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Now
The squeal was so loud that it made Silver flinch.
“Are you okay?” she asked, proceeding to untie the restraints from behind the young girl’s back.
The girl apparently didn’t hear the question. “I mean, the way you fought them all off, that was the most incredible thing I’ve ever seen! I’ll be honest, for a minute there, I thought you were dead meat. But, dang girl! You don’t go down without a fight, do you? I mean, it’s like you’re some sort of—hey, what are you doing?”
Now that she knew there was no immediate danger, Silver had to check if Vince was still nearby. First, she needed a better vantage point, so she quickly walked out the nearest fire escape and looked up. Three floors to the roof.
“Wait, where are you going?” the girl called out. Her ankles were still restrained, so she bent down to untie the rope herself.
Meanwhile, Silver tested the sturdiness of the wrought iron stairs. As expected, they weren’t very steady, but she could use her magic and jump to give herself enough momentum to reach the top. It was faster than taking the stairs inside, at least.
“Stay here,” she told the girl without looking at her. “I’ll be right back.”
Her eyes changed, and she launched herself upward. Up on the roof, she had a pretty good vantage point to search for Vince’s aura, but it wasn’t anywhere nearby. The only aura around—besides hers and the girl’s—was that of Adam, still passed out by the entrance. Vince must have run back to Master to gather reinforcements. He wouldn’t be back for another day or two, which meant Silver had just enough time to meet Remi and—
“Hey!”
Her head snapped around, and she ran to the fire escape. The idiot! Did the girl have a death wish? Two floors down, she was climbing up the rickety stairs, panting with the effort.
“What the hell are you doing?” Silver retorted. “I told you to wait!”
“Just a sec, I can do this,” the human called out, way too confident.
Silver wanted to roll her eyes, but she couldn’t move an inch in case the girl slipped. Years ago, she swore to protect humans from supernaturals. How on earth was she supposed to protect them from themselves?
Any restraint was cut short when the young girl’s hands started to slip. Instincts took over, and Silver let her movements flow without thinking about what she was doing. She didn’t want to levitate the girl up in case she panicked and broke Silver’s concentration, so she simply jumped off the building and twisted to face the fire escape. In the same move, she took out her staff and aimed it at the wall as she let herself slip. She hoped it was the dull tip that she plunged into the brick, using the friction from the fracture to slow down her momentum.
When she was one level above the human, she reached out and grabbed the railing above to stop her fall then swung herself into the opening along with her staff, landing right on her feet inside the building.
“Oh my God, you’re amazing,” the girl gasped. She was staring at her like some goddess, having watched the whole thing.
Before Silver could dismiss the useless compliment, the stairs groaned dangerously. She leaned her staff on the ground and supported herself against it as she bent down, holding her palm out.
“Give me your hand,” she ordered.
A grunt. “I can’t! I’ll fall!”
With a huff, Silver grabbed the other girl’s wrist and pulled her up with more force than she intended. The latter yelped and flailed her arms out, tackling Silver in the process and sending them both tumbling back inside the building. Silver landed flat on her back, which knocked the wind out of her and left her momentarily too stunned to move. Meanwhile, the human had landed on one side of her and her staff on the other.
“That was close,” the young girl panted.
Seriously ticked off, Silver stood up and dusted off her clothes. “Why didn’t you just take the stairs inside?”
The younger girl had the sense to look abashed. The thought apparently hadn’t crossed her mind. “You didn’t.”
Silver gritted her teeth as she examined her weapon. Thankfully, only the one side was in bad shape. It was slightly bent and in serious need of sharpening.
“It’s faster for me this way,” she told the human.
The latter’s eyes lit up with excitement. “Because you have magic, right? That’s why your eyes are glowing right now?”
This gave Silver pause, and she turned to the human cautiously. “Glowing?”
“Yeah,” she nodded, “they’re all silver, like pearls. But they weren’t before, so I’m guessing they change when you’re doing magic. That’s so cool! How do you do that?”
Okay, so the girl didn’t see auras. Still, Carl had implied that there was something different about her. Without a word, Silver planted herself right in front of the other girl, studying her both on the outside and from within.
“What are you doing?” the girl asked timidly.
Faced with silence, she didn’t speak again, simply watching Silver with a mesmerized look.
At first glance, there was nothing special about her. She didn’t emanate any magical signature, nor did she have any defining physical features that set supernatural creatures apart. It was strange that Vince’s squad would go through so much trouble, potentially risking attracting the attention of human authorities, just to get this one ordinary human. It had to have been a ploy to lure Silver, a desperate attempt by Master to get her to show herself. The trail of bodies they left behind certainly suggested as much.
But then, why was it that when Silver tried accessing the girl’s mind, something which was typical for her to do, it yielded no results? She wasn’t met with resistance, as sometimes happened with individuals who were trained to resist that kind of mind invasion. There was just... nothing. Silver had never met anyone—human or supernatural—who could shield their mind in such a way. It was strange and, she hated to admit, more than a little worrisome.
What was this girl?
Returning her eyes to normal, Silver changed tactics. She tried to put as much authority in her tone as she could, just to make it clear who was in charge.
“What’s your name?”
The girl’s eyes glinted with glee. “I’m Theresa! Well, just Reese, actually; it’s much better.”
“How old are you, Theresa?”
“It’s Reese. And I’m 18.”
Silver ignored the correction. “And why are you here?”
“Uh, I was kidnapped? They brought me here.”
She gestured in the direction of the floor below them, where the three dead hybrids were left behind. Silver reminded herself to burn the bodies before leaving the building.
“So you get kidnapped and your first reaction is, oh that’s cool?”
Theresa blinked, taken aback by the accusatory tone. “Well, no, my first reaction was, oh God I’m gonna die. But then you got here, and I wasn’t so scared anymore.”
Silver narrowed her eyes. “You just saw me slicing people in half.”
“Yeah. To save me.”
Silver cringed at the admiration in Theresa’s voice and her nonchalant acceptance of what was basically murder, but she didn’t address it. She needed another type of information right now, and Theresa seemed forthcoming enough on her own.
“Why did they take you in the first place? What did they want from you?”
Theresa blinked in confusion. “I mean, I assumed it was to trap you. You’re some kind of superhero who saves people from evil creatures, right? And I’m the hostage they used to lure you here.”
Well, that confirmed Silver’s fears. Sort of.
There were humans who believed in the existence of supernaturals. Being in the twenty-first century unfortunately meant more stories were being spread about the various species. Some, like Vince, served with the hope of becoming stronger and live longer, but many had a romantic obsession with vampires and werewolves. They would volunteer to an estate purely out of some misguided dreams of a happy life with a supernatural partner. They usually changed their mind as soon as they were faced with the harsh reality of what that life and the creatures themselves were really like, but by then, it would be too late.
Knowing everything she did, Silver was already put off by such ideas, but this was just as bad. She had never encountered a human who had this kind of awe-inspired reaction. It made her reluctant to keep Theresa near even more.
For now, she decided to sidestep her latest question, too. “Did they ask you to do anything to track me down?”
This was apparently confusing enough to completely erase Theresa’s admiration. “Me? I don’t know the first thing about tracking. I mean, I didn’t even like being a girl scout.”
“Is that supposed to be a joke?”
“Uh... no? I’m serious.”
Silver stared back in disbelief. No one was this oblivious, were they? She must have been putting on an act. She didn’t look like a criminal mastermind, but looks could be deceiving. Maybe she was working with Master, playing the victim so Silver wouldn’t suspect her. The thought was alarming, but Silver didn’t have enough information to confirm it just yet.
“What were you doing when they took you?”
Theresa opened her mouth, frowned, and looked to the side. Either she was a very good actress, or she was having trouble with her memory. “Last thing I remember... my friend and I were at a party.”
Silver’s blood turned cold, and she couldn’t stop the memories that sprung to mind, specifically of her human self, dancing under flashing lights, minutes before she was lured into a trap. Her last day of freedom before she was captured.
Theresa thankfully didn’t notice her distress and kept talking. “We’re starting college in a couple days, so we wanted to have one last fun night together. We hit it off with this group of seniors, and we were gonna go with them to another party. But then Ollie and I had a fight, so we went home instead.” Her eyes widened with a sudden realization, and she looked around, patting herself down. “Oh my God, do you have a phone? I think those guys must have thrown mine out the window.”
Silver swallowed a lump in her throat. This story sounded awfully familiar. “Did they grab you on your way home?”
“No, I–I need to call Ollie. He must be so worried.”
“I’ll get you a phone in a moment. Just finish your story first. Please.”
The girl turned to Silver uncertainly but thankfully did as she was asked. “Well, I was fine at night, Ollie dropped me off at my dorm. But then the next morning, I was on my way to his place, to apologize about our fight, and I ran into the seniors again. They told me they saw him going into the library earlier, so I walked there to find him. The street was still empty, but the library opens early, so I wasn’t worried. Next thing I know, a van pulls up next to me, and those twins throw me in the back. I was out after that, and when I woke up, we were here.”
So it wasn’t the same, Silver thought to herself with relief.
She silently reproached herself for her momentary vulnerability and schooled her features back into a neutral expression before Theresa could sense her dread.
As much as she hated the idea, she had no choice but to keep the human close for now. It was the only way to figure out what she was and establish her true allegiances.
“Okay, here’s what we’re going to do,” she said. “Before you call your friend, we need to work on a cover story so he doesn’t call the police or come looking for you.”
“Wait, you’re not sending me home?” Theresa asked, surprised.
Silver shook her head. “You’ve got a supernatural target on your back. It’s better if you don’t go near your loved ones and lay low with me for a while, just until it dies down a little. Now, stay here while I take care of the bodies.” She raised a finger in front of her face and then pointed at the ground. “I mean it. Right there.”
Theresa didn’t seem to understand what was happening, but Silver didn’t leave her enough room to ask more questions. There would be time for that once she had the chance to get her feelings under control.
