“Come on,” Erik continued, coming up beside Adira and placing his hand on her shoulder. There was something almost intimate about his touch, something that unnerved Adira, but she shook it off. He was just trying to help. “Come on, Adira. Fuel it!”
She bit her lip and focused her own inner energy toward the object. The top spun faster. The bubble spread out wider, encompassing almost the entire room.
Everything went silent, and Adira slowly lifted her gaze to see everyone had stopped what they were doing to watch her.
“What’s going on?” she whispered to Erik.
“You are,” he whispered back.
“I don’t understand.”
“I don’t think anyone does,” he said quietly. “Because no one has ever gotten the bubble past the table before.”
Someone from the back of the crowd yelled, “Do more!”
Miss Balek was watching now, a smile glowing on her face.
The kids and adults in the room alike started chanting. “Do more! Do more! Do more!”
“Go on,” Erik said. “See if you can manipulate another object. That boomerang over there doesn’t have a negative charge, so you can send it out.” He pointed across the room. “There. Hit that target.”
“I can’t do that,” she said, shaking her head. The bubble shrunk in a little just at the thought of it.
“Yes,” the witch boy said. “You can.”
The bubble ebbed and flowed, but overall, it kept a steady distance. Adira blew out a slow breath and reached her other hand out toward the boomerang.
“Létat,” she commanded. Fly.
It was the first word that came to mind, because that was how she felt. She felt as if she were flying. And it worked. The boomerang lifted from the table and began to spin. As it twisted faster, the edges caught fire. Adira gasped, then smiled at Erik.
“The target,” he whispered. “You can do this.”
Adira threw her arm to the side, sending the boomerang careening toward the target. When it crashed against the bullseye, the room erupted in cheers. Slowly, she released the spinning top, but before she could take a breather, Anastazie crashed into her with a hug.
“That was the most amazing thing I’ve ever, ever seen,” she said, squeezing Adira’s waist. “You’re incredible!”
Adira rested her hand against the girls back to give her a half hug back. “Thank you,” she said. Then, so low no one else would be able to hear, she added, “But I’m afraid of what it all means.”
Adira did sleep that night—a nightmarish haze that occurred between sundown and sunup. When she woke, the spinning top was on her nightstand along with a note written in what she had come to recognize as Miss Balek’s handwriting.
I think you are onto something.
She tucked the top into her pants. On to what, though? Did Miss Balek think she could put an enchantment on herself to block the witch-testing device? She only had nine days left to figure all this out. So she was the strongest witch here. That didn’t mean she should be the regent’s queen.
Did it?
What if Alec was right? What if she owed this much to her sector? To at least try to save them?
None of it mattered. Her fate had been decided for her. Whether she wanted to or not, she would face a ravager, and if she won, she would be the next doomed queen.
One battle at a time.
For now, she needed to focus on her abilities. Those witches downstairs had been training since their youth, and Adira hadn’t received any real guidance until recently. She’d proven she wasn’t too old to learn, but she was still definitely at a disadvantage, even if she had great natural ability.
Fact was, being stronger than a room full of child witches didn’t mean much in the scheme of things. She needed to be stronger than a ravager and at least as strong as the regent. That was a whole different playing field.
After pulling a brush through her tangles, she hurried downstairs to the training room. Bursting through the doors, she expected to find it as full and bustling as the day before. She could really use that energy right about now.
Instead, when she entered, only Miss Balek stood there.
“Where is everyone?” Adira asked.
“I gave them the day off,” she said. “You need to focus, and you can’t focus with all that hullaboo over a few parlor tricks.”
Ouch.
Miss Balek waved her off. “Don’t pity yourself now. There’s too much work to do and too much at stake. You are strong, yes, but you are yet to use your magic under opposition, and that is what you need to work on. So I’ve brought in an adequate sparring partner for you.”
Adira looked around, but she didn’t see anyone else in the room. “Who?”
“Me,” came a deep, intimidating voice from behind her. She recognized it immediately.
Alec.
She spun around, trying to suppress the smile that wanted so badly to spring to her face. Instead of his usual attire of just pants, he wore only shorts today, showing off not only his sculpted arms and stomach, but also some pretty serious calf muscles as well. It was as if the man were made of stone.
“Oh, it’s just you,” she said to hide the pitter-patter in her stomach. “I thought it would be someone good.”
“Please excuse us, Miss Balek,” Alec said, unwavering to Adira’s tease.
Miss Balek gave a small dip of her head and a polite smile, then took leave from the room.
Alec advanced on Adira. When he reached her, he grabbed her wrists and pinned them behind her at the bottom of her spine, then backed her up against a wall.
“So now I’m no good?” he asked huskily.
Adira’s heart throttled, and heat shot through her body, lighting her up with sudden arousal unlike anything she’d ever felt before. “I was just teasing,” she whispered.
He kissed her until she moaned against his lips, then pulled away.
“Rule number one. I do the teasing,” he said, releasing her and heading toward one of the chalk circles. “Rule number two. Never insult your sparring partner.”
With that, he lifted a wooden sword from the ground for himself, then grabbed another and tossed it to Adira.
She caught the sword with her bad hand, passed it to her right hand, and twirled it around. “What’s this for?”
“Stop being coy and get over here,” Alec ordered.
Adira crossed the room to the circle. Alec took a fighting stance, but Adira stood straight, watching him. He was bigger and stronger. An impossible match for her without magic. She couldn’t let him intimidate her, though. With nine days left, she needed to remember all she’d learned, and then build on it.
That meant intellect over emotion.
She waited for his advance, then deflected his blow, spun away, and sliced the wooden sword through the air to connect with his leg.
His eyes lit up, and he lunged for her again. As he swept his sword toward her, she jumped, whispering a quick, “levitovat” to levitate high enough to evade the blow.
“I guess I don’t have to go easy on you after all,” he said.
“Good.” She tumbled toward him and came up right in front of him with a thrust of her wooden sword against his arm. “Maybe it’s me who has to go easy on you?”
Alec dropped his sword, snatched her wrist, and spun her around. After he gave her ass a hard spank, he shoved her to the other side of circle. “Don’t let down your guard,” he scolded. “It makes you vulnerable.”
Her cheeks were on fire, and she wasn’t sure if it was from embarrassment or arousal, but she didn’t let that stop her. “How do we know who wins?”
“I do,” he said evenly. “I always do.”
“Very funny,” she said. She raised her hand and shot it toward Alec’s sword. “Popel!” Ash. Same end result of fire, but without the heat. The wooden sword disintegrated in Alec’s hand.
“I was hoping you would do that,” he said. He reached behind him and unsheathed his sword. “Now what?�
�
Adira glowered at him. “That’s cheating. You can’t use a sword blessed by the regent.”
He lunged toward her, and she jumped out of the way, but not before he nicked her leg. “There is no cheating in war, Adira. There is live, and there is die.”
“This is a sparring match, asshole.”
He swung at her again. This time, she dodged the blow. “This is a sparring match to prepare you for the real thing,” he said. “Now fight back.”
“Fine,” she said. She had to levitate away from another blow before she was able to devise a plan, but at least she was getting better at her defense. “Ocel!”
Steel.
She blocked the next blow of his sword with her wooden one, wincing with uncertainty. But it worked. Not even a scratch on the wood sparring sword. Alec’s eyes went wide.
“I see you aren’t afraid to take risks, at least.”
“You already knew that,” she said, diving toward him. She spun low, her sword thwacking against his shin. “How will you explain your wounds to the regent?”
He swept her legs from under her with his foot, sending her crashing to the ground with a painful thud, then pressed the tip of his sword to her throat. “You know what your problem is?” he asked. “You waste your words on banter instead of magic. If this were a real battle, you would be dead.”
“Would I?” she asked, raising her eyebrow.
He pressed his sword against her throat a little harder, as if to make a point.
“Dokonalá láska a dokonalá důvěra,” she said. Perfect love and perfect trust. “You can’t kill me. Not with that sword.”
Again, he pressed harder, enough that he should have broken skin. But nothing happened.
Alec dropped his sword. “What did you do?”
“I changed the enchantment on your sword.”
“What?” He shook his head. “Change it back, Adira. You can’t alter the regent’s magic! Don’t you think he’ll notice something like that? How am I supposed to keep you hidden for the next nine days while running around with a weapon you’ve altered?”
Adira lifted her wood sword and placed it on the table. “He won’t know.”
Right?
“What did you do to it?”
She spun toward him. “I stopped you from killing me with that sword. That’s what. It’ll still work on everyone else, so if you want to go beheading people today, go for it.”
Alec grabbed her and stared down into her eyes. “I don’t kill people, Adira. I kill ravagers.”
“You practically feed people to the ravagers you kill,” she said. “It might as well be you that takes their final breath.”
“Do you honestly feel that way?” he asked, not releasing her. “Tell me you really feel that way.”
She bit her tongue. No, she didn’t exactly feel that way. In fact, it wasn’t even him she was angry with. It was herself.
She was angry with herself because he was right. She was being selfish. She should just turn herself in and face her destiny, whatever it might be. She shouldn’t need him to drag her down there to do it. She should do it because, if she didn’t, other witches were going to die. Witches like the ones she’d gotten to know since arriving at Miss Balek’s home.
Adira didn’t want to think anymore, so she pressed up on her toes and kissed Alec with all the anger she had bottled up inside, getting lost in him and the way his mouth matched her fury.
Today, she would enjoy him for who he was, because nine days from now, he would be the man to march her to her funeral.
Chapter 12
Alec had been hard on Adira. Perhaps too hard. But in the end, his body was more bruised and wounded than hers. Although her instinctive reactions still relied heavily on physical ability over magic, she was fast and strong, so when she did come through with magic, it made her a fair match, even for him.
And yet, looking at her, he felt defeated in an entirely different way.
She sat on the ground, her head tipped back against the wall. As she tried to catch her breath, her chest heaved, drawing his attention to her breasts. Sweat had soaked her clothing, turning her shirt sheer and revealing the outline of her nipples.
Alec crouched in front of her. “Had enough?”
She laughed, but winced as she did so. “Don’t make this about me,” she said. “You’re the one losing.”
Wetting his lips with his tongue, he reached out and flicked his thumb over one of her nipples. “Do you always fight so…freely?”
She smacked his hand away, though her face flushed even more. “You try fighting with a bra on. Then we’ll talk.”
“I wasn’t complaining. I merely wonder if you only won because of how…distracting you are.”
“Hmmm,” she purred, sitting forward. Her hand slipped to the inside of his thigh, and his throat closed up. “I’m not the only one who likes to be free when I fight.”
Alec stared into her eyes, a fire starting in his pit, waiting to see what she would do. But she just sat back again and closed her eyes.
“I won because I’m better than you,” she said. She peeked one eye open, then closed it again, smiling.
She was teasing him.
“You won because I let you,” he said. Which was true. She was a fair match, but she couldn’t beat him. Maybe one day, but not yet. “Maybe next time, I won’t be so easy on you.”
“I’m counting on it.” She took a deep breath before opening her eyes and standing. “It’s late. You should probably go.”
He rose to meet her. “I should, but we need to clean up those wounds first. That cut on your thigh went pretty deep.”
She rolled her eyes. “I’ll remind you that you’re the one who did that to me.”
After she pushed past him, she started toward the exit, but the way she was limping, he knew she needed helped.
He came up behind her and swept her up into his arms. “You’re too proud for your own good,” he said. “Come on. I’ll take you upstairs.”
He didn’t wait for her to respond. Just carried her up the stairs and set her down on the bed. While she changed into a fresh set of clothes, he went downstairs to the kitchen to get her a plate of a food.
Miss Balek handed a plate for him as well. “She okay?”
“She will be, ma’am,” he said, although he wasn’t sure how true that was. Would she heal from today’s wounds? Yes. But what about the life ahead of her? “Thank you for your hospitality.”
He rushed off before Miss Balek’s cloudy eyes could see through him. When he reached Adira’s room, she was already changed into her nightdress, lying on the bed with her wounded leg elevated on a pillow.
“Do you need anything?” he asked.
“My life back,” she muttered. “Or at least some of my things from home. It’s bad enough I’m sleeping on borrowed time. I don’t want to sleep in borrowed clothes, too.”
“I’ll get your things,” Alec said without thought.
Adira’s eyes popped open, and she looked at him as though seeing him for the first time. “Really?”
He swallowed, a weird feeling forming in his stomach as he looked at her. “Just tell me where to go and what to bring back.”
Leaning over, she reached inside the nightstand drawer. After pulling out a pad of paper and a pen, she scribbled something before handing it to him. “It’s a map.”
He looked at it from a few directions. “Is it?”
Adira rolled her eyes. “The star is my place. The skull is the regent’s castle.”
Alec dropped the hand holding the map to his side. “Really, Adira?”
She smirked. “There’s a list on the bottom. It’s not much, but I think you owe me every last thing.”
Damn, the girl still had some fight left in her, even after all their sparring.
“Consider it done,” he promised.
Alec pulled the bedside chair toward the end of the bed, closer to her thigh, and retrieved a small pouch from his hip. Inside were
three vials. He’d intended to use them, but her wounds were worse.
“I shouldn’t have pushed you so hard,” he mumbled.
She frowned. “You should have pushed me harder.”
Alec shook his head and opened the first vial. “Lavender and tea tree,” he said. “Blessed by the regent.”
“No, thank you,” she said. “I’ll heal myself.”
She mumbled something, waving her hand toward her wound, but nothing happened. Again, she tried, this time growling under her breath afterward.
“Have you ever been able to heal yourself before?” Alec asked.
Adira glowered at him. “From a sword wound? I’ve never had to.”
Well, she wouldn’t like what he was about to say next. “I don’t think it’s going to work. Even before the world divided, not all the Othala witches were able to use healing magic. That’s why there had been so much disease. The best we have now is a witch’s ability to enhance the natural properties of nature in medicine.”
“I’ve healed from other wounds before.”
Alec shook his head. “This is different. It’s too deep.”
“Then I’ll take my chances letting nature heal it on its own,” she said.
“And yet you bought cloves from the regent’s dispensary?”
Adira sat up a little, a scowl marring her features. “I will never take more from that man than I absolutely need.”
Alec pushed her back into a lying position. “Well, you absolutely need this,” he said. “You can hate the regent later. For right now, we need to disinfect the area.”
He smeared a few drops of the oil over the gash in her thigh, then took out a second vial of neroli and sage. It would help the wound heal and prevent any scarring. He lifted a third vial.
“I’m leaving the helichrysum and rosehip seed with you. Use it. I’m not playing games, Adira. Your pride about this will not be cute. The potion will speed healing, and you need to be at your best in time for the display.”
No sooner had he spoke the words than he regretted them, but there was no sense pretending that wasn’t where all this was headed. She deserved him to be forthright and honest with her.
Origin: an Adult Paranormal Witch Romance: Othala Witch Collection (Sector 1) Page 9