Warlock - Book 3 - Preview Chapter 250406b

“I’ll go wait downstairs,” Cassandra said. “Let me know when you’re done?”

After checking out a couple of the other cottages, we’d let Peter know that we’d go with number seven, then came back to our room to get ready for dinner, while Hannah and Brittany went to theirs. There were some things we needed to talk to Rachel about before I marked her on Thursday night and I wanted to get that out of the way — and before I forgot to ask a witch where she wanted our coven mark again.

Leaving that to the last-minute urges had resulted in Sam having the mark, an oval of brown moles in the shape of my bite, on her upper breast where it’d be visible in a bikini, and then Cassandra’s on her neck where it was visible nearly all the time unless she wore a high collar. I was a little worried about the escalation and didn’t want to wind up biting Rachel on the nose or something.

“Why would you wait downstairs?” Sam asked before I could.

“You’re going to talk to her about stuff, I just thought —”

“We’re going to talk to Rachel about coven stuff — you’re coven.”

I nodded. “We do this stuff together — all of us.”

“Oh.”

Cassandra clicked the door shut and sat next to Rachel across from Sam and I, looking almost more nervous than Rachel did.

“What do we need to talk about?” Rachel asked, plopping down on my bed. “Yeah, Winthrops practice Purity, but that doesn’t mean I don’t know what’s going to happen. In general, at least.” She frowned. “Do I need to go visit a workroom before we talk?”

The shy little witch had a Passion resonant, common in her Family, and she had to carefully manage her emotions, otherwise it would fill and stretch too much, causing her a lot of discomfort — much like Cassandra’s new Lust resonant must be causing her. I wasn’t sure if Rachel’s Family had been exaggerating when they told her too much could make her explode, but I had seen her throw twenty-foot streams of flame from her fingertips trying to burn off the extra mana.

Last semester she’d gotten permission to use a workroom to vent things whenever she needed — a wise choice by Willowmere’s administration.

“I don’t think so,” I said. “It’s just some stuff you need to know and a couple decisions you need to make.”

Rachel took a deep breath. “Okay, I’m ready.”

I chuckled, but inside I was hoping she was, because the first thing I needed to tell her about was my Control resonant and Command affinity, something a lot of witches were terrified of — and that their Families had actively tried to breed out of their lines. Command allowed me to compel someone, including witches, to obey me, provided I could break through their shields and overpower their will with my own.

When I’d told Sam about it, she’d bounced up and down demanding I make her do something, because … Sam. Cassandra and I had been imprisoned by the Patriarchy and facing some pretty nasty consequences when I told her, so her reaction had been tempered by that. But Hannah had found out without any prep, and she’d been terrified of me — running off into the night and hiding in her room until Sam managed to talk her down.

It was also something that could get me killed if it became common knowledge — at least before I could defend myself properly.

I didn’t think Rachel would react poorly, but I also didn’t want it to come as a surprise after she’d been bound to me for life — I wanted her to have the chance to back out if she wanted to.

“First, I need you to promise you won’t tell any —”

“By my Power, by my Grove, and by the Maiden who drives me, I will tell no one what is said in this room tonight without your leave.”

I blinked and Cassandra was staring at the little witch open-mouthed, but Sam was just grinning.

Rachel shrugged. “Winthrops with Passion are always closest to the Maiden.”

“I … sure … that was a pretty quick oath, though,” I said.

She shrugged again. “Geez, Noah, I’ve been waiting for this since school started and I first saw you — yeah, it was all mixed up with my Family’s first-warlock thing, and then the stupid love potion, but … I really love you, I trust you, and I know you’re not going to hurt me, so what is it, already?”

I chuckled. Because of how powerful the Passion resonant could be, and dangerous until a witch had a warlock to drain off the mana she generated, the Winthrops practiced Purity — going to their covens pure in spirit, pure in thought, and pure in deed — they weren’t even supposed to think about sex before they were bound into a coven, and they didn’t even see a warlock, or any man at all, in person until then either, so they knew the first guy they ever saw in person would be their warlock.

Rachel had been very confused when she arrived at Willowmere and saw me.

“Wait,” Cassandra said, narrowing her eyes. “You used a love potion on her?”

“Other way around,” I said.

“Actually, she gave it to me,” Sam put in, while Rachel flushed and hung her head.

“What are you people?”

I shrugged, turning my attention back to Rachel. Cassandra could catch up on her own time.

“My resonants are Lust, Pain, and Control — with Command.”

I took a deep breath and waited for the explosion.

Rachel frowned. “Okay."

“You’re okay with that?”

Rachel cocked her head. “Winthrops aren’t silly scaredy-cats. Command has to get through our shields, and there are a lot worse things someone can do if they have enough power for that.” Her brow furrowed. “Is that why you and Sam do those … things?”

I chuckled again. Sam and I had a power dynamic that went far afield from even the compulsions the coven bond set on witches to obey their warlock or high priestess, different from Command, even, but that was Sam and me more than anything else, I thought.

“Maybe it’s part of it, but mostly it’s just how Sam and I are.”

“Do I have to do it too?”

“No,” Cassandra said, before I even had a chance to open my mouth to say the same. “None of the rest of us are going to have to do that freaky-deaky shit.” She narrowed her eyes at me. “Right?”

“Absolutely,” I said. “I’m not going to make any of you do anything you don’t want to.”

“Ahem.”

I nodded at Sam. “Unless you want me to make you do things you don’t want to.”

Cassandra groaned and glared at Sam. “One day? Can we go one day without you being a pervert?”

“Prude,” Sam said.

“Girls,” I said, “this is about Rachel.”

“Right.”

“Sorry.”

“What else?” Rachel asked.

“Oh!” Sam interjected. “We need to figure out what Rachel’s Event is.”

“No,” I said, “we are not doin —”

“Yeah,” Cassandra put in. “We shouldn’t have to share the equinox.”

“I’m not —”

“What’s an Event?” Rachel asked.

“It’s noth —”

“Noah likes his witches to have special Events around our bindings.”

“I do not —”

“Like mine’s the Event of the Solstice,” Sam said, “but that’s probably not the best thing to call it, since there are two in a year, so it should probably be the Yule Event.” She shrugged. “He still doesn’t know all our holy days, so he sucks at naming Events.”

“Hey!”

Cassandra sighed. “There is so much we’re going to have to teach him.” She shook her head. “Really ignorant.”

“Hey!”

“So we need something roughly a week before and a week after the equinox,” Sam said.

“Hm.” Rachel’s brow furrowed. “Oh! Cassandra’s could be the Eostre Event?”

“Yes!” Cassandra agreed. “That’s for fertility and…” She placed a hand on her stomach and smiled. “You know.”

Rachel nodded, then her eyes widened. “Oh! Could I have Hilaria? We — Winthrops, I mean — always celebrate that for the Maiden.”

I sighed.

“Yes,” Sam said. “I think that’s perfect. So we have the Yule Event, the Eostre Event, and the Hilaria Event. Perfect.”

I closed my eyes and sighed again. “Do you really think there are enough of those for thirteen witches? Because I don’t think this should be a thing.”

“It is absolutely a thing,” Cassandra insisted.

“Enough?” Sam snorted. “Witches have more holy days than Catholics … mostly because we hid the good ones from those dirty, thieving —”

“Yeah,” Cassandra interrupted. “There’s Samhain, Yule, Imbolc, Ostara…”

“Beltane, Litha, Lammas, Mabon…”

“Walpurgis, Lemuria, Matronalia…”

“Don’t forget Perchta and Dziady,” Rachel added.

“Then there’s the monthly Esbats,” Sam put in. “Eclipses, meteor showers, comets.”

I stared at the three, wondering how witches managed to get anything done.

Sam shrugged. “Witches like to party — we’ve just been too busy with school to really celebrate them all properly.”

“I can’t wait to tell Grandma I got Hilaria,” Rachel said. “She’ll love it.” She held a finger to her lips. “After, of course. Ssshhh.”

“I can’t believe you’re just going to … steal her,” Cassandra muttered. “How do you get away with that?”

Rachel shrugged. “Grandma wants me to be happy.”

I cleared my throat to change the subject, because Rachel couldn’t see the sudden spike of sadness and hurt that ran through Cassandra. When Cassandra’s mother had found out her daughter had been marked by me instead of the other way around, she’d simply turned and walked away.

“Can we get back to something important?” I asked.

Note to self, I thought as three pairs of glaring eyes focused on me, never minimize the girls’ Events.

“Being bound to a coven is very important,” Sam said.

“Yeah,” Cassandra agreed. “Even if it is in a basement with a fucking vampire watching it all.”

“Okay, okay,” I said. “But there are some more immediate decisions for Rachel to make.”

“Like what?” Rachel asked.

“I need to know where you want the mark.”

“Sure,” Cassandra grumbled, “she gets asked.”

“I don’t know,” Sam said, rubbing her neck approximately where Cassandra’s mark was. “I’m sort of rethinking being upset about the bikini visibility and wishing he’d gone full-vamp on me — a lot cooler than a collar.”

Cassandra went red. “An hour. Can you give me a fucking hour without being a pervert?”

I cleared my throat again to head off any conflict.

Rachel bit her lip. “Um, where’s Sam’s?”

Sam patted her chest, just at the upper, inner curve of her left breast.

Rachel nodded and touched the mirror spot on her right breast. “Could I?”

“Sure,” I said.

Sam was blinking rapidly as she stared at the other witch.

“Great!” Rachel smiled. “Is that it?”

“Nope,” I said. “One more thing. When we do this, it’s going to open your dormant resonants, so you’ll have three.”

Rachel’s eyes widened. “Really?”

I nodded. “It’s a thing with Mel’s line and it’s an even bigger secret than my Control resonant. Your two new ones have to be from mine, though, so you have to tell me which ones you want — Lust, Pain, or Control.”

“Pain,” Rachel said, immediately.

“Really?” Cassandra asked.

“Have you seen spellstick? All the girls are usually drained halfway through the game — imagine if I could top off every time I got hit! I could Heartfire the entire team late in the third! The other teams might not even hit me once they figure it out and I can run rampant on their ass!”

She ducked her head. “Sorry. Should’ve said butt.”

I laughed. “I think you can swear all you want — you've heard me and Sam, right?”

Rachel shook her head. “No, Grandma says it’s not proper behavior outside of a game.”

I thought about our meeting with Rachel’s grandmother and wondered if the intimidating witch also let loose during a spellstick match.

“We can’t let them figure it out, though,” I reminded her. “Secret, remember?”

“Right … well, the only thing they’d see is me having a lot more mana, so I’ll just say you’re really good at…” Rachel flushed and looked down while biting her lip. “Development.”

Sam snort-laughed while Cassandra rolled her eyes.

“What?” Rachel asked. “It’s not funny! Until after Purity we use a lot of … formal terms for stuff. To keep from, you know, thinking about it.” Her eyes widened. “I’m gonna be able to think about it…”

Sam grinned. “You sure are, sweetie — we’re going to have a lot to talk about.”

“Don’t corrupt her,” Cassandra protested.

“I can be corrupt if I want to now,” Rachel said firmly. “For the second one —” Rachel frowned, really thinking about it. “Lust could be hard.”

“Why?” I asked — I mean, I didn’t need all my girls to have Lust, but I’d have thought Rachel would be more worried about having Control, given how the witches felt about it.

“Hello? Passion? Passion binds with everything. Well, not everything, but definitely Lust — and Love and Rage and Anger and Desire and … a lot. It just multiplies everything! Anything you can be passionate about. It’s bad enough binding to those alone, but when there’s another whole resonant it can bind with?” She shrugged. “Some warlocks can’t handle it.”