Psychic

I could hear the thoughts before I was even fully conscious.

What do we do with it?

Imagine what I can get from the warlocks if we give them her.

She almost looks innocent like that.

Well, I had news for that last person. I was in all counts ‘innocent’. I hadn’t done anything, unless you counted potentially taking down my ‘father’, but they didn’t know that. Who knew what kind of information the hunters had been fed.

I kept my eyes closed and listened in on their thoughts for a bit longer. They were all thinking basically the same thing. I could tell that there was at least one younger hunter in the room who was a bit unsure about their motives, but the rest seemed like hardened adults. This was to my disadvantage.

I could feel some ropes holding my hand together behind a wooden chair, but my legs were free. The rope was unnaturally tight though.

I opened my eyes in a sputter when a bucket of cold water was splashed in my face. I had been too busy digging deep into the younger hunter’s brain to see it coming.

“Wake up!” yelled the man who had dumped the water on me.

I took a quick look around the room and matched the thoughts to faces. The young hunter was in the corner, gangly and wide-eyed. There were three other hunters in the large room, a woman and two other men, the one closest was the one who dumped water on me. He seemed to be leading this group.

I glared at him, tempted to twist on some painful memories in his head, but refrained for now. If they didn’t know what I could do, there was no need to give them a show until I learned what they knew.

“Are you upset we waked you, Olivia? I’m sure you were having a very nice sleep.” He taunted, but I didn’t raise to the bait. I stayed as silent as possible.

The other man in the room stepped forward, “What are you?”

I stayed silent still. I wasn’t going to give them anything. What I needed to do was waste time until Magnus or someone found me, or maybe until they traded me to Hawthorne.

“That’s fine,” said the woman, “we’ve already done the majority of the tests on you. You’re blood runs red, holy water doesn’t hurt you, and neither does salt, iron, or silver. You have no visible fangs and you’re eyes aren’t any unnatural color. You’re not a werewolf, vampire, demon, shapeshifter, or faerie. We’ll find out soon enough. You can’t hide it from us forever.”

I was relieved for once that there was no real way to tell what a physic was. The only way you’d know is if they told you or if you had someone like Magnus tell you. Otherwise, I looked unmistakably human.

I decided that if I had to speak, I would play dumb.

“Who are you people? Where am I?” I asked in a frantic voice. “Why are you talking nonsense?”

The man in charge laughed. “You don’t need to know, creature.”

“What do you mean? Please, if you let me go, I won’t tell anyone. I promise!” I pleaded, a convincing tear even falling down my face.

The younger one stepped forward.

“What if she’s telling the truth, Mendes?”

‘Mendes’ stepped back towards him and pointed a finger at his chest. “Creatures like her will tell you anything to save their puny little cursed lives. Now, if you want to actually do some good in the world, you’d treat her like the creature she is.”

Interesting. So the hunters were as small minded as I thought they would be. Maybe I could use it to my advantage.

“Please! I’m a human being, not some creature! Just let me go!”

The other man in the room stepped forward and slapped me straight across the face, hard. “Shut up!”

The woman gave me a harsh look. “It would do you good to tell us what you are. It’ll be easier that way, you know. There’s less pain with that path.”

I kept up my charade. “I don’t know what you mean!” I sobbed, more tears rolling down my face. Hopefully if I kept up the unknowing persona for a while longer they would actually believe it.

“Fine.” Mendes spat. “If you won’t tell us what you are, then maybe you’ll tell my niece.”

I all clicked together right before the door opened. Bella’s Uncle was supposed to be behind the whole capturing me parade. So if Mendes was her uncle . . .

“Bella?” I asked, playing dumb despite my knowing exactly why she was here and trying to control my temper.

She wouldn’t even look at me. I’m sorry, her thoughts pleaded, I didn’t know about any of this before a couple of days ago. Just tell them what they want to know.

“Bella, just tell these people to let me go. I’m sorry if I ever did anything to you, just let me go, okay?”

She looked up, and her normally perfect makeup was blotchy from crying. That’s when I knew she really was sorry about the whole ordeal, but it still didn’t forgive her for not telling me about who her mom really was.

“Liv? They don’t want to hurt you, not really. Just tell them what they need to know.” She looked sincere, but her eyes were saying something else. I followed their trajectory and saw that the man that had entered the room with her was holding her arm quite fiercely. She was telling me that she would be in just about as much of trouble as me if I didn’t tell them.

But, as far as Bella knew, I didn’t know more than she did about me. She must’ve noticed that Magnus was more than he seemed too, and that he told me something important about what I was. And if she read one of those hunter’s manuals, then she would’ve been able to figure out that he was a warlock by his amulet that he wore around his neck.

She also didn’t say a word about me being traded, so either she didn’t know or she wasn’t allowed to tell me. A quick sweep through her memories told me that the first assumption was true.

I looked into Mendes’s brain and found that they were planning on torture if this didn’t work. Apparently Hawthorne wanted me dead or alive anyways. But he wanted me by midnight, so I knew the hunters were on a time table.

I could tell that they weren’t going to believe my pleas, and their brains were too hardwired in their beliefs to make them believe me, a magical creature, was innocent, so I did the next best thing. I locked my gaze onto the younger hunter’s brain. He was easily malleable, and a couple manufactured thoughts later he was inching closer to me.

I quickly distracted the hunters when I lunged forward, the momentum from my fall bringing me falling forward along with the chair. The younger hunter, thanks to my thoughts, was closest and reached me first. I then persuaded him to do something that might’ve been a bit against his morals. I was just praying it would be enough to-

“Ash, bring her chair up already, we can’t interrogate her if she’s facing the floor!” Mendes shouted.

He brought my chair back up in its siting position, but one difference was noticeable. My hand were no longer tied together.

I stopped my sobbing immediately, and the change was evident enough for the hunters to take notice.

“Hey, what’s the problem?” Mendes asked, coming over with a fierce glare.

I responded by standing up and spreading my arms. “You know, you didn’t have to tie my wrists that hard together, Mendes. It wasn’t like I could escape. Oh, wait, I just did.”

He lunged at me, but I sent out a mental shockwave to everyone in the room but Bella. They all clutched their heads in pain for a full five seconds before I let them go. Bella looked at me with a reproachful fear, but I ignored her to talk to the bigger fish in the pond.

Mendes looked up and I smirked at him. “No, no, no. You’re not in charge here anymore, Mendes. You’ve just made me very angry, and you wouldn’t like it when I’m angry. So, I’ll say this once and one time only, where is Hawthorne?”

He was so shocked that it took him a moment to understand. “How do you know about him?”

I scoffed. “Please. I knew about him weeks ago. I also knew about you all for a while now too. I mean – a big gathering of rednecks in a town like Chesnutt Falls isn’t exactly normal. Plus, I always knew there was something a bit off about Bella’s mother’s side of the family, but this? Man, you guys are messed up.”

“What are you?” He sneered.

I chuckled, “Trust me. I barely even know myself sometimes. All you need to know is that I’m dangerous.”

“Liv?” Bella questioned.

Mendes smiled slyly. “I’m guessing my niece still thinks you’re innocent, monster. Way to show her wrong.”

I titled my head. “Umm . . . no. I didn’t really hurt you, at least not as bad as you were going to hurt me. I mean – just because I’m not human, I’m bad? Those primeval views are so outdated. We live in what’s called a free country, FYI. Besides, I never killed anyone. I haven’t even done anything yet. Believe me, I could if I wanted to though.”

He shook his head, “That’s not what our source said. He said-“

I cut him off, “Let me guess, ‘she’s an untrustworthy creature who will do anything to achieve her means and has no morals blah-blah-blah.’ Am I right?

“Besides, what do you think Hawthorne will do when he finds me? He’s not going to let you guys go. I mean – this is probably the biggest crowd of hunters around, am I right? (All to capture little old me) So he won’t want to waste an opportunity to get rid of you pesky little people. I mean – who’s to even say he’ll keep his deal? What were you even going to trade for me? Knowledge? He won’t want to give you any more than you already have.”

Mendes seemed to get at what I was implying. Hawthorne wasn’t going to leave them peacefully or give them information. It was most likely going to turn into a massacre.

“Besides, it won’t even do you any good to know what I am. There’s only one other creature like me and there’s only one person who’s immune to me, and he’s not exactly on my side right now.”

As far as I knew, Magnus had ran to Hawthorne as soon as I showed up missing. Maybe he thought Victoria and I had skipped town. Or maybe he and Hawthorne were on their way here now. All I knew was that he was against me.

My best friend on the other hand was still shocked. She knew I could read minds, but she didn’t know about all the other stuff. She didn’t know I could control minds too. She didn’t know me as this strong-minded creature that I became after meeting Victoria. The girl she knew was gone, and there was nothing I could do about it.

“You mean Magnus?” Bella asked.

I nodded. It must’ve been clicking for her that the reason we were arguing had something to do with my powers. Which, technically, it kind of did.

“Who’s that?” the woman in the room questioned. “Another one of you?”

I scoffed. “He’s a warlock. His potentia Source protects him from my ‘magic’ and he’s on Hawthorne’s side as far as I know. If they’re planning on attacking, he’ll be with them to apprehend me.”

We were interrupted by a huge crash from outside the door. A figure came rushing in.

It was Bella’s mom.

“Harrison, we have a problem. The warlocks have invaded the base, we need to leave now.”

It took me a moment to realize she was addressing Mendes. Harrison must’ve been his first name. It would be weird for his sister to call him by their maiden name.

The hunters went rushing out the door and I followed them. I had to ignore Bella’s stare as I went through. She was a bit more than upset that I knew all of this stuff and I never told her, but there was no time to dwell on this when Hawthorne was this close to capturing me before I did something to stop him.

I would have to deal with rekindling my friendship later.