…..CHAPTER 1…..
The Rocky Mountains sprawled in the background, the air between him and the peaks to the west clear as flawless crystal. Oliver fidgeted in the passenger seat. His mind whirled with anxiety over the coming battle. Will this raid net us the final evidence we needed? Will we finally be able to make the charges stick?
Oliver forced himself to relax. Feet on the gravel, he unconsciously rubbed his left wrist around the metal bracelet. He settled his mind and body with effort, preparing to harness the magical energy around him. He needed to be ready for this, and these damn memories were getting in the way.
Finally successful, he turned his mind to the coming task. Their informant was spot on. This was likely to be a messy fight. While his magic and body were dancing with nerves, his mind chafed for the results he’d ached for, for nineteen years.
God, I’m so ready to take these assholes down. I shouldn’t have worked so much magic into the grid yesterday. It takes energy to use magic.
He’d worn himself out, dumping magic into the grid to help alleviate some of the slack from sick Grid witches. Of course, yesterday he hadn’t known the quietly presented request would be signed off by the judge so damn fast—that they were going to raid today, the Roxborough Park estate of Braden Kipling.
The Kipling family and their mobsters had been hording, abusing, and using witches to produce magic for their nefarious dealings for decades. From illegal gambling dens, to drugs, to prostituting witches both male and female, the Kiplings were dirty, even the women. Of all his crimes, Braden wasn’t a misogynistic asshole, apparently. Unlike most mob bosses, who were usually cavemen, he showed that even women could dip their toes into organized crime.
Oliver couldn’t help looking down. His control cuff couldn’t hide the wider band of scarring around his left wrist. The cuff that had clasped him first had been wider, thicker, without words, and linked to a tether…
Oliver shook himself, made his brain focus on the now. He closed his eyes, relaxed back into the seat of his Handler’s unassuming sedan. With the door open, he could hear the controlled but quiet frenzy of preparations going on around him. It had to be fast, and this moment was probably not enough, but he had to take what he could get.
Finally, mind steady, Oliver opened his eyes and got out. He turned away from the Kipling family estate with the mountains in the background—and their huge-ass compound. Straightening his shoulders, he faced his Handler, Oscar Dale, Director of the Federal Bureau of Witchcraft and Registry. In his late-thirties, tall, bulky shoulders, mocha skin, short, wavy brown hair, light-brown eyes, and a fine straight nose, his ethnicity was so mixed even Oscar couldn’t place his own ancestry in any one area of the globe. Africa. India. Even Europe. What was that phrase? Heinz 57?
Arrayed around them on each side were both vehicles and boots-on-the-ground, guns at the ready, suited up for the raid. He absently checked his own bullet-proof vest.
Ignored everything, he fixed his gaze on Oscar, waiting for orders.
His Handler gave him a glance and a hard smile. “Ready?
Oliver’s own smile was tight. He flexed his fingers suggestively. “Are you?”
Oscar laughed. “That’s my witch.” He lifted his hand to press the button on the radio hitched to the left shoulder of his thick vest. “I need a five team ready-check.”
One-by-one they called in with their status. All were ready, and Oscar gave him a nod.
Oliver turned to the gates now, reached out with his magic senses, felt the presence of his fellow witches all around the wall that protected the oozing nasty center of Kipling criminal command—and their illegal catchment. God, I can’t believe the power coming from that place. It was enough to make him shiver.
Oscar looked at him, as always, attuned to him. His jaw twitched as he saw Oliver’s reaction to that magic. “When you’re ready, little brother.”
Huh. Oscar’s soft voice was the only reason he said those last words. It was frowned upon for Handlers to get too fond of their witches no matter how long they were paired. Even if they were adopted.
But then, Oscar was the boss, so who was going to call him on it?
Oliver lifted his hands and set himself, firmly anchoring his mind into his native power, the magic of the Earth. With his magic grounded and his mind centered on the fight to come, he gave a curt nod. “Ready.”
“Ready,” Oscar murmured into his radio.
The other federal witches would be setting their minds into their own anchoring with that one word, depending on their native Element.
But they wouldn’t go, until Oliver did.
Narrowing his eyes at the thick staves of the iron gate, he set his hands in front of him, palms toward the fence, waited a beat for the other witches. They would be feeling his power shifting, and move accordingly. While he wasn’t playing alpha right now—where he would control a magical working performed by multiple witches—he was leading their actions, and they sensed his magic moving.
Grasping the metal of the fence, his mind linked to the fabric of the blended materials, the Lattice of the very molecules. In the light of day, the gleam of green Earth magic around his hands was hard to see. Oliver turned his palms toward himself, fingers curling as he did, then jerked hard, dropping a mountain of Gravity into it to help…just for a second, and with a block on this side of it.
The entire gate leaped from its hinges, the snap too sudden for much sound beyond a sharp screech. It clanged loudly on the asphalt drive. Still connected to it, Oliver slid it aside—out of the way of the agents already driving toward the gate—and heaved it up against the stone wall to the side.
He turned his mind to the other witches, watching. All of them had done their job. Perhaps not as neatly as he had, but the entire compound now boiled with federal agents. Two of the gates had been torn aside, bent and broken, but not detached, and one was melted. He could see it all in his mind’s eyes.
Most witches couldn’t do that, couldn’t see things. They ‘saw’ with their magic, the pieces of the element they controlled, but they didn’t have a live-action picture in their minds of what was happening. Every witch could sense their native magic all around them. Some witches could sense their native magic a mile away or more, and a few could use it that far away, too.
But some could not just feel magic—they could see it. This was not a common skill, something usually only levels seven or more achieved.
Oliver strode through the gate on the tail of the vehicles racing for the house, heard the gunfire already, screams of pain, the sounds of running.
Lifting his hands again, he tilted his head in concentration, focused…
Two agents, facing a pair of gang members, didn’t see the one sneaking from the side.
With one hand, he clenched, and the rifle barrel crunched. Still gripping the metal barrel, Oliver used the gun itself to kick back against the goon just like the gunshot he hadn’t been able to fire. Unprepared for the kickback, he was knocked flat. An agent arrived to wrench arms behind his back and snap cuffs on his wrists.
Oliver turned his mind to his section again, saw a woman on the veranda of the big house, eyes cold as she lifted a gun to her shoulder. He grasped the metal of the barrel and jerked it away. Her distant cry of pain announced a likely broken trigger finger. Ignoring it, he bent the barrel.
“Oliver! South position under heavy fire!” Oscar snapped.
Oliver sensed it even as his Handler said it, turned his mind toward the area. Dozens of gang members had come from the back of the house to strafe the agents there.
He sucked in a sharp breath, braced his feet shoulder-width, palms facing the ground, flipped them and lifted sharply.
On the south side of the house, a wall of dirt a hundred feet long, six feet high, a foot thick, leaped from the earth, a channel on the house-side falling in to fill the sudden absence. Cries of anger filled the air, from the mobsters, at the use of magic. The agents now advanced. Oliver gritted his teeth, shifting that wall like it was on rollers, moving closer to the veranda. His instincts and magic reseated every grain of soil as if it had never been jerked out of place, allowing the agents to approach ever closer.
Moving that wall was hard, and sweat broke painfully along his forehead.
He felt it when the household witches joined the fight. With a grind of his clenched teeth, he closed his eyes, briefly stopped his wall, the better to focus on them. Two were Earth witches like him, and they fought him for control of the embankment he’d raised. Oliver knocked one out of their concentration, sent the other reeling with a sharp bump of earth beneath them. Then he moved the hill forward, cover for his fellows as they neared the mansion.
Oliver sensed an Air witch’s magic and glanced at him. He wasn’t a strong witch, but he had excellent control of his chosen Aspect, Air itself. One agent collapsed, clawing at her throat, eyes bulging in fear.
Oliver glared at him from his position. His mind raked the area, noting no one watching him at the moment.
Holding the wall with one hand, he slashed with the other, hand going from green to gold for half a second, and then back. Oliver’s magic had broken the man’s Air magic apart. The man reeled back, head whipping around as he searched for the one that disrupted his attack.
Oliver knew no one in the chaos would know it was him that did it.
Agent Jennings tackled the man, and Oliver turned his attention back to his earthworks.
The ten federal witches in the raid each stayed far back from the actual fighting. They all knew how to defend themselves, but they weren’t risked in the fight.
It took nearly half-an-hour to fully secure the mansion.
Agent Jesse and Assistant Director Randall Grimes walked out together from inside the house to give the all-clear sign. Oscar collected a clear from every agent, minus those held at bay outside the catchment building to the west side of the estate.
Oscar turned to him, searched his gaze as one hand clapped down on his shoulder. “Good job, Oliver,” he said, but the hint of concern in his eyes wasn’t something most would see. He knew his Handler well. He ought to. Oscar had picked him nearly eight years ago, and they’d been partners ever since. “You alright?”
“Fine. Energy to burn,” he said, letting him know he hadn’t worn himself out on this raid. At least not yet.
Oscar trusted his assessment with a nod and turned, firing orders all around. Oliver strode behind him, watching for any danger to his best friend as they made their way into the house.
The family stood or sat in their parlor. Oliver surveyed the lot for weapons, even poison. Nothing.
Braden Kipling, nearing eighty now, sat in a chair in the center of the room, the younger members of his family ranged behind him and facing the double doorway precisely. It was not chance arrangement. To his right stood his eldest, Gregory, and beside him, his oldest living son, having lost his eldest three children years ago to childhood illness. To Braden’s left sat his wife, holding his hand, still-beautiful face defiant. Beside her stood their daughter Penelope Farr and her husband. Children ranged the room, from near adult to two infants.
Oscar waved to him, and Oliver stepped to his side. “Sir?”
“Weapons?”
“No, sir.”
“Gravity, please.”
Oliver glanced at the family, lifted his hands again, palms up and waist-high, elbows at his side. He had to be careful with this. He didn’t want to hurt these people. Even if most of them deserved it. Curling his fingers gently, he pulled down on each of their feet, minus the babes in arms, asserting enough force of gravity to prevent them from moving.
It took a bit of concentration to apply it only to the family and not his fellow agents.
Dimly he sensed the malevolent gaze of the Kipling patriarch on him, and brought his gaze from his hands to the old man. A tic beside a brown eye let him know the man was livid.
But there was also sharp awareness of his magic. The man knew Oliver was a powerful Earth witch.
Besides the fury, there was acquisitive menace. Oliver restrained the tight smile, wanting to bare his teeth at him. Oliver would never allow himself to be captured and used by these assholes ever again. Being government property was bad enough. He’d die first.
He’d kill first, and damn the consequences.
Witches weren’t allowed to kill. Not even in self-defense.
Of course, being an agent allowed him to do so. But only in self-defense or defense of another agent.
He wondered if the man remembered him at all. A glance at Gregory showed a barely perceptible puzzled expression as he stared at Oliver.
“Mr. Kipling,” Oscar murmured, giving the older man a nod. Not really of respect, but of acknowledgment of his place in the household.
The old man met Oscar’s gaze. “I presume you have the necessary paperwork, agent?” Oliver restrained a shiver at memory of those suave tones.
Oscar’s mouth curled into a cool smile. “Of course we do. We have the house but not the grounds. Will you call off your people? Order them to surrender?”
“Why would I do that?”
“To save lives, their lives, if nothing else.”
“They’re defending our own. I appreciate that kind of loyalty.”
Oscar nodded. “I do, too. But isn’t it better to fight another day?”
Kipling’s mouth went from hard lines of rage to a broad smile. It wasn’t a nice expression. “Perhaps.”
“You’ll find the proper paperwork here,” he said, holding his hand to the side. Oliver reached into his inner pocket and pulled out the warrants, delivering them to his Handler. “We have multiple actions today. You’ll find them all documented.” Oscar stepped forward, handing them to the old man.
He didn’t accept them. Gregory, in his fifties, held out his hand for them.
Oscar wasn’t playing their game. He waited, ignoring the son, eyes never leaving Kipling’s hard gaze.
Finally the old man accepted the papers, dropping them in his son’s waiting palm. “I’ll read them later.”
“That’s your decision. But don’t be surprised by our actions because you didn’t read the warrants.”
“Nothing you pigs do surprise me. Even using witches to subdue harmless women and children.”
Oscar smiled coolly. “Harmless? I think not. Good day.”
Oscar turned and left the room. Oliver followed, though he didn’t release the gravity spell. He heard the sounds of protests behind them as the family was arrested. Only when their agents told Oscar they were in handcuffs would Oliver relax his hold on his gravity spell.
It had been years in the making, but they’d gotten the whole family. The children would be put into state custody until relatives could be found to take them, and the adults would be in orange for decades at least.
They strode from the front door, jogging down the wide front steps and climbed into the nearest SUV. Oliver glanced up at the shuttles and air freighters in the sky, heading for Centennial Airport. It was a light day of traffic up there.
Oscar drove them around the house, taking the graveled path to the back of the property where the catchment was located. Finding it hadn’t been the hard part. Finding where the magic was going and proof of wrong-doing was the hard part. Once they were in there, if they were right, the illegally owned and used witches inside would be living proof.
“All clear on the grounds, Oscar,” Randall called through the radio. “Only the catchment left.”
The agents and Handlers with their witches had surrounded the industrial looking sheet metal building, and the mobsters inside had clearly holed up. The various doors stood open and guarded, but Oliver could see several knots of officers shuffling around outside.
“We need to get into the catchment before they start killing the witches,” Oscar growled. He glanced at Oliver.
Oliver shook his head. “Nothing. The magic is still being dumped, and if they were killing the witches, that magic would’ve altered.” He hesitated for a beat. Something had shifted in the magical ‘atmosphere’ as they were arriving at the estate, but it had been very brief. And it had been some Aspect of Fire. Not his strongest element, but he was capable with it.
If it was nice and quiet and there was no one around to notice.
Gunfire erupted inside the building.
“Go!” Oscar snapped.
Oliver went, his gravity spell now in front of him to deflect bullets. He dashed into the open doorway and down the hall, saw his fellow agents dropping to the floor in crouches, one already down. There was zero shelter to be had.
Nearly a dozen mobsters fired from the end of the hallway. He lifted his hands, one in front of the other, palms out. He saw the rifles and pistols swing his way, the green gleam of his hands highly visible in the dim corridor.
His magic told him where those chunks of metal were, as they discharged. With each near simultaneous blast, he seized the bullets as they came to him with gravity, faster than he liked. But he caught them.
And reversed them.
Aluminum venting above clanged to the power of his magic.
The bullets mostly hit their owners, but a few mobsters escaped by ducking. Oliver turned his hands, made a snapping gesture, and the barrels of both pistols and rifles bent nearly in half and the men stared at their guns in shock.
One man had another firearm on him. Oliver lifted his hand, called the metal to him, and it flew to his outstretched hand. He tossed it over to the nearest agent. Oliver wasn’t allowed guns.
“Hands in the air!” the lead agent snapped out, gun aiming for the man in front of the others, a man that looked pissed as hell and ready to charge down the hall at them.
Oliver narrowed his eyes at him. “If your hands aren’t in the air in two seconds, every metal stud and barbell piercing on your body is going to land right here,” he said, pointing toward his own feet without taking his eyes from the man.
Since the man had for some godforsaken reason pierced his nipples, ears, tongue and other sensitive parts, that was a threat the man went pale to. His hands rose, though the anger was still there.
Oscar tapped his shoulder. “The catchment, Oliver.”
He glanced at the men down the way, all with their hands up, in the process of face-planting, courtesy of the agents. Oliver didn’t want to leave his fellows in an unsafe situation. He growled in frustration.
“They’ve got it,” Oscar said, sounding vaguely amused.
Oliver nodded and followed him. He hadn’t realized they’d come this far into the building, having to backtrack to a wide double doorway. The doors were locked, but he could feel the raw power on the other side.
He felt it when the power…chopped off, somehow.
“Shit,” he whispered. “Something’s happening in there.”
He put his hands against the cold surface. Made of steel, these doors were his idea of easy pickings. Mind seeking out the structure of the atoms in the metal, he bent it to his will. The metal shrieked as he pushed it in, reforming the shape. His native power might be Earth, but within that magic, the Aspect that he worked best with was Lattice—the shapes that Matter, another Aspect of Earth, could take.
The shifting of the metal reached a new level, then the doors swung in so fast they slammed into the walls.
Standing inside was not the group of Kipling thugs he’d expected.
Facing the doorway with wide and wary eyes and a hand gleaming red, was a dark-haired young man, his other hand hovering over the controls.