Demon Born Magic (Ella Grey Series Book 3)

by Jayne Faith

  I swore quietly. “What am I going to do? I don’t know where Damien took Evan. Seriously, I’m open to ideas. Wide open.”

  Lynnette was still staring at me, her head tilted. I felt tendrils of her magic creeping around the room. What the hell? Was she seriously trying to manipulate me now of all times?

  “Seriously, witch, don’t push me,” I said through clenched teeth. I started to reach for my own magic.

  Deb stood and moved in between us.

  “No, no,” Lynnette said. “I’m not trying to do anything, I swear. There’s . . . something. A spell around you. Or in you.”

  She squinted, concentrating.

  “Yeah, I’ve got a couple of permanent spells on me now,” I said, suddenly a little nervous. “One keeps the reaper under control. The other restricts the in-between magic to a manageable flow. But you already knew that.”

  Deb was staring at me, too. “It’s not either of those.”

  “It’s like it’s hidden,” Lynnette said. “Or it was, anyway.”

  “No longer hidden, but still locked,” Deb agreed.

  They were both moving closer to me, and I could feel and see their probing tendrils of magic swirling around me, lightly brushing me.

  Lynnette glanced at Deb. “Do you see how to release it?”

  Deb nodded.

  “What? What is it?” I demanded.

  Deb blinked several times. “I don’t know how to describe it, other than a—a new capacity? A space waiting to be activated. A whole bunch of power, like more than I have, just waiting to be set free.”

  “Huh?” I looked to Lynnette for clarification.

  Just then, the front bell rang and we all jumped.

  “I invited the rest of the coven for support,” Lynnette said as she hurried to get the door.

  I gave Deb a frustrated, bug-eyed look. The absolute last thing I needed to deal with was a roomful of witches.

  “Don’t worry, she didn’t tell them everything,” Deb said. “Only that your brother has been kidnapped by a mage. Try to be open to their help. Who knows, they might actually come up with something useful.”

  I made an annoyed sound deep in my throat.

  Some of my irritation dissolved when I saw Roxanne’s corn silk blond head bop through the doorway. With Deb as her mentor, she’d become a sort of unofficial apprentice of the coven.

  When she saw me, she ran up and wrapped her arms around my waist.

  “I’m so sorry about your brother,” she said. “We’ll get him back. We have to, ‘cause I really want to meet him.”

  My chest loosened a little, and her innocent sincerity made my eyes a little misty.

  “I really want you to meet him, too,” I said.

  When she pulled back, she tipped her face up to give me a curious look. “Whoa. You’ve changed. Like, magically.”

  I gave a little laugh. “Yeah.”

  Her lips parted, and her eyes went distant. Her magic passed over me like a soft sigh of wind.

  “You’re sensing something?” I asked.

  She nodded. “There’s Damien magic on you.”

  I pulled my head back in confusion, my heart thumping uneasily at the mention of Damien’s name. “What do you mean?”

  “He attached a spell to you,” Roxanne said. “Weird.”

  Deb was standing close enough to hear, and our eyes met. Roxanne had a unique ability that allowed her to identify who had touched objects, and apparently also who had cast spells.

  “You’re saying the spell Ella is carrying, the one that’s dormant, was put there by Damien?” Deb asked her.

  “Yep!” Roxanne said.

  She didn’t know that Damien had abducted my brother. She still thought Damien was our friend.

  “Can you tell how long ago it was put there?” I asked.

  Roxanne squinted at me for a few seconds.

  “Couple of days, maybe?” Her face broke into a little grin. “Is Damien playing some kind of joke on you?”

  “I’m not sure,” I said.

  But suddenly I knew what the spell was. He’d raised me from a low Level I to a high Level I, and he’d done something else, something he obviously hadn’t discussed with me.

  A whole bunch of power just waiting to be set free, Deb had said.

  Damien had left me with the potential to raise my power even more. I’d bet anything that unlocking the spell would take me all the way to the top of the scale—a high Level III.

  Why would he have done such a thing? Could he have possibly guessed that I would need more power . . . to go up against him?

  No, that was too much of a stretch. Maybe he’d planted it with plans to do something with it later, but then he’d become a mage and no longer cared about the same things he had before.

  Roxanne had drifted away to talk to the other witches.

  “Deb,” I said, my voice low. “I need to know what this is, what spell Damien planted on me.”

  “It’s Damien’s spell?”

  I stiffened and turned to see Lynnette, who’d been standing just outside my periphery but apparently close enough to eavesdrop. She moved closer, again reminding me of a cat stalking its prey.

  “That spell is Damien’s work?” she asked again.

  I nodded reluctantly. “Apparently.”

  Her eyes shone with interest, and her lips parted. “Let’s see what it does.”

  I lifted a hand. “Wait, how do we know it’s not going to make my head explode like a rotted melon, or end us all in a blast of obliteration magic?”

  “Rox might be able to tell us something more about the nature of it,” Deb said. She turned and called Roxanne back over.

  I let out a slow breath, trying to calm my pulse.

  “Can you tell us anything about the intent of the spell?” Deb asked Roxanne. “The spirit in which it was created, or anything about the emotions or mood around it?”

  “I can try.” The young witch cocked her head. I felt the faint brush of her magic, and a faraway look came over her face. She was silent for a full minute, and I was starting to think perhaps her abilities weren’t quite up to what Deb thought they were. But then Roxanne blinked and focused on me. “It’s not a trick. There’s nothing mal—, malifous—”

  “Malicious?” Deb supplied.

  “Yeah, that,” Roxanne said. “No malicious intent.”

  I licked my dry lips.

  “Let’s check it out,” Lynnette said.

  My eyes swept the room, taking in all the coven witches who’d gathered. “Maybe not with so many people around. In case something goes wrong.”

  Or in case the spell had an effect I didn’t want the others to know about.

  Lynnette stepped away from us and pulled herself up to her full height. “Hey ladies,” she called over the backdrop of conversation. “Could you give Deb, Ella, and I just a moment? We’ll meet you down in the basement.”

  The witches sent somber and sympathetic looks my way as they complied with Lynnette’s request.

  After they departed, the room seemed too quiet. My heart thumped uneasily.

  “What if it’s some kind of trap?” Deb asked. “Something he planted to keep Ella from going after Evan? Just because it’s not malicious doesn’t mean it’s not something unwanted.”

  I shook my head. “I don’t think it is. When he left the dormant spell, he didn’t know he was going to take my brother. He didn’t yet know Evan was . . . valuable. He may have had other reasons for leaving this spell, but he couldn’t have known what was going to happen.”

  And I didn’t say it, but Damien and I had left each other on more-or-less affectionate terms. We both knew that he was going to take Zarella’s deal, and we knew it was going to change things. Sure, Damien had his own motives—he always had—but I didn’t believe he’d meant to harm me. Not then. Now, though, was a whole different can of worms.

  “Stay back, Deb. I don’t want you to get caught in the blowback if something goes wacky,” I said quietly. I
faced Lynnette. “I want you to do it. Release the spell.”

  The gleam in her eyes almost made me take it back, but I wanted whatever power Damien had gifted me. I would need it if I were to have any hope at all of getting Evan back.

  Lynnette’s eyes became faraway as she focused on drawing magic. Then she turned her focus onto me. I saw delicate strands of elemental power weave through the air like trails of pixie dust.

  “Stay still,” she whispered.

  Her magic suddenly cascaded over me like a bucket of cold ice water. Every muscle in my body went rigid, and it felt like an arctic tornado was sweeping out my insides. I groaned, clamping my teeth together in an effort to keep from moving. The swirling sensation grew more violent, and with it a nauseating motion sickness.

  A million icy little points seemed to be speeding around inside me, darting between my cells and streaming through my blood vessels.

  Then it receded, leaving me shivering and disoriented.

  I blinked hard as my senses returned.

  Swaying and knowing I was about to go down, my hands blindly reached for something to hold. Lynnette slung an arm around my waist and caught me with a grunt, lowering me to the floor.

  I stared up at her, watching as swirling colors like rainbows on a soap bubble glowed around her. She let go of her magic, and the colors extinguished.

  “How do you pull air magic?” I whispered. “I’ve never done it. I don’t even know how.”

  Lynnette and Deb were both kneeling in front of me with tense looks on their faces.

  “Focus on your breath,” Deb said. “And think about the power of air, like in a storm. Then direct your thoughts just above your left palm, as if you’re catching a vortex of wind there.”

  I did as she directed, focusing my full attention on the task. Nothing happened for several seconds. But then a rush of power moved the tiny hairs on my arm and a gyrating little vortex of blue magic danced in my hand.

  Magic twirled through me like a breeze. The sheer movement and lightness of it were thrilling and exhilarating, so different from earth and fire.

  “Ella,” Lynnette said.

  I looked up at her, which broke my concentration. The funnel of air magic disappeared.

  “You’re a Level III now,” she said. “You’re . . . more powerful than I am.”

  I breathed deeply, sensing the magnitude of the magic I could pull, but almost not believing it.

  I wondered if Damien knew that I’d activated the spell, if he had any idea how readily I would use his gift against him in order to save my brother. A new determination welled up alongside my newfound power.

  Jacob had said the Order of Mages had come to the same conclusion that he had about using Evan to close the rips. Before Damien had become a mage, he’d expressed disdain for the Order. But Zarella had warned that the power would change Damien, that he wouldn’t be the same person afterward. I’d seen my old partner standing there with the Steins and looking quite at ease. Damien must have taken Evan as part of a ploy to get in good with the mages. To finally gain the acceptance in the Stein family.

  Damien hadn’t been helping me at all. He’d just wanted someone to get Evan out of Jacob’s hands. Then Damien had swooped in to take the prize for himself. He might have thought he’d won, but I wouldn’t let Evan slip away from me again.

  Look for the next book in the series:

  Blood Storm Magic (Ella Grey Book Four)

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