Halfway down the lane, magic rippled around me. It tasted of an evergreen forest after a rainstorm … and something else I couldn’t immediately identify.
One moment, I was walking on cobblestones, with snow packed against the walls of the buildings to either side. The next, I was standing in an atrium with soaring, vaulted ceilings — and that churned with magic. I’d never seen anything like it, except maybe for renderings of grand cathedrals or glass castles in fantasy movies.
I might have been a little too hasty with that ‘not easily gaining the upper hand’ boast. I really had to learn to keep my mouth shut, even in my own head.
Peggy gasped, pressing a shaking hand to her temple. She looked pained, as if she’d just been stabbed in the head. “Something is wrong,” she murmured, peering around. Her eyes were narrowed in discomfort, as if the muted daylight was suddenly too bright.
“What gave it away?” Maia asked snarkily. “The purple water?” The skinwalker jabbed her finger toward a stream that now appeared to be twisting along the edge of a black stone path. The purple-tinted creek wove through strange plants and trees, leading us forward.
“Water? Where?” Peggy wrapped her hand around my elbow. Her sweet blackberry-imbued magic slipped through my personal shields with the physical contact. “Oh! Pretty!”
I sighed. Apparently, the telepath could use me as some sort of seeing-eye dog. “Did you ask permission to touch me? To use your power on me?” I side-eyed Peggy, who was even cheekier about Adept etiquette than I was. I really had no idea how her adoptive mother, Angelica, kept her brood from getting slaughtered by easily offended Adepts on an ongoing basis.
Oh, right. She’d moved them all to Vancouver. A problem shared was now annoyingly my problem.
Peggy widened her sky-blue eyes, then blinked at me with feigned regret. Apparently, I also shielded her from whatever had caused her instant headache.
I shook my head. “If I have to move quickly, you’re going to get hurt.”
“I’ll let go.”
Stifling yet another sigh, I slowly traversed the path that had been apparently laid out just for us. I could still feel the cobblestones under my sneakered feet and the cold morning air on my exposed neck, rather than the warmth that visually radiated from all around us. So apparently I was walking through some sort of illusion. And since Peggy was also a truth seeker, which I loosely understood to be some sort of human lie detector, the fact that she’d felt the change but didn’t see the illusion until she touched me made sense.
“No birds,” Maia murmured, scanning left to right in a way that seemed to mimic the raven form she could wear. “Or animals.”
“I think we’re indoors,” I said. “Or at least we’re meant to believe we are.”
I rounded a tree, or maybe it was a really large bush, whose red-veined blue flowers dripped with what looked like malicious magic. “Don’t touch anything,” I belatedly murmured to my young companions. I still wasn’t accustomed to being the babysitter. You know, what with my own childish tendencies. Which included grabbing anything magical within my reach.
The atrium opened up before us to a wide area covered in opalescent black tile, easily large enough for a hundred elves to congregate. The purple stream dropped into a pool near the far side. A dais topped by a single chair rose beyond that short waterfall. Actually, it was a massive throne — and along with the dais itself, it was carved out of some metal that shone with foreign magic.
I slowed, reaching back and physically tucking my two companions tightly behind me. They complied without protest. Seriously, I was just in town to open a damn bakery. So I didn’t need an elder of the local First Nation band and the rest of the itchy-trigger-fingered Talbots gunning for me because I’d led their kids into an elf slaughter.
I didn’t call forth my knife, which was strapped as always in its invisible sheath on my right hip. All my instincts told me I should. But I actually wasn’t certain what sort of tableau we were creating outside the illusion. Would a nonmagical passerby see us standing huddled together in the narrow lane, gazing off into the distance? If so, then waving my blade around like a maniac would really put a dampener on the grand opening to come.
“I know this game,” I said, cutting through the bullshit with snark instead of my knife. “I haven’t played it. But I get the gist. I’m supposed to ask who sits on the throne.”
I glanced around, searching for the elf who’d drawn me out of the cozy interior of the bakery. Waiting for an answer, I scanned the overflowing greenery along the edges of the atrium, seeing nothing other than layers and layers of magic. And Maia was right — I couldn’t hear anything natural within the space either. I should at least be able to hear the waterfall. So the illusion somehow blocked out the sound of the busy marketplace behind me, but it didn’t come with its own audio. Either that or the elf wielding the illusion magic wasn’t strong enough to completely enthrall me. Or she was limiting the display to give me a false impression.
There were too many unknowns. And I wasn’t particularly interested in games where someone pretended to be something they weren’t just to secure my attention … or to distract me.
Though I couldn’t hear anything within the vision created for me by the elf I’d followed out into the cold, I could feel that I was surrounded by her magic. Her particular power was apparently different than the magic the elf in the park had wielded. Either that or he hadn’t bothered showing off — thinking I was easy prey, perhaps.
Feeling the teenagers behind me becoming restless, I wrapped my hand around the hilt of my knife. Someone was going to have to teach Peggy and Maia to be patient hunters. Sadly, I was concerned that that person was supposed to be me, and I was honestly getting bored myself.
I broke the weird silence again. “The thing is, I’m a little busy, and using magic on an Adept without permission is seriously frowned upon in this dimension. So this is strike one for you.”
“Ahead to our right …” Peggy whispered. “You have someone’s attention. I can feel the weight of it.”
Using the telepath’s direction as a focus, I tracked the eddies of magic running up and around the atrium’s arcing walls and vaulted ceiling, sensing a possible source about twenty feet ahead and slightly to our right. Still keenly aware of the scene I was possibly putting on for pedestrians who weren’t caught up in the illusion magic, I gathered the power simmering underneath my feet, coaxing it upward to curl around my left hand. I kept my right hand still loose around the hilt of my knife, just in case I was about to instigate an attack.
When I’d drawn enough of the elf’s power firmly into my grasp, I tore the energy free, ripping through the illusion with strength and will, no blade necessary.
A massive tear appeared, slicing across the black-rock path and the purple river to expose the cobblestones underneath. Through the rupture, I could once again see the cedar-shingled buildings that sided the narrow lane, and the tidy piles of snow edging their concrete foundations.
Maia gasped.
Peggy giggled, quietly delighted.
I allowed the effervescent magic — now tasting of bark and moss — that I’d ripped from the illusionist to collect in my knife. Storing it rather than absorbing it fully. Then I reached for another handful.
The illusion collapsed before I could touch it again.
The elf was standing at the spot where I’d sensed her magic, and the lane around her was otherwise thankfully empty. She was supporting herself with one hand propped against the corner of a building sided in naturally weathered cedar shingles. Though she appeared winded, possibly hurt, she locked her fierce gaze to mine.
“In this dimension, we introduce ourselves before attacking each other,” I said. “It’s just polite.”
She curled her lip in a snarl.
“You were trying to be friendly, yes?” I asked mockingly. “What with the smiling and beckoning?”
The elf pushed herself away from the wall, her gaze flicking to Peggy, t
hen to Maia, both of whom were peering around my shoulders. “Perhaps you should see to your young, witchling.” Her accent was an echo of Pulou’s British lilt, similar to the elf in the park but less labored. Perhaps she’d spent the last three months in ESL classes. “We shall play another day.”
“I’m not interested in —”
The illusionist elf spun away, running with swift, light-footed strides.
Apparently she wasn’t a fan of banter.
I followed, jogging as I assessed her path but not breaking into a full run.
She darted across the main road, Whistler Way, zigzagging through the slow-crawling traffic. Leaping onto the sidewalk on the other side, she nearly slipped on a patch of ice. Then, somehow, she stepped into the crowd at the crosswalk and disappeared.
Another illusion.
I paused at the edge of the road, hoping to catch sight of the elf before I crossed it. Just in case she was doubling back and around.
Peggy and Maia slammed against me, realizing too late that I’d stopped. Their slow reaction time reminded me that I wasn’t backed by my usual companions — powerful, quick-healing Adepts who’d been severely injured the last time we’d tangled with an elf. I occasionally caught Kandy rubbing her ribs as if they still ached from the warrior elf’s blades. And while the fledglings seemed fully prepared to follow me into whatever skirmish awaited us if we caught up to the illusionist elf, their magic practically sparking off them, neither of them wielded any offensive power. At least not any honed magic useful in a toe-to-toe tussle.
And still, I’d been completely ready to abandon my responsibilities and drag Peggy and Maia into danger.
The elf certainly had my number.
Maybe that was what the glittery display of magic was about. Enticement — and of me specifically, because with my companions off skiing, she’d thought I was alone. So exactly how closely had she been watching me? And for how long? I wondered whether she’d followed me to Whistler.
All without me picking up any hint of her magic.
Because that was troubling. And seriously irksome.
“We have a bakery to open,” I murmured, calling myself back to the present and to the teenagers shuffling their feet behind me.
But before I turned back to the bakery, I ran my fingers along the hilt of my knife, stirring up the magic I’d stored within the blade. At a minimum, the elf’s power was capable of making me think I was seeing things — and at its worst, she was invading my mind without me feeling it. So, tasting the magic I’d torn from her, I allowed the knife to absorb it completely. She wouldn’t be able to trick me again so effortlessly.
The fledglings at my back were another story, though.
And, silly me, I’d deemed it overkill to install wards on the new bakery.
“Why show us that?” Peggy asked. “That room?”
I didn’t have an answer for her. But I did have an idea that it had something to do with whoever sat on that throne. Someone who liked having the buffer of the purple pool between them and their subjects. Their followers? Citizens? I really wasn’t a fan of anyone who thought they deserved to sit on a throne carved out of magical metal. And yeah, I understood how totally judgemental that was.
“It was a test,” Maia said.
“Maybe,” I murmured, turning back to the bakery and drawing her and Peggy with me. “That’s what it felt like.”
A test. To see what I would do. How I would react. But had it been a test of my power? Of my willingness to engage? Or — much more potentially foreboding — had it been a warning? Because though I had no concrete evidence either way, I felt pretty certain that the illusionist elf wasn’t the person who sat on that throne. Because if that was the case, why wouldn’t she have revealed herself perched there?
So was she attempting to intimidate me … or was she trying to help me?
“If the elf comes around when I’m not here, I don’t want to be rescuing you after the fact.” I looked pointedly at each of the teenagers in turn. “You got it?”
“Sure, Jade,” Peggy said.
Maia snorted. “Like I’d be that stupid.”
Right. Maybe it was just me who dashed out into the street to follow beguiling magic whichever way it led.
Maia picked up the pace, sprinting as the bakery came into view. Peggy was at her heels. The sight was so carefree that I had to smile. They had just faced off against an elf — a mythical creature from another dimension — and hadn’t batted an eyelash.
Me? I churned the scene over and over in my head and fretted. Because they didn’t know how quickly pretty magic could lead to bloodletting, neck snapping, and utter despair.
Bryn opened the bakery door, peering around and looking a bit panicked. But she smiled as Maia and Peggy barreled by her, already stripping off their outerwear as they tumbled into the storefront.
“Ready, Jade?”
I returned Bryn’s smile. “As ready as I ever am.”
At least I had new cupcakes and hot chocolate waiting for me. Elf or no elf, that was something to relish.
2
A broad-shouldered dragon with dark-blond hair filled the doorway, blocking out the final rays of the cloud-filtered afternoon sun. The gold of his magic glinted across his blue-green eyes as he caught my gaze while reaching for the door handle. And even though we’d been apart for less than twelve hours, my heart hitched.
Warner.
Mine.
Well, in less than a week he’d officially belong to me. And yeah, I knew that idea was a little inappropriate. But I wanted to claim him. To pronounce that he was mine to have and to hold, to cherish. And not because I thought marriage was the most epic thing I would ever do in my life, but because it was a massive declaration of my choice, my desire. Of how I wanted my life to be. Or at least those parts of my life I could control.
My husband-to-be was accompanied by Kett and Drake. All three were decked out in ski gear — jackets in various shades of blue and gray, ski pants, and boots. They would have left their skis locked up on one of the racks strategically placed all over the village.
I passed a tray of mini-cupcakes to Peggy. Early afternoon sales had slowed as skiers returned to the mountain for the last runs of the day, so I’d had a chance to slip back into the kitchen and bake another round of minis. We would give those away for the rush I anticipated after the hills closed for the day.
Making sure my hair wasn’t a complete mess, I stepped around Maia, who was helping a customer navigate the often overwhelming array of cupcakes the bakery sold. I always made sure to group selections by cake bases, and for new customers, I usually just pointed out the swath of chocolate occupying the center of the display case to get them started. Maia had been utilizing this technique all day with great success.
Warner opened the door, allowing a gust of freezing air into the storefront. We had invested in a heat lamp that would counter the chill at the exterior door, but hadn’t managed to get an electrician to install it yet. Thankfully, I couldn’t sense the cold at all over the tantalizing taste of his delectable black-forest-cake magic.
Drake shouldered past my fiance before he even had one ski boot on the large rubber mat set into the slate-tiled floor. In the summer, Bryn would replace the mat with something pretty and not so necessarily waterproof.
“I fell off a cliff!” the dark-haired fledgling guardian crowed as he barreled toward me, seemingly anxious to tell the tale of how he’d conquered skiing the face of the mountain. Almost as tall as Warner now, and just a month shy of his eighteenth birthday, Drake was sporting a wickedly puffy black eye. I knew it must have been the remnant of a much more severe wound, simply by how it hadn’t fully healed in the time it took for the three of them to ski down the mountain and walk to the bakery. Unless Drake had actually tumbled all the way down.
Warner and Kett stepped into the storefront, casting their respective gazes around the seating area. Warner was likely looking for troublemakers, and Kett might possibly have be
en looking for Jasmine, who he practically kept locked in her room when he couldn’t be around. Okay, that was an exaggeration. The newly turned, golden-haired vampire seemed more than content to be left to her own devices. Literally. Devices, as in laptops, tablets, phones … yeah, I was hilarious with the wordplay.
Drake veered abruptly right, completely distracted by a telepath with a tray of mini-cupcakes. Peggy meeped as the fledgling guardian appeared before her. He was already examining the cupcakes with the attention scholars usually reserved for one-of-a-kind ancient texts.
Drake looked Peggy straight in the eye, hitting her with a massive grin. “Tell me the tale of the delectable treats you carry with such grace, oh telepath.”
Peggy opened her mouth as if to answer. But instead, she just sighed and appeared to melt before the onslaught of … well, Drake. And everything that came with him — power, intensity, strength, vigor. To be fair, to anyone with a thing for almost-eighteen-year-olds, Drake was intriguingly, if boyishly, handsome. Tall, dark-haired, and dark-eyed, with gloriously long lashes.
“Chocolate?” Drake prompted, pointing at the array of Chill in a Cup. “And?” He pointed at the Tingle in a Cup.
Peggy nodded as if she would have loved to answer but had no idea how to speak English. A blush flushed her cheeks.
Drake tilted his head at her questioningly. Then, as if he’d sussed out her game, he grinned conspiratorially. “Would you like to whisper the answer in my mind?”
“No!” Peggy blurted. Then she glanced around as her blush deepened.
I met Warner’s disgruntled gaze over Drake’s shoulder, shaking my head. Then I stepped back around the display case, grabbing a full-sized cupcake and instantly snagging Drake’s attention with it.
He accepted my offering, lifting it before him so he could admire it like a piece of art.
“Remember where you are, Drake,” I murmured.
“Of course, dowser,” he said agreeably — and completely missing my point about talking magic among the crowd of nonmagicals in the bakery.
Misfits, Gemstones, and Other Shattered Magic Page 2
