“Bunch of bleeding hearts,” Finch snapped at us. “No wonder you’re stuck on the Rag Team. And no wonder we’ve had low ratings compared to other covens. Less feelings, more magic. Let’s be professional about things, okay?”
Ugh, the platinum hair and piercing blue eyes didn’t work too well with that sneer on Finch’s face. He irked me to unexpectedly high levels. “How old are you, Finch?” I asked him, as innocently as possible.
“What business is that of yours?” he shot back, scowling at me. I had a feeling he just didn’t like new people, in general.
Why the hate, though? What did I ever do to this boy?
“Because you sound like a whiny five-year-old who doesn’t like his new kindergarten, and you’re starting to get on my nerves,” I spat. “I thought this was a coven, not the Kid City next door.”
I heard chuckling around me and from the crowd below, but I couldn’t tear my eyes off Finch. He looked as though he was about to do something stupid, and I never looked away from an aggressive fiend. He reminded me too much of the foster dad whose name I chose to forget—the root of many nightmares and the reason behind some of the scars on my back.
“Sounds like Finch just found another witch who won’t put up with his nonsense.” Garrett chuckled, putting his arm over Finch’s shoulders.
“I suggest you and Wade take your teams elsewhere, and start planning your missions,” Alton replied to Garrett. “Play nice and report back to me by the end of the day. You’ve got the rest of the afternoon to work out your roles and responsibilities. Preceptor Nomura and Tobe will answer any questions you might have. Magicals, dismissed!”
The crowd instantly scattered out of the Main Assembly Hall, while Garrett took Finch and the rest of his team off the podium. “Come on, let’s go get our ducks in a row. Need to get those fifty points back, and more on top!” Garrett said, then glanced over his shoulder and gave me another wink.
Seriously, is he flirting or what?
One by one, the plethora of foreign emotions fizzled out of me, and my new team came into full focus. Wade was frustrated with the cleanup job but satisfied with his choice of team members—until his gaze found mine. He wasn’t too sure about me yet, but hey, I had to give him the benefit of the doubt, since he didn’t know me at all. Frankly, I wasn’t sure how useful I’d be in this place, but I had to at least try and find out.
Santana and Tatyana seemed slightly amused. I had a feeling they’d been through similar gigs before, which made them interesting to follow, going forward. Dylan was stuck in limbo, somewhere between longing and excited, probably still adjusting to life as a magical. Raffe was thankful, mostly to have Wade by his side. And Astrid was psyched and eager to get started.
Alton was worried, on the other hand. The Council’s visit had taken its toll on him, and I could literally feel how much was at stake—Alton was terrified of failure of any kind. It made his blood run cold, and, by the rules of Empathic proximity, mine too.
But what was I really feeling in that moment? If I peeled away at the layers of emotions from the magicals that I’d surrounded myself with, what did I think of all this?
Well, for starters, there was a little voice in the back of my head, telling me that things were about to get even weirder, though I wasn’t exactly sure how or why. But my instincts never betrayed me, and I was never short on ominous feelings.
I was embarking on a new journey, with people I barely knew but with whom I shared a primordial bond of Chaos. It was strange and scary, but it also gave me some much-needed perspective on who I was and, most importantly, who I wanted to be.
Chapter Fourteen
“I can’t believe they’re making me quit my job,” I complained, as I filled out an application form for a research assistant position in the Fleet Science Center’s Library and Archives section.
Shortly after the Main Assembly Hall had been cleared, Wade and the rest of our newly formed Rag Team—a term which we all seemed to hate and love at the same time—had accompanied me to one of the common rooms of the coven.
Santana and Tatyana had raided the small cafeteria for a variety of hot drinks and snacks, while Raffe and Astrid were getting to know Dylan a little better. Wade was sitting next to me at the table, carefully checking the information I put into the employment form. There was still tension between us, mostly because of his strong dislike regarding my Empath ability, but there was nothing I could do about that. Sooner or later, he was going to get used to it. What did he have to hide, anyway? I already knew that I was getting on his nerves—it didn’t take an Empath to see that.
“It pays better, and you don’t have to hang around all those undesirables,” Wade replied, pointing at a box that required my date of birth. I didn’t have a real birthday, just an approximate, almost randomly chosen day and month of the year when I was dropped off at the orphanage. “Fill that in.”
“Only if you people promise not to get me any sappy cards for that date,” I grumbled. “It’s not my real birthday, and I don’t celebrate it, anyway.”
“Why not?” Santana asked, sitting across the table and pushing a freshly brewed coffee my way.
“Thanks.” I retrieved the paper cup, blowing over the hot black liquid before the first sip. I could almost feel the energy flowing through me. “I don’t know my exact date of birth, just that I was about three years old when I was left at the orphanage.”
I said it rather matter-of-factly, which didn’t surprise me. I’d gotten used to the idea a long, long time ago. My Rag Team, however, was nonplussed, judging by the way they looked at me. Then came pity, and I instantly hated that feeling. I hated feeling pity, especially when I knew it was directed at me.
“You’re an orphan,” Dylan said. He was the only one who didn’t feel sorry for me. Instead, I got a whiff of understanding from him. It was a rare reaction. Most people didn’t like being aware of the hardships of others. They didn’t even look at the homeless veterans they passed on the street, as if they couldn’t handle someone else’s misery. I didn’t get that luxury. I felt everything. “So, you were in the foster system?” he asked.
“Yeah, why?”
Dylan smiled. “Me too.” The idea of a kindred spirit came back, twice as loud. I couldn’t help but beam at him. There were plenty of us foster kids in the San Diego area, but we had a tendency to avoid one another. Most of the kids in the system didn’t turn out as well as I had. Most of them never got a family like the Smiths to guide them into adulthood, so they slipped through the cracks. Dylan looked like another fortunate exception, with his crew cut and crisp varsity jacket.
“Seriously? I want to say, ‘That’s so cool,’ but we both know it isn’t.” I chuckled, and he laughed out loud. He was so bright and jovial, so genuine and just plain nice.
“It’s okay, it kind of makes sense in this place,” Dylan replied, while Wade watched our exchange with a slight frown. “It’s why we’re ‘late bloomers,’ as they call us here. We got lost in the foster system and we didn’t have anyone to teach us about what we are.”
“Most of us magicals join the coven at a very young age,” Santana explained. “But people like you, Dylan, and others don’t get that lucky. Nevertheless, better late than never, I say!”
“What about you?” I asked Astrid. “How’d you end up in the coven, as a human?”
“Oh, that’s a bit of a long story,” she said. “I’m useful, and I do a lot of work on the IT side. You know, the usual. Encryption, security, surveillance, and good ol’ fashioned hacking, mostly. There’s only so much that magic can do in a human world dominated by technology.”
“Plus, she’s our only zombie,” Santana said, grinning.
“Seriously, as if this conversation wasn’t complicated enough, we’re bringing zombies in, too?” I said, confused.
“What she means is that I’ve been through a couple of rough patches on field missions,” Astrid replied, a blush coloring her cheeks. “Hence Alton allowed me to go with you guys, on the Rag Team. He wants to avoid another… incident.”
“Define ‘incident,’” I replied.
“I died,” Astrid said bluntly, and it took me a couple of seconds to fully register that little morsel of weird. “Three times, to be precise. Alton brought me back, but the price he paid was… awful.”
“Huh?”
“Alton’s a rare type of magical,” Wade added. “He’s a Necromancer. One of five in existence.”
“He brings people back to life?” I said, utterly shocked.
“It’s not as easy as it sounds,” he replied. “It’s not easy at all. Certain conditions have to be met for a resurrection to occur. The body needs to be in good condition. Any resurrection performed after twenty-four hours will result in a literal, mindless zombie, because the brain decays fast, and the neural pathways start glitching like crazy. On top of that, it takes a massive toll on Alton. After a single resurrection, he goes into an automatic Purge, the worst and most painful kind, that might even kill him. The monsters that came out of him are some of the scariest things I’ve ever seen in my life, and I’ve toured the entire Bestiary. Necromancy is never a solution to death, nor is it portrayed as such.”
“It’s kind of sad, actually.” Astrid sighed. “Having that power and not being able to use it. I mean, he could, but the coven obviously has rules about that. The only reason he resurrected me is because I died while helping the coven.”
“And you can’t keep doing that. It’s taking a toll on him, in the long term, too,” Wade said.
I nodded slowly, before Wade gave me a blunt nudge, pointing at the form. “Come on, fill that out so we can work out your schedule next.”
“Look at you, all stern and serious, like a mentor.” Santana grinned. “I guess you’re eyeing Alton’s position and you’ve started early prep work, huh?”