Chapter 13 #2
The four of us stop at the top of the rise to the standing stones, and Laurel frowns at us. “Having an opinion about something you know nothing about isn’t helping, Orion. Remember your place.”
A menacing growl rumbles in the night air as Eliza lowers her gaze and prowls closer.
“Orion’s opinion is of no concern to you.
If he feels bad about the treatment of a friend, that’s his business.
You may be his high priestess, but I am his alpha.
And I encourage the members of my pack to speak their minds. ”
Laurel obviously doesn’t seem to agree, but she doesn’t challenge the shifter alpha.
There’s a moment of tense standoff, but nobody throws down, so I gesture to the standing stones to get this moving along. “So, do we click our heels three times and say there’s no place like Arcana?”
“Something like that.” Laurel steps over the pithy corpse of a long-fallen tree and stops at a clearing where the last of the day’s champagne light spills through the canopy. “We’re taking a fairy portal.”
I give Orion a look.
He chuckles. “Yeah, it’s exactly what it sounds like. Portal magic is advanced but not rare. In time, we’ll be able to do it ourselves. Until then, we need the help of the fairies.”
“Gather in the center of the stones, please.”
We do as Laurel asks, and she extends her right hand. As she passes us in a slow, counterclockwise circle, she sprinkles blue and green glitter from her fingertips.
The sparkly confetti drops at first, but then swirls in a gentle cyclone around us.
I raise my hand, catching a few flecks. “Did you get this at Michaels? Because I swear this looks like the Glitz Mix the girls in my apartment building use in their pep rally signs.”
Orion grins. “Anything bright and sparkly works to catch the whimsy of the fairies.”
So. Many. Questions.
But instead of indulging, I push them down. Because, hello, the woman is building a portal to access an expanse between worlds. I don’t want her distracted.
When Laurel finishes her third circle, she stops and holds her hands out to me. “This is the part where you trust me, and hold my hand, so you don’t get left behind.”
When Eliza and Orion join hands, I follow suit. “I may not want to be left behind, but I don’t trust you in the slightest.”
Her fingers tighten around mine, and when I’m standing right beside her, she blows a wave of glitter into my face. I clamp my eyes shut, prepared to sputter, but the moment my eyes are closed, the world shifts.
It feels like my body turns into a weightless mist and I’m sucked into the swirl of a magical vortex. My stomach lurches like I’m on that centrifugal force carnival ride that sucks you backward against the walls, and pressure builds in my ears.
Wind whips around us, carrying scents of pine, ozone, and something else.
Something ancient and wild.
The ground falls away, and the weight of my bag lifts as it floats in the air in front of me. Suddenly, the chaos is gone, and my body reforms, my feet planting on solid ground. I stagger to the side, crashing into Orion, who holds me upright until the world stops spinning.
I wait until my mind stops sloshing inside my head.
There is nothing but stillness for a long beat, and then I gather myself enough to straighten and stand on my own.
Eliza offers me a sympathetic smile. “The first trip can be disorienting.”
Disorienting? That’s one way to put it.
It takes a moment for our surroundings to register, but when they do, goosebumps tingle to life across my skin.
We’re standing on a vast lawn that rolls toward a structure that can’t possibly be real.
When Wylder said I needed to come to the Arcana Academy to work on control, I envisioned a cross between Hogwarts and a magical summer camp.
This is nothing like that.
It’s like a magical medieval city. The main buildings rise before us, a group of sprawling architectural masterpieces, with spires and arches that gleam silver in the moonlight.
But it’s not just moonlight—the entire city seems to pulse with a gentle luminescence, as if the stones themselves are alive.
“Holy crapamoly,” I breathe, the sweetness of the air settling on my tongue.
“That’s one way to sum it up,” Orion says.
The surrounding night is alive in ways I can’t even explain. Floating orbs of soft blue light drift along pathways that wind through sprawling gardens where plants glow in purples, yellows, and greens.
Crystals embedded in the ground emit a soft radiance, marking the edges of the paths leading off into the forest in a dozen different places. Above us, the stars seem closer, brighter than I’ve ever seen them, as if the veil between earth and sky is thinner here.
Something beneath my skin responds to being here. It’s a buzzing, humming energy that rises from my core and spreads through my limbs. My fingertips tingle, and when I look down, tiny sparks dance across my skin.
“What’s happening to me?” My voice sounds distant in my own ears.
“This is a magical place, and your powers sense that.” Laurel’s words, for once, aren’t edged with haughty aggression.
She seems to be genuinely imparting wisdom—you know, like a true coven leader.
“Your body is responding to the ambient energy here. Arcana was built at a convergence of ley lines, the same way Emberwood was.”
I spin slowly, taking it all in. In the distance, figures are hustling across the vast, expansive grounds and down the pathways. Some are walking, some floating, others shifting forms as they go. “Where are they all going in such a hurry?”
“To the weekly welcome,” Eliza says.
“It’s like a magical icebreaker for new arrivals,” Orion adds. “We have to hurry, or we’ll be late.”
“What? But I just got here,” I whisper, suddenly overwhelmed. “I’m not ready to meet people.”
Eliza flashes me a sad smile and gestures for us to follow Laurel. “Just stay calm and keep your head down until you get the lay of the land. Odds are you’ll be fine.”
I frown as we strike off across the lawn. “Odds are I’ll be fine? What happens if the odds are against me?”