Page 92 of Last Gift: Supernatural Battle

Wild kissed the back of the hand he still held. “I love you, Tempest.”

The full force of his love hit me inside and out. Emotion choked my voice. “I love you, Wild.”

I summoned some clothes, and he did the same. We’d both opted to keep our runes—and the new ones—on display.

“Ready?” he asked me.

“Nope.”

Wild opened the doors.

I pushed battle into my voice, enough to echo my words through the entire cave. “There will be a coven gathering immediately for all except those on sentry duty.” I glanced around the eating chamber, trying to recall all the places my butt or Wild’s had been. “The gathering will be held out in the meadow.”

Wild grinned.

I called my magic back. “What’s so funny?”

“You were trying to figure out how many tables we’d been naked on.”

“We’ll need to purify this place. Huxley will have a fit.”

Wild winced. “Good point.” He held out his arm, and I looped mine around it.

Together, we walked from the eating chamber and out into the main tunnels. The magus we passed were wide-eyed and fell back into rooms or smaller tunnels to let us pass. They fell into step behind us.

I exchanged a look with Wild, who appeared as bemused as me.

There was a definite you practice dark magic for a living wariness to their actions, but I’d expected that to be accompanied by mob anger.

When we exited the caves onto the knolls, the crowds there parted like a curtain to allow us passage. No big deal.

My pulse hammered as we walked down to the meadow where I’d been initiated and where the demons last attacked us.

Wild and I stopped by the pedestal I’d once sat upon, and the coven surrounded us. Rooke broke away from the others and first hugged Wild, then me.

I tried to read something from her expression, but she was well aware of everyone watching. Sven hugged us, too, then Huxley and Spyne. Corey followed. They stood closest of everyone, my advisors just behind them.

Where to start? I ate Wild’s magic. No. You know how Vissimo and Luthers have that thing? No.

Wild took my hand and lifted it to his lips.

There was an outbreak of murmurs at the gesture, and I saw both of our runes were glowing. Wild called his magic forth to his hand, and though his magic glowed gold in his palm, his runes glowed pink.

I did the same. The magic hovering in my palm was pink, and my runes gold.

Wild said, “Never in magus history has the Mother granted us the gift of a mate. Until now.”

There was a frantic uproar at his words, but what confused me was that it wasn’t angry. It was… jubilant.

What was going on? Where were the pitchforks?

The coven pressed forward.

“How?” one called over the din.

There were furious hushes from those who’d heard his question.

Wild wrapped an arm around me. “We don’t know. Our theory is that the Mother wishes to ensure maguskind are able to hold their own as one of the four main supernatural species over time. If we’re right, then in years to come, more magus may find a mate.”

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