Fic: The Adamant Blade (Epilogue)
Steve danced away from the cloud of fire that the boggart spat at him, feeling the flames lick at the protective charm Danny had thrown over him as soon as the demon appeared. Their bond flickered and flared, making him grin as he heard Danny's feelings in his head. Annoyance, fondness, worry, mumbled words like reckless and stupid. He let his partner know he was okay, that he wasn't even singed a little.
“Steve, down” Chin yelled, and he dropped to the sidewalk.
The kukui nut Chin threw, exploded and obliterated the boggart. The explosion sprayed damp ash across the front of the office block the boggarts had been guarding. Steve twisted around and grinned at his teammate, long since over the jealously he'd borne when his friend's natural talent blossomed under Danny's magical tutelage. Steve had really wanted to be the one to charge up items, use them to protect himself and the team, but it seemed he just wasn't wired that way.
Steve hadn't been able to learn even the simplest of spells, which had pissed him off immensely, the power he was sure he could feel, kept slipping away from him. Nana said it was there and, although he had more magical power than most of the practitioners she'd ever met, for some reason he wasn't able to use it. But Danny could.
He and Danny were learning more every day just what they could do together. Danny was stronger, could cast spells much faster, and the feedback Steve got through the bond, allowed him to keep track of what was going on in the aether. They were completely entangled, he and Danny, and Steve couldn't imagine his life without that bond now.
Steve felt Danny pull on his power, dueling with the practitioner who'd decided Hawai'i was the place to visit to do some casual summoning and blackmail. He could tell from Danny's confidence that the sorcerer wasn't all that strong, and his partner was taking his time trying to learn all he could about the other man's power. If they captured him alive, anything they could learn, would make containing him easier.
“Boss man,” Kono yelled, and Steve ran around the corner to find her pinning a flailing boggart to the pavement. Unsure how she'd managed it, he didn't have time to admire her skill. Pulling out his knife, the adamant blade, he jammed it into the demon's head. The boggart exploded into ash, and Steve helped Kono to her feet.
She had a cut on her arm and a bruise across her cheekbone but she was grinning like she'd found her true calling. Danny had started calling her Buffy all the time, so Steve had finally been forced to sit down and catch a few of the episodes, just so that he could keep up when the two of them quoted lines at each other.
Kono was normal, at least as normal as a woman who happily wrestled demons could be. She and Steve had to rely on Uncle Mack's special rounds, Steve's blade and the watchful eyes of Danny and Chin. And their fighting skills.
Steve felt the surge of power as Danny fired a huge binding spell at the mainland sorcerer, and then the whump of detonating magic as it crashed into the other man. He wasn't sure how long a binding spell lasted but he knew the man was going to be handed over to Keaka to deal with. The Kahu was the ultimate magical authority on Oahu, helped by those who fought the good fight to keep the place safe from people who wanted to mess around with magic.
Last month, they'd busted a woman as she tried to possess her mother and force her to change her will. She was barely a blip on the magical scale, but Keaka still took his duty seriously and stripped her powers. They'd managed to charge her with a conventional crime as well, which was a massive bonus. Steve was already planning how he was going to make sure the idiot who'd summoned boggarts spent a long time in jail.
“Babe,” Danny called, as Steve jogged into the office building. “Everything out there okay?”
The other sorcerer was curled in a ball on the floor. Just outside of the spectrum of visible light, Steve could sense the web of power that seemed to shimmer over him. Danny looked tired but otherwise fine, a little grin on his face when Steve's affection bled through their bond. “Yeah, all good.”
The other half of the team tramped in, Chin already on his cell calling Keaka, with Kono gleeful and still looking for more demons to wrestle. Danny grinned at them all, and Steve could feel his immediate joy at a job well done. He was experiencing the underlying happiness at finally having both sides of his life in harmony, keeping everyone he loved safe.
Steve grinned back. Sure, the world was now an even more horrifying place than before his trip to New York, before he learned about a world beyond the normal, but he'd gotten so much back in return. He let his mind dive deeper into the bond, feeling Danny and the island reaching back to him. Yes, definitely worth it.
~fin~
