Reasons Scrying will fail: the subject is already being Scried upon, the Mentalist loses focus, the subject enters a walled-in building or Scrying-restricted territory, the subject is dead.
— Helen Blackburn, Echelon to the
School of Mental Magic
Witches didn’tetherize.Corporeal Animal Etherealwere the three forms of theGoddess. This shouldn’t be happening tome, a half witch. But there I was, wedged between a brick wall and a dumpster, both of which I could probably slip through,etherizing. If the Goddess didn’t vanquish me for it, the Echelons sure would. If it even mattered. If there was even a way to return to my human, bodied, form.
My arms, or the projection-like image of them, were folded over my chest, only sometimes there when I glanced down. I frowned at Leland’s hand, outstretched and waiting. Then my eyes went to his mouth, his well-defined lips, unnaturally glossy and shining with a thin layer of Vyra’s lip gloss — and I disappeared entirely.
“You’re staring at my mouth,” he said, his face somber in thelow torchlight of the dark alley structure.
“I know,” I said, sounding out of breath for some reason.
Leland wet his lips, then pressed them tight and rubbed them back and forth, taking off the sheen while his eyes stayed trained on me. When he was done, his lips were reddened and wet, but the lip gloss was gone.
“Better?” he asked.
“No,” I breathed, unable to look away, to hide my interest. My own lips burned like his had been on them. “I don’t think it is.” I closed my eyes and shook my head, my thoughts spinning as he stayed kneeling only a foot away from me.
“Ember. Look at me.”
I opened my eyes slowly, my muscles tense. If only he knew the things I saw when I looked at him.
Leland tried offering his hand again, but I clutched mine in my lap, my fingers tensing. I didn’t want his hand. I didn’t want to feel the warm swell of being close to him. My blood craved him, and its hunger to absorb his magic was what had landed me in this position.
“Did Vyra see?” I asked, looking down to take in the full extent of my ghostly image.
Leland’s hand fell to his side, for the moment giving up on me. “I took care of it,” he said. “Pitch Black took care of everyone else.”
“What about the scrying orb?”
“Disappeared the second you started flickering. Can’t Scry on an intangible.”
That’s hardly better, I thought. If the Echelons were watching, if itwasa Mentalist as he’d said, and suddenly I’d disappeared . . .
“So they’ll know?” I asked, partly out of curiosity, but mostly, I was stalling.
“They’ll assume they lost focus. All day is a long time to Scry.People get tired. No one would guess this.”
I rubbed between my eyes. “Skye . . .”
Leland held up his transmitter. “Already messaged her. She’ll meet you at Helen’s.” Putting his transmitter away, he held out his hand again. “I don’t want to scare you. But if you go full ether, I have no idea how to get you back here. The only thing that might keep you here is if you — right now — hold on to me.”
“No.”
“Ember. It’s just a hand.”
“And that’s the problem,” I said. It wasn’tmyhand. Leland was with Vyra, not me.
Of course, these weren’t rational feelings. This was my blood talking. Mybloodthat had burned me up, forcing Leland into the alley with me.
“What is the problem?” he asked, not understanding.
“I ruined your date,” I said guiltily.
“I already said goodbye to her.”
“You’re stuck here with me. You wasted like twenty spells to build this.” I didn’t know the exact number, but I knew a regular witch would be depleted and sleeping by now. “Five of them on” — I winced at the far wall — “wall sconces?”
