Death spell, p.1
Death Spell, page 1
Death Spell
The New Orleans Shade - Book 2
D. N. Hoxa
Contents
Also by D. N. Hoxa
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Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Also by D. N. Hoxa
Copyright © 2021 by D.N. Hoxa
This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of
America. Any reproduction or other unauthorized use of the material or
artwork herein is prohibited. This is a work of fiction. Names,
characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s
imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons,
living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely
coincidental.
Created with Vellum
Also by D. N. Hoxa
The New York Shade Series (Completed)
Magic Thief
Stolen Magic
Immoral Magic
Alpha Magic
* * *
The Marked Series (Completed)
Blood and Fire
Deadly Secrets
Death Marked
* * *
Winter Wayne Series (Completed)
Bone Witch
Bone Coven
Bone Magic
Bone Spell
Bone Prison
Bone Fairy
* * *
Scarlet Jones Series (Completed)
Storm Witch
Storm Power
Storm Legacy
Storm Secrets
Storm Vengeance
Storm Dragon
* * *
Victoria Brigham Series (Completed)
Wolf Witch
Wolf Uncovered
Wolf Unleashed
Wolf’s Rise
* * *
Starlight Series (Completed)
Assassin
Villain
Sinner
Savior
* * *
Morta Fox Series (Completed)
Heartbeat
Reclaimed
Unchanged
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Chapter 1
Mace
* * *
It was too dark to see anything clearly, but I wasn’t sure if the darkness surrounded me or if it came from my own eyes. Blurry figures around me, distant voices.
Where was I? Every time I woke up, I had trouble remembering how I had ended up here. It felt like years now, and the torture was never-ending.
But eventually, if I was awake for long enough, it always came back to me.
I was somewhere inside the Winter castle of King Caidenus, my father. I was in the heart of the Winter kingdom in Gaena because I’d chosen to come here and fight for my life—or die. I’d been nothing but a fool because I’d forgotten the most important thing I had ever discovered about my father: King Caidenus does not play fair.
Asking him for a fair fight had been a mistake. If the cost had been my life, that would have been perfectly fine, but it wasn’t. I should have known that it wouldn’t be.
Now, it was too late.
“Bring him in,” said a voice, and I was almost completely sure that it was my father’s. I tried to blink my eyes, to see where I was, who was with me. My neck wasn’t strong enough to hold up my head, so it kept falling from one side to the other. It hurt…everywhere. Where was Taran when I needed her most?
Oh, yes. She’d left. She took off to gods know where, and chances were that I was never going to see her again. As strange as it was, that knocked my breath out worse than the pain coming from my body.
Footsteps echoed in a familiar way. The entire castle was made of stone, so the echo was the same in every room, but this one had a slightly deeper ring to it. A ring I recognized, and it made me want to throw up. I would have if there’d been anything in my stomach.
How long had I been here? Why was I so weak?
I tried to move my limbs—they refused. The only thing that worked properly was my sense of smell. Metal and dirt—that’s all I could make out. A door screeched open—a heavy door. I turned my head slightly in its direction and tried to see better, but no matter how many times I blinked, all I could make out were silhouettes. Dark shapes against a lighter background.
Two of them were right in front of me now.
“I need you to look deep,” my father said. Hearing his voice from so close up left no doubt in my mind that it was him.
“Father, please,” said someone from farther away, but for the life of me I couldn’t make out the voice. Was it my brother Arin? I couldn’t think of any of the others my father would allow in the room here.
I was in the vaulted chamber of the castle, buried three levels below ground. It was spacious, with a high ceiling, with all kinds of devices meant to incapacitate and torture my father’s victims. I’d been here before for five days—when I betrayed my father and refused to kill elves without being attacked. He’d wanted me to wipe an entire village clean off Gaena just because they were elves, and I’d refused. They hadn’t been soldiers, or even armed. They were innocents, and I wasn’t going to take lives just because the soldiers who were to protect them were fighting in another battle nearby. Instead, I’d taken my battalion back to the castle.
Needless to say, my father had not been happy. I’d fought in over fifty battles to this day, and most of the scars on my body were from him.
How many more of those scars would he give to me today?
What day was it? I couldn’t remember how long I’d been there. All I remembered was Taran—my beautiful elf, a prisoner in my castle in the Winter Shade, yet more free than I was ever going to be. I remembered facing my mother, my father, my entire family, and telling them exactly what I thought about them since I was a little boy.
Then, I fought. Soldiers, first. I killed a lot of soldiers, and then I fought my father.
I must have lost, which didn’t surprise me. He was the strongest fae I had ever met, able to tap into Winter magic in any season and freeze a heart without breaking a sweat. But I’d been so sure he would kill me once he was done with me.
Why hadn’t he yet?
Voices again, whispering.
Footsteps.
“That’s enough. Leave if you’re too weak to watch,” said my father as he came close to me again.
“Your Highness?” said a man whose voice I couldn't recognize.
“Do it,” my father said. “I want to know everything. There’s a starting point to this madness, and I have to know what it is.”
“As you wish, Your Highness,” said the man again, and then I felt fingers on my forehead.
They were cold, which meant I was feverish. My eyes popped open once more, and this time, by some miracle, I managed to even move forward a little bit. The sound of splashing took me off guard. I was in water? It didn’t feel like it.
Forcing all my focus on my eyes, I tried to see for one last time.
Red. I saw red. I was in a tub made of stone, but it wasn’t filled with water. It was filled with blood—my blood—and it reached all the way to my middle. My arms were chained to the sides, knives sticking out of them, I don’t know how many. And my blood kept pouring out, filling the tub more.
That’s how he kept me weak. That’s how he kept me paralyzed without having the need to use his magic. The bastard had cut me open in just enough places to keep me bleeding and my limbs numb, but not enough so that I would die of blood loss. I would have laughed if my voice worked.
As it was, my head was pushed back by those cold fingers once more. Whoever that man was, he dug his fingertips into my forehead and held me back. I couldn’t move if I tried now, but I did hear. I heard it all—the whisper, the words, the spell being chanted in Latin. Terran—an Earth supernatural. What was he doing to me? Would he mess up my mind like he had before my elf healed me?
On the inside, I screamed. I kicked my feet and slammed my fists all around me, but my body remained perfectly still while the terran chanted his spell. Soon, I began to feel the magic slipping inside me, merging with my skin, reaching my brain. I’d known it was a lost battle when I walked into the gates of the Winter castle, but I’d still hoped. What for, I wasn’t sure.
But now, there was no more hope in me. I’d lost. I’d lost my life, and I’d lost the only thing I had ever truly cared about—the elf whose name I didn’t even know.
Memori
Whatever it was, if I survived it, I would break the worlds apart until I found her again.
But, for now, all I could do was let go.
Chapter 2
Elo
* * *
The faces around me blurred out of focus as I ran. Just a little farther. Just a moment longer. Floating crystals burned green everywhere I turned. Night had fallen just minutes ago, and I thought the darkness was going to be my friend.
So far, it hadn’t helped.
I pushed someone to the side gently and kept on going, my knees shaking, my body weak with hunger. I’d been in the New Orleans Shade for two days now, and I still hadn’t been able to find a job. The Shade had given me a roof over my head—a tiny room that nobody seemed to use, with nothing in it but hardwood floors and cobwebs—but that’s it. I’d had to eat food I’d found in the streets, near dumpsters and by the back doors of bars and restaurants.
Needless to say, I was in no position to fight whoever was coming for me.
“Take a left,” Hiss whispered, his head barely coming out of the Guild jacket I’d stolen the night I came here. He preferred to stay wrapped around my torso for the most part, but now that we were running, he seemed impatient.
I did as he asked and turned left. Take me away, I whispered to the Shade in my mind, over and over again. It could take you anywhere you wanted within seconds, but to do that, you had to think about the place you wanted to get to clearly. I couldn’t do that because I didn’t know where I wanted to go. Away could mean anywhere, and the Shade was only so big.
When I spotted a narrow alleyway across the street, I shot for it as fast as my legs allowed. I was tired, had been running for the past five minutes, and I didn’t know how much longer I had until I collapsed. I needed a rest—and a healthy dose of luck.
I reached the alleyway and the darkness covered me completely. There were no Shade lights anywhere near it. I could barely make out the shape of some crates practically thrown against the wall, so I hid behind them. With my back turned to the wall, I sat down on the cold concrete and closed my eyes.
It was okay. I was going to get through this. I just needed to hide, that’s all.
“How curious,” Hiss whispered, slithering his way out of my jacket and onto my lap. His head rose up, his scales shining green even in the darkness. The hood spread around his head, making him look like a completely different animal. I’d almost forgotten that he could do that—pull out a hood from his skin and wings, too. Small black wings that he could only use to jump unusually high—for a snake.
“Not curious,” I whispered back, risking a look over the crates and toward the street at the mouth of the alleyway. Nobody was there. “It’s him, Hiss. It must be.”
A stab in my chest. I’d been wandering around the New Orleans Shade, trying to find something to do—or myself, I’m not sure—and nobody had even looked my way twice.
Nobody, until that man, just minutes ago.
I’d been sitting on a bench outside in the Shade, very close to the Magic Square, and I’d been watching the Doran Brothers play their instruments while their magic burst out in colors in sync with the melody. They hadn’t been there the night before—I’d searched—but the Shade had brought me to them tonight. I’d watched and listened together with the crowd of people, mesmerized by the sound and the view. I’d thought about Mace. I was always thinking about Mace. It surprised me as much as it scared me to find my thoughts drifting his way every time I wanted to focus on something else.
But then I saw that man.
He didn’t look anything out of the ordinary. He was five foot seven, maybe eight, with dark hair and eyes, dressed in the same clothes as every terran in the Shade. If it wasn’t for the way he watched me—completely still at first—I would have never even suspected anything.
And when he smiled, I felt it all the way to my bones. I felt the malice in it, and it was clear to me that that man knew exactly who I was.
“The prince would never send terrans after you. He would have come himself,” Hiss said, slowly moving away from my lap and onto the ground. He slithered to the side of the crates and looked at the street, too. “No, it wasn’t the prince.”
“Who else?” Because Mace was the only person who would want to find me. My family…my brother, my people—I was dead as far as they were concerned. That was why they’d betrayed me, poisoned me, thrown me to the fae. To kill me, and I should have been dead a long time ago. Any fae would have killed me in the cruelest way possible just because I was an elf. It was the way we lived in my world. Gaena knew nothing but war, and we were all the same, too.
Any fae would have killed me without a second thought—except Mace. He was the son of the Winter King, and out of all, he should have despised me the most. I should have despised him, too. But we didn’t. Somehow, in some way, we found each other among all the blood and lives lost in vain. We found each other…and then I left him.
It was hard not to blame myself. Harder still not to feel like a traitor. He’d given himself to me, body and heart, and I’d walked away. Not only that, but I’d paralyzed him before escaping, too.
The guilt wasn’t going to change reality now. I always knew he would come for me. How could he not? I just hadn’t thought that he would send terrans after me first.
“I don’t know, Pain Seeker,” Hiss said. “But whatever happens next, trust no one.” He turned to me, his ten golden eyes wide. “No one, not even your own heart.”
“What happens if they find me?” Even my whisper broke. “I am weak. I cannot fight.”
“You can and you will,” Hiss said, not a hint of doubt in his strange voice. He believed in me far more than I believed in myself. “This isn’t your end, Pain Seeker. You’d best remember that.”
I closed my eyes and rested my head against the wall. Coming to the New Orleans Shade had been a mistake. This wasn’t my home. It wasn’t my world. I was a stranger here, and I couldn’t find strength in a place I didn’t belong. I should have stayed home, back in Gaena. I should have tried to find a way to get my House back while I was there.
Now, it was too late. I’d barely made it out of the Gateway that was guarded by the Sacri Guild here in the Shade. I’d caught them off guard. Elves were meant to withstand magic, and nobody expected an elf to wield active magic like I did. But now, they knew all about what I could do. The Guild was not going to just let me use the Gateway again as easily. I was stuck here.
“I hear nothing,” Hiss said after a while. My eyes opened to the darkness. Even the moonlight didn’t shine into this alleyway, almost like it couldn’t see it was there.
“Maybe they’re gone?” I dared to ask and cringed at the fear in my voice.
I was an elf. More than that—I was the ruler of House Heivar. I learned how to use a sword at the age of five. I could fight better than most men I knew, and I had magic that could stop a heart from beating if I wished it.
When had I become so afraid of even my own thoughts?
