Page 18 of The Spell Caster

“I appreciate you letting me stay with you, but you should know up front that there’s a reason I’m not in a coven yet.” I couldn’t let this go on without being honest. My face flushed in embarrassment. “I can’t invoke my familiar. It won’t… come out.”

“That’s a new one,” Sativa said, frowning. “Is it mad at you? They can be touchy if you mess with them.”

“Hooray, another screwup for the screwup coven.” Datura pushed a pile of glossy gossip magazines out of the way and plunked her plate down on the island to eat.

“Performance anxiety,” Oliver declared, twirling his spoon around to point it at me.

“Maybe,” I said. There wasn’t anywhere to sit, so I balanced my plate, trying to eat while standing. My injured shoulder ached. I mindlessly filled my mouth with some sort of potato casserole.

“Who thinks we’re going to get attacked next?” Datura sang with sarcastic glee.

Oliver raised his hand with a matching grin.

“Oh, here we go,” Sativa said.

I cleared my throat. “Our teams were pretty thorough. I don’t think there are any angels left to come attack here.” I swallowed back a wave of tears. I was so tired.

Datura left her empty plate where it was, and Oliver stacked his on top of it. They retreated to the couch in the middle of the room, each pulling out a phone and sprawling out together.

“I heard one of the Northern Sea casters did some kind of super spell that killed a dozen angels at once,” Datura said.

Oliver tapped his phone excitedly. “Ooh, is there video? Check the group chat.”

“Did you see the super spell, Layla?” Datura called.

I cringed with a painful self-awareness that made me want to disappear into the floor. Both telling them and not telling them was awkward. But I would need to discuss it. At some point.

“I’m… I’m sorry, I’m just…”

“Cool it, you two. She’s barely upright.” Sativa took my empty plate and stacked it on the counter with the others. She gave me an apologetic look. “Come on, I’ll show you your room.”

The apartment had four bedrooms arranged with a bathroom on a short hallway. Sativa showed me to a small, plain room with two beds, not too unlike the hotel the night before, but much homier. A wide window was covered with a blind. “You’ll have to share if we get any more members, but it’s all yours for now.”

I closed the door behind her and turned off the overhead light, leaving only the pretty glass side lamp on. I carefully sat down on the bed.

Aloneness and confusion pressed in on me.

Becoming a spell caster and joining the coven had been my life plan—really the only plan available. I never even considered anything else. I was supposed to team up with Costi, and we would venture around cleaning out angel infestations for a decade or so before I settled down with a nice, handsome spell caster from an exotic and far-off Circle.

My failure to summon a familiar, followed by the last two days, had delivered me into a nightmare and left me reeling. Would I ever see my home again? Were the angels somehow evolving to be deadlier? Would they come after us as Datura feared?

My phone blinked on as a message came through.

You okay?

One of the strings of tension in my body released.

I’m fine, I texted Costi back. I found the coven. Are you okay?

Fine.

I breathed out a silent laugh at his typically Costi reply.

I’d rather stay with you came the second message.

A wistful longing twisted through me, shocking me with its intensity and making my throat catch on a sob. I drew a shaking breath and forced myself to be calm. I could handle this. I would handle this. I just needed to rest and then do some thinking.

Determined, I pulled myself off the bed and crept out into the dim hallway, finding the bathroom to brush my teeth and clean myself up. The other bedrooms were closed, but I could see a strip of light under two of them. Oliver and one of the others chatted in the same scandalized tones that seemed to be their norm, but I didn’t pause to listen.

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