by Jody Morse
I was sort of embarrassed that I had misread his signals. Knowing that he probably had a girlfriend changed everything.
I was just glad I hadn’t acted on what I had felt—or what I had thought I’d felt—between us. That would have made the situation so much worse.
When he finally came into the classroom, he shot a smile at me—a smile that made my heart do funny things.
“Hey, you,” he said as he sat down in the seat in front of me.
“Hey.” I smiled at him. Just because he probably had a girlfriend didn’t mean we couldn’t be friends. Unless his girlfriend was as crazy as Everly Carmichael, in which case, we obviously couldn’t be friends.
A thought crossed my mind then. Maybe that was why he had snuck off the day before, towards the Enchanted Forest. Maybe he had been secretly meeting his girlfriend.
“Do you have any plans after school today?” Kaden asked me. “There’s something I want to show you.”
“Actually, I do,” I replied. I wasn’t sure how long my one-on-one session with Professor Tate would even last.
“Oh.” Kaden’s face fell. “Some other time then.”
“What was it you wanted to show me?” I pressed.
“You’ll see. Eventually.” There was an air of mystery to his response. It made me wonder even more what he could have possibly wanted to show me—and why he wanted to show me and not her. To say that I was slightly jealous of the girl who was most likely his girlfriend would have been an understatement. I was completely jealous.
Oh, well. This school was full of hot guys. Maybe I would find myself a hot vampire to make out with, after all.
Except, right now, there was only one guy who I wanted to make out with, and he was sitting right in front of me.
***
Around four o’clock, I headed into the Elemental Magic classroom. I was surprised to find that it was empty.
Had Professor Tate forgotten that he’d asked me to meet him here? That seemed sort of odd, considering he had reminded me.
I glanced down at the time on my cell phone. I was five minutes early.
Speaking of my cell phone, it was sort of surprising that no one from the real world had tried to reach me. Not that I had many friends. In fact, I didn’t have any friends. But I was surprised that Karen hadn’t tried to get ahold of me. It was supposed to be her responsibility to take care of me, after all. Then again, I figured that, if she had reported me missing (which was a pretty big ‘if’), they probably thought I was just another foster child who had run away.
At that moment, the sound of the door opening snapped me out of my thoughts. I glanced up to find Professor Tate walking towards me.
“You’re early,” he commented.
“A little bit.”
“You must be anxious to learn more about this affinity.” As his gold eyes locked on mine, it felt like they were piercing straight through me, plunging deep down into the depths of my soul. It made me feel a little weak in the knees. “Or you’re just anxious to see me again.”
The tone in his voice made me think that whatever I was feeling right now was mutual. I wasn’t sure if it was just the way he was looking at me or the dim lighting of the room, but it felt like there was this tension between us…
I tried to shake the thought away. It didn’t matter that I felt something. Even if that feeling was mutual, nothing could ever happen between us. Not over the course of the next two years, anyway. It was too risky for both of us.
“So, anyway,” Professor Tate said, clearing his throat. “I was reviewing your academic file, hoping it would help me learn a little more about you. But your paranormal race was left blank.”
“That’s because it is a big blank right now,” I replied. “No one actually knows what I am.”
His eyes widened. “Really?”
I nodded.
“Wow. I would have thought with your family bloodlines, they would have known, for sure.” He paused for a moment and then glanced over at me. “I wouldn’t tell anyone that you don’t know what you are.”
“Why?”
“I’m just afraid that if the other students knew, they would figure out a way to use it against you.”
My eyebrows shot up in question. “Use it against me?”
“The Academy is a place where people come to learn, but it’s also more than that. For many students, this place is about competition,” he explained. “It’s about figuring out who is the most powerful witch or the fastest werewolf. More students than you might think are just looking for your weaknesses, and it’s quite possible that some might see this as your weakness. If the wrong students find out you have what they perceive as a weakness, they could potentially use it to try to tear you down.” His eyes locked on mine. “All I’m saying is that the fewer people you tell about this, the better.”
“Thank you for the advice,” I murmured. Even though I had told a few people, I didn’t think I had shared with the wrong people. Ambur and Draia were safe, anyway. I didn’t think Gavin was going to use this against me, either. I paused for a moment. “Do you think this makes me weaker than the others?”
“I don’t think anything about you is weak, Juliana. I think you have the potential to grow into a very strong… well, whatever it turns out you are.” He stared at me for a moment. “I’m not a paranormal race expert, but I do believe you’re a witch.”
“How can you be so sure?” I asked.
“Knowing your grandmother was Emily Montgomery and that you seem to have this affinity for fire…” He trailed off. “I would just place my money on you being a witch is all I’m saying.”
“Hmm.” I thought about it. I wanted to believe that he was right, but I just couldn’t help but think that he wasn’t.
If it was that simple—if I really was a witch—then my blood would have been purple, just like all of the other witches’ blood. And yet, mine wasn’t. Mine was lime green. Whatever that could have possibly meant.
“Professor Tate—” I began, but he interrupted me.
“When we’re alone together, you may call me by my first name, Avery,” he said softly.
A smile hit my lips. “Avery, do affinities for the elements ever run in any other paranormal races?” I asked.
“Magic users are most likely to have an affinity for one of the elements,” he replied. “But they’re not the only ones. Mermaids and other aquatic paranormal races often have an affinity for water. We also sometimes see affinities for the elements in werewolves and other shifters, but it tends to be much rarer.” He paused. “I would say that probably about ninety-eight percent of all affinities for the elements are within witches, fairies, and other magic users.”
“Does an affinity for the elements have to be genetic? Is it possible for someone to have one even if their ancestors didn’t?”
What if the reason my grandma hadn’t told me about an affinity for fire—or any other element—was because she really hadn’t had one herself? What if I was the first in the family?
“It’s not as common, but it does happen,” Avery replied with a nod. “So, are you ready for what I have planned for today? In the future, I thought it would be much safer for us to go outdoors, but first I thought we’d conduct another experiment.”
I nodded. “Okay.”
Avery pulled a candle out of the bag he was carrying and set it on the stage behind us. He stared at the candle for a moment, and sure enough, a little light flickered from the end of the wick.
He hadn’t even needed to use matches, which was a weird concept for me to grasp.
He glanced over at me, his gold eyes illuminated by the small flicker of light from the candle. “Now, I want you to catch the curtain on fire again, except this time, I want you to actually try. You said you didn’t mean for it to last time, but I want you to focus all of your energy on lighting that curtain on fire.”
“But I don’t want to end up burning the whole school down,” I insisted. I hadn’t even tried to set the cu
rtain on fire last time and I had nearly set the stage on fire. Who knew what would happen if I actually tried?
“Don’t be afraid. I’ll put the fire out before it gets out of hand. You just focus on catching the curtain on fire.” His gold eyes locked on mine. “You’ve got this, Juli.”
I stared into his eyes for a long moment and then nodded. I focused on the candle’s flame.
Rise, I thought.
I stared hard at it, waiting for something to change… but nothing happened.
Rise. Grow.
Still, nothing. Was it possible that I really didn’t have an affinity for fire? Maybe last time had been a fluke.
I wasn’t sure, but I could feel myself growing frustrated.
“Think of nothing else in the room besides the candle,” Avery told me. “Focus every ounce of your energy on it.”
I took a deep breath. As I stared at it, I focused on nothing about the candle, allowing myself to get completely lost in it. Everything else around me just seemed to fade off into the distance, including Avery.
Burn.
I watched, in awe, as the flame grew… rising and rising… until it was moving quickly up the curtain. The fire continued to spread rapidly until the entire curtain was completely engulfed in flames.
My heart pounded against my chest as I watched the fire consume the velvet.
Just as my own panic began to set in, rain began to fall from the ceiling as the fire was put out.
I glanced over at Avery, whose gold eyes danced with amazement as he stared back at me.
“That was incredible, Juli,” he whispered. “I have never seen such a strong affinity for fire.”
Then, before I even knew what was happening, his mouth came down on mine. But as our lips brushed, something happened… something completely unexpected.
Sparks flew—literally.
Chapter 14
As we pulled away from one another, my heart was pounding against my chest. It felt like my entire body had been set on fire, but in a good way.
“W-what just happened?” I asked shakily.
“I-I’m sorry. I need to go.” Avery gathered his things and then hurried away from me. I watched as he went out the door, leaving me standing there, completely confused and clueless about what had just happened.
What. The. Actual. Fuck.
So many emotions were swirling around inside my mind, so many that I could barely process them all.
Whatever I had been feeling between us—this crazy tension—clearly hadn’t only been in my imagination. It had been real. So real, apparently, that it had led him to break the school’s policy about students and instructors. It was a huge risk for both of us.
And that wasn’t even the craziest part of it all. When our lips had touched, we had made sparks fly. Literal sparks. And while I wasn’t sure what that had meant, it must have meant something.
I couldn’t help but wonder if Avery knew what it meant and if that was what had made him practically go running. I just wish I knew what could have caused the spark. If Avery knew, why hadn’t he told me?
With a sigh, I headed out of the auditorium. I could still smell the smoke—the smoke from the fire that I’d pretty much ignited. A lot of confusing things had just happened, but that fire wasn’t one of them. That fire told me everything I needed to know.
There was no question, no mistake about it. I really did have an affinity for fire, which scared the ever-loving crap out of me.
***
As I headed back to the House of Mage, I couldn’t help but feel disappointed on every level. The fact that Avery had run off so quickly after our kiss had me wondering so many things: 1). Was I a bad kisser? I hadn’t kissed many guys before. What if I’d done something wrong? 2). Did he regret kissing me? 3). Had it been an accident?
Okay, I was pretty sure we could rule out that last one. How did you just accidentally kiss someone?
No, by kissing me, he had completely put both of our positions, his as an instructor and mine as a student, on the line. The risks were too great for him to just kiss me entirely on a whim.
The worst part about it all was that Kaden had also asked me to hang out today. I had chosen not to because I’d had this one-on-one instruction with Avery. I should have just hung out with Kaden. I was pretty sure that if Kaden kissed me, he wouldn’t go running off like Avery had. And, considering Kaden probably had a girlfriend, there was a really good chance he wouldn’t have kissed me at all.
As I reached the House of Mage, I hesitated. The last thing I wanted to do was go back to my dorm room and have to explain to Ambur and Draia why I was back so soon. How could I do that without telling them about the kiss?
Even though I was pretty sure I would end up telling them about the kiss eventually—I mean, how could I keep this huge secret to myself—but now didn’t feel like the time. I trusted Ambur and Draia not to get either of us into trouble for breaking the rules, but I really needed time to process this on my own first. I also hoped that Avery would be able to tell me what had caused the strange sparking thing before I told them.
So, instead of going back to my dorm room, I headed towards the garden. It seemed like the perfect place to think, even if I would probably end up talking to some flowers.
I had just entered the courtyard when my eyes landed on Kaden, sitting on the same bench we’d sat on together the day before. And my heart sunk.
He was sitting next to that same girl who he’d been talking to in the cafeteria. She was leaning in real close to him, and they were whispering to one another.
Kaden seemed to be completely lost in whatever she was saying.
Turning away from him, I headed back to my dorm room, after all, this time wondering how I could be attracted to so many guys at this school.
***
“So, I have an odd question,” I said that night as I sat at our table with my roommates in the Dining Hall.
“Yeah? Odd how?” Draia looked intrigued.
“Well, I’m just wondering…” I poked at my mashed potatoes, unsure of how to word this exactly. “Why does it seem like I’m attracted to practically everyone I’ve met here? I’m pretty sure I’ve found myself having more crushes in the past few days than I have my entire time in the human world.”
Okay, that was partially an exaggeration, but still. I was seriously crushing on both Kaden and Avery, and even though he was taken, I found myself abnormally drawn to Brett, too.
“It’s because we’re all so attractive,” Ambur explained to me.
“Ambur, you know it’s more than that.” Draia turned to me. “You know already that we’re all really attractive. It’s a fact. But what you don’t know is that it’s actually in our blood for people to be drawn to us. Humans are abnormally drawn to paranormal beings, more so than they are to other humans. Meanwhile, paranormal beings are abnormally drawn to one another, too.”
“Especially certain types of paranormal beings,” Ambur added.
“Like vampires,” I pieced together.
“Vampires are pretty irresistible, usually because they have a different sort of appearance. They almost always have unique eyes and fairer than average skin,” Draia said. “Shifters are biologically meant to produce more offspring, so as a result, both humans and other paranormal beings tend to find them more attractive. And then there’s magic users. We can be like magnetic forces, drawing anyone we want, for the most part.”
“You’re my little magnet,” Gavin said then, turning to Ambur.
“You’re the North to my South, baby,” she cooed back at him and then kissed him.
“You guys really need to get a room,” Draia said with an eye roll.
I laughed. It was hard to believe that, only days ago, the two of them hadn’t even confessed their feelings to one another. Now, they were pretty much attached at the hip. It was crazy to think how much things could change in such a short time.
I couldn’t help but wonder if there was someone at the Academy for me�
�� and if he was someone who I was already crushing on.
Chapter 15
As I walked to Elemental Magic class with Draia the following day, she glanced over at me.
“Everything okay?” she asked. “You look pale. Paler than usual. So pale you could be a ghost.”
“I’m alright,” I lied. I still hadn’t told her about what had happened between Avery and I the day before, even though I couldn’t seem to get it off my mind.
Classes had been a whirlwind today. My mind just kept drifting back to Elemental Magic and Avery. I was so nervous to face him again that I barely said two words to Kaden during our first period class together. In Magical Animals and Creatures class, Brandon and I made plans to meet up after school the next day so I could spend more time with Spike. I wasn’t going to lie. Finding out if the dragon was my familiar was the least of my concerns…
All I could seem to think about was that kiss. That damn kiss.
When we stepped into the auditorium, I was disappointed to find that Avery wasn’t there. Instead, there was a woman with long, brown hair standing at the front of the classroom.
As class began, she said, “Hello, everyone. I’m Professor Quinlan. Professor Tate had to take a temporary leave of absence. He has plans to return in the upcoming weeks, but in the meantime, I’ll be your instructor for this class.”
My heart sunk.
I just couldn’t seem to shake the feeling that Avery’s absence had something to do with me, with the kiss.
What were the odds that we’d had our strange kissing incident and now he had suddenly taken a temporary leave of absence?
A part of me wondered if he had somehow gotten caught for the kiss, but I was pretty sure that if that was the case, his leave wouldn’t only be temporary. Aside from that, I would have been in trouble, too. I just couldn’t seem to make sense of it all.
The only thing I was certain of was that, for some reason, our kiss was the reason Avery wasn’t here. I just wanted to know why.
***
By the time I got to Spells and Charms, I already had a plan. At least, I hoped that I did, anyway.
