The Undead Pool

“Morgan!” Landon shouted, voice coming through the broken windows. “Get in here!”

I pushed Ivy’s hands off me and yanked open the door. My God, it looked like the set of a Ring movie, everyone blond and beautiful and oozing magic. My jaw clenched, and I took three steps into the windy, demolished car. Seats were in twisted piles, the carpet burned and emergency lights glowing. The attendant was in a huddle, a weapon pointed at her. Trent was kneeling in what once was the aisle, facing me with his hands behind his head and another one of those overcompensating guns touching the back of his skull. Landon was holding it. Fear slammed into me, stopping me cold.

“What did you think you were going to accomplish with this?” he mocked, and I looked for Jenks, not seeing him and wondering if he’d been ripped away by the wind. “You seriously think you can stop me? Elves have always been stronger than demons. You’re under our heel, and you don’t even know it.”

“Yeah?” I said, terrified at the gun at Trent’s head. Mystics were screaming at me, and I shoved them to the back of my thoughts. The gun at Trent’s head was the only thing that mattered.

“Drop the line or he’s dead,” Landon said, shoving the butt of the weapon into Trent, his head bowed and clearly dazed.

“Don’t,” I said, hand outstretched as I did what he said. But still the wild magic flowed. It was pure mystic energy that was making my hair float and my skin tingle. “Please. It’s not a line.”

“Drop it!” he screamed at me, face contorted, and I almost passed out.

“It’s not a line!” I shouted, panicking. “It’s the mystics! Please!”

Trent’s eyes met mine, his fear for me, not himself. Oh God, was I going to lose him just when I found out what he meant to me?

“Landon?” one of the men interrupted, a handheld scanner in his hand. “She’s right. It’s free-ranging mystics.” He swallowed as he looked up at me, suddenly pale. “Sir?”

Landon smiled, probably unaware that he had pulled back from Trent almost half an inch. I took a breath, shoving the voices in my head down. “Splendid. You found a way to control them. That will be handy over the next couple of months. Even better. Turn around, Morgan. Kneel. Hands on head. Keep to that order or Kalamack dies.”

If I let him have the mystics, the world would be thrown into chaos. If I attacked him, Trent would die. Indecision rocked me, and my head felt as if it was going to explode.

Become! the mystics in me were screaming. Let us become!

“Become?” I whispered, heart pounding. “I don’t know how.”

You don’t become, one said. We do. Just listen.

Landon’s eyes narrowed. “Morgan . . .” he threatened, shoving the pistol into Trent’s skull a little more.

Listen, more said, and in desperation, I finally did.

My breath hissed in as I suddenly understood. The mystics who’d been swimming in my neural net the past two days had been slowly adapting to how I saw the world and how to work within it. What had once been confusing had cleared without me realizing. What had once taken minutes to understand had become second nature. Looking back, I could see the tracings of their gentle progression like a path through the woods. All I had to do was step out into the sun.

So I listened, and with the ease of blowing a bubble, I knew everything they saw: the frightened engineer tending to his shot partner as a man stood over them with a gun and his desperate plan to sacrifice himself to save untold millions, Ivy behind me with her hands in fists in frustration. I could see Nina, crying for Ivy as she raced ahead to where the next road crossed the tracks, hoping to stop the train even if it meant her death. I felt the stirring energy of the Weres massing in Chicago, rival gangs uniting to storm the station and overrun the train. Even the excitement in the news helicopter and Jenks holding on to Bis as he crawled to the front to find his dad. So many people willing to sacrifice—but none of it needed to happen. The mystics had evolved, become. And Trent would not die today.

“You should let them go,” I said, feeling light and unreal. Humming with light. It burned my soul, charring it even as it gave me strength.

The muzzle shoved Trent forward, and my breath slipped easily from me as I saw how I could down Landon before the bullet could get to the end of the gun. I took a step forward, and Landon’s expression shifted, seeing the change in me.

“That’s right,” I said, the fear gone. “I’m chock-full of ’em, and if you don’t let their kin go, you’re going to find out how a demon plays with wild magic.” Oh God. It hurt.

Landon’s confidence faltered. Behind him, his men exchanged glances.

“I know I’m curious,” Trent grumbled.