Chapter 15 - Liv
“This was a great idea, Liv,” Jessie said, reclining on the sofa as she sipped her wine. She let out a contented sigh. “With everything going on, I could use a bit of girl time.”
“No kidding,” Rachel agreed. “With the demon and everything, Emma and I are stretched pretty thin. I was getting so in my own head that it’s nice to get a bit of reprieve.”
I grinned and raised my glass in a mock toast. “Always happy to be of assistance.”
“You seem a bit more relaxed. Are you and Drake getting along all right?” Rachel said. “Are you adjusting all right? It’s been a crazy time without having to deal with a new mate.”
I gave a wide smile that I hoped reached my eyes. “Yeah! It’s been fine. The adjustment has still been a bit weird, but for the most part, we’ve gotten into a rhythm.”
That wasn’t entirely true. In fact, it was nowhere near true.
Everything with Drake felt as though it had gotten infinitely more complicated in the last few days.
We had spoken, and things had become more cordial since we’d had sex, but we had never spoken about it.
It was a huge chasm between us that neither of us seemed to want to, or know how to, acknowledge.
And I couldn’t shake the way he had looked when I told him I didn’t think it was a good idea for us to have sex again.
His reaction, turning immediately surly again, had sent a different jolt of panic through me: What if he was only interested in me for sex?
It was possible. But if that were the case, the fact that I had refused to have sex again was a good thing.
The problem was that I still wanted him.
I thought about him constantly, imagining him coming into my room late at night, slipping into my bed.
I had fought these feelings for so long, and now it seemed like all of that restraint was crumbling around me.
I didn’t understand how it could happen.
And that didn’t change the fact that I was still furious with him for what he had done.
And every time I thought about it, it just felt more complicated.
My emotions and thoughts seemed to swirl around and around like a tempest that wouldn’t stop.
I just wanted things to make sense, for them to settle so I could think straight. But nothing—
Something crashed behind me. I spun around to see the lamp that had been in the middle of the end table moments earlier on the ground, shattered.
“What—?” I muttered, but didn’t have time to get anything else out before a photo hanging on the wall rose from its spot and began spinning around.
I took a step back as my eyes widened. The red wine in my glass began to rise as if we were suddenly in zero gravity. My hand flew to my mouth as I gaped.
Jessie gasped, her eyes growing wide.
“What the hell?” she asked.
Rachel, however, didn’t panic. Her eyes darted around, watching the scene with a knowing scrutiny, as if she already had a suspicion as to what was going on.
“Liv, I think you’re doing this,” Rachel said, her voice uncharacteristically sharp and intense.
“What?” I asked, brow furrowed. “What are you talking about?”
Instead of answering right away, Rachel said, “Close your eyes and breathe deep. Center yourself, all right?”
I was too confused and bewildered to argue or question the command.
So I closed my eyes, focusing on deep breaths as my chest rose and fell, rose and fell.
My mind began to clear as I pushed thoughts of Drake and all the other problems plaguing the pack and me right now out of my mind.
Right now, the only thing that mattered was my breathing.
“Oh my God,” Jessie muttered. “That’s…”
“Liv, open your eyes,” Rachel said, something inscrutable in her voice.
I obeyed. When I did, all of the objects that had been swimming all around had stopped. They hovered in the air, as if waiting for…something. My mouth dropped open. I reached out and poked a blob of wine near my head. It wiggled a little, but didn’t start moving.
Then, without my doing anything, everything collapsed. The wine splashed as it hit the floor, a little sinking into the carpet while the rest spilled onto the hardwood. Glass shattered, the wood of the picture frame cracking.
“Oh, God.” My hand flew to my mouth. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to…”
To what? What exactly had I done? I had no idea. How did I even know it was me who had been doing it? I wasn’t sure, but deep down, I knew it somehow had something to do with me.
I turned to look at Jessie and Rachel. They looked stunned, unsure what had just happened or why. Jessie looked as stumped as I was. Rachel, though visibly shocked, looked as though she knew precisely what was going on, or at least had an inclination.
“What…?” I trailed off, licking my lips as I glanced at the carnage around us. “What just happened?”
Rachel’s lips twitched upward, something dancing in her eyes. It might have been excitement, but it might have been relief, too.
“How much do you know about your family history?” Rachel asked.
I frowned, scratching the back of my neck as I began to pace. “I don’t know. A little? Why?”
Rachel stared at the destruction before us, chewing the inside of her cheek. “I’m guessing that if we look back far enough, we’re going to find out there’s a witch somewhere in there. A great-, or maybe even a great-great-grandmother.”
I blinked, the words taking a moment to sink in. When they did, I tried not to laugh. “Are you telling me that I’m a witch?”
Rachel shrugged. “It certainly looks like it. I sure as hell didn’t do it, and Jessie wasn’t the one with heightened emotions when all of it started.”
“I didn’t have heightened emotions—” I argued.
Jessie and Rachel laughed.
“Yes, you did,” Jessie said. “We could see it all over your face.”
Heat flooded my face. Instead of responding, I glanced around at the destruction, letting the notion wash over me. Me, a witch? It didn’t make sense. Surely, I would have known about it before now.
Then I remembered the glass of water the other day, the one that had fallen off the counter without any sort of explanation. Yet again, that had been when I’d been thinking about Drake.
Was it possible?
I didn’t buy into the stigma some of the town had about witches. How could I, considering one of my best friends was a witch? It was the opposite, really. Witches were so incredible, so powerful, so helpful to the town that there’s no way I could be one of them.
I didn’t know how to articulate any of that, so I settled for a simpler response. “I don’t know anything about any witch blood in my family tree, though. I would surely know about it, wouldn’t I?”
“Considering the stigma that’s plagued the town for years, it’s not like that’s a shock, is it?
” Rachel said. “I mean, I didn’t know about it until my own powers developed.
It looks as though witch blood might have been a bit more prominent than we expected.
” Rachel rolled her eyes with a smirk. “Leave it to our grandparents and great-grandparents to be complete and utter hypocrites. They hate witches, but they apparently can’t stop having sex with them. ”
“But…” I trailed off. How much did I actually know about my family? Mom and Dad had died a few years ago, and I have never bothered asking them much about our family history. There was a chance that there was a witch buried somewhere in my family tree.
As if able to read my thoughts, Rachel bobbed her head enthusiastically. “Try it intentionally,” she encouraged.
Glancing around at the items on the floor, I stared at the spilled wine, not entirely sure what to do but trying to tap into whatever instinctive thing had allowed me to make things begin flying around in the first place.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then, the wine began to rise, even pulling itself out of the carpet, the stain evaporating.
The blob of burgundy liquid hovered in the air for a moment before floating and dropping back into the glass.
Rachel let out a low whistle. “And here I thought that magic had to be element-based,” she mused. “I guess there’s a lot more to magic that we need to learn.”
I didn’t answer, not right away. My mind was spinning, reeling with the realization. I stared at my hands as if expecting sparks to shoot out of them at any minute. I gave a half-laugh of disbelief as I continued to gawk.
“You all right?” Jessie asked.
“Of course I’m all right! This is amazing!” I said. My hands were still trembling, but more with an influx of adrenaline than dread or anything else. “I can help. I can actually do something against the wraith and this new demon.”
I had to stop myself from bouncing on the balls of my feet.
I shouldn’t have been this ecstatic about putting myself in the line of fire.
If the wraith or Azaret discovered what I could do, they would start wanting to go after me the same way they had Rachel and Emma.
Except I couldn’t be terrified. I had been given an incredible gift: the chance to help.
Despite everything that happened to me when I was a kid, I loved my pack.
I always had. Now, I’d been given the opportunity to help save it. How could I not be excited?
Rachel rubbed her chin as she scrutinized the destruction.
“I’m going to have a word with Emma,” she said.
“She needs to know. Then we’ll get some plan together to start training.
If you’re going to help, you’re going to need better control than, well…
” She gestured around. Even as she did, she gave a broad grin.
“Yeah…I kind of made a mess of things, didn’t I?”
“A bit,” Rachel admitted.
I giggled. That tiny giggle mutated into a chuckle, which morphed into a genuine laugh. Rachel joined in, followed a moment later by Jessie. Within a minute, we had all started laughing. I couldn’t help it. It was all too incredible, in the best possible way.
I had been agonizing about what I could do to help the town, had been racking my brain trying to come up with something. Now, the answer had been delivered to me on a silver platter, hovering in the air. I wasn’t useless. There was something I could do.
For the first time since this had all started, I didn’t feel helpless.