by Lizzy Ford
“No, I mean, did you ask your element to tell you where the information is in the book?”
His eyebrows lifted. “Um, no.”
“Why not?” She gazed at him.
“I guess I never thought of magick as doing that. Kind of seems silly to use it to do something I can do without it.”
“I summon it; ask it for things,” she said defensively.
He cleared his throat. “By silly, I meant … uh, not silly.”
Morgan gave him a half smile. “I’ll burn it if I turn the flames on it. But you should ask it with your earth magick. These are, or were, trees.” She nudged the pages. “Shouldn’t they tell you?”
“Maybe.” Why didn’t I think of this? Beck thought in frustration. Even when he started to gain ground in one area, he came up completely oblivious in another. He rested a hand on the book and summoned his earth magick. It was hard to tell if the book retained the spirit of the trees its pages had come from. He heard no distinct voice and saw no images in his mind.
Morgan relaxed more deeply against him as the magick passed through her to get to the book.
He lifted his hand and waited. The pages began to turn of their own accord. He watched, fascinated. They stopped towards the end of the book and fell open.
Morgan tugged the heavy tome into her lap. Beck read over her shoulder, struggling through the clunky words.
“Ugh,” Morgan said. “All it says is that it took all five elements and both Masters to capture him. I was hoping for an instruction manual, I think.”
“That’s more than we knew,” he said thoughtfully. “All five elements, Light and Dark. That’s a ton of magic to bind one guy. The equinox is tomorrow. That might help.”
“One really bad guy.” Morgan closed the book and set it aside. “You didn’t know you could do that? Find things with your magick?”
“No,” he admitted.
“So … you do need me to protect you as well as help you figure things out.” She sounded satisfied.
“I suppose,” he said with a laugh. “We can work together. As a team.”
She muttered something he didn’t make out, and he guessed he’d failed to disguise his I-told-you-so tone.
“Right? Teamwork!” he said and squeezed her.
“Not until the stone no longer hurts you and the Light.” The stubbornness was back.
“Morgan.” He sighed. “We will work together. There’s no other choice.”
“Yes there is.”
“This isn’t Beck speaking, but the Master of Light.”
“I have a problem with authority.”
He lifted her chin to meet her gaze. “I know,” he replied. “Then do it because you love me.”
She flushed and yanked away, burying her face in his sweater once more.
Beck smiled, sensing he had won, albeit not in the way he intended to. “What’s your plan? Burn Bartholomew out of Dawn?”
She said nothing.
Got that right. “Sam said it’s not possible. She invited Bartholomew in. She’s pretty much a lost cause.”
“No,” Morgan replied. “I can’t accept the idea she’s lost.”
“You’re too sweet,” he murmured. “You think because you were damaged, another damaged soul can be saved. Morgan, you can’t save someone else. I know this first hand. We all are charged with the responsibility of saving ourselves.”
“No.” Her protest was softer this time. “You saved me. I’ll save you.”
“I didn’t save you! You turned Light when you fried Noah,” he reminded her, amused.
Her anger flared and she sat up, glaring at him. “You gave me a reason to try, Beck. You gave me a reason not to run away, to want to stay.” Fire flashed in her eyes, and the burning hearth stretched towards them in response to her pulse of magick.
He maintained their physical contact, sensing she was too tired to manage on her own, and pushed back the fire with earth magick. Her look ensnared him, reminded him he could never fight hard enough or make enough excuses to keep what was between them from existing. He had once wanted to keep his distance from her, so she wasn’t dragged into his life, his messes with Dawn and internal struggle.
Losing her for three months, however, had showed him how terrible the idea was and how much he needed to treasure their time together. With her in his arms, even if she were angry, he could no longer support the small whisper inside that tried to convince him they were better off apart.
“I don’t understand … this,” she continued with a combination of frustration and looked at his hands. “I don’t understand why I can’t leave.”
“Do you want to?” he asked.
She shook her head then proclaimed. “But I should.”
“Why?” He didn’t smile even though he wanted to. She was moving through some huge issues rather quickly, and he didn’t want to discourage her from opening up to him the way she rarely did anyone.
She gazed at him, telling him with her eyes what she couldn’t with her voice. He touched her face, satisfied that she didn’t flinch away this time. Beck had an idea of what she had been through at the hands of another man. Connor had hinted at the abuse while Decker, who could read the thoughts of someone else with a shared element, confirmed it. Morgan’s on-off again warmth towards Beck was another indication.
Thinking that anyone could hurt the sweet girl before him infuriated him to the point of wanting to do something no Master of Light should and send her abuser a message. He purposely didn’t let himself dwell on these thoughts, not wanting to disturb her progress or the fact that he had her in his arms again after three months of believing her to be dead.
Emotions tumbled within him. “It’s okay,” he said when it was clear she couldn’t say the words. “I was scared at the beginning, too.”
“What changed?”
“You fried my resistance.”
“Beck.” She frowned, her plump lower lip sticking out in a pout.
He grinned briefly. “This isn’t natural. That much you feel right?”
She nodded.
“There’s a reason for that, for the draw we can’t fight and the knowledge this isn’t the way it is for everyone else.”
Morgan said nothing, listening.
“Every Master of Dark and Master of Light has a counterbalance, someone with the potential to be a perfect match, to balance out the side of the Master that otherwise isn’t balanced. Decker has Summer. I have …” he drifted off.
Her eyebrows were lifted quizzically.
“Well. You.”
Morgan’s expression didn’t change. She wasn’t surprised. “Did Sam do this?”
“No.” Beck chuckled. “From what I can gather, the elements decide it. Our magick chooses. Mine chose you. Yours chose me.” He waited for her to make some snide remark about how his taste in women was as bad as his magick’s.
She didn’t. If anything, Morgan appeared pensive.
“Does that make it less scary?” he asked.
“It helps.” She ducked her head. “I have a … you know my past. Parts of it.” She stopped.
He said nothing.
“We wouldn’t be chosen for each other if we weren’t meant to be together,” she observed with a deep breath. “Does that mean there’s a solution we haven’t found yet?”
“I want to think so, yes.”
“I need there to be.” Morgan studied him, the pink of her cheeks heightened. Sitting here like this was killing him.
“You should get some rest,” he said. “We have some big days of figuring stuff out before us.”
“I’m leaving tomorrow.”
“No, you aren’t.”
“I am, Beck.”
“Morgan, you aren’t.” He leaned forward, unwilling to give. “I just told you we’re destined for one another and your response is to leave?”
“To protect you, as always,” she replied archly.
“Like my duty is to protect you.”
“I won’t l
et you.”
There were moments … Beck stepped back from the edge her fire pushed him to. “You. Won’t. Leave. I’m putting my foot down.”
A flare of something else sprang into her gaze. It was more than a challenge; there was amusement as well. “You don’t have the guts to stop me, Beck. You didn’t three months ago. You didn’t at the hospital. You won’t now.” She stood and moved away.
Beck watched her, compelled towards her with a power he struggled to fight and which flustered his thoughts for him to know how to handle her blatant defiance. She would get herself killed because she wasn’t capable of bending or compromising. She was likewise accurate about his history of not standing up to her.
It ends now. There was no question or doubt in his mind they were meant to be together. He had stood up to Dark witchlings; he could stand up to his own counterbalance, no matter how angry – or beautiful – she was.
Chapter Eighteen
“I’ll check in daily,” Morgan said and draped her wet clothing over the furniture. She didn’t think twice about Beck’s silence, assured he would roll over the way he usually did. She’d seen him do it with Dawn; he’d done it multiple times with her. Confident and amazing, Beck nonetheless usually let women walk all over him.
For once, she was almost glad about it. Sitting in his arms left her too turned on, too confused and afraid of messing up to know what to do. She was mentally puzzling over his assertion about them being destined for one another. The part of her that felt the primal belonging agreed, yet the rational side of her didn’t quite get how two people were chosen for one another by magick. She’d been able to ignore the idea until he finally admitted to it.
His explanation made sense. It wasn’t the fact it happened. It was the fact it happened to her. To someone who had never had a good day in her life, and she was the one given a gift as incredible, exhilarating and terrifying as Beck.
“Alright. That’s it.” Beck rose and approached her.
Morgan glanced at him and tossed her wet sweater over the arm of the small couch near the fire. Beck was glowing with Light, and there was resolve on his features. Entertained at the thought he was really going to try to put his foot down with her, she faced him and placed her hands on her hips. “You grow a backbone with women while I was gone?” she taunted, unable to help the words when her fire magick was sending flutters of desire in every direction inside her.
“With you.” He stopped inside her personal space.
Unwilling to back down, she stayed put and leaned her head back to gaze up at him.
“We’re in this together, whether or not you want to admit it,” he continued with the same firmness. “You aren’t leaving, Morgan. You’re safer here.”
“But you aren’t.”
“I can handle me,” he said with a brief smile. “I can handle you, too.”
She was surprised to realize she believed him. His steady gaze and powerful magick were trained on her. It was as much the Master of Light as Beck addressing her, and the combination of earth and Light magic transfixed her.
Fire leapt into the space between them, and he subdued it with his earth magick. She already knew she’d lose in a magick battle, partly because her control was tentative at best. A small voice warned her Beck wasn’t going to back down. It was smarter to wake up early and leave, but something about him made her want to push him, as reckless as it seemed. Her eyes slid to his lips, and she recalled too well how incredible it had been to kiss him. She often wondered what it would be like to provoke his gentle earth magick to the point he lost control. Beck was powerful, and earth magick was the oldest, the strongest. If he ignited her fire with a simple touch, what would a night with him be like?
Not that she was ready for such a thing. “I’m not staying.”
“For me?” The moment he took her hands, some of her resistance began to slide away. Morgan tried not to let his earth magick deflate her anger and resolution, make her want to agree to whatever he asked. She stepped back only to run into the coffee table.
The intensity between them was climbing, and she felt ready to combust. She needed a distraction, a way to take his focus off her so she could put some distance between them without backing down from her decision. She wouldn’t get far if she left now. She was too tired.
But if she drove him away …
He had backed down whenever she tested his control. She just had to remind him of it.
With need and his claim to love her clamoring inside her, she stepped into him. Taking his cheeks with her hands, she pulled his face to his and kissed him.
The moment his lips touched hers, her fire ignited. She felt the surge of his earth magick attempting to rein it in and realized he was fighting something, too. He was fighting her. As much as he said about them being destined to find one another, he was resisting.
The thought intrigued her, and she unleashed more fire, loving the thought of pushing him off balance, of challenging him.
Beck’s arms went around her, and he deepened the kiss. The moment she tasted him, her world began to crumble and burn from the inside out, crippled by yearning for the man who touched her soul and feeling as if crushed to mere smoldering embers by the power of his earth magick. His body was outlined by the fire he was absorbing.
He feels right. Her magick tangled with his, pushing and teasing, while their kissing grew heavier. She sensed his restraint and poked at it, pressing herself the full length of his lean frame and wrapping her arms around his neck. His scent filled her senses while she melted into the heat and strength of his body. His erection grew hard against her lower belly, and she pressed her hips to his, wanting to experience all of him. His warm lips and hot tongue guided her less experienced ones, and she let him show her, let him lead them both towards the molten desire lurking just below the surface, waiting to consume them.
“Morgan,” he whispered in a husky tone and broke the kiss. “You have to control it.” Despite the words and the struggle she felt through their magick, Beck traced hot kisses down her jaw and neck. She stifled a groan, amazed at the amount of pleasure something so simple could give.
She said nothing and closed her eyes. This kind of blaze was new to her. It was different than that of a bonfire, more intense, her whole body rendered sensitive to the slightest sensation and her magick for once flowing in a single direction – towards Beck. It was pleasure and desire so intense, it left her intoxicated by the burn and dancing of flames in her blood.
Normally, she felt fire. With Beck, she became fire, and not only could he handle the flames, he was feeding off them.
“Morgan,” he whispered again. “Tell me what you want.”
She hesitated, enthralled by the sensations, yet a little overwhelmed, too. She was almost out of control. Beck was regulating everything from the pace of their kissing to the fire magick she couldn’t. What would it feel like to entrust him with all of her, to release the fire that was never fully free and trust him not to hurt her?
Or … was every intimate experience going to end up how it did when her uncle hurt her? In such pain, she wanted to die and with so much shame, she couldn’t look in the mirror the next morning?
This is Beck. He was different. He was hers. Chosen for her by the elements, by her own magick, which wasn’t capable of betraying her the way a person could. Yet the doubt and fear remained. “I don’t know,” she replied, breathing hard. She pressed her cheek to his, loving the feel of his skin against hers.
“I won’t hurt you,” he said.
Her breath caught. She hated his uncanny ability to guess her thoughts.
“If you aren’t sure, then we’re stopping here. I’ll never push you, Morgan,” he added. His breathing was uneven, his embrace tight around her and his hands clasped together behind her back as if to prevent them from roaming. “Even when your fire is doing its damnedest to push me.”
She opened her eyes with a small smile and traced his jaw in awe. Beck was beautiful, the most handso
me man she’d ever met, and the best person, too. How did she end up in his arms? How did she deserve anything this wonderful?
Her amulet was warm, pressed between their bodies. It struck her for the first time this night that she really had turned Light. It wasn’t what she expected. There weren’t fireworks or epiphanies or parades to celebrate or anything else she expected. In fact, she hadn’t noticed, because the soul stone sucked up the Light inside her and that radiating off her amulet.
She didn’t feel any different, and the world still frightened her the way it had before. The only change she cared about: nothing stood between her and Beck except … her. Not his status as Light and hers as in-between. Not her shame or embarrassment about not being good enough to be Light. Not the knowledge he was incapable of the flaws she carried. Not her past or the insistence by her father and uncle she wasn’t good enough to be Light.
She was and had proven everyone wrong. Not only that, but she had burned away the Dark in Noah and turned him Light, too. For reasons she didn’t fully understand, she was Light, and that meant she had a shot with Beck, a shot at helping him.
Morgan lifted on her tiptoes once more and planted a kiss on his lips.
“Morgan …” He raised his head. She sensed how hard he was fighting her and the attraction between them.
She met his gaze. “Please.”
“Please, what?”
“Stop fighting. Show me what it’s like to be loved.”
“Oh, god.” He sighed and crumbled at the words like she knew he would. He searched her gaze. “You’re sure?”
She drew a breath and lowered the barrier remaining on her magick. Flames shot up around them.
He groaned and kissed her hungrily with intensity that startled her, his restraint slipping. “If I … rush you or … hurt you …tell me. I’ll … stop,” he said between kisses. “Okay?”
“Yes.”
Fire swept through them, and Morgan let his magick soothe away the remnants of her fear, instead focusing on the heady pleasure of Beck’s skin against hers, pushing him when she could and diving head first into the heat, passion and hunger with which he quickly consumed her.
