Evil Spark (2 page)

"You have to eat. It's how you recover."

"I know, Kate. But I just couldn't face it. Rest was what I needed, and quiet. Now look what's happened. If I find out anyone has done anything bad to Grandma I'll—"

"I know, Faz, I know. I feel the same way. We have to find her, before this starts a war. Ugh, can you imagine?"

I could, and it would be terrible. When Rikka went crazy after my parents died it nearly tore the vampire and human Hidden communities apart for good, and to this day things aren't right between Rikka and Taavi, the Head vampire in the UK, two thousand years old and more powerful than the rest of his kind combined. Not that vampires and humans ever really got on, probably because most vampires dismiss mere humans as little more than a sub-species, even though they were human once, too.

Forcing my fingers to behave and stop shaking, I opened the door to Grandma's using my key. As I stepped inside, familiar smells of her endless potions hit me. Then my ink clawed at my skin and my eyes darkened as I raised my hands, ready to blast the living hell out of the vampire stood at the end of Grandma's hallway.

My anger would know no bounds. I would obliterate the intruder until he was nothing but a stain on the familiar, patterned carpet.

I would split him down the middle and pick out the bits with tweezers. This was Grandma's house, where I spent my teenage years. Where I was loved, helped to grow, and grieve. It's a sanctuary. Vampires are not welcome. Apart from Kate.

"Prepare to die. Painfully," I whispered at the startled figure, hood covering his features, but the essence of him making it clear what he was.

Another form darted past in the living room, nothing but a blur, then stood beside the other. A mirror image.

Something clicked. These were short, and very wide vampires. They pulled back their hoods, revealing blank faces devoid of fear. It was the Chinese goons. Taavi's henchmen. The twins, Bret and Bart.

"You better have a damn good reason for being in Grandma's house, and I can't think of a single one that will allow you two to leave here without me sucking the magic out of you and chopping you up with one of her cleavers." I moved in front of Kate as the twins unzipped their black sweaters. They may as well have had swag bags they looked so much like stereotypical burglars.

"We were sent, Spark. By Taavi," Bret, or Bart—I can never tell which is which—added unnecessarily.

"You were sent, were you? Makes it all right to enter my family home uninvited, does it? You know the rules. You don't do that. Ever!" My tattoos were itching like molten lava ran through them, screaming to be allowed to send dark magic flaring at the intruders. I felt my eyes darken further, pools of pure magic, as the familiar feeling of silver sparks pricked my eyes like they were sliced by fae wings. My mind emptied. Dark magic rushed into me from the Empty.

They took a step back, the usually stoic twins knowing I was dangerous in my current state. "We had orders."

I didn't care. Nobody desecrated the sanctity of Grandma's home, especially not vampire goons. I felt the scream build inside as dark magic seeped out of my pores until I was shrouded in a haze of powerful hate and loss.

I was unstoppable. My body vibrated as I got ready to unleash hell in Grandma's hall.

Vampire Burglary

"Prepare to die, real slow." I was close to gone, magic and sickness almost all I was.

"Wait! We're sorry, Spark. Honest. You know Taavi. Like we said, we have orders."

"Orders! This is Grandma's house! My house!" I was going to erupt and already the sickness threatened to double me over and leave me curled up like a baby. Not until I sucked the blood magic out of them and got answers though.

"Sorry, Spark, we really are. But it's chaos out there. Everyone has gone loopy." This was the most the twins had ever spoken to me, more than I'd heard them say to anyone.

Their slight accents had grown stronger, revealing uncharacteristic nervousness. They never get nervous, so I must have looked seriously deranged. It was only a week ago they'd picked me up and taken me to their boss, to Taavi. Now it felt like a lifetime ago and my anger made me invincible.

"Faz, you need to calm down." I felt a hand on my shoulder and spun.

"Calm down? I'll..." I looked into Kate's eyes, saw the concern and the fear. What was wrong with me? I had lost the plot and I'd only been in the house for a minute. She smiled and I smiled back weakly. I nodded then turned back to the twins, doing all I could to reign in my emotions. Hard to do when they were stood in Grandma's house, in her kitchen.

"Do not move," I warned, as I stepped forward and entered the familiar room. They stayed rooted to the spot, muscles tensed, making them look even larger than ever, thick chests bulging through open sweatshirts showing matching t-shirts.

Kate followed in behind me and did what she is so good at doing—diffusing awkward situations. "Let's all sit down and I'll put the kettle on. It won't be like Grandma's," she smiled at me, "but it may help. We can talk. Like grownups." She looked at each of us in turn; we nodded like naughty schoolchildren.

The room was silent while Kate busied herself at the counter, boiling water, putting tea in the pot and getting things ready. She pulled milk from the fridge, sniffed it, and decided it was fine. So Grandma couldn't have been missing that long or it would be off.

"How long has she been gone, Kate?"

"Two days as far as I can tell, maybe three. But most likely it's two."

"And why does Rikka believe vampires are involved?" I tried not to make it come out nasty. After all, Kate's a vampire too. A young one, three years only, and me and Grandma are the ones that saved her. We have been as close as family ever since. I wanted more the moment I laid eyes on her, and felt the relationship get closer, but me being me I never acted on it, too afraid of rejection, of losing a friend.

"Because they found a human sucked dry in here," said one of the twins.

"What? Where?" I looked around the room but it was the same as usual. Chaotic, dried herbs hanging all over the place, pots and pans on racks, dressers with plates on display—although I have never understood why you would want to show off ordinary plates like that—everything clean and orderly, but too busy for my taste.

The large table was scrubbed and clean as always, all knick-knacks dusted and lined up perfectly. The only thing I could think of that was missing was a rug from the floor. "There?" I nodded at where the rug had been and the twins grunted.

Kate brought over the tea and placed a bowl of sugar and the bottle of milk on the table. I went to grab mine but my hands were shaking. I was losing it, and the ink was itching something terrible.

"Let me do it," said Kate, putting her hand over mine. It would have been a nice intimate moment if it wasn't for the twins and the fact Grandma was missing.

"Thanks." I leaned forward so I could take my jacket off. I was too hot and my skin was ready to erupt. With my arms exposed, veins thick as snakes, skin tight against what muscle I had, tattoos as black as an old vampire's heart practically screamed at me. They wriggled and crawled across my body, full of dark magic that showed no sign of dissipating. I was edgy, nervy, in a real state.

Kate looked at me with concern. Even the twins appeared worried, and they never worried about anything. They were normally as expressive as a pair of trolls in a "show no emotion" competition, but I swear they scraped their chairs back across the floor. Grandma would scold them for that. Lift it boys, lift it.

Sickness bent me forward as I breathed deeply to let the dark magic I'd drawn dissipate back into the Empty. I was too strung out to feel the full effect, wired and ready to rain down dark vengeance on the world.

"Okay, let's take this from the beginning. Kate, you said on the bus that everyone is accusing everyone else. When did this all happen? Who was found dead here? Are there any clues and what—"

"Faz, it's okay. We'll find her. First things first. What are you two doing here?" We both turned our attention to the twins. Kate may be a part of their world, and tied to the most powerful vampire in the UK, Taavi, because her maker, the man I killed, had been his too, but she has no loyalty to him, or them. She is her own woman, a modern gal, and she has done a great job of living a relatively normal life. If you call hanging around with vampires, dark magic enforcers, imps, trolls, shifters, necromancers and the like a normal life.

Nobody's life is perfect, right?

The twins moved their arms in unison, stretching out their backs like they had identical cricks, flexing their lats like they were ready for a workout—something they did enough of already. One went to speak but I interrupted before a word was spoken.

"Okay, look, if we are going to have a conversation then which one is which? It drives me nuts."

They looked at me like I was simple. "I'm Bret," said Bret.

"I'm Bart," said Bart.

"Okay, good. So, why are you here?" I really wanted to smash their faces, but now I'd calmed down I realized what a bad idea it was. These guys are hardcore vampires. You don't become Taavi's men on the street without being seriously old and strong. They could handle the daylight too, rare for those of their age.

"We told you," said Bret, sipping his tea and nodding approvingly at Kate. I thought I caught a slight look of admiration—she has that effect on men. "Taavi sent us."

"Why?" asked Kate.

"To see if we could find any clues."

"Clues! You're goons. Why didn't he send one of his specialists? He has people for things like this."

They both shrugged. "We do as we're told. We came to see if we could find anything. Nobody wants a war. Taavi is not happy though."

"I bet. Well, have you found anything?"

"No," said Bart. "We don't know what to look for."

These guys, they would be the death of me. What was Taavi thinking?

"Who killed the girl? And who was she?"

"Just some girl," said Bret. "Who cares. She was a human."

"It was Matilda, Faz, the witch in training. A sweet girl."

I knew her. She was a good kid. Keen to learn, always asking questions and making herself useful.

"Like I said, just a human," said Bret with a shrug. He didn't care; it wasn't important.

"I'm going to kill you, both of you. Right now." I sank deep in an instant, felt dark and terrible magic engulf me as I called to the air and pounded them back into their chairs as they began to rise.

Just a Human

I may have lost the plot a little. If they were going to be evil then I could be evil too.

Yes, I know vampires survive by feeding off Regulars, and I have taken Kate to locations where the sole intent is for her to feed, but her victims—if you can call them that—are bad people, carefully selected, and even that is such a hard thing to do, never mind that they deserve it.

With most vampires they have no such morals, not those that survive and thrive. They need the blood magic contained within us all to be what they are, and the longer they live the more often they need to feed.

I was in no state to hear such callous words from the twins. I was in no state to hear anything but Grandma telling me off for not eating enough.

Before I knew what I was doing I pushed back my chair, knocked the table hard, spilling tea everywhere—she would definitely tell me off for that—and shot upright, muttering under my breath about what I would do, calling forth the Empty so it surged through my body, tattoos expanding painfully like they were inflated with the power of the entire Empty. My mind turned blank, and black.

My power and control over the Empty pummeled the twins. They fought to stand, but I was lost to my fury and my rage overwhelmed me. I'm not prone to such outbursts, but their offhand remarks pushed me over the edge. I was out of control and didn't care about the consequences.

Magic comes in many forms, but for human beings, or ex human beings, it all comes down to one thing: control. I have mastered many aspects of dark magic, and learned many things from my teachers, Mage Rikka and Grandma. I know secret words and how to move my fingers and arms in interesting and spectacular ways, but the more you learn, the more you realize that is all nonsense—tricks, not the truth at the heart of what it is to become a wizard.

It's what happens inside of you that controls the magic. Words, or clever finger manipulations, are nothing but ways to get you into the zone, to focus your mind and direct your thoughts as energy. A way to control it.

You direct the magic through focus, and once you know what you are doing, really know, then you don't need to say anything, or wiggle your fingers. You think it and then you do it. It happens.

During my long life, spread over two centuries, I have conquered many variants of the dark arts. I can summon spirits of the dead, or demons. I can warp the minds of Regulars, direct the air to protect myself from attack with a bubble of impenetrable magic, and I can crush the bodies of men with a thought, like they are at the bottom of the deepest ocean with the weight of the world above them.

Or, I can make it really nasty.

The twins fought to stand, but my magic swirled and hammered at them in black sparks of evil that danced in the air and scratched at the calloused veneer of reality as energy left my body and pushed at the twins like black hands of death. Their faces contorted and their muscles strained against the weight as they battled the pure rage and hate-filled energy above them

Their hands were on the table, fingers splayed and knuckles white. Normally stoic and pale faces grew red as veins in their foreheads protruded like garden hoses ready to spring a leak.

Then they were up, massive bodies wired by blood magic accumulated over centuries finally breaking free of my fury. I drew the magic back inside of myself, let it swirl and dance through my body, out of control and wild.

My hands clapped together, loud and crisp as a bird cry in an empty sky. The air cracked open, a split in reality with a fractal tear of blackness linking me to the twins. Uncaring, I let my magic pour out of my hands, my eyes, my mouth, converging at their minds and I drew back then breathed deep.