I gathered every last shred of strength I could find and breathed deeply through my nose, fighting my need to cough. Then I spit the mouthful of blood I had gathered at Aleric, with as much oomph as I could manage.
He cursed and tried to flinch away, but he hadn’t seen it coming and was too slow. My blood hit his cheek, and he screamed in shock and apparent pain. He clapped his hand over his cheek and stared down at me in horror, his eyes wide. Even in the darkness, I could see by the little puffs of steam that left his mouth that he was panting, and it wasn’t from running.
From somewhere in the distance, I heard a shout, and Aleric quickly looked up, his green eyes blazing with both fury and fear as he snarled at whoever had dared to disturb him.
My vision was growing continually dimmer, and my eyes were starting to flutter, wanting to close, but I was curious who was doing all that shouting. I wanted to stay alive and conscious long enough to find out, especially considering how Aleric looked. He hadn’t gone up and disappeared in a puff of smoke like I might have hoped, but he was clearly horror-stricken anyway, still covering the side of his face where my blood had hit.
There was an explosive crack, and Aleric cried out again, doubling over. My eyes closed, and I forced them open one more time. I needed to know what had happened.
Aleric put his free hand to his shoulder, and it came away bloody. He gave me one last malevolent glare before he turned and ran. I heard another gunshot, but I couldn’t keep my eyes open a moment longer.
Who the hell was shooting at Aleric? And how come he was wounded? I had to think that had something to do with my blood.
I hoped that second shot had taken him out. It was hardly an unconditional victory while I lay broken and dying in the pit he had built to trap me, but it felt like a win for the home team anyway.
I died with a smile on my lips.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
I woke up and had no idea where I was or what was happening. I groggily assumed I was in one of the many anonymous hotel rooms I’d shared with Dr. Gilliam while we were on the run. My eyes were all crusty, and my mouth was dry as ashes, and I wanted nothing more but to go back to sleep. Except now that I was awake, I realized how much my entire body hurt. I groaned and opened my eyes.
I wasn’t in a hotel room. I was in a hospital. There was an IV stuck in the back of my hand, and I heard a beeping sound that corresponded with the beating of my heart.
I remembered falling into the spike-filled pit, and I remembered the sound of shouting voices and gunshots. I tried to sit up, but it hurt too much, and I cried out in pain.
I’d been too disoriented to notice my mom, sitting in a chair beside my bed. Her arms were folded on the bed beside me, pillowing her head as she slept. I swallowed hard and wondered how long I’d been out. I couldn’t see a clock anywhere, and a glance out the window told me it was still dark out, but that was the most information I could glean.
“Mom?” I croaked, then grimaced. My throat was so sore it felt like someone had taken a sandblaster to it.
Mom must not have been sleeping very soundly. She instantly jerked awake and raised her head. When she saw my open eyes, she burst into tears and reached for me, then pulled back.
“I don’t know where it’s safe to touch you,” she said between hiccups, then settled for laying her hand over the back of mine.
I blinked, struggling to make sense of the unexpected reality that I was alive. I didn’t want to test my voice again, so I settled for whispering. “What happened? Why am I not dead?”
Still crying, my mom reached out and brushed some hair back from my face. “You texted Sam to tell him where Piper was. He went and got her, and she told him what you were doing. He went after you and found you in that … that…” She shuddered and hugged herself.
It must have been Sam who’d shot Aleric. “Is Aleric dead?”
Mom’s brow furrowed in puzzlement. “Who?”
“Aleric! The guy who was trying to kill me!”
“Sam said he chased off some Nightstruck guy who was standing by you, but I don’t think he killed anyone.”
That was a damn shame. Had it been wishful thinking on my part when I’d thought Aleric had been wounded?
No, I realized with certainty. If Aleric hadn’t just discovered he was vulnerable to gunshot wounds, he never would have retreated, never would have let Sam rescue me from that pit.
“What time is it?” I asked, glancing at the darkness of the window once more. It felt like about a thousand hours must have passed since I’d almost died, and yet it was still nighttime.
Mom glanced at her watch. “It’s three o’clock.” She saw me staring at the window. “In the afternoon.”
I shook my head in denial even as my heart sank. Aleric had lured me into that pit not because he was trying to kill me but because he was trying to “harvest” my blood. If I’d been conscious when Sam had come to my rescue, I could have told him how important it was to clean up my blood. Whether he would have believed me or not was anyone’s guess. But as it was, he’d had no way to know how important that blood was to Aleric.
It was almost funny. Aleric had given up on using me as a renewable resource and had planned my death, but thanks to Sam’s rescue, he had his cake and could eat it, too. I wondered how many new gates he’d opened, but I didn’t really want to know.
“This is all my fault,” my mom said miserably, and tears shone in her eyes once more.
I was so used to thinking everything was all my fault that it felt really strange to hear those words come out of my mother’s mouth. At first, I had no idea what she was talking about, but I suppose that was because I was drugged to the gills. It took until she claimed responsibility to remember that she had brought the police to the hotel, that because of her I had had to go on the run—and Aleric had gotten his hands on Luke.
“Luke!” I cried, forgetting about the sore throat until too late. I tried once again to sit up, but despite all the meds the pain practically knocked me out, and my mom hurried to put her hands on her shoulders and keep me down.
“Shh, shh, easy honey,” she said. “You’ve had a bunch of surgeries and more stitches than I can count. You need to rest.”
“Where’s Luke?” I insisted, though I gave in to the pressure of her hands and didn’t try again to sit up. “Is he safe?” My entire purpose in going to that bridge was to try to save Luke, and for a little while, I’d allowed myself to hope that I’d succeeded. But the look on my mom’s face answered my question, and it wasn’t the answer I was looking for.
“Why don’t you just concentrate on getting better and let me worry about everything else for a while.”
“Aleric was supposed to let him go,” I whispered, wondering what else I could possibly have done. Surely there was some way I could have saved Luke if only I’d been smart enough.
“We don’t know where he is,” my mom said. “I haven’t spoken to Dr. Gilliam since early last night, but I’m sure if Luke had come home, she would have let me know—just so I could let you know. She asked me to tell you she doesn’t blame you for what happened.”
My eyes burned and I had to blink rapidly to stave off tears. Dr. Gilliam knew exactly how much of that blame rested on my shoulders. “Aleric never would have taken Luke if it weren’t for me.” I felt my lower lip quivering dangerously. “But you believe I’m having paranoid delusions and none of this has anything to do with me.”
My mom sighed heavily. “I’ll admit that’s what I thought before. It just all sounds so … crazy. But after everything I’ve been told by Dr. Gilliam, and Piper, and Sam, it’s getting harder to deny.” She glanced at the window, at the darkness that reigned at three in the afternoon. That probably made my story sound a little more credible, too.
I closed my eyes, partly to help fight the tears, but also because our brief conversation had sapped what little energy I had. Sleep was tugging at me, and I wanted to give in. I didn’t want to think about what Luke might be goin
g through right now—assuming he was still alive. If Aleric thought I had died in that pit, then he wouldn’t need his hostage anymore.
I was just going to have to hope that whatever magic linked us told him I was still alive, because no matter how many gates he had already opened, I was sure he would want to open more if he knew I had more blood to give him.
I was exhausted, in a lot of pain, and greatly troubled by the darkness. I was terrified for Luke, and worried about what my own future held. I wasn’t handcuffed to the bed, and I saw no sign of the police looking over me, but I doubted they had changed their minds about arresting me, even if Piper had recanted her accusations. I could ask my mom about it, but I figured that particular conversation could wait.
“Try to get some rest, sweetheart,” my mom said gently, once again stroking my hair.
I made a sound of murmured agreement, and was sure I would soon sink back down into sleep. But for all the doom and gloom, I was also nurturing a tiny spark of hope.
Aleric had bled. That meant he was no longer invulnerable. And one way or another, I was going to get to him, and I was going to kill him. Maybe that would banish the night magic, and maybe it wouldn’t. But twice last night I’d almost died, and I hadn’t fought and clawed my way back from the brink of death to let Aleric and the Night Makers win.
My blood was the key. And if I had to shed every remaining drop of it to put things right, then that was exactly what I would do.
TOR TEEN BOOKS BY JENNA BLACK
Replica
Resistance
Revolution
Nightstruck
Night Magic
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JENNA BLACK is your typical writer—which means she’s an “experience junkie.” She received her bachelor of arts in physical anthropology and French from Duke University. She is the author of the Faeriewalker series and Replica series for teens, as well as the Morgan Kingsley urban fantasy series. Visit her at www.jennablack.com, or sign up for email updates here.
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CONTENTS
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Tor Teen Books by Jenna Black
About the Author
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
NIGHT MAGIC
Copyright © 2017 by Jenna Black
All rights reserved.
Cover art by Cliff Nielsen
A Tor Teen Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates
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New York, NY 10010
www.tor-forge.com
Tor® is a registered trademark of Macmillan Publishing Group, LLC.
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-0-7653-8006-7 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-4668-7177-9 (e-book)
e-ISBN 9781466871779
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[email protected] First Edition: May 2017
Jenna Black, Night Magic
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