Raised in Fire (Fire and Ice Trilogy Book 2)
Raised in Fire
Fire and Ice Trilogy, 2
K.F. Breene
Contents
Raised in Fire
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
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Epilogue
Also by K.F. Breene
About the Author
Copyright © 2017 by K.F. Breene
All rights reserved. The people, places and situations contained in this ebook are figments of the author’s insane imagination and in no way reflect real or true events.
Cover by:
Eric Wilkerson
http://ericwilkersonart.com/
Raised in Fire
The exciting continuation of the Top 10 Amazon Bestseller by USA Today Bestselling author, K.F. Breene!
It is a common truth in my life that when it rains, it pours.
The killings that once plagued New Orleans are cropping up again in Seattle. The local office is stumped. I’m called out to lend a fresh set of eyes, and my unique magical touch.
It’s only when I get there that I realize the Seattle office isn’t stumped at all.
They’re being silenced by the Mages’ Guild, a corrupt magical institution that doesn't want word to get out of what is plaguing the city. Worse, news of my magic might’ve slipped down to the underworld, hitting the ears of some extremely powerful demons.
What I thought was a routine murder investigation turns into a fight for my life. With the help of Darius, my stalker elder vampire, and my dual-mage side kicks, I somehow have to dodge the Guild in order to stop one of the most powerful demons I’ve ever encountered. If I don’t? It’ll escape back down below with proof of what I really am.
My life hangs in the balance, and this time, I can't see a way out.
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Chapter One
A light breeze ruffled Agnon’s oily black feathers. The being sat on a hillside, soaking in the pleasant heat of the afternoon sun. Below it, nestled into the golden hills of Northern California, ran a dull gray track. Metal boxes of all shapes and sizes moved along it, bending and twisting with the contours of the land.
Such stupid creatures, humans. Nothing but walking carcasses waiting for their expiration date.
Agnon closed its eyes and homed in on its duty. It had been sent topside for a specific purpose. Rumor had it the Great Master finally had an heir, a daughter powerful enough to rule the vast kingdom of the underworld in his stead—and if Agnon succeeded in validating the rumor, its superior would bestow a higher level of power unto it.
It was getting ahead of itself. It was mere hearsay. Silly babbling from the unworthy, who gained their pale knowledge from witches playing at magic.
Witches.
Delusional creatures. They thought their chalk and their books could contain someone as powerful as Agnon. They chanted and they danced, issuing commands they had no business voicing.
The being shuddered in annoyance and dug its claws into the soft dirt of the hillside.
Regardless, they served a purpose. The being would allow them their misguided conceptions of power. For now.
From the north flew a nearly solid blot of black, twisting and turning against the deep blue of the sky. The throng drifted apart for a moment, revealing the hundreds of individual birds that massed into a whole. It immediately regrouped and changed direction, heading Agnon’s way.
The being could feel the evil emanating from the inky mass, even from the distance. The aswang was old, and it was strong. At least the witches had gotten one thing right.
The birds thrummed by Agnon before altering course, circling.
“Go,” Agnon shouted. “You have your orders. Find Reagan Somerset. Infect her.”
The throng twisted again, now heading east.
The aswang thought it would be passing its evil to a new host. And maybe it would, if the girl Agnon sought was nothing more than a powerful human bound to this world. But if the aswang’s seed couldn’t take root, Agnon would have the first sign that its purpose topside was of utmost importance. That the Great Master had a capable successor.
It was well known that the Great Master longed for a disciple. Only once had it nearly happened, but the mortal elements of the son’s body had finally withered away. That would not be the case with this new find, or so it was whispered. The girl had the blood of gods on her mother’s side, as well as her father’s. That was the secret elixir. She could survive.
If she was genuine.
Rumors of this magnitude had surfaced before. Once in every few human life spans, actually. Mages more powerful than their peers. Humans with the unique ability to summon fire. To feel the pulse of magic. To unravel spells.
In each case, the Great Master had gotten his hopes up. Found the human in question. Taken him or her to the heart of the Dark Kingdom.
The result had always ended in mortal death.
Agnon had been sent to scout the truth of the rumor before the Great Master was informed of the possibility. It was better for all involved. If true, a select few would reap impossible rewards. If false, no detriment would ensue.
Pausing for a fraction of a moment to feel the sun warming its back, something that lasted an hour in human terms, Agnon spread its great wings and launched into the sky.
Below, in one of the cars winding along the California highway, a child looking out of a car window saw a great black bird sail above. “Look, Mom! What kind of bird is that?”
“What’s that, honey?”
But it was too late. The winged creature was already gone, beating the air with its magnificent wings, shedding blue magic in its wake. Waiting for the aswang to infect the girl.
Chapter Two
I dangled my hands to the sides of my chair and stared up at the beige ceiling. My gum popped as I chomped it, taking out my boredom on the watermelon Bubblicious.
“Reagan, we got something.”
I turned my head without raising it from the back of my chair. I wasn’t even slouching at this point—I was trying to lie down without actually dropping to the floor.
Clarissa, the healing witch employed by the Magical Law Enforcement office, or MLE, filled the entryway of my cube. Her frizzy blond hair had long since escaped the bun in which she’d tried to contain it. “We got something. Wanna come?”
“What is it?” I asked, my tone flat.
Her blue eyes blinked within black-framed glasses. She grinned and shook the sheet of paper clutched in her hand. “A partial beheading. They have no idea who did it.”
A jolt of fire ran up my spine, but I didn’t let it push me to sitting. Not yet. I’
d been fooled one too many times by promises of magical mayhem wrapped in mystery, only to arrive on scene and discover the MLE agent had embellished the situation. More often than not, it would take all of fifteen minutes to solve the case, and then I’d have to loiter off to the side while the agent did paperwork. It was annoying, especially when the car ride was long and the agent was unnecessarily chatty. Like Clarissa.
Using the papers that Darius, the vampire whom I’d worked a case with a while ago, had made, saying I was a legal—though completely fictitious—person, I’d gotten a full-time job in the MLE office as a peacekeeper. I’d figured I would be out running around, dodging spells and fighting for my life.
Instead, I sat in this boring cube with a mountain of paperwork and an uncomfortable chair. Occasionally I got to get out of the office, sure, but we were encouraged to use our words to pacify the situations, not our fists.
What did I know about using words? That wasn’t my style at all.
What a bunch of hooey.
If it weren’t for the regular paycheck, which kept me from dipping into the stash of cash I’d earned from completing the job for Darius, I would’ve walked away by now.
Well, that, and getting my chance to show up Garret the douche, the single most annoying peacekeeper in the MLE. It was going to happen. I wanted to be the rightful king of the office, the agent everyone thought was the best.
I just needed that chance.
“Who was beheaded?” I asked, watching Clarissa for signs of lying. She was a wily one when she wanted someone else to do her work.
“An older witch. The human police on scene thought it might’ve been done by a sword.”
“What else?”
She hesitated. “What do you mean?”
“What else is there to the case? A sword attack is pretty tame. Was the victim held by a hook in his navel over a simmering pot of mysterious potion or something?”
Things I’d learned about myself during the two months on the job: I got really gruesome when routinely bored.
“Or maybe the aggressor is still on scene somewhere, waiting to strike again?” I continued. “Because that could be a good time.”
“Psycho.” My annoying coworker Garret’s voice carried through the gray cube wall separating our desks. It was my boss Captain Lox’s terrible humor to put our desks so close together.
My hands curled into fists despite my best efforts to remain calm. “I wasn’t talking to you, Garret.”
“Good. I don’t want your crazy rubbing off on me,” he said in an elevated voice. Someone in our cube farm of an office snickered. “You should just shove off. We don’t need your kind around here.”
“And what kind is that, Garret? Competent?”
“Vampire lovers, that’s what kind. You should go back out onto the streets where you belong.”
“I am not a vampire lover, you donkey. I am stalked by the buggers. Not my fault.”
“Whatever, freak,” he said.
“Sticks and stones, Garret. Sticks and stones.” I rolled my eyes. “Speaking of sticks, did you take my advice and head to the gym? I worry about you. One wrong move and a leg might crack. Feebleness has a cure, my dear boy. Movement. You should try it.”
“I move plenty, or hasn’t anyone told you who reigns as king around these parts?”
See? He always had that on me. It instantly invalidated every rebuttal.
“Anyway,” Clarissa said in a slightly shaking voice. The office personnel got a little on edge when Garret and I disagreed. Our past was fraught with…incidents. “There isn’t any potion or anything, no. But he might’ve shown signs of struggle.”
“Might’ve?”
“Well, he was sitting in a chair when it happened—”
“Nope,” I said, turning my head back toward the ceiling.
“They think it was a magical sword that holds power—”
“Nope,” I said again. “I was hired on for the more dangerous, robust cases. This was assigned to you for a reason. It sounds pretty tame. You don’t need me.”
“C’mon, Reagan, please? It’ll take you two seconds to solve the case. It’s girls’ night out tonight. I don’t want to miss it. Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve gotten out of the house without kids? Please. I really need this.”
I hated sob stories that involved missing a party. They pulled at my heartstrings.
The slide of my boots across the clean desk surface preceded the thunk of them hitting the ground. No clumps of dirt flaked off. Yet another sign that the job was too slow.
I missed my bounty hunter gig.
“You’ll come?” Clarissa said, bouncing up and down. Being that she was mid-forties and had birthed a few kids, there was a lot bouncing up and down with her.
“Yeah, sure, but I’m leaving directly after. I’m not going to hang around while you do paperwork.”
“Pushover,” Garret drawled.
I gritted my teeth, trying to keep a surge of violence at bay. Captain Lox had told me I couldn’t physically assault Garret. If I had a problem, I was supposed to take it through the proper channels. That was apparently how offices in the Brink ran, and MLE was trying to do things by the book. This was explained to me after our first “episode.” Garret had harassed me (office language for being a dick) shortly after I started working at MLE full-time—he’d said you’ve got a big ass, and I had (understandably) punched him in the mouth, shaking loose a tooth. We’d both had to sit through hours of videos on why each of us had behaved badly. On that occasion, everyone more or less agreed he’d deserved it, but I had been warned that when he didn’t deserve it, I’d get a red flag in my file. Three red flags, and I’d be fired.
Three flags had come and gone rather quickly. The captain had quietly boosted my flag limit to five.
I was now sitting pretty at four and doing pretty good, if I said so myself. When Garret was absolutely unbearable, I waited until after hours, followed him in the shadows, and then punched him in the mouth.
He’d had a lot of trips to the dentist in the last couple months. It hadn’t kept him from continuing to badger me.
The hot and sticky air coated my exposed skin the moment we left the cool of the air-conditioned building. I grimaced as I followed Clarissa to her car, and slipped my phone into the leather pouch at my waist. It jostled a bunch of casings filled with spells that were weak and mostly useless. The office kept us stocked up, and even though they weren’t great, they were free. I’d keep putting my hand out for free spells, no problem.
“I’ll debrief you while we’re on the way,” Clarissa said after we were in and she’d started up the engine.
“You don’t have to. I can just take a look for myself when we get there.”
“This one is tricky, though.” She gave a little laugh, condescending in nature. It was very mage-like of her. “It has some serious magical elements. The mage work will surely be above your expertise, since, you know, you aren’t a mage.”
She’d said that before. I didn’t bother to argue. It wasted time.
Instead, I stared out at the darkening sky, letting my mind wander as she drove us to the crime site. Being a secret department within the Brink law enforcement, we were often called in after the “real” detectives had taken their pictures, written their notes, and noticed all the little details. All but a select few thought we were psychics and mystics, and even those select few often made a show of rolling their eyes when we came on scene. It was quite the change from the bounty hunter days, let me tell you. There’d been no rolled eyes on that detail, but there’d been plenty of shifty eyes and shiftier perps. Chases had been the norm rather than the exception.
Perp. Since when did I call them that instead of a mark? This job had changed me for the worse. Made me soft. Made me follow rules.
“What was that sound for?” Clarissa asked as we parked beside a patrol car.
“What sound?” I asked, pushing open the door of her old Honda.
“
The yelch sound. Is it the smell of my car? I’ve tried to clean it, but I can’t find the source.”
I was no stranger to the lingering smell of decay that was Clarissa’s car. It smelled like a poopy diaper had been dropped between the seats and left to rot. Being that her oldest was beyond diaper-wearing age, I couldn’t even speculate what had created the foul odor. But like everyone else familiar with the smell of her car, I knew to religiously breathe through my mouth when getting a ride from her.
“No, it wasn’t that. It’s nothing,” I said, waiting for her to drape her satchel filled with magical supplies over her shoulder.
“Oh good. I thought it was getting better. That’s great to hear.”
I ignored the comment so I wouldn’t have to lie.
“You have to leave the weapons in the car. We can’t take those in.” She pointed at the sword on my back.
“I have a license to carry.” I patted the gun strapped to my leg.
“Okay, but…” She pointed at my sword again. “The license doesn’t encompass a sword. I’m pretty sure we’re not supposed to carry those.”
“I don’t see the problem. I’m a nerd. Nerds love swords. Everyone knows that.” I tsked and smiled good-naturedly. “We’re the weird stepchildren of the police department. They won’t question us.”
Without waiting for an answer, because I knew they would question us if given half a chance, as they had tried in the past, I stalked forward. People got confused with moving targets. One thing was for certain: I did not plan to take off my weapons. Anything could happen, and hopefully would. I didn’t want to have to run away because I had nothing to fight with.
A police officer stood in front of an open doorway blocked off with yellow tape. Upon seeing us, he put his hand out. “No one is permitted inside.”
“We’re the special investigation unit.” Clarissa held out a paper badge encased in a canvas slip—the kind with a plastic viewing area and strings that could be worn around the neck. The MLE office wouldn’t even splurge for plastic badges; ours were printed via laser jet.