Page 21 of Mage Massacres

I hadn’t paid attention to what Palmer’s and Stone’s tokens had felt like, not really. I’d just felt the need to have them closer to me, and I hadn’t stopped to think about what exactly that meant.

I wanted to have all the tokens near me, though.

The urge grew the longer I held them.

To further distract myself while everyone finished their meals, I hummed the circus theme song in my head. As the thoughts around me became too loud to drown out, the tune slowed to a creepy rhythm.

I mentally chastised myself as I blocked everyone out, one by one. Miller and Murphy were both as loud as Palmer when it came to their thoughts, or maybe they were just relaxed enough to not care. It didn’t matter. For my own sanity, I silenced their thoughts first.

I hadn’t struggled with keeping my mind quiet since I was a preteen, but all the emotional turmoil had left me too exhausted to subconsciously keep to myself. My father and Franklin had drilled techniques with me until I could build my barrier back up in the blink of an eye. But even my eyes were blinking slowly at this moment.

“You fool. You never get anything fucking right.” Palmer’s accented voice flowed through my mind.

My attention snapped to him, but he wasn’t looking at me. I wasn’t sure he was talking to me either. He was still pushing food around his plate with his fork, unseeing and uncaring of the other people at the table. I started to silence his thoughts too, not wanting to invade another’s privacy.

His mental voice was practically shouting, furious at something he’d done. And I tried to block him out as I worked on the barrier in my mind. The words kept spilling over, though.

“I should’ve been honest from the beginning. Should’ve told her that spell would kill me.”

The entire room tilted as my eyes glazed over in anger. I took a deep breath until my lungs wouldn’t expand any further, and then I held it. Reining in my temper was a struggle, but it was giving me a second wind. The earlier exhaustion I’d felt was no longer a problem.

“I need to tell her. But I can’t. I need to; I just don’t want to. Not yet.”

I squeezed my eyes closed, pressing my thumbs against my temples to ease the pressure I was feeling. The overwhelming desire to scream at him briefly crossed my mind, and then I was shutting Novak out. I couldn’t have him hearing my furious thoughts before I’d gotten them in order and calmed down.

He only heard what he wanted to hear; not the full context of my mental conversation. I knew that was what I’d just done with Palmer, too. I needed to be able to step back and think rationally.

The spell had killed him.

Not me... But he knew it was going to happen either way.

He didn’t want to tell me yet.

Then fucking when?

“Hey, man.” Novak’s hissed mental voice was a sharp juxtaposition to his smiling face.

“You’re thinking really godsdamn loud right now. If you want to talk to her about it, then I’d suggest you shut the fuck up before she overhears you. I’ve already told you twice that you need to tell her. I can’t keep blocking your thoughts.”

I rolled my tongue across my teeth as my ire turned into a slow-brewing storm. I was the eerie calm before the tornado. My heartbeat the distant lightning. My mind as still as the nonexistent breeze right before the siren started blaring its warning to take cover.

From my peripheral, Stone turned his whole upper body to stare at me. I felt him prodding at my mental barrier, but I kept it airtight. Vaughn’s cold hand touched my thigh, his fingertips digging into my skin as he tried to cool me down.

I gently pushed my plate away, using my left hand to swipe across the tabletop before I lay the letter from Rig down for everyone to see. Then I placed the tokens on each corner to hold it flat.

Stay calm, bitch.

One thing at a time.

“What is that?” Novak inquired.

I grinned in return, feeling slightly unhinged. There was only so much shit a person could take, and I’d finally found my limit.

“Rig—whoever that is—and that letter called them Pith Tokens.”

“Those?” Murphy pointed to the gray rocks. “He gave you four of them?”

“There were six,” I informed the group. “Now there are four.”