Secret Magic, page 15
part #1 of Nobledark Academy Series
I was able to get a little closer as I reached the end of the building. I could see the flames through the large window that opened up on one side of the library, and they looked redder and darker than normal flames. I might have been able to dismiss that, but the acrid smell hit my nose, and I knew.
Brimstone.
What did this mean? Why were demons attacking the school? I wanted to believe it had nothing to do with me, because I wasn’t that arrogant, but I was afraid that was wishful thinking. More than that, I just didn’t know.
“You smell it, too?” A form moved behind me, standing close enough to speak softly in my ear.
Silas. I could smell him, even with the brimstone in the air.
“It looks the same,” I said, pointing.
His arm slid around me, pulling me close in the safety of the darkness of the night. “I should be concerned about a second fire, done by something demonic, but all I can think about is that you’re standing in front of me, in nothing but PJs, and I find that I don’t give a damn about the fire.”
I couldn’t speak.
“So I take it you worked things out with Pearce?”
“It was his brother I saw,” I got out, finding conversation difficult as the awareness of Silas’ body next to mine overwhelmed me.
“You didn’t know he had a twin?” Silas was surprised.
“I think I was the only one,” I snapped, irritated.
“He didn’t look like he wanted to rip my head off and use it for practice, either. You talked to him?”
“How do you know all this?” I demanded as I turned around. I meant to yell at him, but I actually found myself in his arms. I wasn’t sure I hadn’t just fallen out of the frying pan and into the fire.
“I knew you were going to be mine the moment I met you, Olivia Washington,” he said, without a trace of laughter or teasing in his voice. “I knew, and nothing has changed that. I also knew I might have to share you. Because that’s how strong women, strong leaders, are—they need more than one male.”
“I don’t understand,” I whispered.
His lips were mere inches from mine. “I will take you any way you’ll have me, Olivia. Any way.” And his lips came down onto mine.
I don’t know what I was expecting. When I’d kissed him before, at the first fire, it had been intense, but brief.
This was the kiss of someone who cared for me. I could feel that in the way he touched me, in the way his arms tightened around me.
My hands were at his chest, and my fingers dug into his shirt. I could feel his pull—the sexual magnetism that made it impossible for me to ignore him from the first time we’d met. And there was more. I could feel emotion—happiness and triumph—behind his magnetism. He was happy that he was here with me, kissing me.
One of his hands came up to fist in my hair at the nape of my neck. Silas deepened the kiss, demanding participation from not only my body, but all of my senses.
A crash from the building behind us made me jump. Silas let go of me.
“Holy shit,” he said. One corner of the building, opposite from where we stood, had fallen to the grounds below.
“Why is this happening?” I asked.
“No, that’s not the right question,” Silas twined his fingers through my hand that was closest to him. “The question is, Why are demons interested in this school? What are they hoping to gain? What’s the goal?”
“I don’t like your question any more than mine,” I said.
“None of this is good,” he replied. Then he looked down. “You should go back to your room.”
“Why?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he said. “But I just got a strong feeling that you didn’t need to be here, as much as I like you next to me.”
“You always listen to those feelings?”
He nodded. “I do. They’re almost always right. You want me to walk back with you?”
“No. I need to find my podmate. I left her to—it doesn’t matter. I’ll find her.”
“Go. I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said.
As I was leaving, he grabbed my arm and pulled me to him, almost violently. Silas kissed me like his life depended on it, and when I was breathless and sure I was about to pass out or something, he let me go. “So you don’t forget me.”
“As if that were possible,” I got out.
His teeth gleamed at me as he smiled. “Good. I like to hear that.”
I walked away, my hand to my lips. Holy shit. When it rained, it poured.
I needed to talk to Raven.
Chapter Twenty-One
The next morning, I woke to the school’s loudspeaker blaring. It was a voice I didn’t recognize.
“All classes are canceled today. All students are to keep clear of the library. Classes will resume tomorrow.”
I got up and padded over to Thalia’s room.
“What?” she groaned from the bed.
“What do you want to do today?”
“I want to sleep. Where were you last night?” Despite her words, she turned over to look at me.
“I got up and went out with Sarah,” I said.
“Oh. We didn’t see you, and thought you might have taken a field trip,” she smiled as she stretched.
“To where?”
“To anywhere that your growing group of men might be,” Thalia grinned.
“No, I just went out to see the library.”
“Is it bad?” She sat up.
“It looked bad last night. It’s like the one near the dining hall.”
“Demon fire?” Her eyes widened.
“It smelled like it,” I said.
“Oh, shit.”
“Exactly.”
“My parents will get all kinds of nervous if this keeps up,” Thalia said. “I haven’t heard from them, so they must not know.”
“What would they do if they did?” I asked.
“They might make me come home. Our family had a bad history with a demon. My parents have PTSD. The whole family does, actually.”
“What happened?”
She waved her hand. “It’s stupid. Hundreds of years ago, someone made a deal with a demon and it went sideways. Probably because my ancestor was stupid about it. I mean, who makes a deal with a demon? It’s not good for your health.”
I thought about Marbys, and how he’d ruined the lives, in a way, of at least three women. “No, it doesn’t seem like it.”
“If they hear about this, they’ll try and get me to come home,” she sighed. “And I’ll spend a week talking them off the ceiling.”
“I didn’t know that,” I said.
“I don’t talk about it much. It’s a pain. What are you doing today?”
“I have to go see Madame Karathos. It’s Wednesday,” I said. I didn’t tell her I’d been dreaming of Marbys all week. I didn’t want to tell anyone. Who could I tell? Madame Karathos didn’t know. My parents? No. Like Thalia’s parents, they might panic. Iliana? She would probably be good. And Raven. “I also have to try and get in touch with Raven and Iliana,” I added.
“Good thing you don’t have classes today,” Thalia said. “That’s a list all by itself.”
“No shit,” I said.
“Well, go, and let me sleep. I’ll see you later,” she said.
I went back to my room. Might as well get a shower and get going. On what, I wasn’t sure, but I’d figure it out after the shower.
I got dressed and went to my bedside table to put on my ring. Without really thinking about it, I’d started wearing it every day, and I took it off at night. I should probably put it back in the shell box, I thought, but I’d been too lazy.
The ring wasn’t on the table.
I looked on the floor all around the table, even pulling it away from the wall to see if the ring had fallen behind it. No joy. I pricked my finger to open the shell box, and it wasn’t there. I pulled my blankets and sheets off the bed, looking to see if it had gotten dropped while I was in bed.
“What are you doing?” Jade’s voice came from behind me.
I jumped. “Holy hell, you scared me.”
“Why are you tearing up your bed?”
“I can’t find my ring,” I said. “I normally leave it on my table, and it’s not there.”
“I’ll help you,” she said, coming in and going through the blankets with me.
For the next thirty minutes, we turned my room upside down.
“It’s not here,” I said, the tears coming to the surface. I hadn’t wanted the ring initially, but now, I was used to it, and I knew that it was important for me.
Jade put her arm around my shoulders. “It will turn up. Come on, let’s get your room back together.”
She helped me pick up the mess we’d made, and I felt a thin string of panic rising inside. What if someone else found it and knew what it was? Thalia said, the first time I showed them the ring, that she could feel the magic in it. What if someone who wasn’t my friend found it?
Then my secret would be out.
I stopped myself. The headmistress of the school already knew. It wasn’t like I was totally hiding it. Although if Madame Karathos hadn’t pressed me, I’d still totally be hiding it, but she had pushed, and I’d told the truth.
“Where could it be?” I said, as Jade helped me make the bed.
“I don’t know. Physical combat?” she asked. “Or Spells? Somewhere that you were using your hands. It might have slipped off.”
“No, I remember putting it on the table last night before I got into bed,” I said, going over the night before I’d gone out to see the fire.
“I have to meet Levi. Are you going to be okay?” she asked.
“I will. Go and enjoy your day with him.”
Jade smiled, and left.
Where the hell was my ring?
I paced around, unable to sit still. Finally, I decided to go out and see what the library looked like in daylight.
When I walked through the yard, there were groups of students talking quietly. I walked past them toward the building. One of the walls had fallen in along the corner Silas and I had seen fall last night. There was still smoke drifting from the roof the building, lazily circling above the school. And all around, the scent of brimstone.
I turned to the right to walk along the far wall of the library. I could see a couple of teachers standing in front of it, and I steered clear of them. I had no idea what I was looking for, or why I was here. But I’d gotten a feeling, and thinking of Silas, I’d decided to follow it.
I turned to the right again, walking along the third side of the library visible from the grounds. The fourth wall was an interior wall, and couldn’t be seen from here.
As I walked, I nearly fell backwards. Something that felt like a hook went around my middle, pulling me back.
“What the hell?” I said out loud. I looked around to make sure no one saw me. Not that I cared if anyone saw me fall, but I didn’t want to answer questions.
I walked back and then turned around and slowly walked toward the area where I’d felt the jerk. Just as I made it to the place where I thought it happened, I felt the jerk again.
Okay. Weird and not good.
I walked further away from the building, and then tried to walk past the spot, and several more times, I felt the jerk that pulled me back. When I got about a hundred feet out from where I’d initially nearly fallen on my ass, I was able to walk past the spot normally, as though nothing was there. But when I got closer, I was jerked backwards every single time.
I moved closer to the building, staying on the safe side of what I called ‘the spot’. As I approached it, a humming filled my ears. Not a nice humming, like listening to bees in a garden, but an annoying buzz, like an alarm on an elevator. The closer I walked to the building, the louder the buzz got.
I stopped and looked around. It was early, and thankfully, no one was near. I must look like a lunatic.
With another glance around, I got as close to the building as the landscaping would allow.
“What are you doing?” a cool, silvery, deep voice asked.
“Holy shit!” I yelped, nearly jumping two feet in the air. When I turned around, Caspian stood with his arms crossed, regarding me with an air that I could not, in any way, describe as positive.
“Nothing for you to concern yourself with,” I said.
His eyebrow went up. “Are you sure about that?”
“Are you all right? You’re not spitting insults at me,” I said. I didn’t have time for his games, even as my body thought differently. I’d moved closer to him, and I could feel a warmth spreading through me, making me very aware of his body and mine, and the sounds all around us.
“I’m well this morning, thank you for asking.”
Holy shit. He sounded polite, and quite non-tortured, unlike the last time I’d seen him. When he kissed me and then backed away like he was afraid.
“Did you enjoy the match yesterday?”
“You’re very good,” I said, bemused by the fact that we were standing here having a completely normal conversation. I met his eyes then, and that was a mistake.
They were dark, silvery gray, and they reminded me of a stormy day at sea. Passion flared in his gaze, and I could see hunger there, as well.
All this while he stood calmly in front of me.
“Thank you. Well, I shall leave you to… whatever you’re doing.” His eyebrow went up again.
“Okay,” I said.
He walked away, and I saw that he glanced back at me a few times. I’d always heard that it meant someone liked you when they looked back. I knew he wanted me, but I hadn’t thought he might like me.
Until now.
I shook my head to clear it and returned to the building. Caspian was a riddle I’d need to tackle later. I needed to figure this out first.
I took a few more steps toward the building, and the buzzing increased, and a roar filled my ears so loudly that it made my head hurt.
I could no longer see the building, but a vast, reddish dark expanse, and to my left and in front of where I stood, I could see a dark hole.
It was an opening. It felt familiar, but I couldn’t remember where I’d felt it before. I blinked with all the smoke that had appeared in the reddish black expanse, and then I was standing in the shrubbery in front of the library once again.
What the hell had just happened?
I didn’t know, but whatever it was, this couldn’t be good.
I prowled around the back side of the building until I started to feel the sun burning me, so maybe another hour? I couldn’t see the reddish black expanse with the dark hole again, no matter how hard I tried. And the spot where I was jerked back had disappeared as well. I was hot, tired, thirsty, and frustrated. So I went back to my room.
A note was pinned to my door.
6:30 pm
There was no name on it, but I knew it was from Madame Karathos. I planned to go to dinner early, so I wouldn’t have to rush to get there.
My books sat on my desk, reminding me that I hadn’t even looked at homework today. I tossed myself on my bed, not interested in work. Why hadn’t I seen Matty, or Silas, or anyone today?
I knew that Jade was with Levi, so I knocked on Thalia’s door. There was no answer. I got food from the dining hall and brought it back to my room, not wanting to eat alone. As I ate at my desk, and tried to look at an Acquisition assignment, I thought about the morning. Where had I seen that reddish area before? What did it remind me of?
As I ate a pear, it came to me, and I dropped the fruit in surprise.
It had been when I’d been in Hell, with Raven and the beautiful woman known as Madame. Right before we’d walked into the red room to see Marbys and everything turned into chaos.
It was a hellway.
There was no way I’d be able to get out of telling Madame Karathos this. I’d have to tell her.
A hellway. Here. At school.
This day just got better and better.
I pushed aside my lunch and my textbook. When I looked at the clock, it was only three o’clock. I had hours before dinner, and my lesson with Madame. I couldn’t sit still, but I didn’t want to just go out and maybe have to see other people, and try to avoid questions I couldn’t answer, like, How are you, and what’s going on with you.
Raven. I needed to talk to Raven. I needed some guidance on how to manage multiple relationships. How to talk to them all.
I lay on my bed and focused on allowing myself to relax. I was pretty skilled at the dreamscape, but if you went into it all out of whack, your experience would reflect it. My parents had taught me how to use it from an early age, so I generally didn’t try to use it when I was upset, but today, it took me longer to relax.
The door I was used to seeing with her appeared, and I knocked on the door. “Raven?” I called.
No answer.
I waited, then knocked again. This time, the door opened, and I saw Raven.
“Olivia, I’m surprised to hear from you,” she said.
All my irritation that surrounded my interactions with Raven Nox welled up in me. I couldn’t help it. But I took a breath and forced myself to come down off my high horse. “I need to ask your help with something.”
Her eyebrows went up. “Really? Why?”
“I think you’re the only one who can help me,” I said.
She studied me and then smiled. “I’m not your enemy, no matter how pissed you are at me. Okay, what do you need help with?”
“This isn’t easy, so give me a minute,” I said. I needed to be honest with her about seeing her before. “I tried to contact you a couple of days ago.”
“I don’t remember that,” she said.
“Well, you were… well, you were preoccupied,” I said. I could feel the heat in my cheeks, as the image of Raven kissing the blond haired man rose in my mind once more. It wasn’t that I got off on watching other people having sex; nor was I shocked. I wasn’t a prude.
It was the naked intimacy I saw, and could feel, coming from every single person in that room with her. It was so strong, and so true—it felt wrong to be there, watching it. It was something private, meant just for the people in that room. It was love.
