Page 14

“Oh right. Drinks on me, I guess. Oh, on us.” Ambrose grins down at me, but there’s a hint of irritation he’s trying to hide.

“How did this happen?” Roman asks.

“True love. Obviously.”

I pinch Ambrose’s side. He’s annoyed at his friends for some reason. He’s not poking fun at me, but it feels the same, regardless.

“Well, I don’t care how it happened.” Stellan radiates pure joy. He picks me up and squeezes me so hard in a hug, I think he fractures a rib. “Piper, you little sneaky witch. I didn’t think you had that kind of mischief in you.”

“It’s nothing like that, you guys.” I look around the room.

There are a lot of strangers around us, but also familiar and nosey coven members.

I spot Ambrose’s parents near the stage.

His dad is looking at the crowd, bored, but his mother’s gaze is locked on us.

“Let’s just get through this, and we’ll tell you everything later, okay? ”

Lucida Ash, the leader of our coven, walks onto the stage. She’s in her late forties with long curling dark hair that's starting to gray at the temples. Her fashion sense leans toward the mystical, with flowing skirts, a multitude of necklaces, and bangles that stack halfway up her forearms.

She holds her hands up and the crowd momentarily gets louder before they quiet down. Everyone is so tense that all it would take is one shouted word, and I’m pretty sure this place would erupt into a riot.

“Thank you for coming tonight. I know you’ve all been anxious for us to find our new council and have been waiting to deal with the witches who tried to harm us at the masquerade ball last month.

I’ve been studying how to fairly open up seats for the council.

As you know in the past, it has been tradition to fill these seats with members of the founders' families.”

Previously, the council was almost exclusively made up of individuals from the founding families of Mystic Hollows.

Or those with a lot of money and power in the community.

In some ways, it makes sense to have powerful witches guiding us, because historically we’ve needed protection from outside forces.

The problem comes in when there’s such a huge disconnect between the people leading and the rest of the coven.

Our leaders stopped taking into account the needs of the coven as a whole, and instead sought only to better their own positions.

The wrongs that the founding families have gotten away with over the years are disgusting, but because no one was there to check them and call them out when they were doing horrible things, they were allowed to operate without consequences for years.

“We will be holding a series of trials to find our new council. These trials will help us find leaders who will embody the magic and values of the Mother, Maiden, and Crone.”

Murmurs break out among the crowd. In the past, the Lumen coven worshiped the Maiden, guided by the purity and innocence of light magic.

Healing power like Josephine’s or empathic abilities, like Ava and Stellan have, are all gifts from the Maiden.

Growing up, we were told the Tenebris coven had dark magic because they worshiped the Mother.

It was said that the Mother desired obedience and punished witches when her needs weren’t met.

The Crone was a symbol of what happens when magic is abused. The loss of vitality because of a misuse of power.

But all of that was wrong. We learned that the Maiden, Mother, and Crone were just manifestations of power at different points in our life.

They each still represent certain magical qualities, but none is good while the other is evil.

They are simply aspects of our magic, of ourselves, that we have to learn.

“For years, we’ve not used our power to its full potential because we’ve been ignoring a very important part of our magic.

We require the balance of the Maiden, Mother, and Crone, and that’s how I intend to form this council.

I will be looking for witches who will help establish that within our coven.

The upcoming trials will test traits that embody all aspects of magic, but also bravery, intelligence, compassion, selflessness, and power. ”

“This is boring,” Ambrose grumbles. I lightly jab him with my elbow.

Members of the coven whisper, and Lucida waits for them to settle before continuing.

“The selection of those people will happen now.” Lucida looks out over the crowd, her eyes connecting with one witch after another.

“There are always those who will step up to lead, whether it be for altruistic reasons or because power fuels them, and so I will not ask you to volunteer.” Lucida pulls a vial from out of her cleavage.

Nervous laughter titters across the room, and she smiles out at the crowd with a shrug.

“Okay, this is slightly more interesting.” Ambrose raises one eyebrow.

Lucida shakes the bright red potion before uncorking the vial. “This is a beacon spell. It has been specialized to seek out those who will best serve our coven. If the spell settles on you, you must come forth. You will be part of our trials.”

The spell floats out of the bottle like amorphous smoke.

It’s slithers over our heads, breaking off in multiple directions as it hunts out the members of the coven most fit for this challenge.

It doesn’t zip across the room. It’s almost as if it's hunting prey, sniffing out the people who meet Lucida’s criteria.

There’s a gasp as one of the tendrils stops and dissolves into a sparkling mass over the head of a blond man.

“Who is it?” Ava stands on her tiptoes, craning her neck back-and-forth, but she’s too short to see over the crowd. Bram, who is much taller than her, squints at the man. “Andrew Bartleman.”

“Who’s that?” Odie signs.

“He’s an accountant.”

Another smoke snake slithers out the door and I gnaw on the inside of my lip. Where is that going?

Several wisps of smoke cross the crowd and head in our direction.

“Whoa,” Stellan says as sparks float above Roman’s, Odie’s, and Ambrose’s heads. The three of them look up, shock on Roman’s and Odie’s faces, humor in Ambrose’s eyes.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Josephine grunts when the smoke sparkles above Anastasia Lexington’s head. She’s a horrible person who tried to assault Roman and was left with the word Predator scarred across her chest in retaliation.

“How is this spell picking people?” I murmur and frown when another burst of color hovers over Ambrose’s mother’s head.

“Look.” I tug on his sleeve, and he peers down at me. His attention focuses entirely on me in that moment, and I lose my train of thought.

“What?” he murmurs. We’re in a room full of people, and are in the thick of serious coven business, but right now, I can’t think of anything else but Ambrose’s lips.

The way they sucked a mark on my neck, the large hands that held me.

And I willingly–no, assertively–told him we couldn’t have sex again.

Why did I force him into that stupid sex bargain?

“Piper.” His eyes drop to my lips, as though he’s thinking about kissing me. I know he isn’t–he can’t–but it appears that way.

A sliver of common sense slides into my thoughts, and I blink away the trance. “Your mother’s been selected.

Ambrose’s head snaps up. He narrows his eyes as he finds Bianca preening near the edge of the stage.

“Holy shit, Piper.” Ava’s exclamation pulls my attention back to her. She’s pointing over my head. When I look up, there are red sparks floating above me. A warmth tingles down my body as if someone has dusted me with a spell. I guess that’s exactly what’s happened.

“This has to be a mistake,” I whisper.

The door to the amphitheater bangs open, and in walks Josephine’s mother, Francesca Delvaux. She’s a horrible woman who should currently be under house arrest.

“No,” Josephine gasps, but I can’t concentrate on her panic, because my own is about to choke off my breath. My uncle strides in behind Francesca, a smug look on his disgusting face and red sparks dancing over his head.