Chapter 2
Out of time
ZARA
“I’ve condemned us?” I laugh bitterly, my hands curling into fists. “You’ve condemned us. All of you. You let the warlocks control us, use us for their power. You’ve bowed to them for years, and now you’re afraid of the one who’s not willing to.”
The coven gathers behind our leader, all my sisters sworn to me in ties more sacred than blood, their faces still torn between disappointment, anger, and betrayal.
Ysolde, the other woman with the silver eyes, steps forward next, her magic a cold, calculated thing.
I can almost feel it, like an icy hand on my throat.
“You don’t understand what it means to be a part of this coven, Zara. We belong here. We have a place. You’ve thrown it all away for what? A fleeting dream of freedom?”
I stand in the center of it, alone and unyielding. “Better a fleeting dream than a lifetime of chains.”
Ysolde’s lip curls, and her voice hardens. “You’ve doomed us all; do you understand that? The Senior Circle will see this as an act of rebellion. They won’t just punish you—they’ll come for the coven. All of us.”
“They already punish us,” I snap. “You just refuse to see it. Their protection is a leash, and you wear it willingly. They take more than they give and we were slaves without rights.”
A sharp gust of wind cuts through the clearing, whipping my hair across my face and carrying the scent of burnt magic and damp earth.
The air feels charged, the residual energy of my spell clinging to the space like an unspoken accusation.
Around me, my sisters tense, their magic simmering just beneath the surface.
It’s instinctive, a shared reaction to danger—only this time, I’m the danger.
The ground beneath my feet trembles faintly as the earth itself shudders at what’s been unleashed.
Ysolde’s silver eyes narrow, a flicker of unease breaking through her anger.
The others exchange quick, furtive glances, their confidence cracking like fragile glass.
Even Aleris looks at me with distrust, the trust built over years of working together undone in a few brief moments.
For all the others talk of order and control, the raw, unspoken fear threads through the coven like a poisoned vein.
They’re not just afraid of the warlocks’ wrath.
They’re afraid of me.
Our High Mother steps forward again, her voice trembling with authority and fear.
“Zara,” she says, her voice soft but edged with pain. “You’ve broken us. We trusted you. We raised you. And now you’ve ruined us.”
I want to scream at her, tell her she’s wrong, but the lump in my throat swells. She was the first to believe in me, the first to teach me magic. She’s the one who showed me the power that could be mine, and now she’s the one who stands with them, condemning me for it.
The disappointment in her eyes cuts deeper than any spell could.
“What did you think would happen?” she asks quietly, almost pleading.
“You can’t defeat the coven. You can’t defeat the warlocks.
Power won’t betray you, but it will demand everything you have.
And even if you think you have found freedom, you cannot be an island.
You cannot be alone. No one can, child. Not if they wish to live. ”
I don’t respond. I don’t need to. I already know what they’ll do. They’ll try to bind me, to break my spirit, to make me bow to their will. But they’ve underestimated me. I’m already lost to them.
The wind shifts again, colder this time, and the shadows of the trees stretch longer, darker. The power I’ve unleashed hums in the distance, a restless thing that refuses to settle. It answers to no one and its wildness mirrors the tempest building in my chest.
But the silence that follows contains only dread.
There’s no relief in its quiet, no calm in its stillness.
We’ve broken free from the chains that suppressed our power and every other witch has felt our bond of servitude snap, and the wild magic sparks in us, and a reminder of what we could be if we united against our common enemy.
Of what we should be and of what is ours to claim.
The warlocks have felt it too. The tremors that traveled through the earth and air have stirred them and they’re already on their way here.
The faint reverberations of their approach, heavy and inexorable, grow stronger with every passing second, and my skin simmers, sensing a storm gathering on the horizon.
“They’re coming,” Ysolde whispers, her voice trembling with a mix of fury and fear. “Do you feel that? They’ll be here soon.”
The wind howls, carrying with it a faint vibration that makes the hairs on the back of my neck rise. It’s faint, like a distant drumbeat, but unmistakable. The warlocks are moving, their magic slicing through the atmosphere like knives, sharp and deliberate, as they converge on us.
The oppressive thrum of approaching power grows stronger, an invisible tidal wave cresting closer with every passing moment.
I feel it in my bones, a relentless vibration that resonates with the earth itself.
My sisters shift uneasily, their magic curling defensively around them like shadows bracing for the light.
Even the High Mother looks shaken, her gaze fixed on the distant horizon where the warlocks’ storm brews.
“What are we going to do?” someone whispers, her voice barely audible over the rising wind.
The High Mother doesn’t answer immediately. Instead, she squares her shoulders, the steel in her spine visible even as the weight of what’s coming bears down on her. It’s Ysolde who speaks first, stepping forward with that icy, calculated calm she’s known for.
“We need a plan,” she says, her silver eyes piercing through the gathering fear like a blade. “And fast. If we don’t act now, there’ll be nothing left to save.”
My heart hammers against the ribs that cage it, beating with the same frantic rhythm of the hearts of my coven.
Adrenaline burns as my body responds to the pulse pouring through my blood, setting me on fire as my muscles and my fingers ready themselves to fight.
My mouth falls open and I want to argue—to remind them that I didn’t cause this, that their years of compliance with the warlocks’ rule left us vulnerable—but the words falter on my tongue.
The truth doesn’t matter right now.
Survival does.
Ysolde turns her gaze on me, cold and unforgiving. “This is on you, Zara. You started this.”
“And I’ll end it,” I snap, my voice as sharp as her glare. “But I’m not running from them. I won’t grovel at the warlocks or beg for forgiveness. I’d rather die on my feet than spend the rest of my life under their boots.”
The night hums with an unnatural stillness, pressing against my chest and stealing the air from my lungs.
Magic thrums beneath the surface, a wild, untamed thing that writhes like a serpent in the dark, and the shadows stretch and twist, warping into shapes that shouldn’t exist, their edges sharp with the promise of danger.
The moon drops from her peak, its silver light fractured as if the sky is cracking under the weight of what’s coming.
I draw a deep breath as I glare at my coven, tasting the metallic air that’s charged with a power too potent to contain.
Each breath feels like drawing in smoke before a fire consumes everything and the hardness of our gazes only makes the tension fiercer, as the coven waits on edge.
It’s not silence that fills the night—it’s the quiet before something terrible arrives, the universe holding its breath as the unseen inches closer.
“Defiance won’t save you,” Ysolde says, her tone bitter and hollow. “The warlocks will tear you apart and they won’t stop with you. They’ll make an example of all of us—of every witch in this coven.”
“Enough,” the High Mother commands, her voice cutting through the tension like a whip. “We don’t have time for this.” She exhales sharply, her expression grim. “We need a scapegoat,” she says finally, her tone as cold as Ysolde’s gaze, “if we are to survive this.”
The words hit like a slap across my face, and I step back.
I thought betrayal would feel like a knife—sharp, sudden, cutting me down in one clean strike.
But this is something far worse, a slow, suffocating weight pressing on my chest until I have to fight for breath.
The High Mother, the woman who raised me as if I were her own, whose approval I used to crave like air, has turned her back on me.
She didn’t even hesitate. Her voice, the same voice that once soothed my fears and promised me I belonged, now casts me out as if I’m nothing. As if I never mattered.
“You’re throwing me to the wolves?”
My eyes find Aleris, and her silence is the loudest blow of all.
The dark witch taught me everything I know.
She shaped me, molded me, told me I was powerful, that I could change the world.
And now, when I’ve done exactly that, she stands there with her arms crossed, her eyes full of judgment.
I search her face for some glimmer of understanding, some shred of the warmth I once trusted, but all I see is disappointment.
A rejection so complete it feels like the ground is crumbling beneath my feet.
These women are my family. My world. And they’ve abandoned me when I needed them most. The pain isn’t just in my chest—it’s in my very magic, like a wound festering beneath the surface.
I can’t tell if rage or heartbreak burns hotter inside me, but I know I’ll never forget this.
The High Mother’s betrayal, Aleris’s silence—they’ve carved themselves into me, and I’ll carry the scars forever.
“No,” the High Mother says, though her voice holds no comfort and my heart feels no relief. “We will give you a chance, child. You’ll leave, and you won’t come back. You wanted to be free, and now you are.”
My pulse pounds in my ears. “You can’t be serious.”