Mercy Burns (Myth and Magic 2)

Then my fingers lost their strength and the phone hit the ground. Before I could grab it, a passerby kicked it away. It skidded off the pavement and into the path of a car. The wheels squashed it flat.

Fuck.

I needed help and I needed it fast. I tried to grab at someone as they passed, but it felt like my limbs were trapped in treacle, and I was unable to complete the motion. The movement unbalanced me and I went down hard while the person strode on, oblivious. Pain radiated from both my knee and my barely healed side—red-hot pokers that did little to clear the fog.

“Are you all right, lass?” someone said Angus.

“What?” It came out croaky, and I licked dry lips. “What have you done?”

“What I had to do,” he said, and I swear there was a note of sorrow in his voice. “Give me your hand.”

“Go fuck yourself.”

He sighed and grabbed my arm, hauling me to my feet. I reached down, deep into the part of me that was dragon, and called to the fire. But for the first time in my life, she didn’t answer. She was as drugged and confused as the rest of me, and even the flames in my soul seemed dimmer.

Fear swept through me. God, what had he done?

I tried to hit him, but my fist swished through thin air and unbalanced me even more. And then unconsciousness claimed me once again.

Chapter Three

Voices invaded the darkness.

Voices that were gruff one moment, and oddly urbane the next. One was far stronger than the other, but together they formed a chorus that made no actual sense. What they were saying remained tantalizingly beyond my reach, swimming in a thick soup of incomprehensibility.

But as my thoughts traveled slowly toward consciousness, the rhythm of speech and the words became things I could grasp and understand.

The stronger of the voices belonged to Angus. The other one—although almost tinny in its tones—was vaguely familiar. A ghost from the past I couldn’t quite put my finger on.

And whoever he was, he had no smell. The only person who seemed to be here—wherever the hell here was—besides me was Angus, which meant he was probably talking on the phone.

“For the third and final time, yes, I’m sure it’s her.”

There was a distinct edge riding through Angus’s gruff tones and it had confusion swirling. It spoke of anger and hate, but that made no sense if Angus was working for the men behind all this.

He continued. “And no, I didn’t see her stain, because she refused to show it. But it’s her. Aside from the scar from the accident your man botched, she matched the picture you sent me perfectly.”

Oh God, the other man had arranged the truck accident. Which meant that I was close to finding out who he was. If I survived whatever they currently had planned for me, that is.

But if they were going to kill me, why drug me first? They’d certainly shown no compunction about trying to kill me before, so why hesitate now? Or was that what waited for me once these men finished talking?

Fear rose, then drifted away. And suddenly, being drugged seemed like a good thing.

“She won’t be restrained by darkness. The bitch never could be.” The familiar voice held a hint of sophistication that came with money and a cultured upbringing, which was odd because I really didn’t know anyone who matched either of those criteria.

Yet there was something about the voice that chilled me.

It was a voice that held no sense of life, no sense of compassion. Just a cold determination to do what had to be done. Once upon a time I’d known a man like that. It was he who’d given me my scars, and he’d made my teenage years hell.

&n

bsp; Of course, there were some who said I’d deserved it. I’d struck back and disfigured him—something few half-breeds ever had the skill or the gumption to do.

But this couldn’t be him. Aside from the fact that Seth had apparently died in an accident, there’d never been anything cultured about his manner or his tone.

Although it still sounded like him.

“The drug will keep her out for twenty-four hours. At least.” Was I imagining it, or was the edge I sensed in Angus’s voice filled with bitterness? He sure didn’t sound like a willing henchman, but maybe the fact that my mind seemed to be drifting a layer or two below true wakefulness was affecting my perceptions. Especially given the sense of wrongness I’d been getting about Angus in the bar.