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“Do you have them on your fingers as well?” I asked Dash without bothering to turn and look at him as I spoke to him. It was only the three of us here, in this bed, they’d know who I was talking to without explanation.

“Nope,” Dash said. “Just Quinton. I don’t mess around in that.”

I shook Quinton’s hand in front of my face. “How did you get them?” I asked again.

I stilled when I realized Quinton hadn’t responded. He remained quiet and he wasn’t moving. I put his hand back where I had picked it up from and looked up at Quinton. His dark, almost black eyes were on me, focused solely on my face. He looked anxious, worried.

“Quinton?”

“I did it to myself,” he muttered and cleared his throat. “I do it to myself.”

My mouth dropped open in shock.

“What?” I sputtered. “Why would you be cutting yourself, and on your fingers of all places? What the hell, Quinton? That’s bizarre and not cool.”

“She’s adorable when she gets like this,” Quinton said as his eyes finally left mine to go over my head to Dash behind me. “Half the time I can’t tell whether she cares or not but I’d lean towards not. Then she gets all cute and caring and it’s obvious.”

I didn’t like it when he talked about me in front of me like this. It was annoying as all get out.

“Quinton,” I snapped. “Are you going to tell me or not?”

“Now her temper is showing. Better watch out, Quint, next she’ll be swearing at you. Something the twins claim she never does but I’ve heard her do it a few times.”

Quinton moved the remote, hiding it underneath the blanket and out of my reach.

“I’m gonna hide this,” Quinton said. “Just to be safe. I don’t want you to get upset and throw it at my head.”

That was it. I was done with them.

Growling in frustration, I shoved the blanket down my body. I wasn’t sticking around just so they could pick at me. And would I never hear the end of the stupid thing with the rock?

Geez. Give a girl a break already.

“Wait, wait.” Quinton said as he grabbed for the blanket, dragging it back up my body. “You’re not going anywhere. Lay back down and I will tell you what you want to know.”

Reluctantly, I laid back down and let him cover me with the heavy blanket.

“Why would you harm yourself in any way?” I asked as I sighed. “I don’t understand.”

“I know you don’t,” Quinton said. “It’s one of the things I love about you. You don’t have a clue about magic. You know absolutely nothing, and it’s our job to teach you. I love it.”

He was so frustrating. Being blind when it came to magic was not something I enjoyed in the slightest, and they had barely taught me anything. I wanted to know how to do absolutely everything, and I wanted to know these things six weeks ago. I didn’t think my lack of knowledge, my blindness, if you will, when it came to all things magical was very endearing and I certainly wouldn’t have found it attractive on another person.

“It’s for the blood magic, Ariel,” he said and my head whipped around so I could see him.

Blood Magic?

I swear, I’d heard someone say something about blood magic before, I just couldn’t remember when or what was said.

“What’s blood magic?” I asked in a quiet voice. I felt like what ever I was about to hear was an important lesson I wouldn’t want to forget about any time soon.

“You can do magic and cast spells and you know it costs something. It’s usually your energy and you’ll need to eat a big meal after you cast or use your magic in any way. You need to replenish the energy you’ve used up. But my father taught me a different way. He taught me about blood magic. A lot of the other coven’s frown on the use of it because it makes everything so much more powerful and harder to control. Power can be a frightening thing to behold and abused when in the hands of the wrong person. There have been a few people who’ve misused it over the years. Even the Elders frown on its use, unless, of course, they are the ones using it. And they have no problem with abusing it to gain whatever they have their sights set on at the moment.”

I wasn’t surprised to hear about the Elders abusing something most witches considered dangerous. They seemed like dangerous A-hole’s of epic proportions. And they were disgusting when it came to their treatment of women. They were this scary entity waiting in the dark for their chance to pounce, that perfect moment to strike. They scared the ever loving beejezus out of me, and I hoped like hell that I never had the misfortune to meet them. Eventually, I would be forced to meet them. My life was like that, me having to do everything I would rather avoid doing if I were able to do so. It seemed like the entire universe was against me, and I never really got what I wanted.

“My father was the same way,” Quinton said. “He used his blood for gain and to make his spells more powerful, to make himself more powerful. You see, if you bleed for it, you mix your blood into the spell you’re weaving, you’re giving it a piece of yourself, your essence, if you will. Then it doesn’t drain your energy source, that source being yourself. There’s power in the blood of a witch, you can’t simply use anyone. And, it doesn’t work with everything. You have to be able to mix it in with something or drip it on to something. I used my own blood for both spells I did against Chucky. Which is why things backfired and got more intense than I had dreamed they would be.”

I remembered something he had said after the vomiting in the cafeteria incident. Quinton had admitted to being responsible for everything. I believe he’d shrugged it off, saying he must have added too much blood to the bowl. He had shrugged it off like it was no big deal. It had been a big deal to me, and I think the guys had even been shocked by it.