Origin: an Adult Paranormal Witch Romance: Othala Witch Collection (Sector 1) Read online

  Origin

  Othala Witch Collection: Sector One

  Rebecca Hamilton

  Fallen Sorcery

  Contents

  Copyright

  About Othala

  Blurb

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  About the Author

  Origin © 2016 Rebecca Hamilton

  All rights reserved under the International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, organizations, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Warning: the unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.

  Created with Vellum

  About Othala

  Many years ago, the Original Sixteen witches were able to contain an outbreak of demon-like creatures from overtaking the earth. But doing so came at a cost. For the human race to survive, the world had to be divided into sixteen sectors, trapping the ravagers to the outer lands beyond, and trapping the humans in.

  The Original Sixteen served as regents over each of these sectors, and when they died, the strongest of witches took their place, using their own personal enchantment abilities to protect their sector. In the process, communication was lost. The only solace that remains is the knowledge that if another sector fails, their own may still survive.

  But what happens when your sector is the one to fail? What happens when the world inside your walls is just as bad as the one outside them? In this collection of sixteen dystopian paranormal romance tales, each and every one of the sixteen sectors is about to find out.

  View the entire collection at

  www.fallensorcery.com

  ORIGIN

  United we fall, divided we conquer.

  Rule Number One: Don’t fall in love with the Doomed Queen.

  Rule Number Two: Don’t get caught.

  Alec and Adira are breaking all the rules.

  ALEC KLADIVO: Soldier. Hunter. Fool.

  When Alec was a boy, the border posts failed, and Ravagers infiltrated their sector. Through sacrificing his sister, he saved his city and gained the respect of Sector One’s Regent. Ever since that day, he has served his sector with unfailing loyalty and nobility. Until he met her.

  ADIRA CHOVANEK: Thief. Witch. Doomed Queen.

  In Sector One, there is no greater commodity than a witch. Which is exactly why each and every one of them are in hiding. Should they be discovered by the hunters, they will suffer one of two fates—both of which end in death—unless they can kill a Ravager and bring forth an heir for the sector’s Regent. The only problem is, the Regent is sterile, and would sooner exile a Doomed Queen than admit that to himself or anyone else. This is Adira's fate.

  THIRTEEN: The number of days before Adira’s death.

  Alec has given Adira just under two weeks to turn herself in and accept her role as the only person who might be able to save their failing sector from certain extinction. And he’s spent each and every one of those days trying to convince her it is the right thing to do. But what happens once he’s finally persuaded her, only to find out he’d been mistaken all along?

  Chapter 1

  Using magic was one way to die. It just wasn’t the only way.

  It wasn’t that Adira Chovanek wanted to be a liar and a thief; it was simply that she wanted to survive. And in Sector One, no one survived if they were a witch.

  Adira learned this at a young age, when she lost her mother to the witch hunters and her father was killed while on the run. All she had left of them was a warning—never use magic.

  Unfortunately for Adira, magic was a part of her survival, so instead, she settled for her own version of their rule—never get caught using magic.

  As she navigated through the market, her stomach rumbled, reminding her it had been too long since her last meal. But now was not the time to dwell on her hunger. She needed to stay focused.

  Here she was, at the sector capital, in search of cloves blessed by the regent. Cloves she would use to protect herself from him, ironically enough. They were said to be the most potent form of protection money could buy. Soon, they would be hers, bought with every last coin she had to her name.

  As she neared the center of the marketplace, she spotted the regent’s official dispensary. Not that anyone could miss it. It was the only kiosk that stood on a large, circular runestone embedded into the ground. This one was different from the runes around the sector that protected them from the ravagers; this was regent’s personal creation: a large, glowing blue circle with other blue circles inside and centered along the outermost ring in uneven, overlapping pattern.

  Adira had seen what this particular runestone could do. She had seen the lives it had taken, many of them more valuable than her own. It was why she only came here when she absolutely had to—when her protection spells were so close to wearing off that the idea of certain death was enough for her to face the potential of the same.

  That was why she stepped in line. Why she didn’t even flinch as she shuffled into the first glowing blue ring of the regent’s marketplace runestone. Why she kept her face a stony mask and waited her turn, one person after the next, until she had to face one of the guards who ran the kiosk.

  “Name,” the guard on the other side of the counter said.

  “Mishka,” she said evenly, not wavering in her lie. It was the same fake name she used every time. “I need some cloves blessed by the regent, please.”

  The guard tilted up his chin, his expression unreadable.

  She wasn’t sure if the pain radiating through her stomach was from hunger or anxiety, but she took a slow, quiet breath, trying to quell it either way, then emptied the coins from her satchel onto the counter. “Will this be enough?” Adira asked. “It’s all I have.”

  For a long moment, the guard looked down his nose at her. Sweeping the coins into his palm, he inspected them and placed them in his own satchel. “Sorry. No cloves today.”

  Tears sprung to her eyes, but she bit back the words that threatened to tumble from her lips. Arguing with a guard while standing on t
he regent’s marketplace runestone was perhaps the most foolish thing she could do in this situation. But she had to say something. That was every last penny she had.

  The guard could kill her, but without those cloves, she was as good as dead anyway.

  She sidled closer to the kiosk, pressing up onto her toes. “I think there’s a little left right there,” she said, tapping the glass display and pointing to the cloves. “Please?”

  Another guard came to the side of the first one—this one was a good foot taller than the first, with a chest twice as broad and biceps that would rival anyone in the regent’s army. Both men wore only pants, which was the standard of the Guard, but this second man would have been impossible to miss either way, every muscle from his chest all the way down was defined, enhanced by a golden tan and the gleam of perspiration.

  As Adira’s gaze lifted to his face, her heart stuttered in her chest. The intensity in his eyes was enough to spark a fire in her stomach, but it was the way her nipples hardened beneath her clothes that warmed her cheeks. Suddenly, a different kind of hunger rivaled that of her stomach.

  “Is everything all right here?” he asked, his arms crossed and his stance wide.

  She couldn’t tell if he was asking her or the other guard.

  “She wants cloves,” the first guard said.

  The second guard stared down at her. “What for?”

  As his biceps flexed again, Adira saw the mark. The same symbol that was on the ground beneath her feet was tattooed on the second guard’s arm. Which could only mean…

  He’s a witch hunter.

  So much for market day being busy enough not to draw attention to herself.

  She swallowed, forcing herself to hold his gaze despite every instinct to turn and run. “For protection, of course,” she said, then added, “the way only the regent can protect us.”

  Of course, any cloves would do for the protection enchantments she cast, but since she was trying to cloak herself from the regent himself, it only made sense to use cloves blessed by his magic to do so. After all, he was the most powerful witch in Sector One.

  As a man, Regent Dvorak didn’t have to fear being found out for his magic. That luxury was not afforded to Adira, who needed to pretend the cloves would sit on a windowsill, doing magic all on their own, and not as part of some bigger spell.

  The second guard’s gaze weighed on her. Finally, he said, “It’s fine. Give her the cloves, but nothing else.”

  As he walked off, Adira’s gaze trailed after him. Such beauty, she would never know. She could never be intimate with anyone, let alone a witch hunter. Not if she wanted to live.

  “I said here,” came the disgruntled voice of the first guard.

  When she returned her attention to him, he shoved a small pouch of cloves in her face.

  She took them and dropped them into her satchel. “Thank you.”

  The man glowered. “You’re holding up the line. Go.”

  Adira ducked her head, turned on her heel, and hurried into the crowd, wishing she could melt into the mass of people and disappear. As she wove back through the outskirts of the marketplace, her stomach rumbled again.

  It was a long hike home to make on an empty stomach, and not much food to return to. But she’d spent all of her…collection at the regent’s kiosk. She had nothing left to barter with, and the sector capital was the worst place for her to test her abilities as a thief. She was more of a ‘sneak in when no one was home and lift what they won’t notice’ kind of gal.

  This was the life she was destined for, and the people in the capital weren’t especially known for their kindness toward beggars and thieves. But when you spent your life hiding who and what you were, you often ended up an outcast—which was still better than being dead.

  But not by much.

  These were the realities that led Adira to have no family, no friends, and no job. All of her choices before this one had led to this very moment, where she had to do exactly what she’d sacrificed everything not to do.

  Use magic. In public.

  But a girl had to eat, and her hunt these past few days had come up empty. That was the disadvantage of the sectors. The ravagers couldn’t get in…but neither could food. With population growing so quickly and the lone regent unable to sustain magic to both protect and duplicate, that meant food was scarce. The better of the hunters had beat her to it, which meant she would have to get her food at the market like everyone else.

  Except she wasn’t like everyone else. She lived off the grid and had just spent the last of her stolen coins.

  As she turned a corner into a busy stretch where vendors had set up their carts for the morning, she pulled the hood of her cape over her head. Ducking into the crowd, she tucked her hands into her long sleeves, hoping to mask what she was about to do.

  The autumn wind blew an encouraging wind across the cobblestone, stirring up dried leaves, debris, and what little courage Adira had. She steeled herself, knowing she needed to think fast. Act fast. With no money to buy food, stealing was her only option if she wanted to eat today.

  Getting caught, however, was not. She would have to make the lift in passing, and she would need magic to do it. Magic no one could witness if she wanted to live.

  If she tried to make a natural grab, she would certainly be caught. That was one way to die. But lifting objects with sorcery had its risks, too. With Adira’s experience, it was still the lesser of evils—a possible death always won out over a definite one.

  She shuffled through the aisles, assessing the various options. The man at the bread cart stared as she neared. His arms crossed and his gaze dipped to her breasts—the only thing harder to hide than her magic, even under the loose layers of clothing.

  Biting her lip, she turned away, trying to still a trembling hand. The eyes of the entire town prickled into her back. That, or paranoia was scraping razors up her spine.

  Adira breezed past the meat carts; men with large knives, food worth guarding, and a meal she would need fire to cook made their offerings easy to rule out. Not to mention it wouldn’t exactly be easy to sneak a stolen leg of lamb through the marketplace.

  Taking a deep breath, she passed by a fruit cart tended by an old woman dressed in dark, ragged clothing. The woman’s eyes were clouded over in white. Blind. This was a cheap shot, but it was also Adira’s best chance at survival. The pangs in her stomach pressed her to at least consider the goods.

  The broskve and meruňky were past season, but only just. Still, Adira was in no mood to deal with any wasps that may have burrowed their way into the fruits. On the entire cart, there was only one piece of fruit she would trust this time of year.

  Hopefully her last protection spell hadn’t worn off yet. It would help cloak what she was about to do. Next time, she would get the cloves sooner. Be more prepared. Not let fear lead to her putting off what needed to be done. But for today, if she was to have the energy to make the hike home, she needed to eat.

  Come on. You can do this.

  At least, she hoped.

  No amount of successfully undetected enchantments seemed to instill any confidence in her. There was always the possibility looming over her that today would be the day she got caught using magic.

  Another sharp pang rocketed through her gut, sending a dizzy feeling through her head. She slowed to steady herself, her gaze darting around to see if anyone had noticed, but the other citizens were too worried about what goods they should fill their own bellies with.

  Adira forced her steps one in front of the other, carrying herself toward the fruit cart. She needed a distraction. As she came upon a crying boy, she patted his head. When he turned in his haste to see who had touched him, he knocked over a bread tray. That was just the commotion she needed, and ambiguous enough that no one would even realize it had been the boy who knocked it over. No one would be hurt because of her choices today.

  Hurrying the rest of the way, she strode past the fruit cart and sent energy out from h
er. She didn’t have much time before the distraction passed.

  Under the hood of her cloak, she whispered, “Levitovat.”

  A small švestka fruit floated from the cart to Adira’s hand. She quickly pulled it into her sleeve and out of sight. Heart hammering in her chest, she let out a slow, steady breath.

  It’s over now. Breathe.

  Adira went to turn another corner when a bony hand snatched her wrist and spun her around. With a gasp, she came face to face with the old woman. Her smoky eyes seemed to burn into Adira’s soul. The woman stared as though she could see everything.

  Slowly, she lifted Adira’s hand. Adira’s sleeve fell down to her elbow, revealing the small plum still clutched in her grasp.

  “I-I’m so sorry,” Adira said, shaking her head. “Please don’t—”

  “Silence.” The old woman’s grip tightened. “I saw what you did, child.”

  Adira’s eyes widened. If only. If only she were still a child, she might get out of this—at least for stealing. But if anyone knew she could spell-cast, her life would be little more than a ticking time bomb. Maybe if she’d been born in another sector. Maybe if she’d been born before the world turned. Maybe a lot of things…but maybes didn’t make things so. This was her life. These were her people.

  The old woman yanked Adira’s arm, pulling her to the side of street. She took Adira’s other hand and flipped both over, pressing her sharp fingernails against her wrists. The plum fell to the ground below, but the old woman’s clouded gray eyes never left Adira’s gaze.

  “You’re one of them,” she whispered darkly.

  Adira shook her head. “If you tell anyone—”