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Rose
When Aunt Ginny’s family got back a couple hours later, it was just her and my cousins. “The Assembly peeps went off to do their corrupt Assembly things,” Naomi summarized for me breezily as she guided me into her room for a private talk. “And Aunt Irene went home, at least for the moment. She threatened that she’d come for dinner.”
“I’m getting the impression you don’t get along with her so well,” I said.
“Oh, well, you know… She just takes being the matriarch of the familyveryseriously.” Naomi wrinkled her nose. Then she motioned for me to sit down at her reading desk while she sat on the edge of her bed across from me. The comforting smell of slowly aging paper drifted from the bookshelf behind me. I tried to focus on that and not the anxiety I could sense from my cousin under her flippant tone.
“I know we have to leave,” I said. That thought had loomed large in my mind while I’d waited for the family to return. “I’ve put all of you in enough danger already. It’s not as if you could hide us away forever. If you don’t have anything we can use to make the Assembly back off, well, we’ll just have to find some other way to do it. We’ve got other strategies we can use to try to gain some leverage.”
Naomi blinked at me. “You know, I was going to suggest the exact same thing—that you should leave and look into other strategies. But not like that. I thinkweshould go take on this wretched faction that thinks enslaving witches is the thing to do.”
“We?” I repeated, staring at her.
“Yes,” she said firmly. “You and me and your consorts—and mine. I already talked to Greg. He agrees with me. And if things get bad, I suppose I might need him for more than just emotional support.” She let out a rough laugh. “I can mask any magic you need to use along the way. And the two of us should be able to accomplish plenty more than just one, even if you’ve got the fuel of five consorts.”
“But…” I grasped for the right thing to say. “It isn’t your fight. You hardly know me.”
“I know you well enough,” Naomi said with a swish of her chestnut ponytail. “I know you’re family. And I know what your father did, with the help of these people—they’ve hurt a lot more than just you.”
“But when they find out you’re helping me, and they almost definitely will, they could ruin your whole future.”
“Not if we ruin theirs first,” Naomi said, so fiercely that the nervous flutter in my chest started to fade. Maybe she was prepared for this kind of battle after all.
My cousin paused and leaned forward on the bed. Her brown eyes held mine. “And it’s not just the principle of the thing, Rose. The truth is… There was a while when I wasn’t sure I’d find a guy I really wanted as a consort. When I thought I’d have to choose between taking some guy I was iffy about or losing my magic.”
“Really?” I said. Snuff my spark, I knew how awful that uncertainty was. It’d been creeping up on me most of the last few years.
She shrugged. “Our family is respected, sure, and everyone knows we come into a lot of power, but we’re also seen as a little odd. My mom told me a few times, ‘Everyone wants to marry into the Levesques, but not all that many want to marry a Levesque.’” She gave me a slanted smile.
“But you found Greg.”
“I did,” she said. “And I feel very lucky about that. But, you know… We got married faster than I’d have really liked, just because I wanted to make sure I didn’t lose him. Everything’s good now, but we’ve only been together a couple of years. We’ve only been married for five months. Sometimes I wonder what would happen if we grew apart after all… Don’t tell him I said that. I’d bet he’s thought about the same things too.”
“I don’t think there’s anything wrong with wondering that,” I said.
“No. Well.” She looked at her hands. “Hearing what happened to you, I know how easily that could have been me. Duped into consorting with some guy who didn’t actually have my best interests at heart. Or what if it happened to Stella? We’ve got so little time to find that first consort. No one should have to worry that the guys they’re getting to know might be trying to trap them. And if more people knew we didn’thaveto pick from witching society, maybe no one would get quite that desperate anyway.”
I scooted forward on my chair so I could squeeze her hand. Those memories of all the fears and worries that had weighed on me when I’d known my time was ticking down, when I hadn’t yet found a connection with any witching guy I knew, resonated inside me. Naomi acted as if she were impervious a lot of the time, but this fight obviously meant a lot to her, enough for her to make herself vulnerable, too.
“Yeah,” I said. “I totally agree. And I’ll change that if I can. I suppose, if you want to come with me, I can’t really say no. It’d be good to have a little relief from the testosterone now and then.”
Her smile came back at those last words. “I can only imagine,” she said, winking at me. Then she leapt up. “All right. How soon do you think we should leave?”
“I thought we’d sneak out tonight,” I said. “When it’s dark, it’ll be easier to conceal ourselves if the Assembly people are watching the estate.”
She nodded. “That makes sense. I can manage that. Let me talk to Mom first so she doesn’t feel blindsided, and then I’ll get packing.”
She bounded out of the room, her ponytail swinging behind her. As the door clicked shut, a presence formed at my left, standing by the bed.
I turned my head toward Philomena. She looked even more filmy than she had the last time she’d appeared. But the pink of the ruffled dress she was wearing this time was still bright, as was her grin.
“I just wanted to say good-bye,” she said. “We’ve had a long good time of it, haven’t we, Rose?”
I jerked all the way around, my pulse hiccupping. “Good-bye?” But even as I said it, I understood. She was only part of my imagination, after all. As much as she’d come to life on her own, in the end everything she knew, I did too.
Phil tipped her head coyly. “You’ve got your guys now. You’ve got a new sidekick who can actually help you with more than just chatter. Who’sreal. I know when I’ve served my purpose. But it didn’t seem fair to just disappear without one last chat.”
I swallowed hard. It would be silly to cry over an imaginary friend, wouldn’t it? I knew I was too old for this. But still…
