Page 25 of How to Charm a Coven (How to Flirt with a Witch #2)

“It’s battling for dominance inside her,” Sebastian says, combing his fingers through her soaked hair.

It hits me then—her hair. She was bald the last time I saw her.

“Did it work?” I ask. “Could she use the magic to cure her cancer?”

He frowns, his eyes hollow. “We don’t know. As she was learning how to use it, she started having problems. Acting funny. Talking to herself, forgetting what she’d been doing for hours at a time, losing control of her magic and hurting herself or me…”

Millie stirs, making us both inhale sharply. “Seb?” she croaks, her voice barely audible over the crashing waves.

He lurches closer, cupping her face with two hands. “I’m here. What do you need?”

She turns her gaze onto me, staring for a moment before her eyes widen with recognition. “Katie. The bio magic. I shouldn’t have…”

I suck in a breath. I never considered that consuming bio magic might be a dangerous process. There was only the danger that the coven focused on—the potential to abuse its power.

“Do you feel its presence?” I ask.

She dips her chin. “Like having two minds. We came here hoping the other chimeras could separate us. It was my magic’s idea.” She looks around with wild eyes, which glow an eerie purple in the moonlight. “I’m so sorry. Please don’t tell the coven, Katie…”

“Of course,” I whisper. The coven still has no clue she absorbed bio magic to try and heal herself—though they might have an inkling, given that she and Sebastian helped us set it free and then disappeared.

Either way, if they’re found out, they’ll probably face a similar punishment to mine for breaking the coven’s laws.

As if she hasn’t been through enough hell.

Sebastian kisses her hand and cups it between both of his. “Shh. It’s okay. You only did what witches before us have done.”

My heart thuds. Of the witches who’ve consumed bio magic in the past, how many actually survived? And looking at the creatures surrounding me… I can’t help wondering: is it even meant to be consumed at all?

“How long have you been here?” I ask, trying to piece together what’s happened to them since February.

“A few days,” Sebastian says, not taking his eyes off his wife. “We came when it was clear something was wrong.”

“And they will be here for many more,” Lucy says, cutting through my thoughts.

I flinch as her voice fills my head, spinning around to face her. “What did you do to her? Fix this!”

She gives me the sort of disdainful look that only a cat can give. “The better question is ‘what did she do to us?’ What do all witches continue to do to us? You trap us, consume us, weaponize us…”

Images flood my mind, blinding me to my surroundings—memories that aren’t mine.

Being trapped beneath a golden net, forced into a cage, afraid and desperate to escape…

Millie, palms out, screaming in agony as she absorbed a chimera into her blood…

Witches I don’t recognize maki ng others cry in pain without touching them, tearing enemies limb from limb on a battlefield, shapeshifting until they’ve taken on a new identity…

Nausea fills me. My mouth goes dry. “Why did you invite me here?”

“To show you what awaits your coven if you continue your hunt. We will not be caged or consumed.”

I swallow hard. My survival instincts scream at me to run, but that familiar pull toward magic keeps me rooted.

As terrified as I am, I need to know more.

Natalie told me chimeras are mindless forces, but that’s not what I’m seeing.

“Help me understand. I came here to find the truth about what you are.”

Sebastian lifts his gaze from his wife to stare at me. “Katie, is it talking to you?”

I nod.

His eyes widen. Millie turns her head on the rocks to stare too, her chest still rising and falling rapidly.

Lucy sits, puffing up and swishing her stubby tail. “We are the first magic. Before—mouse!”

A little brown mouse scurries over the dead leaves between us, and she scampers after it with her claws out, trying to catch it.

I watch, confused, as she chases it into the woods.

“Uh…” Sebastian says.

A moment later, Lucy trots back to us. “My apologies. After spending so long trapped in kitten form, I often find my instincts at war.”

“Oh. N-no worries,” I stammer.

“As I was saying,” she continues. “Before mortals built their stone walls and iron cages, we roamed free.”

I furrow my brow. “None of this matches what the witches told me.”

“They have suppressed their history for a century. We have the power to heal a dying bird, to refill a parched wetland, to help an injured human. And yet, the witches see us as weapons to be contained.”

“But—but you destroyed the city,” I splutter.

“When cages break, the caged lash out. It is the nature of living beings.”

“And when you were my kitten, you—”

Lucy’s eyes narrow. “When I was bound in the confines of a curse, my magic became unstable. You tried to bottle lightning and got struck. That is not my fault.”

I shake my head firmly. “It wasn’t me who trapped you. I’m not a witch.”

“Your kind did—and now you follow in their footsteps, chasing us with nets and weapons. Why not let us exist freely? Why must you harness us for your own selfish desires?”

I don’t know what to say. Can I honestly look at what’s in front of me and say that I believe these creatures should be in cages?

Beyond those surrounding us, more chimeras glide across the shore, their forms flowing from one shape to another.

A deer becomes an otter that plunges into the water.

A great horned owl soars toward the trees, becoming something with too many limbs as it latches onto a long branch.

Millie stirs on the rocks, grunting in pain. While Sebastian presses a kiss to her forehead, murmuring words I can’t hear, several rats edge closer.

A chill rolls through me, and I fight the urge to shoo them away.

“To the witches, you’re just a vessel that holds the most powerful type of magic,” I tell Lucy. “And containing you is the only way to keep people safe from those who want to use you as weapons.”

“We are not weapons to be wielded or forces to be tamed,” Lucy hisses, flashing her little fangs.

“We are spirits of the wild, keepers of ancient magic. We are the force that awakens a bear from its winter sleep, the quiet power that knits your wounds closed, the pull that guides birds across continents. We are a hive’s collective consciousness, a tadpole’s growth into a frog, a whale’s song as she migrates to give birth.

We flow through every living thing, upholding the balance between life and death, growth and decay.

Without us, the natural order simply would not be. ”

The rats scamper over Millie’s body. Sebastian doesn’t push them off, which makes me think this has happened before—that this is supposed to happen. He sits up to watch, breathing fast, as purple light crackles like lightning over her skin. She gasps, arching her back.

Their voices are faint in the back of my mind, barely there unless I focus. “Stay still… We will try to separate you… Do not struggle…”

They’re helping her—or helping the chimera trapped inside her.

I meet Lucy’s eyes. “Why am I the only one who can speak to you?”

As she looks back at me, something foreign ripples through me—an emotion not my own. My breaths come faster. My hands shake, and I ball them into fists, unsure if I should turn and run.

“Wh-what are you doing to me?”

“You feel our suffering?” Lucy asks, tilting her head.

I furrow my brow, trying to think past the terror rocketing through me. This emotion belongs to every chimera who’s been trapped, and it’s filling me like water being poured down my throat. “Why am I feeling this?”

“Few humans possess this gift anymore.”

“Anymore?” I press. “There used to be more people like me?”

“Long ago, there were witches who stood between us and those who hunted us.” Lucy stands, pacing back and forth. “Our ancient guardians could speak with us and feel what we feel.”

I shiver. Around us, many pairs of purple eyes still linger on me. Is this why I feel such a strong pull toward the chimeras? Am I descended from these ancient guardians?

“Those witches protected the balance between our world and yours…until the coven decided we were too dangerous to remain free.” Lucy’s voice hardens.

Her fur ripples, her body growing. She curls her claws over the rock, the scrape resonating too loudly—more like the sound of talons.

“ If your witches attack us again, we will not show mercy. We have been patient, but we will no longer hesitate to unleash what we truly are.”

I nod, believing her. Looking at their true forms, feeling their power pulsing through my veins, it’s clear the witches have no idea what they’re dealing with.

Lucy keeps growing, her form shifting, until a massive griffin stands before me. She clicks her beak, her eyes narrowing. “Help us remain free, and you will see what harmony looks like. Hunt us, and your kind will regret waging war against ancient magic.”

I swallow hard. Help the chimeras? But Natalie, and the coven, and…

“What about Millie?” I ask.

Lucy turns her regal gaze to Millie, who writhes in pain under the chimeras trying to separate her soul from the magic she consumed.

“She made her choice, as do all who consume us. Some can handle the power, and some cannot. If she does not survive this, then that is the price of her human arrogance.”

I open my mouth to argue that it wasn’t arrogance—it was desperation.

If Millie knew what the consequences would be, she probably wouldn’t have done it.

But knowledge of chimeras and bio magic is so strictly controlled and limited within the coven that there was no way she could have known all this.

As for me? I understand better than ever. Millie has shown me with absolute certainty that a chimera’s power is not meant to be consumed. Witches might have named it bio magic and used it to win wars and heal illnesses, but that doesn’t make it right.

But is C.S.A.M.M. right to trap it underground? Or are chimeras meant to be free?

Does it matter, when the only way to secure my freedom is to trap them ?

“Leave now,” Lucy commands, spreading her wings like a massive wall in front of me, “and take this warning back to your coven. Tell your witches to stay away.”

The chimeras with their burning eyes respond to Lucy’s gesture, creeping closer. I back away, stumbling over rocks, the message clear: I am not welcome here. I am not their ally. I’m a messenger, a non-magical human who is no threat to them, and my purpose is to deliver a warning to the witches.

I look to Sebastian, not wanting to abandon them.

“Go,” he says hoarsely. “Before they hurt you.”

My eyes sting, but I nod, knowing I have no other option.

As I retreat, Millie’s screams follow me—a reminder of what happens when humans try to control forces they don’t understand.

My heart hammers as I flee up the dark trail without my flashlight, branches slashing my cheeks raw. The chimeras see me as just another hunter. But I felt their fear beneath their anger—memories of cages and torches, of being trapped and used.

What am I supposed to do? These creatures aren’t what I thought, and they might be the key to understanding my ability. If I’m meant to protect them, then trapping them betrays who I am. But Natalie and the coven would never believe that, and my freedom depends on capturing them.

A shriek tears through the trees—whether human or monster, I can’t tell.

I pause, lungs burning, staring into the darkness behind me. Somewhere in those shadows, ancient magic is trying to heal a witch who made a terrible mistake. Now, I have to decide which side I’m on before my time runs out.