Page 9 of Hellfire

Blaze snapped up from his sagged position over his book, yawning and stretching his chest and arms. “What?”

“Are black candles part of an invisibility spell?” I asked.

Gildrons like us didn’t get taught the ins and outs of spells as that was the Hadrians’ role. They were our go-to whenever we wanted particular spells, ingredients, or weapons. Invisibility spells required cloaking or reflection of light, and I wondered if black candles came into the equation.

“I’ll check.” Blaze’s chair creaked as he stood and moved to the bookshelf, scanning for a text, selecting one and bringing it over to the desk we shared. His finger trailed down the book’s contents page, and he flipped to the desired page. “Yep, they can be. Why, are some missing?”

I spun my book around to show him. “Three missing black candles on separate dates.”

Nothing to crow about and could be easily explained by something as minor as a Hadrian forgetting to track the inventory. Twenty missing tapers or more was reason for alarm. But we had to chase down every lead, and something about this made my gut instincts prickle.

Blaze continued to read from the spell, “It says here that invisibility spells require the scales of a chameleon, spider’s leg, newt eye, and mug wart.”

I checked my list of missing items. “They’re all on here.”

“We’ll take it to Talon.” Blaze set the book down. “Anything else?”

I reeled off the misplaced ingredients on my list, and he checked the bibliography, finding the corresponding spells, and what do you know, they assisted in the erasure of spells.

“I’ll be damned.” I put a strip of paper in the ledger to keep my page and slammed it shut. “I think we’ve found our smoking gun.”

Blaze captured pictures of the spell’s ingredients and procedure, and we took our lists to The Eye to show Talon.

He jerked his head, signaling for us to enter the conference room on the right-hand side of the room, where they often had meetings with Tollens from other Guild facilities. Matters like this required the utmost privacy when it could tip of the mole and send them running.

“What have you got?” He massaged the back of his neck like he’d been seated at a desk longer than us.

My friend stretched his legs on a chair as we ran through our findings, showing him our lists and the pictures, building our case.

At the end, Blaze asked, “Can you check the security footage of the storage rooms and find out who entered on those dates?”

“Yes, I can.” Talon’s deviant smile spelled the end of our traitor problem.

“I’m happy to help.” Blaze stuffed his notebook in his hoodie since he wasn’t allowed to wear the official Guild uniform during his suspension. “Run me through how to search the footage.”

Someone was keen to nail the traitor.

Talon crossed to the door and grabbed the handle. “With pleasure.”

CHAPTER 4 - LUNA

“Oh, God, these are good,” I moaned.

“That’s my job.” Cole dipped a churro in butterscotch sauce and lifted it to my lips. Syrup dripped on my chin as I took a bite, and he leaned over the table, licking it off me. “You taste so sweet.”

I laughed at him and fed him back with churro covered in hazelnut sauce instead. I purposefully dabbed it on his nose, grinning as I reached over to clean him up.

He swapped seats, coming to rest beside me, and leaned in close, growling at me, “We’re taking some of these to go, and I’m going to lick the sauce off your body.”

Yes, please!

My ovaries produced another hundred eggs for the occasion.

An elderly customer inCoffee Countrygave us the evil eye, and we laughed and did it again, making a show of it. She huffed and turned away.

I didn’t care about the public displays of affection and I sure as hell didn’t care what people thought when I was having fun. We were going to damn well enjoy each other’s company on the last day before semester two started tomorrow.

“That belongs to me.” I wrapped my hand behind his neck and brought him down for a kiss to taste him. “Mmmm. I’m going to do the same to you.” I ran my palm down his chest in anticipation of getting back to our room.

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