Witch Fire (Starfall Academy #1)

Chapter 1 Raven

Raven

“What’s she doing here?” Nova nearly dropped a box of potions at the sight of me lurking behind Willow. I tried to smother my grin, but the excitement of being allowed out for the first time in ages bubbled up inside me like fizzing candy.

“Adam said she could come and help. Tally isn’t feeling well.

” A small snort escaped my lips. Willow squeezed my fingers hard in warning.

She knew I’d added some slivers of a green-spored parasol mushroom to Tally’s dinner last night.

The symptoms didn’t take long to manifest. I wasn’t usually a vindictive person, but Tally deserved it.

Nova’s eyes narrowed with suspicion. “Adam left yesterday afternoon.”

Willow shrugged dismissively. “Yeah, but he mentioned in passing that if we needed extra people, Raven could come. He told me she needed to know how we did things on market day.”

“Really? Because the last time I suggested it, he said—”

“Hey, do you have any of the…um…love potions this week?”

We all turned to see a teenage girl with long, shiny blonde hair standing at the entrance to our tent. She tapped her foot and chewed gum impatiently, even though our stall wasn’t officially open yet.

My senses prickled. Her green-gray aura did not look healthy.

Most people I met, apart from Tally, whose sickly yellow aura matched her vile personality to a tee, had pastel-colored auras. Light and sweet. Like Willow with her pretty lilac aura, and Nova with her pale pink aura.

“We do,” Nova replied with a practiced smile. “Do you know how they work?”

Willow tugged me to one side as Nova began her sales spiel. I watched from the back of the tent as the girl listened and then frowned. “So the potion can’t make someone love me if they don’t like me?”

“No, it simply makes it easier and speeds things up.”

“But I want him to love me, not her!” The girl’s polite mask slipped, and her aura darkened. I shivered.

Nova’s eyes widened when the teen swept her arm across our table in a temper, knocking a row of potions to the floor. Thankfully, none of the small bottles smashed, but still.

“Hey!” Willow yelled. “Stop that now!”

The girl turned on her with a furious hiss. “Freaks! Y’all shouldn’t be allowed to come here!” Nova gasped at the venom in the girl’s voice. “It’s all bullshit anyway,” the teen continued with a sneer before kicking over the painted sign by the door as she stormed out.

My blood sparked in response to the perceived threat before the magic in me faded away. I touched the amulet around my neck. The black gem burned against my skin, reacting to my anxiety. Willow saw my expression and shoved me out the back of the tent while Nova cussed up a storm.

“Stay calm and keep your head down while I smooth things over,” she said in a low voice. “If Nova calls Adam, we’re both in the shitter.”

“That girl…” My voice trailed off. I wasn’t sure how to explain my sense that something was wrong with her. Like me, Willow had magic, but unlike me, she couldn’t read auras.

“Yeah, she’s a bitch. We see that kind of attitude a lot. Humans fear what they don’t understand.” She rolled her eyes. “Doesn’t stop them asking for hexes to piss off their exes or fertility potions to help them get pregnant. Now go before Nova comes looking for us.”

I chewed my lip for a moment. Willow was right.

While Adam probably wouldn’t punish me for leaving the compound, he wouldn’t show Willow the same leniency.

Adam’s punishments hurt while leaving no visible marks.

It was why I usually did as he asked, even though I hated I couldn’t leave the compound while the others were free to come and go as they liked.

“Check out the market stalls, but don’t wander too far,” Willow warned.

“I’ll come find you once we finish setting up.

Mary-Lou will be here shortly with the rest of the stock.

” I nodded in agreement, eager to escape before Tally locked me in the van and ruined my adventure.

“Here, go buy a drink or something.” Willow pushed some money into my hand with a grin.

I stared at the grubby note. While I understood in theory how money worked, I had no practical experience of actually buying anything. “What can I get with this?”

Willow’s blue eyes softened. She’d long campaigned for Adam to give me more freedom, but he always insisted the world was too dangerous for me to leave the compound. What those dangers were, he never elaborated on. Not to me, at least.

“This is a ten-dollar note. It’s enough money to buy a hot drink.” She pointed to a brightly painted yellow and blue trailer in the distance. “Go buy a hot chocolate with marshmallows. I promise you’ll love it.”

Willow was right. My hot chocolate drink was well worth the wait. I’d skipped the marshmallow but said yes to the cream and sprinkles. It tasted like heaven in a cup. Literally the best drink I’d ever had.

Sipping my delicious drink slowly so it would last longer, I wandered through the throngs of people exploring the market.

A few stared at me, but most gave me a wide berth.

Their auras ran the gamut of pink, buttercup yellow, sage green, sky blue, and lilac.

Some were paler than others. Only one person had a darker, more malignant aura, and I ducked inside a tent full of paintings to avoid him.

The day had dawned hotter than Tally’s ancient cauldron, but I ignored the discomfort in favor of soaking up everything like a sponge. This might be the last chance I had to see the world before Adam locked me up again, and I planned on making the most of it.

I skipped past several stalls with racks of pretty cotton dresses before lingering at one selling cute candles in glass jars.

Some of them contained dried flowers. They were probably easy to make.

I could do something similar with the herbs I grew in our small kitchen garden.

Add a touch of magic to the candles so that when they were lit, they emitted a calming vibe.

“You want one, sweetheart?” It took me a moment to register the young woman watching me. Her gaze lingered on my simple cotton dress, my unusual violet eyes, and my raven hair with silver streaks. I saw the exact moment my otherness registered.

She tensed and stepped back.

“You’re one of them, aren’t you?” she said in a low voice, her eyes flicking from side to side. I hated knowing she feared me. Why were the humans afraid of us? The witches I’d grown up with were mostly mild-mannered and gentle.

We made potions, raised livestock, grew crops, and kept ourselves away from the human towns.

“One of whom?” I asked, pretending not to understand what she meant. “I like your pretty candles.”

“The magical folk.”

My blood prickled again. As I turned, I caught a flash of blonde hair. The teenager who’d asked about the love potion had come back. Only this time, she wasn’t alone.

“Freak.” Her lip curled. “You’re all weird freaks.” A tall male stood at her shoulder, his thick biceps bulging. Like the blonde, his aura looked dirty, tainted with wrongness. Was there something nasty in this town’s drinking water?

A hand lashed out, knocking my half-full cup of hot chocolate to the floor. The sweet liquid splashed all over my feet and legs. I could have cried, but I fixed a bright smile to my face instead.

“Oops! Looks like I better buy another drink!”

Willow always said it was better to kill bullies with kindness. I had no real-life experience with bullies, but something told me these two were the bullies Willow meant.

The blonde female sneered at me again. “Are y’all dumb as well as freaky?” She took a step toward me, and her aura turned from gray to a sludgy green black. Strange. I’d never seen one with that color before. Maybe she had some goblin in her bloodline?

I debated asking, but decided it might make matters worse. Adam would not be happy if he heard I’d caused a scene at the market.

“I can read, so not dumb. Thanks for asking, though.” I smiled brightly, hoping to defuse the situation, but she sniggered.

“The dumb freak can read. Wow! Who’d have thought it? I thought all those freaks did was chant and wail around cauldrons!” The male laughed derisively.

“I bet they do it naked.” His beady little eyes slithered down my chest, sending my magic haywire. The amulet resting between my breasts burned like fire.

“Nope, not naked,” I chirped. “Too many snakes and mosquitoes for comfort. Oh, and scorpions. Ever been bit on the ass by a scorpion? No, me neither. But Tally was, and boy, did she scream!” A nervous giggle fell from my lips as I edged backward.

Except there was nowhere to go thanks to the trestle table of candles.

Not a single person looked our way. The stall owner had disappeared. I guessed she didn’t want to get caught in the crossfire. From the way she’d acted before, she clearly thought I might smite her into a pile of ash.

If only.

I’d quite like to smite these two idiots. Or hex them so they peed glass splinters for a week.

Both of them deserved a dose of something nasty. Like wart fever. If Adam didn’t lock me in the root cellar again, I’d make up a potion tonight and then find out where they lived. They had to be local. This wasn’t a particularly big market.

“Grab her, Tyler,” the blonde hissed. “I reckon we can have us some fun.”

I choked on a scream when the hulking male lunged toward me. Frustrated tears pricked my eyes.

Why didn’t I listen to Adam? With my streaky hair and violet eyes, I stood out too much among the humans. Willow had honey-brown hair and looked human. So did the others.

No wonder Adam had warned me about leaving the compound. He must have known this would happen.

I tugged on my magic. A small flame appeared in the palm of my hand, hidden from view. When the male tried to grab me, I ducked out of his grasp. While his lecherous eyes fixed on me, a wisp of smoke drifted up from the edge of the floral cloth covering the candle display table.

The human female grinned at my distress.

“Aren’t you gonna curse us, freak?”

At the word curse, the male snorted. He obviously didn’t believe in magic or witches, which wasn’t unusual.

Plenty of humans thought we only came to the market to con them out of their hard-earned cash.

Those who believed in magic were usually a touch afraid and only sought us out when they needed help.

“Fuck,” the girl exclaimed when she spotted the candle display had caught fire. “We need to leave before we’re asked to pay for a hundred fucking scented candles.”

Tyler tried once more to grab me, but I fell to the ground, scraping my knees and hands on the gravel.

“Raven!” Willow’s yell caught my attention as I lay sprawled in the dirt. “We have to go! Now!”

When I looked up, a wall of fire raged at my back. The humans nearby had finally noticed and were screaming in panic, rushing away in every direction like sheep. I wiped my eyes and tried to stand as Willow headed for me.

Only before she got within ten feet of me, a massive male in a lumberjack shirt and jeans appeared from behind an adjacent tent and pulled me into his arms. I squeaked in shock, but to my surprise, the fear and misery churning inside me immediately settled.

The flames behind us sputtered out, leaving a charred, smoking pile of canvas and melted glass.

A deep rumble of satisfaction vibrated through me as the man mountain clutched me so tight I could barely breathe.

Instead of protesting at being squished like a ripe tomato, I snuggled closer, burying my nose in his soft cotton shirt. Stars above, he smelled good. Like pine and ozone after a storm. Far better than the acrid stench of burned canvas. His forest-green aura lightened to gold sage above us.

“Mine,” the man grunted. My eyes widened.

Then four armed mages in combat vests blinked into view out of nowhere and all hell broke loose.