And the one-week countdown beings! If you aren’t a fan of spoilers and are behind in reading the Amplifier Series (starting with the Amplifier Protocol, which is currently free on all retailers) then please continue reading with caution.

Idols and Enemies (Amplifier 4): Chapter One:

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED ABOUT SPOILERS!!!

A dark-haired, dreadfully sexy sorcerer sat in the copper-edged pentagram inset into the white-painted wood-slat flooring of the barn loft. Aiden had been fortifying the rune-etched, five-pointed star for the last three months, starting by adding smaller pentagrams at each point. At the beginning of May, he had embedded a black gemstone — obsidian — in the heart of each smaller star, then conducted tests for two more weeks. It had taken most of those first months to source the volcanic rock in a size and quality that satisfied the sorcerer. More glyphs had been carved into the stones themselves.

Dark-blue magic gleamed from the runes inked across Aiden’s bare chest, shoulders, back, arms, and legs. I’d been exceedingly helpful with the hard-to-reach areas. Then — again, terribly helpfully — I had powered up the sorcerer until he’d groaned and panted under the onslaught of my touch. My magic.

Crouched an arm’s length away with my blades at the ready, I grinned at the remembrance. The lingering pleasure still warmed my own limbs.

Aiden laughed at me huskily, flashing a toothy grin. His bright-blue eyes blazed with power. He was holding an envelope sealed with dark-blue wax in both hands. His long, dexterous fingers were each tipped in sparkly pink nail polish.

The manicure was a remnant of our most recent visit from Opal. The young witch had insisted she needed to practice casting during a break from the Academy, and Aiden was perpetually obliging when it came to the dream walker’s wants and needs. My own fingers and toes were currently bright green. And I’d been completely — irrationally — upset when I noted upon waking that morning that two of my fingernails had been chipped. 

No matter how much I adored my life in general, Opal’s absence always left me feeling a little hollow.

Drawing my attention back to the present, Aiden muttered an arcane word in that unique language he used. Magic snapped into place, sealing him within the main copper pentagram. The sorcerer quietly voiced another command, and the black stones in the five outer pentagrams flared with power.

Opal was safely at the Academy. Christopher and Paisley had left two days previously to join Samantha in Budapest. The telekinetic had been tracking Bee — aka Amanda Smith, aka one of the Five — across Eastern Europe for weeks now, but the path was cold, and the telepath was still missing. Daniel had surfaced long enough to check in, confirm that he didn’t know where Bee was either, and then go dark again. He was on his own separate mission.

In the end, Christopher had wanted to help make certain that Bee was okay, and I wasn’t his keeper. Paisley seemed amenable to doing some tracking, and I trusted that she would listen to the clairvoyant. So other than the chickens and the cows, the sorcerer and I were the only ones remaining on the property.

Which was good. Because it was time to deal with Kader Azar. 

Aiden’s father, and a key member of the former Collective — aka one of my creators. 

Aiden had invested three months into fortifying the pentagram just so he could open the letter that his brother, Isa Azar, had hand delivered last February.

“Ready or not,” the sorcerer said. Then he winked at me.

A flicker of warmth — desire mixing with a gleeful anticipation — flitted through my stomach. My magically sharpened, black-coated steel blades sat by my knees on the wood-slat flooring. The open loft was at my back, with the barn doors thrown wide open below. Aiden’s SUV was still parked beside the barn, but I’d moved the Mustang out, parking it by the house. It was likely that a ton of magic was about to be tossed around, and Lani Zachery would not be pleased if we ruined the car’s paint, which was still the original clearwater aqua. Or the aqua vinyl seating, for that matter. 

Each time Lani caught me driving around with Paisley, I could tell that the full-time mechanic, part-time intuitive had a difficult time not losing her mind. Lani’s latent witch magic manifested in an innate sense of when something needed to be fixed and how to fix it. More so since I’d amplified her.

Aiden held the envelope forward, his attention riveted to the rune-embossed wax seal. He murmured quietly under his breath, repeating a short phrase that stirred the magic within the pentagram. Power I could see but not feel.

I had another chance to wish that Aiden had agreed to have me in the pentagram with him, amplifying him at the same time as he opened the missive from his father.

We had fought over it.

Concern had sharpened my words, but experience tempered Aiden’s response. In the end, experience won, and I’d agreed to the sequence of events we were about to execute.

Aiden snapped the wax seal. It sounded like the explosive concussion of a high-caliber gun, discharging close enough that I expected to be winged by a bullet.

Nothing else happened.

Aiden laughed, quietly relieved.

Then a dark, shadowy pulse of power reached out from the broken seal, striking Aiden’s chest. 

He grunted, pained. Magic flared through the runes inked across every bare section of his body.

My blades suddenly appeared in my hands. I wrapped my fingers around the hilts on instinct, though I hadn’t consciously reached for them. Damn it. I must have inadvertently triggered the intricate retrieval spell that Aiden had fixed in one of the three raw-diamond gemstones embedded in each of the hilts, wasting the energy it had taken him to cast it in my momentary rush of panic.

The shadowed spell expanded across Aiden’s chest. He snarled, dropping the envelope to reach for the magic. The malicious shadow stretched, expanding until it looked suspiciously like a hand with five digits. A hand trying to grab the sorcerer?

All at once, the obsidian stones in the outer, smaller pentagrams flared, becoming brighter and brighter until I had to narrow my eyes against their intense blue glow.

The black stone nearest Aiden’s right knee cracked.

Then another stone. And another.

Five loud, sharp pops.

The magic died within each obsidian gem.

“Fuck!” Aiden snarled. Shuddering with the effort, he cupped his hands before him, fingers spread wide as he began muttering a melodic phrase over and over. The ink-etched runes on his upper chest and shoulders shifted, as if they were being pulled into or siphoned by the shadow hand.

No.

Not siphoned.

Aiden was somehow using the inked runes to feed the spell trying to grab hold of him. More symbols slid up and over the sorcerer’s shoulders and arms, leaving the deeply tanned skin of first his wrists, then his forearms bare.

Sweat broke out on his forehead.

I shifted, bringing my blades forward.

“No, Emma,” Aiden grunted. “I’m handling it.”

I stilled, trusting his expertise. Trusting him. 

Even I could learn. It was just that the lessons involving Aiden, involving any of those I cared about, took longer to absorb.

My heart hammered annoyingly in my chest. But as I watched, the shadow hand was drawn from Aiden’s chest. It coalesced into a dark, seething ball of power suspended between the sorcerer’s outstretched fingers. More runes were quickly stripped from Aiden’s legs, abdomen, and lower rib cage, running up to his shoulders and then down his arms as he continued to feed the spell. The sphere darkened, simmering between Aiden’s hands but no longer touching his skin. I could see lightning strikes of power coursing within it, emanating from Aiden’s fingertips.

With his body now completely stripped of the magical protections we’d spent hours putting in place and powering up, Aiden began condensing the spell he now held firmly, compressing it between his palms. Then, his chest heaving with the effort, he folded the spell in on itself.

The now-tiny black sphere dissolved with an audible snap. 

I waited, blades still poised to slash and rend. All my senses were on alert, reaching through the stillness of the loft, of the upper suite behind Aiden, and of the barn around us. Waiting for the next assault.

Nothing else happened.

Aiden raised his head, grimacing. Power brought forth by his anger blazed in his eyes. Tension was etched through his stubbled jaw. He locked me in place with a soul-searing gaze.

Sometimes he was so breathtakingly beautiful that my heart actually stuttered at the sight of him. Not that I would ever voice such an outrageously idiotic thought out loud.

“Well …” Aiden’s voice was husky, as if he had torn his throat raw while dealing with the magic, even though he’d barely spoken. “He knows where I am.”

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