8. Mason
She was like no woman, witch or normal human, I had ever met before in my whole fucking life.
And she was strangely quiet and watchful of every little thing. I had never met a woman so silent before.
And skittish.
She acted like she was just waiting for someone to come up behind her and attack her at any given second.
I had heard her words over coffee but I hadn’t really let their meaning sink in until I spent the afternoon watching her.
There was more to her story than what she’d shared with us. I was betting most of it was bad and if she ever did get around to sharing it not a single one of us were going to enjoy hearing it.
All day she followed around behind everyone, ever the silent audience member. I expected her to look nervous or fidget or something but she gave away nothing.
I didn’t like what any of this had to say about where she’d come from or what she’d gone through while she’d been there. I already had the vision of her naked body tied to a tree and bleeding everywhere from multiple cuts to haunt my memories for the rest of my days. I had a feeling it was something none of us would soon forget about.
It was absolutely barbaric and I couldn’t believe there were witches out there in this world outside of the dreadful Council who treated other witches this cruel way.
Rain had originally talked about removing the witches from the woods and integrating them with the rest of our society. After the way he’d looked at her from across the table I wasn’t so sure any of them were going to escape his wrath after the way they’d treated this girl. I had a feeling it had more to do with the knowledge of what had been done to his own daughter and he saw her in Autumn.
Perhaps Rain wasn’t going to be the best man for the job because he wasn’t going to be rational about any of this. The problem was the man scared the absolute shit out of every single person and no-one dared to tell him he wasn’t fit to do the job. I knew I wasn’t going to be the one to tell him.
Call me a coward, I cared not. The man had dead eyes and I didn’t want to know what it took to earn such a thing. I think he scared everyone but his daughter and, honestly, her eyes weren’t far from the sight of his own.
Autumn watched everything very carefully all day and Rain watched her, only he did it very openly and he was extremely bold about it.
And we all watched the both of them.
I think Raven had become obsessed with her without knowing it. I didn’t dare point it out to him for fear of him denying it and then keeping himself as far away from her as humanly possible.
Raven, above all the others, broke my absolute heart. He was a good man, the best of them, but he’d allowed all of the shit that had beaten him down in his life to turn him into a slightly cold, unfeeling son of a bitch. He gave everything he had to give to his coven members and that left him with little else to give to anyone else.
It broke something in all of us to watch the man shut himself off from everything and everyone while working relentlessly to give his coven everything he possibly could. It was exhausting to watch, I couldn’t imagine what it felt like to give it.
He was the most selfless man I had ever known and for that reason alone I desperately wanted to be able to keep the female with us. She was the first one he’d ever really showed any interest in. With Annabell he’d gone along with it to keep the rest of us happy and content, but I suspected he’d never really actually cared about her. He flirted with Ariel because she’s beautiful and dangerous and he clearly had a bit of a death wish. He never so much as even attempted to side eye Isobel. Not that I blamed him, that one gave off a whole lot of crazy vibes.
If he saw something that he wanted in this Autumn woman then I wanted him to have it. I wanted him to have her and I wanted him to be happy.
I wanted us all to be happy one day.
I wasn’t stupid enough to think this witch was the cure all to all of our problems but it looked like she might be a good place for at least Raven to start. Though, it really was too bad that she came with so much baggage of her own. These days you couldn’t find a female witch that wasn”t damaged almost beyond the point of repair.
It was an incredibly sad world that we lived in and seemed like it always had been for the fairer sex gifted with magic.
Gunner, the disgruntled giant, made about five-hundred pancakes with scrambled eggs and bacon for lunch. Even after having consumed a huge breakfast. He only pulled out breakfast food when he said he needed comfort. It was something he’d picked up from living with his grandmother. He joked that she was to blame for him being so huge, because food was her answer for everything.
Autumn ate about half of the food on the table by herself and she almost stopped when it looked like she was ready to slip into a food coma.
Gunner watched the whole thing with some strange gleam of satisfaction in his eyes at the sight of her devouring his food like a starving woman.
He looked a lot like Raven, watching her like that. It gave me even more ideas that I likely didn’t need in my head.
Rain escorted her up to her bedroom after lunch and helped her into bed. Sleep was just what she needed. After all she’d been through, and I knew that there was plenty that we did not know, and the healing she had received upon her arrival here, sleep was the absolute best medicine for her. That’s when her true healing would take place and there was nothing more any of us could do to help her with that journey. That one she had to travel all alone.
I did not envy the girl that.
We gathered around the table once again when she was safely tucked into bed where she’d stay while she received all the rest she required to get healthy again. Whatever that looked like for her.
The coffee had been exchanged for something much stronger and alcoholic. And the mood had greatly deteriorated.
Of course it was Rain who started the conversation. The man was practically frothing at the mouth at this point. “You’ve all given me your statements about what you saw in the woods and how you found her. After spending the day with her I’m not even sure what to think. Whatever else she’s been through, I think I can speak for us all when I say that she is not a normal woman. Whatever they did to her, what’s to say they aren’t doing it to the rest of them? It’s going to take forever for her to trust us enough to open up about what’s going on inside that camp in the woods.
“If people are being tortured, tied up to trees in the nude, and left out in the elements to die, then we can’t exactly sit here on our asses waiting for her to trust us so we know exactly what the fuck is going on there. We might not have that time to wait. We have to go sooner rather than later. I have a duty to help those people. I know that you do not but I came here asking for your help. If this has become too much for you guys to handle then I can always call back home for backup who can be here by tomorrow to go in there with me.”
He was right about everything he’d said, of course. Before bringing Autumn home with us I would have said we had no business going back to that place. Now I didn’t have to ask the others to know my entire coven would be returning to the woods with Rain.
But we could probably use some backup anyways because the only one who knew what he was doing here was Rain. And he was kind of psychotic.
I wasn’t so sure him bringing any of his people here to help would be any better. They were all probably psychotic as well. And wouldn’t that just be tons of fun putting them up here in our home.
“We’re going with you,” Raven snapped.
No surprise there but he really needed to stop snapping at anyone who wasn’t Autumn. It wasn’t a good look for him and people were going to start calling him out for being a complete and utter unbearable dick.
“We don’t know how many people are in the woods,” Gunner grumbled unhappily. “Just that clearly they are deranged. I hate to ask for it but, just to be safe, we might want to call in your backup. We have no idea what we are really walking into and I, for one, would prefer to walk back out in one piece. We have a guest we’ll need to return safely back to so we can make sure she’s comfortable during her transition into her new life.”
That was Gunner. Always the smart and reasonable one. And sneaky. By bringing up Autumn’s safety and wellbeing Raven would easily go along with his wishes.
“So, it’s decided then,” Rain said as he drained his drink and pushed himself up from his seat. “Smart man. I’ll have them here tomorrow and we can plan on going in at nightfall. That way they won’t see us coming and the cover of darkness will help keep us hidden for as long as possible.”
I didn’t know who he thought he was fooling, himself? They were witches and the cover of darkness wasn’t going to mean jack shit.
However, it wasn’t going to be me who called him out for it.
I was simply going along for the ride and to keep an eye on all the members of my coven. That was always my job, and it was one I took very seriously.
We all had our roles to play.
Rain left us all sitting there around the table but none of us spoke.
Tomorrow would come soon enough and I had a feeling it was going to leave it’s mark on us all.