Smoke by Roxanne Heath
Synopsis: Finding
a dead man in the woods seems, at first, like any other routine
tragedy. Burdened by a lack of scientific evidence, the investigation
takes a much darker turn when a
series of interviews uncover sordid details from this dead man's past
including a history of magic and violence. This story takes the four
main characters on a journey trying to determine the cause of death,
leading each to question his or her own motivations
for wanting the truth, and quickly revealing the consequences of
betraying the trust of the dead.
Excerpt:
They make their way outside, to where the air is
sharp and cold and the entire night is still. No sooner has the first
lungful of icy air rendered the both of them breathless when Noah turns
and veers towards the back of the building,
to the tennis courts which are lightly dusted with snow that sparkles
beneath the security lights. They stand there for a minute and Noah
thinks to himself that this will be a perfect setting. Maybe now, with
her blood enchanted by the music, with the night
as pretty as it is, with the fact that they do not at all feel like
themselves, maybe she’d accept this one fantastic thing.
Londi does not press him for information as to
why they are there, but she accidentally lets loose a shivering breath
and it is this that breaks Noah from his reverie.
“Sorry,” he says, abruptly turning to face her.
“Here.” He takes off his coat and drapes it over her shoulders, despite
her protests. No matter what she says, she is visibly shaking from the
cold, and his residual heat inside the coat
does feel rather nice.
“I don’t need it, I promise,” he says with a
small half-smile, before rolling up his sleeves. He does as his father
had done so many years ago, calming himself against everything, even
against shivering though the night air bites at every
inch of his skin. When his heart has steadied enough, he lets the words
pass through his lips, much more from memory than understanding. They
are barely louder than a whisper, but it is enough.
It is not long before the sigils on his arms are
alight, an electric green – an odd distinction to be made, where color
was different depending on the one who cast the spell – and Noah does
not even hear as Londi accidentally lets loose
a few curses before slamming her hand over her mouth. It is
extraordinary to come face to face with something so straight out of
fiction and yet here it is in plain sight. There they are, the sigils
she’d only seen glimpses of when he reached over to grab a
book from his bag or reached up into his locker to retrieve his lunch.
These odd glimpses had been nothing but, and now they are real, real and
glowing so brightly they looked as though they must burn terribly and
against the stark contrast of the dark night.
She wants to shield her eyes against this almost painfully-bright vision
but is held steadfast. He reaches over and plucks one from his arm,
throwing it into the air where it hovers for a moment before bursting
outwards into a brilliant green flower over five
feet wide.
He tosses several more into the air, plucking
from a different sigil each time and every time what he creates is of an
equally beautiful quality. As a closing act he plucks one from the
opposite arm and turns to face Londi, letting it
spark in his hands for a moment before snapping his fingers against it.
Closing in on itself before forming in a brilliant, sparkling display,
the ring forms above her head then settles gently down until all at once
she is surrounded. It gently undulates around
her, and she is afraid to move inside of it for what might happen.
“It’s okay. Go ahead,” he invites. “Feel it.”
So she does, and each time it is like passing her hand through a frozen fog.
Noah feels himself growing exponentially
fatigued, and so with a small groan he breaks concentration and the ring
disintegrates into nothing, leaving their eyes seeing nothing but dense
splotches in the wake of its brilliant light.
“Well?”
“It… you weren’t lying,” she says. She rolls up
the sleeve of Noah’s jacket to reveal her wrist, running her thumb over
the spot where she’d let him draw a tiny, abstract looking symbol not
two weeks before. He’d claimed it was to ease
her mind, to protect her against any bullies she might attract as a
result of his friendship. She hadn’t believed him then, and the way she
looks at it now in light of the demonstration suggests a mixture of
disbelief and horror yet neither is true. More than
anything it’s a puzzled sense of belief, albeit one that is threatening
to make her float up and away out of her own head.
“No, I wasn’t,” he responds quietly.
“This is for protection?” Londi asks, reaffirming what he’d told her when he’d drawn it.
“Your life has not been entirely kind,” Noah
says, a trace of embarrassment in his voice. “But you have been kind to
me all the same. I try and protect my allies wherever I can, because I
know others will not.”
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