“What?” Ocean cried, grinning madly. “Are you and Emma getting married? Why isn’t she wearing a ring?! You haven’t bought her a ring yet!?”
“Ugh, really?” Samantha eyed me. “Married?”
Paisley snapped her teeth in the telekinetic’s direction. I held Samantha’s gaze as I stepped closer, the demon dog keeping pace at my side.
I paused, slightly too close for comfort. Watching Samantha’s eyes widen as she tried to decide if I was going to attack her.
“Next time you drag Christopher and Paisley with you,” I said coolly, “make sure your intel is solid.”
She opened her mouth to protest.
“No,” I said. “I want you to have eyes on your target before you even think of calling any of us in.”
Samantha grimaced. “I needed …” But then she didn’t finish the thought. Instead she just nodded, then said, “ ‘Us’? You’ll come with me next time?”
I nodded, already turning away and climbing the stairs to the patio. “Aiden and I will come if you need us, as long as it doesn’t interfere with Opal’s schooling or her breaks.”
“I can’t believe you didn’t kill him,” Samantha said, setting one foot on the bottom stair but not stepping up.
I glanced at Aiden and smiled. “It’s barely time for tea. Who knows what could happen between now and dinner.”
Aiden laughed huskily.
“Um, hi!” Ocean said brightly, speaking to Christopher. “I’m Ocean. Aiden’s youngest sister.”
“Yes,” the clairvoyant said with a teasing grin. “I know. I’m Christopher. Emma’s youngest older brother.”
“The gardener?” she asked. “Because it’s really obvious that it isn’t Emma.”
Christopher chuckled. The white of his power had settled in his eyes, forming a thick ring around his light-gray irises.
“Grosvenor Azar.” The curse breaker offered his hand to the clairvoyant.
Christopher reciprocated, staring at Grosvenor for a few moments, then shrugging in disappointment. “I see.”
Not breaking their grasp, the curse breaker grinned amicably. “You see? What do you see, oh clairvoyant?”
Samantha snorted loudly. “Rude. Though I guess that goes without saying for anyone with that last name.”
“Does that include me?” Aiden asked, still amused.
“Hell yeah,” the telekinetic groused. But she was grinning now. “You’re the worst of them. All up in our business. Pushy. Well, the worst next to your father.”
“He’s the only other Azar you know,” Christopher said mildly, crossing into the house. “I smell ginger snaps.”
“Emma just finished baking,” Ocean said, obviously torn between following the clairvoyant and casting furtive looks at the telekinetic.
Samantha finally acknowledged the witch with a put-out sigh. “Yeah, yeah, I know. I’m gorgeous.”
Ocean flushed. But she didn’t look away.
The telekinetic shook her head. “Way too old for you, sweetheart. I don’t play with baby witches.”
“How old?” Ocean jutted out her chin. “You can’t be even ten years older than me.”
I laughed. I couldn’t help it. Even for my life, the day was verging on absurd.
Aiden twined his fingers through mine. “Let’s get tea.”
“Can I tear you away from your books long enough?”
He looked concerned. “I can eat cookies and read at the same time. I haven’t found a single mention of the guardian Haoxin —”
“What?” Samantha cried. “A guardian?” Without waiting for an answer, she barreled up the stairs, shoved her way by us, and marched into the house. “You are such an asshole, Knox! I asked you what was going on! Multiple times!” Her voice faded as she approached the kitchen. “We could have chartered a plane …”
Christopher mumbled something in response that I didn’t catch.
I looked up at Aiden. “I’d wait until she’s calmed down to ask her, but apparently Samantha knows something about guardians.”
“Does she ever calm down?” Grosvenor asked.
I just looked at him.
He grimaced. “Apologies, amplifier.”
“So …” Ocean said quietly. “Does Samantha like girls?”
“You’re heading to the Academy,” Aiden said. “There will be plenty of girls to romance there.”
Ocean frowned. “Boring witches and sorcerers and necromancers.” She smiled slyly. “I want to walk on the wild side.” And with that pronouncement, she did a little spin and strode into the house.
“Right,” Grosvenor smirked. “Good luck with that.” Then clearing his throat, he said, “I’m heading out. I just wanted to give … everyone else a little lead time.”
He meant Sky, I presumed.
“Stay for the night,” Aiden said. “I’ll drive you to the float plane tomorrow morning. I’ve got to pick up my SUV anyway. Then you can fly into Victoria and catch an international flight from there.”
Grosvenor glanced at me, then away. “I have a sense that I’m courting death every moment I’m here. And … it keeps getting worse.”
Aiden clapped him on the shoulder. “Perfectly understandable. A couple of ginger snaps will ease the feeling.”
Pulling me with him, Aiden stepped into the house, leaving the sorcerer to follow us. Or not.
Aiden, Christopher, and I were gathered around the kitchen island eating breakfast. The granola had turned out surprisingly good — thanks to Ocean. Then we heard Aiden’s iPad start to trill in the study.
Grinning, Christopher took off down the hall.
I raised an eyebrow at Aiden. “What if it’s your father?”
“Then he’s about to get a delightful surprise.”
Laughing, I rinsed my bowl in the sink, catching the clairvoyant’s exuberant greeting all the way down the hall.
“Hello, my little witch.”
Opal.
Aiden took my bowl from me, waving me away as he cleaned up. I took off for the study, finding Christopher seated at the desk, chatting with Opal on the iPad.
“I’m glad you’re back,” the young witch was saying as I entered the room. “Emma missed you. Is Aiden’s family gone?”
“Ocean is still here, sleeping. But the last sorcerer took off this morning,” the clairvoyant replied. “Grosvenor. Gorgeous boy. Not even remotely interested in me.”
Opal pouted playfully. “He must be blind.”
Christopher nodded sagely. “Indeed. When are you coming home?”
“Yeah, about that …” Opal held up a thick parchment envelope and a card. It looked like some kind of formal invitation. “I’ve been invited to the Godfrey coven summer retreat. At the end of June.”
“Witches!” Christopher grinned. “Yes!”
“But it’s just for Emma and me,” Opal said sadly.
Christopher huffed. Then he shoved the chair back. “I’ll let you talk, then. Don’t hang up without saying goodbye.”
“Okay!”
I exchanged places with Christopher, peering at Opal more closely. The lighting on her end was bad, though it was late morning in her time zone. As if she was in a closet.
“Hey, Emma,” she said. “So … you’ll take me?” She looked at the invitation. “It’s in somewhere called Tofino. And Juniper says there will be surfing and maybe we’ll even see some whales.”
I had no idea who Juniper was, other than a witch from or related to the Godfrey coven. “We’ll discuss it.”
Aiden stepped in behind me, leaning forward so Opal could see him. “Good morning.”
“Good morning.” She grinned at him. “We found a sorcerer!”
“Sorry?”
“For our group. You said we needed a sorcerer.”
“Right. Wonderful.”
“Yep, it took a couple of days but I tracked down an Azar.”
“Excuse me?”
“Melanie Azar. As best as we’ve figured out, she’s, like, your second cous
in or something.”
“An Azar,” Aiden repeated, sounding disconcerted.
“Yep.” Opal grinned even more. “Anyone else would have been too boring.”
Aiden huffed out a laugh. “Is that why you’re in a closet?”
“Nope.” Opal glanced around and pulled the phone closer. I got a better look at the young witch. There was something different about her hair. “So,” she whispered. “You’ll never guess what happened …”
“Why are you whispering?” I asked suspiciously. “And what did you do to your hair?”
“It’s called streaks, Emma,” she said, already exasperated.
“Are they permanent?”
She shrugged and then held the vessel that had caused all the trouble up to the camera. The vessel that she’d supposedly turned into the principal of the Academy.
I sighed. “Opal …”
She flipped it, so the lid hung open on its hinge.
It was empty.
“You’ll never guess who we met,” she crowed excitedly. “A soul seer!”
I blinked.
“You know. A necromancer who can, like, manipulate soul magic. She opened the case and released the soul trapped within it. Or, like, the sliver of the soul that was in it. I didn’t totally follow all of what she did. She was just … so … cool.”
“And she had streaks in her hair,” Aiden said, mildly amused.
“Yep! And she said she’d knit me some rainbow heart arm warmers, just like the ones she was wearing.”
I wasn’t completely certain what arm warmers were, but Opal seemed delighted at the prospect.
“So …” Opal blinked at me. “You’ll go surfing with me, Emma?”
“Yes,” I said. Aiden settled his hand on my shoulder, and I covered it with my own. For a moment, I thought my chest might explode.
Joy, I reminded myself. This was what extreme joy felt like.
“Yes,” I said again. “Surfing. And then you can help me plan the wedding.”
“Yay! Okay, got to go before I completely miss breakfast.” She pressed her screen and the video winked out, completely forgetting her promise to Christopher not to hang up.
I pivoted the chair to face Aiden.
He knelt before me, gazing up at me. “You’re sure? About getting married? I don’t want … I mean, the Hallowed was doing some pretty heavy influencing of us all, and —”
I kissed him. Deeply. Lingering with my lips on his, tongues caressing. Then I whispered, “What kind of spells are you planning to embed into my ring, sorcerer?”
He laughed, pulling me out of the chair until I was kneeling against him. “Anything you want, Emma. Anything you want.”
“That will do, my sorcerer. That will do perfectly.”
Power boiled out of me, flooding the room. I stretched into it, fingers splayed, head falling back.
I was …
So …
Powerful.
Adored.
Loved.
Worshiped.
“Emma.”
Warm hands cupped my face, lips gently brushing my own.
“Emma. It’s just a dream.”
Aiden.
I became aware that I was standing, sheets tangled around my feet. A torrent of power still raged around me. My power, my magic.
I gasped, drawing in a long breath of air. Almost as if I hadn’t been breathing a moment before.
“It’s okay,” Aiden murmured, still caressing my face gently. “You’re here. You’re still here with us.”
Us.
I blinked.
I was standing at the end of my bed. The room was dark, but I could clearly make out Aiden. He was naked, as if he’d leaped out of bed.
I blinked again.
“Pull it back, Emma,” Aiden murmured.
The power, he meant. I must have been flooding the entire house. I reined in the energy boiling from me — and only then realized that I’d been picking up emotions. And not just from Aiden.
Tamping down on my magic, I stepped slightly to the side, so I could see past the dark-haired sorcerer.
Christopher, Samantha, and Paisley were kneeling before me. Their heads were thrown back, magic blazing in their eyes. Ocean was clinging to the doorframe, her chest heaving.
They were all in various states of undress.
I had pulled them from their beds. I’d been manipulating their emotions without even touching them.
I looked at Aiden, suddenly terrified. “The Hallowed …”
“No,” he said. “Just you, Emma. Just a … bad dream.”
Samantha and Christopher straightened, sharing a glance. Then the telekinetic crossed to Ocean. “Show’s over, witch.”
“But …”
“Out.”
Samantha closed the door in Ocean’s face. The wards carved into the frame were still active.
My heart was pounding. I was still coated in my power, still feeling the echo of the others’ feelings. Love. Adoration. Worship.
“What the hell was that?” Samantha snarled quietly, leaning back against the door with her arms crossed.
“That was Emma,” Christopher said. “Unleashed. Without needing to touch us.”
“Did I … was I draining you?” I asked in a whisper, hearing the fear in my voice but unable to do anything about it.
“No,” Samantha said bluntly. “You just … enticed us in here.”
“Could it just be the tattoos?” Christopher said. “Ocean didn’t seem to be affected the same way. And Aiden, you were right beside Emma. So why didn’t …” He trailed off thoughtfully. “You’re immune?”
“Apparently,” Aiden said, watching me.
Samantha and Christopher shared another glance. Paisley sidled up to me and pressed her broad head under my hand, offering comfort. I breathed in deeply. My heart rate settled.
“Well,” Samantha drawled, “it’s never a surprise when one of the Five gains a new ability. But, honestly, you were already fucking scary, Socks.” She stared at me for a few moments, her expression inscrutable. Then she shrugged. “At least you’re on our side.”
She opened the door and exited.
“Is Emma okay?” Ocean asked. Apparently she’d been waiting in the hall.
“Always,” Samantha snapped, pulling the door with her. “What the hell time is it? Too early for coffee?” The door latched behind the telekinetic.
Christopher slipped his hand over my shoulder, pressing his fingers to my T3 vertebra, over the magic tattooed there that bound us. His eyes flooded with the white of his power.
“Did I hurt you?” I asked again.
He shook his head. “No. The opposite, actually. But … it bothers me that I’m not immune, like Aiden. For the same reasons.”
“The blood bond,” Aiden said simply.
The clairvoyant nodded but didn’t look happy. He dropped his hand, stepping away without telling me what, if anything, he was seeing of my near future. He left, shutting the door behind him.
I turned to Aiden. Whatever he saw on my face made him gather me into his arms.
“It’s just another skill, Emma,” he murmured into my hair. “You’ll hone it, as you’ve done over and over again.”
“A latent ability,” I said with a sigh. “Triggered by the contact with the Hallowed.”
“Tapped into by the Hallowed, more likely.”
I groaned, enjoying the strength of his body pressed against mine. Letting him hold me aloft, if only for a moment.
Paisley crawled up onto the bed, sighing dramatically as she took up one half of it. Aiden chuckled. We climbed into bed with the demon dog, tangling our limbs together in the tight space she allowed us.
“Can you adapt the wards on the bedroom?” I asked, shimmying back into Aiden. Trying to get as close to him as possible, skin to skin. Allowing his steady resolve to anchor me in the moment. “So that if this happens again, no one else is affected?”
“I’ll start tomorrow.”
&nb
sp; “Thank you.”
I knew who I was. To Aiden, to Opal. Even to myself.
I wasn’t going to forget that or run scared from what I was able to do. I would conquer these new abilities.
Because I didn’t have any other choice.
Aiden pressed his face into the back of my neck, and I rested my hand on Paisley’s chest. Allowing the both of them to pull me back to sleep.
Keep reading for the bonus short story:
The Music Box (Amplifier 4.5)
The Music Box (Amplifier 4.5)
A knock at my dorm room door drew me from the pile of first-year spellbooks strewn across my rumpled bed. For the next three weeks, I wasn’t supposed to be talking to anyone. Except in class or at meals. I glanced at the time on my busted phone. Technically I’d only been serving detention for three hours. Ugh.
Confining myself to my room was extra punishment. Self-imposed, really. For disappointing Emma. For scaring Emma.
I might have been only thirteen, and I might have been hundreds of miles away from home. But I knew that my guardian didn’t like being scared, feeling helpless. Mostly because I was pretty sure that the only time she’d ever really been scared was when I was in trouble, and she couldn’t help me.
And that made her do … things.
Deadly, bloody things she didn’t want to do, but would do … for me.
Whoever was waiting for me in the hall knocked again. A sharp rap of knuckles. I tossed off my cocoon of worn, layered quilts, grabbing the comfy dark-red sweater I’d stolen from my adoptive uncle’s closet the last time I was home, and headed for the door. Christopher — Emma’s brother who wasn’t really a brother. It was complicated — wouldn’t miss the sweater. He was always warm.
It wasn’t a long walk from the end of my bed. Three steps at most.
I opened the door to see an elder witch blinking down at me over the rim of her glasses. Principal Whitaker. The head witch of the Academy. Her eyes were light blue. Intelligent, sharp. Streaks of gray ran through light-brown hair partially pulled back from her temples. The chain hanging from her glasses was strung with purple pearls.
“Opal.” She scanned me up and down, lips twisted disapprovingly.
Idols and Enemies (Amplifier 4) Page 34