Chapter 12
CHAPTER TWELVE
The front entryway of Hallowind House materializes around us, the familiar smell of old wood and fresh baking settling over me like a comfy sweater on a cold day.
Outside, beyond the front porch steps, another layer of snow has fallen, and it is, indeed, a cold day. The late afternoon light falls sideways through the windows, long and golden across the floorboards.
Man, it’s good to be home.
Garrison steps back from our group with the practiced grace of someone who has teleported across continents so many times it has become entirely unremarkable.
I give Wylder a squeeze. “Asher will take you straight up to my bed. I’ll bring a tray up in a few minutes and we’ll snuggle in.”
“No rush. I’m fine. Really.”
He’s not. The weariness in him is visible in the dark circles under his eyes and the careful way he’s holding himself. “Well, you will be after a few days of Hallowind TLC.”
Asher teleports Wylder upstairs, and Orion and Rowan take the bags into the living room. That leaves me alone with Garrison. "Thanks for the transport. And for everything you did for us in Ireland."
He looks at me, his gaze steady. “I’m only sorry it turned out the way it did.”
“Yeah, me too. Henrik was a good guy.”
Garrison nods. “His family deserves to hear what happened, and how he died with honor. I'll see to it personally."
The words are simple, but the weight behind them is enormous. “Thank you.”
He inclines his head once, and then he's gone.
I take off my boots, hang up my coat, and head into the kitchen. Asher is there with Rowan and Orion. When I come in, Asher gives me a hug. “I’m heading over to the apothecary to pick up the puppers. Izzy took them to work today.”
I hug him a little tighter than usual, then ease back. “Pick up burgers and pie at the diner, will you? I think we deserve a little comfort food tonight.”
He kisses the top of my head. “You got it. Love you.”
“Love you, too. And drive carefully out there.”
Orion gives me a hug. “I’ve got him, Pops. We’ll be back soon.”
I pass Rowan sitting on the island and grab the kettle off the counter to fill. “I’m making some hot chocolate and Baileys. Do you want some?”
“No, I’m good. I’m going to put my headphones on and binge Ted Lasso for a dose of feel-good fiction. I’ll catch up with you guys later.”
“Okay. Speak up if you need anything.”
Rowan heads out of the kitchen, the stairs creaking as she climbs to the second floor.
I set the kettle onto its base and click the button to turn it on. “We’re home earlier than we expected, House. A new friend was killed in a battle this morning.”
A vase of poppies, lilies, and violets appear on the island. While I wait for the kettle to boil, I take a moment to close my eyes and smell them. “Thanks, that helps.”
With two mugs of chocolatey bliss set up on the tray, I add a plate of fresh cinnamon rolls, and retreat to my bedroom.
Wylder looks good lying in my bed, even though I’d much rather he be there for a dozen other reasons than needing to recuperate from a lashing wound to his soul.
“How are you feeling?”
"I'm fine, babe, honestly." He says it without hesitation. “I agreed to the Poppy Nightingale treatment more for you than me. I’m okay.”
I smile at the Poppy Nightingale comment and hand him the tray. “I don’t suppose booze and baked goods are the recommended treatment the healers would prescribe.”
"But when have you ever done things the way other people expect?”
I shuck my jeans down my thighs, let them drop to the floor, and climb in under the comforter. Then I snuggle in next to him and claim my mug. “I want to shut the world out for an hour, then I’ll be a grown-up again.”
“That’s fair. And hey, I’m not complaining, but if you want me to clear out so you can get things done, I’ll be fine at home.”
“No. I don’t want that. Too many of the people I love and worry about are gone. Having you here, in my house and in my bed, is exactly what I need to keep from losing my mind.”
He lifts his cinnamon roll and takes a bite. “Well, I can suffer through it, for you.”
I chuckle and join him. “Thank you for your sacrifice.”
"Who's up for a trip to Arcana?" I pop the last bite of my onion ring into my mouth and check in with the group around the table. Before Wylder answers, I hold up a finger and peg him with a look. “You’re not invited.”
He arches a brow. “Poppy Nightingale is very bossy.”
I grin. “If you’re a good boy, I’ll show you just how attentive I can be to my patient’s needs when I get back.”
Orion laughs. “Take the deal, man.”
Wylder chuckles. “Like I’m going to say no to that?”
Rowan shakes her head. "I love you and I would die for you, Poppy, but I’m going back upstairs to get horizontal and continue my feel-good-a-thon. As Dani Rojas says, ‘Fútbol is life!’"
She slots her dirty plate into the dishwasher and heads for the stairs.
Orion pushes himself back from the table and cleans up his place. “I wish I could, Pops, but the Carmichael clan has been invited to another alpha’s territory. It’s a whole honor thing. I gotta go.”
“No problem. That means my bestie is otherwise unengaged?”
Asher smiles at me, bright-eyed in the way that suggests he runs on some internal energy source completely unrelated to what’s happening in the world around him. "I'm in. Obviously."
"Excellent. I need to ask a teleportation favor."
He chuckles. “Just what every man yearns to hear from his girl.”
I laugh despite myself. "Don't make it weird."
"Poppy. I am a gay guardian angel with teleportation powers dating a hot male witch who turns into a white tiger. I was born to make it weird." He spreads his hands. "What do you need?"
"The Concordance mirror in the upstairs hall. I want to take it to Mica in the forge building. Can you teleport it to the standing stones so we can take it with us?"
He pauses. "Are you sure? The last time we talked about it, you were still on the fence about the whole thing."
I consider it for another second, just to check if my instincts want to weigh in.
They don’t. "I don't fully trust Briar's reasons for wanting the students to use it, but I trust Mica.
If it's in the forge building, it's protected, and if anyone tries to take it, they'll have to get through Mica, a supernatural forge, and a very salty cat. "
"All valid points." He nods slowly. "All right. If you’re sure."
“I am. Teleport us back to my room. We’ll drop off our patient, then we’ll collect the mirror, and go spend a couple of hours with my sisters.”
“Gotta love a woman with a plan.”
The Concordance Mirror has hung in the upstairs hallway for my entire life. It’s between the main bathroom and the bedroom doors, and is likely the oldest of my family’s magical objects—well, maybe other than Hallowind House itself.
Full length, and with a heavily carved frame, it hums faintly with something that isn't quite sound.
I stand in front of it, and my reflection looks back at me. And then, a half-second later than it should, it finishes the movement.
I've stopped counting how many times I've stood here hoping it will just be normal. That I'll lift my hand, and the reflection will lift hers, and it'll be clean and instantaneous, and I can stop wondering what it means that I’m out of sync.
I sigh. "I wish I knew what was wrong with me."
Asher steps up beside me, wraps both of his arms around me from behind, and rests his chin on top of my head. “There’s nothing wrong with you. Maybe you're just so incredibly special and amazing that your reflection literally cannot keep up."
I snort. "That's not how it works."
"Are you sure?" He tilts his head at our reflection, and his movements are perfectly crisp. "Because I feel like you don't know everything there is to know about magical artifacts."
"That's—" I pause. "That's actually true. Point to you."
"Thank you for recognizing my superior intellect." He steps back and claps both hands together. "And on that note, let's do this."
He places one hand flat on the mirror's frame. He puts the other on my shoulder.
“Wait. Doesn’t your superior intellect think we should put on our boots and coats before we portal to the standing stones and then on to Arcana?”
He busts out in a hilarious smile. “Well played, P. Well played.”
We portal to the Arcana Academy a few minutes later. There’s a soft crack of displaced air as we take form along the treeline, the mirror perfectly upright between us.
Asher still has one hand on my shoulder and one holding the mirror's frame. He takes a breath, lets it out, and we portal again.
We appear in front of the stone castle that houses the Cinderheart Crucible. Then he steps back, tilts his chin up, and gives himself an impressed nod. "Mission complete.”
I chuckle. “Making these little hops is how you got back to me in the cave this morning, right?”
“Yeah. It costs less energy but takes a bit more focus because I have to be precise about where I want to end up.”
“No drifting. I remember.”
"Maybe you could tell Tanner how amazing I’ve been doing the next time I have a lesson?”
I avoid the grotesque door knocker and rap my knuckles on the wooden panel. “I’ll be sure to sing your praises.”
“Thank you.”
Mica opens the door, sees us, and steps back. “You can put it in here.”
The front room of the forge building is cool and quiet, completely different from the heat and noise of the inner chamber. Asher hooks the mirror onto the far wall where it catches no direct light and isn’t visible from the doorway or the windows.
“So this is your precious enchanted mirror, is it?” Brimstone asks, waddling his furry gray butt into the room.
“Yep. Thank you for allowing me to store it here. As mirrors go, it’s a big deal.”
“I’ll take your word for it.”
Mica shrugs. “There’s no accounting for taste.”
Fair enough. I stand there for a second longer than necessary, then give up on waiting for my reflection to sync.
"How'd Ireland go?"
I lean against the wall beside the door, and tell her everything in one long stream-of-consciousness info dump: Freya and her family records, Cormac resenting us being there, the tunnels, the traps, Wylder taking the hit and going down hard, my vision of The Nine, how the lockstones might be repairable, Henrik touching the wall, and the spirits taking him down.
When I finish, Mica is staring at me. "I'm sorry. P. That’s a lot.”
I look at my hands. "It was. I only knew Henrik for half a day, but he was easy to like."
She looks from me to Asher, and back again. "Are you two doing okay?"
I don’t even know how to answer that. “I’ll be better when the Order healers figure out the damage done to Wylder’s soul. You should see him. He’s putting up a brave front, but he’s seriously hurting.”
She tilts her head. "So why are you here instead of hanging out at home, pampering him?"
"Because the rescued witches need the Concordance mirror. I couldn’t help Henrik or even Wylder, but maybe I can help them.”
Something shifts in her expression. Not surprise exactly, more like she's recalibrating. “Well, I’ll do everything in my power to keep it safe. No one will get in here without our approval, and anyone who thinks to take it for themselves will have a very bad day."
"That's exactly what I hoped you’d say." She glances past me to where Asher is hovering in the doorway. "Are you good, angel man?"
"Outstanding." Asher props up both thumbs. "Just here for emotional support."
I turn back to Mica. "So, in all your research into empowered objects, old crafts, and ancient myths, did you ever come across anything about lockstones or repairing lockstones?"
She pulls a slow breath through her teeth and crosses her arms. "Sadly, no. But my research focused on finding the forge and dealt specifically with spells and enchantments that affect metal. A stone witch would be a better bet than me."
I hadn't thought of that. "That's a good point."
"They're not common, but they exist. Based on what you said about the runes carved into the circle of the cave, if any affinity was used in the original construction, it was probably a stone witch."
"I'll look into it." I push off the wall. "And thanks again for babysitting my mirror. I’m hoping Briar will respect how busy you are…”
Panicked voices outside accompany a bolt of lightning striking less than fifty feet from the building. The crack of thunder is so loud, I curl forward and duck.
Mica is already moving.
Asher and I race after her, following her out the front door to stare at the academy courtyard in the distance.
The sky above Arcana is wrong.
Storm clouds are rolling in from nowhere, darkening the sky directly over the academy building. Lightning flashes through the dense clouds, and even before it dissipates, another bolt starts.
“It’s just over the academy.” I point to where the rest of the city sits in ordinary afternoon sunlight. The line where the storm stops is razor sharp.
"That's not normal," Asher says.
“We should probably go see if we can help.”
Mica nods. “I knew you were going to say that.”
We run, and we barely make it a hundred feet when wind hits us like a wall.
I throw my shield up, and that cuts down on the noise, but the electrical charge in the air is still making the hair on my arms stand on end.
When we round the corner of the academy building, we can see a crowd of students in the courtyard. There looks to be maybe fifteen students clustered together, having some kind of altercation.
The thunder is constant now, a low continuous roll that I feel in my sternum more than hear. Lightning splits the darkness overhead, and in the white flash I see the descending silhouette.
The Arcana guardian.
It sweeps low over the group, and students scatter, screaming. It circles, talons outstretched, those massive wings catching the turbulent air.
"Get back!" I shout, breaking into a sprint. "Everyone get inside!"
It dives, and those talons close around someone at the edge of the group. The guardian hauls the student upward, its massive wings driving hard against the storm wind, climbing fast.
The student flails against the hold, screaming.
I know exactly how it feels to be that girl. I freaking was that girl a few months ago when the guardian attacked me.
The giant bird flies overhead, and I hear the girl’s cries for help. Hearing her voice sends a chill down the length of my spine. Then I see the dark brown hair whipping in the gale.
"Violet!”
My heart stops beating, and then kicks into high-gear, pounding at triple time.
The guardian clears the roofline and keeps going, its wings beating hard as it disappears into the churning dark above.
Violet's screams are swallowed by the thunder. The storm clouds move with them. The lightning follows. The wind follows.
In another thirty seconds, the sky above Arcana is clear again, the storm and my sister both gone.
I stand in the middle of the courtyard with the last of the wind dying around me, and I can’t hear anything except the blood rushing in my ears.