"Get down!" Calen cried, diving for the floor. He caught my arm and yanked me down with him, but he wasn't quite fast enough.

Glass shattered from the front window. A wordless scream ripped from my throat as my right arm lit up with pain. I tumbled across the hard wooden floors from the force of the fireball colliding with my body, rolling uncontrollably until my back hit the front counter with a smack that rattled my spine.

It hurt.

That was all I could think. For a moment, I struggled to even breathe, but then the adrenaline kicked in. Blessedly, the pain ebbed a little as I gasped for air, picking myself up from among the shards of broken glass.

I assumed the adrenaline dulled the pain, because one glance at the floor confirmed that there was a lot of blood down there. Probably mine. Almost definitely mine.

"What the—" I gasped, stumbling to my feet.

I hadn't even recovered from the mental shock before I realized that my store counter was very much on fire.

The fireball had come through the window and gone right towards the counter, catching on a stack of papers. Smoke had already started to billow up in the few seconds it took me to regain control over my body, and I coughed raggedly as I accidentally breathed in a lungful of sooty air. I risked a glance out the broken window, but the street outside was almost eerily empty.

That was scary in itself, but I had bigger problems at the moment, so long as no one was still shooting gobs of flaming magic my way.

Before I consciously thought about it, I made a circle with my right thumb and ring finger, sounding out an incantation in a language too old and strange to properly translate. I didn't bother to keep it under my breath. My front counter was on fire, and casting a smothering spell was the only thing on my mind at the moment.

In seconds, the fire went from a blaze to embers, and then embers to ash, starved of all oxygen. The counter was a mess, my papers were literally toast, and there was a nasty charred spot on the wood that I'd have to deal with later, but the shop would survive. The fire alarm hadn't even  triggered, though I wasn't exactly sure that was a good thing.

It was instinct to cast the spell. Though my most interesting magical talent by far was the ability to manipulate the Threads, it wasn't all I could do. I could make basic potions, both herbal and truly magical, cast simple spells, and obviously do a little divination, though I admit I relied on the Threads for best accuracy.

Smoke filled the air, and I found myself coughing, running to open the front door so the morning breeze could sweep it away. After I propped open the door, I rushed over to the counter to check the damage, looking for any other places the blaze managed to catch and coughing through the leftover smoke.

That was when I remembered that there was someone else in the room.

Eyes wide, mouth open, and panic shooting down my spine, I finally turned back to Calen.

His leather jacket looked singed, and he had a few small cuts across his cheek from bits of stray glass that sliced his skin when the window broke, but otherwise he seemed uninjured. He didn't look shocked, though. He didn't even look slightly surprised. Instead, he was absolutely beaming, so much that it was impossible for me to interpret the expression on his face as anything but absolute joy.

I, on the other hand, was incredibly confused.

"You're the real deal after all," Calen said. "Smart, too. Most people would have used water, or maybe a fire extinguisher, if you're particularly boring."

"... Shit," I muttered, eyes wide and every muscle in my body stiff as a board. Was he one of those witch chasers? Did he want to blackmail me? Was he a crazy person looking for evidence of real magic?

I really, really didn't want to have to memory wipe him. Memory wipes were messy and tiring at best, and could break someone's mind at worst. It was why I was so careful to keep the witchy talk under wraps when I wasn't certain of my customers' lineage.

In general, it was a bad idea to tell anyone about magic who didn't have access to it themselves. They usually had strong reactions, and none of those reactions were good. Courses of action generally ranged from burning at the stake to attempted enslavement, and everyone wanted to avoid those things. So, witches kept to themselves.

I kept a couple of memory wipe potions on hand in my emergency kit, just in case something like this happened, and I was about two seconds away from forcing one down his throat.

"It's okay, I won't tell," Calen said, waving nonchalantly. "I'm the real deal, too, after all."

He flicked his hand at the broom behind the counter, and it jumped up from the wall to start sweeping away at some of the ash and broken glass from the window. The dust pan followed in its wake, bouncing along the floor to pick up piles of debris.

"Cute," I said with a laugh that came out as a snort. "Very Mickey Mouse."

I could feel the tension draining from my shoulders, though. Cheesy or not, that was more than enough proof for me. He might only have a few abilities, but he was a genuine witch.

"Thank you," he said, smirking. "I do birthday parties as well, but before we talk about that, we should get that arm taken care of," he said, gesturing to my right arm.

... Yeah, now that the adrenaline was wearing off a little, it was clear that seriously needed some attention. Wincing, I glanced down at my wound... and immediately wished I hadn't.

I couldn't tell if there was any glass in the wound or not. The burn was bad enough that it was bleeding, anyways, and it was a large burn. It ran from my upper right arm almost down to my wrist, with the top of the arm clearly taking the brunt of the damage.

It looked like it might be something that I should go to the hospital for, if I was honest, but hospitals would require explanations. Explanations were something I didn't have, and investigations were something I certainly didn't need. I'd have to call my mom for help, instead. She was the only magical healer I knew.

Explaining a second degree burn to your mother was, to be fair, almost as bad as trying to figure out how to explain it to hospital staff, but at least my mom wouldn't send police to investigate anything suspicious.

For now, I pulled the first aid kit from under the counter, grabbing bandages and antiseptic and... yeah, it was going to take more than this.

"Fuck," I muttered, rubbing my eyes with my left hand. Now the excitement was starting to wear off, I didn't even want to move the right one. That would be trouble. It was my dominant arm... though at least the sleeve of tattoos on my left arm remained undisturbed.

Instead of bothering with bandages, I snatched a bottle of my own formula for herbal burn salve off one of the shelves, uncorked it, and started slathering it over the wound. It was a bloody mess, but it would do for now. It was something.

"Ah... do you... would you like some help with that?" Calen asked awkwardly, hands frozen in midair like he wasn't quite sure what to do with them.

"I'm heading straight to a healer after this, trust me," I muttered, still slathering burn salve over the wound. "How the hell are you so calm? A fireball nearly killed us both!"

"You're rather calm yourself," he pointed out.

"It's the shock," I muttered. My tone might be calm, but my hands were shaking beyond belief, and my heart raced in my chest. I tried very, very hard not to think about how I'd almost died.

"I could drive you?" he offered. "To the healer."

"No need," I said, shaking my head. It wasn't far, and I wasn't keen on getting into a car with a stranger, even one who had essentially saved my life. Plus, my arm was injured, not my legs. I could drive, or even walk. "I'll clean up here and... call the police, I guess."

"You really want to call the human police and explain that someone launched a very magical fireball through your window?" Calen said with a snort. "Trust me, I've made that mistake before. That's why I can stay calm now."

... Okay, at least that answered the question.

"No, I definitely don't. I think the story we'll go with is more along the lines of 'Molotov cocktail,'" I said, sighing. "And I should probably get the fire extinguisher out, too. Spray some stuff. For looks."

"In that case, I'll leave you to it— that is, if you're sure you'll be okay?" He glanced around the room carefully, though I wasn't sure what he was looking for. No one else was in the shop except us, and whoever shot out the window was long gone.

"I'm sure." I nodded and tried to give a reassuring smile, but I'm pretty sure it came out more like a grimace. The pain in my arm was starting to get truly overwhelming.

"I hope to see you again, then. Perhaps under better circumstances?"

"That would be nice." I took a deep breath to steady myself and made a shooing motion towards Calen. Hopefully I could brush him out of the way with a decent amount of false cheer.

It seemed to work for a moment. He smiled at me, shook his head, and turned to leave.

... And then I had to open my mouth. There was one more question I couldn't keep down.

"Wait," I said suddenly, acting on instinct. "If you're a witch, why did you book me for divination?"

"Maybe I just felt drawn to you," he offered.

"The old cliché," I said with a shrug, though I couldn't deny that my heart rate was very fast. It could have been from the adrenaline. It could have been from the way Calen was looking at me like I was a puzzle he wanted to solve, like he wouldn't rest until he knew every trick and turn in my book.

"Well, if you don't believe in destiny, let me offer you the chance to take fate into your own hands," he said, fishing in his pocket. "Here."

He held out what appeared to be a business card, and as he reached towards me, his long sleeve shifted to reveal part of his wrist.

And all of a sudden, I absolutely believed in destiny with every single fiber of my being. The dying fire of my romantic hopes and dreams flared to life, fanned by the rapid beating of my heart. A wave of dizziness swept over me, like I was watching the scene from very far away, like it couldn't be real.

I reached out, but I didn't take the card. I grabbed his wrist instead, pushing the sleeve of his sweater a little further upwards as I unabashedly stared at the same spider web pattern splashed onto my ankle since birth.

"It is real," I breathed, eyes still locked on his wrist.

It was the same design. I was sure of it.