Page 10 of Reckless Witch

LEILAH

Compelled

I head back into the cold before the heat of Blade’s mouth against mine cools. The nighttime temperature has dropped several degrees in the short time I’ve been in the club and the cold wind burns my skin. Why hadn’t I accepted his invitation? I shiver, but not because of the cold. I have a weakness for Fae, and Blade Tyrion is a prime specimen, all loose-limbed grace and elegance, his every muscle coiled with easy power. Tonight isn’t the first time I’ve wondered what it would be like to pull his long blond hair from its tie and tangle my fingers in the softness while he drives his cock so deep that he touches my soul. He would have made me forget about Grams, her house…and now, the fucking Academy. Maybe I would even be able to vanquish the memory of Ethan’s body against mine in those seconds before I broke free of his hold.

I halt abruptly. I shouldn’t want the man who is forcing me over a threshold I swore never to cross. What do he and Raith have to do with the Illumina’s decree against my grandmother? How did she really die? Not for an instant do I believe the police report of suicide. Grams wasn’t capable of killing herself.

Was she?

My heart twists. Grams was sixty-five when I last saw her—middle-aged in these modern times—seventy-two when she died—barely across the threshold of elderly. I expected her to live at least another twenty years. I told myself I would eventually return and demand to know why she’d kicked out a kid whose worst problem had been figuring out how to not get caught sneaking home after curfew. Hell, I hadn’t even reached the really tough teenage years when she exiled me. What did I do that made her hate me so?

I go cold. She hadn’t wanted me. Neither had my parents, who left me on Gram’s doorstep and then disappeared.

I stalk across the sidewalk and hail an approaching cab. The cab stops at the curb as I arrive. I slide inside and give the driver Jax’s address in Yonkers. It’s late. I’m tired. But I have no intention of trotting over to The Academy first thing in the morning just because Ethan Bordeau branded me like livestock.

As the cab pulls away from the curb, I squint at the sigil. It’s delicate yet strong. Real dragon magic. Jax should be able to handle a little dragon magic. I met Jax in Chicago three years ago. He’s the only contact I have here in New York.

Half an hour later, I knock on the dingy wooden door of Jax’s apartment. His mother is a harpy and his father a demon, making him a devious mix, if there ever was one. Right now, deviousness is exactly what I need. A TV abruptly blares in the apartment next door and some guy yells something I can’t make out. On the fourth knock, the door opens beneath my upraised knuckles and Jax beckons me inside with a hurried wave of his hand.

“I’m not being followed,” I say as I enter his tiny apartment.

I know he’ll crane his thin neck and look in the hall anyway. He does. Then closes the door, faces me, and leans against the wood. He’s tall and wiry and his round eyeglasses give him even more of an owlish look than he inherited from his mother.

“What’s that on your hand?” he asks, zeroing in on the sigil before I can speak.

“Ran into a bit of trouble.” I brandish the mark.

He squints at my hand for less than two seconds. “Yeah, that’s not coming off.”

“You didn’t even really look,” I carp.

Jax shuffles into the dingy realm of his living room, an area littered with video game paraphernalia and empty pizza boxes.

“Don’t have to look,” he grunts. “That’s high-grade persuasion, right there. You’re going to do exactly what that spell wants.” He pauses, then faces me as he folds his arms across his thin chest. “That’s a real Illumina spell. Can’t fake those, you know.”

I scowl. “I thought you could hack anything.”

He dashes any remaining hope with a final, “You’re not getting out of that.”

The air leaves my lungs with an audible hiss.

“Looks like an Academy summons.” A quirk of his lip announces he’s impressed.

“Well, they might force me to show up, but I won’t stay,” I say.

“This is the Illumina you’re talking about, Leilah.” There’s genuine awe in his voice, and precious few things evoke that kind of reaction from Jax.

“I’m not playing their game. Not after what they did to Grams. They can’t just drag her name through the mud and expect me to heel when they wave a fucking carrot.”

Jax shakes his head. “That can’t happen. Acceptances come from the school itself.”

Again, I wonder if my name actually appeared on the Stone. The same shiver that zipped down my back when Ethan informed me that I was to attend The Academy returns. Who writes the names on the Stone? How powerful was the mage who created the Stone to have knowledge centuries into the future? The Zidruhin preach that the identity of the Stone’s creator is a dark mystery we aren’t supposed to question or understand, but what do priests know?

I scowl. Stone or no Stone, the Illumina won’t win—won’t control me—not after they ruined Grams’ reputation and stole my home.

“I’m with Grams,” I say. “And that means I’m against—”

“Stop being a baby,” Jax cuts in as he pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “The Illumina sealed the house and initiated court proceedings. You’re not getting the house.”