Total pages in book: 154
Estimated words: 145721 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145721 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
But if they took Ethan to a hospital and it was the wish powder, then even if they got in, which was a slim chance at best, there was nothing the doctors could do for him. It would all be for nothing. They could pump his stomach, and the magic wouldn’t dissipate. His wish could still kill him.
Graves would know if there was magic involved, but they didn’t have time to go get him.
They only had her.
Chapter Forty-Nine
“Let me in,” Kierse said, pushing Maura aside to get to Ethan.
“What are you doing?” Maura demanded.
“Kierse?” Gen asked as if sensing the shift in her.
Without warning, she pressed her hands to Ethan’s chest and closed her eyes. The magic was there. She just needed to find it, sense it, and feel the weight of it. She’d never done it before, but this wasn’t practice. This was life or death.
So, she delved deeper and deeper. She pushed at the spaces of her awareness that she had never tapped into. All those moments she had been quicker, faster, stronger than others her age and older. When she should have been a small runt of a girl who died on the streets, but she had survived. It was those instincts that had kept her alive. It was her own magic and strength that had done that. She would need both for this to work.
Like a sudden awakening of her senses . . . it was there.
Soft at first. A gentle brush against her awareness. A yearning breeze that said winter was over and spring was coming. Kierse latched on to that feeling, the strange newness within her mind. She clung to it, calling it forth until it came fully into focus. A bright light in the darkness.
She’d been right.
Magic suffused Ethan’s body. Head to toe, he was tainted with it. The vessel for Imani’s powers, the heat and brush of her magic made manifest.
And still there was something more—flowers. She could smell flowers. Specifically lily flowers. She’d never been able to smell another warlock’s magic before, but now she was certain that Imani’s magic had the cloying, overpowering smell of lilies. Kierse nearly gagged on the taste and oppressive smell of it.
But she refused to lose focus, because next up was the tricky part. She had to absorb the wish magic from Ethan’s body and draw it into hers. Kierse had never consciously absorbed magic before. Fear clogged her senses. Not the fear that she couldn’t do it, but the fear that she could. That she would draw it into herself and drown in that magic again.
Would she survive this? Could she come out whole and strong again after what Imani’s magic had reduced her to last time? Without even the antidote from Graves to stabilize her. She opened her mouth, wanting to tell them to call Graves. Please let someone else bear this burden.
But as she did it, the threads slipped. She almost lost Ethan, and he began to seize.
“Kierse!” Corey cried.
Maura tried to shoulder her way in, but Kierse held firm. She closed her eyes, reached for that cloying fragrance, and dug in again.
Graves couldn’t help her right now. She was the one who had to figure this out and deal with whatever came after once she was through.
Her hands trembled against Ethan’s chest, and for a second, it felt as if something clutched her around the middle. As if she were completely immobilized by that crushing ache. It felt like a ten-ton brick weighing down on her, overwhelming her from all sides and trying to sever the connection.
Then there was a hand on her arm. Just the faintest brush of Gen’s fingers. And under that touch, she took in a breath and another. Kierse felt it then . . . Gen’s own magic, of a sort. Not warlock magic. Just a light at the end of a long tunnel. The part of Gen that had always let her read tarot cards and made her medicines so potent. The part of Gen that collected broken strays and nursed them back to health. The part of Gen that was just . . . Gen.
Gen’s touch said she was here. She believed in Kierse. That Kierse could do this. Gen didn’t need to know what was happening to trust that Kierse could do it. It was what she needed. Gen always knew what she needed.
And as Kierse wrapped her magic around that kernel of Gen’s powers and brought the combined weight down toward Ethan, she felt another flicker respond.
Ethan.
A different light than within Kierse or Gen. The part of Ethan that made his plants grow. The part of Ethan that kept him buoyant even in the dark times. The part of Ethan that was purely Ethan.
It pulsed to life at their touch and made a bridge to finish off their triangle. Threefold. A trinity. The beginning, middle, and end. Just enough to bind them together.