Chapter 5
Iwake up warm and confused. One moment I was fighting the Mindless outside of the academy and now someone is fidgeting with my bracelet…
what happened? I snuggle into the hard warmth resting right next to me, underneath me and at my back, breathing in the familiar scents.
I slowly blink my eyes, looking up at brown locks of soft hair and blue eyes, and my lips spread into the biggest smile.
Black. My mate. He releases the heirloom he gave me and rests his bare hand on my cheek, and I press into the touch, enjoying every moment.
“Black,” I whisper, my throat stinging. There were so many moments I didn’t know if I’d get back to him, to my bonded and my world.
“Juniper.” He whispers my name back, like our names are enough to say everything we need to between us. “Don’t you ever leave me like that again…please.”
My heart hurts at his tone, at the way he says please.
Gods. “I came back. There’s never any world I won’t come back from, and I didn’t want to leave,” I whisper softly.
“I’d never willingly leave any of you. Not this year, not any of the years we have had before. I always came back and I always will.”
“I will always wait,” he breathes against my lips before softly kissing me.
I only realize why he is so gentle with me when another hand touches my anklet, smoothing it out.
I turn my head and see Maz lying at our side, and my heart jumps at the sight of him.
He isn’t wearing a shirt, his glasses are lopsided on his handsome face, and his messy dark hair is drifting over his forehead.
Maz’s blue eyes look even brighter when he catches me staring at him.
“Welcome back, beautiful. How are you feeling? How is your back?”
“Sore,” I admit, finally focusing on the claw-made scratches I can feel dragging down my spine.
This is why I’m lying on Black, so I don’t lie on the injuries.
There is a scent of something herbal in the air, and I can taste a potion in my mouth, which I’m sure is pain relief of some kind. “What happened?”
Maz shares a look with Black, one I can’t read. “It’s complicated here; why don’t we begin with your side of things first?” Maz clears his throat. “Do you want to tell me why you brought the enchantress and two of her bonded back? We saved them because you asked…but why?”
Black growls. “She just woke up from being injured. My mate can rest before she needs to answer anything.” His eyes start scanning the room, searching for something. “She needs more pain relief and—”
“I love her too! I would never—”
“No, it’s okay.” I touch Black’s lips with my finger, and he nips it, making me grin. I turn back to Maz, my eyes softening, and I take his hand, linking our fingers. “I understand why you need to know…your curses. She was made out to be the enemy for everyone, and I would want an explanation too.”
I sit up, and Maz offers me a drink of water.
I sip on it as I tell them everything I’ve learnt, why the spell went wrong, and how the enchantress was trapped in the real world.
It takes a while to explain it all in detail, but eventually they sit in silence, looking shocked.
I continue to sip on my water until it’s gone and wince as I shift back to lean on Black’s shoulder.
He sighs before pressing a kiss to my forehead, still watching the only door to the bedroom we are in.
There is a double bed where we are sitting, a lit fireplace and one cabinet.
The wallpaper has peeled, and there is a distinct smell of damp in the air and a chilly breeze coming from a boarded-up window.
“You can’t trust her. None of us can.” Black speaks first. “She might be your mother, but she is an immortal witch who killed for magic, time, and power. I sympathize with her for losing her mate and baby, but we cannot trust her word.”
“I know that, but I do feel like she is telling the truth. I need you not to trust her, but trust me,” I say, looking at them both. “She’s done nothing but help me get back here.”
“She still cursed us, babe,” Maz reminds me.
“I don’t understand why she would have done that or how. She couldn’t get back here.” I shake my head. “We need to talk to her. All of us together. Where is she?”
“Under observation.” Black strokes my arm. “And you’re not well enough to be walking around yet.”
I shrug. “I’m still going.”
Maz grins at me and shakes his head. “It’s not far; she is in one of the local houses.
But first, you’re going to shower, re-bandage the scratches, and have new medicine applied.
We need to get the blood off you because it’s driving my dragon insane, knowing that you’ve been injured.
There’s something else we have to tell you first. Shower, and then we’ll talk about everything with your mother and her bonded. ”
“Where are—”
“Shower,” Black gently suggests, but there is no missing the firmness in it as he slides his glove back on. Vale and Kane aren’t close, I’d know it. I’d feel it. Anxiety makes me itchy, but I know Maz is right, I need to shower the blood off me and let them take care of me for the moment.
Maz lifts me up into his arms, very careful not to touch my back, and carries me through one of the two doors in the room.
The bathroom isn’t much; most of it is taken up by a clean-looking, old?fashioned shower with a tub at the bottom.
Maz helps me strip out of my bloodied clothes until I’m just in my underwear, before he carefully deposits me into the tub before running the tap to get the temperature right.
Minnie peeks her eye out from around the shower curtain before scurrying away.
Black leans against the wall, a thick towel in his hand. “So, your little pet friend turned out to be far more than a pet.”
“I know. It’s weird that she came to me, and the watch too.
It was given to me by the small creatures.
I think they see more and they want change,” I admit, knowing I might sound crazy to anyone else.
Witches were taught that small creatures are pests, but I never once believed that.
“They want to help us. Between them and the tarot cards, we have all three of the goddesses’ weapons.
They were my mother’s, and they belong to my family. They found me for a reason.”
“The broken watch is in Bloodstone Academy. Neither of us got it out in time,” Maz explains, grabbing the showerhead and beginning to wash the blood from me until the water is pink.
“None of us realized what it was.” I shrug. “It should be safe until we get back.” I wince at my injury as Maz softly runs the shower down my back.
“The worst of the cuts are sealed up with a few stitches, but they are deep enough to scar. We will apply ointment and re-bandage them after this. Tell me if it hurts too much.” Maz soothes as he looks after me.
“There are healers here,” Black continues on as I nod once, focusing on him. The pain isn’t too much, but I feel dizzy.
“Where is here?” I ask as Maz pours shampoo and conditioner through the messy waves of my hair, and I try to relax.
“We took all the shifters we could from outside Bloodstone, but we suffered heavy losses that night.” I can hear the sorrow in his voice as my heart cracks.
Every single shifter is family, and to lose even one person is too much for them.
“Everyone who could fly on their own just flew with us, carrying their young. Anyone else, we carried or swam through the seas on the backs of some of the water shifters. We had made rafts, but it was a mess. The Mindless tore through everything like a wave, and for every life we saved, one was lost. Granny Dubois is with the young who lost their parents and she will make them feel as safe as possible. I’m so glad we didn’t lose her that night. ”
I feel like saying I’m sorry doesn’t even begin to cut it.
I knew it had to be bad, but it sounds like the Umbral Authority were just planning to kill all the shifters and be done with it.
Black’s voice lacks emotion, but I feel his grief underneath.
“Getting the children out was a priority for all of us, and that’s what we did best. We got them here.
This camp is guarded against the Mindless, high up in the mountains, and is ruled by shifters who hid away.
” That’s why it’s cold. “It’s an abandoned town and the Umbral Authority never looked twice at it until now.
Every adult shifter knows of this place, to come here if everything goes wrong.
We have patrols set up and we are trying our best with the limited fighting-age shifters we have left. Which isn’t much.”
“They are all looking at the two dragons left to save them, but fuck knows how we are meant to do that,” Maz softly grumbles.
“I’m sorry.” I whisper the words, despite how pointless they feel. Our plan went to shit and people died because of it. I look down at the water, seeing my blood still mixed in. “They died because my spell didn’t work and I was blindsided.”
“Hey, no, don’t do that to yourself.” Maz turns my chin so I’m looking right into his pretty eyes.
“They died because of the Mindless and the Umbral Authority’s orders.
You are one of the very few witches who tried to help shifters, to buy us some freedom and fight on our side.
There were many parents who would have died—did die—to make sure their children got out of Bloodstone Academy, and you gave them that chance.
Until you, there was no chance for freedom for any generations, and yes, it did go wrong, but we have not lost everything yet. ”