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“I said what did you say?” the leader says, raising his voice.

I force myself to look away but it doesn’t help. Savannah’s eyes are damp and wide, her glistening lips part to protest. The buzz of conversation has stopped. Clenching my hands, I grit my teeth as I struggle to keep my cool. Behind me, a table scrapes across the tile and there’s a thud. The guy being bullied grunts in pain.

“Nothing,” the guy says. “I’m sorry, but my lap—”

“You blaming me for that?” The bully raises his voice. He’s a peacock. His gang of idiots chuckles and makes encouraging sounds. Egging him on to even greater heights of assholery. “You’re clumsy. You spill your, what is that, some kind of foo-foo girly drink and then you try to blame me? What, because I wear nice clothes you think you can trick me into fixing your mistake?”

“That’s not wha—”

“Let’s take this outside.”

“Yeah, take it outside,” one of his compatriots’ parrots.

Savannah and I lock eyes. She shakes her head side to side in slow motion. Her lips form a no but if she says it out loud I don’t hear it over the roaring in my ears. I stood by Niagara Falls once and this is that loud. Deafening.

I rise to my feet. Savannah pulls on my arm, trying to stop me, but I can’t. I jerk my arm free of her. This is too much. I’m done being pushed around. Moving with pure intention and deliberation I turn, taking in the entirety of the shop as I do.

In the door to the kitchen stands Moira. She is grinning. Her eyes sparkle with delight and she nods as my gaze passes over. The two baristas behind the bar are watching the incident in obvious confusion tainted with fear. One of them is raising a phone. The patrons watch but two of them have their phones out, not to call the police though. They’re filming it.

It’s more important to capture this moment for their social media than to put a stop to it. Observers. They’re all observers, and only that when something happens in front of them that’s dramatic enough to jerk them out of the disconnected fog they live their lives in.

Maybe I should side with the Fae. Bring about the return of magic. Turn the world to a more dangerous environment that forces all of us to live. Really live. Not exist in a digital mockery of life. Magic, true excitement and wonder.

The power surges in like an exploding geyser. Old Faithful, except its anything but faithful since I can’t summon it on command. I can’t control it, and right now I know it’s controlling me. As I realize that, a twinge of fear ripples through my thoughts but the power washes that away.

The leader has the boy pressed against the wall, his forearm pressed to his chest holding him in place. He is looking over his shoulder at his three buddies with a wide smile showing too many, too perfect, too white teeth.

“I think he pissed himself,” he says, laughing.

“Let him go,” I say. Nothing happens. The gang didn’t hear me. My voice was too soft. The power roaring in my ears is thunderous. I take a step towards the group, clear my throat, and repeat myself. “Let. Him. Go.”

The leader looks first, and his grin turns instantly salacious. His eyes move over my body in a way that in any other time would make my skin crawl and send me packing. A dangerous look, a look that every young girl knows, instinctively, means bad things.

Not today. Not now.

His buddies turn, and when they see it’s nothing more than some wisp of a girl, they laugh like a pack of hyenas. It’s a barking, drunken laughter, but they step aside, clearing a path between me and their designated leader. He shifts, keeping the boy pinned to the wall.

“What is this?” he asks. “Look, honey, you’re not really my type.” His eyes scan over me again. “Bit too much junk in the trunk, if you know what I mean.”

The part of me that is still the old me stings at the insult. The dismissiveness of it hurts that person. I’m not her anymore.I am the Destroyer.

“I said, let him go.”

“Let him go,” he says in a high-pitched mockery of my voice, then his smile disappears. “Or what?”

I’m aware of all the onlookers but they’re distant. They are on a different plane while I’m here, with him. He is my opponent and in this moment there is only the two of us.

“I’m going to beat your ass.”

He guffaws. His pupils are wide, and he reeks of alcohol. I have an awareness of how intoxicated he is. His body is on the verge of alcohol poisoning. If he drinks much more, he’ll be in a hospital getting his stomach pumped if he doesn’t kill himself first. He lets the boy go, who slides down the wall back onto his feet. The boy’s face is pale, and his eyes are wide. His mouth hangs open in shock. It might be a girl saving him but there’s nothing on his face but relief.

“You?” the bully asks, looking around over my head. “Seriously?”

“That’s what she said, Todd,” one of his compatriots says. “This girl is going to beat you.”

“Beat you off,” another quips.

“Yeah, with all that junk.”

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