I fake a cough and finally disengage from his suffocating embrace, turning to peer out into the gloom and buy myself a second to think.
Outside, the sky continues to put on a show, flickering and shouting, lashing the rock with all its might. Hailstones pile up at the entrance, and I shiver, rubbing my bare arms.
“Storm came out of nowhere,” I say. Then, turning back to Luke, “Where were you when it hit?”
Ignoring the question, Luke nods toward my knee. “You’re bleeding.”
“Am I?” I crouch down and pretend to inspect the wound. I don’t even feel it anymore; the bleeding has mostly stopped, the gash nearly healed. Go, magickal me.
I close my eyes and take a deep breath, giving my brain a second to catch up. There’s a whole mess of loose puzzle pieces here, and none of them fit together.
For one thing, Luke is bone dry, which means he got into the cave before the rain started. But I was only on top for about fifteen minutes before the weather shifted, and if he’d been that close behind me on my initial climb, I would’ve spotted him. And his scent? The man smells like sunshine and coconut oil—definitely not the athletic stink of a big dude who just scaled a two-hundred-foot rock.
I glance up at him again, taking in the sight of his clothes. T-shirt and board shorts, a pair of leather flip-flops on his feet, Aviators clipped casually outside his shorts pocket. He’s dressed for a stroll down the beach—not a climb.
And there’s no freaking gear.
I peek into the space behind him. No backpack, no harness, no rope. Nothing.
The hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
“So you’re free soloing now?” I get to my feet, unable to keep the surprise from my voice. Even the old pros back in the day never free-soloed the Grande. It’s too steep, with sharp, deadly rocks on the bottom and lots of smooth sandstone up top—notoriously unreliable, especially when there’s moisture in the air. That’s why they bolted it in the first place, and why they closed it off to us in the next place.
“Oh, I had to ditch my gear on the way up,” he says coolly, but he’s getting real twitchy all of a sudden, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, avoiding my gaze. “Got into a jam and cut it loose.”
Why is he lying to me? How the fuck did he get up here?
“Luke, that doesn’t—”
“Watch the edge, Stevie,” he warns. He snatches my hand and tugs me away from the entrance. “It’s a long way down.”
“Hey! You’re hurting me!”
His eyes flicker with regret, but he doesn’t let go. Just shifts his grip, his thumb brushing the tattoo on the inside of my wrist.
Back and forth, back and forth.
“Remember when you got this?” he asks, as if I could forget.
“I wanted one, too,” he continues. “But nope. I wasn’tspecialenough. Not like you, witch-girl. You’ve always been special.”
I glance down at the source of his fascination—a black pentacle the size of a dime, a nine-digit serial number inked below, courtesy of the state. “Careful what you wish for, Luke.”
It’s the same thing I said back then. Same thing I say to anyone who romanticizes the life of a witch.
Magick has only been public knowledge for about fifty years. And while it’s more of a known quantity now—and Tres Búhos has become quite the mecca for the sage-burning, crystal-collecting set—that doesn’t mean the general population is cool with real magick-users.
Far from it.
Natural-born witches and mages only represent one-tenth of a percent of humans worldwide, and in the minds of a lot of people, we simply don’t count.
In the minds of a lotmore, we’re something to be feared, subdued, or worse—eradicated. Any public display or non-consensual private act of magick is punishable by imprisonment. Magickal assault, even in cases of self-defense? Forget it. Capital offense.
They say our magick makes us perpetually armed and dangerous. The law requires us to register and get the tattoo at age sixteen, for the “comfort and safety” of all.
Luke drove me to my appointment. Held my hand and told me corny jokes to distract me from the needle. After I was all done and patched up, he got his own tattoo. Not a magickal one like he’d wanted, but a scorpion. He said he just wanted to make me laugh.
After, he bought me takeout and drove me to the Grande, and we sat at the base throwing fries at each other until the moon rose and it was time to go home.
