Page 22

22

EMBERLYNN

I ’ve seen death before. I’ve seen dead bodies before. But even during my time as Shadow Man’s prisoner, I never saw a body without a head.

“Who is that?” Nico whispers in horror. “Is that James?”

“I don’t know.” Wylder shuffles back, bumping into me again. “And why isn’t there any blood?”

“Why isn’t there a head?” Nico frantically rubs at his forehead, as if attempting to scrub the memory of this away. “We need to call the council.”

“I know.” Wylder’s feet momentarily remain firmly planted to the floor before he snaps out of his shocked trance, snatches hold of my hand, and dashes toward the front door.

Nico runs after us, his boots thudding against the linoleum flooring. “Why are we running?”

“Because it just occurred to me that whatever did this could be lurking around inside the store.” Wylder fumbles for his phone as we burst out of the building.

Nico comes up right behind me, so his chest is pressed to my back and circles his arms around my waist. “I need to get you home.”

“Take her to my place and try to call Kaiden and Phoenix.” Wylder dials a number into his phone. “I know they might not answer, but maybe we’ll get lucky.”

“I hope so. We need Kaiden.” Nico strides forward, moving me with him.

“We can’t just leave Wylder by himself,” I protest as we hurry across the street.

“Wylder will be fine, pretty eyes.” He slants forward to look left then right before we duck down a path. “It’s you we need to worry about. First the doughnuts get poisoned, and then the baker dies, probably to cover up whoever did it.”

As we reach the center of the path where the thick shrubbery and towering trees conceal the view of town, Nico comes to a stop and swings around in front of me.

“I’m going to get us back to Wylder’s place quickly, but it’ll feel a bit strange, okay?”

I nod?—

Swoosh .

One second, we’re standing on the path amongst the swaying trees, and the next, we’re swishing like a fast-forwarding movie. When we stop, it’s jarring enough that I stumble and smack into the front door of Wylder’s home. It flies open, bangs against the wall, knocks down the coatrack, and Nico and I trip over it, falling onto the floor. I land on top of Nico, and he grunts as my knee bashes his abdomen.

“Oh my goodness!” Stella, Wylder’s mother, cries out as she hurries over to us. “What happened?”

I push off Nico. “He made us do superspeed, and I lost my balance when we stopped. I’m so sorry.”

“I teleported us,” Nico clarifies as he sits up, rubbing his side. “She’s never done that before.”

“I’m sorry,” I repeat as I stand the coatrack back up.

“You don’t need to be sorry, hon. Accidents happen, especially when you’re first learning.” She offers me a kind smile that fades as Nico stands up. “Why did you teleport here? Weren’t you just in town?”

“We found a body,” Nico informs her, brushing a leaf out of his hair. “Of James, the baker who owns Witches Doughnuts, Bites, and Sparking Delights.”

She gasps, covering her mouth with her hand. “No, not James. He was such a sweet old man.” Her eyes well with tears. “Was it natural causes?”

Nico reluctantly shakes his head. “We think it was … murder.”

Tears fall from her eyes. “I need to go find Lila. She’s at practice and doesn’t have her phone.” She drops the dishrag she was holding, pushes past us, and sprints out the front door, slamming it behind her.

“Why is she so frantic to find Lila?” I ask Wylder as he plucks a twig out of my hair.

“Wylder’s father was murdered.” He drops the twig on the floor. “That makes murder a touchy subject for the Averly family.”

“I think it is for all families,” I say as we take a seat on the sofa.

“Not for Kaiden’s or Phoenix’s,” he replies ominously, his attention fastened on the window. “I need to call them.” He raises his hips and removes his phone from his pocket. He calls Kaiden first, to no avail. The same goes for Phoenix.

“You know what? Fuck this. We need them.” He bounds to his feet and shoves open the window. Then he rips a piece of paper out of a notebook and grabs a pen.

“What’re you doing?” I ask as he poises the pen to the paper.

“Getting them a message.” He briefly contemplates before writing:

You need to come to Wylder’s now. There’s been a murder, and we need help. He picks up the paper, but I steal it from him.

“With what happened, they’ll think I’m the one who was murdered,” I point out as I read it.

“Right.” At the bottom, he scribbles :

The murdered creature isn’t Emberlynn.

“It’s blunt, but I guess it works.” My head is spinning with everything going on.

This is crazy. And scary. And I can’t shake the guilty feeling it’s all my fault.

“Blunt is best when it comes to Kaiden. Remember that.” He signs it with a crescent moon symbol and a star below it then crumbles up the paper.

“Why did you do that?” I start to ask, but he places the balled-up paper in his hand, lifts it to his lips, and blows on it.

The edges of the paper smolder with tiny teal flames, and the ball of paper flies away toward the trees with a trail of wispy blue smoke following after it.

Astonished, I turn to Nico. “Why do you guys even use phones?”

He shrugs. “It makes things simpler sometimes. Just so you know, our phones run by magical waves. I’m not sure what humans use to do that.”

“Satellites.”

“What are those?”

“Nothing as awesome as magic.”

He faintly chuckles but then wearily sighs. “Come on; let’s sit down and wait for Kaiden and Phoenix to come. ”

“Will that letter really work?” I wonder as he closes the window and fastens the lock. “Especially with Kaiden since he's in trouble.”

He nods, offering me his hand. “With this, he’ll find a way out.”