Animal Magnetism Read online

  Contents

  Let's Have Some Fun!

  Forbidden Arcana Series

  Animal Magnetism

  Acknowledgements

  You may also like

  Copyright

  Let's Have Some Fun!

  That's our goal here. On it's surface it sounds good, right? Everybody likes fun! Well, it's important to clarify that when we say fun we're not talking about family board game night. We're talking over the top explicit content. Now, once again you're probably thinking that sounds good, right? Well, we really want to emphasize over the top really means over the top. This book is meant for adults. You've been warned.

  Forbidden Arcana Series

  Jinx (Book 1)

  Ariel (Book 2)

  Mirage (Book 3)

  Theia (Book 4)

  Sable (Book 5)

  Luna (Book 6)

  Talia (Book 7)

  Morgana (Book 8)

  Valaria (Book 9)

  Arcana Slice of Life Series

  Warning: The Arcana Slice of Life Series is a series of supplementary shorts that take place at various times throughout the series. Because of this, they may contain spoilers if read before completing the main series.

  Animal Magnetism (After Sable)

  Animal Magnetism

  Ariel prided herself on her ability to get along with pretty much anybody. Even throughout the years of being tormented by the fairy elders, she managed to keep up her cheerful demeanor and make friends. She made friends with a spectral tigress, a shapeshifter, a seraph, and even a member of an ancient race of dark magic users.

  But the spectral wolves were a completely different story.

  Normally Ariel had no issue befriending animals since they were much easier to understand than people. They only wanted food, fun, and love. But the spectral wolves weren’t technically animals. They were powerful spirits with the form and demeanor of animals. And much like Jinx, they preferred to maintain their human forms.

  But, unlike the spectral tigress, the spectral wolves seemed to have almost zero impulse control. Which, considering Jinx’s impulsiveness, said quite a bit about them. Primarily, that they were inconsiderate jerks that did whatever they wanted whenever they wanted.

  They would steal her things and play keep away, jump out and scare her, and follow her around teasing her. They were mean spirited bullies.

  But ever since helping rescue Jinx it got worse. They were watching her constantly from a distance and rather than stealing her stuff and teasing her, they started leaving piles of garbage laying around with her name on it. It started with one or two items but gradually the piles increased in size and that very morning she had to spend twenty minutes cleaning up their mess.

  And the worst part of it all was she couldn’t prove anything since they were watching her with spirit magic and she never actually saw them making the mess. They were sneaky about everything. That’s why she was in Cynthia’s room begging for help.

  “Cynthia!” Ariel whined while hugging the irritated dark fairy. “I’m telling you the truth! I can feel them watching me with spirit magic all the time!”

  “Obviously,” Cynthia said coldly. “It’s their job to protect the house and they’re spectral wolves. They’re watching everybody all of the time.”

  “No!” Ariel stomped while burying her face into Cynthia’s chest. “They’re watching me! This is different from when Jinx watches the house! It feels like I’m being hunted!”

  “You’re probably going through some mild changes due to your recent activation of Nature’s Wrath,” Cynthia insisted. “It’s most likely a side effect you’ll need to get used to.”

  “That’s not it! If that were the case I’d feel the same thing when Jinx uses her ability but I don’t!” Ariel said obstinately. She wasn’t crazy. Although she imagined if she was crazy, she’d think the same thing. But the fact was everybody else’s spirit aura still felt the same. The only ones that changed were those of the spectral wolves. “I’m telling you they are hunting me!”

  “Ariella,” Cynthia growled. “What possible reason would they have for hunting one of their master’s familiars?”

  “I don’t know!” Ariel snapped as her frustration increased. “But I can feel them watching me all the time! And they deny it but it’s obvious they’re lying! Even Mirage said they were lying! But nobody can prove anything!”

  “Hm,” Cynthia said pensively. “Mirage said they were lying? Interesting.”

  “Does that mean you’re finally ready to believe me?” Ariel glared at Cynthia as she realized the raven-haired fairy trusted Mirage more than her.

  Ariel was frustrated that nobody believed her. But Mirage, everybody trusted Mirage just because she was mature, polite, controlled, rationale, even she trusted Mirage more. But it didn’t make it any less frustrating!

  “I’ll see if I can find some more information,” Cynthia smirked. “I still believe given the timing it’s connected to you becoming a full-fledged Nature Warden, but I’ll explore other avenues as well. In the meantime, you can always dull your senses.”

  “Dull my senses?” Ariel asked curiously. “What do you mean by that?”

  Cynthia walked to her cabinet and grabbed a large ornate bottle. She sighed as she caressed the bottle like it was the most precious things in her room and expressed disappointment as she handed it to Ariel.

  “Take a gulp of this and your senses will be adequately numbed,” Cynthia said somberly. “What a waste.”

  “What is it?” Ariel said while staring at the half-empty container. The bottle appeared to be carved from some sort of crystal and the liquid inside glowed black. “Is it safe?”

  “Safe is a relative term,” Cynthia pouted. “It’s my special label, Absolute Black. It’s the strongest alcohol I managed to create that is still safe for consumption.”

  “Alcohol,” Ariel glared at the dark fairy. “Your solution to those beasts watching me is to get drunk?”

  “Would you prefer I give you some sleeping draught?” Cynthia said indignantly. “The side effects of those can be horrendous.”

  “I want a real solution!” Ariel made a motion like she was going to throw the bottle and Cynthia quickly snatched it away before she could.

  “Ariella Pepperspring!” Cynthia said with condemnation in her voice as she cradled the bottle like a newborn. “Do you know how difficult this is to make? It requires extremely rare and expensive herbs and the process takes weeks. And it’s a memento of my time with that idiot mage since he’s the one that acquired the herbs for me. Although he ignores me now that he got what he wanted from me.”

  “I don’t think that’s why he avoids you,” Ariel said knowingly. While she understood why her master avoided sleeping with Cynthia, she did feel somewhat sad as she watched Cynthia smile fondly at the bottle. Although she’d never admit it, the dominant dark fairy did get lonely from time to time. But those thoughts were interrupted as Ariel suddenly felt a tingle shoot through her. “Cynthia! I can feel them doing it again!”

  “Would you like me to dispose of them, my queen?” Cynthia said mockingly while half-heartedly bowing. “No? Alright then. All I can do is promise to look into the matter. In the meantime, if you don’t want to dull your senses you just need to deal with it.”

  “Fine!” Ariel said as Cynthia pushed her into the hallway and shut the door behind her. She looked around but knew she wouldn’t find her assailants watching her. “Gah!”

  Ariel stomped to a window and flew out and to the rooftop. She wasn’t going to let the spectral wolves’ weird behavior stop her from visiting her plant friends in her garden. It was one of her favorite parts of the day and she wasn’t going to let those stupid beasts ruin it for her.

  �
��Oh god,” Ariel whimpered as she landed in her garden. It was completely littered with the same random piles of junk and these ones were the biggest yet. “What happened?”

  As she looked around at the various types of trash ranging from half-eaten chunks of meat to half-empty bottles of alcohol. There were even random pieces of dirty clothing, shoes, and bits of jewelry. It looked like somebody had thrown a massive party in her garden and to top it off the new plot she’d recently prepared for new herbs was completely demolished.

  “Oh no,” Ariel quickly rushed around checking up on all of her plant friends to make sure they were all okay. “Are you okay? How about you? Oh, good. You’re fine. What happened here? Did somebody have a party? It was those wolves, wasn’t it?”

  Ariel listened carefully as the plants slowly began to tell her about what had transpired. Although they didn’t literally tell her. It was less of a conversation and more of a series of feelings that Ariel translated into her own understanding.

  “I see,” Ariel sighed as she began gathering up the trash. There was no way she could keep her beautiful garden in that condition. “So, it wasn’t a party at all. They were just dumping their trash here. I’m so sorry you all had to suffer because of me. I didn’t expect them to start targeting my plant friends too.”

  Ariel sat down on her bench and wiped away some tears. The sad fact was, despite always trying to get along with everybody, she was used to being picked on, the Fairy Elders made sure of that. They never missed an opportunity to remind the people of Dayrose how the incompetence of the Pepperspring family caused the village to fall into ruin. So, being the target of bullying wasn’t anything new.

  It was just she thought the bullying would stop after her master saved the village. Thanks to her master, she was loved, she had friends, and even the people of Dayrose respected her. Sure, Jinx teased her every now and then and Cynthia could be really mean when she wanted to. But she was undoubtedly loved.

  But then those stupid beasts had to move in and no matter how much she tried to be their friend, this was what she got.

  “I think she’s crying.”

  Ariel turned to see where the voice came from. It was surprisingly audible for a whisper and she was almost certain it came from inside of the penthouse. The women were obviously watching her. Of course, she should have realized it, bullying was no fun unless you watched your victim’s reaction.

  “What? She’s crying?”

  “But we tried so hard this time,” Kadra’s unmistakable voice echoed. For whatever reason, the silver-haired woman always sounded like she was angry.

  “Shh. She’ll hear us.”

  “But I don’t get it!” Kadra snapped. “Why is she crying?”

  “You’d have to ask her,” Sirun’s head poked out for a moment before ducking back in. She was the only short-haired member of the group making her easy to identify. That and her hair was bright red. “I think she heard us.”

  “What makes you think that?”

  “She’s looking right at us,” Sirun said. “Check for yourself.”

  Avara, Kadra, and Rela all poked their heads out from behind the door before ducking back in.

  “She’s just staring at us crying,” Avara said before poking her head out again. She brushed her long brown hair out of her face and ducked back behind the door again. “Why isn’t she saying anything?”

  “She looks sad,” Rela chimed in. “Why does she look so sad?”

  “I don’t know!” Kadra growled. “Maybe somebody did something to her?”

  “Should we ask?” Sirun said.

  “I don’t want to,” Kadra said. “I might say the wrong thing and make it worse. Why don’t you ask? You’re tiny like her.”

  “I’m not tiny!” Sirun growled. “I’m perfectly normal sized! You’re just jealous because you’re not cute!”

  “I’m not cute because I’m not a tiny stupid runt,” Kadra snapped back.

  “Ha,” Sirun laughed victoriously. “You agreed that I’m cute.”

  “No, I didn’t,” Kadra said. “I just said I’m not cute.”

  “You sort of agreed she was cute,” Avara said. “At the very least you didn’t deny it.”

  “She still looks sad,” Rela poked her head out again. Ariel locked eyes with the long-haired redhead. She couldn’t believe that they intended to sit there and watch her cry while arguing about who was the cutest. They really were the worst. “And maybe a little angry.”

  “Definitely a little angry,” Sirun confirmed by poking her head out. “Why’s she angry?”

  “She was just in that evil dark fairy’s room,” Kadra said aggressively. “I bet she did something horrible to her.”

  Ariel continued listening as the group of women loudly discussed the situation. She wasn’t sure if the women were being loud on purpose or if their idea of whispering was somehow louder than their normal speaking voices. Either way, she was getting increasingly aggravated by their mockery.

  “Will you just stop it!” Ariel yelled with tears streaming down her face. “It’s one thing to bully me but this time you scared all of my plant friends and they didn’t do anything!”

  “Bully?” Kadra’s head popped out and she gave Ariel a confused look.

  “Who’s bullying?” Rela asked in a perplexed tone.

  “If she’s talking about bullying, she must mean Kadra,” Sirun said. The sound of a loud smack immediately followed. “Ouch! See!”

  “Watch your mouth next time runt!” Kadra said threateningly.

  “Excuse me,” Avara poked her head out from behind the door. The brunette smiled politely while staring at Ariel. “Are you talking to us or somebody else?”

  “Avara you idiot!” Kadra growled. “Now she knows we’re here!”

  “I’ve heard you the entire time!” Ariel snapped. “You’re not being quiet at all!”

  “Wait a minute,” Kadra stepped out onto the roof and pointed at her accusingly. “If you knew we were here why didn’t you say anything?”

  “Yeah!” Sirun jumped out behind her. The short-haired redhead tried to look intimidating but failed miserably. “It’s rude to eavesdrop!”

  “Rude?” Ariel growled. She could feel wrath bubbling up inside of her and did her best to push it back down before she did something she’d regret. She didn’t want to lose control in her garden and risk upsetting her plant friends. “You’re the ones that destroyed my garden and sat behind the door laughing at how sad it made me!”

  “Destroyed your garden?” Avara stomped out and crossed her arms. “What are you talking about? We did no such thing! And it’s wrong to make false accusations!”

  “We didn’t destroy your garden,” Rela walked out completing the group. “Your garden looks perfect as always!”

  “Yeah,” Kadra nodded. The tan silver-haired woman looked at the others who all nodded. “All we did was leave you presents!”

  “And we knew you liked flowers so we planted more of them in that giant hole,” Sirun confirmed.

  “We didn’t do anything wrong,” Avara added.

  “Wait,” Rela paused and looked at the pile of stuff Ariel had picked up. Slowly it seemed to dawn on her what Ariel was talking about it. “Oh no! Are you talking about our gifts?”

  “What?” Kadra jumped up and glanced around as her face turned red. “You’re not talking about our gifts, are you?”

  “Of course not,” Sirun said while slowly moving behind Kadra. “We worked really hard on the gifts this time since she threw out the other ones.”

  “Yeah. This time we worked even harder to find really nice things,” Avara said anxiously. “We even made sure that everything tasted good and felt nice.”

  “It’s true,” Rela said. “We worked really hard this time! You’re not going to throw it all away again, are you?”

  Ariel looked at the women’s pouty expressions then at the pile of garbage that’d been strewn about her garden. She returned her gaze to the concerned wolves as they n
ervously shifted and wondered if they were trying to pull some sort of prank.

  “These are gifts?” Ariel asked suspiciously while holding up a half-eaten piece of meat. “Then why is there a bite out of it.”

  “We wanted to make sure it tasted good,” Kadra said as if it were obvious. “You don’t just give meat to people before checking to make sure it’s good.”

  “Yeah,” Sirun said haughtily. “After you threw out the other stuff we gathered for you we figured you were really picky.”

  “So this time we double checked everything to make sure it was the best,” Avara said somberly. “But you still don’t like it.”

  “If you don’t like it we can take it all back,” Rela said while walking slowly to a half-empty bottle of wine. “Just don’t throw it away again. We worked really hard gathering these.”

  “We should have listened to Jinx,” Sirun said as tears welled up in her eyes. “She said that fairies were really sophisticated and only liked really nice things. Of course, a queen thinks are presents are garbage.”

  Suddenly a deep feeling of guilt welled up in Ariel as she realized the spectral wolves were serious. She watched as all four of the spectral wolves began gathering up all of the gifts from the roof while avoiding eye contact. She’d never felt so awful as she desperately tried to hold back her tears.

  “I’m sorry!” Ariel said while panicking. She rushed around grabbing up all of the partially eaten food and drinks. She quickly took a bite out of a partially eaten piece of dried meat. “I love your presents.”

  “You’re just saying that,” Kadra said while tapping a bottle with her foot. “You don’t have to pretend.”

  “Yeah,” Sirun said sadly while filling a large bag with chunks of dried meat. “It’s fine if you don’t like it.”

  “No!” Ariel said insistently. “I like it all a lot!”

  “You said it was garbage,” Rela’s lip quivered as she spoke. The redhead was clearly doing her best to remain strong but it was clear she wanted to curl up into a ball and cry. “We’re not stupid. Don’t treat us like we’re stupid. If you liked the presents you wouldn’t have thought they were garbage.”