Magaestra: Tested: An urban fantasy series

by Katherine Kim

  Magaestra: Tested

  Katherine Kim

  Magaestra: Tested © 2021 Katherine Kim. All rights reserved. This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwise—without prior written permission of the publisher, except as provided by United States of America copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, at katherineukim@gmail.com

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, or events is entirely coincidental.

  Follow me on Instagram @katherineukim or on Facebook www.facebook.com/katherineukim

  Cover by Sabrina Watts at Enchanted Ink Studio

  Contents

  A quick word

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Excerpt from Caroline's Internship

  About the Author

  Books by Katherine Kim

  A quick word

  Keep up with new releases, giveaways, and other antics by joining my email community. You’ll get news of releases, a free short story, updates from any shenanigans I get up to, and all sorts of things!

  For Margaret, who threw Magaestra: Loyalties at the wall in frustration when she finished it. Best compliment ever.

  1

  Faith sat at the heavy wooden table and gritted her teeth, straining. She felt a bead of sweat start to roll down her face, but couldn't spare any focus to swipe at it as she kept her attention on her task. Another push and the feather settled gently back to the tray it had come from, and she gasped in a breath.

  "Not bad. Did you remember to keep pulling in fresh energy as you worked?" Detective Kenneth Lincoln asked.

  Faith glared at him as she caught her breath. The dark-haired man was the first mage outside her family that she had ever met, and he was helping her to learn things she really ought to have known already.

  "I did my best," she grumbled. "Moving a tiny feather-like that with any accuracy using just wind isn't exactly the easiest thing ever, you know. That's not even a feather feather. It's a bit of down from your winter coat! I could do it easier and faster with my telekinesis magic.”

  Ken grinned and shrugged, then sent the feather through a series of loops before settling it on the table in front of Faith. "I am well aware. Just because it looks easy for me to move that with air doesn't mean that learning control wasn't difficult for me, too. I just did it fifteen years ago."

  He flicked his fingers out and three candle flames flickered into existence in front of him, dancing and weaving in the air and lighting up the meeting room they sat in. "Besides, it's good for you to have more than one way to do things. It's easy for you to move things around by pushing with your magic, but by using the air to move things, you have an extra skill in your toolkit."

  Faith scowled at him. The sounds of clanking weights and friendly teasing from outside the door seemed a direct contrast to the detective's smirk.

  "Show off."

  They sat in the basement of the Frostwalker Clan house, in a room specifically dedicated now to Faith’s magic practice. She grabbed her bottle of water and twisted the cap off, and closed her eyes to focus on the cheerful sounds of some of the enforcers and sentries training in the gym that was just a few steps down a short hallway. The thought that not one of them was human made her grin, mentally.

  The past few weeks had brought more changes into her life than she could even count, but these, at least, were good ones. Learning that werewolves were a real thing had sadly not been the craziest part of it all. Over the past few weeks she had been attacked, her sister kidnapped, and her niece kidnapped then rescued, and Faith herself had killed one vampire and saved the life of another.

  They had learned about a whole world of paranormal people, creatures, and history and while Crissy was still missing, Faith and her niece Kaylee had found safety with a group of werewolves and vampires that called themselves the Frostwalker Clan. Then, there was Detective Kenneth Lincoln.

  A particularly loud clang and a cheer gently rattled the door. Faith grinned but Ken grunted and glowered at the door as if he could see the people in the gym.

  "How can you stay here, anyway?" he grumbled ."You can't trust them, they'll just use you for your magic and keep you locked down here or something.”

  Faith rolled her eyes. "They've repeatedly risked their own lives to keep me and Kaylee safe, and they've tried to rescue Crissy. They're good people, Ken."

  "You can't trust 'em," he grumbled, but this was far from the first time he had tried to convince her to leave the Clan house. Ken didn't trust non-human paranormals, and Faith could admit that she understood why.

  World War Two had been the human extension of a paranormal war waged by a particular coven of vampires and their allies, specifically against human mages. That war had caused mages to be hunted nearly to extinction and so many families were destroyed that it hurt Faith's heart to think about it.

  She had once visited the Holocaust Museum during a trip to Washington DC and she had left badly shaken at what humans could do to each other. Now she knew that was only half the story. The vampires had hunted mages specifically to drink the magic in their blood, then used the abilities they gained from that magic to try to assert their vampiric superiority over the rest of the world. Ken's family had been just as directly affected as her own, the only difference being that Ken’s family had known the history and hers hadn’t.

  Then, of course, his parents hadn't been killed in a car accident, so he had been able to finish his training as a mage rather than get shipped off to LA to get raised by an aunt who thought things like magic were only in the movies the town was known for.

  "I can trust the Frostwalkers, Ken. You know I can, too.” Faith was not going to hear a word against her new friends, and Ken knew it. Well, he did now. She had gotten sick of his constant sniping and lit into him at one point, and since then this was about as bad as it got.

  "Well, you ready to go again?" he asked. He nodded at the damn feather. "Practice makes perfect. And make sure you're drawing new energy from the environment. It's not as easy inside a building like this, but it's plenty possible."

  Faith glared at his smirk and then took a deep breath and started the feather moving again, swooping and dipping to sketch through a whole set of geometric shapes in the air.

  A few hours later and the sweat was making her hair cling to her neck and around her face. She was as tired and sore as if she had been in one of Tamika's self-defense training sessions rather than seated at a conference table the whole time.

  "Do it again," Ken said.

  "Not a chance," Faith answered, slumping back in her chair. "I'm all tapped out for the moment."

  Ken grinned, and it startled her. He wasn't really a grinning kind of guy. Well, at least not anywhere near the Frostwalker Clan, even though he agreed that this room
in the basement of the clan house was probably the safest place for Faith to practice.

  "It's like exercise. Gotta push a bit to build your magic muscles."

  "Yeah, well, my magic muscles are jelly at this point," Faith grumbled. She was about to say something more when there was a hesitant knock on the door.

  Faith and Ken frowned at each other. They were supposed to be undisturbed while they were in here, except in an emergency, since losing concentration while juggling fireballs wasn't healthy for anyone.

  "Yes?" Ken called.

  There was a long moment of silence before a very soft answer came. "Aunt Faith?"

  Faith and Ken exchanged a glance and he got up to open the door. On the other side was Kaylee, hunched in a bit but with her chin up, like she was going to be brave despite everything.

  "Aunt Faith, can I come in?"

  "Sure, Kaylee-bee, what can I do for you?" Faith opened her arms as the child climbed into her lap and snuggled in. Faith exchanged a glance with Ken, who looked equally worried.

  "What's up? Where's Jake? I hardly ever see you two apart anymore." Faith wanted to know what was going on with her niece. It could be anything at this point. Over the past few weeks, the child had dealt with rogue werewolf attacks, her mother being kidnapped, then getting kidnapped herself. She had her newly rescued mother snatched away from them mid-rescue, faced down monstrous dog creatures and vampires, dodged more attacks, and then saw her new best friend suddenly turn into a wolf pup and her favorite teacher in a hospital bed.

  All in all, it was maybe more surprising that Kaylee was as cheerful as she was usually.

  "Jake is practicing not shifting by accident. Mr. Greg and Marc are helping him." Kaylee answered.

  "Ah." Faith nodded. It made sense. werewolves didn't usually shift until much closer to puberty. Jake wasn't even in kindergarten yet but had shifted during an attack on the Frostwalker Clan house in a bid to protect Kaylee. Now, though, he had to learn control so he didn't accidentally shift in front of normal humans.

  "Am I going to turn into a wolf, too?" Kaylee's eyes turned up to stare at Faith.

  "Well, we talked about this a bit before, remember?" Faith sighed. She was so out of her depth here. God, how did Crissy manage? "Your mom is a mage, so maybe you'll have magic you can use to do spells instead."

  Kaylee sighed and snuggled in closer. "Where is Mommy? I miss her and want her to come home now."

  The sadness in the girl’s voice grabbed Faith's heart and squeezed. She tried to answer but the words stuck in her throat.

  "There are a lot of people out looking for your mom right now," Ken spoke up. He scooted his chair around the table and leaned close to Kaylee so she could see him without moving too much.

  "There's the human police out doing everything they can. Your mom and I are looking. Your friends here are looking, too, and probably breaking as many laws as they can while doing so." Ken's expression darkened for a moment before he shook himself and smiled gently at the little girl. "We haven't found her yet, but we will. And she'll be here before you cast your first spell or turn furry the first time. Okay?"

  Kaylee sniffled and nodded.

  "The important thing is to stay safe so that we're here when we do find your mom. Right? So we're staying inside the house unless we have some of our friends with us," Faith added.

  "I know. A whole bunch of us went down to the creek this morning. Miss Tamika is really good at catching frogs. Did you know that?" Kaylee looked up at Faith, the worry in her eyes starting to recede a bit.

  "I did not know that, but Miss Tamika is good at a lot of things, so I'm not surprised," Faith answered.

  "I bet Miss Tamika is pretty good at catching all sorts of things," Ken added. His voice was light and cheerful, but when Faith glanced over Kaylee's head his eyes held a lack of trust in the wolves.

  The three of them kept talking for a while, reassuring Kaylee that she was safe and that everything was being done to find Crissy, and that it didn't matter if she was a werewolf or a mage, she was still important and loved. After half an hour or so, a slightly panicked voice called from down the hallway "Kaylee?"

  "She's in here, Tamika!" Faith called back.

  The door burst open and Tamika's eyes went right to Kaylee, still sitting in Faith's lap. "Sweet lord, Sugar, don't scare me like that! We didn't know where you were! Half the enforcers are out in the woods looking for you!" Tamika pulled her phone out and tapped at it, apparently sending a text to the rest of the team that the girl was found, safe, and still in the house.

  "Kaylee," Faith used her Serious Grownup Voice. "Did you sneak away to come down here?"

  "Well. I was upstairs in the den watching TV and coloring while Jake had his practice and then the show ended and I was bored and then another show started but it was dumb and then the mom in it went on a trip and I started thinking about my mommy and then I came to find you." Kaylee delivered the whole explanation without even pausing for breath. "I didn't mean to be sneaky."

  "I see," Faith nodded.

  Tamika sighed through a grin, "Sweetie, I need to know where you are or--"

  "Kaylee!"

  Tamika stepped aside as Aldric came rushing into the room and scooped the girl up into his arms. Kaylee giggled and wrapped herself around the tall, dark man. Faith took a moment to appreciate the sight of the dangerous vampire's clear relief at finding the preschooler. His strong arms were wrapped around the child, supporting her carefully and he had his head bent over her so that all Faith could see well was his dark brown hair and the back of Kaylee’s head, one lopsided pigtail sticking out.

  "I'm okay Uncle Aldric, I just needed to see Aunt Faith," Kaylee said, her voice muffled by his shoulder. "I didn't mean to scare everyone."

  Faith saw shock sweep through his eyes at the title, then joy spread over his face. "I'm just glad you are safe. That's the most important thing to me. That you and your aunt are safe."

  "Okay. I'm sorry," Kaylee leaned back and smiled at him. "Is Jake done with his dad yet?"

  "I think they may be finished soon, yes. Perhaps Tamika can take you to find him?" Aldric nodded.

  "Let's go, Sugar. It's my turn to read you the riot act over disappearing like that. Then we'll get some ice cream and find Jake. Sound good?" Tamika held her hand out to the girl as Aldric set her back on her feet. The pair headed back out the door and down the hallway, the beads in Tamika's braids clacking softly when she shook her head.

  "Well, I think that was more excitement than I needed when I'm this worn out," Faith sighed, slumping back in her chair. "I don't think I can keep working, Ken."

  "Yeah," he grumbled. "Seems like we're done for today. If you get some time later, keep practicing."

  Faith snorted.

  "Would you like some coffee, or a snack?" Aldric asked. He was trying to be polite to Ken, and Faith appreciated it, in the face of Ken's prickliness. Okay, in the face of his occasionally overt hostility.

  The man did not like paranormals.

  "I'm fine. I'll just head out." Ken stood up and stretched. "Call me later, Faith. We'll chat." And with that he headed out the door, his footsteps fading.

  Faith sighed. "I could use a cup of coffee," she said, reaching her hand out to Aldric, who took it and tugged her gently to her feet. "And a snack. And a nap."

  A smile curved across his face. "I can arrange all those things."

  2

  "I wish I knew what to say to Kaylee. I'm much better at being the fun, silly aunt than this serious kid-raising stuff." Faith pressed her back closer into Aldric's side and he ran his hand up and down her arm.

  "I am simply relieved that she did not wander off as we were afraid of," Aldric said. "When Tamika looked over and she wasn't in the den, we were all afraid for the worst."

  Faith nodded. "I think she gets that now. She's a pretty smart kid."

  "That she is, and you are doing an excellent job, considering the circumstances," Aldric said.

  "I called her p
reschool this morning. They were very understanding about everything when I said that she probably isn't coming back this next year." Faith sipped her coffee and the bitter scent was soothing, layered on top of Faith's own. "They were also glad to hear that Greg Honeyford was recovering when I told them we had taken him in. I told them that we were at the police station talking about Crissy when we heard he’d been rescued and offered to take him in. I think he's going to be fired, though."

  "I believe Marc has offered him a position teaching here. Jake cannot attend a public school until he learns to control his shifts very well. And Greg cannot exactly go out in public already healed from that ordeal. The police have photographs of his injuries, after all, and they are not the sort that humans recover from quickly."

  Faith nodded and sighed and sipped her coffee as they let the conversation die. The sofa in his office was comfortable, and Aldric was glad Marc had insisted he have it. It gave him the perfect place to sit, snuggled up to Faith while she sipped her coffee and relaxed for a few moments. Faith's back curved into his side and she cuddled happily under his arm, pulling it around her waist while she tucked her feet under a blanket.

  Aldric had a file of information on the Goldfang Stalker members they were holding that he was re-reading in the hopes that he would find a clue as to who the vampires working with that pack were. He had asked Frankie to help him, since the man was still grieving and needed to feel proactive in going after the people who killed his fiancée during their first attempt at rescuing Crissy.