Page 1 of Love At First Roar
1
CORA
The night smelled of ozone and desperation.
Cora Thorne’s boots slapped the cobblestones of Blackwick Square, the cramped market on the borderline of the human world. Vendors had long since taken down their tents and closed their windows but lights still blazed on causing eerie shadows to fit the night. Somewhere behind her, Elric’s laughter chased like broken glass.Mine, little fae. You promised me forever.
“Not tonight,” she breathed, voice trembling.
Cora ducked into an alley, fingers already weaving the sigils for a protection ward. She’d practiced the spell a thousand times. Easy as breathing, Mama used to say, but panic knotted her will. A bead of crimson from a cut on her palm marked the first circle, silver glamor lit the second, and a third ring, green as old forest moss, closed around her ankles. The ward should have shimmered like a flower opening?… but the colors snagged. Swirled. Inverted.
“Oh, don’t you dare?—”
Magic detonated, yanking her backward through a tunnel of churning mist. Cold wind howled in her ears, carried the biteof pine sap and river stone, and then everything went blinding white.
She landed hard on her hip, the breath smashing right out of her lungs.
When the world steadied, Cora was facedown on a forest floor, cheek pressed to damp moss. A hush blanketed the ancient oaks that were so thick she’d never wrap her arms halfway around one, and each trunk pulsed with faintly glowing runes. Moonlight filtered through heavy boughs, turning the mist to silver ribbons.
“Where in Titania’s name?…??” She pushed onto her elbows, but dizziness washed through her skull in nauseating waves. The ward had misfired, flinging her who-knew-where rather than building a safe circle. Typical. Her magic always behaved when shedidn’tneed it and threw a tantrum the second she did.
Cora rolled to her knees, brushing leaf litter off her leggings. A root the size of her forearm arced across the clearing, then shifted.Shifted.It slithered an inch to the left, coiling like a resting serpent.
“That’s perfectly normal,” she muttered, aiming for levity and landing nearer to hysteria. “Just a strolling root, nothing to see.”
The forest ignored her sarcasm. Branches creaked overhead, though no wind stirred them. Somewhere deeper in the gloom, water lapped slow and rhythmically as though a giant heart beat beneath the ground. She’d never felt anything quite like this place: not the hectic bazaars of Faerwyth, not the glittering stone amphitheaters of Dunslow where her coven once gathered, not even the wild, lawless edges of the human realm she’d traveled for a decade. This forestwatchedher. And she had the distinct, unsettling impression it was deciding whether she belonged.
Cora swallowed. “Easy now. If the land’s alive, be polite.”
She rose, brushing stray vines from her hair. Pale strands clung in damp ringlets around her face, and a streak of dirt smeared across her jaw. Her pulse throbbed behind her ears, but curiosity sparked, too. Fae blood loved mystery, even when mystery arrived wrapped in mortal danger.
A milky wisp of fog curled around her calves. It smelled faintly of lilacs—home—and the ache in her chest blossomed. Don’t think aboutthere. Don’t think about Mama’s garden or Papa humming off-key lullabies. Don’t think about the night Elric’s red-stained hands reached for her throat.
She shook herself. “Focus, Cora.”
A halo of witch-light flickered to life in her palm, offering a soft glow. She inspected her surroundings: broad ferns, bluebell clusters, mushrooms that glimmered violet under the spell’s light. Everything here was suffused with a kind of gentle magic she hadn’t felt since childhood—until the root moved again.
This time it rose a full handspan off the dirt, arching like the spine of a waking cat.
“Well, that’s enough nature for me.” She sidled to the left, only for another root to slither into her path like an eager puppy. Mist thickened, curling up her calves, tugging at her hem. The trees, impossibly, seemed to lean closer.
“No, thank you,” she told the woods, voice quavering. “I amnotstaying.”
As if in answer, a low hum rippled through the air, rattling the witch-light. The glow strobed once, twice and winked out. Dark swallowed the clearing.
Cora’s heart hammered. “Okay, okay—new plan.”
She spun, searching for any gap between the trunks, and spotted a faint shimmer to the east, almost like moonlight reflecting off water. A lake? Good. Lakes usually meant open space, maybe even a path. She bolted that direction, boots skidding over slick leaves.
Roots lifted to trip her. Vines lassoed her ankles. Mist clawed at her jacket sleeves with cold, wet fingers. Every breath came ragged, dragging air thick as syrup into her lungs. Yet she pushed on, muscles burning, spell book slamming against her side with each stride.
She broke through a stand of silver birch and stumbled onto a narrow trail. Ahead, water gleamed black under the moon—serene, mirror-still. The sight was so eerie and beautiful that for a moment she forgot her fear.
Then the trail shuddered.
“Seriously?” Cora snapped.
The dirt path rippled, like a rug someone jerked beneath her feet. She pitched forward, arms flailing, and crashed to her knees. Sharp pain flared. “Ow!” She ran her fingers along a torn seam in her leggings; blood welled where a rock had sliced skin.
