Is this a trick question? “I’m walking to the bakery. You see, I ran into Mrs. Buttercup. Do you know her? Well, she ate all my cookies, which didn’t look so much like cookies as they did demons. Still tasted great, though, and I’m trying to talk my aunt out of throwing this ball for me because…”
He’s staring at me as if I have two heads, and I realize I may have given him a bit more information than he wanted.
He curls a hand into a fist like he’s shaking off the magic.
The magic.
“Thank you for saving me.” Before I stop myself, I touch his arm and jump.
His clothes are cold—and not outside cold. It’s like he’s made of metal, and beneath that metal I feel the thrum of magic.
Powerful magic.
The kind that could terrorize a village.
I suck in a breath. “You were casting that spell. What were you trying to do?”
His brow furrows like there’s a war waging inside of him. My gaze lingers on the scruff of beard that dusts his face before I force myself to look away, searching for his target.
But there are only houses around me—houses he was going to darken with his power.
I back away as a lump grows inside my throat. “You were going to harm someone. You were going to spell them. Maybe kill them.”
He scowls, which makes him look devastatingly handsome. “And what if I was?”
His face is might be handsome, but his words are lethal. “You can’t do that here. You can’t just curse people. It’s illegal.”
He laughs bitterly. “And what do you know about curses?”
I scoff. The nerve of this guy. “Just everything. When you live with one, you know all about it.”
An emotion flickers across his face—pity, sadness, something between the two, or maybe it’s a mixture of both.
“Look, mister, I know enough about curses to know that you were about to cast one, which makes you a criminal.”
He laughs. “No one will charge me with anything, but…” His next words come out forced. “I’m curious.” He takes a step into my personal space, and I have to tip my head back as far as it will go to keep looking into those ice-blue eyes. “What sort of curse do you know about?”
He lifts his hand, offering his palm, and something opens inside me, something dark, dangerous, curious. My mind goes all soft, trance-like, and I raise my palm to his and feel that cold terror again, like it lives inside him, in his soul.
His magic wraps around mine and tightens. The cold seeps into me, and my warm magic, on the fritz and frazzled, goes very still and calm like it hasn’t done in months—as it reaches for his power. Our magics touch like two snakes winding around each other. His power slides over my skin, up my arm—curious. It’s like nothing I’ve ever felt. My magic must sense my calm because it softens, giving his breathing room to explore.
His power pulses. It races straight to my toes, seizing my lungs and then?—
Pop! Pop! Pop! Pop! Pop!
I jump back as a row of black and golden roses shoot up from the ground beside us.
I stagger back, breaking whatever tether just snapped into place between us. For a brief moment my chest aches, like my magic recognized something in his and is sad that I let him go.
I take a long look at the man, memorizing the tilt of his lips as he smirks, the sharp jaw, the black clothes. “If you don’t leave, I’m calling the magic wardens.” And then I charge away, feeling his magic lingering on my skin, winding around me, and wondering what just happened.
Eryx
Irub my hand, feeling the last traces of her magic on my skin before it vanishes—magic that grabbed me by the throat and then made flowers.I’ve no idea what kind of spell that was, but it’s bound to her blood.
Ooh, takes one to know one, does it?
I scoff.
