Warlock Brothers of Havenbridge 01 - Spell Bound by Jacob Z. Flores Page A

even Miranda’s. They didn’t deserve the fit I’d pitched. Well, maybe Miranda did. She deserved to have a house dropped on her head, especially since I’d thought we’d turned a corner. She’d stayed by my side longer than everyone else.
    Who was I kidding? She was never going to change, and maybe neither was I.
    I might never learn to master spells or tap into my active power. It had happened to others across all three orders. No matter how hard they tried, they never quite got the hang of it. They were what my father called magical lemons, because they were a defect in our species.
    And I had the privilege of being the first lemon in the Blackmoor family. How lucky was I?
    I blew out all the air in my lungs and sat up. I peeled my T-shirt off and wrung out the water before placing it on the rail inside the gazebo. If I wouldn’t have been accused of being a perv, I’d have done the same thing with my jeans. I sure as hell didn’t have a problem with my body. I wasn’t muscled like Pierce, but I had a decent physique. I doubted the parents who walked around the square with their kids would approve of me in only my briefs, so I sat there with a swampy butt and crotch, wishing I could use my magic to get myself dry instead of what I’d likely do, which would be to set myself on fire.
    A blur of motion caught my attention, and I turned to my left.
    Who else could it be but Drake?
    He leaped over trash cans, swung off lampposts, and bounded off walls, all the while avoiding the people who stood in his path or hurried out of his way. I laughed as one crotchety old man screamed after him when Drake nearly knocked him down.
    Drake didn’t let that stop him. He kept moving, staying focused as he always did on that imaginary straight line that no one else but him could see.
    But there was one thing he probably wasn’t taking into consideration—the construction going on in front of the courthouse. He’d have to find a clear path through and had completely missed the hundreds of pounds of thick glass that hung suspended from the crane overhead.
    I saw something: a figure crouching at the top of the crane. Darkness draped it, as if it had somehow bent the light to keep itself hidden. The form crawled down the cable of the crane.
    I got up, and before I knew what was happening, I was dashing through the square on an intercept path. I had to get to Drake fast. The back of my brain itched, and it only did that when something was about to go terribly wrong.
    “Stop!” I yelled at Drake, who couldn’t hear me over the noisy construction crew. Other people along the common heard my warning, and so did the hidden figure on the crane. It stopped its progress, and though I couldn’t see its eyes, I felt its gaze on me.
    Time was running out. In less than a minute, Drake would be dead.
    How the hell did I know that?
    I pumped my legs faster and wished for the first time in my life for Miranda. She could warp Drake out of harm’s way, because no matter how fast I was, Drake was faster.
    I wasn’t going to make it.
    Without thinking, I uttered, “ Ocius ,” and energy I’d never experienced before rushed through my body until it hit my legs. I shot forward as if I’d been fired out of a cannon. Within seconds I appeared in Drake’s path. He yelped at my sudden appearance and tried to stop, but momentum carried him forward.
    He slammed into me, and we tumbled, head over feet, at least three times across the pavement. My bare back skidded across the cement, causing searing flames of pain to burn across my skin, and to make matters even worse, Drake’s head slammed into my nose as we slid to a stop.
    My eyes watered, and pain exploded across my face. Drake rested on top of me, a groan escaping his lips.
    Even his moans had a slight Southern drawl to them. “Jeez, man. What the fuck?” he asked as he raised his head to gaze down at me.
    Before I could answer, all hell broke loose.
    “Move!” another voice screamed as a