Spellbound: Spellbound Academy, #1

By Ivy Carter

"Welcome to Spellbound Academy." Where my kind are sent to die. If you are born different than other Paranormal beings, you are very welcome here.
 
There are only two rules here.
 
Rule 1: Half-breeds do not use magik.
Rule 2: Do as you are told and keep your head down.
Rule 3: When they try to kill you…die.
 
Too bad I have always been very bad at following the rules. They have beaten me and stripped me of my magik. But when they try to kill the only person I love; All bets are off.
 
I will make them regret the day they tried to turn me into their prey.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ivy Carter
• Release date: Sep 20, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393027416

Book preview

Chapter 1.

My feet slap against the wet asphalt as I chase after the bloodsucker that I am tracking for the bounty. The creep was caught on CCTV-video while he was in the process of draining a small-time hooker. One of those pay by the half-hour type of girls. The breath in my lungs whooshes out as I start to gain on the Vamp. I can hear his breath rattling, bouncing off the alley walls. I had to track him through the industrial side of Merrywick. Thank the Fates that our city is hidden from humans by spells and charms. We are a city of monsters. If it weren’t hidden, idiots like the one I am chasing would have exposed Paranormalism eons ago. 

The smell of garbage is thick in the air as he takes me on a merry chase through the alleys of an abandoned industrial park. Running at human speeds is more tiring than tapping into my powers, but the Order of Magik doesn’t know that I keep most of my tricks and treats packed away and secret, from everyone. Especially from them. The Agency of Magikal Miscreants has put the bounty out on this idiotic Vampire. The Agency hunts people like me.

I am what they would call an abomination. Bred in a lab with four strands of Paranormal DNA, all sliced and spliced together. They think that I am a Weather Witch. If they knew the truth... I would be the one running from the collar, a death sentence. 

When the Lorain Family took over The Order of Magiks, they turned the tide against half-breeds and other mixed races. Having mixed blood became taboo, something to be ashamed of. 

Oh, come on! I huff out as the bloodsucker puts the speed on while he climbs up the stone wall of an abandoned warehouse. I pull magik from the well inside me, calling and coaxing it out. Turning the Vampire into a lightning bug with my weather magik seems just the ticket. While keeping him in sight, I use air magik to push myself up and off the ground. I levitate toward the roof of the stone building the Vamp just scaled. Landing with a hop, I call up my magik to fuel my lightening power. I pull back a little, trying to push some of it back down. My magik is too eager to fly out and join the night air. It’s such a showoff at times, wanting to dance and play. 

I can feel the pressure of the air around me change as I slow the flow of magik down to a trickle. Blue sparks fall from my fingers as I feed it into the air around me. The atmosphere around me grows denser as thunder rumbles in the distance. The mood of my magik his happy, dancing around me in soft blue ribbons. 

Hands roughly snatch my wrists and yank them behind my back. Before I can move to defend myself, dampening cuffs are slapped onto me. 

What the hell are you doing? I yell out at the person restraining me. I twist and pull trying to see who has ahold of me. I can feel the cuffs slowly nullifying my magik. All my magik. I use the last of my strength to throw myself to the left and twist before landing on my back.

Trevor. The hell are you doing? Get these damned cuffs off me now. I demand as I look up at the creeper. I turned the douche down once and he has had it in for me ever since. Not that it stops him from stalking me every chance that he gets. 

Trevor just smiles that creeptastic smile of his and starts to laugh. To say that I am annoyed is an understatement. You have landed in it now, Celeste. He chuckles to himself before spitting at my feet.

My whole body freezes up. What in all the Fates is he spewing out of his mouth?

Trevor leans down close, within inches of my face when he whispers one word that turns my blood to ice.     

Abomination. His face twists as if he tastes something foul. 

My whole world stops. How did they find out? I have been so careful. I have lived my whole life hiding what I am. Staying under the radar was the whole reason for sometimes taking bounties from the Agency. Hiding in plain sight.

While I am silently losing my shit, Trevor is ranting about how he stooped to give a person like me attention. How I am lucky to even have someone like him want to show them a good time. ...and to think I wanted to bend you over and... I do my best to block him out while throwing up a little in my mouth. 

He reaches down and yanks me backward by my hair toward the other end of the roof. If you don’t let go of my hair, I am going to make you regret this rough handling, I growl through the pain of losing chunks of hair due to his yanking. Tears start to trickle from my eyes by the time he finally lets go. He shakes stray strands free that he has pulled out. 

Trevor pulls his electric baton from his waist and waves it at me threateningly. You come quietly and maybe I won’t have to use this on you. He smiles his creepy smile at me, showing off his stained teeth. I smile, more like grimace, at him and start toward the ladder that will lead down to the street. Trevor roughly pulls me to a stop and starts down the ladder first. No funny business. He barks at me. 

Like I would do anything that would get me poked by anything in his procession. Silently, I shudder even thinking about it. 

***

The room is silent as I stare at myself in the one-way mirror. I look all kinds of rough. Brunette hair falling in haphazard chunks around my shoulders, my green eyes are dazed and sunken within my heart-shaped face. Exhausted, my whole body is slumped in defeat. 

When we arrived at the underground bunker that houses the AMM (What is the AMM? Maybe print out each word the first time with the abbreviation in parenthesis after just for clarification), Trevor yanked me through the halls, displaying me for all to see. Like a prized fish, hooked and ready to be mounted on the nearest wall. The looks on the agent's faces, as he yelled the words abomination and traitor, will be forever imprinted on the inside of my eyelids. Disbelief, outrage, and let’s not forget the disgust. That one was my favorite. 

Was I getting what I deserve for working for these bigoted idiots? Food for thought. Just one more scoop for the Shit Sundae. 

The knob rattles as Silvia walks through the solid silver door, silent, walking rigidly, and in command as always. She is my contact within the AMM. She is tall for a woman, standing slightly over six feet and slender as a rail. But then, most of the Fae are tall and reed thin. With her blonde hair, sharp cheekbones, and pouty lips, she should be stunning. But she is too rigid and cold to be truly attractive. She has always reminded me of a block of ice. 

I make myself sit up and pay attention to something besides my inner sulking. I can feel myself coming alive. Will they kill me? Will they lock me away and never let me out? Or will they sedate me for experimentation? The last thought makes me shiver with dread. I would rather die. I will never again become someone’s lab rat.

Her feet glide across the white floor with a faint clicking.  Do you know why you have been brought in, Celeste? Silvia murmurs as she gently takes the seat across from me. I look her in the eyes and wish I could read her mind. But Silvia has one of the strongest mental shields I have ever encountered. Even if I tap into my Vampire powers and try to mesmerize her, I doubt I would even make a dent. 

Not really. I shrug and try to act like nothing is wrong. Like I am not silently having a nervous breakdown.

Trevor collected some of your blood that was left at the scene of the demon massacre last week. He had our lab do a routine round of testing and we were very surprised by the results. She shuffles her papers, looking through them as if she doesn’t already know what is written on them, word for word. More intimidation tactics. 

I look at her blankly and keep my silence. Nothing I can say will get me out of this. I could deny the findings, accuse Trevor of sabotage... but they would just test my blood again. Doing a fresh draw while I am secured in this room. I keep my silence for the moment and let her play the games that she taught me to play.

The results tell us that you have a mix of four different Paranormal Species. We thought this was a mistake, but Trevor gave us some hair he secured during your capture. The results are conclusive. She pauses and finally looks at me directly. Vampire. Wolf Shifter. Dark Fae. Weather Witch. You should not exist. You should have been put down at birth. She deadpans. There is no emotion in her voice. She believes what she is saying absolutely.

What do you want Silvia? Why am I here and not dead already? I cut to the chase, exhausted by her intimidation games. 

We have a job for you. You may be able to redeem yourself. It may be a way to save your life. She pauses for effect. There have been a rash of murders and disappearances of young girls. Each victim is brunette and young. She raises an eyebrow waiting for my response. 

So, I am going to be the bait?

That has yet to be determined. If we send you in on this, you would have to go in undercover. You would be posing as a student at a Paranormal Reformatory. Your task would be to attract and entrap the killer then execute him at the first possible moment. There will be no trial... Think you can handle all of that? She raises her brow once again, waiting for my reaction.

What choice do I have? I reply in a calm voice, while on the inside I am screaming. They need me for this case, that is the only reason why I am not dead already. As soon as I finish the task of catching and killing the one responsible, I am dead. There is no way that they will just set me free to live my life. I am something that they abhor. 

Every breath I take from this moment on is on borrowed time. The clock has started the countdown toward the end of my life. I want to laugh out loud. I want to bang my head and fists on the table and rage at how unfair this is. I haven’t even seen my nineteenth birthday. 

I scream inside my mind for my twin, Alex. He died when we were sixteen, killed by the same kind of hateful bigots that I will be working for. After he was murdered, his soul stayed behind, never moving on. We are soul branded. We share the same tether to life, so he is stuck on this plane of existence because I am still here. If they kill me, he dies as well. I shudder and try to keep my breathing under control. 

"What do you need