Forgotten Destiny 5 Read online

  Max looked to the side. He got that exact expression I’d seen so many times. The expression that told me he was hiding something from me. The expression that made me wonder whether he in fact knew every single fact about this case and had always chosen to keep quiet about them.

  “Tell her the truth, Max. All of it. Right down to how my sister died,” Josh said. “Beth was right all along. The more you hide from her, the more trouble we’ll be in.”

  I swiveled my head between both men. “Right,” I said breathlessly. “Just how much did you know, Josh?” Accusation rang through my tone.

  Josh snorted at me. “Don’t use that kind of tone on me, Missy,” he said, calling me Missy for the first time in weeks. He also brought his hands up and spread them wide. “I am the least culpable person in this case. I’m just the charming, attractive,” he patted his chest, a few splashes of the sorcerer pool liquid splashing around his fingers, “competent bounty hunter who’s been stuck in the middle.”

  I twisted my head to Max. “So what else are you hiding?” I emphasized the word else.

  Max darted his gaze away from me. Just when I suspected that he wouldn’t tell me, he took a hard breath. “I’ve been investigating Internal Affairs for years. Ever since my mother told me to, in fact.”

  “Did Jason know?”

  “Jason always suspected, but he never did anything about it. And I doubt he ever… appreciated the extent of my efforts. I specifically made contact with witches who I knew either understood things about Internal Affairs, or were… destined to meet them.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Think about it, Beth,” Josh said. “Max did his homework and got to potential Internal Affairs’ informants before Internal Affairs did.”

  That revelation washed over me. “Like Howard? And Hayden?” I added as realization paled my cheeks.

  Max nodded.

  “I don’t get it, what exactly did you do? Did you get them to spy on Internal Affairs for you?”

  “The short answer is yes.”

  I brought a hand up and flattened it over my mouth. “And did they actually spy for you?”

  Max nodded. “I cautioned them to take every precaution. But yes, they spied for me.”

  “I don’t get why…” I trailed off.

  “You know the answer,” Max said perceptively. “I wanted them to spy on Internal Affairs so that I could finally figure out where they were keeping the hidden sets and what exactly they had planned for them. At that stage, I didn’t even know about the seventh set.”

  “Wouldn’t your mother have found out about the seventh set? If she was a complete finder and a sorcerer—”

  “She wasn’t the expert on the hidden sets – my father was.”

  “But you said that she had diaries of the visions from the past—”

  “And they didn’t detail how many sets there were – just that they must be destroyed.”

  “… I see.” I brought a hand up and clamped it over my brow, pressing my palm in. “So tell me, Max – what exactly did you find out from your informants?”

  “Where to begin?” Max asked.

  I stared at him directly. “I don’t know how much time we have until Jason finds us, but you need to tell me everything I need to know. You’re the opportunity finder,” I pointed out with a harsh breath.

  “So I should know just how much to tell you?” he questioned.

  I didn’t drop his gaze as I nodded.

  Max looked sharply to the side. “My primary remit was to find where they were keeping the hidden sets. After all—”

  “You knew that ultimately, one day you would have to destroy them,” I filled in that fact.

  He nodded quietly.

  Josh suddenly made a face. “Sorry? I thought—”

  “Jason isn’t the sorcerer talked about in the Zero Prophecy. I am,” I said as I patted my hand on my chest. “Max’s my finder.” I pointed at him.

  Josh’s jaw clicked to the side, and his eyes pressed in with confusion. Then he just shrugged. “I can’t keep up with this damn situation. But I guess this is good news. We’d be screwed if the sorcerer talked about in the Zero Prophecy didn’t want to destroy the hidden sets after all, right?”

  I didn’t bother replying to that. I locked my gaze on Max again. “Have you found out where the books are?”

  Max took a tense breath. “I’ve narrowed down several locations.”

  “Then show me, and I’ll help.”

  “It won’t be that easy.”

  “Of course it won’t be that easy. We’ll presumably have to fight an army to get to them – including your brother.” My teeth clenched of their own accord as my body tightened against the memory of him and how – once upon a time – I’d almost convinced myself to love him. “Even if we don’t have to fight off an army to get to them, we’re presumably going to have to find them through some maze of infinity tunnels or something.”

  Max conceded my point with a shrug. “You’re only half right.”

  “Only half right?”

  “Jason isn’t the only sorcerer you’ll have to fight,” Max said quietly.

  “Jason and I are the only sorcerers in town. The only other two sorcerers I know about—” I frowned and looked at him.

  “My mother’s dead,” he volunteered, even though I knew that fact.

  But it left one more possibility.

  I stared at Max with all I was worth, tilting my head to the side and narrowing my gaze. “… Your father? We’ll have to fight your father? I thought you said he was the ex-director of Internal Affairs?”

  “Yes. But he was the architect of the Hidden Grimoires Program. And he never went away. His memory,” Max’s teeth clenched, “is too indefatigable.”

  Max looked away from me sharply. I felt like I could’ve taken off my clothes and done a dance, but he still wouldn’t have turned to stare at me again. He was obviously consumed by his memories of his father.

  Why was Max’s family so unnecessarily complicated? I cast my mind back to when I’d met Max the first time. It was back along that street, when we’d knocked into one another. I’d stared at him over my shoulder and… he’d looked so normal. Okay, so technically he’d still been the richest, most eligible bachelor in town – but back then, he hadn’t looked like he did now. Now he had a complicated, terrifying history that threatened to swallow the world whole. Back then he’d been a charming, rich distraction.

  Now?

  I felt my shoulders drop, my arms loosening, my hands falling open as if they could no longer sustain the grip to press together, let alone hold onto anything substantial. “So your father’s a sorcerer – and that makes two sorcerers we have to fight.”

  “My father… isn’t technically alive,” Max said.

  I didn’t honestly think I could be floored anymore. I’d faced too many world-ending moments and endured too many battles today – but on this fact, my lips crumpled, and they crumpled hard. “… But you just said—”

  “We will still have to fight the memory of him to access the hidden sets. You see,” Max ticked his head hard to the side, his eyes opening as they stared at the floor, and yet it was clear he couldn’t see anything but the contents of his own mind. “My father was ultimately dedicated to the Hidden Grimoires. To keeping them safe – to… fulfilling their promise.”

  “Fulfilling their promise?” I couldn’t look away from Max. Not now – not when he was looking so… open and closed at the same time. Though his eyes were open, his mind and heart were like a lock. One he was holding onto with all his might as he desperately tried to stop it from opening.

  … So this was at the core of Max, ha? Just as Sandra’s murder was at the core of Josh, and his father’s demands was at the core of Jason – this was Max’s wounded heart.

  “… Your father what?” I encouraged.

  “My father believed he could use the Hidden Grimoires to bring peace.”

  “And?”

  �
�He became so devoted to that thought that he… let it embody him.”

  I shook my head hard to the left, a deep frown marking my lips. “You’re losing me here, Max. What exactly do you mean?”

  “My father was easily the most powerful sorcerer in the world when he was alive.”

  A frown kept marching further down my lips until I thought it would split them apart. “What does that mean?”

  “That Max’s dad cast some kind of spell to ensure no one could get to the hidden sets, right?” Josh jumped in. He winced as he said that, bringing up a hand and locking his stiff fingers on his collar. “He’s made himself into some big bad boss who’s going to protect the sets from us, right? I don’t get it – didn’t he know you were the finder who was meant to destroy them?”

  Max looked at Josh carefully. “That was a secret between my mother and me. For his entire life, my father thought Jason was the sorcerer talked about in the Zero Prophecy.”

  It was my turn to wince. I felt sick. I still wouldn’t forgive Jason for what he did, but the more I learned about his history, the more I understood him. He, just like me, had become a tool for others. “So your father trained Jason from the get-go, forming his personality, ensuring he would never destroy the sets—”

  “But use them,” Max concurred. “My father was always of the opinion that good men—”

  “Should seek power, not push it away,” I finished his sentence.

  Max nodded quietly. “In order to protect, you must learn the ways of your enemies.”

  “But if you learn the ways of your enemies, you become them,” I said quietly.

  I tipped my head back, closed my eyes, and tried to think through this.

  But you know what? There was no way.

  Everything was simply becoming so complicated.

  Josh cleared his throat. “I’m right, though, aren’t I? Your dad cast some kind of ultimate death spell,” Josh said, and from the quick way he spoke, it was clear he was referencing a real thing and not just speaking colorfully. “And he’s used his sorcerer spirit to protect the hidden sets. What? As an insurance against Jason turning?”

  “As an insurance, full stop,” Max said. “There was no length my father wouldn’t go to to protect those sets. He understood that with their power, the world would change.”

  I snorted. “Yeah – it would be destroyed under the chaos.”

  “My father thought that the chaos was largely a myth – one cooked up by frightened minds too fearful of power. Even if it did exist, he was confident that good, powerful,” he emphasized that word with a ringing breath, “men could control it.”

  “And he had every intention of creating these good powerful men, didn’t he?” My voice dropped low. “Tell me, did he use the hidden sets on himself and Jason?”

  It was an awful question. One that brought up the buried feelings of the vision. And as it brought up those feelings, I swore it linked me to them through time. It gave me another glimpse at my forgotten destiny and reminded me why I existed. My sole purpose was to destroy these hidden sets so that the world would never have to put up with the threat of absolute power again.

  Max closed his eyes, and he wouldn’t open them again as he nodded. “It is my suspicion that he did use them on himself and my brother. And others. Though he was not foolish enough to create other sorcerers – they would have questioned his power.”

  “Just powerful agents for Internal Affairs?” Josh questioned through clenched teeth.

  Max nodded.

  “Well hell, sounds like we’re dealing with a megalomaniac. I used to actually like those movies from the fifties with all those crazy mad scientists who wanted to take over the world. Now it’s a little too close to home. So what you’re basically telling us is not only do we have to find out where the hidden sets are, we have to get there, presumably get through your dad’s army of Internal Affairs’ warlocks, then get through the old man’s dead, powerful memory, too? Only then can we destroy the seven sets.”

  “First we have to find the seventh,” I reminded him quietly.

  Max looked at me. There was so much going on behind his gaze. Too much to understand.

  Though I wanted to tease apart his emotions – though I wanted to offer him comfort – at the same time, I knew I couldn’t afford to be drawn into my own emotion. Do that, and I would lose the only scrap of reason that was keeping me standing and not melting into a blubbering puddle of fear.

  “If my brother is worth his powers – and my father ensured he was – then he would’ve already found my mother’s diaries. And with those, he would’ve presumably found the seventh set.”

  I frowned at Max. “Do you think Jason knows? Or at least suspects?”

  My question had no context, but apparently he didn’t need any. Max understood – I appreciated that as a surge of emotion traveled quickly through his chest. His back straightened. He cast his gaze to the side. I could tell he was considering my question with all his thought. He shrugged. “I want to tell you that Jason would suspect who we are. But at the same time, my brother has always been the arrogant one. The one chosen by my father to become a sorcerer. In turn, he thinks he was chosen to be the sorcerer of the Zero Prophecy – with the greatest destiny in the world handed to him on a plate.”

  “Jason has always had an enormous head on his shoulders,” Josh conceded. “But he’s not an idiot. What do you think he’s going to do if he figures out he’s not the sorcerer, and Beth is?”

  “I think it’s ultimately irrelevant. He attacked us, we fled – and he will track us down. What happens after that is unknowable. But what we do know is that we can’t let that happen. We have to get to the hidden sets and destroy them.”

  “Can’t we just destroy the seventh set?” I asked, but then I winced as I realized how stupid that was.

  “We cannot simply destroy one or two sets – we must destroy them all. For as long as any remain, it will give the owners of them the power to create their own armies. Magic is given by nature – not by man. We do not get to decide who has power. And the instant we do, is the instant society will change for the worse. Nobody should get to decide who has the power to protect themselves. You were right before,” Max looked at me, and his expression was one of pride.

  “… Right?” I tried not to blush.

  “When you told Jason that there was an important distinction between good men gathering power, and great men giving that power to everyone so that all can defend themselves. That is the mark of a truly enlightened civilization.”

  “I don’t know. There are a bunch of dodgy assed warlocks I would not want to give power to,” Josh interrupted. “But shouldn’t we concentrate on the game plan? There are only three of us, and though technically we’re three of the most powerful witches in Madison City – we’re going to be facing a heck of a lot of resistance. We also need to narrow down where those hidden sets are. Then we’re going to have to get there, leaving the relative safety of this place. I did have a reputation for being able to get anything done in the Army, but creating miracles wasn’t one of them. And a miracle is exactly what we’re going to need if we have any hope of not only getting this done, but being alive by the end of it.”

  “We don’t need a miracle – we need an opportunity,” Max said as he looked right at me.

  I did not look away.

  Josh swallowed. “And do we have an opportunity?”

  Still gazing at each other, both Max and I answered, “Yes.”

  “Then let’s take it,” Josh said as he brought a hand up, curled it into a fist, and slammed it against his palm.

  “It won’t be that easy,” Max said as he finally turned his gaze from me.

  Josh snorted. “It never is. Now,” he frowned down at the pool of sorcerer healing magic below him, “it’s probably time to head out and get dry, sort out our defenses, come up with a cast-iron plan, and save the day for everyone. Question,” he turned to Max as he jumped out of the pool lithely, showing tha
t my healing magic had worked and he was now fighting fit once more, “is there a bounty out on Jason’s head? Or your father’s?”

  Max arched an eyebrow. “If you’re looking for suitable remuneration for your efforts here, don’t worry, we can reach a deal.”

  Josh snorted. “I was kind of wanting to avoid that. Beth,” he snapped at me as he shrugged toward the door, “we need to assess the defenses of this building. We also need to lay traps outside.”

  “But Max said it would take a while for Jason to find this place—”

  “Which gives us a while to be prepared. You coming?”

  Max hadn’t moved from the pool. To be honest, I wanted to jump in there with him – and no, not for the chance to share a sorcerer Jacuzzi with the richest man in the city. Because there was still so much that hadn’t been said.

  Max half closed his eyes and nodded at me, indicating I should go.

  … So I turned and followed Josh. Because I was the sorcerer talked of in the Zero Prophecy, and it was time to protect my finder.

  Chapter 2

  “There’s another option, Max said as he crossed his arms and looked at us from the top of the stairwell.

  After Josh and I had checked the house – which was an utter mind trip – we met Max in the atrium.

  Max was now standing at the top of the stairs, staring down at us.

  Josh had his hand on the base of the balustrade, and he ticked his head up, an unconvinced look in his eyes. “I don’t honestly see how there’s another option. At some point, though I admit that this is a nicely defendable house, we’re going to have to leave it. And that’s when our troubles will truly begin.”

  “There’s another option,” Max repeated again, his voice ringing down low.

  As he suggested that, I swore I felt a change in opportunities. That rush of feelings in my stomach caused me to tilt my head all the way back. “What is it?” I asked breathlessly.

  “Oh no – you’re reacting to something. Which means I’m wrong. I hate being wrong,” Josh muttered under his breath. “I also hate waiting for the facts. So would you two just put me out of my misery already and tell me what this other option is?”