second day, he was barred from taking computer lessons in the big classroom beside Vivica’s office. He’d instigated a mutiny by getting every magickal supernatural student to abandon their lessons and compete in a computerized intergalactic war game.
So far, the only course that held his attention, even here in “solitary,” explained women’s bodies, their sexuality, and how he could enhance a woman’s sexual experience. After learning those mysteries, he wanted nothing and no one but Bronte McBride.
His brother Jaydun, who lived here, too, his apartment next to Vivica’s, to guard her from a mean-spirited journalist, said he should bide his time.
Darkwyn tried. He believed Jaydun had found his heart mate in Vivica, though neither would admit as much, perhaps not even to themselves.
Darkwyn opened a window to gaze in the general direction of the Phoenix. Not one for sitting still doing paperwork, or lessons, he’d agreed to a compromise. He slept wearing earphones and woke smarter in the morning. At roughly midnight, he started his night’s lesson, Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about Salem , before he settled into bed, arms behind his head.
Sleep became a strong taskmaster as he followed the lesson’s words and wandered Salem in twilight, allowing Morpheus, God of Dreams, to lead the way.
In a sleep state, rest gave way to awareness until panic slammed him to action.
Though he knew he slept still, he ran through foggy city streets, evading ghosts, ghouls, gray-faced zombies, and a floating red casket with Bronte inside.
A surge of strength and energy shot through him.
He reached the Phoenix in record time, but the brick building had spires and stained glass, with firelight dancing behind one peaked window.
“Bronte! Zachary!” Darkwyn shouted, while dragon-leaping from one metal balcony to the next, gaining hand-and footholds on granite bands and blocks.
On the opposite side of the firelit window, cool to the touch, came a destructive commotion. He broke the glass with a fist, blood spiraling down his arm as he leapt inside.
No fire, but moving light swept the room, blinding colors disturbing the shadows.
Everything appeared as if in reality, though he floated somewhere between sleep and awareness, between life and death.
He took a blow of powerful magick to the chest, hard, breath-stealing, his attacker burning a raw path down his cheek.
“Is anyone here?” he asked, then he identified his assailant, a glowing kitten, but which one? Lila or Scorch?
Stumbling across the room, he tripped over lamps, walked into caskets, grabbed the cat and dropped it into a salmon coffin, her growl fierce as a wildcat’s.
A lightning bolt came straight for him.
Darkwyn ducked, and the wall behind him glowed and cracked, the sound reverberating in an endless echo.
Darkwyn turned a dial where a light switch should be, throwing a chaotic jumble of bold, bright, and painful colors into a now pitch-black room. In this hellish light, or the odd black lack of it, the kitten glowed blood-garnet red and evil, its threat more acute and frightening, every hair delineated, almond eyes and paw pads amber with negative promise.
He turned the dial again, this time to light the room, and read the markers. ON, OFF, and BLACK LIGHT.
He retested the black light, and the kitten’s eyes glowed gold, again.
Scorch the Abyssinian, her evil revealed. Killian had not taken Bronte’s form, a thought he’d dismissed, but the almond-eyed cat’s. Scorch. How appropriate for a lightning thrower.
Darkwyn ducked a second bolt, and turned on the light. The cat had trashed the room. It meowed now, curling around his ankles—looking cuddly, innocent, sounding less like the cat from hell, so he tried black light, again, and saw a pure white kitten glow.
Killian, the evil sorceress, must sometimes abandon the cat to do her dirty deeds elsewhere, perhaps as a leaf pixie with Jaydun.
Darkwyn took the kitten in his arms. “Let’s
So far, the only course that held his attention, even here in “solitary,” explained women’s bodies, their sexuality, and how he could enhance a woman’s sexual experience. After learning those mysteries, he wanted nothing and no one but Bronte McBride.
His brother Jaydun, who lived here, too, his apartment next to Vivica’s, to guard her from a mean-spirited journalist, said he should bide his time.
Darkwyn tried. He believed Jaydun had found his heart mate in Vivica, though neither would admit as much, perhaps not even to themselves.
Darkwyn opened a window to gaze in the general direction of the Phoenix. Not one for sitting still doing paperwork, or lessons, he’d agreed to a compromise. He slept wearing earphones and woke smarter in the morning. At roughly midnight, he started his night’s lesson, Everything You Ever Wanted to Know about Salem , before he settled into bed, arms behind his head.
Sleep became a strong taskmaster as he followed the lesson’s words and wandered Salem in twilight, allowing Morpheus, God of Dreams, to lead the way.
In a sleep state, rest gave way to awareness until panic slammed him to action.
Though he knew he slept still, he ran through foggy city streets, evading ghosts, ghouls, gray-faced zombies, and a floating red casket with Bronte inside.
A surge of strength and energy shot through him.
He reached the Phoenix in record time, but the brick building had spires and stained glass, with firelight dancing behind one peaked window.
“Bronte! Zachary!” Darkwyn shouted, while dragon-leaping from one metal balcony to the next, gaining hand-and footholds on granite bands and blocks.
On the opposite side of the firelit window, cool to the touch, came a destructive commotion. He broke the glass with a fist, blood spiraling down his arm as he leapt inside.
No fire, but moving light swept the room, blinding colors disturbing the shadows.
Everything appeared as if in reality, though he floated somewhere between sleep and awareness, between life and death.
He took a blow of powerful magick to the chest, hard, breath-stealing, his attacker burning a raw path down his cheek.
“Is anyone here?” he asked, then he identified his assailant, a glowing kitten, but which one? Lila or Scorch?
Stumbling across the room, he tripped over lamps, walked into caskets, grabbed the cat and dropped it into a salmon coffin, her growl fierce as a wildcat’s.
A lightning bolt came straight for him.
Darkwyn ducked, and the wall behind him glowed and cracked, the sound reverberating in an endless echo.
Darkwyn turned a dial where a light switch should be, throwing a chaotic jumble of bold, bright, and painful colors into a now pitch-black room. In this hellish light, or the odd black lack of it, the kitten glowed blood-garnet red and evil, its threat more acute and frightening, every hair delineated, almond eyes and paw pads amber with negative promise.
He turned the dial again, this time to light the room, and read the markers. ON, OFF, and BLACK LIGHT.
He retested the black light, and the kitten’s eyes glowed gold, again.
Scorch the Abyssinian, her evil revealed. Killian had not taken Bronte’s form, a thought he’d dismissed, but the almond-eyed cat’s. Scorch. How appropriate for a lightning thrower.
Darkwyn ducked a second bolt, and turned on the light. The cat had trashed the room. It meowed now, curling around his ankles—looking cuddly, innocent, sounding less like the cat from hell, so he tried black light, again, and saw a pure white kitten glow.
Killian, the evil sorceress, must sometimes abandon the cat to do her dirty deeds elsewhere, perhaps as a leaf pixie with Jaydun.
Darkwyn took the kitten in his arms. “Let’s
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