Chapter 26: In Over My Head

Thank the universe!

Tiny Jem’s discharged blast was nothing compared to what had leveled Hellie.

Before firing his Boomstick, he’d swayed off balance, scattering the payload haphazardly.

Jolted into reacting, I misjudged the blast.

My palm shield, a mix of blue geomagical shapes, flared out wildly, creating a massive visible barrier in front of me.

It easily blocked the orangish spectral buckshot but wasted large amounts of energy.

The ‘noob’ error jostled me.

My magic has an upper limit. I can’t afford to do that again.

But I quickly refocused to take advantage of Tiny Jem’s blitzed mental state.

I swung my arm, and my whole body flowed into the movement, releasing a violent push.

Tiny Jem brutally careened into the kitchen adjoining the great room, landing just out of sight from my position.

The resounding commotion indicated that he had hit hard.

As horrible as it sounded, I had no hope that he was incapacitated.

But quiet followed.

I quickly ran to Hellie.

She was unconscious, breathing sparsely.

Her eyes looked grey and dull.

Her tongue lolled from her mouth.

I ran my hand across her fur, and there were no signs of a wound. I’d expected her ribcage to have been blown out.

Whatever energy hit her, it wasn’t physical—at least not externally.

Nothing except the area around Hellie had been damaged. Tiny Jem’s prize collection was still intact.

And I bet that was the point of his magic.

I probed for any sign, searching for her regenerative healing to kick in.

Looking at Hellie lying there, my edge shriveled. I was tough shit with her backing me, but with her out of the picture—numbness.

Maybe she could use a boost.

Moving skittishly and on alert, I took out the bottle of elixir and poured it all down Hellie’s throat.

Not even thinking—I just did it.

I moved alone to face Tiny Jem.

He remained silent and hadn’t come from the kitchen to counterattack.

If I’m lucky, he’s out cold. Maybe the drugs got him.

Skeptical about that thought, I cautiously moved toward the kitchen.

On the way, I glanced at the movie blades over the fireplace—they were beautiful and lethal.

A thought flashed—me wielding the swords as I made an entrance.

But who was I kidding?

I had no sword training.

I’d get killed attempting to hold one of those, but they gave me an idea.

I stepped over the threshold of the kitchen with a little surprise suspended in the air behind me.

The quiet of the space held a palpable eeriness.

I didn’t understand how he could’ve moved out of the massive wreckage without alerting me.

Glass and debris crunched under each of my carefully placed steps.

The small remnants of the destroyed kitchen lay everywhere, caught in the moonlight.

I stopped, suddenly leery of venturing too far.

Is he cloaked in invisibility?

Suddenly, a prickly sensation made me shoot a penetrating look at the corridor at the edge of the room.

It was distinctly darker.

The space was super narrow—a perfect killing zone for a man with a magical shotgun.

I refused to move in that direction.

He had to be lurking there.

“Hocus pocus. Abracadabra. Remember that loser?”

Something chimed inside me.

The tiny echo grew, making my surroundings dimmer and duller.

Tiny Jem’s voice flashed from different directions all around the room.

I turned in multiple directions trying to pinpoint the source—nothing.

Tiny Jem spoke in my mind, like Gluttony had done in the woods.

“You can’t stand up to a bully like Dane. So what hope do you have against me?”

I knew he was trying to get under my skin, make me panic, and drop my guard.

But sadly, I took the bait.

The mention of The Nameless One cut deep, stirring my ego and fears.

“Is The Nameless One a part of this?!”

My voice should have been loud and angry, but it sounded suppressed, pitifully low.

Tiny Jem laughed in response and sang out the words again, “Hocus Pocus. Abracadabra.”

A chime, as it had before, vibrated within, but this time a sense of detachment hit.

Colors faded from my vision.

Then, a sharp, pungent smell of candy and rotten fruit filled my nostrils and coated my mouth.

I knew it. He had placed a hex on me.

My senses were deadening.

He was trying to take me back to the darkness.

I fought the urge to panic or run.

Like pushing to become sober through harrowing intoxication, I called on everything within me to resist Tiny Jem’s spell.

Somehow I rose.

Pushing outward, breaking the hush, I yelled, “Stop hiding, schlumpy bastard!”

“Gladly. You son of a bitch. How dare you come into my home!”

The loud boom of his shotgun cracked.

Unfortunately for him, simultaneous with the blast, dark ether floated like smog through the walls—revealing his hiding spot.

The glowing orange pellets, behaving nothing like buckshot, arced around the corner of the corridor.

They left luminous trails behind them—seemingly locked on me.

I countered by hurling the three blades that I’d been secretly holding in place.

The might of the push spell hit against Tiny Jem’s attack midair, suspending it.

The swords penetrated the wall like butter, vanishing to their hilts.

“Ahhhhhhhh!”

Morbid, yes. Hearing the scream felt good. It meant I’d hit him.

Once the energy of the push spell faded, the buckshot slammed against the shield I barely erected, forcing me to grunt from the strain.

“Dammit.”

I poured all my willpower into keeping the shield from collapsing.

The first time it manifested easily. But this time, it felt damn near impossible to maintain.

After the heaviness of orange energy lightened and dissipated, I recalled the shield and returned to the great room.

I stood there for a moment, looking.

The destruction from the push spell exposed many of the other rooms in the ranch-style home. The whole area had crumbled, leaving behind a gaping space in the interior.

I don’t know whether the black smoke came from his frustration over the failed hex, another shared ability with Hellie, or him trying to transform.

I didn’t care.

I got him!

Mixed in with the groans, I heard Tiny Jem muttering.

Most of it was inaudible, so I dared to walk closer to listen and to get a better view. I wouldn’t have attempted it if the wreckage hadn’t pinned him down.

As I zeroed in on his location among the debris, I began to understand his soft, desperate whispering.

“Please. Please. I’m in pain, and I’m high as hell. Take over. I’m sorry for trying to handle this myself. I’m sorry for interrupting you. I won’t do it again.”

I noticed one of the blades from my attack.

The holy sword’s hilt protruded from the wall slab covering Tiny Jem.

I tugged at it several times, but it was stuck.

Finally, to Tiny Jem’s misfortune, the sword came out after I stomped hard on the pile and yanked forcefully.

Tiny Jem screamed in agony.

The outcry and blood running down the blade showed me I had gutted the bastard. Despite not knowing how badly he was injured, I felt exhilarated that my attack was effective.

I looked over for Hellie, instinctively wanting her recognition.

She was gone.

Had Tiny Jem distracted me long enough to do something to her?

Had she healed?

“Hellie. Hellie!”

I reached out through our mental connection, but I didn’t feel her.

Suddenly, the pile beneath me shook, forcing me off balance.

Not even a second later, the debris exploded outward, propelling me back.

As I tumbled, I dropped the sword. It slid a good fifteen feet away. Lying on the floor, I immediately noticed the sensations of sharp and blunt pain caused by the shrapnel and explosion beating at my body.

Gluttony floated upward, entirely metamorphosing into his enormous, bulbous entity form.

As he hovered almost to the ceiling, I saw a crown of horns on top of his head, piercing through the wisps of grey smoke that encompassed and shrouded a large portion of his body.

He looked down at me with cold red eyes, squinting just beyond a large pig snout and the faint edges of tentacles whipping about from his face.

I know it was a horrible place for humor, but I rejoiced that the smoke was covering his Johnson.

“Losers are always losing something!” Gluttony was back to speaking directly to my thoughts.

“Screw you, Tiny Jem.” Instead of acknowledging Gluttony, I spoke directly to Tiny Jem. Summoning all my strength, I jumped up and pushed over the superhero display case closest to me.

“Stop ruining my collectibles. Get out of my house!” Gluttony’s form shouted using Tiny Jem’s voice.

At his command—there was no discharge of energy, absolutely nothing visible that I could detect—my body flew backward and crashed through the glass wall of the house.

The impact velocity tossed me at least twenty-something yards from the house.

If not for the shield buff I’d performed, I would’ve suffered from extensive broken bones and a concussion.

I lay there, racked with pain, glad I wasn’t dead.

My clothing suffered the most, ripped to shreds—thinly attached tatters flapped all over. And since my black mesh mask was destroyed, I ripped it off.

Despite the setback, I smiled to myself.

Tiny Jem had given me a means of attack—thousands and thousands of glass shards were all over the ground, and I was about to send them all hurling at him in a hailstorm.

It was a great effing idea, except I was too far away. And with the rack of the Boomstick, followed by its loud rocking blast, I had to go on the defensive.

I drove my palm forward, instantly forming a barrier.

The impact of the blast reverberated across my nerves, spiking with the pain of a thousand needles.

The agony made concentrating and holding the barrier harder.

Gluttony floated across the broken seal of the glass wall, slowly making its way out of the house to meet me.

The blast of its shotgun rang out incessantly.

Each shot bore down, harder than the last, pushing me back—farther and farther.

I feared if I broke position—or tried to run—I would lose my shield.

So I kept casting it, hit after hit.

I knew the constant expenditure of magic would come back to bite me in the end.

It already had in the woods—and without warning.

That frightened me, but I couldn’t let the thought throw me.

Belief fortified my shield.

Fifty feet away, the width of my shield lessened.

“Malvic, you were wrong. Our connection runs deep. You don’t think you’re a glutton. But you are… a glutton for failure. You run to it. You crave it. You can’t exist without failing!”

Although Gluttony didn’t laugh, I sensed the roast seething from his goopy tones within my head.

“You didn’t come here tonight to kill me. You came here tonight to lose. So I could clean up your mistake of reading the Tome.”

Thirty feet away, the width of my shield lessened.

“See this shotgun? It’s my Auracroft. If you were serious about taking me out, you would’ve brought your Auracroft and more than a handful of spells.”

“I must admit, coming to kill you was a bit of a rush job. But Hellie was adamant.”

Hellie, I need you! Hellie?

“Who’s the master—you or that bitch? Hellhounds are wild, dumb beasts. All they know is to attack and destroy. The finesse in their kills—all in their training.”

Fifteen feet away, his shots slowed, but the width of my shield still lessened.

Dammit! Is my magic or willpower weakening?

An electrical sting pulsed under my skin, tightening my muscles—telling me another story.

My body was being brutalized.

“You’ve failed your hellhound. You’ve failed yourself.”

Seven feet away, Gluttony racked his shotgun, fired a single blast, and racked again.

My shield had utterly faded. I was exposed.

The pain overwhelming me, mixed with the strain of protecting myself from the onslaught of attacks, didn’t lend itself to flight.

It left me on my knees.

“And what is the most profound failure in your heart?”

Gluttony’s smoke-covered, boar-like hooves touched down, and he stood over me.

The smoke billowing off him and swallowing me smelled rotten and sweet.

Looking up, blood from my nostrils ran into my mouth.

His presence loomed large, distorted but dominating.

Piercing high-pitched tones seared my ears.

The heaviness of my battered body and the weight of my defeat pressed me downward.

The irony wasn’t lost on me.

Gluttony had tried twice to remove my senses, yet there, crumpled at his feet, I was choking in sensory overload.

He gently placed the tip of his shotgun on my head, and my breath burst out. A sharp sensation stabbed my brain. I could feel his presence within me invading my thoughts.

Then it stopped and he spoke.

“Now that is sad. You failed your dead mother.”

“Leave my mother out of this!”

At the crescendo of my rage, Gluttony pulled the trigger.

The ear-splitting sound of the Boomstick thrashed against my eardrums, and a sea of orange flooded my vision.