Hour of the Dragon - Heather Killough-Walden Page 0,168
should try a spell to find him,” and realize that you’re utterly serious. Because you totally can.
It wasn’t as if she hadn’t ever thought of using magic before. When Annaleia had first come clean with Piper years ago about what she was and told her about the world and all of its otherworldly phenomena, Piper had gone through two stages: The first had been a short little phase in which she made sure Anna wasn’t fucking with her. And the second was an even shorter stage in which she asked point-blank, “Can you teach me some magic?”
But apparently magic was something inside a person to begin with. Learning spells simply channeled that magic. There were wardens who could and could not use their own magic – those were spell casters, mages, magic users, witches, and warlocks. They came in all sorts of shapes and sizes and names to boot. And then there were the wardens who had no magic of their own. This was the majority population of wardens in fact, utterly mortal beings who utilized bespelled items given to them by their warden leaders to use in lieu of their own magic. These items transported them from point A to point B, counteracted offensive spells, created shields or wards, and so forth. They came in the form of pendants, rings, tattoos, bracelets, embroidered clothing – the sky was the limit.
It had always comforted Piper to know that if she – a normal, magicless human mortal – ever decided she wanted to join her best friend in the world of wardens, she would have these items to rely upon. But that comfort was nothing compared to what she felt when she woke up that morning with the absolute, certain knowledge that she could now use magic all on her own.
It had to be what Annaleia had done to her and Carmen. Piper could think of no other reason she would suddenly gain the ability to cast up her own spells. Somehow Anna had not only transferred renewed life into Piper, she’d transferred a second life into Piper. Perhaps it was a little like being Withered, but without that scythe mark.
The first thing she’d wanted to do that morning of course was contact Annaleia and set something up, some sort of guided trial where she could attempt a spell or two. But Anna was unreachable in the dragon realm, so Piper had gone to Carmen instead. She’d hurried her friend into Carmen’s apartment bathroom, turned on the shower and the fan so her visiting family wouldn’t hear, and whispered, “Dude. I think I can do magic. Can you?”
Carmen’s eyes had gone very wide and she’d nodded in emphatically. In a rush, her words falling over one another in rapid succession, Carmen told her, “I was baking casadielles instead of frying them for my nieces and nephews because they’re getting chubby, but it’s Christmas time and you know how I love to cook, so I was also making pestiños, I mean they’re a tradition, and I lost track of time so the casadielles burned and I was furious and suddenly I was swearing and wishing with all my might that the damn things weren’t burned – and suddenly….” Her voice finally trailed off as her eyes grew even wider. “They weren’t. They weren’t burned!” She shook her hands as if she couldn’t get enough air. “Piper, they were cooked perfectly!” She grasped Piper’s arms tightly. “Madre de Dios, I knew it was magic. I just knew it! That bruja made me into a witch like her!”
From that point, it had simply been a matter of finding alone time to test Piper’s theory. What they’d come to realize was that whatever magic they had access to was residual, like left-over carpet remnants when someone had finished laying a fresh living room. Piper imagined that Anna had poured so much of herself into the act of resurrecting her friends, the two of them had a little extra mojo to work with right now.
And that was awesome. What was not so awesome was that it was slowly running out.
They had to be smart about how they used what they had left. Piper wanted to use it to track down the escaped serial killer and make sure he never hurt anyone ever again. Carmen was less willing to go this route. She was afraid for obvious reasons. And she had a big family to live for.
Piper had no one but her friends. They were everything to