Marianna“I don’t understand.” I swallow hard past the lie, folding my hands over my lap, meeting the headmaster’s shrewd gaze. She’s an otherwise lovely woman in her late fifties, I believe, with raven-black hair peppered with silver and bright brown eyes. Her pink lipstick crinkles when she gives me a sad, sympathetic smile I know all too well… because this has happened before. Twice. Three times now, if I count today. The pewter stone walls of the exclusive, ridiculously expensive Children’s Academy of Crescent City smothers me. She looks down at her desk for a moment, sighing. “Ms. Abbot,” she says, meeting my gaze again, her face washed in what I believe is empathy but could be something far less deep. “Skye doesn’t belong here. She's too–too–” She waves her wrist in what I can only construed as dismissal. “Too intense?” She purses her thin lips. “I have other students to think about. We’ve given this a shot, haven’t we? After her… premature departure from MoonWolf Preschool,
SorenPatton limps down the wide, golden hallway somewhere on the fourth floor. He’s dressed in a brand-new tuxedo, something of Jane’s doing, I’m sure, but it fits him like a glove. He checks his watch.Voices drift through the air and the sun beams onto the pristine, crimson carpet. I catch my reflection in one of the many mirrors along the golden walls and stop to adjust my hair, sweeping the chestnut curls away from my forehead. The black-on-black tuxedo I’m wearing was Evander’s idea, even though I could be in sweatpants and a T-shirt right now. The electric hum of the crowd gathered around the palace walls reaches the upper levels of the grand house I now call home, but it’s been like this since the earliest hours of the morning when Maeve sent warriors out into the street to proclaim the birth of the princess. She was, technically, born three days ago, but we’ve had a lot to do since then. Mostly… rest. In fact, Maeve, Fallon, and I haven’t done much but sleep, eat, and sleep
SorenIt’s dark in Moonrise when we return to the palace–to Maeve’s entire family in wait. Blake is whisked away by his parents and a trio of healers. Jane, blubbering, reunites with Patton and the two disappear to the clinic to have his wounds tended. Sydney brought us back within minutes of Maeve using her magic to scorch the island into a blackened heap of rubble, and we’re back, but… everything feels different. Ryatt stayed behind with the Ghosts and Evander, but I feel his presence everywhere I step. Maeve clutches my hand tight, her fingers like ice, and we rush through the castle toward her suite. Our suite, I suppose. Toward the daughter I promised I’d be here to witness coming into the world. Maeve’s armor clicks as she moves like the wind, ignoring the shouts coming from the end of the hallway where we landed only moments ago. Warriors and healers rush after us but neither of us turn around. My heart is in my throat as we climb the final staircase to the sixth floor. Ke
MaeveMonths ago, when the trees were green and summer bloomed all around me, I used my powers to try to spirit home from the Roguelands. My powers did, in fact, take me home, but… not to the home I expected. I should have realized it then. Now, the landscape coming into focus is desolate and barren–an icy hell of wind beaten grass and rough seas… but he’s here. My powers brought me here, back to him, back home.Firestone witches can have mates, and I’ve found mine, but my powers recognized him before I did. I like to think the Goddess had a hand in our first two meetings–that She drew him to that tea shop on the same night as me, seeking quiet companionship. That she urged me in his direction after Brie and Logan’s elopement just so we’d cross paths ago, planting the seed of our bond in both of our chests. Now, my powers have called me home again, but I have no idea where I am. A cold, angry sea laps against a beach of sharp, dark stone. Cliffs overlook the roiling black water, a
SorenWater dribbles down heavy mildew stained stone as I blink into the glare of flickering fluorescent lights. Patton pants beside me, grunting in pain as my mind catches up to my body. My wrists are bound with iron shackles and strung up over my head with a chain connected to the ceiling. My back is to the wall, however, and I’m… seated, my legs stretched out in front of me, my thigh brushing Patton’s. I close my eyes against a searing pain along the left side of my head. I taste blood when I lick my lips and realize I must have been struck on the side of the face with something heavy and blunt. “Pat? You good?”“I dunno,” he murmurs. “I can’t feel my legs.”I open my eyes, straining my neck to look at him and notice the blood seeping through his thick, goose down jacket now flayed open down the center. He got stabbed. That’s obvious, but I think we’ve been out for a while judging by the total numbness in my arms, so the fact he’s awake and talking is a good sign. A rattling ec
MaeveI can’t breathe through the pain anymore. It grips me, tearing through my back, splitting my spine. I grip Misty’s arms as I howl, tears streaming down my face. Misty’s trembling, holding me upright, her healing powers hard at work mending the bruises and scratches I’ve left on her skin. It’s been four hours of this. Six hours ago, Soren, Blake, and Patton left. Soren told me he'd be back within an hour. Maybe two, at the most. I’ve been counting the seconds.“Maeve, you should try to lie down,” Misty says gently, coaxing me toward the bed, but I furiously shake my head and writhe through another contraction that begins to build at the base of my spine. “No, no, no, no,” I mumble then gasp as the pain curls around me in an iron embrace. “Ginny, how much longer?” Grandma Ella says sternly from my other side as I stand between the two women, my legs shaking, but I’m unable to find the strength to move. I feel Ginny’s hand glide between my legs. The pain is unbearable. I lea