I leant back, feeling the cool leather of the posh car against the back of my neck. We had only been in the car for a few minutes, but I was already anxious to get all of this over with. I looked over at Taylor, he was wearing a tailored black suit and his eyes were scanning out of the tinted window. My eyes wandered over to the driver in front of us working his was through the London traffic, following closely behind the car Taylor's parents where in. I bit my lip, wanting to ask Taylor for advice about how to handle the situation we were facing but I didn't know how much the driver knew and I didn't want to say anything that would attract attention. As I looked over at Taylor again, my eyes met his. I don't know how long he had been looking at me for but I could sense that understood what I was feeling. His hand grabbed mine, holding onto it gently.

"It'll be fine," he whispered softly.

I nodded at him, trying to show a brave face. His eyes glowed softly, this time he spoke in a normal voice, "You look beautiful in that dress."

"Thank you," I tried to keep my voice steady.

The car slowly pulled up at the side of the street. I held my breath before turning and looking out through the tinted window, past the pavement I could see crowds of similarly dressed people congregating in front of the entrance of the sandstone cathedral. Before I had a chance to take it all in, the driver had opened my door and as I stepped out Taylor had arrived on my side of the car, stretching out his arm for me to link mine with his. I followed his lead and he walked us gracefully up towards the crowd of warlocks. As soon as we approached the low chatter died down to silence and the crowd parted like the red seas. Taylor steered us confidently through and up the steps to the entrance of the cathedral, a minister in his black robes nodded at us respectfully and held the door open.

As we stepped in to the cathedral, I could hear our footsteps echo on the marble floor. I stared straight ahead, my eyes fixating at the three people in front of the casket. The late king's queen, King Jasper and Queen Anastasia were having a conversation. I glanced to my left and I could spot a guy who looked like he was in his early twenties. As we walked down the aisle, towards the front of the church I could see his features more clearly. He looked a lot like the newly widowed Queen. Could he be the son of the king? Is he one of the heirs that will be fighting for the throne?

I felt the steel of determination form in my stomach, I strengthened out my back, kept my head held high and my facial features neutral. Whatever this day throws at me, I can deal with it. We closed the distance between Taylor's parents, the Queen and us.

"I'm so sorry for your family's passing," Taylor said the words, bowing gracefully at the queen.

I automatically followed him in the bow, choosing to stay quiet.

"Thank you both," the Queen replied, her voice slightly shaky.

Anastasia's eyes gave me a silent nod, allowing me to feel like so far I was playing my part right.

A smile was forming at the corner of her eyes, "Magdalene, you've meet Cara before."

"Yes, of course. Nice to meet you again," the Queen directed at me.

I smiled back at her, unsure what the protocol was when Taylor cut in.

"I heard you had quite the introduction?" his voice was playful, as if the meeting between the Queen and I had be an utterly absurd misunderstanding. The reality is that she let a Vortex leave her court without knowing it.

"I don't know if you all have meet my son?" she looked around us with a light smile, one that was in stark contrast with the casket just behind her. She waved with her hand towards the guy on her left. He walked over to us hesitantly, as if he was a nerdy guy approaching the cool table at lunch.

"Let me introduce you all to my son, Marcus Mortimer," the Queen looked at him, her eyes practically beaming.

"So nice to meet you," Taylor replied, stretching his hand out to shake Marcus.

As they shook hands I added, "Yes, very nice to meet you."

King Jasper summed it up, "Indeed, very nice. Unfortunate that it has to be during these circumstances."

We all nodded gently, a sad blanket swallowing the conversation up. A bell started billowing in the tower above us and with it the rest of the crowd from outside started welling in.

Taylor steered me towards the first row of seats. I sat down on the wooden bench and quickly realised I was sitting on the royal bench, next to me I had Taylor and on my other side his parents. On the other side of them where Queen Mortimer and her son, both trying to keep the grief us their faces as the minister started to speak. If I craned my neck a little further, I could see some people I didn't know and then what looked like the Brownlow girl. I keep my gaze forward, focusing on the minister as my thoughts stormed through my mind. I had to fight every urge in my body not to run away. I was sitting with my back towards a full church of warlock, some of which included Aaron's men and Aaron himself. All knowing full well that I was a Vortex, I was pinning my hope on the fact that they wouldn't dare to kill me in a church during a funeral.

The minister keep on speaking, his words soon slipping into what sounded like Latin to me. I kept my gaze focused straight forward, trying to ignore away the thousands of needles I felt dancing across my back.

"And now, we have come to the time when we say good bye," the minister announced. Simultaneously everyone in attendance stood up at the same time, the only reason I was on my feet at the same time as everyone else was because Taylor had practically pulled me up with him. We all stared at the casket in front of us. I looked to my left and I saw everyone holding out their palms.

"Just follow my lead," Taylor whispered into my ear.

I opened my palms up in front of me like the rest of them.

"What are we doing?" I asked.

"When everyone else starts, just focus you magic on the casket," he whispered back in such a low voice I was questioning whether I had heard him correctly. And in that moment, every warlock in the church released their magic towards the casket. It was like a stream of a purple, green, red, blue, pink rainbow above me. The frightening part was all that magic landing on the stone casket in front of us. I followed Taylor's instructions and allowed some of his purple beams of magic to flow through my open palms towards the caskets.

As I looked at the stone of the caskets it was as if it was vibrating, like it was contracting with the amount of power that it was absorb. As I looked at it, in amazement but also slightly concerned about how long I could keep projecting this purple magic stream before if turned a different colour or something worse happen. Something strange happened, before my very eyes in what seems like minutes but most likely was just a second the casket compressed into a small stone circle, landing on the floor and staying perfectly still. Silence fell and the crowd sat down, Taylor yanking me with him this time to.

The minister fell into another big speech as if this had been the most normal funeral service ever. My eyes were fixed at the stone sphere, deep between it's stone exterior I could sense the most concentrated globe of magic I had ever sensed. It was settling down behind the stone, moving less and less as it was getting ready to go into hibernation.

My eyes were still adjusting as I stood outside of the cathedral, even if the sunlight felt harsh after the long service inside the dimly lit church at least I was out in the fresh air. I was standing close to Taylor as he was speaking to some of his warriors. His arm rested over my shoulder and I had the lower part of my neck rested on the corner of his shoulder. The warlock's around us seemed to expect a certain level of closeness between us and I playing along. The funeral ceremony had been draining and I was just happy I would be out of here soon. No more playing games. My eyes drifted across the crowd as I tuned out from the conversation Taylor was having and landed on Lucas. His suit was black, tailored and had a hint of light blue in the stitching. He was talking to some warlock's that I didn't know and glued to his arm what that stupid Olivia Brownlow. The slit of her black dress went so far up her leg all I could do was pray that she had sense enough to not take any long steps. As I turned my attention back to Taylor, I could feel Lucas eyes burning a whole at the back of my head.

"I'm just heading to the ladies," I whispered softly, allowing him to continue on with his conversation.

I walked down the deserted side corridor of the cathedral, stone walls closing me in on each side and the marble floor reflecting in the light of the burning candles. I was keen to head back to Taylor outside of the church. Hopefully he is done speaking to people and we can just leave. I hope I haven't done anything which seemed odd. My eyes were locked at the end of the corridor, when I suddenly heard footsteps echo behind me. I didn't have to look over my shoulder to know who they belonged to. I stopped, waiting for him to catch up with me.

"You look stunning in that dress," Lucas voice was low and his eyes shone intensely dark blue. I looked back at him, for a second allowing myself to wonder if I could ever be able to interpret those ever changing eyes of his. Everything within me froze as I heard footsteps approaching.

"I don't want to look at the apartment a second time," I said to Lucas as I turned away from him.

He walked with me, unaffected by my sudden change he replied calmly, "I just wanted to check again out of politeness before offering it to another interested party."

"That is very kind but we have made other arrangements," I replied formally, my eyes meeting Marcus Mortimer, the source of the footsteps as he approached us in the corridor.

"Hello," Lucas nodded to Marcus before walking past him and towards the entrance of the cathedral. Marcus shot him a look that held both politeness and distain in it.

"It was a beautiful funeral," the words fell out of my mouth before I could think of how wise it was for me to stop and talk to him.

I looked at Marcus as he nodded gently at my comment and for a moment I only saw a guy who had lost his father. I didn't see the power hungry heir looking to take the throne and kill the hidden Vortex as I had expected.

"Thank you," he started softly, biting his lip for a split second before adding, "I'm glad you found another apartment. I don't think buying from Mathlow would have been a good idea."

I raised my eyebrows for a split second before wrestling my face into a neutral expression, "It all worked out. We've made other arrangements."

I gave him a polite nod before walking down the corridor. What was he on about? Was there something unresolved between Lucas and Marcus?

The questions spun around my head like annoying bees as I exited the church, trying my best to keep my neutral facial expression in place. I spotted Taylor in the crowd and walked over to him. I could tell from his face that he was ready to leave.

"Want to go?" was the first words out of his mouth as I approached.

I nodded gently and we walked towards the cars lining up on the pavement. Taylor turned to wave good bye to his friends and as a good pretend girlfriend I did the same. As I was waving with a smile on my face, what I saw made my throat close up. I felt like someone was cutting of my oxygen supply, as I spotted Aaron in the crowd of warlocks in front of the cathedral. His eyes were locked on me and if looks could kill, I would be dead. Flanking him on either side was the silver haired man and a guy around my age with messy brown hair, his eyes felt like they were burning into my chest by the force he was staring me down with. I looked at them and couldn't make myself move, until Taylor practically yanked me into the car.

As we slid in I whispered, "Who is that young guy next to Aaron, who is he?"

"Oh, that's Peyton. He's one of Aaron's closets," Taylor replied in a low voice so the driver wouldn't hear.

As the car slotted in between two cars and followed the flow of traffic I felt my mind spin. Peyton... He had been there when Lucas got attacked. Had they seen me? Did Aaron tell him that I was a Vortex. Exactly how many of Aaron's men know what I was? How am I going to protect myself and keep playing the role of warlock and girlfriend of an heir if I don't know who knows that I am a Vortex?