Demon Accords 8: College Arcane (50 page)

Shaking out my stiff hands, I stood up and
grabbed a pair of handcuffs which I started to snap onto Chris’s
wrists.

“Don’t break these. They’re just for
learning. I had to borrow them from Darci,” I said, snapping
additional pairs on Arkady, Tanya, Lydia, Nika, and Stacia. They
just sat there, cuffed, looking at me expectantly.

“Now mentally say the
word
aperi,
as you
think of your wrists,
”
I said.

“Latin for open?” Arkady asked, even as six
sets of cuffs popped open.

Next I pulled out some plastic wrist
restraints, which I put on them.

“Again, these obviously
wouldn’t hold any of you, but it’s the thought that counts,” I
said. “And the thought is
scalpere.”

“Slice?” Lydia questioned. They tried it and
all six restraints each fell into four pieces, but not at the same
time.

“We’re using Latin because you don’t think in
it all the time. Can’t have you thinking of slicing something and
your favorite necklace or bracelet falls into four chunks,
right?”

I grabbed some plastic neckbands for them to
practice with. On the second runthrough, Chris counted down from
three and they all sliced their bands at the same time.

Then he grabbed a nearby duffle and produced
seven sets of fancy metal collars with lights on them. He gave us
each one and then pulled out a square plastic box with two lights
on it, one green, one red.

“These are linked to each other and the box.
Put them on. You too, Declan,” he said.

We each snapped the simple clasp shut on our
necks. It didn’t bother me, but only an idiot would miss the
hesitation that they all showed at the collars. When all seven were
on, the green LED on the box lit up.

“If we touch these or mess with them, the red
light comes on and the collars all buzz,” Chris said, reaching up
and tugging his own. Instantly, my collar buzzed and I felt a
shock.

“Ow,” Lydia said.

“Oh yeah, we also get shocked,” Chris said
with a grin. The light was red, but after a few seconds, it went to
green.

“Alright. On the count of three, think of the
Latin word for slice. One, two, three,” he counted.

All seven collars fell apart and the green
light never changed. Awasos picked up a broken collar in his jaws
and started to chew it.

“Too easy,” Arkady rumbled.

“I agree. It should have taken more practice
to synchronize,” Tanya said, turning to me.

“Ah, I made the spell so that it sorta
self-synchronizes if everyone is pretty close to the same mark. You
told me about the bomb collars and I thought we shouldn’t leave it
to chance,” I said.

Chris turned to the others. “See?”

“Yeah, kid you’re gonna fit right in,” Lydia
said.

“Provided you’ve decided to play for team
Demidova this summer?” Chris asked.

“Yeah about that,” I began. The vampires went
very still, only Chris and Stacia still showing human movement. I
quickly held up both hands. “I still want to, but I’m not sure
you’re gonna still want me.”

“Why, Declan?” Tanya asked, cocking her head
and frowning.

I reached into my book bag of magic supplies
and pulled out Sorrow’s previous home, tossing it to Chris.

“I found the Book of Darkest Sorrow. Well,
actually, it found me. Only it’s not in there anymore,” I explained
as he pawed through the blank pages.

“Where is it? And how did you get it?” Tanya
asked.

I explained that the witch fight, which they
knew about, was actually driven by Sorrow and was fully directed at
me. Then I told them about the elves, Ariel, Neeve’s Black Frost
blade as Ian had called it, and the wound in my side.

“But it was indestructible?” Chris asked.

“My aunt feels that it allowed itself to be
punctured in such a manner that my skin got opened, too. Then it
could transfer itself inside me,” I said, pulling up my t-shirt so
they could see spells in black ink appear on my stomach as I
thought about them.

“What does this mean?” Stacia asked.

“That I have a semi-sentient
five-hundred-year-old grimoire from an evil German witch inside me.
We think it has an agenda and it wanted me for that agenda.”

“That explains your aunt’s rather cryptic
comment. I asked her if you had mentioned the summer job and she
said we probably didn’t want two for one,” Chris said. “When I
pressed further, she said that you would tell as what she
meant.”

“Yeah, I can’t imagine you’d still want me
for an employee,” I said.

“Why?” Tanya asked.

“Hello, evil book trying to take over my
powers and then the world?” I said.

“Hello, vampire who craves your blood where
you stand,” she said back without any sarcasm. “Any others here
want to bite Declan?”

Arkady, Lydia, and Nika all raised theirs
hands. Not gonna lie, it was a more than a bit creepy that they all
wanted to drink my blood.

“I have to work real hard to keep from
ripping the hearts out of men who make obscene comments to me,”
Stacia said. “Somehow, they think it will make me want them and it
does—torn open and bleeding out.”

“I have days when it’s best I don’t drive in
traffic because my road rage is not like everyone else’s road rage.
Grim would really like to clear traffic and his proposed methods
are… outside the box,” Chris said.

“Okay, I get what you’re saying. But this is
different. What you’re talking about is part of you. Sorrow isn’t
part of me. It’s alien and aware and constantly trying to influence
me or trick me. I can’t trust its spells and if it wins, things
will be really bad.”

“I presume your aunt is working on getting it
out of you?” Chris asked.

“Yes, of course,” I said.

“Well, we can offer her unimaginable
resources. There are books in private vampire collections that
haven’t been seen in a thousand years. Plus, where better for you
to be than in a group like us if you do get taken over. You are
aware that Nika is one of the most powerful telepaths in the world,
right?” Chris argued.

“Wait, you still want me on the team?” I
asked.

“Yeah, we do. Listen Declan, aside from the
fact that we like you, I don’t think you understand the value that
you bring to us. You are the most powerful male witch known, as
well as one of the most powerful witches, period. Beyond that, your
particular skillset is uniquely suited to help us deal with a
threat we feel is fast approaching all mankind,” he said.

I must have frowned because Tanya answered my
unspoken question. “Technology, Declan. Particularly artificial
intelligence. Like Stephen Hawking, we feel the achievement of AI
might be an extinction-level event.”

“Now with the global awareness of the
supernatural, governments all over the planet are putting more
resources into finding counters to the threats of vampires, weres,
and demons, mostly with technology,” Lydia said.

“You think it’ll happen soon?” I asked.

Chris and Tanya exchanged a glance. “We think
it may have already happened, at least once, maybe more. We need
your help to find out,” Chris said.

“Me? You must have the best hackers?” I
asked.

“We do. But we don’t know of anyone that can
do what you do, though—what you did with that robot during
yesterday’s game,” Lydia said.

“Oh, yeah. I can see how that might be
helpful in tracking the ghost in the machine,” I admitted. “What
makes you think there is an AI out there?”

“Do you remember the Tomahawk missile?” Chris
asked.

“Yeah, it was on the news. Supposedly a
training accident. That’s bullshit, right?” I asked.

“Thing is, we tracked down the captain of
that boat. The Navy cashiered him after that, but it was all a
cover-up. Nika read him like a book. He has no idea how the missile
launched. It just launched itself and assigned itself the exact
coordinates that we happened to be occupying. He was thoroughly
disturbed by what happened, which was supposed to be impossible,”
Chris said.

“Then, during the battle for Washington, or
rather, at the end of it, that Star Wars weapon opened fire. Again,
we haven’t been able to find out where any order originated to use
it. Everyone with supposed control was left baffled. Our lead
computer guy, who you will meet, is of the strong opinion that a
powerful government program got away from its tenders,” Stacia
said.

“And you think I can help?” I asked.

“Can you? If we put you onboard that sub,
could you look for traces of something like that?” Chris asked.

I thought about it for a moment, remembering
things I done in and to my high school’s computer. “Yeah. Very
possibly I could.”

“Can he be trusted? Stealing the witch’s book
may have been his plan,” Arkady suddenly interjected.

“What? I get myself stuck by
some Fairie death weapon so that an alien book can invade me, all
to steal it from you, after it came looking for
me
, and then I
tell
you about it? That’s insane,” I
said.

“Is insane? Or clever like fox?” he
asked.

“Oh,” I said as the answer
came to me. “Oh, you’re saying that to prod me into opening up my
shields so that
she
,” I pointed to Nika, “can probe my brain. Clever.”

“Clumsy. I told you so,” Lydia said to the
giant vampire.

Chris frowned. “You
didn’t
tell me, though,
did you?” he asked, angry.

“Because you would have said
no. You are biased where
he’s
concerned,” Lydia said, not backing
down.

“But that doesn’t give you the right to—” he
started, but I interrupted with, “I’ll do it.”

“What?” Tanya asked me, forcing the others to
stop glaring at each other.

“I’ll do it. Open my shields. Here,” I said,
turning toward Nika and dropping my mental protections.

Keine!
I paused, frowning. The others looked baffled, but Nika looked
fascinated.

“Internal conversation. Somebody is
backsliding into German again,” I said.

“He is open and honest. Very brave too,
telling us about the book. He thought we might kill him. There is…
another. Odd, it slips away from me. This is fascinating,” Nika
said.

“You thought we might
kill
you? And you came
anyway?” Chris rounded on me.

“That’s not how we taught you, Declan,” Tanya
admonished. “You don’t go headfirst into dangerous territory.”

“
You
do all the time, and anyway, I
only thought it was a
possibility.
A low one. I didn’t think you really would. I was
pretty certain that you wouldn’t hire me,
though.”

“Satisfied?” Chris asked Lydia and Arkady,
his voice cold. They both glanced at Nika, who was still staring at
my head, eyes focused like she was trying to peel it
telekinetically. She nodded once without looking away. They, in
turn, looked back at Chris and nodded without any sign of
self-consciousness.

“Declan, I’m sorry. I’ll understand if this
changes things,” he said.

“I actually like that they will protect you
even if it pisses you off. That’s cool. I’d want to check me out
too if I were you guys,” I said.

“Really,” he said. “You’re still on board?” I
nodded.

“And the tattoos really work. We’ll be
testing them further and you can tweak or adjust them if we need
to, right?” he asked.

“Something like that. We’ll see how the magic
holds in them. I may boost them every few years or so,” I said.

“Okay, great. Anything else we should go
over?” he asked.

I hesitated. There was, but I didn’t know how
to approach it.

“Head on,” Nika said to me. I glanced at her
and she nodded encouragingly. Still, this was touchy. How would he
react?

“Go on. You saw how he was with them,” Nika
said. Curiosity was killing the rest of them.

“I, ah, wondered if there was something you
might let me try… on you?” I asked Chris. He raised both eyebrows,
first at me, then Nika. She just smiled.

“When I study for tests, there’s a spell I
use. It helps me during the tests. I don’t think it’s cheating; it
just helps me… remember,” I said.

Stacia sucked a deep breath and the vampires,
other than Nika, all went stock still. Chris rocked back, eyes
locked on mine, face unreadable.

“It’s very light. Very safe—it’s my mom’s
spell, from her book. Not Sorrow’s,” I said.

Sorrow flooded my mind with better spells,
much more powerful memory enhancers.