Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 109329 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 547(@200wpm)___ 437(@250wpm)___ 364(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 109329 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 547(@200wpm)___ 437(@250wpm)___ 364(@300wpm)
“Why am I doing this?” My whole body shook, adrenaline coursing through me. I worried I’d accidentally kill her, yes, but also that she’d pound me into the ground. I’d stood up to her when it was necessary. Now…it wasn’t necessary. I didn’t have as much courage when the only stakes involved were my getting pulverized.
“We do not know, darling.” Aunt Florence lifted her eyebrows at me. “Seems like a bad idea. But you’re full of bad ideas! What’s one more? And look, we have these very powerful shifters ready to help you if something goes wrong, and we have that fabulously handsome gargoyle in the sky—”
“Tristan reads you so well, Jessie,” Patty cut in. “He’ll swoop down and pluck you out of the air if you go sailing, don’t you worry.”
“Is anyone rooting for me?” I asked lamely.
“Of course we are.” Patty nodded adamantly. “Everyone loves a good underdog story.”
“Underdog, great.” I let go a breath. “Fine. Let’s do this.”
Warmth and love radiated from the bonds with Austin, and then aggression and fire. I needed to let my gargoyle out.
Connections lit up in my awareness as an impending battle beat on my nerves. Magic started to pump through me.
“There you go. Good. Yes.” Aunt Florence put up a fist. “That’s it. Get ready. We’re with you.”
I thought about changing into my gargoyle form, but then I couldn’t move as fast on the ground. Flying wouldn’t make sense with all the trees. I’d need to start in my human form until I found her, and then…figure it out.
“This is a very strange challenge,” I murmured, setting out.
The goal was to find her within the wood as she stalked me, thwart her attack, and take her down without killing her. Not killing her was literally part of the challenge. If I failed? Well, she died. She apparently had faith that I wouldn’t fail.
But no matter—if I did fail, she held no ill will, and the basajaunak would not avenge her death even though it was a grave insult to harm an elder.
She was much too nonchalant about the whole thing. It made me uncomfortable.
I needed to go through with this, though. I felt it. This was a test of some kind. It wasn’t about power, and it wasn’t about skill. It wasn’t even about my ability to kill or not kill her. There was something else she was looking for, and if I produced whatever it was within this strange trial, she’d be more than distant kin, brought in by Dave. She would choose me—us—as family. We’d have the approval and blessing of an elder. In their culture, that was a huge deal.
So here I was, agreeing to all her terms. Ivy House was keeping everyone’s whereabouts from me, but the Elder could still feel me through the trees.
“It is starting to worry me that you haven’t figured out how to circumvent that trick of mine,” Ivy House said as I walked toward the wood.
“I’ve been freaking busy,” I groused, ticking off the list. “I don’t have all the right spells, Nessa wants me to learn about ley lines and nexuses and whatever else, Sebastian wants help going through the books in your library—
“Focus on the task at hand,” she cut in, “or you’ll get thwapped by treetops. Getting drop-kicked will be embarrassing.”
I stopped in irritation. She was the reason I was thinking about my laundry list in the first place!
Edgar appeared from around a trunk. He pointed off to the left, nodded slowly, and then disappeared again. From the other side of the tree, a thumb jutted out. Nessa’s. They would be dogging my feet even though it wasn’t likely they could help when that she-beast rushed me.
“Don’t worry about it,” I murmured, shaking out my limbs. “I have excellent reflexes. I’m fast. I will react in time.”
“Just don’t react with a really terrible spell,” Ivy House said.
I ignored her. Kinda. That was, after all, the big worry.
My magic blanketed the area in front of me and then off to the sides. I went the direction Edgar said to go.
Sebastian had been invited to magically help me “see,” but he’d said no. Hard no. He didn’t want to watch, even flying above. He knew he’d somehow become the butt of their jokes.
Sadly, he was probably right. He’d faint or something, and they’d all die laughing.
My magical spell hit a shifter. Then another. Then a lump squatting behind a bush. A basajaunak hiding.
It was hunched down, but even still, I could tell it wasn’t big enough to be the Elder.
Austin passed right by it, and from the bonds I could tell he sensed its presence but felt no concern. He knew it wasn’t powerful enough or dangerous enough to be the Elder.
Only the Elder would attack me. She’d made that point clear. Regardless of who else hung around the woods, she was the only one I should engage. Everyone else should be ignored.