Seduced by Magic - Softcover

Cheyenne McCray's enchanting and deeply sensual Forbidden Magic left readers captivated and eager for more. Now, in Seduced by Magic, the stakes are higher, the passion hotter, and the danger darker than before…
 
DESIRE
Copper Ashcroft is an accomplished D'Anu witch, but the magic she wields is a potent force--strong enough to hurl her into a mysterious Otherworld when a spell backfires. Before Copper can escape, another being is pulled into her realm--Tiernan, a powerfully virile Tuatha D'Danann warrior. Blond, blue-eyed, and shamelessly seductive, Tiernan could be Copper's savior…and his touch sets her body on fire.
 
DUTY
Like others of his kind, Tiernan stands alongside the D'Anu witches to battle the demons of the Underworld. Obligation to his cause and his people cautions against any entanglement with Copper, yet each second spent with this beautiful, uninhibited woman stirs an insatiable hunger. Desire explodes into carnal bliss, but the visions that haunt Copper's dreams are growing stronger, and they foretell a terrifying evil waiting to be unleashed…
 
DESTINY
Saving the city will take more than brute strength…more than witchcraft. Only together can Copper and Tiernan find a way to overcome the dark forces--and seize a passion that has bewitched them both.
 
"Forbidden Magic is Charmed meets Kim Harrison's witch series, but with a heavy dose of erotica on top!"
--Lyndsay Sands, New York Times bestselling author
 
"Cheyenne McCray is my favorite new author!"
--Bertrice Small, New York Times bestselling author

Chapter One 
San Francisco
 
Fifteen months prior
 
Copper Ashcroft moved through the fog-shrouded San Francisco night and shivered. Everything looked and felt exactly as it had in her dream-vision.
 
Rocks and twigs crunched beneath her running shoes as she made her way down the darkened trail to the sacred stretch of beach below, with only her wand light to illuminate the path. Tonight was a new moon and it was foggy as hell. But she knew her way and didn't pause.
 
Her arms strained as she gripped the carved wooden chest bearing the tools of her witchcraft at the same time she carried her wand. Her breathing came easy. She was fit from regular exercise, playing softball, and toned from working out at the health club. She'd been a track star and a mean softball pitcher in high school, as well as being the lead pitcher on the California Bears team at UC Berkeley during her undergrad years.
 
Copper stumbled over a root and almost tumbled down the path. She grimaced and steadied herself. "Bless it," she murmured. She'd known the root was there. "Too bad being fit and athletic doesn't make me any less clumsy."
 
Zephyr buzzed at her ear, but she ignored her honeybee familiar. She sensed Zeph's unhappiness that she was attempting this moon ritual alone, but in Copper's dream-vision she'd performed the ceremony with no one else around. For some reason the goddess wanted her to do this by herself.
 
She stepped from the dirt path onto sand when she reached the small portion of beach known only to the Coven of D'Anu witches to which she belonged. Her Coven was one of thirteen scattered across the United States. Many more Covens existed around the world, working to keep the cities they inhabited safe from dark magic. Descendents of the Ancient Druids, the D'Anu were powerful witches who used only white witchcraft.
 
Well, besides Copper and her sister, Silver. The sisters believed in utilizing gray magic to protect their world from the evils that preyed upon the innocent. If their father found out . . . they'd be in a world of trouble. Victor Ashcroft was high priest of the D'Anu Coven in Salem, Massachusetts, and he was a rather formidable man. Their mother, Moondust, was more an ethereal being, the calm in the storm. But she would agree with their father.
 
White witchcraft just wasn't strong enough as far as Copper was concerned. She was somewhat of a rebel when it came to choosing between white and gray, and she had no fear of the gray or ever slipping to the black.
 
With white magic, their skills were limited. Several of the D'Anu could affect the weather but they didn't dare tip the natural balance. Most could heal and work with animals, "talk through trees," and make plants grow like crazy--even fast enough to help them bind an enemy. Useful, but . . . not strong enough.
 
Sand shifted beneath Copper's jogging shoes as she heaved the chest higher in her arms and carried it across the small beach. Her jeans felt snug and comfortable and her cropped T-shirt allowed the coolness of the night to brush her flat belly. In the distance she could see a portion of the Golden Gate Bridge, its lights looping up and down in the darkness. A foghorn added to the eerie quality of the night, and despite the familiar sound, goose bumps prickled her skin and tiny hairs rose up on the back of her neck.
 
Copper remembered the old Grimoire she and Silver had used to learn gray magic. Mrs. Illes had given it to them before she passed on to Summerland, and Silver still had it. The ancient book looked harmless enough, but the spells inside--well . . . As Copper had found out when she tried to summon the tide and ended up almost flooding the city, gray magic had the potential to blow the natural order all to hell. Gray witchcraft could help a lot, but it could also cause indirect harm, like hurting a living creature or subverting a being's natural will.
 
If anyone of the D'Anu suspected that Copper and Silver practiced gray magic, the pair of them would be kicked out of the Coven. Even using the craft to track down criminals just wasn't allowed.
 
Besides, gray witchcraft carried heavy-duty risk to most witches, too. Many believed there was such a fine line between gray and black that gray witches could feel the incredible power that darkness offered. If a gray witch became too emotionally entangled--her own anger, want, need--her spells could lean close to the black. She could use her magic for personal gain and power instead of the general good.
 
Touching gray, Copper could sense the immeasurable and powerful flow and pull of dark magic. Yet Copper didn't fear it. She embraced gray magic. She had no doubt she wouldn't tip to the dark side no matter how deep her gray magic ran. Silver wasn't so sure and wasn't as strong a gray witch as Copper was.
 
A knot twisted Copper's belly as she allowed a brief flash of why she believed so strongly in gray magic. A childhood friend, Trista, had been murdered when Copper was sixteen. If Copper had been a strong gray witch at that time, she knew with every fiber of her being that she could have saved Trista.
 
Copper shoved the thought and the threat of tears away. When she reached her favorite part of the shore, she bent and dropped the chest. It made a dull thud that was almost lost in the sound of waves crashing against the shore. The wind off the water carried smells of fish and salt.
 
As she settled on her knees before the chest, she caught another scent that made her pause. Her skin prickled again. "Wolfsbane?" she murmured.
 
She shook her head, her shoulder-length copper-colored hair swinging with the movement. Your imagination is on overdrive, girl.
 
Holding her wand tight in one hand, Copper fumbled with the catch on the trunk using her other, but finally managed to flip the rusted latch open. "I really need to get that oiled," she muttered. It was one of those things that tended to be low on the priority list.
 
Hinges creaked as she opened the trunk lid and peered at the contents. Zephyr landed on the curve of her ear just as her wand slipped from her fingers and tumbled inside. She lost her focus and her wand light went out.
 
"For the Ancestors' sake." Her copper pentagram earrings swung against her neck as she rummaged around inside the chest until her fingers found her wand. She was never clumsy with her magic, but she tended to drop some things and knock over others.
 
The wand was made of copper and tipped with a round quartz crystal at one end and a pointed quartz crystal at the other. She gripped it tightly in her hand and frowned when the crystal did not immediately brighten again. She focused her magical energy on the wand. This time golden light glittered from the crystal and caused the pentagram on her thick copper bracelet to look as though it glowed against her wrist. She didn't know what she'd do without her wand--her magic was powerful, but only with her wand. Her hand magic wasn't so hot.
 
Copper mounted the wand in a corner slot of the trunk where it continued to spill its golden light across the sand, making the grains sparkle like Faerie dust.
 
She quickly stripped out of her clothing, tossing her T-shirt, bra, shoes, socks, jeans, and thong in a heap on the sand. Even though her witchcraft helped keep most of the coldness at bay, the chilly San Francisco wind whipped at her body, causing her nipples to tighten. She hurried to slip on a shimmering earth-colored robe she dug out of the chest and wrap it around her body.
 
Copper gathered her supplies, only dropping one candle and her incense burner as she strode a few feet away to where she would cast her circle. After she retrieved everything...