Midnight Kiss

by Sarra Cannon

  “Please, Hazel …” She sighed. “Impress them somehow.”

  How was I supposed to do that? My magic didn’t hold a candle to theirs. There was nothing I could do that would impress them. Honestly, I didn’t know why they accepted my request.

  I counted to ten before answering. “I’ll try.” I waved my hand to the circle. The red and white lines turned to dust, and soon they were carried by the soft breeze.

  “If they ask you for a demonstration, what will you do?”

  I scanned the alley one more time, making sure I hadn’t forgotten anything, then turned on the heels of my high-tops and walked out the alley.

  “I don’t know, mayb—” I bumped into something and tripped backward, but recovered before my butt met the ground. My phone fell from my hand and my tongue tingled with too many curses. “What the f—?” I cut my words short and stared at the guy before me with wide eyes.

  Even peering out from under a hood, his eyes pulled me in. I had never been this close to him and it was breathtaking. His eyes were the brightest blue I had ever seen, and they went too well with his fair skin and his dark brown hair, which was shaved close on the sides and longer on the top, but he didn’t leave it up in spikes like Mohawks or fauxhawks. His puckered lips and sharp chin and jaw added to his beauty. As if his face wasn’t enough, he was tall and wide. Peeking from his sleeveless hoodie, his arms were inked and toned and, right now, gleaming with sweat. I didn’t know what to stare at first. The tattoos or the muscles or the sweat running over his skin.

  Frowning, Sean Flaherty bent down and picked up my phone from the ground. “Sorry,” he said, offering the phone to me.

  I forced myself to swallow. “Thanks.” I put the phone to my ear and flinched when I heard my mother yelling my name. “I’m here. I’m here. Sorry. I dropped the phone.”

  Sean stared at me the same way I had stared at him. Was he checking me out or was he just curious about my unusual visual? My fair skin and pale blue eyes were nothing new. But blond hair with several pink and blue streaks, a bar on my left eyebrow, a tiny crystal piercing on my nose (I had another, not so tiny, on my belly button, but he couldn’t see that one), eyeliner and mascara, but no other kind of makeup, a tattoo of three stars on the side of my neck (I had more, but he also couldn’t see those) were almost always something people stared at. Not to mention the style of clothes I liked. At the moment, I wore a thin, off-white, long-sleeved tee, black leggings, black and pink high-tops, and had my pink leather jacket hanging from my tote. Well, my style might be a novelty back at home, but I knew it wasn’t here in New Orleans. Maybe he was staring at me for another reason, then. People always told me I looked younger than I was. Did he see me as a fifteen-year-old girl instead of nineteen?

  His eyes met mine and I inhaled deeply. “Um, Mom. Can I call you tomorrow?”

  “Sure,” she said, sounding a little suspicious.

  “Bye.” I turned off the call before she could say anything else. I dropped my phone inside my tote. “Sorry about bumping into you.”

  Sean buried his hands in the pockets of his sweatpants. “It’s okay.” His voice was deep and gruff. I told my girly side to be quiet before I acted like a hormonal high school girl and giggled at him. “It was my fault too. I should have been paying attention to where I was going.”

  I tilted my head to the side. “You were running at this time of night?”

  “And you were in a dark alley talking on the phone with your mother,” he said, his tone tight. I almost flinched. He averted his eyes. “Sorry. It isn’t my business.”

  “Yeah, well, sorry I asked too.” As much as it pained me, I turned around and started walking to my dorm building.

  The breeze blew again, carrying one of the many fliers spread throughout campus announcing the big Halloween party this weekend. I stepped on the flier and I picked it up, thinking about throwing it away in the next trash can I saw.

  I took another three steps before he said, “Yes, I was running.”

  I stopped and glanced over my shoulder. Sean’s body was angled toward me. Now he wanted to talk? I turned back. “Do you always run at this time of night?”

  “Only when I can’t sleep.” He paused and touched a red macramé bracelet around his wrist. “Which is often.”

  “Oh.” I wanted to ask why. Why couldn’t he sleep? But I didn’t want to pry too much. I had two classes with him, and until now, I had never seen him speak to anyone. I didn’t want to risk pushing him away, but I wanted to keep talking to him, even though I wasn’t sure what to say.

  “How about you?” he asked, surprising me. He looked like the quiet, lonely type. Making small talk wasn’t his thing. “Do you always sneak into dark alleys and call your mother at this time of night?”

  I smiled. Turning my own question against me. Touché. “Sometimes.”

  His expression hardened, and the muscles in his neck and shoulders tensed. “You shouldn’t be out alone so late. It’s dangerous.”

  On instinct, I gave one step back. Was he warning me he was dangerous? Not that I was afraid. I really wasn’t. I had ways of defending myself. If I didn’t allow it, a normal human would never touch me. But he didn’t know that.

  “Right,” I said, playing along. “Well, I have class tomorrow morning. I should try getting some sleep.” I gave another step back.

  He nodded. “Good night.”

  “Good night,” I said before walking the short distance to my building’s front door.

  Once inside, I spied on him through one of the lobby windows. Sean remained in place, staring at my building door. Slowly, his gaze shifted up—to the dorm windows? He shook his head, turned around, and pushed into a run again.

  I watched until I couldn’t see him anymore. Sean was intriguing, to say the least.

  I peeked at the flier in my hand. It would be nice to go to the Halloween party. To go out, period. I spent most of my weekend nights hunting ghosts and putting them to rest. Halloween night was always worse.

  Fishing my phone from my tote, I climbed up the steps to my floor. There were several messages from Amber. As much as I wanted to answer her, I really should go to sleep. Just because I was a witch, didn’t mean I didn’t get tired, and knowing me, tomorrow I would feel like a zombie.

  ***

  The next morning, I looked like a zombie. If I cared about what others thought, I would have applied more makeup to hide the dark circles under my eyes. But since I didn’t care, I just played with the eyeliner and mascara as usual.

  The first thing that popped in my mind once I opened my eyes was the encounter with Sean. I didn’t know what to make of that. He was so … hot? Handsome? Manly? Mysterious? Intriguing? There was more to him than he wanted people to see, and that made me curious.

  The second thing on my mind was the audience. Holy shit, I had an audience with the white witches today. My stomach rolled and nervousness made its way into my system. Now I would spend the day anxious and overthinking it.

  The bathroom door slipped from my hand and closed with a bang. I held my breath, but my roommate only snored in her bed. Kimberly was a party girl and hadn’t signed up for any class before noon. Since it was my first semester in college, I made the mistake of picking 8 a.m. classes. Never again.

  As quiet as I could so I wouldn’t wake her up, I got dressed in a thin black sweater, skinny jeans, and black high-tops, and exited the room. I stopped by a coffee shop, bought a white mocha latte and a blueberry muffin, and ate on the way to my literature class. It was a second-year class, but since I had taken some other English classes during the summer, I qualified for it.

  I was seated in my usual spot right in the middle of class when Sean walked in. He wore an open dark gray hoodie over a black T-shirt, and jeans. As usual, he had the hood pulled over his head. His eyes met mine and I held my breath. I raised my hand to wave at him, but he averted his eyes and marched to his seat at the back of the class.

  I spied on him over my shoulder. He
was looking down, at the cover of his closed book on his desk. Disappointment bloomed in my chest. Wasn’t he curious about me like I was curious about him? I was so plain, so boring that he wouldn’t even look at me now?

  “Careful,” a girl said. I turned to the side. She was seated at the desk next to mine. I knew her name was Julia and nothing else. “He’s a handful.”

  I frowned. “Excuse me?”

  “Sean.” She nodded her chin to his direction. “You were just staring at him, weren’t you?”

  I opened my mouth but nothing came out. “Hmm.”

  She continued before I could form a coherent sentence. “He’s a mess after what happened.”

  “What happened?”

  Her eyes bugged. “You haven’t heard?”

  “Heard what?”

  She leaned over her desk. “Last year, he was a sophomore and one of the most popular guys on campus,” she said in a low voice. Wait. I thought Sean was a sophomore this year. “His younger sister and his best friend died on Halloween night. He was with them and I heard he couldn’t explain what happened. He got arrested since nobody knew how both of them died. They thought it could have been him, but he was found not guilty. He didn’t come back to school and failed that semester, then he skipped spring and summer. He came back this semester, but he isn’t the same. He’s quiet and alone. He lost all of his friends and he doesn’t seem like he wants new ones.” She glanced at him. “If you ask me, I would say his head is pretty messed up.”

  The professor walked in, and the girl straightened in her seat and turned her attention to the front. Not two minutes later, the professor began his lecture. My attention, however, was on the guy sitting in the back.

  Chapter 2

  My other classes, history and biology, were a blur. My nervousness only grew as the day went by. My mind came up with several scenarios, none of which ended well. In one of them, the witches asked me to perform my most powerful spell, and I ended up setting the place on fire. In another, they were cruel and rough. They decided I was a shame to the entire witch race and that I could serve as a sacrifice. Which was ridiculous since they were white witches, not dark ones. As far as I knew, white witches were kind and fair, and they didn’t perform any sacrifices.

  I stopped by my dorm, looked at myself in the mirror, and wondered if I should change clothes, maybe put on something more formal. What the hell? I wouldn’t change to please them. The important thing—my magic—was already weak. My appearance wouldn’t matter. I was just going because I had to try for my mother.

  I knelt beside my bed and waved my hand under it. A wooden box with ancient runes carved on the lid appeared, and I pulled it out. I opened it and ran my fingertips on my grimoire. It was thick with theory. If only I could do everything written in it. Or even half. Or one quarter. I would be more powerful than Amber and my mother. I shook my head. What was I thinking? Hadn’t I decided I wasn’t cut out for this witch thing? This meeting was my last attempt, and after that, I was done. Even hunting ghosts and putting an end to their suffering. I would be done. I would be a normal girl going through college and soon looking for a job.

  Sighing, I pulled the parchment from under my grimoire, folded it until it was small enough to fit in the back pocket of my jeans, then closed the box, pushed it under the bed, and cast the cloaking spell again—I didn’t want my roommate to accidentally find my witchy stuff.

  The instructions on the parchment took me to an antique store in the French Quarter. I glanced at the parchment, then back at the three-story building, crammed between a coffee shop and an apothecary. Intricate framework adorned the gallery on the second and third floor, and crystal chandeliers could be seen from big floor-to-ceiling windows. This couldn’t be it, could it?

  Certain I was in the wrong place, I entered the store. It was just like any other antique store. Too dark, too crammed with all kinds of crap, and hard to walk through. I weaved my way to the end of the store, where a blond woman was writing something in a notebook on a desk.

  “Hi, hmm, I’m think I’m lost, bu—”

  She lifted her eyes to me and a small smile took over her lips. “Hazel Rose Levine,” she said, her voice flat.

  “Wait.” I frowned. “Am in the right place?”

  “The council is waiting for you.” She beckoned me to a closed door behind her. She opened it. “Come.”

  Gulping my nervousness, I forced one foot after the other and walked through the door. I turned to wait for the woman to come with me, show me where I was supposed to go, but she just smiled at me again and closed the door in my face. Darkness surrounded me.

  I rested a hand on the cold wood. “Hey,” I called. “What am I supposed to do now?”

  She didn’t answer. I twisted the knob, but it was locked. Damn it. Getting a grip on the fear wanting to crawl up my spine, I leaned my back against the door and took a deep breath. Okay. I could do this; whatever this was.

  I extended my right hand in front of me. “Incendo.”

  A small white fire appeared in my palm, shining bright but not enough to show me the end of the long, narrow hallway I was in. So far, I couldn’t see any doors, just metal sconces every few feet, holding torches ready to be lit.

  Like I had done before, I forced myself to move forward. I tried controlling my nerves, but after walking for a few minutes and having reached no end, desperation clawed at my chest.

  Trying something new, I duplicated the fire in my hand and threw it ahead. It illuminated the walls as it rushed through the hallway, until it was too far away, and even I couldn’t see its light anymore. Where the hell was I?

  Then it hit me. This was a test.

  I took in several deep breathes, trying to calm down. I was good at tests—when they didn’t require a powerful witch. However, my mind was clear, and I was good with strategies. I knew all the theory. Now I just needed to figure out what the white witches wanted me to do.

  I looked around. Long hallway, walls, and the torches.

  Hmm. I sent the fire in my palm to the torch right in front of me. One by one, all the other torches lit up, creating a white haze in such long hallway. It went on and on, until I couldn’t see it anymore. The fire on the torches grew, shining brightly. The walls became white. The ceiling and the floor became white. Too white. Too bright. I lifted my hand to my eyes, protecting them from the light.

  A second later, the lights were gone. I dropped my arm and opened my eyes. I was back at the first door, and now the hallway was just a few feet long, with only two sconces decorating the plain walls, and a second door at the end.

  Suspicious, I reached for it and slowly turned the knob. It opened easily and I stepped through.

  I gasped.

  Smooth stone under my feet, green grass around it, darkening skies over my head, and a huge white castle right in front of me. I turned around but the door was gone. Instead, I was at the edge of a forest. What the …?

  Six men stood before the closed gates of the castle, with brown leather armor and white cloaks, and swords hanging from their waists. One of them stepped forward and I instantly stepped back.

  “Hazel Rose Levine,” he said. “The council is waiting for you.”

  The gates rose and the guards formed a living corridor, waiting for me to pass. Wishing I had brought the crystals in my purse in case I needed to use magic to defend myself, I walked down the stone path, crossing the gates into a beautiful front garden. A dozen steps led to double doors that looked too big, too heavy to be opened without magic.

  I put my foot on the first step and the doors opened. Wearing a simple but beautiful blue gown, Lenora appeared from behind it. “Hazel Rose Levine, welcome.”

  “Hi.” I climbed the rest of the steps. “Hmm, you don’t need to keep calling me by my full name. Just Hazel is fine.”

  Her expression didn’t change. “Just Hazel. This way, please.”

  She led me through an imposing foyer, around a colorful winter garden, in front of stairs that
seemed out of a movie, through a long corridor with floating white flames for light. Guards were strategically placed at archways and in front of doors—all of them impassive and with their hands close to the hilts of their swords.

  This place was impossible. It couldn’t be located in New Orleans. There was no way I wouldn’t have known of its existence if it were.

  Finally, the corridor ended on another set of large double doors. Lenora waved her hand and the doors opened. Following her, I entered a big room with ten white chairs like thrones, forming a circle. She positioned me at the center, and I couldn’t help but squint at several markings on the stone floor.

  “Arianna’s marks,” I whispered.

  “That’s right,” a new voice said. I raised my head and was taken aback. Half of the chairs were now occupied. A woman with long raven hair and wearing a light yellow gown smiled. “What do you know about Arianna?”

  “I-I know that she was the most powerful white witch that ever lived, and that around five hundred years ago, she founded the White Sisterhood.”

  “You’re right,” the woman said. “How did she die?”

  Was this another test? To know the history of the white witches? If it was, it was a boring test. “Her village was surrounded by the Brotherhood. Prince Thales arranged for some of his men to take Arianna out of town, but unfortunately, the soldier, Hugo, betrayed the prince and brought Arianna directly into a trap. Prince Thales arrived as Arianna was dying. He killed the men who captured her, but it was too late. She died in his arms, becoming ashes right after. Some rumors tell that Prince Thales gathered Arianna’s ashes, and he spent the rest of his life trying to bring her back to life, but he failed.”

  “Those aren’t rumors.” The woman entwined her long fingers and rested her hands on her lap. “It’s all true. Prince Thales spent the rest of his short life trying to bring Arianna back to life. He also went after her necklace and grimoire, both of which were never found again. Not even seven years after Arianna’s death, Prince Thales perished during one of his quests. We know the sisters Brita and Anna, Arianna’s friends, buried him in a hidden, unmarked grave with Arianna’s ashes right before they were burned at the stake themselves.”