Angel Fever (Immortal Legacy #3) - Ella Summers Page 0,54

a few friends here.

No, I was getting out of here. There had to be a way. Sure, I hadn’t found one in all this time, but I wasn’t going to let that smother my optimism. Giving up was for losers. And my father had raised me to be a winner.

“Has Taron calculated the new arrivals’ chances of survival?”

“He believes three of the five should survive. Perhaps even four out of five.”

“The telepath?”

“Is among those he believes will survive.”

“Very good.”

No, that wasn’t good. Any time people died, that wasn’t good.

“The telepaths are critical to our gaining magic.”

The Guardians deplored the gods and demons for the black-and-white, level-up-your-magic-or-die dichotomy of their Nectar and Venom. And yet they quietly brushed over the fact that their own magic-balancing Life potion killed people too. Often enough, it granted death rather than life.

I’d seen the bodies. Just this morning, in fact. Taron and Giselle had piled bodybags, one for every person the Life potion had killed yesterday, into a train car. Then they’d driven them out of the Sanctuary.

The burial grounds lay outside the Sanctuary’s borders. The Guardians were superstitious about the dead. They wanted to be with the living, with the Immortals, the epitome of immortal life. They feared being near the dead.

Wait a moment.

The bodies had left the Sanctuary. But only people with balanced magic could leave the Sanctuary, escort or no escort. These people had died because the Life potion could not balance their magic. So they couldn’t have left here.

And I had just discovered the loophole I’d been searching for. The barrier to the Sanctuary let out the dead. Which meant that in order to escape, I simply had to be dead.

16

Dead Again

Being dead was actually much less permanent than it seemed. I’d been dead once, and I could be dead again—at least until I was free of the Sanctuary.

Last time, I’d used a potion to fake my death, and it had worked perfectly. I was going to mix up a weaker dose this time, though. I only had to be dead enough to fool the spell around the Sanctuary. That should be easier than fooling the Legion’s battery of physical and magical tests. No one would be examining my body. I planned to hide in the back of Eva’s truck as she drove out.

Plus, a lower dose of death would wear off sooner. I’d calculated the mixture precisely. It should wear off shortly after I was clear of the Sanctuary. That was a necessity since I wouldn’t have anyone to administer an antidote to me this time. Everything was up to me.

I crept quietly into the potions lab. The lights were out. It was empty, as it usually was at this hour. I cast a globe of floating light over me, then grabbed a few pouches and vials. I took a cutting board and a knife. Then I proceeded to cut, chop, shred, and mix the ingredients, weaving them together with my magic to create my potion. My magic had returned the moment I’d stepped out of the Guardians’ temple. Without it, my potion would have contained as much magic as a bowl of plain tomato soup.

“Who are you trying to kill?”

I glanced over at the door. Zane stood just inside the threshold of the room. He was a telepath who’d been brought to the Sanctuary almost two years ago. His stance was relaxed, his eyes amused, as they looked upon my bubbling potion.

“Killing people is easy,” I replied. “It’s keeping them alive that’s the problem.”

He moved in for a closer look at my potion. “I see. You’ve brewed the Living Death, which only creates the appearance of death. That’s a tricky potion.”

“I’m surprised you’ve heard of it. During my days on Earth, this potion’s formula was classified Legion intelligence.”

“It probably still is. But my sister Leda has always had a knack for finding treasure, people, and classified intelligence. Leda discovered this particular potion formula about ten years ago, in the hands of a rogue witch coven who’d set up shop on the Frontier of civilization. She promptly shared the formula with our sister Bella.”

“A witch.”

“Yes.”

“Did your sister ever have cause to use the potion?”

Mixing up a classified Legion potion was risky. If the Legion found out, they wouldn’t knock before they broke down your door.

“Bella only made it once that I know of,” Zane replied. “There was this pirate king we were hired to capture. It was worth a big payday. Our car had just broken down again, so we