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Rhun stared at him. “You didn’t.”
“Nope, I did not, which is why I’m asking hypothetically.”
At first, Rhun’s expression remained blank. Watching his features change into a study in amusement over the next few seconds, however, was an exercise in torture. Tallak barely held himself back from crushing the damn bottle in his hand while Rhun regarded him with a shit-eating grin.
“Oh, this is so delicious,” the bluotezzer said, shaking his head. “I swear, this is better than a telenovela. A feast for my gossipy inclinations—”
Tallak pointed the bottle at Rhun and snarled. “If you talk to anyone else about this, I will fucking end you.”
“Ah, threats,” he said with a chuckle, his eyes sparking with laughter. “One of the five love languages between manly-man friends.”
“I’m serious. Swear on your mate’s life that you’ll keep this to yourself.”
Rhun’s expression turned tortured, then he sighed. “All right, all right. My lips are sealed.” He mimicked locking his mouth. “Now, back to your…juicy problem…”
“I will slap that grin off your face, you know.”
“No, my desperate demon,” Rhun said with a cluck of his tongue, “what you will do is take notes.”
CHAPTER 6
The letters on the page swam together. With a sigh, Hazel shut her eyes and massaged her closed lids with the fingers of one hand. Hours of scouring the Murray library for information on the Forbidden Craft took their toll.
She closed the book about the ancient history of spells, which she’d just gone through looking for any mention of blood magic and its more heinous uses—finding nothing much of interest, only vague references to methods one should not try—and carried it back to its place in one of the several floor-to-ceiling shelves lining the walls of the Murray library. Her fingers glided over the backs of the books, her eyes scanning the titles—A Genealogy of Witches in the New World, Gnomes and Their Secret Benefits, Grimoire-Keeping for the Experienced Witch—when her attention snagged on a space between volumes that shouldn’t be there.
It wasn’t that she knew the correct position of every book in the library by heart, but her mind was excellent at noting differentiations from the status quo. And that gap hadn’t been there the last time she’d been in this room.
Checking the books left and right from the empty space, the missing title had to be volume two of a three-part anthology about the advanced weaving of spells, which was standard educational material for all witches, part of the regular study of witchcraft. But, as a part of her brain noted, not containing anything about the Forbidden Craft—she would remember that since the information in the anthology had been hammered into her brain when she was growing up and learning under her mother.
And that was the crux, wasn’t it? All the regular books on witchcraft and spells just didn’t even address this nefarious aspect of magic. Which made researching it right now an arduous task.
She checked the desk and side tables for the anthology volume, with no luck. It was possible Merle had taken it with her, as the other Elder sometimes came over to go through the books here, considering the MacKenna library was a lot smaller than the Murrays’.
Hazel pulled out another book on advanced magic and complex rituals and immersed herself in it.
An hour later—or maybe two? She’d lost track of time—she came upon a section in the text that made her sit up, her pulse spiking. Blood magic… There. Her eyes tracked over the page, over the words giving her the least vague description of blood-related spells she’d found so far.
She was so absorbed in the text that her phone ringing in the silence of the room made her jump up from the seat.
“Yes?” she answered the call from Merle, her gaze still on the passages in the book.
“Hi, um, Hazel?” Merle cleared her throat. “Are you on your way yet?”
She frowned. “Where to?”
“The Elder meeting at my house?” Merle drawled. “You wanted to get here early?”
“Shipwreck,” Hazel muttered, massaging her temple with her free hand. “That’s tonight.”
“You forgot?” A considering pause. “What’s wrong? You don’t forget stuff like this. You’re like a walking calendar and to-do list rolled into one. What’s going on?”
Hazel pursed her lips, pondering. There was really only one among the other Elders whom Hazel trusted with the sensitive information about the murderous witch in the community, and it was time she told her.
Hazel checked her watch. If she left now, she’d still be early enough to have a few minutes to lay out the situation to Merle. “Let me explain when I get to your place.”
“Sounds serious.” A cautious note in her friend’s voice.
“You have no idea.”
