Page 1 of Magic Claimed
ONE
I was falling again.
Tumbling wildly through the air, buffeted by winds and flying debris. A scream ripped from my throat, but it made no sound. Even the storm was silent as it tossed me like a leaf—boneless, weightless, discarded and forgotten. The ground beneath me yawned wide, like a mouth preparing to swallow me whole, and I flailed in desperation, clawing the air, searching for hope.
But it was useless. The tornado spun me in violent cartwheels, and the already dim light began to flicker as consciousness faded. I was blacking out, but that was a mercy, because the ground loomed nearer… nearer…
I couldn’t die. Someone was supposed to save me. But no wings swooped out of the darkness. No powerful claws yanked me out of the storm’s clutches. I fell and fell and then hit the ground with a spine-rattling jolt…
And then I was staring at the ceiling of my bedroom,tangled in sweat-damp sheets, my heart pounding uncomfortably as flickering lights continued to dance at the corners of my vision.
Drat these stupid dreams.
It had been just over a week since I’d briefly experienced unassisted flight at the hands of an out-of-control elemental. Just over a week since the tornado that had come so close to killing me, along with Logan, Kes, and our misguided kidnappers. I’d survived—thanks to a literal last-second rescue by the most powerful dragon on the planet—but apparently my brain was still trying to process the trauma.
Probably didn’t help that the elemental in question was currently sleeping on the couch in my living room.
Ornotsleeping, judging by the odd flashes of light coming from under the door. He must be up watching… the TV we didn’t have?
I sat bolt upright and tried to jump out of bed, but I was tripped up by the bedding and let out a muffled yelp as I fell, narrowly avoiding hitting my head on the way down.
“Raine!” Kes sounded panicky, and I could hear her patting the bed beside her. Searching for Ari—a justifiable reflex when you slept next to a six-year-old who could teleport.
Thankfully, Ari was at a sleepover with our friend, Kira.
“She’s fine,” I murmured, while struggling to extricate my legs from a sheet that was trying its hardest to impersonate a boa constrictor. “I think it’s Ethan.”
Much like me, our current houseguest had once been human. Also like me, Ethan had been kidnapped andstuffed to the brim with magic as a part of the former fae queen’s highly illegal experiments.
But as bad as my own experiences were, his had been so much worse. Nearly torn apart by the forces of uncontrollable magic, he’d spent who knew how long being sedated, exploited, and abused. Used as a magical battery and treated as a pariah by those who were terrified of his power.
Which was pretty much everyone, including me.
But he still deserved a chance at a normal life, so after we’d fought off a crew of murderous mercenaries and survived a kidnapping attempt, Ethan had come to live with us. It had been a week now, and we’d been hoping that between Kes’s ability to drain his elemental powers and Kira’s magic-suppressing bracelet, he might be able to keep his abilities safely under control. However, from the looks of things, we might have been overly optimistic…
After finally freeing myself from the bedding, I stumbled sleepily towards the door and eased it open, only to stumble back again with a quiet but heartfelt curse at the sight of our couch—or rather its ratty gray cushions—engulfed in flames.
And Ethan? He was lying on the floor, a throw pillow under his head, eyes closed, mouth slightly open… still sound asleep.
He’d set the couch on fire in his sleep. Somehow his unconscious mind had found a way around the bracelet’s block and unleashed his elemental magic.
Which meant we were all in so, so much trouble…
But that was a problem for future me. Right now, I needed to put out the fire before it set off the alarms, but extinguishing it would do no good if I couldn’t wake Ethan and stop him fromstarting more. Given that his sleeping mind could control his magic, that meant I had to do so very carefully, or his subconscious might identify me as a threat.
“Ethan.” I kept my voice steady and calm. Hoping the sound of his name would be enough to wake him without scaring him. “Ethan, it’s Raine. You need to wake up.”
He didn’t budge, and I glanced to the side as Kes appeared at my elbow, her eyes wide and terrified.
“Can you stop him?” I hated to ask, but she nodded without hesitation, her eyes still glued to the flames.
“If you can put that out.”
Easy peasy. All I needed was a little bit of water and my own elemental magic…
I took a single cautious step forward, and that’s when the klaxon cry of the fire alarm began to blare from every room in the apartment.
A few things happened at once.
