Page 68 of Fated to the Lone Shifter
I tell myself I have time. I tell myself I’m still in control.
But the truth is, I’ve never been this far in on a case and still felt this lost.
I whisper one more line—this one just for me.
“Let me hold the fire, not be burned by it.”
Then I open my eyes.
The sage is almost out.
The salt glows faintly, just for a second, before fading.
And I know—whatever comes today, I’m going to need every ounce of balance I just scraped together.
Now for the locating spell.
The clearing hums beneath me—old magic, older than even the trees that form a perfect circle around me. Moonlight filters through the canopy in soft shafts, illuminating the crude symbols I’ve drawn into the soil with ash and salt.
I kneel in the center, breath fogging in the cool air, hands trembling as I place one of Tori’s gloves on the ground before me.
"Loca Tori," I whisper, voice low and reverent. "By root and flame, by blood and name, Reveal to me the path she claims. Through soil, smoke, and shadowed line, Let her presence answer mine."
I press my palm to the glove, channeling heat into the earth. Power pulses from my chest, through my arm, into the circle.
For a moment, the world stills.
Then the leaves shudder. A spark flickers in the center of the sigil. Smoke curls upward like a thread of incense… and dies.
Nothing.
Not a shimmer. Not a pull.
Just silence.
The spell breaks with a brittle snap in my chest, like dry twigs cracking underfoot. I gasp, the sudden emptiness hollowing me out. Magic drains from my limbs, and I slump backward, chest aching, heart sinking into something cold and afraid.
Either Tori’s too far, doesn’t want to be found or…that last one is a little too painful to express even to myself.
And I’m running out of time.
It is late in the afternoon when I am dropped off in a barn with Ember after being picked up on my way back to the dorm. The scent of hay and dust mixes with something sharper—anticipation, perhaps. Ember paces like a caged animal, their features obscured by shadows and their voice taut with frustration.
“You need to do better,” Ember snaps. “We’re not getting the intelligence we expected from you.”
I nod, pretending to focus. But my thoughts are on Tori—my cousin, my healer, my anchor. The one person who has helped me navigate this mess of magic, lies, and supernatural chaos. I try again to reach her telepathically, pushing past my fear and the swirl of magical static. I am starting to receive a signal, panicked, disrupted. Something is wrong.
The sigil burned into my door two nights ago flashes through my mind. The Lunaris Curse. The wolves at our door. Is this all connected? Did the arsonists take her because of me?
I can’t focus. Ember’s voice cuts through my fog. “Another source has shared some curious things. Bursts of energy. Flames igniting without a source. Magical healing.” They narrow their eyes at me. “Some of the same energy we found in the ash and the stone you brought back.”
Inside, my spidey senses are screaming. How much do they know? Who told them? What are they going to do with me now? Outside, I feign confusion. “Flames and healing? That could’ve been Marcus. He loves to pull pranks like that.”
Ember studies me for a moment too long, their gaze sharp and searching, like a scalpel peeling back skin. The air tightens around us, brittle with suspicion. They're not buying my subterfuge—not for a second.
“Can we trust you, Sera? I need to know where your loyalties are.” Ember’s tone is threatening.
“You know where my loyalties are. I’m an FBI agent,” I state for the record, but there’s a quiver in my voice I don’t need a lie detector to detect. And neither does Ember.
