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“What can I do?” he asks her excitedly. “You’ve got to show me!”
“Whoa back there a sec,” says Elara, raising her hands to pat the air in the universal “chill out” gesture. As glad as she is that he’s not totally freaking out, him jumping right to using magic is so not the right play here.
Laith narrows his eyes at her. “You did magic too. Surely you can show me.”
All of a sudden, she thinks she might prefer it if he freaks out. That she could deal with. She’d calm him down, try to reason with him, and explain things, at least as much as she knew. Instead, he seems to be wanting to use magic now, which is a terrible idea.
“Let’s just slow down a bit.” She barely knows how to control magic herself. “It takes time to learn this stuff.”
But she’s not sure Laith even heard her. He starts to pace, eyes moving quickly over the rocky ground. “How is this even possible? I could never do magic before. Did you do this?” He glances at her but then quickly looks down as if the answer doesn’t really matter. He stares at his hands and she sees the slight shift as the magic comes to life, leaves already starting to swirl around them, and she winces. If he keeps this up, someone is bound to notice. They might be the last ones at the falls, but that doesn’t mean that no one else will come along. And who knows what they’d see.
“Laith,” she tries again. “Look at me. We need to talk about this.”
But he ignores her, staring at the trees as they begin to move again. He lifts his arms in the same way she did not long ago, and the trees move even faster. As if he’s the maestro and they’re the instruments.
“Holy heck, this is so cool,” he says in awe.
When he lifts his arms another notch, Elara knows she needs to act. He’s so excited about his magic that he doesn’t even notice as she picks up a stick, steps closer, and cocks back, cracking him on the back of the head, the entire time praying that she doesn’t accidentally kill him. She has no idea how Kade did it with just a touch. She can’t see Laith’s face, but his knees fold and he sinks forward. She grabs the back of his jacket to keep him from falling on his face, slowly lowering him forward.
Once he’s down and still clearly breathing, Elara steps back. Wrapping her arms around herself, she scans her three unconscious friends.
This is not how today was supposed to go.
What’s more, what the hell is she supposed to do now?
Chewing her lip, Elara knows she can’t afford to flip the freak out, otherwise the catastrophe she just avoided with Laith is going to happen anyway. She needs to think.
Annoyingly, Kade is the first person who comes to mind. But his solution is to wipe their memories, and she doesn’t trust him enough to go anywhere near her friends. Not to mention it’s all a moot point anyway. She has no way of contacting him.
Which leaves Denzel.
Already cringing, she pulls out her cell phone, surprised to find there’s enough reception to send a text.
Bit of a situation. Could use your help. At the waterfall.
He rings back instantly. “Elara? What’s…go…on?”
“I can’t really hear you—” she starts before the line goes dead.
Denzel must sense the urgency in her message, or somehow know with his wolf senses that she's freaking out, because he’s there in record time, glancing around at her three unconscious friends. His eyebrows rise, and she shrugs, still not sure how she's going to explain everything that happened here. It should have been just another day at the waterfalls, but even though it hadn't been her drama that started it, the whole thing was still embarrassing.
“What happened here?” he asks.
Elara wraps her arms around herself again. That's a great question, and now it's time to face the music.
"We were here at the falls and Kira and Laith started to fight, which made Laith's magic come out, and then I had to use my magic to stop him.” She hesitates for a second. She hasn’t mentioned Kade until now, and she’s not sure why. Some misplaced need to protect him? Could she be any more stupid? “Jordyn and Kira were about to freak out when a guy I’ve seen lurking around, Kade, came and knocked them both out, but Laith was still messing around using magic, so I knocked himout, too.” She winces, not liking any part of that story. “And then I called you."
“A guy’s been lurking around?” The way he says it makes him sound as if he’s not all that surprised.
“Yeah.” She shifts uneasily. “He picked me up after I was attacked. And now it’s clear he can do magic. I’m starting to wonder if he’s the one who turned me.”
Denzel hums gently, rubbing his chin as he thinks. "If this Kade knows about the supernatural, then he could be a problem. But I'm not sure whether he's also the wolf that scratched you."
Elara nods, hating that the uncertainty is back, but also glad there’s someone else who knows about this now. Denzel should be far more rational and impartial about this. He won’t be confused by the strange sense of safety she experiences around Kade. Nor is he likely to notice what a hot, brooding hunk he is.
"I'll make sure that the pack keeps an eye on him," says Denzel, still looking thoughtful.
A pang pierces her chest. He’s talking about his pack. The pack she’s not allowed to meet because she’s too unknown. Dangerous. Possibly wrong.
