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Iban deposited an antique-looking brass key into his hand, and I blushed as I realized that I hadn’t even noticed he’d come up the stairs with us. His eyes snagged mine as if he knew it too, and my blush deepened.

Headmaster Thorne was dangerous in all the worst ways if I couldn’t even notice my surroundings when he held me in his arms.

Hell’s sake, I was damned.

Thorne slid an arm around my waist as I swayed, trying to reassure myself that my exhaustion was the cause of my distraction. His other hand slid the key into the lock on the door, turning it until the old wooden door swung open. He deposited the key into the back pocket of my black jeans as he reached around me, his mouth only a breath from my own.

“This is grossly inappropriate,” I muttered, watching as his lips twitched into a smile.

“So is calling your headmaster an asshole,” he murmured, patting the key with two swift but firm taps that made me twitch in his arms.

He guided me through the door into a common area with four chairs and a sofa lingering by the fireplace in the corner. There was a small kitchenette with a refrigerator and sink beside the door. On either side of the room, two doors waited. The one on the left was open, revealing a small, but pretty bedroom.

“I assume that’s mine?” I asked, peeling myself away from Thorne’s grip. The room swayed as I walked toward it, but I lingered in the doorway to the private room as I glanced in.

The walls were painted a light gray, the sage-colored drapes opened to reveal a view of what I felt certain were meant to be gardens. The headboard of the double bed was upholstered in a fabric the color of sand, the linens a light, natural cream. The chandelier that hung overhead had pink and yellow interspersed through it in the shapes of delicate flowers. A single wood nightstand rested beside the bed, with a bouquet of roses in a vase set upon it.

“Does it meet your standards?” Thorne asked, knowing it was far more elegant than the home I’d shared with my mother and brother.

“It’s lovely,” I admitted with a hesitant sigh. I bit my lip as I stepped in slowly, glancing toward the gardens that needed my attention. I was already tired just thinking about it.

“Good. Classes begin in the morning. I’m sure one of your roommates will be happy to show you the way,” Thorne said, retreating back into the role of Headmaster.

My thoughts scattered, scrambling frantically for a way to bring back the man who’d carried me up the stairs. Love didn’t exist for a Vessel, but the lust he showed was something I could work with. Something Ineededto work with if I wanted to find my aunt’s bones. I opened my mouth to speak, dread filling me at the thought of what I needed to do.

Of how horrible it had once seemed.

“Goodnight, Miss Madizza,” he said, shoving his hands into his pockets as if he didn’t know what to do with them.

I swallowed, clamping my mouth shut as I nodded. “Goodnight, Gray,” I murmured, the words soft enough that a human wouldn’t have heard them. My cheeks warmed as I chewed on the inside of my lip.

Thorne froze, his head tilting to the side slightly as he held my gaze for a moment. He nodded once, pressing a hand to Iban’s shoulders as he stood looking between us as if he was dumbfounded.

Thorne—Gray, I forced myself to correct even my thoughts—nodded once.

Then they were both gone.

12

GRAY

My nights were always restless.

I wandered the halls of Hollow’s Grove, choosing to forgo the offer of nighttime companionship from one of the female Vessels who had warmed my bed in the past. Gemma had done nothing to deserve the angry response she’d gotten when she made herself available tonight, but that hadn’t stopped me from flinching away from her touch.

Even hours later, my reaction infuriated me. The girl was nothing. Just another witch who would soon be groomed into whatever the Coven wanted her to be, with a heart filled with nothing but hatred for my kind. The witches made me feel nothing but gratitude for the fact that I did not possess a mass of beating flesh within my chest.

Better to not have one at all, then to have one that rotted beneath my skin.

But it had been decades since someone arrived in Crystal Hollow, looked the Covenant in the face, and defied them at every turn. She was obstinate and difficult, rude and ill-tempered.

But as I stared at the trellis where her magic had brought the courtyard back to life, there was no doubting one truth.

The witchling had gotten under my skin.

Life had spread from those vines, rippling across the courtyard in the hours since I’d delivered her to her bed. The rose bushes pulsed with life, fresh buds appearing from the vivid, green leaves and sharp, pointed thorns. Where before everything had been nothing but the ghost of a reminder of what had once been, now the courtyard thrummed with life. With vibrancy that had been missing from the Coven for a very, very long time.

My hands clenched at my sides as I turned away from the sight of what she had given. The Coven didn’t deserve the sacrifice she was willing to make to bring the land they’d used and abused back to life. Susannah and George had led the witches away from everything that had once motivated them, sinking further and further into the selfishness that drove the politics within the families.