Chapter 36
Archer
It’s an unexpected sense of relief when I get home from my morning shift at the library and find the house empty. Sybil mentioned something about going to the town market with Rowyn. I didn’t know it would be a group affair.
I can’t say for certain that Renata is avoiding me again, but I haven’t gone looking for her over the past two days either.
Gale could tell something was wrong—I wasn’t a very strong opponent at chess today.
It’s not the most challenging game for someone with our abilities, but cheating is a lot harder when the playing field is even.
Our game was going on our fourth week. Today, he beat me in three moves.
Now that I’m with the coven, he has been more forthcoming with both questions and information, but he didn’t pry. He simply reminded me that I’m welcome to stay in my old, temporary room any time I want.
I considered the option for the rest of my shift but knew I would be returning to the inn. It wasn’t really a question to begin with.
Resolved to go straight to bed despite the early hour, it’s the only choice I have to avoid Rowyn’s guilt for missing a second dinner in the last few days.
Wallowing in my confusion and hurt with Renata, I’m looking down at my feet as I walk up the stairs. I don’t notice Nestor’s presence until I walk straight through him, hit by the type of cold that seeps down to your bones.
“Fuck,” I mutter and try to shake it off. Nestor moves in front of me, watching me with a curious expression. “Uh, sorry about that.”
He doesn’t acknowledge my statement, instead turning and floating down the hallway to Renata’s door.
After a stunned moment, I turn down the opposite hallway and walk toward my bedroom. As I turn the knob, a glowing ball lands over my hand. It’s the same numbing sensation, but more condensed when he’s in this form.
Not even attempting to turn the lock, I drop my hand and take a step back, giving him room to move without having to experience the cold sensation again. I flinch when he morphs into his full apparition. Nestor avoids looking at me and turns back toward Renata’s room.
Taking a tentative step in his direction, he waits outside of the door until I slowly reach him.
“She’s not home,” I remind him.
Surprising me with a nod, he looks back at her door then me.
Shaking my head, I say, “No, I can’t go in there without her permission.”
He grows frustrated, flickering in and out of visibility. After a long moment when I don’t move, he snaps into the glowing orb and opens the door, throwing it open in his haste to go inside.
I stop at the threshold, still unsure about taking the final step. Part of me is curious. A bigger part of me knows Renata would not be happy about this, and this isn’t exactly how I imagined being invited into her bedroom for the first time.
Still, his glowing ball form grows more agitated from my reluctance. He flies across the room—too fast for me to see—and knocks a stack of journals off the corner table.
“Nestor,” I chastise before feeling ridiculous for trying to scold a hundred-year-old ghost.
Morphing into his full-bodied form, he stares down at the journals. I figure hitting things is easier than picking something up for him, but my annoyance begins to match his earlier mood.
Dropping to my knees, I pile them up, hoping they weren’t in any particular order she would notice later.
I never would have taken her as someone who writes in a journal, I think and assess the dark, leather bound books. Renata keeps things too close to her chest to want the evidence of her emotions written for anyone to find.
A bitter taste lingers on my tongue when I consider that maybe I actually don’t know her as well as I thought I did.
Granted, our time together is new and hardly ever lasts long but we know each other on a deeper level than most people who have been together for decades.
Some of the things she has told me in our meadow—that I now have access to—are too vulnerable for Renata to share willingly. Even with the coven, if I had to guess.
Grabbing another of the journals, I catch a name on the open first page.
Petra Blackthorn, 1918
That insecurities fade, realizing these aren’t Renata’s. At least I was right about that.
They belong to Petra, which is more nerve-racking in comparison.
Looking up at Nestor, he stares back at me, having not moved in the last minute. After a moment, he nods before dispersing into a puff of smoke.
I’m not sure where he went or when the other witches get home, but I don’t have much time to make a decision. I will probably never get this opportunity again—I’m not even sure the other witches have read these.
With the stack of journals, I clumsily slip into the armchair behind me and begin reading.
When I finish this first one, I look for the next consecutive years. And so on it goes.
The bedroom door opens, pulling me from the entries I’ve become consumed by. Renata gasps in surprise when she sees me sitting under the window, using the light of the moon and the flames from the fireplace to assist me.
Glancing down to make sure Hexate made it inside, she closes the door swiftly and turns back to me.
“What are you doing here? Are you waiting for m—” Her words trail off once she realizes what I’m holding. “Those aren’t yours.”
There’s no bite in her tone—only caution and a thin layer of sadness.
Flipping over the journal, I lay it on my knee to hold my spot and lean forward with my arms on my thighs. “They aren’t yours either.”
“More mine than yours,” she mutters and crosses her arms.
Squinting at her, it only takes a few seconds for the reluctant smile to tug at her lips, visible thanks to the firelight.
“Is that how tonight is going to go? A competition of who can be the most petulant?” I ask, happy to break up the tension, but not ready to pretend I haven’t read through half a decade of Petra Blackthorn’s life.
She ignores me and continues to avoid my eyes. “Where’s Nestor?”
“He left.”
She finally turns to look at me, confusion clouding her eyes for only a second. “He brought you here—to the journals.”
It’s not a question, so I don’t bother confirming her speculation. Instead, with more bite than I’ve ever directed at her, I say, “You should have been the one to do it.”
“I…I just—” She stops and shakes her head, trying to clear the fog from settling.
I don’t want her to fall into another hallucination, but I need her to start including me in her plans—or at least in the information she finds.
She wipes her eyes, smudging her mascara, and says, “I wanted to make sure that my only theory was true before bringing it to you… and to Sybil.”
She grimaces at the admission, and the sour taste of her guilt hits me.
I don’t point out that her reasoning of keeping me in the dark is the same as Cordelia’s.
The realization is hitting her before my eyes, and maybe this is the reality check Renata needed.
To realize how stubborn and hypocritical she can be at times.
“Not the rest of the coven?” I ask, already knowing the answer.
At Gale’s birthday dinner, when we all “agreed” to be forthcoming about the information we each had, there was a silent agreement between Renata and her coven.
Sybil picked up on it as well, but with the fog of her prophecy only beginning to wear off, she could have forgotten about it. I did, until now.
“They all came to the same conclusion, but Rowyn stays hopeful that we’re wrong,” she says quietly.
“Just… tell me, Renata. Please,” I beg. Rising from the chair, I take a step toward her but don’t close the distance.
For a moment, she stands a few feet away from me. Her long legs are shaking despite the warmth from the fire.
“You’ve read her journals now—or some of them,” she says.
“Her and Barrett, they were together. They were in love. Soul-deep, unbreakable love. How do you think Barrett handled that when Nestor came back? When his best friend was broken, looking for the two people he was closest to? Nestor had to live with the loss of her for two years… Petra was hardly able to.”
My eyes jump between hers, letting her words settle over me. “He could have grown jealous,” I admit. “We already knew that was the most likely option. How does that change anything between us?”
Her head tilts in desperation for me to understand, and her face almost crumbles. With a deep breath, she walks to her nightstand and shuffles through it before pulling out a sheet of paper.
In a quiet, broken whisper she says, “It changes everything, Archer,” and hands it to me.
I stand frozen in place, pinching the paper between my fingers. Dread creeps through the room in a thick, dark mist as I stare down at the folded square.
“Open it,” she says. Her voice is quiet but there’s a bite to it—frustration.
I do as she demands and read over it a few times.
Renata? Eye-for-an-eye?
The handwriting is messy, but I can make out the words easily enough. The meaning takes me longer to process. It’s not a riddle, especially not to another witch.
She steps forward, grabbing my waist and shaking me lightly. My burning eyes tear away from the paper and meet hers, tears already running down her cheeks and her bottom lip swollen from nervously biting it.
Fuck, she’s beautiful.
I’ll never be able to live without her now.
“It changes everything,” she sobs and tangles her fingers into my shirt. “Don’t you get it? If Barrett killed them, it means… It—I have to—you—” she starts, not able to get the words out and shaking her head frantically.
The paper falls to the floor and I tangle my hands in her hair, stopping her growing panic. I’m barely keeping mine at bay as the pieces click together.
It’s obvious. So fucking obvious.
“An eye for an eye, a life for a life,” I murmur, heart racing, “That’s what will end the curse.”
Could it be true? Is that not any other way?
I have to potentially trade my life for Renata’s safety—to protect Sybil and the rest of the coven. Because of a jealous man’s anger a century ago, I have to balance the scales.
Sobbing, Renata grabs my hands and lifts them back to her cheeks. I’m numb to our surroundings, not realizing they fell from her body. I take on my earlier position, holding her face so I can stare down at it through my own silent tears.
“I’ll do it,” I say.
It’s not even a choice. I would do anything for Renata, but with Sybil’s safety also in the equation, it’s the only right answer.
“But I… I can’t,” she admits and drops her head to my chest. “If I do it, then I won’t be here much longer. I can’t live with that, Archer. I won’t.”
She’s the only living Blackthorn witch with spirit magic. It has to be her.
Fuck.
Holding her, it takes a long moment for her words to process through my hazy brain. When they do, I roughly pull her back to look at me and forcefully say, “That’s not an option. Fuck no.”
With a fresh wave of defiance, she says, “You couldn’t stop me.”
As the blow lands, her face crumples and she begins crying harder. There are some garbled words, most likely apologies for her sharp-tongue. I try my best to comfort her, kissing her head and shushing her, until her breaths begin to slow.
Once she’s relaxed, leaning all of her weight onto me, I place a soft kiss on her temple and murmur, “I will do anything I need to do to protect you and Sybil. The coven. Please,” I say and slip my hand to the nape of her neck, “you could live a happy, long life, Renata. We saw how full Cordelia’s was. You could have that.”
She pulls back, glaring at me. “No. No,” she spits out. “I don’t want that with you. Not after finding you. If we do this, Archer, I will die with you.”
“Renata,” I whisper and close my eyes. The thought of her life ending scares me more than my own.
When I think about it from her perspective, there wouldn’t be any moving on for me either.
Leaving only one option… “Then don’t fight this.
If all we have is this short life together, then let us have it, Little Wisp. ”
Letting out a deep sigh, she watches me for a moment before nodding.
A fucking nod.
“I want you—now that I know what it’s like to be with you, the only option is to follow you into the afterlife when the time comes.”
Her words are like a dagger to my heart, but there’s a selfish, possessive part of me that loves the idea of eternity with her rather than the possibility of someone else getting her love after me.
“Let us have this,” I plead against her lips.
With another bob of her head, she slips her hands up my chest and pulls me down to kiss her.
It’s a rough clash of our mouths, as desperate as our desire to change our fate.
All of the need, affection, and dread manifesting through this kiss and bonding us together through the reality of our situation.
“I need you,” she whispers and pulls away to look at me. “All of you.”