He’d gotten toast and jam instead.He’dbeen delighted, but Alistair had thrown it away dismissively and told him to do somerealconjuring.
This time, Scout got an entire loaf of bread, a brick of butter, and ajarof jam. His favorite.
He hadn’t let Alistair throwthataway, insisting that it must have come from the kitchen and he’d return it. The fact that he’d taken it to the kitchen, toasted himself a snack, and disappeared for the rest of the day had never been mentioned again.
And he’d never learned to conjure weapons either.
So Scout wasn’t really a brilliant wizard, but hedidhave power, and he rather enjoyed the feeling it gave him. Not that he could lord it over people or conjure a crossbow to lay waste to his enemies or anything. That never occurred to him. It was the feeling of oneness it gave him with the rest of the world. The wizard compound was stifling, and all the boys were housed in the same quarters, and Scout wondered if it was possible to have a thought not permeated with stinky gym socks and the midnight sounds of the teenaged and twentysomething boys masturbating in the dark.
Meals were family affairs, everybody seated at the table looking suitably grateful and chastened that the women—who were never given a word of thanks from Alistair or the elders—had slaved away for the meals before them.
All of this togetherness, and the only time Scoutdidn’tfeel alone was when he snuck some toast and jam and wandered off into the wooded part of the compound. He’d bring his sketch book and write poems or sketch badly, or bring Kayleigh, his favorite sister, and they’d find pictures in the clouds or talk about the things they’d snuck into their reading or away from their studies that Alistair hadn’t seen.
If they missed lunchtime, they conjured food. If they needed a book from their study, they conjured that. If they wanted to try their hand at levitation or talking to the animals, they did so, and failed and tried again and failed and sometimes succeeded.
Those moments of peace, of playing with Kayleigh, throwing words or ideas or potions back and forth, those had made him feel more connected than anything. And not to Kayleigh, but to, well, the world. Even without Kayleigh, those moments in the woods, alone with his thoughts, had made him less lonely.
But still, Kayleigh had helped, and he thought about her now, mourning one of the two people in the compound who had given a damn where he was. Would he be able to see her again? She was pretty powerful, but she was also twenty-one, and Alistair was trying to marry her off to “strengthen the bloodline.” Scout had managed to evade Alistair’s machinations for three years, but Kayleigh was supposedly betrothed to someone from the south already. Oh Goddess. Kayleigh, with her sparkling brown eyes and apple cheeks. The thought of her married to a hovering despot like Alistair made him physically ill.
He started to pace, looking at his phone, wondering if he could ask Macklin to help him get her out. Could they mount a rescue? Alistair hadthrown her through a wallfor simply asking about Macklin. What would he do to her for protesting Scout’s banishment?
His worry for her grew, and that power, that oneness he’d always felt when alone in the woods, grew too. He found himself reaching out for her, wanting to grab her hand and justyankher out of the now-invisible compound. He closed his eyes and conjured her image behind them—brown eyes, sleek brown hair in a ponytail, apple cheeks, and all, and thought,Kayleigh!
“What?”
Her voice was so real and so honest that his eyes popped open, and then he screamed and she did too, because she wasright there. Or ratherhewas right there in their spot in the compound, andshewas sitting under a tree crying.
“Scout?”
“Kayleigh?”
“Did you just rescue me?”
He stared. “We’re still in the compound, so I’m going to say no!”
She stared back. “But the portal is right behind you.”
“I can’t conjure porta—”
She didn’t give him time to finish. She launched herself at him and hugged him so tight his eyes almost popped out of his head, sobbing, “I’m free! I’m free! I’m free!” and he stumbled back, through the gateway of space and time he’d apparently opened up. In a heartbeat, they were back in the spot Scout had recently left, the portal had closed, and he was freezing his ass off in his ceremonial robes in the New England woods in the brisk early days of September.
And that’s where they were when a guy in his late thirties—not too tall but not short, with the Quintero black hair, square jaw, and Scout’s cobalt eyes—appeared in the forest through another portal about twenty feet from them.
“Scout?”
“Macklin?” His eyes strayed to the objects dangling from Macklin’s fingers. “Oh my Goddess, are thoseshoes?”
Those eyes—so much like their father’s that Scout quailed a little when he first saw them—had crinkles at the corners that one only associated with kindness.
Macklin smiled and his eyes crinkled, and the family reunion was complete.
MACKLIN APPARENTLYhad been kicked out of the compound for being the cool older brother every kid needed and Alistair didn’t want them to have.
But the resemblance to Alistair was still a little spooky—and never more apparent than when he was chivvying Scout and Kayleigh through the woods.
“Look,” he said as they made their way carefully along what appeared to be a deer path. “I hate to hurry you both, but my boyfriend—erm,fiancé—is renting a car from the nearby town, and I want to be near the road by the time he drives by.” He gave Scout an apologetic glance over his shoulder. “We’re going to take you to buy some clothes, and there’s apparently a cheap hotel in the town. It’s one of those places right off a major freeway where you can stop for food, gas, and lodging. We can regroup there and see what your next move is.”
Scout opened his mouth to argue, because he always argued. He always had a better plan or wanted to know the why of things. But Macklin had justgivenhim the why of things, and the guy had come in from… wait. Wheredidhe portal in from to save Scout and Kayleigh’s bacon?
