“Get in your car!” I yelled, surveying the group to make sure we had everyone. Emory and Fallon carried Sascha, since she was still looking a little out of it from earlier. Peter and June followed quickly behind them. For now, the whole group appeared to be intact.
“Asher, over here!” I motioned for him to follow me the few blocks over to where I had parked and had the car unlocked before he’d even reached the passenger side. Jumping inside and hot-wiring the car with a few choice words (I’d left my keys somewhere in the house during all the drama), I then slammed my foot down on the gas and the car lurched forward, peeling out as we made our exit. I met up with the other car a few blocks away, before we all got back onto the highway to head to the cabin. Every few seconds I’d glance back to make sure they were keeping up.
Once we’d been driving for at least twenty minutes, I finally allowed myself to let up on the gas and trust that, for the time being, we weren’t being followed.
For now.
“What the hell was that?” Asher asked once I’d stopped driving like I was in the Indy 500. The sound of his voice breaking our silence startled me as I’d been pondering what our next move should be. I started to answer, but he cut me off. “And don’t give me that crap about magician gangs. Magicians or not, that was magic back there. You guys were doing actual spells. But not fun ones like making cake appear out of thin air or guessing cards. That was a battle. The kind you don’t walk away from.”
My mind raced to come up with an explanation that would be less crazy than the truth, but in the end nothing I could make up would sound any saner. And I was sick of lying to Asher. It somehow felt wrong. Like, if I was trying to start a relationship with someone, I didn’t want to base it on a plethora of lies. After everything he’d just seen, I doubted he’d believe me anyway. Better to come clean and deal with the consequences later. Even if it turned out that Asher wanted nothing to do with me or my crazy life.
I hoped all this didn’t scare him off for good.
My stomach twisted into knots as I prepared to do what I knew I had to. “Asher, I’m a witch,” I said, saying each word carefully like it might help the meaning sink in. “I come from a long line of witches. My mom could do magic. My grandmother, too. As far as I know everyone in my family tree has had some ability to cast.”
I left out the fact that my super-great-grandmother was the first witch to be executed at the Salem witch trials and was quite possibly the most powerful witch of all time. And that it looked like the apple didn’t fall far from the tree in my case. It didn’t seem important to the story, and I was nervous about overloading him with too much heavy information all at once. That discussion was more of a fifth-date kind of topic.
“You were right that it was a battle, Asher. And those guys back there? They’re the bad guys. Really bad guys. They’ve been hunting down other covens for centuries, wiping out anyone who could threaten their rise to power. And now they’ve found us. The people who helped us out at the house tonight are members of my coven, the Cleri. Just over a week ago the Parrishables—those are the bad guys—they attacked our parents at a coven meeting and burned the place to the ground, with everyone still in it.”
I chanced a look over at Asher but he wasn’t saying anything.
“After that, those of us who were left went on the run, escaping to the only place I knew would be safe. And then we started to train. We hid and we trained, trying to perfect all the spells that we’d been taught by our magic teacher. But it wasn’t enough. Because when they found us at the mall, they ended up putting two of my friends in the hospital. One even had to have emergency surgery.”
Now I was unloading everything on him. All the stress and upset I’d been letting build up inside me in order to shield it from the others came spilling out. It was hard not to choke on my words when I thought about Jinx and her injuries, but I kept going. I had to.
“Then I found out from one of Samuel Parris’s goons that it’s really me that they’re after, and if the Cleri hadn’t been with me that day, they never would’ve gotten hurt. So I left. Figured they were better off without me. But it was all a bad idea—well, good because I ran into you, but bad because of that total slasher scene back at my house.
“Now it looks like we’ll have to go back to the cabin where the rest of the Cleri are staying, because so far it’s the only place that the Parrishables haven’t been able to find us. And on top of that, I’ve pulled you into my witch fit and put your life in danger too! Asher, you’re the last person I’d ever want to get hurt and I’m not sure if you should even be around me anymore, but I also don’t know if it’s safe for you to be out there by yourself now. I don’t know what to do.”
I looked over at him again, scared that he’d call me a psycho and jump out of the moving vehicle just to get away from me. But his butt stayed glued to the seat and his face remained neutral, both reactions I hadn’t been expecting. I waited patiently for him to say something. Finally, he cleared his throat and broke the uncomfortable silence.
“So, you’re a witch,” he said in a way that was like, “So, you’re seventeen” or “So, you’re a redhead.” It brought a feeling to my heart that was indescribable. He didn’t care that I was a witch. Or that I did magic. Or that I was different.
I’d told him my big secret and he hadn’t gone running for the hills. My mind boggled at the fact that he seemed to be taking it all pretty well. I never would’ve expected it.
“So, what next?” he asked, settling back into his seat, more at ease than I would’ve expected of someone who’d just found out that witches existed.
“That’s it? You’re okay knowing that they’re after us and all?” I asked, surprised but happy. “I mean, I’m kind of a liability right now. Trouble seems to follow me around these days.”
“Oh, you’re trouble all right,” he said with a smile. “But like you said, they’ve already seen me, and it won’t be any better out there fending for myself than here with you. Besides, I trust you to keep me safe; I’m sort of not ready to let you go just yet.”
This made me blush and I was thankful that it was dark in the car. Taking my hand off the wheel, I placed it on his and linked our fingers.
“So don’t,” I said.
Chapter Twenty-One
The whole gang of us trudged into the cabin in silence. It wasn’t necessarily that we were trying to be quiet; it was that nobody had much to say. I’d been wondering during the trip home—when I wasn’t busy beaming over how understanding Asher had been about everything—whether it would be weird now that I was coming back. I mean, the last time I was there, I’d pretty much ditched them. Of course, in my mind I’d had reason: I was just trying to keep them safe. Still, I could see how they might’ve interpreted my exit as abandonment.
On the other hand, they had come looking for me in the end and that had to mean something. Since we’d all been in separate cars, I hadn’t had the chance to talk to any of them and gauge how they were feeling.
All I really knew was that it felt oddly good to be home—odd because the cabin had begun to feel more like home than anywhere else.
It was about 11 p.m. as we walked in the front door of the cabin, and I was expecting the house to be quiet with all its inhabitants asleep. But as I walked into the living room, I saw that almost everyone was still up. It was possible they’d been waiting in the same spots since the others had left to find me; people were leafing through magazines or had books open, and a few were just sitting there staring off into space. But when we shuffled in, all heads and eyes turned to us.