Page 3 of Livewire Witch

That’s one type of magic I’m thankful for, at least. My cell phone has zero signal down here and we’d be totally cut off if I wasn’t able to get in touch with Ember.

He responds pretty quickly, somehow managing to drawl even when responding directly into my brain.“Not yet. Seems like they got back to business a few days ago, but it’s like trying to get a meeting with damn royalty. I had some seriously suspicious side-eye when I said I wanted a word.”

I groan and rub my eyes. Typical.

“You all right, Silver?”

“I’m okay.”

Apart from the pounding headache that’s been plaguing me. It’s a mixture of dehydration, poor ventilation, not enough food, and of course, the damn whispering bones preventing me from sleeping.

I’m exhausted. Mentally frayed.

And emotionally, I’m feeling kind of... fragile right now.

Mostly thanks to having to spend so much time around Fabian. Every time I look at him and he gives me that adorably confused frown, like maybe I’m someone he’s bumped into at the local store but never directly spoken to. Like there’s a sense of familiarity there, but it’s so vague he can’t place me and subsequently dismisses me.

Yeah, that sucks.

“Well... that’s a lot.”

Dammit, I must be more frazzled than I thought. I didn’t mean to broadcast any of those thoughts to Ember.

He pauses for the longest time and I miss the distraction of his voice as I skirt past yet another entire wall of bones. Not sure what it is or why it’s here. Maybe it’s artwork. Maybe someone’s been trying to summon a demon god. Whoever designed this forsaken place had clearly spent too much time down here without access to clean air.

I then have to pass down a section of the labyrinthine tunnels that has no lighting at all. Summoning a little ball of fire so that I don’t trip over my own feet, I walk fast, not wanting to linger any longer than necessary.

“I’ll try again to talk to your mages,”Ember says.

“They’re notmyanything,”I grumble back.

My stomach swoops with anxiety. I dread to think what they must think of me right now. They won’t even know that Fabian’s okay, or that his curse is gone.

Although whether he’s ‘okay’ is kinda complicated right now. His body seems a little messed up, and he’s got the memory of a goldfish—at least with his memories of me—which makes finding out about his well being a tricky thing.

He doesn’t know me anymore.

Doesn’t trust me.

And having the same conversation repeatedly is like the slowest form of torture. Not to mention how heartsick it makes me.

“And if that doesn’t work,”Ember adds. “I can see if I can get close enough to that fucker, Felix, to find out what he’s thinking about you and the kid.”

“Ember—”

“I know I can’t remove you from his head like the mini mage-ling can, but that doesn’t mean I can’t mess him up a bit. Scramble a few wires until he’s not sure what he knows. Hell, I could make it so he barely knows his own name. Bombard his brain with outside voices and thoughts. See what happens.”

Ember’s voice is lined with steel and I’m so shocked by what he’s saying, I can’t even think for a moment.

He’s so protective of himself and his magic. It tookyearsbefore any of us learned what he can do. Hehateshis powers like no one else and barely uses his telepathy other than to talk to me, and that’s only when the need is dire.

Too bad that tends to be a weekly occurrence for me.

But I’ve never, in all the years that I’ve known him, heard him threaten to use his magic as a weapon. Using telepathy is illegal, after all. It’s one of the banned forms of magic, just like my necromancy.

It scares the shit out of the Archarcans, the elite rulers of our city.

“Ember—”I try again to get some words out, but he’s not listening.

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