“I have to get back inside,” she told him. The need to return to her spell work nagged at her. Sonia would expect her to have perfected something by the time she got home.
Lifting his head, Aric nodded.
When she entered the house, the pain didn’t return. She watched him through the window as he lay on the grass as though content to enjoy the day. There he was, doing exactly what he promised—being nearby, not interfering, taking pains to let her live her life.
She needed to buckle down and practice being the witch everyone believed her to be. Surveying her supplies, she decided to drown out distractions.
Going to the bedroom, she pulled a pair of earbuds and her phone from her purse. There were missed calls from Rori. Swiping them away, dismissing them without a call back or consideration, felt empowering. It would be a cold day in hell when she talked to him again. Perhaps those swipes were one step closer to swiping him out of her life for good.
Stuffing the earbuds in, Divina lifted her chin with newfound confidence. She had done her part of the prophecy concerning Rori. There was no need for further interaction. This prophecy forced itself upon her at his command. The time for her to take control and twist it to work and benefit her had come.
Turning on a loud rock station to drown out her thoughts, she returned to the coffee table. She had collected some dry herbs and spread them around the small mortar beside the book Sonia had given her. Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath. Focus.
She plucked at the herbs, placing some in the bowl, only half paying attention to what she did. With Rori out of her mind, her thoughts drifted to the wolf just outside the house. He must still be there because her chest didn’t hurt. Flipping music stations, she pushed Aric out of her mind as well.
Divina pricked her finger using a safety pin and added a small drop of blood to the mixture in the mortar. She used the pestle to grind down the herbs and began casting, botching the pronunciation of the words in the book. Sonia had tried to help her with the phonetics, but learning a new language in a few hours wasn’t easy.
Divina continued to struggle. She’d say a word one way, then pronounce it differently the second time. She hoped good intentions outweighed bad pronunciation.
Repeating the words, trying her hardest to make the right sounds, she struck a match and inhaled deeply. The sulfur smell filled her nostrils. Continuing to chant, she focused on the small flame. Here goes nothing.
Closing her eyes, she focused on the purpose of the spell. She envisioned a seed in the bowl and not the paste made from dry leaves and blood. She mumbled words, and the match slipped from her fingers.
Wha boom!
Divina startled and turned to the kicked-open door, knocking over the mortar with a flailing arm. Her back to the spell, she yanked the earbuds out.
“Divina!” Ted shouted as he marched into the room with arms held out toward her. His wide, frantic eyes searched her face.
She blinked at him, a hand over her chest, trying to keep her rapidly beating heart inside her. “Ted?”
Once close enough, he placed his hands on her arms and looked her over. “Sonia said you needed someone to check up on you,” he explained.
A crease formed between her brows when he touched her and her skin crawled. She backed away from him and bumped into the coffee table. “What?” she barked.
“You didn’t answer the door,” Ted said. “I—”
“So you kicked the door in?” Divina shrugged him off. With a raised brow, she turned her attention to the wide-open door, which hadn’t been locked.
Ted dropped his hands and looked over his shoulder. “I didn’t kick it in. I just sorta panicked, I guess.” Pausing, he faced her sheepishly. “All right, so there was some kicking.”
She looked past him, out the door, at a figure in front of the house. Aric paced back and forth in front of the gate. He couldn’t get in but was clearly worried. Her stomach twisted for him. She wished for some sort of signal she could give. If she called out to him, she’d have to explain to Ted why he was there and couldn’t get closer.
She returned her focus to him. “I’m fine. I was just working on—”
Pop. Sizzle. Fizzzzz.
Divina turned sharply and gasped, hands covering her open mouth. Stepping back, wide-eyed, she bumped into Ted, who once again put his hands on her arms to steady her.
“What the fuck is that?” he asked.
Divina blinked. What the fuck was that indeed.
Standing on the coffee table, leaving little tiny black soot prints, was what could best be described as a fire imp. It was tiny, about five inches tall, with a flicker at the top of his flame-head. Large, black, coal-like eyes looked up at her and Ted. Its flaming short arms had flittering fingers at the end of its hands. Its feet were rounded black protrusions at the end of its legs. Resembling a flaming gingerbread man of sorts, the creature blinked at them.
Ted pulled Divina backward, away from the little fire person she had made.
She had made it. It was the product of her spell. With the realization, her eyes widened, and everything about her stiffened.
And Ted had seen it, this unnatural creature. Sure, Sonia and Divina had practiced small tricks in front of him the previous night, but those were party tricks, easily explained away as sleight of hand.
The cute little flame creature took a step closer but remained on the coffee table. A sense of curiosity radiated from it with the heat it put off. It was infectious, as she felt the same.
“Fuck! It’s following us!” Ted exclaimed in fright as his fingers dug into Divina’s arms and broke into her thoughts.
She wriggled in an attempt to get out of his grasp. She needed to fix this and find an explanation. “Let go!” she ordered.
“We gotta get out of here!” he shouted and yanked her again.
“It’s tiny.” She dug her feet in to resist. “Let go!” she yelled again. With one more good pull, she freed herself from him and stepped toward the creature. It looked up at her, and she felt an affinity for it. Ted ran past her toward the kitchen.
“He’s kind of cute,” she said with a smile. Crouching, she got a better look at the fire critter. If the thing had a mouth, she couldn’t tell. It did, however, lift its arms up to her. She wanted to touch it. Tentatively, Divina brought her hand toward the creature. Heat tickled the pad of her index finger, increasing the closer she got to its flaming outstretched hand. It might burn her, but it wouldn’t be too bad—nothing ice wouldn’t soothe.
Hiss.
Water splashed over the table, and she gasped. Ted had dumped a bowl of water onto the fire creature. White smoke plumed upward.
“No!” She waved her hand, trying desperately to clear the smoke and see what had happened to the little creature she had made. Coughing, Divina wondered if it could survive the water dousing.
Once the smoke had cleared, standing on the coffee table edge was a black gingerbread-like man, frozen in position with its arms outstretched toward her. She sat back on her heels with slumped shoulders and a frown. He had only existed for a few seconds, but she already missed him.
“Why did you do that?” she asked as tears welled in her eyes. She gingerly tapped at the blackness’s head.
“It was a fire monster,” Ted explained as he stood opposite the coffee table, looking down at the remains. “It could have set the whole place on fire. It could have burned you. It could have…” He sputtered and then licked his bottom lip. “I don’t know how it got here, but it’s gone now, and you’re safe.”
Divina glared up at him. “He was this big,” she snarled, holding her fingers up, guessing his height. “He wouldn’t have done any of that.” She pushed up to her feet.
Movement caught her attention, and she flicked her eyes to the window. She could see Aric glaring, golden eyes and all, at Ted.
“How do you know?” Ted challenged, regaining her attention.
She opened her mouth to explain that she had made him, had conj
ured him. She had given him life with her blood. Then it slapped her in the face—Ted was human and had glimpsed the supernatural. There were strict rules for all supernatural beings, no matter how close to human they were, that they were not to let humans know of their existence. They were to keep it silent. Humans could not be trusted with this information.
“That was some crazy shit. I’ve never seen anything like that before in my life. You don’t know what that thing would have done,” Ted continued, but Divina barely heard him.
She looked down at the creature’s burned remains. Her jaw slackened and her brows pulled together. What would happen to her? The council would find out.
The prophecy said that the wrong vampire would out their kind. Her eyes widened. The wrong vampire would show the world. The wrong vampire would end them all. Rori was the wrong vampire. Divina was the wrong witch.
The last line of the prophecy was wrong. It wasn’t the vampire, it wasn’t Rori who would out them—it was her. If anyone other than Ted saw what she’d done, saw her spell, knew about witches, it would end all kinds. Humans fear that which they don’t understand, and history had proven they don’t understand witches. There would be a war between humans and supernaturals, and it would be Divina’s fault. Divina would end all kinds.
Her ice-blue eyes shot up to Ted. He would tell everyone. He would let the world in on the existence of preternatural beings. He would be the undoing of all the kinds, and it would be Divina’s fault. Her throat went dry. Her heart hammered so hard in her chest that she feared it’d break a rib. She shook her head. She needed to fix this.
Looking to the window for answers, she saw Aric outside, still pacing. He charged at the property line only to bounce off the invisible walls of the wards. In any other circumstance, it would have been comical.
Click.
She blinked and saw Ted taking pictures with his cell phone.
“Stop that!” Divina shouted and snatched his phone from him. “What are you doing?”
“No one’s going to believe me without proof,” Ted said, reaching to get his phone back from Divina.
CHAPTER 17
With the warmth of the sun coming down on him and his mate within earshot, Aric’s wolf had curled up to take a nap. The drowsiness of the animal was infectious, and he dozed sprawled out on the grass. They’d been so sleep deprived that neither of them picked up the approaching male scent. However, the boom of the door had both Aric and his wolf jumping to his feet. He turned, looking for the source of the sound, and his lips curled up so his incisors were displayed as he charged to the front of the property.
What the fuck just happened? What’s going on? His mate was in distress. Aric could hear her rapid heartbeat. Through their incomplete bond, faintly, he picked up her panic. And there was a burning smell.
That human male. He was alone with Aric’s mate. The wolf snarled and slammed himself within Aric. He wanted to be free. He wanted to take out the competition. He wanted to kill that male for even being in Divina’s presence.
Attempting to calm his beast, Aric watched through the open front door and listened while he paced. He despised that all he could do was watch, and even that wasn’t going so well. He couldn’t see what was going on at all. His sightline through the door was minimal, and they kept moving. He caught mere flashes of one or the other as they were rarely both in frame.
Then the male had his hands on Divina, and Aric’s vision tinged red. The male pulled her, and the feral rumble that came from Aric shook his body. But she didn’t move.
Curling his hands into fists, he tried again to force through the wards using brute strength, only to rebound off the invisible guard.
Darting around to the side of the house, he remembered a small window he could look through. He still couldn’t see much, but it showed more of the room than the front door had. Aric had to stand back because of the goddamn wards, but he could make out something. Not knowing what was going on inside really chapped his ass. His fists clenched and unclenched. He let out a roar as he paced the property line, attempting to cross it and each time meeting with an impenetrable wall. Bouncing off it repeatedly only increased his rage.
The smell of smoke thickened. Divina shouted at the human. Good. She wasn’t happy with him. Perhaps Aric shouldn’t have taken as much solace in that as he did. It did nothing to sate his wolf. The beast wanted to break free, and it caused his skin to burn while he pushed the wolf down.
Aric paused when he heard the male say “proof.” Proof of what? With his enhanced hearing, he’d heard bits and pieces of their conversation, until they started shouting. With raised voices, he made out exactly what they said, but it didn’t offer clarity. A fire monster? What was that anyway?
Stuffing his hand into his pocket, he pulled out his phone and fired off a text to Bruce.
Something’s going down. Can’t get to her. There are wards.
He needed another strategy—being on the outside looking in wasn’t working. This wasn’t how he could protect her.
Divina waved something away from the human. That must have agitated the male, as he started to chase her. Clutching his phone tighter in his hands, Aric growled, seething in anger with his inability to do anything. He needed to get past these goddamn wards.
Stepping back a few paces, he took a running start. Perhaps sheer force could penetrate the spell.
Crack.
Aric’s head and chest bounced off the invisible barrier. With a thud, he landed on his butt. Pain shot through his forehead and up through his tailbone. Brute strength was no match for witch spells.
The vibration in his hand signaled Bruce had responded.
On our way.
With a deep inhale, Aric tucked his phone into his pocket. Bruce would figure it out.
He lifted himself off the ground and looked through the window. They weren’t there. A flurry in his chest and stomach sent him into a panic. He’d lost sight of them.
Fast, heavy footfalls sounded on the porch, and he sprinted in that direction.
“Give it back!” the male demanded.
“In a minute,” Divina responded, out of breath.
Aric stood on the edge of the property watching as she and the male darted around the front yard. She went left, and when the male chased her, she evaded him, going right. It looked like two siblings fighting over a toy. Aric raised his brows and watched wide-eyed and befuddled.
“What are you doing?” the man asked.
She paused and tapped at the screen of the phone, which they were apparently fighting over. “Deleting.”
“What the hell!” The man lunged for her again.
Divina dodged him and smiled triumphantly. She stepped up to the porch and tossed his phone back to him. “You can’t have those pictures,” she explained in a much more somber tone of voice.
“No one will believe me without them,” the man replied without looking up from the phone he had just caught. His fingers danced along the screen while he frowned.
“That’s the point.”
His head snapped up. “Are you kidding me?” The man shoved his phone back into his pocket. “Some…some fire thing was on the coffee table,” he sputtered. “It appeared out of nowhere!”
Divina’s face twisted in concern, her lips tight and her brows creased together. She shifted her weight uncomfortably, as though realizing they were being watched. Her eyes snapped to Aric. The male’s gaze followed. Aric stood tall and put his hands on his hips. Keeping his expression neutral, he leveled a stare at the male. For all he knew, Aric had been walking by and saw their scuffle. He was just another concerned citizen watching this guy chasing a female.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Divina stated in a shaky voice. It wasn’t convincing at all. “You had a picture of a black statue. Clay.”
Thudding to Aric’s right caught his attention, and everyone else’s as well. He turned to see Bruce and Smitty bounding toward them.
Slowing their pace,
the pair paused once they reached the sidewalk. The human male looked around at everyone with panic in his eyes. He didn’t address the men, just turned back to Divina.
Aric stalked toward the elder and the friend to his pack but kept his hard eyes locked on the male. He didn’t trust him. The wolf within Aric raged to be released.
“What’s going on?” the human asked, turning again to look at Aric, Bruce, and Smitty.
“We were about to ask the same thing,” Bruce declared, arms folded over his broad chest. Smitty mimicked the intimidating posture but didn’t say anything, though there was recognition in his eyes. He must have known the human.
Aric shifted his attention away from the offensive human male, leaving him to Bruce and Smitty so Aric could focus on Divina. She stood on the porch with wary eyes flicking back and forth over the wolves. She took an uncertain step back before her gaze landed on him.
“I don’t know who you are or where you came from,” the human proclaimed, his gaze darting from Aric to Bruce but hesitating when he saw Smitty, a look of confusion on his face, “but this isn’t what it looks like. I just wanted my phone.” Shaking his head slightly, as though to wipe the scene from his thoughts, he stepped toward Divina.
Aric growled in response. If only he could break through the barrier, get to his mate, he could assure her protection. He could end this mess right now.
“We saw you chasing that woman around the yard,” Smitty offered, pointing a wide stubby finger at Divina.
The human rolled his shoulders back. His nervous expression went to the growling Aric and then back to Smitty.
“Don’t take too kindly to men harassing women is all,” Bruce chimed in. Aric snorted in agreement.
“I’m not harassing her. Smitty, you know me,” the human defended.
The Wolf of the Prophecy Page 12
