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But despite all the work spent on mastering our magic in the name of self-defense, I still feel woefully unprepared for tonight.
Brom looks up from his book and stares out the large windows. “Sun will set in an hour. When should we head to the lake?”
My nerves dance inside my chest, my pulse quickening at the thought. I need to be able to keep it together or I’ll be a complete wreck by the time the moon comes out.
“As soon as it gets dark,” Crane says. “Dark enough that we can’t see anything—and others can’t see us. We’ll go to the lakeside and set up. As soon as the moon rises enough that it’s reflected on the lake surface, then we start.”
Crane then gives me a long, searching look, rubbing his lips together, and I can tell what he wants to ask me. He wants to ask me if I want to go through with it again, he wants to tell me it’s not too late to back out. But he can’t bring himself to say it because it is too late to back out.
If I don’t do this, we lose Brom to the horseman.
If I don’t do this, we’ll all lose our lives.
So I just give him a nod, letting him know that I’m in it until the end.
We stay in the library for another hour, until the sun turns gold, choked out by the mist, and twilight descends. Then we gather up our books and swing by Crane’s room, where he grabs the sterile knives, the vials of sunflower oil, healing poultice, and the elixirs, a dozen crystal towers, plus the bottle of laudanum. I shouldn’t be shocked that the bottle is half-finished already.
“You should take a bath,” Crane says to me.
I frown and press my nose to my shoulder, inhaling. I had taken one this morning. “Why, do I stink?”
He gives me an adorable grin. “No. But I think a clarifying bath might help prep your body for the ritual. Allow me.”
He goes into the washroom and starts drawing a bath. He brings out a couple of jars filled with salt and dried herbs and flower petals and dumps them in the water, then gathers up a few quartz and tourmaline palm stones and tosses them in the water, too, where they land with a splash.
I want to conserve my energy so I don’t heat the bath further with my magic, so I take off my clothes and step into the lukewarm water. It still feels like heaven, the salt invigorating me, the floating rose and hydrangea petals and various herbs swirling around me like a watercolor painting.
Brom and Crane are staring at me with desire burning in their eyes. They’re already in their robes, naked underneath, and I can see how visibly aroused they are, even though both of them know they can’t touch me until the ceremony. But I won’t let them leave the bathroom since I don’t want to be alone in here, not after what Marie did.
“You do enjoy torturing us,” Crane murmurs as I seductively run the soap over my breasts, my nipples hardening under my touch and under their gaze.
I grin at him, teasing, and for a moment it feels like it’s just me and the two people most important to me, that there’s nothing outside of these walls, that there’s no ritual to perform, no coven of witches that want to use and destroy us, no imminent threat of death.
But I can’t pretend for long. Once I feel cleansed and invigorated, I get out of the bath, both men toweling me off like I’m some goddess or queen in the ancient times, and I step into the robe.
We all look at each other and nod.
It is time.
Crane grabs his kit, and we head out into the hall and into the night, the grass cool on our bare feet.
The moon hasn’t risen above the trees yet, but there’s still enough light for our eyes to adjust as we make our way down to the edge of the lake. Crane had already scouted the perfect spot the other day, near where the wall leads from the shore to the front gates. We’re still in the school’s perimeter, but we’re at the furthest point away from prying eyes and as far as possible from the cathedral. It helps that the shore is softer here, dirt and mud instead of pebbles.
“We obviously can’t do a circle of salt if we’re going to be in the water,” Crane says as he puts down the bag on the shore and surveys the area. “But I will create a pentangle using the crystals, pushing them down into the mud. That should help with some protection.”
“Maybe the circle was what prevented it from working last time,” I say to Crane. “Maybe we need those from the veil to step inside the circle and come closer.”
