Free The Potioneer (Shadeborn Book 3) by K.C. Finn Page B

something about shades and broken mirrors, and how ‘seven years bad luck’ was more than a throwaway phrase when you belonged to the caste of the shadeborn.
    “Lily’s actions with the mirror have resulted in a curse being laid upon her,” Novel surmised. “I’ve been watching the situation carefully in order to confirm it, but I think we can all conclude that, after tonight, the state of affairs needs attention.”
    There was a murmur of voices, but Novel let one pale hand rise until he had silence again.
    “It is time to take action, and lift the curse as best we can. Baptiste will deliver a message to-”
    “What am I, your carrier pigeon now?”
    The MC’s interjection might have sounded like a joke in any other circumstance, but in the tense air of the theatre’s kitchen, his words cut like a challenge. Novel met his eyes with a frost-filled glare, and any compassion that Lily had mistakenly witnessed between the two men seemed to die in the space between their eye-lines. Baptiste bowed his head and let out a long, tense sigh.
    “To whom do I send this message?”
    “To London first,” Novel continued, his glare abating, “and then to the other Great Cities, should we receive no reply. We are in dire need of a potioneer, one skilled enough to lift the curse before…”
    The illusionist cut his own words short, his eyes meeting Lily’s. A shiver ran straight up her spine, like he’d shot her with only a look.
    “Well,” Novel stumbled, holding her gaze, “as soon as possible, shall we say?”
    Novel and Baptiste left at once to compose the request for a potioneer, and the remainder of the troupe slowly filtered out of the kitchen. Lily wasn’t thrilled at the sight of their half-satisfied expressions, nor was she inspired by the way each of them looked sharply about their surroundings, as though they might be next to catch some of Lily’s rotten luck. It was only Jazzy and Lawrence who stayed with her, Jazzy still clutching at her hand in her defiant best friend style. Lily exchanged a grateful smile with Jazzy, but she was more than a little disturbed by Lawrence. His dark features were suddenly gloomy, half-captured by his inner thoughts.
    “Oi,” Lily said, snapping her fingers before his eyes. “Cut that out. I can only handle one brooding figure per theatre right now.”
    Lawrence’s focus slowly returned to the room, and he spared Jazzy a thoughtful glance before his big brown eyes fixed solely on Lily.
    “Novel said a curse had been laid upon you,” the voodoo boy reiterated.
    “Right,” Lily answered, cocking a confused brow at him.
    Jazzy squeezed her hand an instant later, and Lily switched her gaze to her friend’s bright face. Jazzy was staring beyond them both again, but this time her eyes were rapt with imagination, not visions.
    “ Laid upon you ,” she repeated, “his exact words. A curse was laid upon you…”
    Her glasses slipped down her nose as she quirked a fearful, inquisitive brow.
    “So who laid it?”

 

November
    The Quiet American
     
    Salem was finally free from his confinement. Lily discovered this by accident, when she burst into the attic space of the theatre with a loud, childish huff. In a flurry of air magic, Lily had the old wooden door flying open with a bang, and inside the dark, wide space, a shadowy figure jumped. At the sight of him jumping, Lily jumped too, and the force of her magic treated her to a hard crack where her head connected with the lintel. As her feet shot down to find the ground once more, Lily looked sourly towards the other end of the room, where Salem’s familiar shape came into view among the shadows.
    “You frightened me to death,” Lily scolded, rubbing at the crown of her scalp viciously.
    “Lucky you,” came Salem’s flat reply.
    In just a few weeks of the older shade’s confinement, he’d managed to make himself look more ragged than ever. A black and silver beard had sprouted in full from his proud chin,