Southwest Nights (Semiautomatic Sorceress Book 1) by Kal Aaron (large ebook reader txt) 📕

before charging toward their targets, firing freely at the royals. The thick earthen shields absorbed their bullets.

Two of the assassins opened fire on the armored man, but their shots bounced off his armor. When he twisted his palms, coils of dirt and stone shot out of the ground and wrapped around the men before enveloping their guns.

An earthen arm whipped toward the remaining assassins, sending them aloft. They tumbled through the air before crashing into the ground. The arm lifted again, preparing to crush the assassins, but stopped feet from their bodies.

The camera shifted and focused on the Queen. She stood, her expression stern and her palm out. She shook her head.

Sergeant Smith backed away as police approached cautiously, eyeing the Sorcerer and the terrorists with equal concern. The Queen gestured at the sergeant and began clapping. Soon, the entire area was filled with cheers and applause.

From what Lyssa understood, the Queen was aware of the existence of the Society, but she hadn’t realized that one of her guards was a Sorcerer. Even though she was a Sorceress, there was a lot Lyssa didn’t know about the incident.

The convenience of Sergeant Smith having the Royal Knight regalia didn’t bother her. Beyond compatibility with essence, the more an Illuminated embodied the concept of the regalia through their actions and influence on others, the more power they could draw. It made perfect sense for the Royal Knight to be guarding a queen.

She turned off the TV. Sergeant Smith didn’t need sorcery to stop the assassins. The Society would later claim they’d received a tip that shards would be used in the attempt, which was why the sergeant had gone straight to sorcery, but given that the Society was the only organization capable of investigating at the time, along with limited personnel in the know in governmental intelligence agencies, no one could confirm their claim.

Most people, including Lyssa, doubted the official story. The Tribunal who ruled the Society and their handpicked Elders had wanted the Society to stop hiding from the rest of humanity. She wouldn’t be surprised if they’d somehow concocted the assassination attempt.

The would-be regicides’ bizarre motivations only added to the mystery. They weren’t with any of the usual terrorist groups one would suspect of sowing discord in London. Instead, they claimed to belong to the New Cromwellian Freedom Army, a group dedicated to the violent overthrow of the monarchy despite the modest and mostly ceremonial power of the institution. Interrogation revealed they were a group of disturbed young men who had planned the attack in intricate detail for months and had no links to other terrorist organizations.

The Society took advantage of the positive press to fully admit their existence to the public and governments of the world, reestablishing the ancient patterns where the Illuminated and the Shadows openly acknowledged each other. The Society tried to downplay their manipulation of history, including Sorcerers posing as gods in the far past.

“We opened up to go backward.” Lyssa frowned.

“I don’t understand,” Jofi said.

“The Society.” Lyssa stood and licked her lips. It was going to take her a while to get used to the dry heat of Arizona. She needed better humidifiers. “Sergeant Smith had to leave the Queen’s Guard after that. All the different governments insisted that Sorcerers involved in high-level positions be identified. Now, they might hire Torches and Eclipses through the Society, but the idea of someone like Sergeant Smith serving directly freaks people out. The guy saved the Queen, though!”

“Does that anger you?”

“It’s more that it confuses me.” Lyssa laced her fingers together and stretched them over her head. She needed to work out the tension in her muscles from the long ride and being around Lee. “The Tribunal and Elders don’t tell us rank-and-file Sorceresses what they’re thinking most of the time. We didn’t get a lot of warning before they announced us to the world. I’m lucky I wasn’t that deeply embedded in Shadow society. A lot of people got screwed in the aftermath.”

“Do you want to go back to secrecy?” Jofi asked.

“It doesn’t matter.” Lyssa shrugged. “You can’t put the rabbit back in the hat so easily.”

Lyssa had hated the Society’s secrecy when she was younger. She’d attributed it to the hubris of ancient fossils stuck in their ways, idly pining for a Golden Age of Sorcery, which had been over for thousands of years. Now she wasn’t sure they hadn’t been onto something.

The public confirmation of the existence of sorcery meant the worst scum of humanity now knew there was a previously untapped power they could seek, both from rogue Sorcerers and lost shards. It wasn’t as if rogue Sorcerers hadn’t always existed, but they’d had to keep a much lower profile in the days when any odd public occurrence might lead to a Society investigation.

Shadowy hands clawed at the edge of her vision, and a chill seeped through her body. Lyssa’s perimeter alarm might not be loud, but it was hard to ignore.

She spun toward her front door, narrowing her eyes. She didn’t grab her gun from her closet or go for the safe and Jofi. Her alarm spell might have been tripped, but she didn’t feel active sorcery. Many of her neighbors might like their guns, but pulling a weapon on a Girl Scout selling cookies or a member of the HOA wouldn’t fly. Mostly.

She hurried to the door and the peephole before frowning. At least Damien’d had the common sense to wear casual clothes and a hat, but how the hell was she supposed to maintain her secret identity if EAA agents started showing up on her doorstep?

Lyssa threw open her door and gestured him inside. “Get in here before somebody sees you.”

Chapter Eleven

Damien offered a sheepish smile to Lyssa as she slammed the door behind him after looking around the street. “You seem pissed.”

Lyssa snorted. “You’re not exactly giving interviews on camera, but it’s not like someone can’t look you up.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. “Showing up at