This Wicked Magic Read Online Free PDF Page B

to get away from his intense closeness and paced toward the door. A shiver traced her spine. Against better judgment, her innate magic was attracted to the man’s power. “I have a sticky soul. It tends to catch lost souls that linger after death.”
    “I’ve never heard of that before. That’s cool. So you’re full of stray souls?”
    “No, a soul bringer scrubs them from me every so often.”
    She turned and saw he looked over her work and the mortar but kept his fingers interlocked behind his back. It was polite not to touch another witch’s work unless invited to do so. As he leaned over her book of shadows to scan the spell, his hair dusted the paper, and she flinched because it was as if she had felt his hair brush her skin.
    “You should increase the belladonna,” he suggested. “It’ll jack up the potency, and you’ll need less lavender. For nocturnals to rest, yes?”
    “That’s a wise observation.” She strode to the counter and wrote it down on her notebook. “Thank you. I will try that. You said you practice the dark magics. I can’t imagine a simple sleeping draft would be of interest to you.”
    “I’m noctambulatory myself. Though I haven’t utilized any spells against it. I’ve come to terms with the night, and it me. Spellcraft is a particular expertise, both dark and light. Though, since I’ve taken on these demons, my power has decreased measurably. I can barely throw air. It’s pitiful. Please.” His hand clasped over her forearm, a warm touch that belied his bedraggled appearance. “If you can replicate the process, I beg you to try. I can’t go into the dark. I need to stay in the light to keep them at bay. I rarely sleep. I fight them daily. These demons inside me...they’ll kill me.”
    It was an awful thing to endure, she felt sure. When even one incorporeal demon occupied a soul, it could overtake the person, drive the person mad or kill him or her. And he said many lived within him?
    If the soul had moved through him...
    “Are you sure the soul I sneezed at you moved through you? What if it’s still inside you?”
    She could get back the missing soul!
    “No, I definitely felt an exit.”
    “Could have been the demon leaving.”
    “No, that followed immediately after I felt the brightness pass through me.”
    Ah. The brightness. Yes, that was the indefinable feeling.
    “It was...wondrous,” he said softly. “As if a divine presence had, for but a moment, brushed against my soul. Trust me, there’s no way I’m carrying a wolf soul around inside me. Just a lust demon, a war demon, menace and grief, and a few others.”
    “I need that soul back,” Vika said.
    “Because of the soul bringer?”
    She nodded. “He’s particular about receiving all the souls in his territory.”
    “Then let’s make a deal, shall we?” He tilted a hip against the counter and eyed her up and down, for the first time showing some interest in her for more than what she could do for him.
    She liked when men looked at her with blatant desire. Made her feel sexy. Never a wrong feeling. But Certainly Jones made her uneasy. It was the darkness surrounding him. Much as she trusted her grandmother’s nail would protect, she didn’t want to step too close to him without a shield ward to protect her own soul. Nor did she trust her impulsive desire to touch his power.
    “What did you have in mind?” she asked.
    “I must have a connection to the werewolf soul. Maybe?”
    “If it’s still in the vicinity of its death, it may be compelled toward you. On the other hand, it may try to reattach itself to me. I was headed there now—”
    CJ clasped her hand. “Let me go along with you. If I can help you locate the soul, will you agree to expel another demon from me?”
    “But I don’t think I can.”
    “It’s the only thing I’ve got going for me right now. You. Please, Vika. Help me.”
    She dropped open her mouth because never had she heard such a sincere plea. And while her neat and