Page 123 of Bound By Fury

“YOU CONTROL YOURSELF!” I scream, pointing at her. “You show me your magic. You want me to control it so bad—I don’t know how! No one has taught me! So go ahead! Teach me! You claim to be like me, so fucking prove it!”

She holds up her palms like shields against me, her face crumpling. “Harper, please.”

“What?! You said you were like me. You said I’m not alone anymore—”

“Sweetheart, you’re not alone. I promise you’re not alone. But I can’t do that.”

My heart stutters. “What do you mean you can’t do that?”

I search her face. Is she even who she says she is?

“Fuck this!” I pant. “You’re—you’re lying to me! Why are you lying to me?”

Turning, I slap the chair out of my way and it goes flying against the wall. I pull at my shirt, there’s too much too much too much on me, near me, crowding me. My hands twitch as I bring them to my face, the static jumping from fingertip to fingertip, desperate for an escape.

I am held captive by the music screaming in my veins.

“Harper, focus! Breathe! You must maintain control!”

She rounds the table and blocks the only exit. “Focus on me. Look at me. Take a deep breath.” She models it for me, sucking in a long stream of air, encouraging me to do the same. “Okay, now let it go.” She purses her lips, exhaling slowly.

I know I should want to do what she asks. Should want to listen to her. But right now I don’t want to control my power. I want to let it consume me.

For sixteen years I lived a certain life with certain goals and certain beliefs. All I wanted was to finish school and get the hell out of Pine Grove. Maybe go to college and settle back in Earnest. Take care of Gigi as she aged. I wanted to forge my own way in the world. I wanted to see what I could be, and I wanted to do it with my best friends by my side.

But now I’m a Zodiac Witch on the verge of some ancient war?

“Harper, listen to me. You are powerful, but you haven’t had your catalyst yet. You’re going to hurt yourself!” Her grip on my arms has grown firm, her fingers trembling with fear.

I hiss through my teeth. Reel it in. I’ve got to reel it in.

I keep breathing the way she showed. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. I slow my heart rate beat by beat.

I peel the static from myself, winding the gilded rope of power into a knot and stuffing it back at my core where it belongs.

In the uncomfortable silence that ensues, I’m still too overwhelmed and angry to apologize for my outburst. Instead I shrug out of her grasp and take a few steps toward the windows.

“What,” I say again, short of breath, “aren’t you telling me?”

She clears her throat as she takes a seat, her fingers drumming against the table.

“Harper, the thing is… it’s been a century since one of our coven has wielded magic.”

Her words are a drop in the void of my mind, and they ricochet off the walls like a pinball.

“I’m sorry… WHAT?”

It’s immediate, the way the magic comes rushing back. Like it’s second nature. Or first nature, as if this was always my base instinct. After everything she’s already told me, I can’t tamp down the fury that explodes when I realize she’s completely buried the lead.

It makes sense in a way. You’d think that if my grandmother was secretly doing magic, there would have been signs, but instead her stories felt like fiction that bled into reality. Why would Maureen tell me everything but this? And why me?

Why me, why me, why me?

I never, ever asked for this. I felt alone before, but I had no idea how true that was.

“How is that possible?” I cry. “If it’s been a century since one of our—our coven—has wielded magic, then how do you explain this?” I roar, flinging my arms away from my body, pulling on the molecules dampening the air inside the house with humidity.

I thrust the gathered water out in a torpedo stream that slams into her collection of cats. The hutch splinters down the middle, water ricocheting off the wood in a fine mist that coats everything in sight, the ceramic pieces shattering against the ground.