THE MAGICIAN

CHAPTER ONE

Damian was a man of silence and smoke, the kind of soul who lived between shadows. In his early thirties, with storm-gray eyes and a quiet presence, he often walked unnoticed through crowded rooms—just the way he liked it. Nonchalant, precise, and deliberate.

His great-grandfather had once dazzled Victorian courts with sleight-of-hand. His grandfather escaped Nazi-occupied Europe by hiding in illusion. His father, Richard Osborne, passed down the art like a sacred weapon. Damian didn’t shine in school—math bored him, literature confused him—but when it came to tricks, to crafting wonder from nothing, he was a prodigy.

Birthday parties. Open mic nights. Arena gigs when money allowed. He poured everything into his craft.

But lately, everything was unraveling.

His father, once a towering figure of elegance and charisma, was wasting away in a hospice bed, riddled with stage-four cancer. Damian had burned through every dime on treatments, trying to buy time from a god that didn’t barter. Meanwhile, his mother—Loise—was a ghost. She’d vanished when he was five, a whisper of perfume and slammed doors. All he ever had were his father’s cryptic words: “Your persistence always reminded me of your mother.” And nothing more.

So when an unknown number flashed across his screen, he almost didn’t answer.

But he did.

“Hi, Damian… it’s your mother. Loise.” Her voice was brittle, wrapped in a layer of guilt that didn’t even try to hide itself.

Damian’s throat tightened. “What do you want, Loise?”

“We need to talk.”

“About what?” His voice cracked into anger. “About how you left me? Left Dad? How you disappeared like a cheap trick and never came back?”

There was silence. Then: “Please, Damian—”

“I have to go.”

He hung up.

The quiet of his minimalistic apartment returned like a blanket. Clean walls. One chair. A tiny kitchen. A suitcase filled with smoke bombs, flash powder, steel chains, and tricks of the trade. His hands trembled as he packed, slipping his wand into its custom velvet sheath. The call had shaken something loose.

Damian hadn’t cried in years. But now a single tear trailed down his cheek. He wiped it away, furious at himself for letting her back into his head.

He took one last look around the apartment before locking the door and heading into the cold night.

---

Downtown L.A. glowed with neon breath as he checked into a motel near the Showtime Arena. He dressed in silence—polished shoes, tailored tuxedo, crimson silk bow tie. His top hat rested like a crown on his head. Every piece of his look was deliberate, a symbol of control in a life that had none.

Backstage, ballerinas pirouetted, singers warmed up their voices, and crew members buzzed like ants. The promoter, a wiry man in a sparkling blazer, nodded as Damian passed. “You’re on in twenty, maestro.”

Damian gave a curt nod and waited in the wings.

When his moment came, the house lights dropped. A hush fell over the arena.

“Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls… Prepare yourselves! Tonight’s featured performer: Damian the Magician!”

With a sudden burst of flame and smoke, Damian appeared center stage, unscathed, tall and still. The crowd erupted.

He bowed once. Then, with a flick of his wand and a swirl of silk, a woman emerged from an ornate black box. The audience gasped.

Next, he levitated, hovering inches above the ground, his body rigid, eyes closed. More applause.

Then came the escape trick. Shackled in steel cuffs, he swallowed the key and locked himself inside a transparent capsule filled with water. The crowd murmured, nervous. Thirty seconds. Forty-five. A minute.

Then—CRACK!

The cuffs hit the floor. Damian burst to the surface, gasping. A second later, he bowed with theatrical flair. The arena roared.

---

Back in the motel, he slumped onto the bed, soaking in the silence. The adrenaline faded fast, leaving him empty.

His phone vibrated.

A voicemail.

> “Hi Damian… it’s Loise. There’s something I need to tell you. I’m landing at LAX tonight. Please… it’s important.”

The message ended. Damian sat still, staring at the ceiling. His heart pounded—not from the show, not from the crowd, but from the weight of that voice.

She was coming.

After all these years… why now?

And what the hell did she want?