Mistake of Magic

by Alex Lidell

  I’m swinging my fist at Malikai’s face before I can think through the wisdom of it. The wisdom of attacking a fae quint leader in the middle of a hall filled with other immortals.

  “Leralynn! No!” River bellows, lunging for me as the world slows to a mocking crawl.

  Malikai marks my coming fist and, instead of blocking it, opens his face to the blow—all but aiming his eye to connect with my knuckles. His grin widens.

  Coal, who is closest, shoves me so hard that I tumble over my own feet and slide across the polished floor. Standing where I was a moment ago, Coal now leans down to bring his face so close to Malikai’s that the latter has the good sense to blanche. “I imagine you will discover the pleasures of Mors soon enough, Third Trial.” His voice is sharpened steel. “I wouldn’t wish to ruin the surprise.”

  My heart pounds in the silent hall. I climb to my knees and feet, breathing hard, while Coal steps away from Malikai, whose chest seems to expand in relief. Before I can take a step, however, an arm that belongs to none of my males grips my hips.

  “I believe a third trial ordered you to clean his breeches,” an unfamiliar voice says, shoving me forward into Malikai’s lap. My face slams into the wine-soaked fabric around his crotch.

  “Oh, you are back.” Malikai’s hand clamps onto the back of my head, keeping me in place despite my struggle to rise. “See anything you like? Please have a feel if—”

  The crash of an overturned table is the first sign that the world beyond Malikai’s crotch still exists. Malikai’s scream of pain is the second. I’m pulled away by River’s familiar hands just in time to see Coal’s fist strike Malikai’s jaw a second time. The blow lands hard enough to elicit an audible crack of bone.

  Malikai drops to all fours, one hand trying to stanch the flow of blood from his mouth.

  Grabbing Malikai’s now-empty chair, Coal breaks the wood easily over his knee, thrusting the two jagged legs against Malikai’s throat like daggers. Coal’s eyes are dark, the blue in them a deep, feral sapphire that is hungry for violence.

  “Stand . . . down . . . First Trial,” Malikai says, straining to speak through his broken jaw, the words pushed out desperately as blood pours from his mouth onto his tunic. “I order—”

  Coal twists, sinking the back of his heel into Malikai’s abdomen.

  As if set loose by an open floodgate, the rest of Malikai’s quint, including the male who shoved me into Malikai’s lap, rush forward.

  The chair legs in Coal’s hands move so quickly, they’re a blur of wood that sends the first of the attackers to the floor, a bloody gash crossing his chest from left hip to right shoulder. His gasp of pain cuts through the room.

  River’s hold on me tightens, my heart racing.

  The second male stumbles over his fallen companion. Grabbing the back of the second’s head, Coal spins the male in a wide arc, using the circular force’s momentum.

  The third male’s eyes widen, his attempt to sidestep coming too late. Ice crackles in Coal’s blue eyes as he slams the forehead of the spinning male into the new one’s nose. Both males crash into a nearby table, sending bits of meat and porcelain into the air.

  River’s arms cover my head, shielding me from the debris.

  The fourth male, the only one of Malikai’s quint left standing, holds up his hands.

  Coal tosses a chair leg from his left hand to his right and advances on the trembling male, blue eyes flashing with murder. Coal’s arm cocks and—

  The air thickens to the consistency of sour cream, just like it did when River surrendered in the arena.

  My heart stutters. I can’t move. Can barely breathe. Before me, Coal is stuck mid-motion, his eyes blazing. The other combatants, too, are held in their own odd and frozen poses.

  “I see we have a small problem here,” Elder Elidyr says with a sigh, his thick brown braid swaying as he looks around the once-pristine dining hall. Splatters of blood, food, plates, and trainees litter the floor. “May I trust all parties involved to act like civilized children once I release the hold?”

  No one moves or speaks. None of us can.

  Elidyr snaps his fingers.

  The air loosens, River releasing me immediately to grab Coal, while a few others form a line between us and Malikai’s quint. Not that anyone seems inclined to fight anymore. Or speak. The dining hall now holds its collective breath while the council elder shakes his head.

  “Malikai,” Elidyr says, waiting until the male has risen painfully to his feet. “I walked in to what appeared to be a single first trial pummeling your whole third-trial quint into a spineless pancake. Would you agree with that assessment?”

  Malikai bows.

  River’s jaw tightens, a muscle ticking on the side of his face.

  “Report to the infirmary, Malikai, and then wait in my office.” Elidyr turns to River, the elder’s eyes kind as he spreads his palms. “I’m sorry, River. I imagine you are aware of what happens next?”

  “Yes, sir.” River’s answer sends a shiver down my spine. “Would next bell be acceptable?”

  Elidyr nods, turning toward the door.

  “Malikai.” Coal’s soft voice carries the promise of murder, stopping the injured male in his tracks. “It’s fortunate that the trials need not be taken in order. I look forward to . . . facing you in the arena.”

  All the color drains out of Malikai’s face.

  19

  Tye

  “I’m fine, Shade,” Tye said, trying and failing to pull his shoulder from the male’s grasp. The bite was deeper than Tye had expected and the flesh was still weeping. “You already saw to it this morning.”

  “Take off your shirt or I’ll tear it off.” Shade pushed Tye down onto the couch’s armrest. “It’s a bite. You don’t know where the wolf’s mouth has been.”

  “You know where it’s been,” Tye said, throwing up his hands. “It was your bloody mouth.”

  Shade flashed his canines. “Which lends weight to my insistence that we keep a close eye on the wound.”

  Tye pulled his shirt off. “I hope you were more charming when you talked Lera out of her clothes.”

  Shade flinched, but it was much too late for that. Despite the whole morning apart, Leralynn’s lilac scent drifted from the shifter in waves. For once, however, Tye little minded. He’d had enough females over the years and would have the lass when she wanted him for more than curiosity or instinct—if she ever did.

  Females, in Tye’s experience, saw through him all too easily. He was the kind of male they tumbled with for fun, not the kind they wished to share a life with. The lowest in the quint’s hierarchy, Tye had nothing. No rank, no title, no property that he’d not stolen. He was a short-lived amusement in females’ lives—the one Lera had gone to for instruction, not emotion. For the first time in his life, Tye little wanted to be that male. He wanted a bond. Love. Tye wanted to mate.

  The very high probability of this never happening . . . That Tye did mind. Very much.

  He also very much minded the jar of green medical goo Shade was reaching for. The stuff stung like a lash. “Touch me with that and I’ll roll in Lera’s underclothes and stay outside your door all night. See how well you sleep with that bonny bouquet filling your nose.”

  “I imagine I’ll have to get used to it sooner rather than later. Though it was almost worth it just to see River’s face when we left for lunch.” Shade cracked open the jar and lathered the hell-in-liquid-form over the punctures, sending a healing pulse along with the salve. For such a deadly predator, he truly did hate watching others in pain. Most of the time. “I don’t recall seeing him quite so afraid before.”

  “I counted all limbs present when we passed them,” Tye said through clenched teeth. “But with some luck, we’ll still catch some sparks between them this evening.”

  Shade tried for a smile and failed miserably. “What the bloody hell am I going to do?”

  “What the bloody hell did you do?” asked a familiar feminine voice f
rom the doorway as River’s sister, Autumn, let herself into the suite. Dressed in sapphire silk trousers and a top that stopped at her ribcage, the female shimmered with an energy as brilliant as the emerald-and-diamond stud piercing her navel. Her hair, braided along her scalp in many silver-blond strands, sparkled with golden thread. Her sharp gray gaze narrowed on Tye’s shoulder. “If those are teeth marks, I do hope it was Lera who left them.”

  Tye felt a grin taking over his face. “When Lera bites me, she won’t be aiming for my shoulder, Sparkle,” he said, rising to spin the petite female in the air.

  A second female voice—this one still outside—dissolved into a coughing fit.

  “You can bite me too, Kora, if you’d like,” Tye called as he set Autumn back on the floor. “It seems to be the day for it.”

  “I wouldn’t be biting your shoulder either,” Kora called back in a way that made Tye close his legs. Walking inside, the female set down the pile of books that accompanied Autumn everywhere she went and backed away. Her gaze—which, in a just and righteous world, would be brushing Tye’s shirtless torso—was instead working very hard to avoid Autumn’s curves. “She came out of the Gloom inside the Citadel somehow,” Kora said. “And asked for you when my patrol challenged her.”

  “Actually, I asked whether any quints were severed recently,” Autumn said, dropping her cloak, bag, gloves, and a half-eaten sweet roll on various previously empty surfaces—bringing chaos to a tidy room with preternatural efficiency. “And once I was satisfied that you lot somehow scraped together enough wit to not let that girl from your sight, then I asked after you. Granted, I hadn’t expected to find you back in trainee garb. Good stars. What the bloody hell happened?”

  “Excuse me,” Kora said with a polite bow, letting herself out.

  “Well?” Autumn invited herself onto the couch, pulling her legs under her as she fixed her sharp eyes on Tye. “If you don’t tell me exactly what’s going on, kitty cat,” she said sweetly, “I’m going to tell Lera that the marks still on your shoulder are a symptom of fae pox.”

  Tye grabbed his shirt, pulling it on quickly. “I sent you a message yesterday,” he said through the fabric. He sat down opposite her on the low table. “Which I imagine will be arriving at the Slait palace imminently. But the short answer to your question is that everything that could possibly go wrong either already has or is simply waiting its turn.”

  “You’ve been at the Citadel for two and a half days,” Autumn said. “How much trouble could you possibly have gotten yourselves into in two and a half bloody days?”

  Tye held up a hand, ticking things off on his fingers as he spoke. “Klarissa made us into rune-bearing trainees on the ridiculous grounds that Lera’s mortality makes us a brand-new quint. Shade mated with Lera and can think with nothing but his cock unless the female is out of the room. Lilac Girl developed magic with an earth-based affinity, which she can only access when it’s convenient, to piss off River—”

  “Lera hasn’t developed magic,” Autumn said calmly. “She is human. That’s what I was catching up to tell you. That while Lera has no magic, it doesn’t mean she can’t use or at least bear magic. You may be able to connect the full quint.”

  Tye glanced at Shade. “You are right on the connection. We, well she . . . When we faced a school of piranhas . . . It’s a long story. Why are you staring at my neck?”

  Autumn wasn’t just staring. She had risen up on her knees for such a careful examination that Tye was starting to feel like a potential dinner option. Extending her hand, Autumn traced one of the runes tattooed over his jugular. “I’ve seen that mark before,” she said, pulling out one of the leather-bound volumes Kora had carried in. The same book she’d been studying when they were last at the Slait palace, if Tye recalled correctly. At her shooing motion, Tye obediently surrendered his space on the low table, stepping away while Autumn flipped through the earmarked pages. “Yes. Here. Except this is only a theoretical symbol. A story illustration.” She slipped off the couch, heading right out for the door. “Tell the others I’m here and that I’ll see them shortly. I need the library.”

  “Of course you do,” Tye muttered at Autumn’s receding back. “Who wouldn’t want a library?”

  The female threw a vulgar gesture over her shoulder before stepping out the door.

  “Thank the stars she is here,” Tye told Shade, sinking into the couch once the door closed behind Autumn’s lithe form. There were few things in Lunos Tye could count on absolutely, but the fact that River’s sister would take care of the heavy thinking topped the short list. More to the point, after witnessing the small female teaching Coal to read, Tye felt confident in saying there was nothing Autumn couldn’t do.

  Except decently cheat at cards. But no one was that perfect.

  20

  Lera

  “What happens next?” I demand, following the silent males back toward our suite. My pulse pounds, the sound of my own rushing blood filling my ears. “What happens at the next bell?”

  “Procedural matters,” Coal says. “Nothing of consequence.”

  I step in front of Coal, blocking the male’s path. Coal’s eyes, now a flat, hard blue, slide around me to rest somewhere down the hall. I cross my arms. “Horseshit. It’s something of enough consequence that Malikai expected it to provide him immunity.”

  “No, he didn’t.” River’s voice is low, his jaw a hard line as he steers me around Coal. “He was simply willing to take a blow in order to trigger one of the penalties. Coal humiliated him when we arrived. Now Malikai will get to watch him be shackled to a whipping post. It was a planned provocation.”

  My mouth dries, a gut-churning dread filling my lungs. Phantom shackles clamp over my raw wrists, pain from another place, another world, washing over me. I gasp, shaking myself back to now.

  “Whatever silliness you are imagining is incorrect,” Coal says, lengthening his strides. “I’m an immortal—we heal faster than humans. I won’t remember the lashes by tomorrow morning.”

  I grip River’s thick wrist, holding him back. Shadows of screams only I can hear echo in my ears. “Coal is lying,” I say as quickly and quietly as I can. “You need to stop this. Have the council do something else. Anything else. Please.”

  River sighs, gently tucking a strand of hair behind my ear. “I can’t stop it, Leralynn. I can refuse to administer the penalty, but the council will simply find someone else to do it. But Coal is right—a couple dozen cuts, with Shade’s magic helping, will heal quickly. This is more about the ceremony of it, the reminder of who is in charge. And who is not. A very sharp reminder.”

  I release his wrist, my gaze on Coal’s back as the dread in my chest grows to a cold, gaping hole. River is wrong about what it will do to Coal. I know it. Except I can’t explain why. Can’t understand it myself.

  “You shouldn’t come to watch,” River says gently. “I don’t imagine Coal would appreciate more of an audience than will gather already. That’s the true damage Malikai was going for—though if I know Coal, the show will be quite anticlimactic.”

  Right. Of course. Making a noncommittal noise, I start walking back to the suite.

  Shade and Tye meet us at the door, Tye’s attempt to tell us something drowned out by the wolf shifter’s lunge for me.

  “Cub,” Shade rasps, his chest heaving as he cups my face with his wide palms. His yellow eyes gaze deep into mine, his thumbs tracing my cheeks with a desperation that makes my chest tighten. For a heartbeat, the world fades but for Shade’s body heat, his scent of earth and rain. Shade braces his forehead against mine, the need inside him echoing through my blood. Shade draws a slow, desperate breath, like a man seeing water after days of drought. “Cub,” he repeats as a gentle pulse of magic ripples through my flesh, making the scrapes along my skin tingle and pull until my ache dissolves and a relieved breath finally escapes Shade’s lungs.

  “I thought you were leaving that to me,” River says dryly.

  Shade pulls awa
y, his shoulders tense. “I . . .”

  “You couldn’t help it.” River squeezes the shifter’s shoulder, eliciting a surprised brow tilt from Tye. “And we’re about to have more work for you.”

  “What do you mean?” Shade brushes my hand one more time before reluctantly stepping away, his shoulders spreading as he transforms from gentle to deadly within a single heartbeat. “What happened?”

  “A fight,” Coal says, stepping out of his room. Wearing his signature black leather pants and sleeveless tunic, his blond hair in a tight bun, the warrior is a portrait of bored patience. “Why is the common room a mess and smelling of Slait?”

  Tye picks up a half-eaten sweet roll and stuffs it into his mouth. “Sparkle is here. Well, not here—in the library. Because who would want to say hello to her brother when there are books to be read. But returning to other news, did I hear that right? Someone is going to be punished and it isn’t me?”

  “I’ll be happy to bleed you tomorrow if you are envious,” Coal tells him.

  Tye opens his mouth, the tip of his tongue making a leisurely exploration of his canines. “As tempting as that is,” he drawls, “I must admit that my own pleasures run a wee bit differently.”

  “Oh, good stars.” Twisting on his heels, River stalks to his bedchamber.

  I retreat to the couch, sinking into the soft cushions, the joy over Autumn’s arrival unable to penetrate the flood of dread drowning my soul. Coal was a slave in Mors. Everything about this is wrong. Vile. Except no one but me seems to think much of it. Most notably Coal himself, who now leans against the wall with deadly grace, using a boot knife to clean his nails. The muscles in his arms bunch and slide with the small movements, and I long to go stand by him. Touch him, comfort him—but I know I’d just be comforting myself.