Chapter 14
Chapter Fourteen
Kaeli took a drink from her travel mug of coffee and finished copying the new spell from the book Lorene had left the day before into her spellbook.
It was a south magic spell for offense, not defense.
She’d learned that protection spells were mainly defensive, like using the roots to trap a dangerous person so someone could flee, or the anchors she’d put around their home to let her and Solan know if someone dangerous came into the house.
But if she was in trouble? She needed to be able to fight back. And her fire magic seemed tailor-made for it.
“Okay, girl,” Cinder said, yawning as she stirred honey into her mug of tea. “Let’s head outside and see if you can send fire away from yourself. We’ll use the firepit so you can practice setting something on fire besides a candle.”
“Awesome. There’s so much to learn,” she said.
“You’ll get there. You’re doing great.”
Kaeli smiled. She took her coffee, gathered her spellbook, and followed Cinder out into the yard. It was about an hour past dawn, and there was a chill in the air, but she was too excited to go back into the house and grab her jacket.
She stared at the spell, committing the short phrase to memory, then she set the book down and looked at the firepit and the logs waiting to be set on fire.
“Direct your magic, don’t try to throw it.”
“Gotcha.” Kaeli raised her hand and called her south magic to herself.
She whispered the two-word spell, and a bloom of fire swelled in her palm, all gold and red and pulsing with warmth.
She guided it to the logs in the firepit.
But her direction was forced, and the fire shot through the air like a bullet, right past the firepit and landing in the yard with a whoosh.
“Crap!”
“Pull it back to you, try again,” Cinder said calmly as the grass burned.
Kaeli reversed the spell and drew the fire back, leaving the ground black where the fire had started to spread.
“At least it wasn’t the house,” Cinder said. “Or one of the guys.”
“I’d never hear the end of it if I set Solan on fire,” Kaeli said.
Cinder grinned. “Definitely. Okay, try to touch your north magic at the same time. Allow the earth’s power to work with your fire.”
Kaeli nodded. Before she tried again, she said, “Thanks.”
“For what?”
“For spending time with me, for helping. I didn’t have that with my old coven. They never saw me as anything but a failure.”
“They were blind to your true potential and idiots, too. But it’s my pleasure to help you in any way that I can. Knowing there’s a witch in our midst who can help keep us all safe and that we’re not without protection while I’m pregnant is a blessing. You’re a blessing.”
Kaeli’s eyes stung suddenly. No one had ever called her that before.
“You are to me, too.”
She turned her attention to the firepit, called her magic forward, and watched as a dancing flame appeared in her hand. Touching her earth magic, she twined it with her fire, the two pulsing together, and then she spoke the spell and sent the fire forward.
Just as it hit the logs and they burst into flame, Cinder’s phone beeped, and she took it from her pocket.
“Oh no!”
“What’s wrong?” Kaeli asked.
“This morning, before dawn, the convoy to the dealership was attacked, and everyone was knocked unconscious. Leo just woke up. They took Mira!”
Kaeli pulled the fire back to herself and extinguished it. “Get in the house, we could be in danger,” Kaeli said. She watched her friend run to the house, then took off for the security office. She pushed open the door, locking eyes with Solan. “It’s true? Those anti-shifter people took Mira?”
“Yes,” Solan said. “We’re going to gather the team that’s out of commission and try to find Mira.”
“I’m coming with you,” she said.
“Abso-damn-lutely not,” Solan said with a snarl.
“Hey! You need me. I can cast a location spell; I just need Leo. I saw it in the book Lorene gave me yesterday.”
Solan’s upper lip curled, and she could see the indecision in his eyes.
“Solan,” she said. “Please. Let me help.”
“Fine, but you’re by my side like glue. Got it?”
“I promise.”
In minutes, they were on the road, another group of security team members with them, including Adam. The pack was urged to shelter in place as the remaining security team would be stretched thin keeping watch over the town.
Solan drove, and Adam was in the front seat.
Kaeli rode in the second row with Dove and Linus.
She stared down at her spellbook. Location spells were fairly basic to witches, and now that she’d been working on spellcasting for a couple of days, she was feeling more confident.
But she was nervous, too. If she couldn’t cast a spell to locate Mira, they’d have to reach out to the coven and ask for help, and that would delay things.
The attack site was halfway between Thorn Hollow and the dealership and looked like a bomb had gone off.
The pack’s vehicles were off the road, many damaged as if they’d been hit by other vehicles, and two were toppled on their sides.
Leo and a couple of security team members were standing on the side of the road when they arrived.
“Come on,” Solan said when he parked. “Stay close, babe.”
“I will.”
They exited the truck and moved to Leo and the others. He was bleeding from a head wound, his eyes amber as he growled when he talked about waking up and finding Mira gone.
“It was so damn fast,” Leo said. “The two scout vehicles radioed that everything was safe on the route, but when we caught up to them, we were attacked. They came at us with some kind of grenades that put out tons of smoke. That’s all I remember until I woke up and Mira was gone.”
Kaeli’s stomach twisted. Mira must be so scared.
She reached out and put her hand on Leo’s arm. “I can help find her.”
“How?” he asked.
“Just think of her. Open your wolf to your connection as truemates.”
She closed her eyes and focused both her magics, drawing them together, weaving them into a thick thread of magic. Solan stepped up next to her and settled his hand on her back, and she felt her magic respond to him. He was her anchor, her catalyst. Her everything.
When Leo touched his wolf and focused on Mira, Kaeli spoke the spell with every ounce of power and magic inside her. “Delins, fastarle, delinaso, mesture!”
Leo gasped as her magic wrapped around him. She opened her eyes, but she didn’t see what was around her; she saw Mira.
She was chained to the support beam in an empty room with concrete walls and broken windows. She was gagged; her head lolled to the side as if she were still unconscious. A man stood nearby on the phone, and she could see the shadows of other men.
The vision ebbed backward like a wave and shattered, and Kaeli let go of Leo, her knees going out from under her. Solan caught her. “What did you see?”
“I saw her. She’s alive but unconscious. In a warehouse.” She described the man she saw, and Adam snarled.
“That’s Hawthorne.”
“The shifter hunter?” she asked with a shiver.
Solan nodded.
A surge of worry flashed through her. That meant Mira was possibly in even more danger. From all she’d heard, Victor Hawthorne was a terrible man who sold shifters like they were trophies.
She quickly spoke the spell again, and this time her magic flowed out of her, and she felt Mira’s location, the name a whisper in her mind. “Darington.”
“That’s on the river,” Adam said. “Twenty minutes tops.”
“Let’s fucking go,” Leo said. “We can’t waste another minute.”
Solan grabbed Kaeli’s hand, and they sprinted for the vehicles, leaving enough wolves behind to care for those who were coming out from under the effects of the smoke Leo had described.
Leo sat in the front seat next to Solan, and Adam got into the back with Kaeli and Dove. “Let’s go,” Leo said. “Hurry.”
Solan nodded. “We’ll get her back.”
Kaeli could feel Leo’s worry for his mate like it was a living thing in the vehicle. She didn’t know what they’d face when they got to the warehouse, but she knew she needed to be there. To get Mira to safety and keep her mate and his friends safe.
“That was pretty damn cool,” Dove whispered.
“I’m so glad it worked,” Kaeli said.
“Me too,” Dove said. “Mira is a really sweet girl. Did you know she was adopted by psychics when her life was in danger when she was little, and she didn’t find out until recently that she was a female gryphon?
Apparently, she’s the only female gryphon.
They’re usually male. Her mom and sister are called madters; they’re supernaturally perfect mates for two males, and their kids are essentially hybrids – the mix of the two shifters. ”
“Solan told me some of her story, but I didn’t know that,” Kaeli said. “Northern Ohio sure does have some interesting supernatural creatures here.”
“Oh, for sure,” Dove said. “There’s a Pegasus shifter who lives with the bears, not to mention the dragons, which I think are just too cool. There are also polar bears who are part of the vampire coven. But you can cast spells, I think that’s really awesome.”
“I’m still learning how to wield the magics I have, but I’m doing my best.”
“That’s all anyone would ask of you,” Dove said with a smile.
Kaeli just hoped her best was enough to get Mira free. “I’m ready now, Solan.”
“Cast away, Nightling,” he said. “Tell me where to go.”
She drew on her magics and cast the location spell again, so they didn’t have to waste time searching the town.
I hope this works.