Free To Kill a Wizard: Rose's Story (The Protectors of Tarak Book 1) by Lisa Morrow Page A

floor, her terrifying face inches from mine.
    “Are you frightened of me, girl?” she asked, husky and breathless.
    I nodded slowly.
    “Well, I am the least frightening thing you will see for the remainder of your life. And if you should make the wrong choice tonight, the image of me now will likely be the last thing that passes over your mind before you die.”
    Then, she was gone. I wasn’t certain if I blinked, or if a candle or two had gone out, but the room felt darker, and the woman was nowhere to be found.
    I rose to a sitting position and gripped my arms until my fingers bit painfully into my flesh. Part of me wanted to go running, screaming, from the fears she’d enflamed inside of me, but the other part of me refused to back down. Even from this.
    Rising on shaky legs, I moved to one of the candles, resting on a partially empty shelf. It flickered harmlessly in the small glass holder.
    I felt a word filled with power catch in my throat. Glancing towards the shadowed hall, I tapped the wooden shelf, leaving marks in the dust. These women thought to frighten me, to force me to make the choice they wished, but they might find me a little different than the helpless girls they were used to manipulating.
    Pulling on the cord around my neck, I brought the shard of stone out. It dangled over the fire, glittering shades of purple in the light. My father had given me the stone when I was just a little girl, but I’d known instantly it was more than something pretty.
    It’d opened up another world. A world of magic I’d suddenly sensed flowing through all things. Most girls had to wait until they were much older to know whether they had powers, or be trained by The Protectors in order to learn how to tap into it. My magic had roared to life the moment the necklace touched my flesh.
    I’d sensed it, but didn’t know how to use it. Not until one night a few weeks after receiving the necklace. I’d gotten turned around in the woods. Freezing in the dark, alone and afraid, a name had come to my lips. Several times I’d spoke it in desperation, before it worked.
    Since then, I’d tried several other names. None had worked. Yet. But the one name was enough for me. For now.
    “ Prometha , Prometha , Prometha ,” I chanted the Goddess of Fire’s name over and over again, watching the stone change from purple to a deep scarlet.
    The word was just as I practiced it, a song, a prayer. I forced emotion into each syllable until my chest hurt. But I couldn’t stop, not until the intonation, pitch, and inflection were perfect.
    Warmth gathered around me, a physical sensation tied to the gathering of my powers. Like pulling back an arrow on a bow, I held my magic, waiting until I showed it what I wanted it to do.
    In my mind, I pictured a flame being swallowed by the air, and a tingling spread across my flesh as I released my magic. Moments later, the flame went out, followed by all the other candles in the room.
    I cursed. “Nice work, Rose.”
    It was easy to tell magic what to do, but in my experience, it rarely worked exactly the way I wanted it to.
    The smell of smoke drifted to me in the darkened room, and I made my way cautiously to the hall, where a tiny light filtered through the shadows. My hand reached out, feeling what I couldn’t see. I moved forward, turning to slide down the hall. I walked for some time and frowned, wondering if perhaps I’d turned the wrong way, when a light appeared ahead of me.
    “Can you believe this?”
    I paused, letting my hand linger on the cold stone. The voice was familiar, but I wasn’t quite sure from where.
    “I never imagined being Chosen, and now I’m here!” The speaker dissolved into giggles, and I relaxed. It was Yara.
    Continuing forward, I saw, much to my surprise that the light was coming from a missing row of bricks about as wide as my shoulders. Kneeling down, I glanced through the space. Pressure grew at my temples. What exactly was I looking at? And then, I