Uprising: The Magi Saga (Tales of the Magi Saga Book 1) Page 2

  She walked over, her trainers crunching the gravel beneath her feet. She passed close to the edge of the building as she walked and looked down into the courtyard far below. She recognised the large paved area, the dilapidated play park and the usual locals and residents walking and standing down there.

  Was this the right thing to do? She hadn’t been back here for so long now. It felt like a lifetime ago, and yet, it was only two years. So much had happened to her in those two years. She’d lost everything but also gained so much as well. It all felt a little overwhelming when she really thought about it.

  With the most recent events she had been involved with, though, she needed some time to think things through, to go back, to see the life she had left behind.

  She knew that her mentor Amanda had done something similar during her time as a Magus, visiting the orphanage she had grown up in back in Ireland. She’d even somehow managed to get an old friend of hers involved in the hidden world that Liz, Amanda, Gentle Water and the others were now a part of. She hoped nothing like that happened here, though. She had enough on her plate without getting a friend possessed or bitten by a Vampire.

  She reached the door and tried the handle, predictably finding it locked. She’d guessed this would happen, not that it would be an issue for her. She summoned up some Essentia and with a quick force of will, aimed a matter rip effect that the lock. The whole area of the lock and around it looked like it had been suddenly attacked with a flurry of hammer blows in the space of a split second, reducing the lock to a ruin of metal.

  Liz pulled on the door again, swinging it open easily with a metallic squeak and stepped inside, out of the wind and down a few steps into a service area with some caged off pipes and machinery and various bits of cleaning gear, tools and other items of the caretaker trade.

  She quickly found a doorway and attempted a more focused and less destructive version of the same effect. With a clunk, the door swung free.

  This time she’d managed to ruin the lock, but the door would close and stay closed. She smiled at her minor triumph and walked through, closing the door behind her as she stepped into the corridor beyond the door.

  Memories flooded back, triggered by the familiar sounds and smells of the block that had once been her home. The walls might as well be made of paper for all the soundproofing they provided, and she could hear mums shouting at their kids, children running riot, televisions blaring out the soccer game.

  Soccer game? Jeez, she’d been in America too long. She wondered which football teams were playing, was it a local derby? She didn’t care really.

  She moved off down the corridor and soon found the central flight of stairs that would take her down to the floor she wanted to be on. She could take the elevator, sure, but it just didn’t feel right. She wanted to take her time, to see her old haunt again. She started down the stairs and made her way through level after level, floor after floor, passing a couple of people she didn’t recognise.

  She’d lived on the third floor and didn’t really come up much beyond the fifth, so these upper ten floors were new to her really. She soon made it down nine floors only to find herself pausing on the block’s sixth level, wondering what she might find down here, who she might see. She’d had a few casual friends who lived in the building, but she’d grown apart from them during the last year or so that she’d lived here. Instead, she spent more and more time with her sister, Fran, and the two boys, Stephen and Ben that they had grown closer to through their shared interest in the occult.

  She felt sure that most of her old friends who lived here would likely still be around, doing whatever it was they did here.

  What was it that they used to do? She had difficulty remembering actually. Whatever it was it was of little consequence. It made her laugh to think about it now, they’d thought themselves so important, so clued into what was really going on in the world, and yet they really had no clue at all.

  She rounded the corner and descended the next flight of stairs to the window that looked out over the courtyard before doing a one hundred and eighty degree turn and walking down the next flight to the fifth floor, finding that she recognised some of this now. Some of the stains on the walls and the graffiti that accompanied them seemed familiar.

  Turning again to drop down the next flight of steps, she saw three girls with their back to her, leaning against the bannister and looking out over the courtyard. Her enhanced hearing picked up the sound of one of the girls chewing gum while her nose recoiled at the stench of cigarette smoke that surrounded them.

  They seemed familiar to her, and it gave her pause for a moment, wondering if she really wanted to walk past them. They were bound to turn around.

  Well, she came here to confront her past, why flinch from it now?

  She started to make her way down the next flight of steps, approaching the girls below her.

  The one on the right turned and looked at her and gave her a curious look.

  Liz recognised her immediately, it was Tracie. Like most of the kids on these estates, you soon learnt to take care of yourself because life here was tough. Many of the children that lived here came from broken families. Many of them were also the victims of abuse or neglect, and that led to bullying and fights. There was a distinct hierarchy here as well, and you did well to remember your place in it and give respect to those who would otherwise hurt you if you didn’t. Of course, by respect, that usually meant giving up your pocket money, or for the older kids, if you were unlucky, your phone or other stuff. If you didn’t, you’d return home with a black eye or missing some teeth.

  Liz had always been the quiet one, her twin sister, though, Francesca, was anything but. She was always loud and confident and acted as something of a protector around Liz. Liz always hated going anywhere without Fran. Fran could handle herself and always gave as good as she got. She didn’t take any shit from any of the bullies and made sure that Liz didn’t either. But Fran couldn’t be there all the time. On more occasions than she cared to remember Liz had run afoul of Tracie and her friends. It usually ended with her losing some money or some clothes, only for Fran to seek revenge later. Sure, it was nice to have such a strong and protective sister, but when Fran beat up Tracie and her mates, it only served to piss them off further, so the next time Liz was caught alone, things were worse.

  That was then, though, and this was now, and everything had changed.

  Tracie just stared at her as Liz walked down the stairs. Liz chanced a couple of glances at Tracie but otherwise did her best to ignore her. She wasn’t scared of her anymore. When you’ve faced off against Murderous Nomad Magi who want you dead, or enormous werewolves who want to eat your insides, the local bully isn’t really going to cut it anymore. But even so, she really wasn’t in the mood to deal with the likes of Tracie.

  Tracie, though, had other ideas it seemed. As Liz reached the landing and went to make the turn to go down the next flight of stairs, suddenly Tracie moved and slid in front of her.

  ‘Liz, it is you isn’t it?’

  Tracie was entirely too close to her, so Liz took half a step back, so they weren’t all but touching each other.

  ‘Tracie, good to see you, how’ve you been?’

  Tracie took a long drag on her cigarette, looking at Liz through the smoke, before she stopped, removed it from her mouth and blew the smoke in Liz’s face. ‘Where’ve you been hiding then?’ Tracie asked.

  Liz could see the other two girls had turned to look now, wondering what this little confrontation was all about. Liz knew them too, they were Tracie’s closest friends, Courtney and Barb. Both of them just as bad as Tracie was.

  ‘Fuck me, is that little Lizzy?’ Courtney said between loud chews of her gum.

  ‘Bloody ‘ell, it is,’ Barb said.

  ‘Where’ve you been these past few years then hey? And where’s your sister?’ Tracie asked, stepping in closer.

  Liz sighed quietly, this was going about as well as she expected really. These t
hree were always causing trouble, and it looked like they were on the war path again.

  True, they had a history, so maybe it was inevitable, but Liz had hoped they might have grown out of it by now, matured a little? But then, two years really wasn’t a lot. Liz was seventeen now, getting towards eighteen, which put these three in that eighteen to nineteen range.

  Also, Liz had seen and done an awful lot over these two years whereas these three probably hadn’t even left the city let alone the country. This estate and this block where their territory, this was where they were strongest; this was where they had respect. When she thought about it, it didn’t really surprise her that they hadn’t really changed that much. We’re creatures of habit after all.

  Liz didn’t give any more ground. In fact, she leant into Tracie as she answered her. ‘Fran is dead, as is my mum, and what I was doing up there is none of your business.’

  Oh, that felt good. That felt magnificent actually. And seeing the look on Tracie’s face was just the icing on the cake really.

  ‘The fuck you say?’ Tracie said, looking incredulous.

  ‘Excuse me, I don’t have time for this,’ Liz said, hoping she could avoid the confrontation. She didn’t really want to have things get out of hand. Stepping sideways, Liz made to go around Tracie, but she moved too and blocked Liz’s path, pushing her face in towards Liz.

  ‘This little bitch needs to be reminded of how things are around here,’ Tracie said, apparently wanting back up from her mates, who stepped towards Liz as well.

  Liz sighed internally. She’d figured something like this would happen, so she wasn’t really very surprised. Well, she thought, here we go.

  Liz spotted the shifting of Tracie’s bodyweight as she moved to deliver a hit to Liz, broadcasting her attack way before it actually hit her. Watching the movement, it was almost comical.

  Only a few years ago she would have missed these details and had no clue of what to do, but things were very different now.

  Liz caught Tracie’s hand easily and wasted no time in giving it a sharp twist, spinning Tracie around and putting her into a painful arm lock. Liz knew the feeling well, she had been put into it many times during her training, it felt like your arm was about to pop from its socket.

  ‘Aaah,’ Tracie yelped.

  ‘What the hell,’ said one of the other girls?

  To her left, Courtney went for her, again, telegraphing her movements too far in advance. Liz lashed out and caught her in the face with a swift and sharp strike. Courtney also dropped to her knees with a yell, holding her bleeding nose and mouth in her hand.

  ‘Why you little…’ Barb hissed as she launched herself at Liz. With the heel of her hand, Liz broke the girl's nose before sweeping her legs with her foot, dropping her to the floor with a painful thud. Barb stayed there, whimpering.

  Liz turned her attention back to Tracie who was bent over before her still struggling in Liz’s arm lock, hissing and panting with the pain.

  ‘Want me to break it?’ Liz asked.

  ‘Fu… fuck you bitch,’ Tracie spat.

  ‘As you wish,’ Liz said and jerked Tracie’s arm. Liz heard the crack very clearly before she let go and Tracie dropped to the floor, crying with the pain.

  ‘Like I said, it’s none of your business, good day to you,’ she said and continued on down the stairs and away from the three bullies.

  She couldn’t help the smile that played over her face. She didn’t like hurting anyone, but sometimes, some people just deserved it. Those three girls had made her life on this estate a living hell for far too many years, so teaching them a little lesson like that felt amazing.

  She gained a new spring in her step as she descended a couple more floors before reaching the third where she turned away from the stairwell and started to make her way along an eerily familiar corridor. Memories of her time here, her life living here with her mum and her sister came flooding back. She’d walked these corridors countless times, and they were filled with memories, both good and bad.

  A few more steps on the front door to her old home came into view, and she couldn’t help the rush of emotion that filled her, choked her up and filled her eyes with tears.

  She missed her mum, but most of all she missed her sister. She loved her mother, but she was never as close to her as she was to her sister. She had many lovely memories of her mother, though, of her love and commitment. She worked all hours she could, working two jobs to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table, but in the process, left her and her sister to fend for themselves. They were often home alone for hours on end, some days they wouldn’t even see their mother.

  This naturally led to the relationship she had with Fran being a much stronger one. They were already twins, so their bond was already powerful, but their situation, the fact that they had to do everything themselves in the home, only made that relationship stronger.

  But now, now they were gone. Killed two years ago by supernatural forces that wanted something Liz and her friends had come into possession of.

  They had paid a high price, and there were times when Liz wondered if it had all been worth it.

  A Nomad Magus called Nate had killed her mother, but it had been an Inquisitor that had killed Fran. She held a special hatred for these Inquisitors, and one day she would exact her revenge on them, she would pay them back for what they had done to her.

  Liz shook her head, she didn’t like thinking like that, she hated that her head went to dark places when she thought back to the events that led to her becoming a Magus. They were dark times, difficult times filled with pain and tears, but her life had become so much more since. She had walked a path that so few people get to travel upon, and she knew that Fran would be proud of her, jealous, but proud. It was a thought that she tried to remember every day because that above everything else kept her going. She was doing this for her sister. She was living this life, learning about Magic and learning to look after herself because it was what Fran would have wanted.

  Looking at that once familiar door to the home she had once had, she considered having a look inside. She could use her Magic, send her senses into the apartment and see the new owners, see what they had done to it, to her and Fran’s room… But why? What was the point of that? It would likely only upset her, and the whole thing seemed like she was just living in the past. Trying to recapture those thoughts and feelings, but she knew that was impossible. The world had moved on. Other people lived there now and called it home, and who was she to go poking her nose in there?

  Her life wasn’t here anymore.

  Liz turned away and left the apartment block, heading back outside onto the streets.

  She wondered why she’d come here suddenly. Why was she doing this?

  She thought she’d wanted some time to think after recent events in New York, and Texas.

  Memories of that day filled her mind again, making her shudder with disgust at the thought of it.

  Dealing with Nomads was one thing, you expected them to be crazy and evil, that was kind of their thing, but when the threat came from other Arcadians, then things got a little more complicated.

  One of her earliest lessons with Amanda as she took her under her wing and started to teach her how to harness her Magic was about the various dangers she would encounter as a Magus. The factions she would encounter as she entered this world. She, along with her mentor Amanda, and Gentle Water were Arcadians, the largest Magi group whose primary purpose was to oppose the Nomads and to protect humanity. Then there were the Nomads, basically the bad guys. They worshipped dark gods called Archons and saw themselves as above humanity and prepared for their dread master's return by corrupting the masses and fighting the Arcadians. The Inquisition, by comparison, were a much newer group, these delusional Magi were a part of the Vatican and believed their Magic was, in fact, God-given and not Magic at all. They saw all other Magi as the pawns of Satan and hunted them down accordingly.

  These were fairly straightforwa
rd guidelines to follow, but when another Arcadian Coven, called the Magi Legion, took Amanda, Gentle Water and herself in for questioning, things grew a little more blurred.

  She known that they were after Amanda and they used Gentle Water and herself as leverage. The thought of being tied to that chair in that dirty cell, stripped and hurt by these so called Arcadians only made her shudder. She remembered the pain, the hits and punches, the screams of her friends, the whole nightmare.

  She had been used against her friend and mentor. She had been leverage, plain and simple. She hated that. The thought that someone who was supposed to be on their side, exploiting their love for each other for their own twisted gains, it made her sick.

  It reminded her of what happened to her mother and the parents of her friends, how the Nomad Nate had done the same thing, using their relationships with their parents against them.

  She walked up the suburban street and reached the corner of her former friend, Stephens’s road. Up there, on the left she thought, that’s where the reality of the world she would come to be a part of really revealed what it was capable of. That’s where they went on the run, that’s where they had first encountered the Inquisitors, and that’s where her life had truly changed.

  ‘Liz Fox?’ said a voice from nearby.

  Liz blinked the growing tears away from her eyes and turned to look at whoever had just called her name.

  A young man stood there, just a little older than her, in his mid-twenties maybe wearing a leather jacket and jeans. He was a good looking man with a shape that suggested he worked out.

  ‘Um, yes, who are you?’ she asked.

  The man stepped forward with a smile as Liz shifted her vision into the Magical spectrum. The world around her suddenly glowed with a silver light as the ebb and flow of the local Essentia was suddenly visible to her. She spotted the Aegis, the Magical shield around this man straight away. He was a Magus, like her.

  ‘It is you, great!’ the man offered her his hand. ‘Richard, I’m with a local Coven, it’s such a pleasure to meet you. I’ve heard so much about you… well, about Amanda, but, you too. What brings you to London?’