13 #2
Especially those of us who have our eye on priestesshood.
What good would it do us not to be where everything happens?
Where witches compete in their classes and for their mentors, always trying to make a name for themselves and catch the High Priestess’ eye for outstanding talent.
Leaving would mean sacrificing being seen, losing what little power and influence we have.
So we stay in that pressure cooker.
Day in, day out, always striving, always with one eye open and never trusting our sister witches fully.
All that pressure only gets worse once an Ascension candidate is chosen.
It’s a precarious time for a witch. Open council spots only come around every few years, and Ascension only happens on Samhain. Though Esme’s made it clear it’s my name she’ll be calling to come to the dais and take my place next to her and the others, that could always change.
Now it seems more likely to change than not.
Why would she give her only council spot to a witch who’s shown she can’t handle her shit?
Sure, I could give up this whole excursion, get someone to take me back to the Veil, slink into the coven hall and pretend nothing happened, but I’ve got the feeling the damage is already done.
Besides, I don’t want to go back.
Not yet.
Despite what this trip is doing to my innate need for routine and predictability, going back and facing everything still sounds infinitely worse.
None of the options are good.
And that was even before… Finn.
Like I’ve summoned him with my thoughts, he appears in the tent’s doorway a few minutes later.
I sense him even before that, though.
The same pull under my breastbone, the tingle of magick against my skin. A warmth growing stronger the closer he gets.
“Hello,” he says softly, waiting just on the other side of the door. “Is it alright if I come in?”
I look back over my shoulder and nod, taking care of the bottles of solvent I was working on before turning slowly to face him.
In his hand, my canteen.
It’s the third time he’s refilled it since we got here.
He’s doing it in such a sneaky way, I haven’t had a chance to tell him I’m alright, that I don’t need to be coddled.
One moment I’ll take a drink, set the canteen down and go back to my work, and the next I turn around and it’s disappeared, only to show back up in Finn’s helpful hand a few minutes later.
It’s a kind gesture, it really is, but having him be so nice to me just makes me feel even worse.
He hands it over. “Are you feeling—”
“Fine. I’m feeling fine.”
It comes out more clipped and annoyed than I intended, and the way his face falls makes my stomach twist painfully.
It makes me feel like the unfriendly, standoffish witch I’ve been accused of being around the coven hall more than a few times over the years.
Not to my face, of course, but I’ve heard the whispers.
Usually I don’t care. It’s never been my priority to make people like me—they either will, or they won’t, and I don’t twist myself up in knots about it either way—but something about the hurt Finn immediately hides under another bright smile makes me wonder if I’m the problem here.
Goddess, he’s at least trying, isn’t he?
I bet if he was given the choice, he wouldn’t have ended up with a mate as unsuited to him as I am.
He’d probably like someone lighthearted, effervescent, with the same devil-may-care energy he has. Well. At least that he seems to have, or would have, if I wasn’t out here making his life miserable.
In any case, he’d probably like someone else.
Not a surly, unpleasant witch with a perpetually bad attitude who doesn’t know how to accept kindness or help in any form.
I press a hand to my forehead, trying to rub away the budding ache there. “I’m sorry.”
He immediately shakes his head. “No. Don’t apologize, I know I’m hovering.”
“You are, a little,” I say, and surprisingly, he laughs instead of getting offended.
“Fair enough,” he says, then takes a step back toward the tent’s entrance. “I’ll get out of your hair then.”
“You—” He turns back around, just as surprised as I am that I said anything at all to stop him from going. “—don’t have to.”
He looks genuinely surprised. “Really?”
“Really.” I let out a breath. “Unless you want to.”
“If I don’t want to?”
I nod toward a wooden stool at the side of the tent. “Then you can sit there and stay out of my way while I work.”
Again, Finn surprises me. He grins, which isn’t the response I’d anticipated, but this demon is determined to subvert my expectations.
He dutifully takes his seat, and I make myself turn back to my tasks.
Only, having him this close is… distracting. Not because he’s doing anything but sitting there just like I told him to, but because this close to him it’s impossible to ignore the magick pulsing between us.
It’s so distracting I have to say something.
There’s no way he’s not feeling it too.
“Is it…” I begin, trying to find the words. “Just because of the bond? Is that why you want to be here? Are you… I mean, if it wasn’t like this, I can’t imagine you would be—”
“Trying to find any excuse I could to talk to the beautiful witch Vayla brought along on this trip?”
Color climbs my cheeks.
“Because I assure you, I would absolutely be trying to do that.”
“Oh, is that so?” I arch a brow at him.
“Yes, it is so.” He grins, a little challenging this time. His shoulders straighten and his wings flare slightly behind him.
Confidence looks good on Finn.
Correction. Cockiness looks good on Finn. And he wears it so easily I can’t imagine it’s a rare look for him.
“And you think I’d give you a chance?”
That roguish grin of his widens. “Yes, I think you would.”
“So sure of yourself,” I murmur, shaking my head as I go back to unpacking.
“I’d like to think I am,” he shoots right back. “And useful, too. If there’s anything I can do to make your chores go faster.”
He comes to stand beside me, hovering there like he’s waiting for an order. I hand him one of the scrolls and point to an open corner of table.
“You can pile these up there.”
Finn does so without question, and between the two of us, we make quick work of unpacking the pile of trunks.
When we’re finished, he leans back against the table and crosses his arms over his chest. He gives me a long, lazy look, still so goddessdamned cocky it should give me the ick immediately.
But it… doesn’t. And that’s a problem.