Page 56 of Awakened Ash and Alchemy

“I won’t hurt you, Angela.”

“Then take me home. Now.” Angela’s grip tightened on the raised poker, like a baseball player ready to swing for that home run.

“You can’t go back. You’re in danger now, not from me—”

“From where I’m standing, it sure looks like it’s you.”

“I’m not your enemy.”

“Yeah, well, heroes don’t behave like this.”

“I’m no hero. I’m a warrior acting on orders.”

“So, you’re not the one in charge?” Holy-smoking-candles, who was the boss? “Why am I here?”

“It’s complicated.”

“That’s an excuse, not an answer.”

“So I’ll try to answer as best I can.” He exhaled heavily, his boot soles scraping along the slate floor as if bringing his knees up while his back pressed against the door. “The first night we met, when that second group of Black Cloaks appeared, you warned me they were there, before I did. Remember?”

How could she forget?

“You sensed them.”

“What do you mean sensed them? I don’t understand any of this.”

“Magick senses magick, especially in the mortal realm where it’s become so diluted it’s barely recognizable. Centuries of mortal breeding has all but destroyed magickal bloodlines. Then there were those persecuted like your historical witch trials, driving those with power into hiding or silence. What little remains is hunted by the Black Cloaks that there is barely anything left in your world.”

“So basically you’re saying magic is an endangered species.” She so wanted to roll her eyes, but that would mean she was calm and not some hostage.

“In your world, yes. That night, with you, I didn’t sense that pair of Black Cloaks, not until you pointed at them. And for me, that’s dangerous. They could’ve easily killed me.”

Her stomach turned at the thought of him being injured. “So I’m the problem.” In more ways than one; it was impossible to fathom how she could care for this man that took her! What is wrong with me?

“No, not like that. You block our ability to sense magick.”

“I don’t believe in your magic, or know what it is.” This was some nightmare, right?

“We classify magic into two categories. Magick with a k, is the power we are born with. The power that lives inside us. Mine. My brothers’. Katarra’s.”

Angela’s brows shifted into a frown. “And that’s different from… what?”

“From magic, that is constructed power. Wards. Glamours. Spells. Anything created.”

She listened hard, loosening her grip on the fire poker enough to let it rest on her shoulder. “You’re telling me, I block magic?”

“You don’t just block it, Angela. You disrupt it completely. As if immune.”

The poker became so absurdly heavy that she let it fall, and it clattered against the marble floor. This wasn’t superstition or another one of Aunt Claudine’s stories about the old ways of folklore that Angela had politely rolled her eyes at for years.

“And I cancel it out?” she asked, quieter now. “How?”

“When I stand near you, my magick cannot be sensed. It’s as if it’s shielded somehow. My brothers can’t sense me, and I can’t sense Katarra’s Black Cloaks either. Also, our cloaking spells don’t work with you when they should. It’s how you can see Black Cloaks and me, when we’re all heavily cloaked—like the bar.”

She frowned at the door. “Wait. When you tossed me over your shoulder and took me—who knows where—you were testing it was me? To check it wasn’t some weird black hole, like the way cell phones drop out in certain areas?”

“Yes.”