Page 14 of First Ritual

Magus trailed down the slope from above and gathered in a circle about fifty feet away. The thirteen members of the council walked from their midst to face me, and I set my sights on just about anyone except the magus dressed in black. Why did he wear black though?

Talk about wild.

I snorted softly. Get it together.

“Tempest Bronte Corentine,” Barrow boomed.

He’d do okay as a ringmaster.

Gasps broke out at his words. Had they not known who I was? That explained the mild reaction to my presence.

“Daughter of Hazeluna. Granddaughter of Rowaness and Caradoc,” he boomed again.

More gasps, then a loud buzz and the coven members turned to each other in shock. I kept my expression smooth.

Barrow waited for the murmurs to die down. “You seek to join our coven and caves,” he declared. “The council has accepted you. Now our people and the mother herself must show their favor. Only then can you be one of us.”

Winona stepped forward next. “Novices up first, please. Form an outer ring afterward.”

Whoa, whoa, whoa, what were we doing here? Did they have shivs? They looked like they had shivs.

The novices—who made up the bulk of any coven—lined up. Those at the front crossed the meadow to where I was displayed.

I tensed as the first, a male, reached me.

He smiled and waited.

“Am I meant to do something?” I whispered.

The young woman behind him leaned out. “Release your magic. Let it fill the stone. Everyone has to meet it.”

Oh.

Everyone would do that? I mean, to find the person on the other side of my new tether, I had to touch them, but… everyone?

I managed to stop myself from wrinkling my nose. Meeting someone’s magic was insanely personal. Something family and close friends did, lovers too. I’d never done this with anyone other than my sister, mother, and grandmother. I wasn’t embarrassed on the score of physical intimacy—I mean, I’d kissed a random dude in a bar on a whim—but magical intimacy was a vastly unexplored territory.

Heat tinged my cheeks. “Right. I didn’t understand what they meant about the coven deciding.”

This was ideal though. I could find my family member tonight. So easily.

I bit my lip.

The man waited. The woman behind him elbowed him out of the way. “I’ll go first. She’s uncomfortable.”

I wasn’t sure I liked how well she could read me, but taking the opportunity she’d granted, I released magic through my divination affinity into the pedestal, feeling the stone warm in response.

“Nice to meet you.” The woman winked. “We’re cousins, did you know? I didn’t! I mean, no one knew my aunt had a baby. I’m rambling. When you want to get liquored up, come find me, okay?”

My gaze flew to hers. Cousins? Would the first person to meet my magic be the person I searched for? I hadn’t thought two cousins would form a tether unless they were good friends first. Spontaneous tethers were for immediate family—parents and their children, siblings, and sometimes between grandparents and grandchildren too.

I was happy to be proven wrong.

The young woman touched the stone.

The slight zing of our fleeting magical connection seemed to confirm her words. The vibration of her magic was similar to what I’d felt with my family, just on a lesser scale. Most importantly—most disappointingly—she had nothing to do with my mystery tether.

I had a cousin though.

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