Chapter One: Adriana

This is not a nice story. I don't think it has a happy ending. Protect yourself before it gets any worse.

The words reverberate through my mind at an alarming pace.

I don't know what has gotten into me. I don't know where the world has gone, but for a moment, I am surrounded only by those three sentences.

This is not a nice story. I don't think it has a happy ending. Protect yourself before it gets any worse.

I am a witch. And while I am powerful, my abilities certainly do not extend to seeing the future. I have never been particularly good at clairvoyancy.

That was always my mother's gift. And my sisters'. But never mine.

Maybe I am just feeling a natural sense of foreboding. Because right now, my life is ending.

"You have to actually go out and seek your mate Adria!" My mother shouts the words from the ground floor of our Upper East Side mansion.

I hate it when she uses the shortened version of my name. It is almost demeaning. I fucking hate it.

I throw more clothes into my bags, and with a wave of my staff, they rise, floating into the air.

"I thought my mate was supposed to find me!" I retort sharply as I get downstairs. My bags follow me, floating a few feet in the air.

My mother's eyes are bloodshot and wet. She has been crying for weeks, though I don't know if her grief is real.

Those tears could be crocodile tears for all I know.

I feel almost bad for accusing her of not grieving my leaving. I am her youngest daughter after all.

But then again, she has been lying to me for all my life. And now, on my twenty-sixth birthday, she has sprung the truth on me.

I am the next leader of the Black Wind Coven. And if I do not find my mate by the Full Moon, I cannot become the leader - the High Priestess.

And I will, effectively, be banished from my home. The only home I have ever known.

So I have decided to leave first. Before they can fucking kick me out.

"You have to find your mate!" Her voice is shrill. My father is standing at the kitchen door, which leads to the conservatory.

The place where all our magical items and belongings are stored.

"I don't need to do anything! Not after you've lied to me! You told me that I wasn't part of the prophecy! You told me that I didn't have the same powers as the others!"

My voice cracks on the last words. My sisters have always been considered the more powerful of the four of us.

I was considered insignificant.

And because of that, my training was ignored, and my abilities weren't nurtured.

They neglected me. And they lied all throughout my childhood.

How can I stay?

"I was just trying to protect you!" My mother says. Now tears are flowing copiously down her face.

I march past her and my father and into the conservatory where the portal waits for me.

"You're a liar!" I whirl around, snarling at her.

Then I march through the portal, and into my new life, in New Haven.

This is not a nice story. I don't think it has a happy ending. Protect yourself before it gets any worse.

The words resound through my mind so strongly that I stagger through the portal and fall to my knees on the other side.

My father - my only supporter - walks through behind me. He takes my bags and places them on the hardwood floors of my new apartment.

Then he turns to me. His brow is furrowed. I have never seen him this solemn before.

"Listen, I know that you're hurt. But your grandmother left you all the money and power because she knew you were worthy. She knew you were the subject of the prophecy."

I look away from him.

"I know you don't want this. But the prophecy, and your grandmother's wishes, are binding. You have to do this."

"How am I supposed to find my mate before the Full Moon in four weeks? In a world full of eight billion people?" I protest, my voice hoarse.

Tears well up in the corners of my eyes, and I start sobbing. The tears have been jerked from a part of my body I didn't know existed.

My grief is dark and deep and a heavier burden than I can handle.

My grief is a twisted amalgamation of the shock of my grandmother's death, the results of her will, and the truth coming to light.

The truth about all the lies of my past.

The truth that an entire coven kept from me. All while bullying me, making snide remarks about my lack of powers.

All while they knew I was the strongest of them all.

My father sighs, then pulls me into a hug.

"Just do what you can." He whispers into my ear. "Start using your magic and do a spell. And most importantly, remember that the coven will fall apart if you don't follow your grandmother's instructions."

And with that, he leaves.

****

I am in New Haven. It is a solitary town, built by supernatural creatures, for supernatural creatures.

Located on the border between Scotland and England, it is one of fifteen small towns around the world.

One of fifteen small towns that cater exclusively to supernatural creatures.

There was one close to my home in Manhattan - a little town called Millford - but I didn't want to stay close to home.

I wanted to be an ocean away from my family.

At least I got what I wanted.

I used part of the five billion dollars that my grandmother left me to buy an apartment and property in New Haven.

It is beautiful, and belonged to a witch too. It is clear from the get go that she was a hedge witch. The apartment is filled with flowers and plants of every kind, and crystals hand from the ceilings.

It is absolutely stunning.

But she found her mate, a beautiful, sexy leapord shifter woman. Now they've moved in together. And I figured that buying an apartment already imbued with magic would make my life a lot easier.

After I check out the magical wards around the building, and make sure that they're solid, I unpack.

Then I decide to go into the town center and get a coffee.

I am determined to build a life here, and I will do what it takes to shake off the stink of my old life.

Even if I cannot get my father's words out of my mind.

"The coven will fall apart without you."

I stop at a local coffee shop a few miles from my home, called "The Witch's Brew". It is run by a witch and a Faery couple.

I have just finished my coffee when he stumbles in. A man, disheveled, broken, bleeding.

Sierra, the Faery who owns the shop jumps up.

"Derrick!" I don't miss the genuine fear in her voice. Right now, everyone in the coffee shop is standing up, some of them to help the man called Derrick.

He is a wolf shifter, or werewolf, and I notice this right away, because his hands and feet are still claws.

I stand up to, calling my magic to me, and send sparks trailing through the air.

He has been cursed, I can smell the stink of it emanating from him. And the curse has trapped him between forms. Right now, he is both human and wolf.

I break the curse easily enough and he falls to the ground even further, groaning with pained relief. His claws become hands and feet, and he becomes full human.

Then he speaks for the first time.

His voice is hoarse.

I cannot believe I broke the curse so easily.

"It's gone," he says. "The compound is all gone. My pack, we've been burned out of the compound."

And then his head rolls, as he loses consciousness, and his eyes flutter shut.

This is not a nice story. I don't think it has a happy ending. Protect yourself before it gets any worse.