Page 123 of The Unbound Witch

“Where are you?” Torryn growled, pulling at fallen debris near where the baker’s shop used to stand.

“Bit further,” the man yelled.

Before we could dig him out, another voice cried for help. And then another. We spread out, lending hands to our neighbors. Listening to their stories of what they’d witnessed. As each was so greatly affected, they began to pool their remaining resources. Each witch contributing to the greater good of the community, wracked with destruction.

Endora had come at last, warning all of the witches into the stores as she claimed to be destroying a great evil I’d hidden in mine. And maybe I would have been their enemy, had I not been there to help dig most of them out. To show them I was just as sane as I ever was and whatever stories were being spun, it was none other than the Dark King, tunneling into the ground to help rescue the children and find food for the families.

“Your Grace,” Torryn barked from the far end of the square. “Come quick.”

Bastian ran for the shifter, myself and several others hastily following, stripped of their prejudices, if only for these moments where who you were didn’t matter as much as whether you could help the injured, locate a missing person, or find an extra set of hands.

As we approached, Bastian held a hand up, signaling for the rest of us to stay back. He knelt in the dirt where Torryn pointed, and lifted a large, red stone, brushing it across his chest to clear it of dirt and debris. Having only glanced that stone one time, I still knew exactly what it was.

Endora hadn’t found a witch to mute Bastian’s powers. She’d destroyed the Fire Coven Grimoire and Bastian held the only piece left of it in his palm.

50

RAVEN

By destroying the Grimoire, she’d annihilated all of the Fire Coven’s magic. Each witch living there would now be at the mercy of those with power. Their only safety, found behind the shifters they lived and worked side by side with. It would be enough, for now, but only just.

Bastian, though? Still shifter, but never again able to conjure his wings. Never again able to feel the cool relief of those shadows or the simple means of travel. He may have seemed fine, but I would bet my last crystal the outside was only a hard façade for the fury within. And the absolute devastation as his identity was stripped away.

“Nothing important,” he forced out, slipping the stone from his coven’s Grimoire into his pocket. “You should all go to your homes. Find your neighbors, offer helping hands and save what you can of yours. When something like this happened in the Fire Coven, it devastated the entirety of our territory.”

The witches we’d helped turned away. Likely, we’d never see that level of kindness from them ever again. But people tended to bond over shared misery. Once they became desperate, realizing exactly what they’d lost, this world would be turned upside down. Endora had made the grandest mistake by obliterating all the covens. The shifters were no longer our greatest enemy. Starvation was. And we’d already been so close before.

“What’s the plan?” Atlas wiped his hand across his forehead, smearing more dirt.

Bastian slid his hands into his deep pockets. “I don’t even know where to start.”

“Start?” Kirsi forced a laugh. “This battle has already begun, King. It doesn’t matter where we start, we’re going straight for the finish. Endora Mossbrook is as good as dead and you all can join me, or you can sit here and mope, but I’m ending this.”

The Dark King contained his tremble, eyes glancing to the ground before twisting his neck in anger. “Endora Mossbrook has every advantage.”

“She killed your mother,” I whispered.

He pinned me with an angry stare. “I know. I was there.”

I shook my head. “She killed your mother so that she could use her blood to enact the Harrowing. Juliette Firepool was the seventh witch. If we can take out Xena Foresthale and Endora, that’s it. The spell is over. No more witches die by that curse. Nym and I are saved.”

“Are you though?” Kirsi snapped. “You’re only getting worse. I know you felt the Grimoire die.”

I rubbed my hand over the back of my neck, pinching to ease the tension. “Leave it alone, Kir.”

She moved behind Bastian. “No. You’re not taking care of yourself. What difference does it make if the Harrowing is stopped if you’re going to die anyway, Rave?”

“Kirsi, stop this. I’m … I’m not dying. And this isn’t just about me. You’re supposed to be saving Nym, too.”

Her eyes lit with flames as she glared at me and then vanished.

Atlas sighed. “I’m with Kir. We need a plan. But sitting around here fighting with each other isn’t the way forward.”

“I have to go check on my parents. Why don’t you guys just decide what we’re doing and let me know.”

“Raven,” Bastian said, his voice low and threatening.

“I don’t need your Dark King shit right now.”