“What on earth were you thinking? I’m an electro-mage. Wouldn’t a cat have been better? Or a snake? Anything but a six-foot-and-then-some bear?” His voice had gotten louder with each word until he was yelling. He thrust his hand out, and a streak of blue trailed from his fingertips and lashed the side of a building. The frustration he’d been feeling since being ordered to go on this mission uncurled.
It was just him out here.
There was no one he could hurt. No wires he could short. No hospital to damage and no city to black out.
He stretched his fingers toward the ground then flung his hands upward. Lightning tore from the ground into the sky. The movement of electrons and the minute differences in charges all obeyed him. He stalked through the town; past warped steps surrounded by broken liquor bottles.
Electricity crackled around him. He threw lightning and tossed balls of blue that could kill an elephant, not that he’d ever killed an animal. He’d never deliberately hurt anyone until Mack. He wasn’t good with people and for the most part he didn’t trust them. Was the Coven doing him a favor by trying to draw him deeper into the paranormal community? He didn’t need that kind of help.
He lashed out, striking a small tree. For the first time in his life, he didn’t try to contain or control his magic. He could use it without risk or worry. The power rushed through him like a drug.
It was intoxicating.
When his anger at the Fates, the Coven, and himself faded, he started to play and experiment with what he could do. He lost track of time as he created webs of electricity between two houses that crackled before he dispersed them in a shower of sparks. He drew the charge toward him and pushed it away without releasing it as though it were a whip. This was a freedom he’d never imagined because he was always so busy keeping himself in check. Laughter bubbled up.
“So you’re a storm god.”
Jude spun. Mack stood in the road, with his arms crossed. How much had he seen? Anything was too much.
Electricity flicked across Jude’s skin, sparking as it leaped from hair to hair. His breathing was fast, but he was more alive than he’d ever been. And if the Coven learned he’d been out here letting loose, they’d strip him of his magic before he could say “No one got hurt”. People would get hurt if witches were revealed to be real. Landstrom was right, he was dangerous to himself and others, even though he didn’t mean to be. The smoking ramshackle building that had once been a house was testament to that.
“Electro-mage is the modern terminology.” He tried to sound like he knew what he was doing and that he didn’t care Mack had caught him.
“Right. And they sent you here to hunt down a creature that tears apart half ton cows with ease. Aren’t you the wrong kind of witch?”
“How much do you know about witches?”
“Enough.”
“But you live out here.” There was nothing out here, including no Coven. Jude had to admit that was a point in the town’s favor.
“That doesn’t make me ignorant. And you didn’t answer my question.”
Jude licked his lip, his mouth dry. How long had he been out here? He didn’t risk taking his eyes off Mack to look at his phone to check the time. Had Mack been on the Coven’s database? “There are different types of witches, including ones that can talk to animals and rebalance nature.”
Mack was silent.
The air lost some of its charge. Jude’s hair felt a little too big. He smoothed his hand over his head, only to discover his hair was standing on end like he’d been electrocuted, which technically he had been because all that power ran through him.
The shifter’s lips twitched as Jude tried to tame his hair. It was futile. He needed to wash and blow dry his hair to restyle it into the casual, not-trying-too-hard look that he usually aimed for. It took time to appear careless. He was willing to bet Mack didn’t do anything more than step out of the shower, dry off, and dress. He didn’t want to be thinking about a naked Mack. Too late. That door had opened and was not getting slammed shut anytime soon.
“So why did they send the wrong witch for the job?”
“I’m a qualified witch, and the only…investigator…available.” He didn’t mind saying that at all.
Mack stared at him like he could see straight through the lie, then he shrugged. “We’re already thirty minutes late. If you’ve finished trying to raise the ghosts, I suggest we get going.”
“I wasn’t raising ghosts. There’s nothing here to raise. No old hexes. Nothing.” Just the lingering something that he couldn’t place, but the old magic was stronger near the mine entrance. It was probably just an old locator spell to help the miners.
“I was being polite instead of calling it a tantrum.”
“I wasn’t having a tantrum.” He might have been at the start. “I was testing some limits with no one, and no other electrical interference, around.”
They walked back to the cars. Mack’s blue truck was covered in dust. It belonged here. Jude’s neat little rental coupe did not.
“Well, next time you test some limits you might want to think about going farther away as I saw the cloudless storm from town.”
Jude hadn’t considered that. “Lucky you were the one to find me.”
“Yeah, my luck just keeps getting better.”
Now was not the time to break the news about the familiar bond. Would there ever be a right time? “Maybe there’s a non-magical cause to the deaths.” A regular bear or coyote or something. He didn’t even know what kinds of animals lived out here.
“I doubt it. Morris senior said there were claw marks in the ground and that his cow was bled dry.” Mack stopped next to his car.
Jude was close enough to smell the oil on his clothes and
