Page 87 of A Winding Wave of Magic
Or was that only in my memory?
It was difficult to differentiate my senses from others’.
“Jesus,” I said, continuing to rub my temples with my hands. The world was starting to spin again.
Gran had been murdered and had known it was coming. She had also left me a small fortune, including mysterious property and a high-ranking position in the magical world. I had been attacked by her shadowy assailant, to come within inches of losing my mind, not to mention my life, only to be rescued byhis son, who happened to be some kind of wild cat as well as a scientist and a lawyer.
I opened one eye to peer at Jonathan. Yep, he was still human. But those large cat eyes regarded me cautiously.
“Are you all right?” he asked again.
My other eye opened. “No,” I said, and proceeded to bolt out of the car to the only place I could think of that might offer even a little bit of solace.
Touch the water.
The beach was a silent block and a half from his inn, just off the sleepy town where everyone was probably already tucking in for the night. Jonathan was probably fast—bobcats were fast, I assumed—but I knew every trail on this beach, every secret path through the dunes to the waves and freedom that beckoned below.
Things needed to make sense again, even if just a little bit.
I kicked off my shoes and dashed into the waves to my waist, impervious to the near-freezing temperatures and storm still calling farther out.
Even the whitewash was angry, joining an angry chorus with the rain whipping down the beach.
“Cass! Wait!” Jonathan’s voice was nearly lost in the wind. I didn’t need to turn around to know that he had stopped short of the water, paralyzed by his fear of water.
My teeth chattered as soon as the first wave doused me. Already my toes were starting to numb, but the remnants of the veil that had clouded my senses during the attack finally lifted. The salt—that was mine to taste. The cold was freezing my limbs, not a distant memory.
I leaned into the next wave and let it carry me back toward the shore in its icy clutch. I breathed in, tasting the brine in the back of my throat, smelling the kelp and salt spray that coasted through the air and across my face.
No smoke, no fire. Just water.
The clouds broke, their outlines cast in silver by the newly risen moon.
Beautiful.
Eventually, my heels dragged across soft, wet sand as I washed up on shore. The wind whistled over my body, and my whole body began to shake.
“Cass!”
Jonathan was at my side again, pulling my frozen form off the ground to balance on his shoulder. “Come on, you ridiculous woman.”
My teeth clacked like the empty bones I’d be one day.
But not today.
His body was warm, but his mind was clear. Through some strange blessing, I didn’t See a thing.
It wasn’tuntil I was resubmerged into water—hot this time, in the oversized tub in Jonathan’s suite—that the shivering finally began to abate. Jonathan was pacing around his room when I emerged from the bathroom, wrapped in a thick terry cloth bathrobe and a large towel wrapped around my dripping hair. All vestiges of the fire, of the shadow, were scrubbed away. I felt alert and calm. And so, so sad.
I found an armchair facing the gas fireplace at the back of the room, and Jonathan took the other facing me.
“All right?” he asked.
I nodded.
He didn’t look convinced. “One of these days, you’re going to die of hypothermia. And I won’t be able to stop it.”
“You can’t just ask my blood to heat up?” I joked.
