Fateful Magic
The Star-Crossed Series
Lilly’s Novella
By Rachel Higginson
[email protected] Rachel Higginson 2014
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Cover Design by Caedus Design Co.
Other Books Now Available by Rachel Higginson
Love and Decay, Season One, Episodes One-Twelve
Love and Decay, Season Two, Episodes One-Twelve
Love and Decay, Volume One (Episodes One-Six, Season One)
Love and Decay, Volume Two (Episodes Seven-Twelve, Season One)
Love and Decay, Volume Three (Episodes One-Four, Season Two)
Love and Decay, Volume Four (Episodes Five-Eight, Season Two)
Love and Decay, Volume Five (Episodes Nine-Twelve, Season Two)
Reckless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 1)
Hopeless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 2)
Fearless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 3)
Endless Magic (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 4)
The Reluctant King (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 5)
The Relentless Warrior (The Star-Crossed Series, Book 6)
Breathless Magic (the Star-Crossed Series, Book 6.5)
Heir of Skies (The Starbright Series, Book 1)
Heir of Darkness (The Starbright Series, Book 2)
Heir of Secrets (The Starbright Series, Book 3)
The Rush (The Siren Series, Book 1)
The Fall (The Siren Series, Book 2)
Bet in the Dark (An NA Contemporary Romance)
Striking (The Forged in Fire Series) This is a co-authored Contemporary NA
To Lilly,
You’ve been with me from the beginning.
I finally get to give you a voice.
Prologue
Then
My face heated to the same color as my hair and I wanted nothing more than to walk through the door and disappear. Why did he keep looking at me?
Why had he been looking at me all day?
Did I have something on my face?
Or was it worse?
Did he know?
Oh my god, he knew.
He had to know!
My parents had risked everything to send me here and with the arrival of one Titan Guard, my life was over. They had almost abandoned me for this cause and he was going to murder me before I even got close to graduation.
Not exactly abandoned. But they’d left me here by myself so that I could finish my education at a real Immortal school. They’d wanted me to have a proper education, surrounded by my peers, by my kind. They’d wanted me to be treated equally, even if that meant hiding my identity. And I couldn’t argue with them.
Even if I did think they were being difficult about it.
I could have finished school anywhere. I could have gone to the best human private school in the world and nobody would have known the difference.
But, no. My parents, the defenders of justice and equality, wanted to take a stand. They wanted their Shape-Shifter daughter to attend school with all the privilege every other Immortal child received. They wanted their daughter to have the education she deserved.
They wanted her to mingle with the society that should accept her because it was right. Even though, they didn’t accept our kind. Even though, I was too afraid to actually make any friends to be considered mingling. If anyone found out, I would be dragged away to a Romanian prison and never heard from again. That fact alone guaranteed me loner status.
I wanted rights and freedom as much as anyone else, but I was only sixteen. I had a really long life ahead of me. And I’d heard terrible things about those prisons.
For instance, rats. I did not want to be forced to make friends with rats.
Most days I kept to myself and blended into the background. While the other kids at Kingsley did their best to ignore my entire existence, I floated through classes and kept my head down.
When I waded through my fear and imprisonment-resistance, I really did believe what my parents believed. My convictions mirrored their convictions.
I wanted Shape-Shifters to be completely free from persecution and have equal rights over everything in the Kingdom. I wanted to walk the streets confidently and not be afraid of some cover team of Titan Guard swooping down with a weighted net and swords that would drain me of all my Magic. I wanted to be able to go to whatever school I chose, and walk among the other students with my head held high and my Magic in full bloom.
But that wasn’t going to happen anytime soon.
Lucan was as opposed to my existence as every other King before him had been to my entire race. And after seeing his son for the first time in person this morning, I had no hopes for the future of the Immortals.
We were doomed.
Kiran Kendrick couldn’t be more spoiled or conceited. He’d been at school for only a couple hours today and the entire atmosphere of Kingsley had shifted.
The students catered to his every whim. The teachers sniveled at his feet. He would turn out just like his father and persecute my kind for the next thousand years. Only to raise another son that would carry on the Kendrick legacy.
I had no doubt that if Prince Kiran knew my secret, he would not hesitate for even a second before he had me hauled away. Like father, like son.
And if it wasn’t bad enough that I had to hide my secret from the freaking Crown Prince, he’d brought his Guard with him.
His Titan Guard.
Who hadn’t stopped looking at me all morning.
I had never been more paranoid in my entire life.
I swore the very Magic in my veins trembled with fear.
However, as bad as this morning had been, good things had come out of it. I had almost made a friend. At least this girl seemed to want to be friends.
She also seemed completely clueless. I didn’t know anybody in the Kingdom that didn’t know who Kiran Kendrick was. Even Shape-Shifters that were forced to hide in the most remote places knew every member of the Royal family. And she wasn’t a Shape-Shifter. She hadn’t been forced to live her entire life in hiding. She should know better.
I wondered why she didn’t. I kind of loved the way she talked to Prince Kiran. She didn’t seem to care for him at all. I wanted to know why she wasn’t afraid to make waves. I wanted to know where she’d grown up that kept her so sheltered. I wanted to know who her parents were and why they’d kept her in the dark for so long.
But it wasn’t like I could start asking her questions. What if she started asking me questions? That would be unacceptable. I couldn’t give her any answers that wouldn’t end in me getting arrested and stripped of all Magic and what little rights I still maintained.
I caught him staring at me again.
I felt my cheeks heat even more than us
ual and followed the urge to look at anything but him.
Eden had been talking to me, so I should probably talk back.
“Do you know where your next class is?” I asked her with the strongest voice I could muster. I didn’t want him to see how nervous he made me. He was trained in warfare and all things bodyguard-related or whatever. I felt like he could smell my fear.
And maybe that’s what he was trying to do… sniff out my sins.
Eden looked just as anxious to exclude the guys from our conversation as I was. Both of them hovered around us as though we would fall into line with all the other students that worshiped them this morning. Not happening. From either one of us. Even if it meant prison for me.
Eden answered, “I think French. Is that in this building too?”
We walked through the hallways as quickly as Eden could. I hurried along with her, trying to downplay my animal-like grace. I needed to be quick without revealing anything of my true nature.
It was a lot more work than it should have been.
I was naturally graceful, just not in the ballerina way.
More like the feline way…
Prince Kiran pulled Eden’s attention away from me and I breathed a small sigh of relief. Thankfully, he seemed absolutely absorbed with the pretty new girl. Which was kind of a scandal since he was definitely engaged to Seraphina Van Curen.
I just hoped Eden kept him distracted enough that he never noticed me.
Although, his Guard definitely noticed me, it didn’t matter where the Prince kept his attention. Talbott Angelo had just as much pull to end my life as anybody. Maybe second only to the Royal family.
“I would like you to tell me your name.”
It was the first time he spoke to me and something inside of me jerked alive. Not just awake, but alive.
I shook my head and tried to get over the sensation, but it refused to leave. His small greeting made something bloom in the core of my being.
It felt like I had drowned and his words were the first breath I took after being revived. It felt like I’d been buried alive my entire life and then he’d pulled me from the gritty, suffocating earth with just that simple statement.
I sucked in oxygen and breathed purely for the first time in my entire life. And all he’d done was speak a few simple words to me.
I glanced over at him while we descended the steps and my breath caught in my throat.
I should be terrified of this Titan. I should be running in the opposite direction.
But there was something about his full lips that tilted up in the corners and his deeply tanned skin. Maybe it was his impressively masculine body that was nothing but coiled muscle and tightly packed aggression. Or maybe it was his eyes: rich, dark chocolate that twinkled with intelligent awareness and saw everything around him all at once.
They definitely saw me, saw through me. They saw every piece of me.
Those expressive eyes swept over me with a quick brilliance that made my feet stumble.
He knew. He had to know.
I cleared my throat nervously before admitting, “Lilly.” My stomach churned with unease. I knew he could find out from anyone else what it was, that he could demand the right to know it even. But offering it to him… giving it to him freely made me feel like I had some semblance of control in my life.
“Lilly,” he repeated with a small smile. “Pretty.”
His thick accent made me smile in return. His simple words turned into poetry with the lilting way he spoke. I thought I could listen to him talk for hours if he’d let me. If he wanted to, he could have read me the phonebook and I would have been a very happy girl.
“Thank you,” I squeaked.
He leaned into me with a formal bow. “Lilly, I’m Talbott.”
“I know who you are.”
His smile faltered. “I’m sure you do, Lilly.”
My mouth spoke before my brain could decide if it was a good idea or not. “Why do you keep saying my name?”
Not that I was complaining. My name, that accent, those lips. Did he have to be so completely perfect? It would be so much easier to hate him if he weren’t so utterly breathtaking to look at.
“I don’t want to forget it.” That was his reply. He didn’t want to forget my name. As if this Titan, born and bred for warfare, trained since birth to be the most perfect warrior alive, charged with protecting the heir to the Throne, could ever forget anything!
I thought it had been sweet for a half-second until I realized this was probably part of his Titan training. I was sure he met a lot of people protecting the Royals, he no doubt had to have tricks to make his job as successful as possible.
“Do you forget a lot of names?” I asked because I had the sudden, desperate urge to make him feel stupid.
Maybe it was vindictive. Maybe it was petty. Maybe it was just plain stupid. But this man would imprison me for the rest of my life just for being born the way that I was. A part of me needed to punish him for that.
He shrugged with a lazy lift of one shoulder. “Possibly,” he said. “But it seems very important that I remember your name in particular.”
My heart jumped to my throat and started pounding frantically. My nerves and fears pinged around in my blood at light speed and I was positive I would pass out from my anxiety. He was going to put me on a plane to Romania before the end of the day. I just knew it.
“Why?”
As anxious as his attention made me, his next words quieted every single thing inside me.
“Because I shall never forget your face, not for as long as I live. And I would like to remember the name that goes with such a memory.”
I shook my head again, intending to disagree with him or argue with him or something, anything, but I had lost the ability to speak, or even think.
“Lilly, with the reddest hair and the prettiest green eyes I have ever seen, I want to know you more.”
I melted. Right there in midstride, I pooled into a sticky pile of goo and ceased to exist as the same person anymore. Talbott’s words changed me.
Irrevocably.
I had been ignored and neglected for the better part of my sixteen years and now this boy had come into my life and told me things that no other living being had said to me before. Even my parents! And I knew they had the greatest intentions for my wellbeing.
Talbott wasn’t just the first person to willingly seek me out, he was the first person to ever make me feel worthy... and interesting… and beautiful.
The rational side of my brain told me that he probably spoke this way to all girls. He would have access to an unlimited number of females trying to vie for Kiran’s attention. And the poor Prince couldn’t attend to all of their needs.
Talbott would be in the perfect position to help him out with crowd control.
But the other side of my brain just didn’t care. I had never felt like this before. And I didn’t know if I would ever feel like this again. But I wanted to. I wanted to keep feeling like this.
I also didn’t know if Talbott would ever look at me or speak to me again, but two things became crystal clear at that moment. One, I wanted to know him more too. Womanizer or not, racist or not, I wanted to know him. And I wanted to hear more of that delicious Romanian accent.
And two, he could never, ever, ever find out my secret.
There was no doubt in my mind that he would never look at me like this again if he knew the truth about who I was.
I didn’t think I would be able to live through his judgment. Talbott Angelo had done something to me in five minutes that nobody else had been able to do my entire life.
He made me feel special.
He made me feel important.
My life would never be the same again.
Chapter One
Now
I felt like I was floating. Or more accurately, drowning. I felt too much pain, but then strangely, I didn’t feel anything. I seemed to be numb all over, as if my entire body had been injected with some
thing.
Although, a still-rational part of my brain knew I hadn’t been. This feeling was something more like self-preservation.
I couldn’t tell up from down at this point, or in from out. I was so confused. I was so confused that I didn’t have actual thoughts in my head. My consciousness just flashed with a bright, neon sign that read: Confusion. Confusion. Confusion.
“Lilly?”
That voice… I didn’t know… I couldn’t understand…
“Lilly?” the voice asked more desperately.
I tried to focus. My head still spun a thousand different directions and my body ached in ways that I didn’t understand. But that voice seemed to anchor me somehow.
“Lilly? Please open your eyes. Can you hear me?”
Were my eyes closed?
“I miss you, Lilly,” the voice cried and then I felt like crying. Why did he sound so heartbroken? Why did his pain hurt me worse than anything else I’d ever experienced?
Pain seemed to be the one thing I could remember clearly. I hated the very idea of it. I hated that this voice had managed to rip me apart and shred my insides with just the tone of his voice.
“Lilly, iubita mea, please come back to me.”
I knew those funny words. I mean, not at the moment, but they called to something inside me. Something I wanted to remember.
Much like the pain in his voice, those words pulled feelings out of me I didn’t understand. His tone gutted me. But that strange phrase pieced me back together.
I knew it. I knew it intimately.
But how?
“I love you,” the voice whispered hoarsely. “I need you. Please open your eyes.”
And then, as if they suddenly remembered how, my eyes opened.
Reality came crashing back to me with the same violent way light assaulted my eyes. I opened them but then had to shut them just as quickly. I heard that voice move around the room and something click off but I was too busy racing to catch up to the things my brain had just realized.