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How long have you been able to see the wild magic as threads? Belle’s mental tones were sharp.
I don’t know. I studied the threads through narrowed eyes. They were as fragile as moonbeams and yet pulsed with a power I could both see and feel. I reached out as one drifted by. It curled around my finger and warmth tingled across my skin. With it came a sense of acknowledgment. Of kinship.
It should have frightened the hell out of me.
It didn’t.
This stuff was a part of me now, even if tha
t should have been impossible.
There has to be a reason for it, Belle said. I know Monty said he’d check the archives, but maybe we should also ask Ashworth to do some discreet research.
To what end? I crept past a few more trees, watching the ground more than the car ahead, trying to keep my steps as silent as possible. If the wild magic was going to cause me harm, it would have done so by now.
It’s already changed both your eyes and your power output. We need to know if that’s it, or if there’s more to come.
I grunted. She was right—it would be better to know than not. I’ll ask him next time we see him.
Depending, of course, on how busy he was. He and Eli might have decided to move into the reservation, but Ashworth still worked for the Regional Witch Association—or would once his arm healed.
There was no movement inside the car ahead and, despite the pulse of wrongness coming from the vehicle, little indication that the spirit remained.
I glanced at Monty. His expression was a mix of determination and trepidation, and the barely leashed spell that spun around his fingertips was an interweaving connection of furled strands that glowed with power.
I blinked. Not only could I now see the wild magic rather than just feel it, but I also saw ordinary magic. Not just the creation threads of the actual spell—which was something most witches saw if they took the time and concentrated—but the actual force of it.
I could see—and understand exactly what it was—with just a look.
What the hell was happening to me?
I had no idea and, right now, no time to wonder or worry. I needed to concentrate. I took a deep breath to quell the stirring fear and studied the car. The closer I got, the more evident it became that the spirit had already fled. But that didn’t mean she hadn’t left a clue behind. Didn’t mean we couldn’t still track her via her power output or spore.
Monty motioned me to stop; I immediately did so. He continued on cautiously, a thread of magic spinning out from his free hand—the hand not enmeshed by the leashed spell. It gently probed the car, then slipped in through the open window. After a moment, the thread dissipated and some of the tension left Monty’s body.
“She’s gone.” He turned and motioned for Jaz to come up.
I rubbed my arms against the chill gathering inside, though I wasn’t sure whether its source was the sudden uncertainty of what was happening to me, or the growing certainty that the thing that had tried to kill us was far from finished yet. “And her spore?”
“Is fading fast, even though we can’t have missed her by more than ten minutes.” He moved around the car and studied the trees beyond it. “She ran through the trees, going up the hill rather than down, from the look of it. Do we risk trying to track her?”
“Well, we certainly can’t risk not tracking her. The sooner we catch this bitch, the sooner we can concentrate on finding the other one.”
“Other one? Oh, the thing that drained the guy of blood.” He paused. “You know, it’s possible they’re one and the same being, given what you said about the heat and the fact this thing flung fire at us.”
He walked into the forest. I hurried around the car and caught up to him. “But how many fire spirits can actually take on human form and then drain their victims of blood?”
He raised a hand, grabbed a tree branch and pushed it aside. I grabbed it from him as I passed by then let it swish back.
“I don’t know offhand, as I didn’t actually study demonology in uni. But there’d have to be a few.”
“It says a lot about the high council’s view on reservations,” Jaz said, as she caught up to us, “that they’d send a witch with so little arcane knowledge.”
“Which under normal circumstances wouldn’t have been a problem,” Monty fired back. “It only is in this reservation thanks to the fact your elders left the wellspring unguarded for so long.”
“A fact your council was made aware of before your appointment,” Jaz said. “I would have thought it’d be a point mentioned when applications were called for.”
“Why would it be when any witch appointed here has a major arcane library up in Canberra to access at will? No witch these days really needs in-depth knowledge of demons and spirits unless they intended to make the study—or the hunting—of them a career choice.” Monty glanced over his shoulder, his expression somewhat bemused. “And anyway, why would you presume this sort of position is a much sought-after one by those in Canberra? Because I’m here to tell you it’s not. In fact, there were only five applicants—the man who was initially chosen, but who literally missed the plane, three older witches looking to get out of Canberra and semi retire, and me.”
