
It was past eight. The sun was beginning to set, and the world turned dimmer. Twilight dripped into the parking lot. Twenty-foot-tall lamps, four per metal pole, had come on, flooding the parking lot with bright electric light.
“Stay here,” I told her. “I’ll get the car and pick you up.”
I could see the calculation in Mom’s eyes. I would make it faster to the protection of the armored car on my own. She would only slow me down and Cornelius and Gus would present extra targets.
“Go,” she said. “I’ll cover you.”
I exited the doors and jogged across the parking lot. Mom and Cornelius stepped out of the lobby, close enough to duck back in, and waited.
The lane stretched in front of me. I kept moving, taking a quick inventory of the other cars. Seven or eight SUVs, several trucks, a few sedans, no doubt some of them armored. A lot of vehicles despite the hour. In the distance, a good hundred yards away from Rhino, someone had parked a food truck painted a ghastly lime green with orange letters promising “flaming tacos.” A bad place to leave a food truck. If they didn’t move it, it would be gone by morning.
Rhino loomed in front of me. I grabbed the door handle, swung it open, and climbed into the driver’s seat. I shut the door, putting B7 ballistic armor between me and the world outside, and braced myself.
Nothing.
I started the engine. It roared, reassuringly steady. I reversed and drove toward the entrance. Mom and Cornelius started toward me.
I pulled up just outside the red line that marked the kill zone around the building. A moment and the doors swung open, and then Mom, Cornelius, and Gus were in the car. I let out a breath I hadn’t known I was holding and turned left, into the next row, heading down through a corridor of parked cars toward Stadium Drive. I would only be on it for a minute. Once I made a left onto Old Spanish Trail, I could blend in with traffic.
The taco truck went airborne.
My brain refused to process what my eyes were seeing.
The truck hurtled toward us as if someone had hit it with a giant bat. It was like a movie.
Food truck. Propane. Fire.
We were trapped between two rows of cars.
I wrenched the wheel to my left. Rhino plowed into a red Honda. The impact yanked us forward. The taco truck flew past.
“Out!” Mom barked.
We moved. I landed on my side of Rhino. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw the taco truck stop as if it had hit an invisible wall. It turned, spinning on its axis in midair.
I sprinted down the row of cars, ducking behind them as I ran.
The taco truck smashed into Rhino. The world exploded. The blast wave picked me up and tossed me to the right, straight into a white pickup. Thunder punched my ears. My head swam. I spun around, trying to clear the transparent swirls in front of my eyes.
An orange fireball engulfed Rhino. Grandma Frida wasn’t going to like that. Not one bit.
My ears stopped ringing.
The truck in front of me slid, pulled out of the way. I dashed left, across the row, ducked behind a black car and kept moving, back toward Rhino and the burning wreck.
It had to be Xavier. His talent relied on sight. He must’ve been hiding behind the taco truck and now he was digging through the cars, shoving them out of the way trying to find me.
I jumped to my feet, ran back toward the entrance, and ducked behind another white truck. I pressed myself against it, edged toward the row, and peeked around the bed.
At the far end of the row, Xavier stood, his arms raised in a mage pose, elbows bent, palms cradling invisible basketballs. The ground around his feet glowed with white. He had set up an arcane circle. A pair of over-the-ear headphones shielded his ears. He’d come prepared.
Connor with a simple amplification could throw a city bus around like a frisbee. Xavier had less control but almost as much power, and my siren call would do nothing. He wouldn’t be able to hear me.
I chanced a second look. Another man stood next to Xavier, tall, lanky, with pale blond hair dripping onto his forehead, identical headphones protecting him from my magic. Dag Gunderson.
How was he here? Where was Alessandro? Was he dead?
A second circle, a deep magenta, ignited at Gunderson’s feet. The glow flared, illuminating a wooden crate behind them, and settled into a steady glimmer.
Alessandro couldn’t be dead. It would take a lot more than Gunderson to kill him. I grabbed onto that thought and used it like a life preserver to keep myself from being dragged down into panic.
Gunderson thrust his arms forward and strained, as if trying to lift an enormous weight.
My magic spiraled to them. Without my voice, my wings were my next best bet. But mesmerizing with wings alone took time. Xavier would snipe me the moment he saw me. Not to mention that they were too far away, and distance was a factor.
Gunderson snarled, the veins in his neck bulging. The arcane circle slid off the ground, tilted on its side, and hung in the empty air twenty feet above the asphalt like a curtain of magic.
What the hell . . .
Wood cracked. The crate behind Xavier snapped open, and a cloud of projectiles rose in the air.
Oh great, Xavier brought his toys.
I opened my mouth and sang. My magic snaked across the parking lot and wound around their minds, but I had no way in. I sang out, pouring power into my voice.
No effect. It was like trying to grasp a cannonball dipped in oil. It was heavy and slick, and the tendrils of my magic kept sliding off.
The projectiles shot forward, slicing through Gunderson’s arcane screen, and turned into glowing magenta sparks. The shower of magic rained onto the cars like an arrow storm launched by an ancient army.
A spark punctured the truck bed next to me. I glimpsed an eight-inch nail coated in a magenta glow and dove to the side. The nail detonated with a shriek. Magic crackled above my head. I glanced back. The truck bed was a mess of twisted metal, like an aluminum can that had exploded from the inside out. All around me holes gaped in cars. Metal debris littered the parking lot.
Moving cars back and forth trying to find us would have taken too much juice. Instead, they would turn them into shrapnel bombs.
I pushed harder with my power, straining with everything I had. The shoots of my magic had wrapped so tightly around both Gunderson and Xavier that I could barely see their glow in my mind. It did nothing. I had no way in.
I’d never felt so useless.
A sad sound rose to the sky behind me, a song without words sung by a beautiful male voice. It reached into my chest, took my heart in its fist, and squeezed. The world went white in a daze. I choked on empty air.
Cornelius was singing. Oh dear God.
The song reached its crescendo and died.
My magic was still wrapped around the two attackers. I sank into it, pushing as hard as I could. The world faded, its sounds dulling, as all of my energy went into invading the two minds.
A second barrage of nails tore into the cars. Magic crackled all around me, magenta lightning dancing over the trucks and SUVs. Explosions popped like crazy firecrackers. Something hot smashed into my head, and a chunk of a side-view mirror rolled off me to the ground.
I barely noticed. My magic vines pulsed and pulsed, without any way in. If I didn’t succeed, we’d die in this parking lot.
Third barrage. Something stung my legs.
I had to do something, or we wouldn’t make it out of here alive. I had to chance the wings.
I hauled myself forward and looked around the rear tire. Xavier was aiming another set of nails at Gunderson’s screen.
The rapid staccato of the Rattler split the night. Mom returning fire.
Gunderson jerked and stumbled to the right, clutching his shoulder. The arcane screen melted into the air.
I squeezed their minds with everything I had. I never wished for Tremaine powers, but right now I’d trade ten years of my life for just one burst of my grandmother’s brain cracking magic.
Xavier bared his teeth. The vehicles in front of him slid, knocked back like Matchbox cars kicked by an angry child. A huge Tahoe at the opposite end of the row screeched and rolled to the right. Mom jumped to her feet, firing. A flaming tire shot across the lot and smashed into her. Mom flew back and crashed into a blue SUV.
Mom!
