Dark Horse: Nate Temple Series Book 16 by Shayne Silvers

Author:Shayne Silvers [Silvers, Shayne]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Argento Publishing, LLC
Published: 2022-02-07T16:00:00+00:00

26

We stopped in a wide clearing surrounded by tall striated white and black trees, but the night sky opened up above us, the bulbous red moon shining down on a large fire pit surrounded by red stones the size of my head. A black cauldron hung over the cold fire pit, but it was already stocked with hunks of black wood.

An axe was buried into a nearby stump, and I saw more piles of chopped black wood piled around it. I arched an eyebrow. “You didn’t tell me you had a muscular lumberjack neighbor, you naughty girl, Sugar.”

She frowned up at me with a distracted look in her eyes. “I chop my own wood,” she said without smiling at my joke. She pointed a claw at the pit as she resumed rifling through her basket with her other hand. “Start a big fire. Carl, fill the cauldron with water.”

Carl walked up to the cauldron, and I realized he was carrying two medium-sized buckets. He didn’t offer an explanation, so I assumed he’d carried them from the hut. He poured them into the cauldron as I got the fire started. I used magic because I didn’t know how to do it the other way.

I stepped back beside Carl and assessed our work. The fire was roaring, the cauldron was starting to steam, and Sugar looked like she’d snorted some cocaine as she frantically pulled strange items from her basket and either tossed them into the cauldron or set them aside, muttering under her breath.

Embers and sparks fell down over the clearing, making it look like a million angry lightning bugs. Or that the surrounding forest was on fire, sending errant sparks dancing through the air. One of the two.

All in all, the scene was decidedly sinister and creepy, especially given my lizard companions.

Carl sat down in the grass, crossed his legs like he was preparing to meditate, and then silently watched the cauldron with a critical gaze, like he was at a college lecture given by one of his favorite science professors.

Unlike Carl, I was the kid who skipped most of those, preferring to go straight to lab class and see how quickly I could make an explosion of some kind with the unknown ingredients. There were many kinds of magic, and wizards often felt callings to specific areas of study. Witches and sorceresses loved this shit.

But this type of magic was not my forte. Too many numbers and measurements and ingredients to memorize. Too many damned rules.

I was more of a violent hippy wizard—I hated all forms of authority, right or wrong. I think it was their smugness—their lofty penchant for holding their pinkies out while they sipped tea and discussed magical theory. Their country club, academic approach to magic. To me, magic was a wild stallion, and I was a gritty handsome cowboy.

A free spirit. I liked to fly by the seat of my pants and react based on my instincts. I liked to swing my giant club of magic at Mr.

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