Tangled in Moonlight: Unshifted (Ava and Lucas)

Chapter 229 Ava: Fire

Bureaucracy in the Fae Ward moves with the pace of a paralyzed sloth, leaving me with an itchy feeling between my shoulder blades, as if staying here is the worst decision I've ever made.

Selene spends most of her time slinking around the Fae Ward, finding pockets of space with less wards to sneeze over. Vanessa and Marcus stick with me, with Vanessa sharing my bedroom.

Our first lesson doesn't happen for three days. Why?

Application for Unlicensed Magus to Practice Dangerous Magic Within Residential Areas.

It's an actual title of a piece of paperwork Magister Orion had to file. Apparently, new wizards (though the official Fae-paperwork term is magus, unknown origin) are deemed a deadly force. Whoever runs this place has a serious stick up their butt about me learning magic.

"I don't like it," Vanessa says, staring out the window. "They'll have your name on official paperwork. We have no idea how deep Renard's influence lies."

"It's only within the Fae Ward," I point out, like I have the other thirty times she's mentioned it. "If they're going to find me here, the paperwork won't be the only reason."

Marcus, of course, is quiet. We already know how he feels. He hates it and doesn't trust the paperwork, either.

Not that I disagree with either of them—it's just that, like them, I feel stuck.

three days. Knowing that they're fighting over there, not knowing

all of

I'm surrounded by five papers with different runes written on them. Unlike the magic book I'm still kicking myself over for leaving in my room at the

over again and again. There's nothing that happens when I touch them; no tingle or buzz within my

grumbling about red tape, gave me these five papers and told me to find the elements within me that correspond to them. With such vague instructions, it's no

commune with a single element within me, nothing

helps with fighting. Learning to center, to focus only on what matters. Maybe you're too in tune with the world around

look—it's not like I haven't tried that before—I grab the

slow breath as I center myself. The sounds and scents of the world fade away, leaving only the sensation of my own body,

to touch it. Nothing happens. I try to visualize

I supposed to access this power if nothing works? Taking another

silence of my meditation, my thoughts drift to the rune for fire sitting on the paper in front

Burning.

a memory of this life, but of another. A dream?

couldn't move, couldn't scream, couldn't see. There was nothing

me. I want to pull away from the memory, to escape the torment, but something holds me there. This is important. This

nothing. Only pain. No name, no self, just pure sensation. And in that moment of complete dissolution,

by fire. The bright core of magic within me pulses in response, as if recognizing a kindred spirit. For the first