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“Rowan?” I croaked, wondering if I was losing my mind.
But his face softened, and he hurried over to me, pulling me into a hug. Immediately surrounded by the essence of him, there was no fighting as the happy tears gathered in my eyes.
“Willow,” he murmured, sounding just as moved as I was. His arms wrapped tightly around me, sheltering me from the pain and deeply rooted sadness. “I’m sorry I took so long.”
While I was so consumed by the joy of seeing him again, the reality settled back into place, and I pulled back enough to look up at him.
“How are you here? I’m glad you are, but you could’ve been caught,” I said, feeling so many different things at once.
Rowan chuckled and pushed some of my hair from my face. “I found a path straight here that avoided town. Besides, since everyone has lost their heightened senses, I figured they wouldn’t smell me here anyway.”
It was clever, but it was still dangerous.
Cupping my cheek with one hand while the other stroked my hair lovingly, Rowan’s expression turned more serious. Genuine, and full of warmth. “I had to see you again, and I needed to know you were all right. I don’t imagine it’s been easy here.”
“It’s been awful,” I admitted, willing myself to keep the tears back. My head already ached from the emotions earlier, and I didn’t want to lose myself in them again. “But I’m so glad you’re here.”
Diving back into his arms again, I was encompassed by his smell and warmth as he hugged me back and rested his chin against the top of my head.
We stayed like that for some time, basking in how amazing it was to see him again, until we migrated to the couch and wrapped ourselves in a blanket.
I urged myself to soak it in while I had the chance, but that lingering reminder that we needed to make things better seemed to hang over my head.
We couldn’t sneak around forever, and I needed Rowan back in my life for good.
Chapter 26 - Willow
It had been three weeks since Keres took the shifters’ powers, and I had enough of it.
From missing Rowan to fearing the unknown, and feeling that inescapable dread around town, I was sick of how things had been.
As far as I knew, Kai and the others made no move to fix things. They didn’t know how, or even where to begin. Soren’s search for answers ran cold, seeing as he didn’t have much information on demons and their powers.
I was tired of having to sneak the father of my child inside without anyone noticing he was there, and I wanted to get to the bottom of it. I needed to, for everyone’s sake.
While Kai made it sound like he would take care of it despite having no leads, it hit me that there was a group in town that had access to more occult trades and secrets that the others didn’t dare meddle with.
The coven. We were witches, after all, and I knew we’d have some sort of tool at our disposal to help us out.
In fact, our coven had a stash of old tomes and helpful handbooks that only needed to be found.
Sifting through our collection in the stone building we used to gather and perform rituals, I stumbled upon one resource that stood out to me the most. One on demons and other underworldly creatures. It was as good of a place to start as ever.
By the time I managed to skim through it to find some helpful sections, I knew what needed to be done.
With a note scrawled across a charmed piece of old parchment, I breathed in and watched as it split into several copies until I had enough to send to my coven sisters. Focusing my energy, I established my intentions and sent them out for each one of them to receive.
At once, the small notes flew out the window and fluttered through the air to their rightful recipients.
Standing there on my own, I knew it wouldn’t be long before they appeared, ready to attend the meeting. In the meantime, I grabbed the tome we needed and prepared for everyone to gather in the main room that looked reminiscent of an old church, minus the religious allegories and pews.
Once all the candles in the building were lit and it began to feel like a proper place for the coven to meet, the first witch arrived.
***
A sense of purpose moved through me while my coven sister looked in my direction for guidance and answers. They were all gathered together, seeming lost as to how we were going to solve the issues at hand.
Hayley, Alora, and Sara stood in the front, listening intently.
