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“Kara …” Paul stepped forward cautiously, one hand raised. “Xan’s a norm, right? Whatever’s happened—”

“Bullshit,” she snapped, her tail flicking in agitation behind her. “I know what I felt.” A delicate frown creased her brow. “ Feel . He’s still doing it.”

As far as I was aware, I wasn’t doing anything. I couldn’t . I only had two powers, and—

My slow aging, which had long felt stagnant, now surged beneath my skin like a dark tide. It felt eager, as if it had a mind of its own.

That wasn’t supposed to be how it worked. Powers manifested at adulthood and stayed fixed. Everyone knew this.

How had mine grown?

I checked again, not believing what I could feel.

My power swirled inside me, stronger and more alive than ever before.

Part of it had stretched out hungrily toward Kara—like a tendril.

Or a … tether? My breath caught. It had to be a Halloween effect.

All of it—the weird shift in my power, the strength of it, the connection to Kara.

Tomorrow, it would all be the same as it had been.

“Oh, shit. What happened?” Emma’s voice cut through the heavy silence, pulling me from my thoughts.

She walked back in from the storeroom, her eyes flicking from Kara to Paul, then to the watching supes, before landing on me amid the wreckage of table splinters and overturned chairs. “Xan! You’re hurt!”

Adrenaline had dulled the pain, but Emma’s cry brought it rushing back. My arm ached sharply; I was sure it was broken. A splinter of wood had pierced my shirt, embedded in my back. I pushed myself up to a sitting position and winced at the movement.

I gave her a weak smile. “Nothing the healers can’t fix.”

Emma came around the bar. “All of you, get out. Bar’s closed. That’s quite enough for one night.”

Though barely five feet and a norm, her fierce expression sent the supes filing out the door. The rest of my bar staff stirred themselves and started to clean up, casting me worried looks as they gathered stray glasses.

Kara folded her arms. “I’m not going anywhere.” Her nimbus of dark aether receded and her horns shrank back into small, shiny black nubs. The red glow faded from her eyes, returning to emerald green, but her whip remained coiled in her hand.

Paul didn’t move either.

Crystal came over, crouching beside me. “I have minor healing. Want me to try?”

“Sure,” I said. Nothing to lose.

She closed her eyes and extended her hands, and a wave of cooling water aether brushed over me. I gritted my teeth as my arm bone shifted, grating against itself. Then the pain faded and the magic dispersed.

“Thanks. Good as new.” I flexed my arm. “That was just minor healing?”

Crystal gave a smile. “I guess my power is stronger tonight.”

“Happy to take the benefits.” I pushed myself to my feet and touched the spot where the splinter had pierced my back. It felt like it was an inch into my skin, and I grimaced as I pulled out a sliver of wood from one of my bar tables.

“I can fix that too,” Crystal said. “Hold still.”

She healed the ache in seconds. My shirt felt damp and sticky, but I figured that was more from my blood than her water aether. I needed a new one anyway. Conrad had torn half of it off me.

“Are you done?” Kara demanded.

“Yes,” Crystal said, stepping back quickly. No one wanted to mess with the succubus after how easily she’d dealt with Conrad and his wolves.

Kara stepped forward into my space, glaring at me. “What did you do to me?” she spat, then, like she couldn’t help herself, she tagged on, “Master.”

I had no idea why she called me that. Some succubus thing, maybe?

“Fuck,” she muttered, glancing away. “I can’t even talk to him without calling him …”

Paul’s lips twitched as he watched. “Someone must be playing a joke,” he said. “Were there any mind mages in the bar tonight?”

“How would we know?” Crystal replied. “Besides, no one would admit to that.”

She wasn’t wrong. But I knew there hadn’t been—I’d have felt mind aether if it had been present.

It had a bad rep even among supes, for obvious reasons.

The ability to compel someone to act against their will was unpopular, to say the least. Paul’s fae glamour was different; it only made him more charismatic.

It couldn’t force someone to do something they didn’t want to.

“Everyone’s left,” Kara said. “Doesn’t a mind compulsion fade if the mage isn’t around?”

Paul shrugged. “Depends on the magic.”

He would know better than me—I’d spent three decades keeping away from supes as best I could. With my powers so weak, that was prudent. I was only friends with Paul because we’d somehow ended up sharing an apartment.

The bar door opened and Professor Baldwin strode in. He was in his mid-sixties but looked younger by a couple of decades, his large frame and shaggy long hair giving hints to his supe magic; he was a werebear, powerful enough to keep all the other weres on campus under control. Usually.

He cast an eye over the smashed furniture and the state of my shirt. “What the hell happened here?” Then he paused, sniffed the air, and looked at me more sharply than before.

“Conrad,” Emma replied. “He and three of his pack came and picked a fight with Xan.”

Baldwin dragged his eyes off me as if with an effort. “Shit,” he said, his voice a deep rumble. “Where did they go?”

“Kara scared them off,” Crystal said, while the succubus folded her arms again, her tail lashing irritably as she stared daggers at everyone but pointedly avoided me.

Baldwin raised an eyebrow at her. “Pretty impressive.”

“That doesn’t matter now,” Kara said. “More important, some mind mage has used a compulsion on me.”

Baldwin’s other eyebrow rose to join the first. “That’s a serious allegation. Do you have any proof?”

She opened her mouth to respond, then shut it with a click, her glower answering for her.

“What did they make you do?” Baldwin asked.

“Defend him,” she said, jerking her thumb toward me. She still wasn’t making eye contact.

“Doesn’t sound so bad,” the professor replied. “Could just be a defensive instinct manifesting unusually, because Halloween and all.” He shrugged his massive shoulders. “Disconcerting, I grant you, but as you’ve clearly suffered no ill-effects, I wouldn’t worry too much.”

Kara looked like she wanted to argue, but settled for another scowl.

Baldwin turned for the door, throwing a final frown my way. “Well, if there’s nothing else, I need to go and track down those weres.”

“Thanks, Professor,” I said. He grunted, then left. He knew I was a supe, but he also knew what little my powers could do. I wondered what had puzzled him.

“Well, that’s that,” Paul said with a sigh. “No point in a lock-in anymore, Xan. Crystal and I are gonna call it a night. Coming, Kara?”

“Yeah.”

“Right,” I agreed. “I’m going to close up and walk Emma home. Thanks for healing me, Crystal.”

The selkie gave me a smile and pressed herself to Paul’s side.

“You guys be safe, okay?” Paul said, sliding his arm around Crystal’s waist. Then his cheeky grin returned. “Don’t wait up, Xan.”

“You guys can head off too,” I said to the rest of my bar staff. They’d cleared most of the mess by now. “Leave the rest for tomorrow.”

We fetched our coats from the storeroom, and I grabbed Emma’s too. When I walked back into the bar, Kara was still standing there, arms folded. I paused in mid-step, then continued on and held Emma’s coat for her, ignoring the succubus. She could do what she wanted.

“Ready?”

“Yeah,” Emma said, shrugging on her coat. She frowned at Kara but said nothing.

We all trooped outside, the air biting enough to make me tuck my hands into my pockets. My staff gave muttered goodbyes and headed off, but Emma waited while I triggered the window shutters and locked the door. Kara stood nearby, still avoiding eye contact.

“Are you heading home too?” I asked in reflex, before remembering I didn’t like her and didn’t need to care.

“I …” She gritted her teeth and swallowed hard, then turned away and addressed the night. “I haven’t decided yet.”

“Er … okay. Well, thanks for helping me in there, and sorry about … the compulsion thing.”

Kara made a noncommittal sound, like she couldn’t admit she’d helped me. I left her to stew and walked on, Emma falling into step beside me.

“She’ll be all right, won’t she?”

“After the way she dealt with Conrad? Yeah, I figure she’s pretty safe by herself. Like you said, the campus has extra patrols tonight.”

We took one of the many paths that crisscrossed the campus green—cracked asphalt decorated with shriveled dandelions, streetlights spaced every dozen yards, wending through lawn areas dotted with trees, the corners muddy where students took shortcuts.

The main buildings loomed in the distance, while residence halls ringed the green, punctuated with the odd coffee shop.

We passed a pair of uniformed campus security armed with aether-powered stun batons, who nodded as they recognized me.

“Weird night.” Emma hugged herself as she walked. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine.” I was better than fine; I felt energized, like never before. All I wanted to do was get Emma home, then sit down with my new power and figure out what the hell had happened.

“Can’t believe Conrad attacked you. He’s totally getting expelled.”

I laughed it off. “Just Halloween hijinks. I doubt anything will happen. No harm done.”

She stared at me. “No harm done? He assaulted you and trashed the bar!”

Three students approached us, laughing too loud as they staggered along the path.

I let my senses run over them: two wore wolf costumes, but neither of them was a supernatural.

One was a wind elemental, glamoured to appear human, leaning on a friend, happily drunk.

She gave me a long look as they walked by.

I waited for them to pass before I replied to Emma. “It’s not so bad. Chloe healed me, and it was just one table.”

“Crystal.”

“What?”

“Crystal. You said Chloe.”