by Tanya Milne
‘As soon as Elijah is well enough, we’re getting out of here. It’s just too dangerous for…us…to be here.’
Ezra ran his fingers through his hair. ‘You can’t–’
‘Well, I know it’s not going to be easy, and it will take some planning, but now that we’re not under suspicion, we should be able to find a way.’
‘It’s impossible to get out. Dad has made sure of it.’
My heart started to thud in my chest. ‘What do you mean…impossible?’
‘He’s set up an electric magnetic field around town. Anyone trying to leave will trigger it, and the police are on standby to arrest anyone who tries. And the punishment, well, it’s harsh, really harsh. You don’t want to try, trust me.’
I tried to find my breath, but it had fled and I gasped.
‘There’s only one road in and one road out, and that’s now manned, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. There’s simply no way out,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry. I wish you could get out.’ He spoke quieter so that it was just a whisper. ‘And I wish I could come with you.’
I looked closely at Ezra then – his body was slumped forward and his eyes were fixed on the ground. Our lives were going to be miserable trapped in this hellhole, but Ezra’s life was indescribably worse – his would be hell on earth.
‘I’m sorry. That you have to live like this,’ I said quietly.
He looked up at me suddenly. ‘You’re sorry.’ He let out a gruff laugh. ‘You have no idea how bad I feel about what happened to you, to Elijah, to your family.’ He stood up and started to pace. ‘My dad, he’s a beast, and there’s nothing I can do about it. I’ve tried, over and over, to talk to him, but he never listens. He calls me the biggest disappointment of his life.’
‘Oh, Ezra, that’s awful.’
‘Do you know the only time he’s ever been proud of me? When he thought I’d turned into an animal like him,’ he said, his words hot and heavy. ‘My life… It’s… Without my mum…without you…I don’t know how I would go on.’
Ezra’s brutal honesty tore shreds from us both. I had trusted him with my secret, and now he’d trusted me with his.
The only sound came from the waves as they gently lapped against the side of the boat. I stood and slowly walked towards him and held out my hands. ‘You are not your father, Ezra. You are not your father. You are not your father.’ I stopped in front of him and opened my arms, and he stepped into them. We held each other close. For the first time in as long as I could remember, I felt safe – at home.
Finally, we broke apart and I put my hand on the side of his face. My body prickled with heat and every part of me felt naked, exposed, but I made myself say the words anyhow. ‘Even though our lives are so screwed up, I want to be with you.’
Ezra put his large hand over my small one, and his voice was soft when he spoke. ‘I want to be with you too, more that you know.’
I took his hand and pulled him towards the bed. My legs started to shake, so I sat down on the edge and took off my jacket, lay back and waited for him.
‘Ezra.’
‘Eva,’ he said, sitting down on the bed, his back to me. ‘We can’t. We can’t be together, not now.’
A pain stabbed my heart, and every part of me went cold. I lay back and looked up at the stars that were twinkling away, diamonds in the darkness. I put my hands over my eyes to block out their beauty.
‘Every single cell in my body wants to be with you, and not just for now. God…yes now. But for every single day I have left in this world. What I want more than that, though, is to know that you’re safe – that I haven’t put you and your family in danger.’
‘Don’t you see? We’re already in danger just by living here,’ I said, my voice cold.
‘Yes,’ he said, sighing. ‘But if we’re together, even in private, my dad will find out and then…’
I swallowed, remembering the fear in my brother’s eyes, the fear Orpheus Blackthorn had put there. I had a flash of what Orpheus might do to me should he know I had the heart of his one and only son.
‘I could never live with myself if something were to happen to you because of me,’ said Ezra.
His words, the truth, sliced a light into the darkness of the small cabin and all of a sudden, the night felt large and I felt small, so very small. I tried to imagine how I would cope, day after day, seeing Ezra, knowing we could never be together.
‘I don’t think I can…’ I said, my words breaking up.
Ezra turned around and crawled over to where I lay. He settled down next to me, drawing me close. His face was wet with tears and I wiped them away, kissed his face, his eyelids, and finally, his mouth. At first he didn’t respond, didn’t kiss me back. I pulled away. ‘If this is all we have, this night, this one night, then you’d better at least kiss me goodbye.’
Ezra’s eyes reflected both the stars above and burning pain. He pulled me close and kissed me in a way that we both knew would be impossible to forget.
Breathless, we pulled apart. I wanted more, he wanted more, but if we went further, we both knew there’d never be any turning back.
I sat up, moved to the end of the bed where I put on my jacket.
‘Never forget, Ezra, I am here for you.’
He let out a sound, a guttural sound that came from his soul.
‘You are never alone,’ I said, standing and doing the most unnatural thing I had ever done. I walked away from my one true love – my one true love that I could never, ever have.
THE END
Thanks so much for reading The Witch Born to Ignite, Book One in the Inferno series.
If you enjoyed reading this, I’d be very grateful if you could recommend this book to friends and family who you think may enjoy it. Honest reviews on Amazon and Goodreads are also enormously appreciated. Recommendations and reviews make a huge difference to authors as they help give their books the chance to succeed, which enables them to keep writing.
I’m excited to let you know that Book Two in the Inferno series, The Witch Born to Burn, is now available to pre-order on Amazon now.
CLICK HERE to Preorder The Witch Born to Burn.
Here’s a little teaser.
A hidden power. A deadly poison. To save a life, she'll have to risk everything…
Eva is hiding her true identity right under the nose of the tyrant mayor who wants her kind eradicated. By day, she’s the model citizen of a town that’s returning to darker times. By night, she’s learning to become the witch she was destined to be. To survive, she must keep up the charade and somehow nurse her broken heart.
After most people in Melas are poisoned, Eva must enlist the help of the boy she’s forbidden to be with, to try and save everyone. But she’s pushed to the brink when the poisoning is declared an act of witchcraft, and sinister witch testing condemns a young man she’s been trying to stay away from.
Can Eva save the doomed young man – who’ll do anything to win her heart – without sacrificing everything that’s important to her?
The Witch Born to Burn is the second book in the spellbinding Inferno YA witch fantasy series. If you like forbidden magic, simmering chemistry, and page-turning paranormals, then you'll love Tanya Milne's compelling supernatural tale.
Buy The Witch Born to Burn to watch Eva make a dangerous choice today…
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