Shadow's Edge (Shadows Saga bk1)

Chapter 12- Electricity

Mara woke up confused. She didn’t remember going back to her room, but that’s where she was. She rolled over and started to scratch her cat’s head.

Sasha began to purr loudly before opening her mouth into a wide yawn, stretching her paws out in front of her, and leaning her head into Mara’s hand. “What were you up to last night that you couldn’t make your way back on your own?”

All it took was that one question for Mara to remember the previous day. It all came crashing down and her chest felt heavy as if an invisible force was crushing her. She remembered the threat of the Other Side looming over her, and how her magic had taken control of her. She wasn’t exactly what she had done the day before but Zander said he had to forcefully snap her out of it.

“I need to talk to Marx right now.” Mara jumped out of bed, pulled back her hair and put on her slippers. As she was about to leave she heard Trixle stir.

“Mara?” She said, hoarse from sleep. “What are you doing?”

“I need to talk to Marx,” she paused for a moment. “Do you know his room number?” She asked, realizing she had absolutely no idea where his room was.

“495,” she said, her eyes closed.

“Thanks,” Mara said as she opened the door to leave. She heard something that resembled a ‘yeah’ from Trixle and she was on her way up.

Mara’s feet pounded on the stone steps as she went up the flight of steps. She stepped onto the fourth floor and wandered around until she found room 495. She stood in front of the door nervously trying to work out what she wanted to say. After almost knocking four times and turning to walk away just as many, Mara swallowed her nerves and her knuckles made contact with the wooden door.

A loud thump followed by the sound of someone cursing flowed under the crack of the door. When the door swung open, Marx’s face went from annoyed to surprised when he saw Mara standing there.

“Mara? What in the world are you doing here at eight in the morning? In your pajamas?”

Mara looked down at her clothes. Sure enough, she hadn’t changed before making her way up to see him. She looked back up at him, brushing off the fact that she wasn’t actually dressed. “I-I need to talk to you. Can I come in?”

Marx stepped to the side, motioning for her to go in. Mara hesitantly went past the threshold and looked around. The walls were bare, the place hardly looked lived in except for the textbooks and school supplies sitting on the desks. Mara leaned against the desk on Marx’s side and looked towards the other side of the room. It looked just as empty as Marx’s.

“So, you want to tell me why you’re here so early on a Saturday?” He sounded slightly annoyed, but she could tell he was trying to hide it. He knew Mara wouldn’t show up at his door without a good reason for it.

“I’m sorry, but I couldn’t put it off. I had another accident yesterday,” she said looking down, hugging herself.

“What do you mean you had an accident?”

“I mean I had an accident with my powers. Zander was trying to help me find my trigger, to see what would happen when it was provoked, and how we could possibly control it,” She trailed off.

“And what happened?” Marx crossed the room and bent over so he could look at Mara’s face.

“That’s the problem, I don’t really know. I can’t remember any of it. All I know is that it wasn’t anything good. Zander said I got really hot, like physically hot to the touch. I burned him, and my clothes started to singe.” Mara looked back up. “He had to use some kind of cold blast to snap me out of it.”