“Well, that’s a lonely life to lead isn’t it. The necklace will help you answer some questions that I know are nagging at your brain and once you’ve found them, we will meet again.”
He stood up and within a blink of an eye he was gone. Witch, he had to be a witch as only they were able to appear invisible and disappear in front of your eyes.
I looked at the necklace in the velvet black box before taking it out and expecting some sort of burn or magical spell to take over, but it just appeared to be a normal mundane necklace. Upon closer examination the symbol was that of a star with an arrow or something running through the middle of it. I had seen the symbol before but couldn’t place where.
* * *
“What doyou mean there’s no information on Darius? Jackson, this isn’t ok! He knows my real name and not my alias.”
I was riding through the city streets on my blacked-out Ducati Panigale V4 SP while trying not to shout over my Bluetooth headphones. How did this guy not exist? Perhaps he had given me a different name knowing full well I would try and do some research on him.
Turning a corner and narrowly avoiding a parked car, I cursed loudly at the annoyance, no one knew how to park correctly anywhere in the city, and it aggravated me.
“Jackson, get Molly on the case. I want everyone’s eyes on this. He said the break-in was an inside job and that someone is helping Angelique hide from us. Do everything in your power to get to the bottom of this. I don’t want another surprise visit from this guy until I know more about him.”
“But Hayley, we don’t know his name.”
“You know what he looks like, do it.”
Hanging up the phone as I came to an immediate stop at a red light, I could feel the air start to change as the weather began to grow darker and colder, a storm was coming, and this didn’t feel like any normal storm.
Someone was working magic and it most certainly wasn’t one of the witches at headquarters, this felt different, darker. Dialling Jackson again I knew he wouldn’t answer my call, but I kept pestering him until he did.
“You know when you hang up, I don’t think we have anything left to discuss.”
“Shut up, something is going on. Go outside and tell me if you can feel what I’m feeling.”
Hearing him huff a sigh, he didn’t sound too impressed to be moving anywhere, especially after I had already ordered him to do something. The traffic light had still not changed from red to green and I looked around to see if anything else had gone amiss and as expected, everything appeared to be at a standstill, as if time wasn’t moving.
“Jackson,” No answer, “Jack? Can you hear me?”
Taking my helmet off, I pulled my phone out of my pocket to see the screen frozen on the timestamp ‘17.53 p.m.’ and I felt a sense of unease wash over me. This was magic and I had no idea what kind of magic it was. Thunder clapped above me, and a lightning strike flashed through the dark cloudy sky.
Looking ahead of me as I watched a strike fall from the sky and hit a spot in front of me, there appeared a person. Their jacket moved swiftly in the wind as the lightning flashed once again and then they moved quicker than I could even comprehend, shoving me off my bike and into the air.
Their hands wrapped tightly around my neck as we flew, sliding up the side of a glass building and then up to the top before throwing me down onto the roof with great force, causing the ground around me to break.
Winded and unable to get my bearings of what the hell had just happened, I heard the whoosh and as I looked up the person was flying back down towards me and appeared ready to strike. Moving quickly out of the way and rolling onto my side, I pushed myself up and looked around me, the person nowhere to be seen or heard.
“Great theatrics, you will have to let me know who choreographed your entrance.” I shouted over the thunder as a clap ran through the air.
Still nothing appeared and then suddenly the person landed across from me, almost in perfect form. Vampire for certain, but not just any ordinary vampire, this was either an elder or an alpha.
Great, and I was not prepared to fight something as ancient as one of these. The wind felt as if it were starting to wrap around me as the thunderclaps grew louder and the ground beneath my feet began to shake, perhaps this was a vampire with the help of a witch?
Taking out my gun from its holster, which, thankfully, I had strapped to my leg before leaving this evening, I locked and loaded it, prepared to fire at wherever my attacker was. Although I had no chance to react earlier, I wasn’t going to allow that to happen the second time round and yet nothing happened.
No one appeared and as my adrenaline started to disappear, the pain from my injuries began to scream at me. I had been thrown from a distance into the rooftop floor and if it wasn’t for the vampire blood that ran through my veins, I would have certainly been dead.
Not willing to take the chance I still didn’t lower my gun. Looking around and it was as if time had begun again, the clouds started to clear and the buzzing sound of the world around me started. I heard shouting down on the streets wondering whose bike was there. Mine was still lying in the middle of the road.
Heading down the fire escape as quickly as I could and reaching my bike, I put my helmet back on and hoped to God it started. I sped towards headquarters, this wasn’t something I could just discuss over the phone and even if I wanted to, that had been smashed to pieces now and rendered useless.
Something powerful attacked me but didn’t do much of anything, was it a warning? A sign that I was getting too close to something. I hated feeling clueless as I was normally squared up on the ins and outs of this city and yet, I was ten steps behind already.
I hit the freeway heading out of the city as fast as my bike could take me. I was on edge, my body screaming at me for rest, and I could feel the aches and pains running up and down my spine and legs. Ignoring it, I was grateful when I eventually arrived at headquarters, but I most certainly wasn’t ready for what I was greeted with.
Red flames bellowed out into the air, a glow of fire filled the night sky, and the piercing sounds of screams came up the driveway. The manor was on fire.