AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Not at all,” Nadine said gently. “I want to be friends again. You’re the first person I met on my first day at Miriam College. Our friendship means a lot to me. I understand if things got too intense for you, and I’m sorry we ever had to put you in that position. I want to move forward with a better understanding of each other so that no one gets hurt again.”
“I want that, too,” Mandy said. “I agree that things got hard, but if I could do it over again, I’d never turn you in to the priestesses. I never wanted to stop being friends, even when I couldn’t handle the pressure. All I wanted was your forgiveness.”
“And you have it,” Nadine promised.
Tears streamed down their faces as the girls hugged.
“I owe you an apology, too,” I told her. “The last time we spoke before our trial, I was very harsh with you. I should’ve put myself in your shoes. Maybe I would’ve understood better what you were going through.”
“If you can forgive me for turning you in, then I can forgive you for what you said that day,” Mandy offered.
“Then we have a deal,” I told her, reaching out to shake her hand.
Chloe stepped forward. “If you’ll accept my apology, I’d like to say sorry as well. I treated you awful, especially after you dated Ryan right after we broke up. I mean, the guy’s not even worth it. There’s no excuse for how mean I was, and I never should’ve treated you that way.”
Mandy chuckled, like Chloe was already long forgiven. “Don’t worry about it. I’m totally over him.”
“So… we’re good?” Chloe asked.
“Yeah, we’re good,” Mandy said, glancing between the three of us. “We’re all good. I’ve been through a lot since you’ve been gone. I used to think we couldn’t go up against the priestesses, but I was wrong. I’ve never been more ready to face them. I want to keep working with you to find the Oaken Wands and do right by the coven.”
I didn’t think we’d ever be friends with Mandy again after she turned us into the priestesses, but I’d been wrong. If we could mend our relationship with Mandy and unite our friends, then we could certainly heal the coven, too.
We just had to keep trying.
Chapter Fourteen
NADINE
Two weeks passed since we returned from the Abyss, and I’d slept through most of it. We’d been through so much, and sometimes, it all felt like a dream I hadn’t fully processed.
When we’d returned home, it hit me all over again that Grammy was gone, and that sent me to a dark place. It didn’t help that we weren’t getting new leads on the Warlock’s Trial, and it didn’t feel like we were making any progress at all. I felt out of control to change anything.
I cried every day, so I slept a lot just to block out the world, because there was nothing else for me to do. I napped for hours at a time, curled under the blanket Grammy had crocheted—the one she’d gifted to me during my bridal shower. It still smelled like her, and I couldn’t decide if that brought me comfort or hurt even more. My friends kept trying to push on without me and gain answers, but I couldn’t find it in me to join them.
I’d gone to the Abyss and seen what the witches were willing to do to each other, even in death. If we were that hellbent on torturing one another in the afterlife, what was the point? There were witches in the Abyss who’d been tormenting themselves and others for centuries, and they were happy doing it, so why bother interceding? Why was I even trying to stop any of this, when most of the coven was going to keep persecuting those among us even in death?
That’s how I thought sometimes, though the thoughts didn’t feel like my own. I knew we had to push on and find the rest of the Oaken Wands, but it was hard when I felt empty inside.
It was like Lucas and I had swapped places. He cooked me meals and convinced me to get out of bed at least once a day to take a walk. He’d gotten really good at taking care of me.
When Lucas wasn’t sleeping next to me, he was going through old books Hattie had given us shortly after we returned. She couldn’t find anything on reapers, so she’d sent along books about the afterlife from other supernatural societies and suggested we start there. She thought there may be some similarities between the lore. So far it didn’t sound like Lucas had found anything new.
We couldn’t go up against the priestesses until Lucas had the Mortana Wand. We could use the Mentalist, Seer, and Alchemy Wand against the priestesses, but with an army of Mortana Executors on their side, we’d be slaughtered by Death magic the second we showed our faces in Octavia Falls.
I witnessed Talia’s tearful goodbye with her sister before Lucas portaled Tate to Hok’evale. Talia had baked her cookies and sent Tate with one of her sweaters and a care package. Tate seemed relieved to be leaving Octavia Falls for good. I really thought Hok’evale was going to be good for her.
Talia hadn’t learned much else from her visions about the mystery man who was lurking our ward borders. No one had disturbed us since, so I figured Lucas was right and that we were safe here. With the three Oaken Wands we’d obtained, our wards were stronger than ever.
Talia was using the Seer Wand to keep an eye on the priestesses. We’d thrown them off our location by moving the Executors’ bodies, and they’d been searching for us miles away. The priestesses were so preoccupied with searching for us that they weren’t doing much else inside the coven right now, according to Hattie’s report. They were obviously preoccupied with finding out where we’d taken the Wands, but they hadn’t been able to track us down.
Miles suggested we use the Wands to read the priestesses’ minds to get more information, but neither Chloe nor Talia could get their Wands to work that way. There were witches from both the Mentalist and Seer Casts who could read minds to some degree, but it required skill that neither Chloe nor Talia had mastered. The Wands were powerful, but they were still limited by the confines of witch magic, and by the caster themselves. Though some witches could read minds, most couldn’t do it at a distance, and it was especially difficult to read someone’s mind without their consent. Most witches’ mind-reading abilities only captured fragments of thoughts anyway. It was a skill that might prove useful, but Talia and Chloe were still working on it. Even with the Wands, they weren’t all-powerful. They needed to find, then teach themselves, a way to get around all these constraints, and it wasn’t an easy process.
Things were getting worse inside the coven. It was obvious because the Waning had hit all of us harder over these last few weeks than it had all summer. We had three Wands to combat it, but they weren’t much help with mine or Lucas’s powers. He’d gone days unable to use his portal magic, and we needed to make a supply run soon.
I woke one morning to find Lucas was already out of bed. My joints protested as I rolled over to check the clock. It was almost noon already. I sat up in bed and yawned. All I wanted to do was curl up and go back to sleep.
It took everything in me to haul my ass out of bed. My legs felt like noodles, and I had to lean against the nightstand for support. Dread sank in my stomach.
