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  The Hidden Magic Series — Book 3

  L.L. HUNTER

  Copyright © 2017 L.L. Hunter

  Obliterate

  Hidden Magic – Book 3

  Smashwords Edition

  ISBN: 9781370917204

  All Rights Reserved

  First Edition

  Manuscript Services Provided by

  Rogena Mitchell-Jones, Literary Editor

  www.rogenamitchell.com

  Cover Design by Desiree DeOrto

  This book may not be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission from the author. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. All characters and storylines are the properties of the author, and your support and respect are appreciated.

  This book is a work of fiction. The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Both author and editor have taken considerable effort in presenting a manuscript free of errors. However, editing errors are ultimately the responsibility of the author.

  This author writes in both American English and Australian English and may include Australian diction.

  Prologue

  The blade glimmered in the moonlight streaming through the open window. His reflection gleamed off the metal, his grin wicked and cruel. It was my worst nightmare. All the past nightmares paled compared to this moment.

  “Emmaline! Run!” My mother’s screams echoed in the silence of the night as I ran from her and my father’s blade and his cruel taunts.

  I hadn’t wanted to leave her alone, but somehow, I knew she was strong. Strong enough to survive. I had to protect my legacy and my magic. At that moment, I had to protect my future.

  I fled into the night on my dappled horse, not looking back.

  Chapter One

  I blinked.

  This could not be happening.

  My father could not be here. I was surely dreaming.

  A hand on my lower back told me I wasn’t.

  “Are you okay?” Darcy whispered his breath warm in my ear.

  With a shudder, I brought my attention back to the present and to my reality—the fact that my father was here to take me back to the world I thought I’d left behind forever.

  “Father…” I managed, stepping forward. I had to play it cool and show him I wasn’t afraid. For this was the man who had shown me what fear was. “How long has it been? One hundred, two hundred years?”

  “It has been over three hundred years in this realm, but only three in Dragontopia. It has been far too long for your mother. I’m afraid she remains heartbroken over your disappearance.” My father brushed a hand over his velvet hunter green cloak and shiny chainmail armor. He stood near a table that was already set for dinner. He picked up a wine glass and studied it, rolling it around in his hand, and peering through it like a telescope before setting it back on the table. I cringed. How dare he bring my mother into this! I hated leaving my mother in the hands of his cruel, cold heart, but I had no choice. I couldn’t stay in that place a second longer.

  “I had no choice but to leave. You left me no choice.”

  He sighed. “You were always such a disobedient child. I waited for your return, but I grew tired. Your mother grew tired. I have come to bring you back because, frankly, our people have lost hope, and I am getting too old, your mother too frail. They tolerate me. Come back and save your kingdom, Emmaline. Your people need you.” He looked up at me, and I could see in his eyes that his words were clearly tinged with lies.

  I shook my head and step backward, leaning into Darcy. When my father saw the way Darcy looked at me, cared for me, the way he touched me, his eyes turned dark. His face began to turn an unsightly shade of red—the color of rage.

  “This… don’t tell me, this… this creature is the reason you never returned?”

  I clenched my fist as rage bubbled within me. How dare he call Darcy a creature! I stood before Darcy and pulled up a protective shield around us with my magic. My father walked toward us swinging his longsword around in an arc over his head before bringing it down. I let out a scream before I realized my shield would protect us. But I was too used to my father’s rage. I was too used to the blows of his sword. I was too used to hiding my head in fear. After all those years, the memories resurfaced as if they had happened yesterday.

  I am a little girl in the castle running to her bedroom to hide under the bed because she had just stolen a cookie from the kitchen… or caught my father kissing a woman who was not my mother…

  The moment the sword collided with my magical shield, my scream, raw power, and the impact of the blade against the magic shield propelled my father back through the air. He landed heavily on the other side of the nightclub floor. He didn’t stay down, though. He got to his feet, but he wasn’t angry, which surprised me. I was so used to his rage. His rage was a normal part of my life for so long.

  “You have become so powerful, my daughter. Too powerful. Power like that is dangerous to humans. You must return at once with me so we can deal with it. It will be okay.”

  Once again, I am the little princess in the castle who, after being caught by her father and scared by his sword, was being lured out by her father’s hypnotic, charming voice. He used to do this every time he punished me. He used to compel me to him and make me forgive him. He used to make me feel like I was dangerous, unhinged, and that he could fix me if I came to him.

  But I wasn’t that little princess anymore. I shook my head.

  “No! You will not make me feel like I am the crazy one anymore. I made a decision all those years ago, and I stand by it now. I will not be going back with you. I’m staying here with Darcy.”

  I looked up at Darcy, and he smiled down at me. I smiled back.

  My father screamed in frustration before a magic portal appeared behind him. With eyes wide open, I look to Darcy to see if he had anything to do with it, but he looked just as confused.

  “You have made a grave mistake, my daughter. For that, you will pay.”

  The portal shimmered as a figure shrouded in shadow approached the portal and stepped through. I gasped in shock. I recognized the woman immediately. Her billowing long white hair and her black, white, and gray magic are as familiar to me as my own father.

  I dropped to my knees.

  “Mother!”

  She never used to be this strong. For years, my father, who had to be the most powerful being in the kingdom, suppressed and banned our magic. He felt threatened by the magic my mother and I possessed. We used to practice our magic together in secret. I always remembered her physical manifestation of her magic as white—the color of purity and goodness. But over time, as my father controlled her more, my mother’s magic began to take on darkness. It began displaying gray and black streaks as well as white. Over the years, my mother stopped practicing. Right before I ran away, her magic had almost stopped working completely. What had happened in the wake of my disappearance?

  “Mother?” She was looking at me, but she wasn’t talking. I kept calling out, but it seemed no one was home. I turned to my father.

  “What have you done to her?” I got to my feet. I wanted to run to her, but something deep within me warned me to stay away. Something wasn’t right. Darcy’s grip on my arm solidified this.

  “Emma…” he warned.

  “Emmaline, for far too long you have taken your immortality for granted. This has made you careless, reckless, and promiscuous.” The latter my father spat as if it were poison.

  I would be offended if it weren’t for the fact that he was from a completely different era, and
to him, revealing even the slightest bit of skin or a woman wearing pants was a sin.

  “You have lost all sense of dignity. You are not fit to be Queen. For that, you must be punished.”

  “Emma!” I could hear Darcy’s warnings, but somehow, I couldn’t move from the spot. I was frozen, cemented to the ground.

  “Since you’d rather remain here, you will live out the rest of your days as one of the creatures you care about so much.” My father nodded to my mother, and my mother waved her hands in the air and began chanting something in Latin.

  “Emma! Emma, run!”

  One of the creatures you love so much. Could he mean a vampire? I tried to run, but I was stuck.

  I was paralyzed. Why couldn’t I move?

  Darcy dove for me at the same time my mother threw her magic toward us. It surrounded us and plunged our world into nothing.

  Chapter Two

  I woke up sometime later in a dull, dark place. I tried to move but found I was restricted. I rolled back. I was laying on something soft, at least. And the thing restricting me seemed to move. It had rolled over with its arm no longer over my stomach… my eyes snapped open, and I stared up at the bare white ceiling. This place seemed familiar, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. I couldn’t until I tilted my head to the left and saw the man sleeping beside me.

  Darcy.

  That’s why this place was so familiar. We were at Darcy’s place. I was in his bed. I wiped my hand over my face and sat up in bed, letting the sheet fall to my hips. As soon as I did, my head throbbed. I cried out, waking Darcy.

  “Emma? Are you okay?”

  “My head. My everything. Everything hurts.”

  Darcy’s hand rubbed soothing circles on my lower back.

  “It must have been whatever spell your mother placed on us.”

  My eyes widened. And then it all came back to me.

  “Emma! Emma, run!”

  “Since you’d rather remain here, you will live out the rest of your days as one of the creatures you care about so much.”

  One of the creatures you love so much.

  I gasped, and my hand flew to my mouth to feel for fangs. But I could feel no pointed incisors. I turned quickly to look at Darcy as a horrifying thought struck me. I reached for his mouth.

  “What are you do—”

  “Open your mouth!”

  “Okay… but, Emma…” My name came out as ‘Mmma’ as my fingers searched his mouth for any sign of his vampire fangs. I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw they were white, pointy, and perfectly untouched in his mouth. I flopped back against the pillows.

  “Emma. Please talk to me. Tell me what’s going on inside your head.”

  “I’m not a vampire.”

  “Okay… since when did you think you were a vampire? Last I checked, I hadn’t turned you. I’ve always been careful with you.”

  “No, no. I know you wouldn’t turn me. I wouldn’t let you. I mean, my mother. I thought she’d turned me. The spell… my father…”

  “Oh,” replied Darcy, finally getting it.

  “Yeah. He said, ‘one of the creatures you care about so much.’”

  “And you thought that would be a vampire?”

  I looked at him, really looked at him. I searched his face. Doesn’t he believe that I love him?

  “You’re talking like you don’t believe that I love you, that I care about you.”

  “No. No, I’m not. Well, I guess… a little. I just… I’m not used to this. And I guess I should be.”

  I leaned into him and kissed his jaw. “I do love you and care about you. That’s why I thought the spell would turn me into a vampire… Wait, I could still be a vampire!”

  Darcy chuckled and kissed my head. “I guess we’ll find out sooner or later. It’s too early to know.” He went silent and stared up at the ceiling before turning his body toward me and taking my face in his hands. “I have an idea.”

  I gazed into his dreamy chocolate brown eyes and saw them glistening with wickedness. His eyes are chocolate brown when he’s not hungry or… turned on.

  “Uh, oh. I know that look.”

  He laughed. “What look?”

  “That look. The look that says you have a plan.”

  “I do have a plan.”

  “Then let’s hear it.”

  “The only way to test if you’re a vampire is to see if you crave blood.”

  Chapter Three

  Darcy asked me to get dressed, and when I walked out into the club, I found him behind the bar on the lower floor. I descended the metal stairs and cautiously yet curiously made my way over to stand in front of the bar.

  “I thought you were going to take me hunting.”

  “If you’re a new vampire, I am not taking you outside this club. Anyway, it’s daytime, and if you’re a vampire, you’ll catch alight.”

  “But you go out in the daylight, and you don’t catch alight.”

  He stopped what he was doing behind the bar, which I couldn’t see because the bar was high—and I am short. He dropped his voice and seductively said, “Ah, that’s thanks to the magical blood I once drank from a certain witch-dragon princess.” He winked and went back to doing whatever he was doing. My cheeks inflamed. So, I am the cause of his power, and he is the cause of mine.

  “What are you making?”

  He placed a glass filled with thick red liquid garnished with a stalk of celery in front of my face on the bar. I automatically turned up my nose. It smells metallic and not citrusy like it should.

  “Is that…a Bloody Mary made with real blood?”

  “Yeah. If you’re becoming a vamp, then you’ll become ravenous when even a single drop of this hits your tongue. Your fangs should also protrude.”

  “Eww,” I said, pushing the glass away. “I can already tell I’m not. That smells revolting.”

  “Just taste it so we can rule it out. We need to be sure.”

  “Ugh. Fine.” I grabbed the glass. The scent of the disgusting concoction hit my nose, and I felt like puking. It smelled like blood mixed with tomato juice and vodka and all the usual ingredients used to make a normal Bloody Mary. I held my nose with the other hand and took a small sip of the concoction. Iron, and copper, and tomato, along with garlic hit my tongue, but mostly blood. I leaned forward and placed my hand over my mouth to keep from spewing.

  “Oh, my god! I can’t believe you made me do that!” I slid the glass back on the bar, and Darcy grabbed it and drank it down fast, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand afterward. I stared at him aghast.

  “At least we can rule out turning into a vampire.” He chuckled.

  “Brilliant plan, Darce. What’s next? If I’m not a vampire, then what am I?”

  He stopped laughing, then leaped over the bar and landed softly before me.

  “There’s only one other explanation.”

  I was afraid of his answer.

  “What? What is it?”

  He went silent and looked down at his hands, which had specks of blood on them from mixing the blood cocktail.

  “Darcy?”

  “I was afraid it would be this. I didn’t want it to be true.”

  “What is it? Tell me!”

  He sighed and looked up at me, his eyes filled with sympathy and something else I couldn’t grasp.

  “You’re human.”

  Chapter Four

  “Human?” it couldn’t be true. How could I be human? But Darcy was right. If not a vampire, then there was no other alternative. I must be human. And if I was human, then that meant…

  “I’m no longer immortal.” I clenched my fists and willed sparks of pink magic to flare to life, but none appeared. “Oh no.”

  My heart thudded with dread as I tested my magic over and over, but no matter how much I willed the magic to come, it didn’t. It was gone.

  “My magic. I’m no longer a witch, either. He made her take my magic!”

  I screamed and tried throwing my magic like I normally
would when I was angry, but nothing happened. I screamed again.

  “That bastard! It’s another way of controlling me. He told me I was powerful, and then he took my magic away, so he thinks he’s the one in control. That controlling, evil bastard!” I screamed once more and then decided to take out my frustrations on a nearby table. I upturned it. Glass and cutlery shattered and clattered to the ground. I stopped and took a few deep breaths and stared down at the carnage I’d created.

  “Feel better?”

  “A little. I guess my father always gets what he wants. The only way to fix this is to go back to the supernatural realm and demand he turn me back—or see if we can get my mother to do it. While I’m there, I might as well take back what is truly mine, and then rid the Dragon kingdom of his tyranny once and for all.”

  “How are you going to do that?”

  “We’re going to the Dragon Realm, and I’m going to kill my father, get my mother to make me immortal again, and then I’m going to reclaim my throne.”

  Darcy stepped forward, took my face in his hands, and claimed my mouth. I kissed him deeply and passionately.

  “That’s the princess I fell in love with.”

  I kissed him again. “Queen. You mean the queen you fell in love with.”

  “Yes. Let’s go take back your kingdom and get you back your immortality.”

  We walked hand in hand up to Darcy’s office. When we reached the mirror portal in his office, I was glad one of us still had some magic, because Darcy had to open the veil to the supernatural realm this time. The mirror shimmered, and we stepped through into the magical hidden world adjacent to this one.

  ***

  I hadn’t been home for over three hundred human years. Well, I hardly thought of this place as home anymore. Just being here, the very moment my foot touched down in the supernatural realm, I began feeling extremely anxious. As Darcy and I made our way to the castle, I looked over my shoulder now and then. It was silly, but that’s how my father’s relentless fear tactics were ingrained in my soul. It was a scar that would probably never heal, but I knew I would find the cure here, hopefully. It was time to vanquish my demons once and for all.