Soul of the Storm (The Wardbreaker Book 2) Read online

  Contents

  TITLE PAGE

  Synopsis

  Get a FREE, EXCLSUVE Short Story

  Also by Katerina Martinez

  Follow the Author!

  Dedication

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  Follow the Author!

  About the Author

  Also by Katerina Martinez

  Copyright

  SOUL OF THE STORM

  The Wardbreaker

  Book Two

  By Katerina Martinez

  I have an exceptional talent, and it's going to get me killed.

  Let's be honest, things haven't exactly gone well from me ever since I stole from Becket, the red-eyed Demonologist. You could almost say that single act of dumbassery started this whole mess. But even though I'm a mage, I can't exactly reverse the course of time, so here we are.

  We're hiding.

  Why? Because a big-time crime-boss is out there, waiting for us to make a mistake that'll let him clamp down on us like a hungry wolf on the leg of a wounded deer. Now, hiding sounds easy, right? You get to shack up somewhere with a fireplace, a couple of books, and a whole bunch of mage friends? Not quite. You see, we've kind of been forced to shack up with Becket, and he doesn't keep a horde of cats as pets like a normal person; he keeps demons, and it's creepy as hell.

  But even if I could live with the demons, I can't sit on my hands and do nothing. The scroll we retrieved from the Magister's vault is fraying, and if I don't enter the Tempest and find my Guardian soon, it'll probably turn to dust and we can kiss any hopes of learning more about the drowned Queen's treasures goodbye. I have to get my act together and do this, because I'm the only one who can. The problem is, the Tempest isn't opening its doors for me, and I'm running out of time.

  The weight of the world is on my shoulders, and I don't know if I can do this, but I have to try.

  For a limited time only, you can grab a FREE novella to one of Katerina’s other series by signing up to the authors’ reader group email lists. To opt in, click on the link below and go through the quick sign up process. There’s no spam, and you can unsubscribe at any time.

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  Also by Katerina Martinez

  **(NEW)** THE WARDBREAKER SERIES

  Book 1: Heart of the Thief

  Book 2: Soul of the Storm

  Book 3: Crown of the Queen

  THE OBSIDIAN ORDER SERIES

  Book 1: Wings of Light

  Book 2: Wings of Night

  Book 3: Wings of Shadow

  Magic Blood Series

  The Warlock

  Book 1: Demons and Deception

  Book 2: Mages and Masquerades

  Book 3: Scions and Sorcery

  Book 4: Hellfire and Homicide

  Book 5: Warlocks and Wickedness

  Magic Blood Series

  The Primal

  Book 1: Hunter’s Calling

  The Blood and Magick Series

  Book 1: Magick Reborn

  Book 2: Demon’s Kiss

  Book 3: Witch’s Wrath

  The Half-Lich Series

  THE HALF-LICH BOXED SET

  Book 1: Dark Siren

  Book 2: The Void Weaver

  Book 3: Night and Chaos

  The Amber Lee Series

  THE AMBER LEE BOXED SET

  Book 1: True Witch

  Book 2: Dark Witch

  Book 3: Shadow Witch

  Book 4: Red Witch

  Book 5: Devil’s Witch

  The Cursed and Damned Series

  Book 1: The Dead Wolves

  The Order of Prometheus Series

  Book 1: Smoke and Shadows

  Book 2: Cloak and Daggers

  You can also join Katerina’s Inner Circle on Facebook, where you’ll be able to interact with her directly, whenever you want! That’s also where she’ll be sharing early snippets, early cover reveals, and more contests!

  JOIN KATERINA’S GROUP

  ***

  For Isabella, Reece, and Karim, the real-life inspiration behind some of these amazing characters.

  ***

  CHAPTER ONE

  They call it the Precipice; I call it suicide. Tonight was perfect for it. Better than any other night this week had been. The sky was filled with clouds charged with bubbling lightning, rain had been falling an hour ago, cleaning the streets and giving the air that damp, wet scent. And yet, as I stood on the edge of the rooftop I was about to hurl myself from, the urge to do it still wasn’t there.

  I’m not talking about the urge to commit suicide, but the pull toward the Tempest. They—RJ, Danvers, Karim, even Axel—had all said they’d felt it before taking the plunge themselves. RJ had described it like the adrenaline rush at the apex of a good workout, while Danvers had likened it more to the thrill of doing something you absolutely know you shouldn’t be doing.

  It was slightly different for everyone, but they’d all felt something. Me? The only feeling gripping my throat was fear. Fear that I was about to kill myself up here. Fear that I’d jump and the Tempest wouldn’t open for me because I’d waited too long, because it was too late, because my Guardian didn’t want me to come for it anymore.

  “Could we get this moving?” Karim asked, “I’m freezing my bollocks off over here.”

  “She’ll do it this time,” Danvers said. “I know she will.”

  “That’s what you said yesterday. And Tuesday. And last Saturday.”

  I wanted to tell Karim to quit whining, but I couldn’t speak. I was afraid if I spoke, my heart would finally jump out of my throat and take its own dive off the side of the building. Anything to get away from me and my crippling anxiety about what I was about to do. The irony was, it was safer inside of my chest, because simply put? I was too scared to jump.

  The building we were on was twenty stories tall. It had to be. A shorter one wouldn’t have worked. From my vantage point, looking down, I could see the street below and the rooftop of the—much lower—building across from this one. There were no clothes lines, no dumpsters to fall into, not that they’d be much help at the speed I’d be going. There was only the jump, and blind faith that it would all work out.

  And I’d never been good at the whole faith thing.

  “Could y’all just give her a minute?” RJ asked.

  He was standing by my side, making sure none of the others got too close. He was like a Guardian himself, with his hand on my shoulder, making sure I wouldn’t accidentally topple over and fall to my death before I meant to. I caught him out of the corner of my eye looking down over the ledge, and then casting his eyes across the horizon.

  Manhattan glimmered like a bed of jewels there, lights twinkling, skyscrapers kissing the low hanging clouds. When the clouds lit up from the inside, so too did the gl
assy, reflective windows on the buildings themselves, making the light dance across almost the entire island.

  “I’m wasting everyone’s time,” I said, keeping my eyes on the city. “This isn’t gonna work.”

  “You don’t know that,” RJ said, “You’re only telling yourself that because it’s more comfortable to believe it than to face the truth.”

  “Truth?” I turned my eyes toward him.

  “That you were meant to do this. Nobody wants to do the difficult thing even though they know it’ll make them better for it. People just wanna sit around where it’s safe and comfortable, and wait for greatness to come to them. That’s not who you are.”

  “I hear what you’re saying, I really do, but you’re not the one about to throw yourself off this thing.”

  “I’ll do it with you. You know I got you.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “I do… but I still don’t understand why.”

  “Why?”

  “You said you’d be done after we finished the job. Why are you still here?”

  “You want me to go?”

  “No, I’m just…”

  “Questioning everything. I get it. This ain’t no game—this is the Precipice. It’s meant to turn you against yourself. It’s meant to make you doubt everything you know. Once you fall into it, you’ll never question yourself again. So, why don’t you just focus on getting through this instead of wondering why I’m still here?”

  I nodded, then I turned my eyes toward the horizon again. This wasn’t the first time I’d found myself at the Precipice in recent memory. It wasn’t even the fifth time. We’d been trying this for a few weeks, coming to the same place, trying to get me to enter the Tempest. None of them had to come. They’d signed up to do a job with me, not to help me achieve a spiritual awakening.

  But here they were. Danvers, RJ, Karim. Axel was the only one of us who was missing tonight. None of us knew where he was, but then none of us questioned him much on his whereabouts. We were all on Asmodius’ shit list, but out of all of us he was probably being surveilled the hardest.

  Then there were the crows. I hadn’t seen them since the night of the heist, almost three weeks ago. The last time I’d seen them, both had been in bad shape. RJ had really done a number on them. But they were Vivimancers; not only were they naturally tough, but they could stitch torn skin and mend bones with their magic.

  They were fine, they were out there somewhere, and they were waiting.

  I took a deep breath and watched the street again, feeling vertigo’s dizzying pull pinch the pit of my stomach. I could see the colors of the cars from up here, the yellow cabs, the people on the streets—some with umbrellas up. Still, that pull wasn’t the same feeling as the one I was told I would get when the Tempest was ready to open for me.

  It was a human feeling, something normal and natural. Looking down, I was sure I’d end up as a blue-haired pancake on top of somebody’s car. In my mind I kept telling myself, this is suicide, Izzy. It’s suicide. You’re just gonna die if you do this. They were hard thoughts to ignore, because they were true. This wasn’t some deeply rooted insecurity coming up to stop me from doing what I needed to do; it was logic and reason trying to save my life.

  “I don’t know if I can do it,” I said.

  “Great,” Karim said, “How about we all go back to the house and I’ll fix us a cuppa?”

  “Once she jumps,” Danvers said, “You can go and make some for all of us.”

  “I would, except I’ve pulled first shift again. Those straws are rigged.”

  “Oh, boo-hoo. So, you’ve gotta sit up here for a few hours and wait for Izzy to come out of the Tempest. Tell you what, I’ll take first shift if you make me a cup of tea.”

  “And why would you do that?”

  “Because despite being a stiff-upper lipped kind of asshole, I never knew what a good cup of tea tasted like before I met you.”

  “Well… you’re not as bad a b—”

  “—I’m doing it,” I said, my words cutting through the banter like a hot knife through butter.

  RJ squeezed my shoulder, then he let it go. The only thing tethering me to the building was an antenna stem, and my knuckles were turning white from the vigor I was holding onto it with. I took a deep breath, followed by another one, and then another one. Strangely, I thought of Becket, the infernal mage who had taken us under his wing; the infernal mage we had no choice but to trust more than most people.

  He hadn’t only taken us under his wing, he’d also invited us into his home and allowed us to stay there. I, for one, knew how difficult it was to break into his place and get past his defenses, so I wasn’t about to pass up the opportunity. Even if the Magistrate wasn’t after us—they didn’t know we’d hit the Magister’s vault—it was comforting to know we were safe from Asmodius and his cronies, at least.

  Slowly, I let my grip slip from the metal pole I was holding onto. As the seconds passed and my hold on solid ground loosened, my heart raced harder. It was well and truly wedged inside of my throat and hammering like it was about to explode. I felt my orientation tip past my center of gravity… and immediately I tried to grab the pole and swing myself back around.

  “Shit!” I yelped, as my fingers couldn’t quite get a good grip. My body swung from left to right, and as I toppled over the building’s ledge, my arms stretched, my fingers splayed out, I caught a glimpse of Axel arriving on the rooftop where I’d been standing a moment ago. My breath caught in my throat, I thought I was about to scream, but I didn’t. Instead, I slid out of his view and off the side of the building.

  Falling was like nothing I’d ever felt before. It was as if my insides, all of them, surged up and into my head all at once. My stomach filled with butterflies, my entire body started to tremble and vibrate as the rush of adrenaline hit me all at once. It was like riding a rollercoaster, that first drop after the climb. The anticipation of the fall is the worst part, but the fall itself is exhilarating—almost liberating.

  For a moment, a slight gasp of breath, I almost thought I could give myself up to the feeling. I thought I could surrender myself to faith and, if I did, that the Tempest itself would open for me. But then the reality of what was about to happen tore into me like a hungry lion into a wounded gazelle, and I regained my senses.

  The Tempest wasn’t going to open like some safety net. I’d ignored the Journey for far too long, my Guardian wasn’t calling out to me anymore, and I was about to die.

  The people and the cars on the ground beneath me were already starting to look much, much bigger than they had been a minute ago. With my heart thundering inside of my chest, blurring my vision, I called to the Tempest and begged it to give me my power, even if it wouldn’t open its doors.

  Lightning ripped through the clouds as the realm of magic responded to my call, my entire body began to vibrate. With what little of my sensible, non-panicked, mind would allow, I pushed magic into our world.

  I wanted to stop myself from falling, to project a wall of force ahead of me strong enough to break my rapid descent. That didn’t work. I wasn’t strong enough to do anything nearly as epic, but I was able to slow myself down just a little and push my flight-path close enough to the building I’d just jumped from.

  Frantic, I searched for something I could hold onto—a balcony, a gantry, anything. I couldn’t have been more than three floors from the asphalt when I managed to grab hold of a drainpipe that snapped straight off its joints as soon as I touched it. A flower of white-hot pain bloomed from the hand I’d used to grab it with, but I couldn’t think about it. The pipe had come loose from the wall and had started to swing wildly around the front of the building.

  I was about to free-fall again. The pipe was about to come around and smash against the corner of the building, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to hold on after that. I saw my one and only chance a split-second before the window of opportunity closed, and I took it, using my feet to push off the building and launch myself toward the gantr
y on the building across from me.

  I don’t know how I managed to catch it. Maybe luck, maybe magic, maybe grit—maybe a little bit of all three. I’d just about lost my ability to breathe by the time I pulled myself up and onto it. But I was alive.

  I rolled onto my back, desperately trying to catch a breath but failing miserably. My hand throbbed. When I saw what I’d done to it, I cringed. It was red all the way to my elbow. I’d opened a gash in my palm when I’d grabbed that pipe, a gash so deep I was sure I could see bone under the broken skin, and it was bleeding like I had an infinite supply.

  Turning my eyes away and gritting my teeth, I held my injured hand up in the air, pinched my wrist with the other to stop from bleeding out, and waited for RJ to find me. I’d tried to make it into the Tempest, and I’d failed. Again.

  Dammit.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Learning to live in a house full of demons hadn’t been easy. Becket had tried to reassure us all that they were harmless so long as no one touched anything inside of his inner sanctum. But in the dead of night, things would happen in that house… things that kept you up most nights, and gave you nightmares when you were lucky enough to find sleep.

  Bumps, knocks, and shuffling sounds were as common as the crickets that would abruptly stop chirping at exactly midnight every night. A kind of perpetual cold existed, the kind that finds a way to get into your bones no matter how many layers of clothes you’ve slapped on your back. And don’t get me started about the whispering walls. It was bad enough that they talked, but when they started repeating your secrets to you, that kind of thing made the blood run cold.

  Still, it beat having to move from place to place, or having to sleep with the constant threat of being picked up by Asmodius, or the crows.