Read Online The Magician's Mistake (The Fay Morgan Chronicles Book 1) by Katherine Sparrow - Free Book Online Page B

history. And another nose bleed.
    I drove to work.
    Morgan’s Ephemera was the disaster I needed to take my mind off everything. It would take all day or more to clean it. Before I began, I made coffee and took out my tarot deck. I shuffled the deck a couple of times and wondered if I really wanted a reading today.
    With a shaking hand, I pulled the Magician.
    A moment later the door clanged open and he came in. Merlin looked well-slept and bright-eyed. He looked exactly like the man I’d been having graphic and extremely pleasant dreams about every time I closed my eyes. A woman my age should not blush.
    “I was wondering if you would actually show up,” I said.
    “I said I would.” He stood in the doorway, looking me up and down with a worried look on his face.
    “Yes, well, I don’t have the memory to know if you are a man of your word these days or not.” I held out my arm with the forgetting spell wrapped around it. “The memories are leaking out slowly.”
    “I have never lied to you. I will never lie to you,” he said, striding across the room until he stood too close.
    I handed him a mug of coffee and led him back to the card table. I sat down and gestured for him to sit across from me. I needed the space to think. To not grab hold of him and do what every one of my instincts urged me to do.
    “I’m guessing you’ve figured out who made the forgetting spell by now.” He took a long sip of coffee, like he had no cares in the world.
    I was a creature made of nerves and fire. I wondered if he felt anything, or if everything between us was all long ago ended, and I just didn’t remember it yet.
    “I do know who made the spell.” I took a deep breath. “I did. Who else would have been able to make and bind me with such a spell? But it doesn’t make sense why—”
    “Why you would put a forgetting spell on yourself so massive that you might imagine you were growing old and senile, so huge that it hid you and made you almost impossible to find, and so strong that when it starts to break it might tear your very mind apart, all so you could forget I ever existed?” he said coolly. “Agreed. It doesn’t make sense.”
    Ah, his indifference masked anger. Anger was better than nothing. I stared at the smooth, dark surface of my coffee and bit my lip. “I bet I had a good reason, but I don’t suppose you are going to tell me why, are you?”
    “I made a promise to you that I wouldn’t.”
    “Did you also promise to stay away?” I asked. “Is that why … ?”
    “I have some dignity, Morgan. The love of my life deleted me from her memories. I can take a hint.”
    The love of his life. Heat rose across my body. “But then you came and found me when Guinevere came to town.”
    “It was not my intention. I’d been tracking Guin for months, trying to stop her. I didn’t even know she was after you or that you were in Seattle, but then I was running from the trolls and I felt this draw, and I let it pull me, and there you were. And … damn it Morgan, once I saw you, I wanted to breathe your air for a bit, even though I knew it was all impossible and foolish and that I would have to leave without you ever knowing who I was and … anyway, it was a good thing I stayed since Guin was after you.”
    “Because I’m so weak and helpless?” I rolled my eyes.
    “You are ten times the witch that Queen Guinevere will ever be, but as soon as you saw her, as soon as she started telling you the truth about your own past, I knew some of your memories might surface and when they did your forgetting spell might break. And if that happened during battle, as it did, I thought you might need back up.”
    I nodded stiffly. “Thank you.”
    “Always.”
    I glanced at him and saw the man who knew me better than anyone, but also? He was a complete stranger. And I was so used to keeping people at arm’s distance, I was so good at it, but now that he was here? How had I lived for so long without him, without any hope