Chapter 11 #2
“No,” I said, shaking my head with a scoff. “That’s impossible. You know the history. The Ravenspells anchored our wards to the ley lines themselves. There isn’t a witch alive powerful enough to pick that lock. It would take a god. Or—”
I froze. The blood drained from my face.
“Or a Ravenspell,” I whispered.
Calder didn’t say a word. He just gave a grim nod.
My stomach dropped to my boots.
“He has a Ravenspell on his payroll?”
He nodded again.
“But… why?” I whispered, my mind reeling. “Which Ravenspell would willingly tear down the wards? They built this place. They’re the backbone of this place.”
I racked my brain, searching through the family tree, through the rumors and the history. And then, a name surfaced from the depths of my memory. A name that was rarely spoken in town, usually only in hushed tones as a cautionary tale.
“Wren,” I said.
Calder didn’t confirm my guess. He didn’t have to.
Wren Ravenspell. The black sheep. Her family had exiled her from town three decades ago because the “wholesome” earth magic her sisters used wasn’t enough for her. She’d wanted power. Chaos. Darkness.
And apparently, she’d found it.
“She knows all the anchor points,” Calder said. “And he bought her loyalty. Along with a bear shifter who loves to cause misery.”
I felt sick. Physically, violently ill.
I sank into the nearby armchair because my legs decided they were done participating in this conversation.
But as much as I wanted to turn my brain off, to go back to my state of existence before this conversation, I couldn’t.
Calder said this man, whoever he was, had blackmailed him.
And that entailed leveraging him for something.
“What did he make you do for him?” I asked. “What did you give him in exchange for Eternity Falls’ safety?” And mine, but I wasn’t ready to acknowledge that part yet.
“Artifacts,” Calder said. “He had a list of several he wanted me to acquire for him. That was the deal. I work for him—exclusively, immediately, and without any questions—and he leaves the town, you, and your family alone.”
I frowned. “Seriously? He wanted artifacts?”
“Powerful artifacts,” Calder corrected. “This guy supposedly has paranormal heritage, but it’s so watered down he reads as human.
He thinks he has a right to our magic and our property.
And the things he’s had me steal? They weren’t random.
Each one gave him something: strength, stamina, influence.
He’s been stacking the deck for years. I just don’t know what the end game is. ”
“So that’s where you’ve been,” I said quietly. “Not on a beach. Not with another woman. You’ve been running errands for a psychopath to keep my family safe from the government.”
“Yes.”
“And the silence?” I asked. “No texts. No letters. Not even a postcard. If you were doing this for me… why didn’t you tell me?”
“Would you have let me go?” Calder asked. “Or would you have unleashed your brothers on”—he cleared his throat—“him?”
I opened my mouth to defend myself and my family, but Calder shook his head.
“It doesn’t matter what you say, Thorne.
I know you. You wouldn’t have accepted this.
Hell, I almost didn’t. But Adrian is a killer.
And Wren Ravenspell is an absolute nightmare.
She wants to tear down the wards and destroy Eternity Falls.
You love this place. Do you remember the day we returned from Istanbul?
Because I do. You shone with happiness the second we crossed the town boundary.
You told me you never wanted to leave again, that you were finally home. You were so damn happy.”
Calder sighed and sat on the edge of the bed, staring at me.
“I couldn’t let him take that from you. If I’d told you, you would have told your brothers, and they would have hunted him down, and Wren would have obliterated them.
Then you. Then the town. Silence was the only way to keep you and everyone else safe. So, I let you hate me instead.”
I closed my eyes, letting the horror wash over me.
I’d done exactly that. I’d spent so long hating him. I’d nursed that hate like a grudge-baby, feeding it whiskey and late-night rants. I had built an entire identity around being the woman Calder scorned. The woman who wasn’t good or exciting enough to keep him.
But he hadn’t left because he didn’t love me.
He had left because he loved me so much he was willing to erase himself from my life to keep me breathing.
“You idiot,” I choked out.
His head jerked up. “Excuse me?”
I opened my eyes and glared at him through a blur of tears I refused to let fall.
“You noble, self-sacrificing, absolute idiot.” I stood up and paced the room.
“You took away my choice! You decided my life for me! You protected the town, sure. You saved my brothers, fine. But you destroyed us in the process. Did you ever think that maybe I would have rather fought by your side than lived in safety without you?”
“Yes,” he said instantly. “I knew you would want to fight. That’s exactly why I didn’t tell you. If I had, you would have come after me. You would have gone after the blackmailer. After Wren. And you would have lost, Thorne. We all would have lost. I refused to risk your life.”
“So, you martyred yourself instead.”
“I did what I had to do.”
I stared at him—this time, really looking at him. I saw the exhaustion etched into his face, the gray hairs at his temples that hadn’t been there before. I saw the weight of the secrets he’d been carrying.
He hadn’t been on an adventure. He’d been in Hell.
The anger drained out of me, leaving me hollowed out and aching. I wanted to scream. I wanted to hit him. I wanted to kiss him until I forgot any of this had ever happened.
“And now?” I asked, my voice quiet. “Why are you back? Did he… did he let you go?”
Calder hesitated. Just for a fraction of a second. A flicker of something shadowed passed behind his eyes—guilt? Fear?—but I knew that look.
“You’re here on a job, aren’t you?” I demanded.
The silence that followed was louder than a scream. Calder didn’t look away, but his jaw muscle feathered—a tiny, telltale spasm that I used to kiss just to make it stop. Now, it just made my stomach drop.
“Thorne…”
“Don’t,” I snapped. “Don’t you dare lie to me. You didn’t come back because you were free. You came back because he sent you.” I shook my head. “There’s another artifact, isn’t there? Here in Eternity Falls?”
He ran a hand down his face, looking far older than his years. “Yes,” he admitted. “But it’s the last one,” he said, the desperation bleeding into his tone. “If I get it for him, he’ll destroy the files, call off Wren, and let me go. Then I’m free to go.”
“And if you don’t get him the artifact?”
His silence was answer enough.
“Alright. Well, what artifact does he want?” I asked.
“It’s called The Star of Avelon.”
I frowned. My family dealt in a lot of weird stuff—cursed monkey paws, bottomless coin purses, jewelry that screamed when you touched it—but I’d never heard of that.
“Its original name is lost to time, like most fae relics,” Calder explained. “But it’s ancient, volatile, and it’s supposedly some mythical source of magic from before the fae went extinct. Wren assures us the artifact is here.”
“And you believe her?”
“She has first-hand knowledge,” he said grimly.
That made me frown. “First-hand knowledge?” Then the light bulb clicked on in my head. “It’s in the Ravenspell estate.” Because of course it was. I sighed. “Perfect. This couldn’t be easy, could it?”
“No,” he agreed.
“If they’re the ones who have it, why can’t Wren get it herself?”
“Her sisters exiled her so she’s not supposed to be able to get into town.
Not that she’s letting that stop her. I don’t think her sisters know she’s figured a way out.
But she did say if she broke into the family estate, they would know immediately.
The blackmailer doesn’t want us tipping them off.
And since I have a more… personal and believable stake in this town, he sent me instead. ”
Okay, I was just gonna move past that. I didn’t love him using me as his cover, but at the end of the day, that was hardly the most upsetting part.
I sighed. “Alright. When is the hand-off?”
“Tomorrow night,” he said.
My stomach dropped. So soon. That didn’t leave much time at all.
“I know,” he said, obviously scenting my sudden spike of anxiety. “But I’ve already scoped the estate and have memorized the lay of the land. Tomorrow after sunset, I’ll break in, steal the artifact, and complete the job quicker than the Ravenspells can say ‘Abracadabra.’”
“They don’t say that,” I stated.
“I know.” He quietly chuckled. “I was trying to break the tension.”
“Mm,” I muttered, so not in the mood for humor right now.
Calder was good at his job, I knew that better than most considering I’d once gone on a few adventures with him.
But this wasn’t some dusty ruin in the middle of nowhere or a forgotten crypt no one had touched in centuries. This was the Ravenspell estate.
And whatever insider knowledge Wren had fed him was thirty years old, minimum. Calder’s own understanding of the property wasn’t exactly current either. The witches had never been the type to leave their defenses stagnant. If anything, the wards were probably nastier now than they’d ever been.
“So, let me get this straight,” I said. “You want to rob the witches who protect this town… to stop their sister from destroying it?”
“Yes,” he said, his voice hardening. “I don’t care if I have to burn a bridge or steal from a friend. I am getting that artifact, Thorne. Because the alternative is watching the government drag you and your brothers out of your beds.”
He meant it. He absolutely meant it. He was sitting there, dead serious, prepared to break into the Ravenspell estate, steal from one of the founding families, and likely get himself killed, all based on outdated information and sheer stubbornness.
And the worst part? It never would’ve spiraled this far if he’d just come to me in the first place—or asked for help the second he got back to town.
I might not have helped him, but I sure as hell would’ve told him how catastrophically stupid this plan was before he decided to throw himself headfirst at the Ravenspells alone.
“You absolute moron,” I breathed.
He went very still. “I know you’re angry—”
“Oh, I’m furious,” I snapped. “Insulted, even.”
He blinked, clearly confused by the pivot. “Insulted?”
“Yes, insulted.” I closed the distance between us, stepped between his thighs, and jabbed a finger against his chest. My finger hit solid muscle, but he stared at my finger like I’d stabbed him.
“You come waltzing back into town with an exiled witch and a killer bear shifter on your heels, planning to heist a legendary fae artifact from the most powerful family on the continent, and your plan is what? To do it alone?”
“I work better alone,” he said stiffly.
“Bullshit,” I countered. “You work better with me. We were a team, Calder! We were the best trackers the world had ever seen. You have the nose, I have the instincts. You have the muscle, I have the charm and the lock-picking set.”
“Thorne—”
“If you fail, my brothers die. If you fail, I die. Do you really think I’m going to sit on the sidelines and knit while you play Mission Impossible with my life?”
Standing this close to him—feeling the heat radiating off his chest, the press of his thighs tight against mine—was doing unspeakable things to my insides. Things I definitely wasn’t in the mood to acknowledge right now.
“You want to save me?” I asked, my voice dropping to a breathy whisper. “Fine. But you aren’t doing this alone.”
I squared my shoulders, locking my eyes with his to make sure he understood exactly who he was dealing with.
“I’m going to help you.”