And Balthazar? Embry wasn’t sure why she’d been so drawn to him, other than perhaps she’d been drawn to the things about him—magical, dramatic, gifted him—that she actually liked about Rye. All it took was his clear interest in her to topple every defense she had.
Her confused heart knew exactly what it wanted now.
Exactly what she couldn’t have in this moment—for his sake. For hers. Because if he left her side now because she’d confessed her excavated feelings… that was the sort of rock-bottom loneliness that would stain her heart—and their friendship—forever.
Embry stepped back. Watched as Rye’s arms fell to his sides, his gentle fingers motionless without her to hold.
It was better this way. That they stayed focused.
Embry Woodcross had spent her entire high school career avoiding the whims of her heart. For as much as it hurt in this moment, she could do it just a little longer. To focus on her future. A future where she could tell him how she felt.
And if the Table investigators deemed that future would be behind magical lock and key, she’d tell him how she felt before she went.
Instead, this time, Embry said, “We need to know if my corsage is an actual lead.” She blotted again at the damp under her eyes, took a steadying breath, and asked, “You ready for some breaking and entering?”
“You bet.”
His full mouth pulled up at the corner into a smile she needed to see.
“Good. Now stand still while I cloak you.”
“Cloak me?” Rye squinted at her, clearly waiting for her to produce the breaking-and-entering version of Ames’sInto the WoodsLittle Red Riding Hood costume times two.
Embry flexed her empty hands. “I may have perfected a magical cloaking spell. It only works for twenty minutes at a clip, but that should be all we need before we’re in my dorm room and it can wear off safely.”
Rye arched a brow. “Where was this magical cloaking spell when we entered the police station? Or when we were locked in a glorified cupboard fifteen feet from Jonesy and Heston?”
Embry felt her cheeks heat at the very mention of their time locked together. The ghost of his finger on her lips was undeniable. She cleared her throat and put on her best exasperated-yet-elegant expression.
“Knighton, you know very well fairies can pick up on magical signatures from a mile away. I wasn’t about to risk catching their attention either place.” She glanced around the fairy-free graveyard before holding up those flexed hands in a no-nonsense way. “Well, that, and it might not be perfected exactly, because it’s pretty draining. But Iwillperfect it. Someday. Now, hear me this time when I demand you stand still. You’re going first.”
CHAPTER 32
BREAKING AND ENTERING
FOR A WITCH, THE IDEA OF BREAKING AND ENTERING ISN’T THEsame as the general population. The breaking isn’t of locks or windows, but of spells and magical protections, followed by the entering portion of the concept.
Usually.
In the case Embry and Rye were currently facing? They weren’t so much breaking things as trying to slip under them—both magically and literally.
Cloaked in Embry’s spell, they had ten minutes by the time they reached the dormitory to make it into the building before the magic would wear off and their presence would be revealed.
Unfortunately, they’d spent the last three minutes bickering five stories below her dorm window. Truly, considering the current whims of Embry’s heart, this old pattern was for the best. Even better, because both were cloaked in the spell, they could see each other even though others could not. A happy side effect.
“We’re going through the front door,” Embry was insisting, in a very hushed tone, even though Rye had already thrown up the sound shield. There were plenty of magic-sensing students inside, of course, but sound shields were the kind of magic everyone expected to be used in close living quarters. “We wait for someone to go through, slip in as they go out or in, and scramble the magical signal. The wards will accept us because we helped castthem, and our decoy will disguise the fact it’s me in case I’ve been banned. Easy peasy.”
The school preferred to layer wards one on top of one another. The outgoing prefects (one of whom was most recently Rye) recast their wards, while the incoming senior prefects (including Embry) layered their wards over the old ones ahead of orientation. They hoped that the combination of the wards’ familiarity with them and the cloaking spell would keep them from tripping the wards and let them safely enter the building.
“Or,” Rye whisper-argued, “no one comes because curfew was literally an hour ago, and in ten minutes we’re completely vulnerable as you run your cloaking spell again. Why does it only last for twenty minutes anyway?”
Yet again, Embry could feel her face heating. The true answer was because she’d created it on the fly to avoid Rye after he’d berated her for having clear interest in Balthazar. She hadn’t designed it for longevity; she’d designed it as a hasty way to slip past him as he overtly used his well-hidden musculature to do yard work for Daddy.
“Our best bet is levitating to the window, hauling it open, and getting to work.”
“Stop being obsessed with windows. It’s not as cool as you think it—”
In a blink, Embry halted her retort, grabbed Rye’s hand, and charged up the steps, having spotted a shadow in the lobby to the double doors on the ground level. Someone was leaving. Spine flat against the wall, Embry watched as Headmaster Martinelli herself slipped into the crisp autumn night.
