I stood from the table, leaving Ash to finish his dinner as my cell buzzed in my hand. Stepping out of the kitchen and heading for the
stairs, I answered with a quiet murmur.
“You know it’s too dangerous to be calling me right now.”
“Why haven’t you disposed of your phone or your brother yet?” the male voice on the other end of the line asked.
“I am not disposing of my brother,” I snapped, glancing back toward where he remained in the kitchen as I kept my voice hushed. My black jeans hugged my legs as I ascended the stairs slowly, trying not to draw attention to the urgency I felt. “Ash made it clear that he doesn’t want to go without me. His father is meeting us at the bus stop tonight, so he’ll be there to help if he refuses to go alone. I can’t risk being the one to drive him to Maine. Not now.”
“You should have sent him away days ago. What were you thinking?” my father asked, his voice dropping low with the scolding tone that I was far too familiar with.
I’d have been more concerned to have him speak to me without it.
“I was thinking he deserved to attend his own mother’s fucking funeral,” I whispered, swinging my bedroom door closed and leaning against the back of it. I’d packed a small bag, mostly to convince Ash I had every intention of joining him at his father’s house. But I’d filled it with the small pieces of my life that mattered to me.
I wouldn’t be allowed to wear the clothes I preferred, the gray and black tones that covered me from head to toe not suited for a Green. My boots scuffed over the carpet in the bedroom as I moved toward my bed and sat on the edge, hanging my head in my hands.
“You’re playing with fire, girl. If they find out about him—”
“I know.” I sighed, rubbing at my eyes. My fingernails were painted a matte black, the polish chipped at the ends. I frowned at them as I pulled them away from my face.
“If he wanted to attend the funeral that badly, then you should have left and gone elsewhere. His father could have taken him,” my father, Samuel, said.
“You’re demanding I give up my entire future for your revenge. The least you can do is understand I would want to attend my own mother’s funeral,” I said, dropping onto my mattress with a sigh.
“It is not just my revenge. She was your aunt, Willow,” he argued, and his voice went quiet in the way it only did when talking about her. The older sister who had given everything to protect the knowledge of his existence. The one who had stolen her baby brother from his crib and sent him to grow up somewhere far away from the Coven.
So no one could make him choose between his magic and his ability to sire children.
What a loving relationship he’d fostered with that gift, turning his only daughter into a weapon designed to do the one thing he couldn’t…
Find his sister’s bones. “I know she was,” I said.
Even if I’d never met her, I couldn’t help but want to avenge the young woman they’d murdered fifty years ago. I just didn’t want it enough to never see my brother again. As much as I wanted to earn my father’s approval and do the one thing he and my mother had raised me for, I’d have walked away from all of it if there had been even a chance of Ash and me finding a safe place to hide.
“She deserves to find peace, Willow,” my father said, his voice softening before he continued on. “And you deserve to have what is yours by birthright.”
“I don’t give a damn about my birthright,” I said.
The confession hung between us. Collecting the bones was a means to an end, a necessity for my aunt and all those who came before her to find
their way home.
Most of the witches of the Coven drew their power from nature. The Greens, like my mother, from the earth; the Whites from crystals; the Yellows from fire.
But the Blacks had been different.
We drew our power from the bones of our ancestors, from the magic that only existed within our line. Without those bones, we were nothing, and they were tucked safely within the boundary of Crystal Hollow somewhere.
I felt them—knew that they existed. Any wise person would have burned them with salt when they killed off the last of us just to be safe, but someone had kept them instead.
A perverse collector’s item, I was certain. The last of the necromancers.
I scoffed as my father spoke, his words a regurgitation of everything he’d said over the course of my life. I’d been too young to remember when he taught me the principle of summoning, of how to use my blood and wear the bones of my ancestors to raise the dead.
“Do you have any idea what I would give to be the witch our ancestors chose to wear the bones?”
“I have some idea,” I said, letting the bitterness come through in my voice. I knew exactly what he would give to be chosen.
He would give them me. He would sacrifice me in a heartbeat if he thought the bones would fall to the only remaining member of the Hecate line. It was why he’d only had one child, so that there would only be one person standing in his way.
The sacrificial lamb.
He didn’t feel their call. Didn’t hear them whispering to him in the night when there should have been silence.
For Ash’s sake, that couldn’t happen. I’d grown up knowing that one day, I would either have to kill my father or allow him to kill me.
The ringing of the doorbell saved us from having to acknowledge that reality, making me sit up quickly as I glanced toward the door.
“Fuck,” I hissed, hoping for the first time that it was just a pesky, nosy neighbor coming with a casserole to pry into our business and my plans for how I would support the two of us.
My father hung up without a word. There was no touching goodbye— even knowing that if that was who I feared it may be, he might never see me again. There was a very good chance I wouldn’t survive Hollow’s Grove University.
I hurried for the door, sprinting to the stairs. My relief pulsed through the air when Ash remained safely tucked inside and out of sight. He’d been forbidden from answering the door years ago in an effort to protect him, leaving me to huff a breath as I adjusted my gray sweater and hurried down the stairs.
“Go into the kitchen and stay out of sight,” I whispered, shooing him as far from the front door as possible.
He did as he was told, tucking himself into the kitchen, though he lingered near the doorway so that he could listen to what might be said.
His curiosity would be the end of me.
I drew in a deep breath, trying to convince myself that it would just be Mrs. Johnson waiting on the other side. That she’d thought to see if we’d eaten already and brought us another lasagna. Placing a hand on the gold- plated doorknob, I glanced down at the amulet I’d already fastened around my neck. The chain was irrelevant, but the black tourmaline nestled safely within the rose-gold wire cage would protect against compulsion. All witches in the Coven wore them when they came of age, and I’d be damned if I risked facing one at my door without it.
With my free hand, I reached up and unfastened the chain and deadbolt. Twisting the knob as I confirmed with one last glance behind me that Ash had remained hidden, I pulled the door open a crack and peeked outside.
I swallowed as my eyes landed on the male standing on the front porch. He was alone, his lips twisted into the faintest of smiles. I had no doubt it was meant to be reassuring, softening his full lips from the tense set that seemed to linger beneath the unfamiliar gesture.
Definitely not Mrs. Johnson.
The power rolling off him confirmed he not only wasn’t my nosey neighbor, but that he also wasn’t even human, let alone truly alive. His eyes flashed as they connected with mine, the blue steel of them darkening for a moment before he lowered them down to the amulet at my chest. My breath caught at the sensation of those smoldering eyes running over my body, of the way I could feel it like claws dragging over the surface of my skin lightly.
He was beautiful and infuriating—a disaster waiting to happen.
“Miss Madizza, I presume?” he asked, his voice deep and raspy as he slowly tilted his head to the side. His gaze continued to rake down my body, sliding over my stomach and thick thighs until his smile broadened when he took in the combat boots on my feet.
“Are you talking to me? Or my feet?” I asked, pulling my sweater tight across my chest. His gaze came back up in a slow, languid path. He didn’t hurry to meet my eyes once again, in spite of the fact that I’d called him out, the arrogance of centuries of life allowing him to behave in ways that defied manners.
“I am most definitely talking to you,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest. He leaned his shoulder into the iron column that supported the roof of the open porch, looking far too comfortable in the space that was meant to be mine.
“What is it that you want from Miss Madizza?” I asked, resisting the urge to wrap my fingers around my amulet. My best chance in getting Ash out safely, even though they had already found me, lay in pretending I knew nothing of who they were. If I feigned innocence, maybe I could sneak him out.
“I represent a prestigious university. We have a unique opportunity for her to study alongside the best and brightest students of her year. Perhaps I could come inside to discuss it?” the male asked, pushing himself off the railing with a nudge of his shoulder. He took a step toward me as I stepped through the door, pulling it mostly closed behind me and blocking his path.
“No,” I said, my tone brokering no argument.
Too quickly.
He raised his brow at me, his mouth parting lightly as he ran his tongue over his bottom teeth. I smiled to soften the urgency in my voice, swallowing down my terror at having a predator so close. He took another step toward me, stopping when he was near enough that I had to tip my head back to look up at him.
“A girl can’t be too careful these days. I’m sure you understand,” I said, focusing on the rhythm of my heartbeat.
A deep breath in, then another one out.
My amulet warmed against my chest as he looked down at me, holding my stare as he attempted to force his compulsion on me. I pretended I
couldn’t feel it, pretended that the crystal didn’t confirm everything I’d already suspected about his unnatural beauty.
Vessel.
He studied me intently, his steel-blue eyes flashing. This close, I found myself mesmerized by the ring of gold surrounding the pupil of his eye, a spark of warmth in the otherwise cold of his stare.
“Of course,” he murmured, spreading his lips into a carefully controlled smile. He’d had centuries to practice, to avoid showing the fangs that would send a panic through even the most foolish of humans.
“Hollow’s Grove University would like to welcome you to attend in two days’ time.” He glanced over my shoulder at the house. My mom would have never allowed it to fall into disrepair, caring for it even if it was no Buckingham Palace, but the disdain with which he studied the aging siding made my neck prickle with rage. “It’s the sort of opportunity that a girl like you would be foolish to reject so carelessly.”
I shifted, turning my gaze down as I smiled in disbelief. “A girl like me? What does that mean, exactly?”
“An orphan,” he said, not missing a beat as the word rolled off his tongue. There was no sympathy or pity for my recent loss, only a matter-of- fact statement that made angry tears threaten my eyes.
“Don’t you need to be a child to be considered an orphan?” I asked, sinking my teeth into my cheek. I leaned forward, putting myself in his space. His nostrils flared as I got closer, the scent of my blood undoubtedly filling his lungs. “If I’m a child, then what does that make you with your lingering gaze?”
“You’re not a child,” he said, his jaw tensing as I held his gaze in challenge. “I shouldn’t have used that term. I only meant that you are suddenly on your own in this world. Having a place to start over may be to your advantage—”
“I’m going to make this very simple so that we do not waste any more of one another’s time,” I said, cutting him off. “I’m not interested in attending any university that sends a seedy, sketchy man to the doorstep of my home. Any reputable university would allow me to apply myself. If you’d like to leave me an application and save a stamp, my mailbox is right over there.” I pointed behind him to the end of the driveway in the distance
—to the little red mailbox that sat there.
“There are no applications for Hollow’s Grove University. It’s invitation only,” the man said, taking a step back. He held out his hand for me to shake, staring at me intently as he willed me to take it. I raised my chin, ignoring it pointedly while he continued. “I should have introduced myself. I’m the headmaster of Hollow’s Grove, Alaric Thorne. This is your formal invitation—”
“Then leave my invitation in my mailbox,” I corrected.
“I am the invitation,” he said, clenching his back teeth as he glared down at me.
He pulled his hand back, sliding it into the pocket of his trousers. The three-piece suit he wore was far too distracting for my tastes, a complete and utter distraction. I had a feeling that was the point, as if his very being was sin wrapped up in the finest suit.
I reached behind me, grasping the doorknob so that I could pull the door open just enough to wedge my body into it. He couldn’t enter without an invitation, and I’d be damned to the nine circles of Hell before I ever gave him one.
I smiled as I maneuvered myself into the house, peering out at him as he watched me like a wolf. “Then I am definitely not interested.”
