Joy of Witchcraft (31 page)

The other woman sighed, expelling a weariness that seemed embedded in her bones. “The NWTA.” She narrowed her eyes at me, a look that would have been a glare if she’d retained an ounce of strength. “I lost three good witches to that one. My nucleus was breaking up. If I didn’t do something, I’d be left with nothing. Weak witches. Gutless followers. Tentacles alone.”

Raven snorted in disgust. Maria’s face hardened to stone, but she didn’t try to explain further.

I used the heavy silence to look at Teresa’s other allies. I recognized a couple of them from the case David had built against Pitt. Julie Harton, the Kansas City Coven Mother who had bribed Pitt for her title. Margery Shoreham, the Dallas Coven Mother who had paid off the conniving Pitt when he threatened to disclose her willingness to purchase a truckload of sham spellbooks.

Cassie, my former student. Her freckled face was stunned as she leaned against Zach. Tupa crouched between them, pressing against their knees.

“Why?” I asked her. “What did I ever do to you?”

“Nothing,” she said. The single word was dull as sandstone.

“But why would you do this?” I gestured toward the centerstone, toward the jumble of objects stolen from the vault. I waved toward Zach’s broken arm. “Why would you work for Pitt and Teresa?”

Cassie’s hand fell to Tupa’s head, and I wasn’t sure she was aware of her action as she stroked his tight curls. She spoke to the ground beneath her feet. “Pitt said I had to.” Her whisper was soft enough that I had to step closer to make out her words. “Otherwise he’d take away Zach. He’d take away my warder.”

Zach’s good hand closed on her shoulder. In that gesture, I saw the entire story, the one Cassie wasn’t brave enough to tell. She’d fallen in love with her warder, against tradition, against the rules of Hecate’s Court. She’d been too afraid to take a stand; they’d been too afraid together.

And Pitt had somehow learned about their indiscretion. He’d preyed on their fear. He’d forced one little action—applying to the Academy, no doubt. And then he’d demanded more. The satyr, whose brutal attack had only confirmed that Cassie was wrong for what she’d done, corrupt for loving her warder.

I couldn’t help but look at David. He had also tried to follow the Court’s strictures when we’d first met. He’d kissed me once, then pushed me away, told me that we could not follow through on our attraction. But we’d built on our bond, built on our trust. And we’d decided—together—that some things were worth defying authority. Love was worth taking a stand.

I shook my head as Cassie huddled in misery. “And Teresa?” I asked. “How did you come to work for her?”

“She found out what I did for Pitt. She sensed him when she helped you banish the satyr. He told her about me.”

Cassie had caved to one blackmailer. It must have been easier to succumb to another. After all, Teresa hadn’t threatened any witch’s life. She’d only gone after
things
.

I turned to the Washington Coven Mother. “And you? What was Pitt holding over you?”

Teresa stared me down with chilly pride. “Nothing.”

“But you joined forces with him a year ago. You did your best to keep the Court from issuing the Academy’s charter.”

“Yes,” she said, the single word perfectly toneless.

“You worked with Pitt to set impossible goals for my magicarium.”

“Yes.” She could have been testifying before the Court, for the bareness of her answers, for her refusal to explain, to justify.

“You conspired with Pitt to bring us down with monsters.”

“No!” Teresa’s sudden shout was full of anger. “I had nothing to do with the monsters. I told Pitt he went too far. The satyr, the orthros, the harpy—they were designed to maim, to kill. That might have been Pitt’s plan, but I never wanted that. Never.”

“What
did
you want?”

Teresa gaped at me, her face slack with astonishment. “You have to ask? After all these years? I wanted my property. I wanted the Osgood collection returned to me.”

“You never had it!”

“The Osgood collection was squarely located in my territory for over a century. It should have belonged to my witches. It should have enriched
my
coven. But you stole it away the instant it was uncovered.”

“The collection called
me
, Teresa. It summoned
me
to that cottage in Georgetown. It taught
me
to awaken Neko. Territory isn’t ownership. You have no claim. You never did. You’re just a liar and a fraud and a thief.”

Her eyes narrowed, and I saw her brace to deliver her killing blow. “Call me whatever you want, Jane Madison. But
you
are outcast from Hecate forever. And you’ve destroyed every single witch you let work with you tonight.”

But I had always told the truth. To Neko, when he appeared on this goddess-forsaken patch of lawn. To my students, through my trusted warder. The women and men who stood with me had known precisely what they paid to bring down Teresa Alison Sidney.

“We are not banished from Hecate,” I said. “We are banished from the
Court
of Hecate. We are cast out from covens and magicaria, from institutions of magic so corrupt that we could never bear to stay within them.”

As I spoke, I sent out a tendril to Neko, confirming that he’d regained some strength after our battle, that he could offer me a basic familiar’s service. He shifted in the crowd behind me, just enough for me I could feel his arm brush against mine.

I reached out to David, too, tugging on our witch-warder bond to show him what I meant to do. I didn’t ask his permission, didn’t need his consent. But I was grateful, all the same, when he gave me the sparest nod.

Turning my attention back to Teresa, I saw a flicker of fear cross her face. She wasn’t an idiot. Far from it—she was the shrewdest adversary I’d faced since I’d become a witch. She knew my momentary lapse in speech could not be an accident. She knew I was planning something.

But she seemed to have forgotten that I was the witch who had set her centerstone. I had poured my magic into the core of her safehold, relying on herbcraft and runes, on ancient knowledge and newly fashioned spells. I had longed for acceptance from Teresa, from the entire Washington Coven. I had been willing to invest anything to belong.

Almost
anything. Not the Osgood collection. And not, in the end, my dignity.

I spun out a cord of energy, a golden rope long enough to encircle the centerstone. Before Teresa could measure my intention, before she could react, I tightened the cord, cinching it close about the marble.

“Teresa Alison Sidney, you accuse me of taking what you wish was yours. But you’re the one who has taken. You stole my power and the power of my students. You plundered the Osgood collection. But your thieving vortexes weren’t the first time you took what didn’t belong to you. You harvested my magic under false pretenses the night you had me set your cornerstone.”

As I uttered the last syllable—
stone
—I cinched my energy tighter, tugging with all the frustration of three long years, with the sorrow of a social outcast, with the shame of a woman betrayed. I drove my energy through the golden strands, reaching out to the spells I’d set inside the centerstone, to the magic that I’d used to secure the heart of the Washington Coven. Clutching at the power that suffused the marble, I broke it into countless shards.

Too late, Teresa cried out. But I had already used the backlash of my golden rope, spreading the power into a shimmering blanket. I gathered up my ancient rowan and ash wand, my bag of jade runes, a stack of leather-bound books that threatened to tumble to the dusty ground beneath the centerstone that was no more.

And when all the pilfered items were safe within my arms, I sent out one last lick of power, blazing toward the shrunken mouth of Teresa’s swirling vortex. The stolen power of that whirlwind belonged to me. It broke apart the instant it sensed a command from its proper source.

As sparks flew across the clearing, David’s hands settled on my shoulders. I leaned back into his competent, confident touch, and I let him carry me away from Teresa Alison Sidney and the Coven Mothers, and their broken familiars and warders, and everything they had done in their failed attempt to destroy me.

~~~

I blinked hard as I materialized back to physical existence.

I expected to find myself in the parlor at Blanton House, or maybe the basement, surrounded by my students and their supporters. But instead, we’d all emerged in an antiseptic hallway. A mottled linoleum floor stretched for miles beneath fluorescent lights. Portraits lined the walls, austere men and women in somber black robes.

“The Night Court of the Eastern Empire?” I asked David, squelching a chill. I’d spent too much time that day in a different courthouse, called before a judicial body that had betrayed me. But the Eastern Empire was separate from Hecate’s Court. It was where David and I had come to find evidence of Pitt’s crimes, to find records of his monsters terrorizing other supernatural creatures.

David nodded, but his answer was directed to everyone. “We’re outcast now. Beyond the reach of Hecate’s Court. We’re fair game for any supernatural creature that wants our powers, our possessions. The best thing to do is file an Affidavit of Citizenship with the Empire.”

I trusted him. I’d always trust him. But I had to ask, “Why? What does that do?”

“It transfers your allegiance from the world of witchcraft to the wider world of supernatural creatures.
All
supernatural creatures.”

“Oh,” Clara breathed. “Are there fairies?”

I rolled my eyes. Everyone knew there was no such thing as fairies.

“Yes,” David said, raising a murmur among the others. “Fairies, gnomes, boggarts.”

“Next you’ll be saying there are vampires out there,” Alex scoffed. Her eyeliner had run down her cheeks in the course of our battle, and she looked like a prisoner behind streaky black bars.

But I knew the truth. I’d seen vampires a year ago, when I’d first met the Night Court’s clerk. “There
are
vampires,” I said.

David rubbed a hand over his face. “You can read entire encyclopedias about the citizens of the Eastern Empire. And the bottom line is, joining the Empire means you might be sued by any of them. But not joining means any witch in the world can use Hecate’s Court against you. From this day forward, you can’t appear before Hecate’s Court, ever. You’ll forfeit any case brought against you there. But if you complete an Affidavit of Independence, any witch who wants to take action against you has to do it here. In the Night Court of the Eastern Empire.”

Raven tossed her hair over one shoulder. “Where’s the dotted line? I’m ready to sign.” Somehow, even after a night of fighting, after the physical and emotional blows we’d all sustained, she still managed to make signing a document sound like an exotic sexual act.

David turned on his heel and led the way down the hall.

Sarah Anderson was actually working behind the counter as we poured into the clerk’s office. She offered up her bright smile of recognition, sparing only the slightest glance of concern at the coterie that gathered behind us.

“Of course,” she said when David told her what we needed. She disappeared into a back office for a moment, returning with a sheaf of papers. “You can take them down to the cafeteria to complete.”

Like a horde of zombies, we shuffled to the cafeteria. I wondered if zombies really existed. If the Empire had jurisdiction over their legal claims. I hoped I never found out.

Collapsing at a cafeteria table, I stared at the rows of vending machines. The adrenaline from our battle was finally wearing off, and hunger was taking its place. I’d need to ground myself soon.

But for the meantime, I muttered a quick spell to banish my fatigue. It depleted the last of my reserves, but at least I’d stay on my feet for another hour or two. I’d pay for it tomorrow. For tomorrow, and the entire week to follow.

Shaking my head, I started to read through the legal jargon on the Affidavit. The requirements for joining the Eastern Empire were set forth in a series of bullet points. I had to be physically present in the Eastern Empire for at least thirty months before applying. Reasonably proficient in English or willing to pay for translation services. Willing to forsake all other loyalties, including but not limited to allegiance to Hecate’s Court, Dionysus’s Den, and Mercury’s Council. Familiar with Empire history, government, and society.

“Just sign it,” David said when he saw me hesitate over the last line. I was shocked to hear the sudden exhaustion in his voice. Exhaustion or something more, because he leaned close to whisper: “Sign it, and we’ll get you some sort of astral protector tomorrow.”

His words shocked me more than any affidavit requirement ever could. “
You’re
my astral protector.”

“I broke my warder’s oath, Jane. I raised a weapon against my witch.”

I laughed in disbelief. “That oath was sworn before a body that cast you out! Besides, you couldn’t control your actions when you were bonded by Ethan.”

“I placed myself under his control. I gambled for Blanton House, and I lost.”

“No,” I said, and now I was getting angry. “If you think I’m letting you walk away after everything that happened tonight, you’re certifiably insane. Do you realize what we discovered out there?
Witches can tap into warder’s magic.
”

“Jane—”

I silenced him the most effective way I knew, by pressing my lips against his. His pulse jumped, just as it had on the battlefield.

I knew I could reach out for his warder’s power, for that steely sphere deep inside his consciousness. But I didn’t want to work magic. I didn’t want to burst through new astral frontiers. I just wanted to kiss the man I loved.

And so I did, ignoring everyone else in the room, ignoring the affidavit in front of us, ignoring all the things that were wrong in the world so I could focus on one thing that was very, very right: us.

And it
was
right, because David finally kissed me back.

“Marry me,” I said when we came up for air. “Now. Tonight.”