The man’s grand speech slid off his lips like a pancake against a brick wall. His body dropped, too, frozen and immobilized, hitting the ground with a giantWHOOF. Standing behind the sorcerer was Lazarus Woodcross, the very immobilization spell he’d taught Embry for protection veritably smoking from his fingers.
The coven and the crowd of Raven’s Head students cheered with the second takedown. Merlin swooped a large, happy circle over the cemetery, before diving toward the outstretched arm of Headmaster Martinelli.
In the near distance, sirens wailed from the direction of both the school and the Woodcross Residence, Inspector Brown and the Table arriving just in time to find that the students at Raven’s Head School for the Magically Gifted had everything under control.
All around the graveyard, sorcerers lay prone, heads lolling to one side or the other as strong witch-based magic took themunder. The Table would be able to sever their connection to the dark well of magic until the completion of a fair trial.
Embry took a few stumbling steps toward Balthazar. And suddenly Rye was there, reaching out a hand—his only working one from the way his shoulder hung too low on the other side—to steady her. Embry didn’t need it, but she took Rye’s hand anyway, squeezed it as tight as she dared, offering him a smile as she did, before turning her attention to the sorcerer.
She crouched down beside Balthazar. He’d yet to be bound with the necktie she’d lost somewhere in the second phase of the fight but instead lay askew like the outline of a dead body, reeling and unblinking under her stun spell.
His breath was coming in little pants, the dark magic in his veins beginning to recede, but he still appeared marbled, bloated, unwell. His eyes continued to sparkle, though. And staring into them, Embry booped Balthazar on the nose. Then, leaning in close, her smile as cool and smug as the one he liked to wield, she found just the right words, her voice raspy but as direct as her gaze.
“Have a nice life behind bars, Sorcerer.”
CHAPTER 44
THE WORDS UNSAID
UNTIL A WEEK AGO, EMBRYWOODCROSS HAD BEEN ABLE TOavoid the pitfalls most people felt in daily life—self-doubt, anxiety, and nerves among them.
Now all three churned in the pit of her stomach as she glanced sidelong at her oldest friend. That old thorn in her side that somehow had become part of her. Rye Knighton, the boy next door, the man her heart ached for under the wide, autumn sky.
With his dislocated shoulder magically mended, he was talking with Daddy and Merle in the coven pentagram, the long morning and afternoon of giving statements to Inspector Brown and his team from the Table over for now, Raven’s End cordoned off with yellow tape and wards. There was so much still left to do, though the coven’s video feed corroborating eyewitness testimony did the heavy lifting.
But there was one thing Embry knew was not on any official list. And because she was literally the best of best friends, Amethyst Oberon knew it, too.
“What are you going to do about that, Em?”
Embry yanked herself away from her one-sided staring contest and blinked at Ames. She cleared her throat. “About what?”
Ames frowned, looking the very picture of annoyed.
“Embry Woodcross.” Ames folded her arms over her chest and arched a perfect brow for extra sharpness. “I know you’ve beenthrough the wringer in the past week, and, well,today, but considering this is for your own good, I’m not going to let you off the hook about playing coy.”
Her BFF waved a hand in the direction of Rye, and Embry gulped. “I wasn’t—”
“Pretend all you want, girlfriend, but that does not excuse the fact that something has happened between you and Ryszard Knighton.”
Ames’s hands lifted and Embry braced for a pointer finger to the sternum but instead found her best friend lovingly pinching her cheeks for a little added color—no magic needed.
“And,” Ames continued, “weare not going to letitjust fall by the wayside becauseyouseem intent on pretending you aren’t looking athimthat way andheisn’t returning your frequent glances with all the broody beanbag smolder that very hot boy next door can muster.”
For a rare instance in her young life, Embry Woodcross was speechless.
Ames smiled and bent close so that Embry’s entire vision was her best friend’s big, beautiful brown eyes. “You’ve suffered enough, Em. Go get your man.”
Amethyst Oberon, of course, would not allow Embry to wait until Rye excused himself from his current conversation. No, she forced Embry to approach right away with a threat to involve FairfaxandAlistair if she didn’t get a move on. And though Embry loved a good audience when on stage, she didn’t exactly want one now.
Luckily, the rest of the coven had moved out by then—some forcibly by Ames as she collected Fairfax and Alistair—and the rest of the student body and Raven’s Head faculty were safely back on school grounds. Even more fortunate (or perhaps itwasn’t luck at all), Daddy apparently had something he urgently needed to show Merle in the conservatory. Thus, the elder witches pointed themselves toward the house as Embry arrived at the sun-spackled spot between trees where they’d been standing, eyes trained on Rye.
“Hey,” Embry said as he waved goodbye to Lazarus and Merle. Not the strongest start, but then Rye looked at her and the fact that she was still on her feet was a miracle.
It wasn’t just that he was handsome. He was.
It wasn’t just that he was familiar. He was.
It wasn’t just that she’d wanted to kiss him for days now. She had.
