Our Covenant
PROLOGUE
Legacy Manor
Five Years Earlier
Alric
Their failure is predestined by my own hand in collaboration with the old gods that have chosen me as their champion. For the dog I have in this race will solidify my ascension out of mockery and into my destined power.
Our high council is in an uproar over the decline of magical potency yielded from previous legacy cycles.
Each harvest ritual they performed before the birth of the newest incidental champions was weak and only barely got us through that interlude.
It’s no secret that there has been a rapid decline, but a scant few have gone up against those who do not feel a change is needed.
Mariana Nurse, our coven’s matriarch and highest priestess, will be overseeing the new legacies’ first harvest ritual down in the most holy and protected space.
Those preparations started long before this evening’s social events, and the pinnacle will commence soon.
The moon has been drifting across the floor-to-ceiling windows of the first-floor drawing room all evening, and the hours have grown heavy with expectation.
As I creep along the gaudy floral wallpaper, the women of our coven do what they do best: gossip.
Busybodies congregate in large packs, leaving the men on the outskirts to “talk shop” and silently scrutinize the outgoing legacies, as it has been for as long as I remember. Tonight, the chatter is as hot as these last weeks of September.
I smirk, hearing three men whispering to one another. “The Proctor boy better live up to his grandfather,” says Damian Howe, who hopes his daughter will be considered by one of the new legacies as a wife in the coming years.
Edmund Morey raises his chin, elevating himself above his two companions.
“It may be our last moon as the reigning legacies, but I’d hope you’d respect James Proctor enough to wait until after he officially steps down from his throne to besmirch his name.
” His and James Proctor’s sons are two of the men being anointed in oil and prayed over currently.
Edmund is waiting to be summoned with his wife to prepare for their part in the ceremony.
But until then, he must suffer through the endless chatter from those who envy what they could never comprehend.
“That’s not what I meant.” Damian holds his hands out in front of him. “I only meant that he’s lucky his mother’s . . . inabilities didn’t become his own.”
Edmund cuts Damian a sharp glare, but it’s Clayton Elwell that interjects with a vicious smile, “And how is your son’s ability coming along? He’s about to turn fourteen, isn’t he? And with no sign of the blessings of his mother’s line. Won’t that be a shame.”
Damian’s face flares with embarrassment and anger.
I can practically see him biting back his vitriol.
While Clayton’s cutting remark landed the way he’d intended, he is not one to be dishing out parenting advice.
It’s long been known that Victoria looked the other way while Clayton assisted Maddox in discovering his impressive abilities with brutal force.
It’s the reason Damian thinks he has the luxury of a loose tongue in present company.
Clayton is insinuating that Elenor didn’t choose the right man to procreate with and that fact is being proven through their inept son.
But all three men have now crossed lines that would, on any other occasion, be an invitation to spill blood.
“There’s nothing wrong with blooming late. It seems to be the trend these days. We choose to nurture our children so they may come into their full power without later consequences,” Damian counters, letting the accusation in his tone hold more weight than his words.
The young Elwell only returned from a dramatic stint in a treatment facility three days ago. The boy’s delicate mental stability has been in question as his induction has drawn closer. Even in the last hours, the unease is palpable. While Maddox’s influence over nature is vast, heavy is the crown.
“I assume Tiffany will have set her sights on a Bishop?” Edmund finally finds his spite.
Damian’s daughter will have wide prospects within the coven for marriage, including a running at one of the new reigning legacies. After insulting three out of four of the families in one swift conversation, it’s clear that the Howes will be looking for a Bishop line alliance.
“They’ve been friendly for years. If that is where love blooms and, gods willing, a strong legacy heir comes to be, then who are we to speculate?” Damian’s agitation is masked as optimism, but he’s fooling no one.
The fact of the matter is, if Theo doesn’t receive blessings from our ancestors, he won’t be considered to marry within the higher-ranking families of the coven. Meaning, Tiffany is the Howes’ last chance to contribute their line to the next cycle of legacies.
“Gods willing.” I step into their circle, unannounced and unwanted as always. “Gentleman,” I greet them.
“They’re still allowing you to slither around, Alric?” Edmund quips over the lip of his whiskey glass.
Clayton huffs a laugh and adds, “A caged snake is still a snake.”
My confinement to the coven has been seen as a mockery for generations. But theirs is the last to laugh without consequences. While the rest of the coven has been looking forward to this night for almost two decades, the new surge of magic harvested will only be a drop in my metaphorical bucket.
“Weren’t you gallivanting around Switzerland or Sweden?” Edmund teases. “Must be nice to fuck off for a decade with no responsibilities on the coven’s dime.”
Edmund Morey is no less the immature frat boy than before I shrouded my existence. I stayed gone long enough to be forgotten by staff and pupils, but my reputation amongst the coven remains ominous. A relic not treasured or coveted, but feared and craved.
“My term of isolation has ended.” I smile wide at their disappointment. “I will be taking up my position at the university this semester and very much look forward to having the new class of legacies in attendance.”
Clayton scoffs, “You won’t be collecting the Proctor kid. He was shipped off to MIT last fall. James never was one for tradition.”
The three men laugh, their united front against Damian shifting with a new threat in their midst. Damian relishes the change and his mood lightens. “You’ll have to torment him outside of term papers and impossible exams.”
“So impossible that every member of the coven who has taken my class has passed, save for one?” I smirk and greedily bask in his shame.
Edmund and Clayton erupt with haughty laughter until Damian tilts his nose to the high ceiling and walks off the injury to his ego.
“Callous bastard,” Clayton says. “Isn’t he your half cousin, three times removed or something, Alric? Shouldn’t piss off the family you have left. You never know when Mariana will get sick of you darkening the coven’s doorway.”
“As if Mariana gives him a second thought,” Edmund rebuffs.
The muscle in my cheek twitches, and both men should thank whatever ancestor is watching over them. While the rest of the coven has been using their magic stores, my wealth overflows silently.
Victoria Elwell approaches, her ceremonial robe cinching her full waist and clinging to the sweat-damp skin it’s hiding. “Clayton, it’s time.” After she passes along her message, both men follow her away without glancing back.
Edmund and Clayton have always been close, long before they took up the mantel of legacy.
I sat by and watched as they grew from infants to boys, all the while being predicted to be the most powerful cycle of legacies the coven has seen in hundreds of years.
But, it has become popular over the last century for duties to be performed as quickly as possible to mask that the curse looming over us still holds.
It was Maxwell Bishop who produced the first heir only two years after being received in the very same ceremony his son is leading in the basement of the legacy manor.
Hawthorne Bishop, my “nephew”—an insignificant title to keep me docile and human, though our blood is thin—will be the first to be crowned with a wreath of iris and bay.
A symbol of the coven’s loyalty, devotion, and protection to and of the next generation of legacies.
He’ll then be welcomed into the blessing circle to receive the honor that was stripped from me so many years ago.
Hawthorne will lead the sons of Emilie Morey, Victoria Elwell, and the late Anita Proctor as the reigning legacies.
Their sole purpose will be to serve their sacrifices, appease the old gods, honor our ancestors, and replenish the magical stores of the coven before they are inevitably rushed into unfit marriages and must live out the rest of their lives in misery, all for the cycle to continue.
How lucky for them that I have much more disastrous plans that will relieve them of their duties.