Novels by Maxwell Aggie

A blinding white searchlight cut through the rainy night, pinning us against the brick wall of the alley like insects on a board.The heavy gray helicopter hovered just above the rooftops, its spinning blades kicking up a furious wind that tore at my jacket and sprayed cold rainwater across my face. On the side of the aircraft, a stamped metal emblem shaped like a golden scales-and-sword gleamed under the light.The High Council.Vane pushed himself up from the mud beside his overturned car, wiping dark blood from his cheek. He didn't look victorious anymore; his eyes widened with genuine panic as he stared up at the hovering machine. Even district wardens like Vane answered to the higher powers governing Chicago's hidden magical underbelly."Move!" Mara grabbed the back of my jacket, pulling me hard to the left just as a thick beam of blue light shot down from the helicopter, melting a hole straight through the concrete where I had been standing a second ago."We can't outrun a chopp

The black car door clicked open, and Vane stepped onto the wet pavement of the alley.Rain drummed hard against the roof of the vehicle, but not a single drop touched his sharp suit. He stood there with his hands tucked neatly inside his coat pockets, watching us with that calm, sickening smile. Behind him, two men in heavy gray coats stepped out of the front seats, their faces hidden in the shadows of their hats.I took a step backward, my boots splashing in a puddle. My heart hammered hard against my ribs. We had just climbed all the way up from the deep underground tunnels, thinking we had finally escaped. We thought we were safe back in the normal streets of Chicago. But Vane was already waiting for us before we could even catch our breath."Did you really think a rusty ladder and a drainage pipe would be enough to lose me?" Vane asked, his voice smooth and quiet as he took a slow step toward the mouth of the alley.Mara did not hesitate. She dropped into a fighting stance, her ha

The water in the drainage canal did not just move; it boiled.A pair of glowing red eyes stared straight at us from the black shadows of the lower pipe. The air turned heavy and sour, smelling of old iron and sulfur. My boots slipped on the wet wooden boards of the dock as I backed up against a damp piling."Get behind me," Mara said.She didn't run. She stood her ground at the edge of the platform, her hand sliding down to her belt, though her iron pry bar was gone, lost somewhere back in the collapsing vault. She grabbed a jagged piece of loose wood from the dock instead, her eyes fixed on the dark opening.Barnaby the cat hissed, his orange fur standing straight up like a brush. "That's not one of Vane's debt-collectors. That's a breach-hound. Hayes must have released it down the secondary lines the second we jumped."The creature stepped out of the dark pipe, and my chest went tight.It looked like a wolf made out of rusted metal and thick black smoke. Its jaws dripped with glowin

The glowing silver staff in the woman's hand hummed with a sharp, heavy charge that made the air taste like copper.I stayed frozen on the cracked marble floor, my breath hitching in my throat. The armored guard she had blasted through the wall was gone, swallowed by the dark void outside the shrinking room. The woman in the long white coat didn't look like Vane. She didn't have his dark suit or his quiet, terrifying calm. Her eyes were sharp, calculating, and completely ruthless, scanning the crumbling vault as if she were a boss inspecting a messy warehouse."I won't ask twice," the woman said, her voice cutting clean and cold through the noise of the collapsing stone. "Hand over the anchor girl. Vane is a fool who runs this city like a dusty bookstore. I have much bigger plans for what she can do."Mara pushed herself up from the floor, clutching her side where she had hit the stone wall. She grabbed her iron pry bar, her eyes narrowing as she glared at the stranger."Who do you th

The white marble floor began to crack right down the middle with a sharp, ugly snap.I threw my hands out to catch my balance as the entire circular room gave a violent lurch. The massive stone pedestal holding the closed ledger sank a foot into the ground, grinding against the bedrock with a sound that set my teeth on edge."Move!" Mara shouted, grabbing the front of my jacket and pulling me out of the way just as a slab of ceiling stone crashed down right where I had been standing.Dust exploded into the air, choking and thick. Through the gray haze, I watched the heavy double doors we had locked behind us vanish completely as the stone walls slid inward, sealing the seams shut. There was no crack, no handle, and no way back out the way we came."The room is resetting," Barnaby rasped, digging his claws into the shifting marble floor to keep from sliding toward the expanding cracks. "Vane didn't just run. He triggered the vault's final security protocol. This place is designed to cr

The black chains whipped through the air like living snakes.I threw my arms over my head, curling my body around Chloe as she lay flat on the marble floor. Her breathing was shallow, and her face looked as pale as paper. The massive ledger on the stone pedestal was still flipping its pages at a dizzying speed, glowing with a fierce, blinding light that pushed against the dark smoke filling the room.Mara did not wait to see the chains hit. She lunged forward with her iron pry bar, swinging it hard into the path of the oncoming smoke.Clang.The impact sent a shockwave of sparks across the floor. Mara stumbled backward, her boots sliding against the slick white marble, but she managed to deflect the worst of the attack."Get up, Leo!" Mara shouted, her voice tight with strain. "We cannot stay here!""I can't leave her!" I yelled back, dropping to my knees beside my sister.Chloe's eyes fluttered open. The silver light inside them was so bright now it hurt to look directly at her face.