Page 163 of Jinxes and Drumsticks

“Nothing,” I grumble, hiding the athame I’d been attempting to consecrate and how it’s turned black with soot.

“Lillith...” Aemon warns.

I bite my lip and stare out the shop window, watching a car drive by. “My magic isn’t working properly,” I say. “I’m not sure I’m going to be able to consecrate all the tools for the ritual.”

Aemon sighs, leaning on his forearms on the counter, staring out of the window with me. “I can do it,” he says.

“I want you to have all the power you need for the working,” I say.

“I have more than enough,” he says. “Believe me when I say an abundance of raw energy is not something I struggle with. Well—I mean, I suppose it is something I struggle with. But I struggle with having it.”

I look over at him, brows furrowing. I almost ask him why he needs Wren and Bastion in that case, and I realize we never established his power level because I wasn’t comfortable being under his subjugation in the first place.

“It feels odd, doesn’t it?” he asks. “Your magic being muddled. Like someone’s touching you somewhere you haven’t consented to.”

It conjures a terrible mental image, an uncomfortably accurate one, unfortunately. It’s a terrible violation of the self that has me certain losing my magic would be more devastating than death could ever be. I nod, nose stinging with my held-back tears.

He offers me his hand; open, palm up. I’m surprised when I take it, even more surprised when I find comfort in the way his fingers fold with mine. Those tears spring to my eyes, pebbling at their corners.

“You Nightingales,” he sighs, sounding equal parts exasperated and indulging. “All of you are so stubborn. Independent to a fault. Both yours and the fault of others. Is it so bad to rely on other people?”

“I don’t have the best track record when it comes to relying on others,” I say, swiping at my eyes with my free hand.

“Your ancestor didn’t either,” he says, his eyes going distant like he’s seeing her. “Let’s see, what was her name? Ah. Aurelia. That’s right.”

“What was she like?” I ask.

“A medicine woman,” he says. “Most witches back then were, you know. Wise women, physicians, midwives. Hailed from the rolling hills of Appalachia. They’re still a deeply magical folk over there, you know.”

“I’ve always wanted to go there.”

“It’s fantastic,” he says. “Even before we made our bargain, she was so attuned to the magic in the land. But you know how it goes. Uneducated mining town, some religious zealot rolls into town, sowing distrust. They tried to burn her at the stake and that’s when I came to her. Told her if she married me, I’d give her the power she needed to save herself. She accepted. I thought I was finally in the clear and turns out she fell for some bumpkin she’d met before I happened across her.”

“How rude,” I say sarcastically. “For her to have already had a man.”

“I know,” he says back with a wink that tells me he’s long over the betrayal of it. “That woman was terribly likable, you know. She was the only woman I ever loved for a very long while. It’s a shame her progenies fully went off the handle for a while.”

I give him a questioning look and he shrugs. “They worked it out eventually. Another witch who carried her namesake met some little artist in the village and cured hatred for a while.”

I huff a laugh. “Maybe I’ll get to meet them sometime.”

“You will,” Aemon says. “I wouldn’t be working so hard at all of this if I didn’t think we could get out from under this prick’s thumb.”

My phone buzzes and I pick it up to look at Damien’s text on the screen.

I’m losing my fucking mind. The whole team from this concert production company is fucking incompetent.

I shake my head and text him back.

What’s going on?

I’ll tell you later, I finally got their boss on the phone.

“Poor little drummer boy,” Aemon sighs.

“Don’t call him that. It makes him sound like the ghost of Christmas past.”

“You really don’t know your Christian mythology, do you?” he asks.