Chapter 21

With all of my courage gathered, I headed for the doorway leading to the ante-chamber. I could hear someone speaking softly and knew that Walker and Mom were waiting for me.

I donned my armor, as modified and prepared as I could be for anything Walker threw at me. I also dropped a dagger into my hand. I wouldn’t hesitate this time. I had to hit Walker with a dagger as soon as I spotted him.

I stepped through the doorway and found the two of them standing in the middle of the room. I couldn’t use the dagger yet. Walker was positioned such that Mom stood fully between him and me. He was using her as a shield already.

Walker looked up and smiled. “Well well well. He arrived sooner than we thought.”

Mom turned, spotted me, and smiled. “Oh, good. Seth, you’re here.”

“Mom, please step aside,” I said. “Walker and I have unfinished business.”

She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “What else is there to discuss? Walker found the items he needed. He needs to leave now. You have to let him out.”

She spoke as if we were in a store and Walker was ready to check out or something.

“I can’t let him leave, Mom,” I said, fighting to speak in a controlled tone rather than yelling at her. “You need to move aside.”

She turned to face me, arms akimbo. “Now, you listen to me, young man.”

“No!” I shot back. “I’m not the young man you can order around anymore, mom. I’m doing this to protect you and who knows how many other people.”

She stood her ground and even stomped her foot. “I am your mother. You will do as I say.”

Walker simply stood behind her with a huge smile on his face. This obviously couldn’t have worked out in his favor any better.

“Fine,” I said. “You won’t let me protect you?”

“There’s nothing to protect me from,” she said, relaxing because she thought she won the argument.

I called up my TK spell and used it to move her aside. In the same motion, I drew back and let the dagger in my hand fly.

Mom tumbled to the side, just as planned, but someone grabbed my hand and pulled me back, which wasn’t planned.

I looked up at Jade. She twisted my hand into a thumb lock. I couldn’t stop her from taking the dagger from me. While maintaining a thumb-lock on me, she tossed the dagger to Walker.

He caught it and held it up. “Very nice, Seth. Enchanted for accuracy and to disable the target.” Then he looked at me. “A tool of your great Uncle Randall, if I’m correct.”

I struggled against Jade’s hold and asked Walker, “How do you know that?”

“You can’t tell me that you haven’t figured it out yet,” he said. “I was told you were rather intelligent.”

I ignored his comment and looked at Jade. She stood next to me, staring off toward Walker with no emotion on her face at all. “What did you do to Jade?”

“Hmm?” he asked, looking from the dagger to us again. “Jade? Who’s Jade?”

I frowned at looked at Jade again. She turned her head and met my eyes with her own. Hers were as lifeless as could be, given that she still stood up and moved. “I don’t understand. Why help him?”

“You haven’t figured it out, have you?” Walker asked with all the disappointment of a father learning that his son was not going to follow in his footsteps.

I didn’t understand his reaction or why it had anything to do with Jade’s choice to help him rather than me. Granted, I should have known better than to expect her help. I wanted her out of the way while I tried to stop Walker. He must have cast some kind of spell on her before we started that would trigger when we reached the exit.

I looked at my mom, who had picked herself up off the floor and moved up next to Walker again. “You’ve cast a spell on Jade, something similar to what you used on my mom,” I said.

He shook his head. “No. I didn’t have to.” Then he looked up at the doorway.

All of us could hear Maria struggling against Ruby. “No! Get your hands off of me!”

Ruby came in, pulling Maria along. Maria, held by her wrist, leaned back against Ruby’s pace but didn’t seem to slow the redhead in the least. Ruby stopped and gave Maria a slight toss in my direction. “Damn, she’s a handful.”

Walker frowned at Ruby, looked over Jade’s expressionless continence, and then looked at Ruby again. “Who are you?” he asked the redhead.

She looked up at him and smiled. “Oh! Sorry.” Then she stepped to the side, changing shape, growing in height, her blood-red hair brightening to gleaming blonde. It was Nikia. “Your Ruby is trapped in a red stone obelisk somewhere back in the hallways.” She looked at Walker with the same expression of desire she had shown me while we were in her room and I gave in to her. “I swapped places with her while this one recovered from trying to destroy me.”

“Walker,” I said with a warning tone. “This is a succubus. She’ll drain you dry given half a chance – or less.”

Nikia looked over at me with a less-than-friendly expression. “You can fuck right off. I asked for forgiveness, to be released. But, no, just like the rest of your asshole family, you were willing to leave me in there to rot.”

“You’re too dangerous to set free,” I said.

She tossed her hair over her shoulder and looked at Walker. “Why keep him? I mean, he’s a tool.”

“Oh, he’s a tool all right,” Walker said. “Without him, we won’t be able to leave this place. We would be as trapped down here as you were in that obelisk.”

Nikia looked over at me. “Really?” she asked in a drawn-out tone. “Maybe I should convince him to let us leave.”

“You had to dupe Ruby to escape your prison,” Walker said. “I believe Seth was too much for you to handle.”

Nikia shot him a look but didn’t say anything else.

I didn’t say anything either. I was too focused on how to take these three down. True, I would have to push Mom out of the way too, but it was a small price to pay to keep her from being hurt. Pain shot through my thumb where Jade squeezed, and I lost all focus of thought.

“I’m not sure what you’re thinking, Seth,” Walker said, “but Jade is more than equipped to handle anything your young mind may come up with.” Then he threw the dagger at the floor, making it stick straight up. “Besides, it’s time to leave.”

“You can’t leave if I don’t let you,” I said and Jade squeezed my thumb more.

Walker studied me and grinned. “If you don’t let me?” he asked. “What can you possibly do that would stop me?”

I focused and used the swap-places spell that I had used on the Sheriff’s deputies when they had tried to arrest me. Jade and I swapped places and I was holding her in a thumb lock. She didn’t drop to her knees in pain. She looked at me as if I had honestly surprised her. I squeezed down on her thumb harder, but she didn’t respond.

“I said it before we started: Seth is no longer a Child Magus,” Walker said, and I wasn’t sure to whom he was speaking. “I dare say he has a few more tricks up his sleeve.” Then he looked at me. “But I’m afraid there’s nothing you’ve planned for which I am unaware or prepared to counter.” Then he held up his hand and with a twist of his wrist, Jade and I swapped places again and I dropped to my knees because my thumb popped out of place under her lock.

Jade released me and stepped back.

“See?” Walker said. “Cooperation is so much better.”

Maria knelt next to me. “Let me see,” she said.

I held up my hand. My thumb was bent back at an odd angle, and I didn’t dare attempt to move any of my fingers out of fear of the pain it would cause.

Maria looked up at me. “We have to put it back in place,” she said. “It’ll hurt for a moment, but then feel better.”

I looked from her to Walker, who stood by and watched with only disjointed interest. He didn’t try to stop her or bark any orders to the contrary, which mean he was going to allow Maria to do this. I looked at her and nodded.

She wrapped her hand around my thumb, moving gingerly so as not to move my thumb any more than necessary. Once she had me where she wanted me, she gripped my thumb and gave a hard jerk.

Pain shot through me like a thunderbolt from a nearby lightning strike. It quickly subsided too, leaving a deep ache in my hand. I allowed myself a second to breathe, to focus. When I looked up again, Maria and I moved at the same time.

I used my TK spell to sweep mom away from Walker, and jabbed Jade with a dagger. Maria spun and threw one dagger at Nikia and the last one at Walker.

Nikia and Jade both collapsed. Maria leaped toward mom.

Walker held up a hand and Maria’s dagger hit a shield. I was a bit bigger than a dagger and had more weight behind my intent. I slammed into Walker, knocking him to the floor. My hand grazed his skin and I dove into his memories, looking for answers to my questions – not to mention some fear of how I might stop him.

Walker was invited by Hayden to the manor. When he showed up, she asked for his help with the manor and the vault. She voluntarily told Walker about the vault and the family history. Out of curiosity, more than anything else, he agreed. Then she added him to the manor’s defenses and gave him a copy of Rho. Rho would be Walker’s teacher regarding the vault and its contents.

Walker realized the wealth of magic in the vault and began learning all he could as quickly as he could. He quickly realized that many items used spells largely unknown. Learning those spells alone would be worth his weight in gold to the right magus.

Part of the maintenance was to supply the manor and vault with a regular supply of magical energy, for the defenses and containment spells. He regularly invited his Fonti to the manor and brought any one-night stands there too.

One day, Hayden informed Walker that they would be hosting a party. Her parties, as it turned out, always devolved into mass orgies, and she expected Walker to attend. He was also allowed to invite anyone he liked to the party but no one could learn about the vault. He agreed, albeit for entirely different reasons.

During the orgy, Hayden found Walker. To him, she seemed to be drunk – possibly on all of the energy flowing. He didn’t know. When she went down on him, he didn’t care about the reason. They ended up doing more with each other that night, which Hayden later said couldn’t happen again.

It did. Several times.

Walker didn’t have any real political aspirations until a situation between a guild and the Council occurred. Several Guild members approached the Council to discuss reforms of the Laws of Secrecy. All of those in attendance, including Walker, expected the Council to flat-out refuse. However, everyone was momentarily surprised when members of the Council agreed with the delegates that changes in the Laws were needed. However, the tone of the audience darkened when the council member announced that more stringent Laws and enforcement would be needed if what the delegates had said was true.

The delegates tried to argue, pointing out how the stronger laws would only make the situation worse, but the Council wouldn’t listen and even called in Sheriffs to arrest any protesters – most especially the delegates.

A fight broke out. Under a barrage of magical attacks, the Council voted in a new law citing that any group formed as a Guild would be considered an enemy of the Council and the Laws of Secrecy.

Word spread later that the Guild the delegates represented were not arrested, but eradicated.

Weeks later, Walker ran into his mother, Kerri Kirchhoff. Kerri was a member of the Guild who sent the delegates, which meant she was hiding from the Sheriffs. To make things easier for herself, she had changed her appearance to that of a woman half her son’s age. She was strong-willed and of the opinion that the world would be better off if Magi were openly in charge. They talked and he let slip that he was working for Hayden. After only a few questions from Kerri, Walker realized that he didn’t need Hayden’s permission to use the items. So long as he wasn’t caught with them, there shouldn’t be any problems. He went back to the manor with the intent to determine which items were best suited to help him deal with the Council – but it would take time.

The sex and orgies continued, as did sex between Hayden and Walker. It wasn’t much longer before Hayden finally confessed to Walker that she was pregnant. To Walker, she was gloriously happy over the pregnancy, and he believed he knew why: The baby wasn’t a product of one of her Fonti, but of him. The baby was Walker’s. When he pointed this out, she immediately denied it and claimed it belonged to Wayne, her favored Fonte. An argument ensued and she stormed off to her room.

Walker, frustrated with the situation, focused on his goal with the items. Hayden somehow learned that he was devising plans to use items from the vault, though she didn’t know any details. Walker pointed out that they weren’t the only ones suffering at the hands of the Council. A lot of Magi were. Another argument built up and Walker admitted that he was looking to replace the Council with members who would bring about real change. Short of that, the Council had to be disbanded and the Laws of Secrecy abolished.

While Hayden didn’t care for her position regarding the Council and the Laws of Secrecy, she honestly believed that more Magi would suffer if the Council and Laws were taken away. It wouldn’t just be anarchy among Magi, but Banal would learn of them, and with all the tension in politics as it was, that discovery would only light a fire that would burn the world.