Black Spark (Dark Magic Enforcer Book 1) Read online

  Feeling like someone had kicked me in the side of the head while wearing dirty and insanity-stained rugby boots stolen from a three centuries old corpse, I left the scene of my crime behind me, heading down to the smaller parks where there were less people and away from the swarming media and police, where I'd killed somebody for being a bad loser.

  I was still fizzing like an out-of-date bottle of Pepsi with a slow leak—it seemed I had a real aversion to getting wet—but it was so subtle nobody would notice unless they were real close. I didn't intend to let that happen again.

  Things went from bad to worse.

  "Who's been a naughty boy then?" came a voice from up above me. What the hell, up above?

  "There's going to be trouble," came another annoying sound, this time a man.

  Something was off with their vocal cords, like they were talking but breathing out at the same time—it's hard to explain. I didn't even flinch. Yeah, tough guy, right? Not really, I just knew it was what would be called normal in my usual life—if I knew what that was.

  "Go away, I'm busy," I said, staring up at the two "people" sat in the tree with their legs dangling over a branch like they'd been there for hours waiting for me.

  "Not as busy as you will be. Somebody wants to see you," came the strange lilt of the woman.

  She wasn't quite right, the guy either. They were intense somehow, and everything else faded away like an extreme case of tunnel vision, or the way you are just drawn to some people. An inexplicable presence or charisma. But this wasn't in a good way, this was in a run-away-as-these-dudes-are-messed-up way.

  "Who?" I couldn't help myself. At least I was getting somewhere. Maybe.

  "Who do you think?" said the man, voice almost hypnotic, his words trying to squirm into my head.

  I had no idea what he was talking about.

  My tattoos danced about my arms as if alive at their presence, and I felt something slam down hard in my head—a rusted steel shutter stopping them getting in and making me do things I didn't want to.

  "He's doing it again. So annoying," whined the woman. They clearly didn't appreciate the denial of entry.

  "We'll be seeing you soon," said the man.

  They jumped down and stood in front of me, scowling at my arms and at me in general, like I was a disappointment.

  I guess I was.

  I thought it would be a fight there and then. They smiled this weird smile at me, all exposed teeth, sharp and pointy canines just like you'd expect. It was an act—who smiles so their teeth show like that? They looked stupid. They also looked freaking terrifying.

  There was an almost overwhelming urge to turn around and see who was staring at me. Like that funny feeling that washes over you sometimes when you are somewhere incongruous, maybe in the newsagents buying a paper and you half expect the bulbous-headed Toad King to peek out from behind a shelf and lick his lips. Or is that just me?

  These were not pretty, mesmerizing characters, they were people you knew deep down in your bones were wrong. Their minds were on a different plane to mine and their movements were strange—like a few frames were missed out, making them jerky, running on a different frequency. They looked too old, as if they were weary but had no intention of giving up. Ever.

  I brushed past between them, a false bravado. My head was not ruling my decisions. There was this aura about them, like you could lose yourself in their eyes for eternity. They were waiting, waiting to drag me under and take me. No way.

  As I moved past, there was one hell of a tingle in parts I really didn't want to get involved, not with me being on the run and all.

  "See you soon," said the woman, and they laughed as I picked up speed. I turned a few moments later. They were gone.

  That's vampires for you, always got to be dramatic.

  Yes, I know. You're thinking, hang on, vampires, in the day, and not bursting into flames? Not gorgeous and impossible to resist? Nope, they were nasty looking, gave me the creeps, and had no problems coping with what passes for daylight and summer around what the locals refer to fondly as "Wet Wales," and for good reason.

  So how did they do it, these supposed ghouls of the night?

  Magic. From the Empty.

  It's not a place, not a thing, it's all there is when you get right down to it. It's the darkness behind matter that makes us all. It's what drives us, what allows us to be alive at all. This is the essence, that mysterious first flip of the switch that turns a collection of cells, or in some cases rocks or the air itself, into something more.

  It can be used; brought to life; change you. Like, I'm a wizard, although I don't care for the name. I don't think of myself like that. I'm just a kick-ass part time enforcer for the UK Dark Council, more specifically for Mage Rikka. But he doesn't own me, I'm what they call an Alone.

  It's the name they give to those like me, sentient beings that aren't part of a coven, a sect, a family, or whatever any particular species, race, creed or collective calls itself—as if it makes a difference in the long run.

  I answer to no man, woman, or entity. Well, that's not strictly true, but I'm not part of any of that nonsense. I will not be classified, categorized, or cauterized—I grew out of gangs a long time ago; it all seems so juvenile.

  But it has its drawbacks, this life I lead by choice, like when you kill someone and show the world magic exists and a couple of freakoid vampires come to taunt you and you don't know who you are or what to do next.

  Picking up speed once more, I got out of the damn parks, crossed a road without getting hit by a bus, and entered the outskirts of the city.

  *

  Ten minutes after walking through soaked and depressing streets lined with terraced, red brick Victorian houses—some with flaccid spiders of smoke clawing their way out of black chimneys even though it was summer—and crossing the main road that led to the city center, I was feeling a lot better.

  I had my bearings, remembered that I lived in Cardiff and, most importantly at this moment, I knew where the pharmacy was.

  Time to get a bit of a disguise going before the hunt was on for me and I got into even more trouble.

  The shopping district was packed, so chances were high this was the weekend. Who cared? I had more important things to worry about, at least I assumed I did.

  Bing-bong.

  I nearly lost it right there, but it was just the damn door making that weird noise to tell the woman behind the counter someone had come in. It was off though, like the batteries needed changing. The noise bounced around my head like a half-deflated beach ball. Stuff like that must drive you nuts. How many times would it happen every day?

  The place was busy. That's the damp Cardiff air for you. Everyone always has the sniffles, or a chest infection, and you can't walk five paces without someone coughing something gross into your face. I don't need to worry about that though—perks of being the Black Spark and all.

  I got what I wanted from the shelves after wasting precious minutes hunting around—why is there always so much choice in these places?—and stepped up to the counter.

  Money! Did I have any? Maybe I was down on my luck, or homeless, or one of those people that never carries it so they can annoy everyone else and amass a fortune by pleading poverty. I patted down my jacket pockets, then quickly put it on as the woman was looking at my arms funny—nice move, Faz.

  There was a cell phone, a wallet, and a slip of paper. I tried not to gulp at the contents of the wallet—money somehow permeating my fog of amnesia as I could see I was loaded—and gave a note to the woman.

  After giving me my change, she asked if I wanted a bag. I said, yes, and she asked for five pence. She looked at me funny over the top of her glasses. Maybe I pulled a face, or maybe she looks at everyone like that.

  I'd forgotten that you had to pay for bags now or carry your purchases loose. Why didn't she ask me before I paid? I changed my mind on principle, declined her offer, and stuffed the items in a pocket.

  Back on the street, I
picked the closest McDonald's, fought through the carnage of plastic food and plastic containers and plastic smiles of parents with pleading eyes silently imploring, "Save us. Is there nowhere else left to eat now our city is 'cosmopolitan?' Is this all there is?" and hurried through to the back where the toilets hid to deter passersby from braving the morning melee, instead deciding a bursting bladder was a small price to pay for freedom.

  And, please don't think bad of me, but I went into the disabled toilets. It was the only one where I could have a room to myself and I could lock it so no one came in. Honest. Look, I may be, well, me, but I'm not that callous.

  Jacket off, goodies on the sink, and ignoring the handsome but rather haunted and, I admit, freaked out and no-wonder-the-lady-in-the-pharmacy-looked-at-me-weird face, I took a deep breath and began cutting.

  My hair. My beautiful, black, shiny, straight as an imp's ear, gorgeous hair. I cut it all off. Hacked away like a lunatic let loose in a barber's shop with instructions to "have at it." You should have seen it, my hair was the business. Makes me cry just to think about it.

  Soon I was down to what I guess you would call urban chic. In other words, it looked like I'd cut my hair myself in a McDonald's toilets with shaky fingers while my eyes refused to focus and felt like I'd washed them in gravel—the bad kind, not the happy gravel we usually all love to use.

  To complete the "style," it was also obvious I'd gone all out and cut my locks with a pair of scissors for left-handers. How the hell that happened I will never know. But the cut was all the rage, so why not? Mind you, I didn't know that until later, and all I felt was like I'd committed the second truly terrible act of my so far very not at all fun morning.

  Next came the peroxide.

  Five minutes later, after sticking my head under the tap and then the drier—that made me feel like I was a dog sticking my head out the window on a car journey and wondering if my tongue was sticking out too—I looked like a new man. Not a better one, just a different one. I also found I had a mole on my neck.

  Gone was the dark, mysterious stranger, hello, blondie. It was all right, I guess. In fact I'm getting used to it. Kind of.

  Now, about that note.

  Putting the Pieces Together

  As I walked down the street, feeling strangely exposed without the familiar tickle of hair at my neck, and wondering if the blond clashed with my shirt, I dug out the paper from the inside jacket pocket and unfolded it.

  It was a receipt, just not one you are likely to have ever had. This was for services rendered, or maybe not, I couldn't recall. But it explained the cash in my wallet and the memory loss. I'd taken on a job, and clearly it hadn't gone quite as expected.

  There are a lot of us, enforcers, cleaning up the mess of others, dealing with people or species that get a little too carried away with what I'm going to stick to calling magic, although it's a word that doesn't do it justice or even hint at the truth. Let's say those with the ability to harness the Empty, that's closer to the reality of it anyway. Those known as Hidden, and for good reason.

  I may be an enforcer but I am not a killer. Yes, I've killed, but what happened in the park is not my usual behavior. I'm a bit of a softy really, although if you looked at me you'd see this cool, calm, kick-ass dude who doesn't get bothered by much at all and is always ready for action, but that goes with the job. It's not who I am.

  This guy does not go around kicking and punching people, telling them to hand over their cash, or else. I'm an enforcer, a magic enforcer, and that means I'm one of the good guys. I have been tasked with keeping us safe and upholding our, albeit often strange, rules—like the law but without the uniform or the need to fill out forms. A good guy.

  Or I was.

  Now it had all gone to hell because I'd killed someone, and done the worst thing possible in our Hidden world where bad shit happens all the time but nobody in the Regular world knows anything about it.

  I'd let the undead cat out of the coffin, and this was exactly what I was employed to stop happening. It's who I am. It's my identity. It's me.

  I've got a special talent. One I wouldn't wish on anybody. I have the ability to suck the Empty right out of you and send it back where it came from. It doesn't work on true Hidden, creatures born wholly of magic, and I can't just stare you down and BAM! you are normal again, but if you are, or were, human, then I can take the magic away and leave you empty inside.

  What I do is deal with those that get a little cocky or carried away with their use of magic, risking exposure for themselves and the rest of us.

  Except, and this is where things start to make sense, it takes a hell of a lot out of me. So much so that I often lose a few hours afterward, as the only way to get away from the insane pain, the sickness so deep it makes my bones weep, and the feeling of being ripped to bits by a load of annoyed trolls who then hand my still conscious carcass over to a shortage of dwarves, who know for a fact I stole their gold, is to sink down deep into blackness, cry for Grandma, and try to forget I was ever a person.

  Which I was. Still am to some extent.

  It explained the memory loss that suddenly came back to me when I opened the scrap of paper and realized I'd been on a job. Hopefully it had been successful, but judging by the state of me and what I did I wasn't so sure.

  "Hello, Faz."

  "Uh-oh."

  "That's a new look. Not trying to hide from us are you?" said one of the goons.

  Yeah, you guessed it, more vampires. But these weren't like the two relative beauties I met earlier, these were old dudes. Not in appearance, but in actual age. A few hundred years at least, so they were still fine walking around in the daylight, if you could call the weather daylight.

  The proper old ones, like thousands of years and more, the bosses, the Heads, they keep well away from the light. They sleep through the day or rest somewhere suitably dark and vampire-like, half-dead until the sun sets and they come to life and are pretty much invincible as people. Not that people is really the best way to describe them.

  Younger vampires are okay with being labeled human, or ex-human, but the old ones, the ones that have thrived in the shadows for centuries, even millennia, they will rip out your throat if you refer to them as anything but vampire.

  They see themselves like butterflies, emerging from the chrysalis of an almost forgotten human being to become what they are now, and you would no more call a butterfly a caterpillar than you would an old vampire a human being.

  Are they dead, these bloodsuckers? No, not really. They use blood magic to remain what they are, and that is pretty much immortal. But such a gift comes at a high cost, more than most are ever willing to pay, and the charge is your humanity.

  Yes, I'm not exactly a regular guy, but I know what's right, and wrong—killing the innocent—and I have a lot to answer for because of what I've done, but at least I know the difference. And besides, something happened to make me do what I did. I'm not usually a homicidal chess player, honest.

  So, the goons.

  "Hi Bret. Hi Bart," I said casually. "Fancy meeting you here. Doing some shopping are you?"

  Bret and Bart stared at me, with those spooky as hell eyes serious vampires have, not that many of them are jolly. They aren't big conversationalists, although once, in a rather unexpected outpouring of more than a few syllables each, they'd explained why they had ditched their Chinese names at the turn of the century and insisted on Bret and Bart now—to make themselves more modern.

  Nothing crazier than a vampire, apart from a Chinese vampire. Okay, apart from the Welsh, they are proper crazy. Must be the confusion about the signs, or the damp.

  "Um, okay. Nice chatting, see ya." I moved to step around them, which was quite a distance, but I knew it was no good, and besides, there's no getting away from these guys once they are given a job.

  The twins may look like lumps of Chinese granite, all roughly chiseled features and way too much time spent in the gym to make up for their five foot nothing stature, bu
t they are not to be trifled with. And anyway, I knew who had sent them after me, and to be honest the alternative wouldn't be much better.

  Many Hidden would be baying for my blood the moment what I did hit the news or the underground networks, so in a way it was a relief. The kids from earlier were just playing, knew better than to try anything, but the twins, they would fight if they had to. Although I couldn't see that they would have been given orders to mess with me in the middle of the street on a busy Saturday, if it was Saturday—I was in no mood to find out.

  Did I go along quietly with the Chinese vampires? Hell no. I knew they wouldn't be at their best in the daylight as they were a few hundred years old. Enough had come back by now for me to know who I was and a little of what I, and they, were capable of. I was an enforcer, but I was also an Alone.

  An Alone has drawbacks, the main being you don't have others with you to help focus magic, and numbers are always good. But it has advantages too, like the fact people who can do what I do are pretty damn selfish and not very nice people.

  Don't get me wrong, there are a lot of lovely people who can use magic, and some even live relatively normal lives, but most don't. Once you understand our world it's easy to see why.

  I steeled myself, not really in the mood for any meetings until I found out why I'd done what I did, and could think of a way to not get killed for it. Maybe by Bret and Bart's boss, or my own, and readied myself for the sickness.

  Even thinking about drawing power from the Empty made my guts churn and my palms sweat, but I went with it, let it build, let the darkness envelop me and I felt my tattoos swell with the power.

  The nauseating dark magic spread from my knuckles up my arms, across my shoulders and down my torso, just as I felt it come from my feet, writhe along my calves, scamper up my thighs like a hairy-legged giant centipede craving the dark and moist most private parts I owned, and it all met at my navel.