Insidious: (The Marked Mage Chronicles, Book 1) Read online

  “Please, just listen to me. I know this sounds crazy, but you can’t get in the van.”

  In any other circumstance, I would have already screamed bloody murder, but there was something about the earnestness in his voice that seemed to paralyze me.

  “There a problem here?” Daniel and Eric started heading over to our sides. I tried pulling away, but Reese again wouldn’t release his grip, and the guys immediately charged over at the sight.

  “Let her go!” barked Eric.

  “Don’t do it,” Reese pleaded again, refusing to take his eyes off me.

  A force ripped between the two of us, and Daniel slammed Reese against the side of the truck as Eric safely pried me away.

  “What the hell’s going on?” begged Carly, seeing Mark quickly meet up to aid Daniel.

  “Please, don’t get in the van!” Reese repeated.

  “Why?” scoffed Carly.

  “’Cause he’s a freak,” spat Eric.

  “Kat, don’t—”

  “Give me one good reason not to bust your teeth in,” barked Daniel, shoving Reese back against the vehicle as he tried to step forward.

  “She’s going to die!” Reese suddenly blurted.

  The entire parking lot came to a standstill.

  What did he just say?

  “Okay, the guy’s clearly bat-shit. Let’s just get out of here,” howled Mark.

  No one else hesitated, but Daniel was forced to practically lift me up into the vehicle as I remained paralyzed in place. Mark grabbed hold of Reese’s coat, feeling around the pockets. Sure enough, he pulled out his car keys and hurled them into the oblivion of the woods bordering the parking lot. Mark used the distraction to race back over to us, and he hopped into the front passenger seat. The van took off before he even had a chance to close the door.

  “Shit,” Reese muttered. He charged at the van, and we all unreservedly screamed as his fists hammered the back window right where I was sitting.

  Daniel managed to shift the van into third gear, and we finally gained momentum.

  I stole a look at the speedometer, seeing us already pushing over twenty miles an hour.

  “This dude’s gotta be on PCP or some shit,” said Mark, watching Reese unrelentingly race beside the van, not losing ground.

  He kept hollering, pleading for me to get out.

  It wasn’t until we clocked thirty that we finally started pulling away from him. Only once he became nothing more than a speck in the distance did anyone else breathe.

  “You okay?” asked Vanessa, giving me a hug as I sat frozen in my seat.

  Eric looked over his shoulder and sighed. “Hey, don’t let that freak get to you, okay? He was just trying to scare you.”

  “Mission accomplished,” said Carly shakily.

  “Don’t let him ruin the night. The guy’s nuttier than a peanut butter factory,” assured Mark.

  Chapter 2

  Bad Moon Rising

  “You need to loosen up!” Everyone continued to tease me as we all sat on bales of hay, watching the massive bonfire blazing nearby.

  Music coursed through the air, and a bunch of our classmates drunkenly gyrated away to the beat in the middle of the open field. Screams sounded off in the distance by the waterfront, which drew my concern, until I realized it was from a bunch of moronic guys throwing their girlfriends into the pond. I shivered at the thought, not just because it was a little chilly outside, but because that pond was murky beyond belief. I was pretty sure the creature from the black lagoon lived in there.

  “If it isn’t my favorite people,” chuckled a pleasant voice as hands draped over my eyes from behind. “Can you guess who it is?”

  “Given that you sound happy to see us, I think it’s safe to say it’s not Principal Harris,” I finally laughed.

  Everyone else shared in the amusement as my admirer removed his hands from my eyelids, poking his head over my shoulder to cast me a charismatic smile.

  “Well, if it isn’t Mr. Blaine Ryder.”

  “The one and only.” He beamed a bright smile, sharing the seat beside me. Blaine always looked suave, and tonight was no exception. Not a single strand of his midnight black locks lay out of place. The sides and back were cut short while the top layers were longer and slicked back to perfection. Between his hair, formal fashion sense, and unmistakable charisma, he was like a modern-day Jay Gatsby. And that was precisely why every female classmate was shooting me visual daggers, seeing him cozy up closer to me.

  “So, Blaine, weren’t you saying something earlier about how you wanted to ask a certain someone to dance?” grinned Carly, nodding obviously in my direction.

  “Car,” I growled in embarrassment.

  Blaine chuckled, obviously sighting the redness in my cheeks. “Well, as a matter of fact, I did mention something along those lines.” He rose up, taking my hand into his, and even added in a small, playful curtsy for good measure.

  “Awww,” Carly mused as he kissed the top of my hand.

  Blaine grinned down at me, trying best not to laugh. “What do you say?”

  “If you don’t say yes, we’re all gonna take turns kicking your ass,” remarked Daniel.

  I buried my hands into my face, sharing in Blaine’s amusement as we both laughed. “Sure.”

  “Amen!” everyone howled.

  In no time at all, the dread from earlier eased away and I finally relaxed. After a number of rounds of dancing and partying though, the merriment seemed to catch up to me.

  I excused myself, pushing my way through the throng of people.

  “Kat? You okay?” called out Blaine, following after me.

  My equilibrium gave way and I stumbled, falling right into his arms.

  “Whoa.” He chuckled slightly as he adjusted his hold on me. “You know, I’ve been hoping you’d show me some interest for awhile now, but I never imagined you’d literally throw yourself at me.”

  I attempted to steady myself again, but my legs felt like they didn’t even have bones to offer me support. My body started to sink down to the ground, and Blaine thankfully eased me back up.

  “Kat? How much have you had to drink?” he asked, concern raking through his muffled voice.

  I opened my mouth, trying to force the words out, but for the life of me, nothing would come. What was wrong with me? I hadn’t drunken anything, except soda from a closed can.

  “Oooh,” howled Vanessa and Carly giddily in the distance, clearly getting the wrong impression. “Seems you two are getting cozy!”

  The bass of the music suddenly pounded in my eardrums, and a guitar shriek sent my hands clawing over my ears. Everything sounded so distortedly loud.

  “Hey, how about I take you home?” offered Blaine, safely snuggling me into his embrace. “You don’t look so hot.”

  I barely managed to nod my head.

  “Good.” He turned us around, keeping a taut arm held around me to ensure I wouldn’t stumble.

  I continued to stagger, practically dragging my feet across the trampled grass. My vision blurred as a bunch of parked cars came into sight.

  “Here we go.”

  I heard a set of locks pop up, and a door opened to my left.

  “Watch your head,” cautioned Blaine as he helped me into the passenger seat of what I assumed was his car. He gingerly propped me upright to put my seatbelt on properly, and I suddenly heard what I thought was someone calling out my name.

  The passenger door closed and I looked up through the windows, but my eyes refused to focus. Blaine joined me a moment later, hopping behind the wheel.

  “We’ll be home in no time. Okay?” His voice sounded so serene that it helped soothe the disarray running through my head.

  The engine roared as he turned the car over, and the blurred scenery started rolling past the side window. I woozily tipped to the side, my body resting against the door of the car. As the vehicle drove down the hillside, I started sliding forward, but Blaine eased me back into my seat.

 
; “Hang in there. You’re doing good,” he continued to assure.

  I had never felt so drunk in my entire life. My lungs even seemed to struggle taking in air. Panic began rising up inside me, and I only managed to moan out something that sounded more like a whine than actual words. What if I suffocated to death?! A cry escaped my lips, and it caught Blaine’s attention.

  “You’re gonna be fine.”

  “No,” I croaked. I needed help!

  The car banked down another hill, and Blaine swiveled the steering wheel to accommodate the deep, winding bends in the road.

  “Shit!” He suddenly jerked the wheel and the vehicle skid so severely that my head slammed into the passenger window with an excruciating wallop.

  A distorted, large black mass on the road swept past my vision as the car spun out of control. One full rotation later and a boulder came into sight, illuminated by the headlights. My neck snapped forward as the front end smashed into the rock head-on. Talcum powder engulfed me as the air bag deployed, but the impact didn’t relent. In an instant, the metal of the hood was pulverized in one swift crunch and the glass from the windshield blasted into my face. The power of the compression forced the front of the car to impede the inside of the passenger cabin, and my entire body was met with an annihilating blow as I felt my insides shatter apart.

  Darkness.

  That’s all there was. Searing pain raking through every inch of me, and I couldn’t move.

  “Come on,” I overheard a distant voice grunt. “Just hang on.”

  Cold hands pressed to my neck and someone’s fingers cradled my head.

  “You’re gonna be alright.” The words were nothing more than a whisper, and then everything fell silent.

  I couldn’t feel anything.

  Subtle sounds slithered their way back into my world. After a moment, it became clearer.

  “Miss? Miss?”

  Lights blazed into my eyes as my right cheek lay against the dampened pavement. A bloodied hand rested in my line of vision, and I willed myself to move, seeing the fingers twitch. It was mine. There was also a line of rubber from a busted tire, mangled pieces of steel, and broken glass fragments splayed in front of me. A pair of thermal conductive gloves came into sight, and my head was readjusted to look straight upward.

  “Can you hear me?” asked the middle-aged man crouched over me.

  I could see the Star of Life emblem on the front of his hat, and I realized he was a paramedic. After failing to verbalize a response, I achingly nodded my head. Everything seemed to move in slow-motion with a disorientated haze clouding my eyes. People raced all around me, and I was eventually lifted up onto a stretcher.

  “Blaine?” I tried angling my head back in the direction of the wreckage, but an EMT turned me forward again and placed an oxygen mask over my face.

  ***

  Every inhale felt like I was trying to lift an elephant off my chest. The bleariness slowly eased from my vision, and the collection of screens and wires looming overhead finally came into focus. A green line continuously spiked up on one display before falling back to its baseline, and I realized it was a heart rate monitor. I didn’t remember the ambulance ride or my admission, but I was apparently now at the hospital. Only a small light in the corner illuminated the space, and blackness blanketed the sky outside the window. It was still night. Or maybe a whole other day had come and gone.

  “Shhh,” cooed a male voice beside me. “You’re okay now.”

  A familiar scent wafted in the air, overpowering the concentrated odor of disinfectant. I tried looking over at the individual, but the pain that shot through my neck kept me from fully turning. The only thing I could see in the limited light was a tall figure donned in hospital scrubs with a matching blue cap and surgical mask.

  “Get some rest,” whispered the male nurse, heading out the door.

  Not an inch of me seemed to be spared from the agony tearing through my body, and I prepared myself for the worst as I looked down at myself. A full body cast, an amputated limb, mangled features, deformity. I knew the impact, felt its devastation. I didn’t delude myself into believing it could be better than expected.

  My breathing faltered as my eyes traveled down my body, my pained arm tearing away the blanket covering my legs. It couldn’t be. Deep purple stains painted the exposed skin in large splotches, greenish hues spreading across the edges before bleeding into healthier, untarnished flesh.

  How?

  Despite the horrid bruising and the pain that came with it, I could still bend my joints without opposition. My body remained intact. Not even a trace of a bandage. I tried calling out for help, but my parched throat merely made me cough at the attempt. Scouring the space around me, I failed to find anything with a reflective surface I could use to look at my face. My right cheek throbbed and my temple felt like someone had taken a baseball bat to the side of my head. I stifled a cry as I forced myself to sit up.

  The aching pull inside my left arm made me acknowledge the needle shoved in my vein. I was attached to an IV. Grappling for the pole with the clear liquid bag hooked at the top of it, I planted my bare feet on the cold linoleum floor. Vanity outweighed the agonizing pain scorching my body as I struggled to stand. Where were my clothes? My jacket, pants, shirt, boots, and even socks were gone, replaced by a hideous hospital-issued gown.

  One step, and I woozily collapsed to my knees. The room tilted as a new sickness washed over me. I must have just been administered a sedative. If this was how it felt with heavy painkillers raging through my veins, I shuddered to imagine what fresh Hell I was in for when it wore off. Struggling back upright, I grasped the IV pole, using its ball bearing wheels to slowly guide me toward the bathroom.

  Batting away the matted locks of hair obscuring my face, I gazed into the large mirror, sighing in relief. Further bruising extended from the right side of my temple across my cheekbone down to the corner of my lips, but there didn’t appear to be any swelling. Dark smudges encrusted the skin along the side of my hairline, and I grabbed some paper towels from the dispenser beside the sink to clean it off. Dampening the cloths, I dabbed them over the area, gently scrubbing the surface. The stains slowly washed from the skin, bleeding into a muddied soup across the paper fabric. I dropped the moist heap at the realization.

  It was blood.

  Achingly lifting my arms, I pulled up the hospital gown, seeing more bruising…and more dried blood. But not a single scratch maimed my skin. Where did all the blood come from?

  Chapter 3

  Mad Hatter

  A light knock registered at the bedroom door, and it only caused me to roll over and bury my head into my pillows. Another knock followed, along with my mother’s voice.

  “Kat?” She opened the door and stepped inside after my failure to acknowledge her. “Hey, you have some company.”

  I cringed at the painful tug in my ribs as I turned and looked up at the entryway. Vanessa and Carly both gave me a small wave. “How’s she been?” asked Vanessa softly to my mom.

  “Hasn’t left her bed with the exception of eating and using the bathroom. That’s about it,” Mom affirmed intentionally louder.

  “At least she’s eating,” sighed Carly.

  “That’s what’s so strange. Normally when she’s down about something, it’s like having to extract teeth to get her to eat,” said Mom. “Now, Kat’s like a human garbage disposal. I’ve seen her eat more in the last week than she usually eats in three months. She polished off two pints of ice cream, downed a bag of Lays potato chips, had an entire bucket of fried chicken, and then ate a large pizza. This was just yesterday, mind you.”

  “Damn, girl.” Carly came up to me and ripped my comforter right off the bed, exposing me in my Batman boy shorts and tank top.

  “Hey!” I curled up into the fetal position as the brisk air bit at my bare legs and arms.

  “Seriously? You’ve been pigging out like Garfield the cat, and you look thinner! If I so much as dream of French fries, I
wake up five pounds heavier!”

  “Just leave me alone,” I groaned, jamming a pillow over my head.

  “You need to get out of this room,” sighed Vanessa.

  “I like this room.”

  “You haven’t returned any of our texts or phone calls, and no one else has heard from you. Being a hermit isn’t healthy, babe. We all think you could use a little fresh air.”

  Carly and Mom nodded.

  “And you just so happened to pick today to do this?” I scowled at all three of them. “I’m not an idiot. I know what today is. And even if I didn’t, Johnny Cash’s entourage here is pretty much like a neon sign in my face,” I remarked, pointing at Vanessa and Carly’s all black ensemble. Neither wore the color frequently, and never did they wear it head-to-toe.

  “The funeral starts in about an hour,” Vanessa confirmed.

  Mom nodded to my friends, as if silently passing the baton to them. “I’ll leave you girls be.”

  She exited, and Vanessa slowly made her way over to my bedside, smoothing out the ends of her dress.

  “How’s your mom been?” whispered Carly. “When we saw her at the hospital, she was wound up tighter than a ten day clock.”

  “You guys were at the hospital?” I asked, my voice muffled as I buried my face into my pillow.

  “Yeah, so was Adam,” replied Vanessa.

  My head shot up from the fluffiness with surprise. “He was?”

  I looked over at Carly who unreservedly shot V an ugly glare.

  “The nurses wouldn’t let any of us come see you though,” added Vanessa, obviously ignoring Car’s anger.

  “Anyway,” Carly growled.

  “Mom’s been…well, Mom,” I clarified. “Thankfully, I’d been sedated in the hospital, so by the time I’d woken up, the doctors had already assured her that I was fine. Though, I could’ve used a little more mother and a little less public relations liaison.”

  Carly gave me a sympathetic smile. “That bad?”