22. Sacrifice
SACRIFICE
mother? can we visit the magic lady and gus’s wolf friend?
they need us.
— gus
Something is wrong with Delilah.
I know it the moment I see her. It might be the way she keeps wringing her hands together, or how her usual bright smile looks like she had to remind herself to put it on before she approached us.
Even the soft orange magic that normally clings to the chipper yet professional illusion witch seems subdued today.
Then again, I think it’s because she’s not as comfortable around Riordan as she was the last time we met…
A surge of jealousy rushed through me as I remember how he charmed her while sitting inside the coven house and how she seemed to enjoy the younger male’s attention.
I understand now that he already considered me his mate—he did from the moment he got over himself and came back to Moonburrow—but he’s also been in law enforcement for more than a decade.
To most of the supernatural town, Riordan is the ‘good cop’ to the Alpha’s ‘bad cop’, and he played that role perfectly when trying to get intel out of Delilah.
On the plus side, Delilah’s not flirting with my mate.
Could be she’s heard that Riordan and I have made it official at last. For her to know to find me here so soon after our mating, odds are she stopped by Dough You Believe in Magic and Honey told her where to find me.
Add that to how it seems like everyone in Moonburrow knew that I was Riordan’s fated mate before I did and I’d bet she has some clue.
Then Delilah speaks up against and she confirms that she’s well aware of who I am to Riordan.
“If you wouldn’t mind, Beta, I would like to speak to your… wife?”
“Mate,” says Riordan flatly.
“Ah, Yes. Sorry. It isn’t often that a witch finds herself in a supernatural coupling—”
“Penelope did. And it’s pretty new for her. For us,” Riordan adds. “So while I appreciate you need her for something, I have to ask if it’s urgent. Because we really were in the middle of something and I’d like to get back to it.”
“I understand. But, yes, it is important.” Her pretty brown eyes dart back to me.
“It’s coven business, Penelope. Witch business.
I tried to get in touch with Serena, but she’s unreachable.
You’re the only one from the national coven I can talk to…
it has to be you. I’ll only need a few minutes of your time, but I’d like to speak to you in privacy. ”
“No.”
I lay my hand on Riordan’s arm. “It’s okay,” I tell him before I address Delilah.
“Serena is a very busy witch. I barely can get in touch with her half the time. But when I’m traveling, I can act as one of her representatives.
” Something she knows very well because I made a point to tell Delilah that when I first arrived and was staying at the coven house…
“Of course we can talk. Riordan? Why don’t you wait for me inside? ”
His jaw goes tight. “I’ll stay right here.”
Of course. Welp, that’s what I get for mating an overprotective alpha wolf shifter…
“That’s fine. But I’m going to take a walk with Delilah.” And go just far enough that the witch believes we’re out of shot of my mate and his impressive shifter hearing. “I’m trusting you to stay on the porch. And you’re trusting that I’ll be right back.”
I catch a hint of the scowl before he hides it.
Yeah. I know. I brought trust into it, but I meant it.
He can protect me from any predators and witch killers, but this is Delilah.
She’s a sister witch and the head of her coven.
More importantly, something is wrong and I’d only disappoint Serena if I refused to listen to a witch because I would rather go to bed with my mate.
Finally, he nods. “Don’t go far.”
I rise up on my tiptoes. “I won’t.”
Just far enough.
As though she doesn’t want to test Riordan’s patience, we only walk for a couple of minutes before she stops.
Taking the lead, Delilah led me down a path away from Riordan’s cabin, going until all of the spattering of cabins in that area of the woods were hidden behind even more trees.
I can’t tell if that’s enough distance so that she has the privacy she wants, but I get the strange vibe that she picked this particular spot on purpose.
That certainty only multiplies when I take another step, trying to match her impressive pace, and something sends a mild jolt all the way through my body. It’s like a static shock on steroids, and I rub the little hairs standing up on my arms as I ask stupidly, “What was that?”
A ward, I realize a moment later. Just like the boundary spell that I drove through the first day I arrived in Moonburrow, only notably weaker. It wasn’t enough to block me. No. It recognized me and let me in, reforming after I stepped past it.
Why? Because Delilah is determined for this chat to stay between us and no one else? If that’s the case, she could’ve gotten in touch with me and invited me to the sanctuary of the coven house instead of having this discussion in the middle of pack territory.
She smiles at me. It’s not a nice smile.
In fact, she’s lost any bit of the nervousness and urgency she had while she was pleading with me to come out here with her.
What the hell is going on?
“Delilah?”
“You wouldn’t begrudge me a little protection, would you?
Especially since we’re on their turf and not mine.
It’s a pity that the magic insists I perform the ceremonies on wild land, but I’ve come this far…
and you don’t want to hear about that. You want to know what I needed to confess to Serena and the national coven. ”
I do, but I’m suddenly also very interested in what she meant by ‘magic’ and ‘ceremonies’ and the way she spat out ‘their turf’ like that…
“Um. Okay. We can start with that. What did you want to tell me?”
And then, to my surprise, she says the one thing I was never expecting:
“Garnet never made it to the other coven.”
“Excuse me?”
“The coven she was supposedly transferring to,” Delilah says helpfully. “She never arrived. Did you know that?”
I shake my head. “No. I didn’t.”
“So you haven’t heard from her in weeks? What about Ashton? Has she contacted either of you? Checked in on her precious books at the library she abandoned so quickly? No?”
Another shake of my head as I wonder where she’s going with this…
“And the book?”
Oh. Shit. That’s where she’s going with this?
I keep my voice as innocent as I can as I ask, “What book?”
Delilah gives me a long look. I don’t think she’s buying my clueless act, and she proves that when she says, “The journal, Penelope.”
How does she know about the journal?
There’s no reason she should know about Garnet’s journal.
Ash didn’t even know it existed when Riordan and I found it mixed in with the books on the floor, and we only told him because I wanted him to know I had it in case Garnet came looking for it.
But Ash is the only one we told, apart from Max.
We definitely didn’t tell Delilah… so how does she know?
“How do you know about Garnet’s journal?” I ask.
“Because she showed it to me.” Delilah pauses.
“At the coven house, when she came and excitedly told me all about her theories of Moonburrow being built on the ruins of Avalon, and how there was a lodestone buried somewhere on shifter land. Unfortunately for me, she didn’t bring the book with her the night we dug up the lodestone together.
” Another more pointed pause. “The night I killed her.”
I… she didn’t just say what I think I heard her say… did she?
“Garnet is dead?”
“Oh, Hecate, yes. Since the evening before ‘she’ left the note at the library, claiming she was moving on to another coven. I did that, of course. When I went to see if I could find the journal, but she must’ve hidden it with more than a spell because I couldn’t locate it with one of my own.”
Delilah’s magic couldn’t find Garnet’s book, but with one powerful spell that knocked every book off of the shelves in the Moonburrow Library, mine did.
Now, I know this isn’t the time to be proud of myself. Delilah just casually confessed to murder, but… at least I have the journal.
But Delilah?
If she really did find and dig up the lodestone before Riordan and I had the chance, she has that.
And I’m trapped inside of a warded circle with her.
How do I know that? Because, when I take a step backward, hoping that I can outrun her magic and get some help, I bump up against the edge and let out a short shriek as the jolt from before returns five-fold. I swear, I smell smoke, as Delilah gives me an impish shrug of her shoulders.
“Sorry about that, Penelope. Now that I have you where I need you, I have to keep you here. And don’t try to call for your wolf. He won’t be able to get to you and he’ll only hurt himself trying. Oh, no. This is between you and me.”
“Me? What did I do? What did Garnet do?”
“Garnet… ah, poor Garnet. It wasn’t intentional, if that’s what you’re thinking.
Me murdering her the way I did. It just happened.
She wanted to take the lodestone and bring it right to Serena and the coven council.
But why should it belong to Salem? No. Avalon was here long before the beasts decided to claim this land and call it Moonburrow.
Now that I have the lodestone, this land will belong to the witches as we rebuild Avalon.
Garnet didn’t agree, and Garnet… she died, and it didn’t even count as one of the sacrifices. ”
I’m sorry, but—
“Sacrifices?”
Delilah huffs. “Don’t tell me that Serena’s precious Penelope doesn’t know how to activate a lodestone? It’s a secret among all coven leaders, but I would’ve thought… a true lodestone will protect the land it’s buried on. But if you activate it? There is no limit to what can be done with this.”