Page 19 of Muddled Magic

A parasite! Just like the wasps and the tomato hornworms. A parasite who needed a host to survive. And what was a host? Food.

My family was the food.

I couldn’t very well remove my family from the grimoire—they would fight tooth and nail to protect it, as it was one of the sources of our coven’s power. They would destroy anyone who posed a threat to it as well, including a family member.

That would be me. And I certainly wasn’t strong enough to go up against an entire coven. I wasn’t Violet, after all.

So…

Steal it.

Steal the grimoire, Meadow. Run away with it, deprive it of its food source. Maybe the parasite will die. If it doesn’t, you’ll at least weaken it. And while it’s weak, you’ll find out a way to remove it for good.

I could do that. I was smart, after all, and I’d heeded my family’s teachings my entire life—how to fight, how to track and hide, how to use magic in the most unusual ways. And, more importantly, I knew the methods they would employ to find me. Well, most of them, which still gave me an advantage.

It wouldn’t be easy, not in a million years, but it was my family’s lives and magic at stake—what wouldn’t I do for them? Even that aggravating brother of mine?

With that plan firm in my mind, I rose from my hiding place and dusted myself off. Now there was only one more thing to decide: when.

CHAPTER NINE

“Easy, Meadow,” Dad laughed, forced back a step from the ferocity of my kick. “You’ve been riled up for days. What’s going on?”

“Yeah, a bug crawl up your skirt or something?” Otter teased, narrowly missing a hook to the face from Rose. She was the tallest of our generation and a brawler, an unnerving grin plastered on her face anytime she sparred.

I have to steal the grimoire away from you and a glamoured not-dog, Dad. You’d be antsy too.

Antsy didn’t even begin to describe the whole of my feelings on my impending exile. It was like I was living under a constant cloud of what-if-I-get-caught anxiety. For days I’d been looking over my shoulder as I quietly prepared and planned and collected. I’d decided on Rose’s Camping Spell to amass the basic necessities and the Vanishing Spell to cover my tracks. There was an unmarked sedan in the garage stables that would be the perfect for my plan—I’d deactivated the spells by which my family could track it just a few days ago. All of my most precious trinkets and knickknacks were already in a little box hidden in my underwear drawer, and yesterday I’d raided the family safe for a few rolls of bills.

The Hawthornes had a bank account, of course, but our world relied more on tangible exchanges of currency rather than a few lines of code that transferred numbers from one account to another. So we had two safes—one an actual room that held the bulk of our on-hand money, and a smaller one for quick access. That had been the safe I’d targeted, sprinkling the whole thing with white Caer powder to reveal any wards before I even thought about touching it. I only took a handful of rolls, not enough to be missed in a hurry, but something Aunt Eranthis would definitely noticed at her end-of-month audit. I was taking a risk removing the money so soon, but I needed to be prepared. If I wasn’t yet ready to leave by the first of September, then I’d sneak the money back and no one would be the wiser.

But in the meantime, that money, my box of trinkets, all the little things I’d done to prepare right under my family’s nose, well, it all made me jumpier than a frog on a bed of coals.

“Just”—I huffed—“working off”—I huffed again—“some steam.”

Whirling, I dropped into a sweeping ankle kick. It caught, but Dad hadn’t been renamed Tod after the fox for nothing. He backflipped, a blur of black hair and black athleticwear, coming up with a pair of knives in his hands from hidden sheaths. I didn’t attack with magic as I normally would have, instead rushing to close the distance.

I didn’t know what that not-dog was capable of—I might need physical proficiency more than magical prowess. Dad’s expression flickered from calculating to surprise at my change in attack pattern, but only for a moment. He shifted his weight forward and charged at speed, blades flashing.

But before we could collide, I was tackled from the side. Yelping from both surprise and the sudden shock of pain, I tucked my head down as I crashed into the turf.

“Situational awareness, Cuz!” Boar laughed into my face. All trace of his earlier vexation with me about Marten was gone. He hadn’t mentioned finding me in a tree to anyone else, allowing me to take whatever action I saw fit. And I saw fit not to bring it up, especially now that Marten was initiated and no robed elder would believe me.

His laugh was short-lived as I punched him in the side of his neck. It wasn’t a hard punch, just enough to shock him. To let him know I wasn’t playing.

“Ooo,” he taunted, blocking my strike to the nerve cluster in his shoulder joint. “Someone wants to wrestle.”

What came next was a flurry of arms and legs as Boar tried to pin me and I tried to get away, or at least get him in some kind of choke hold. My cousin was as quick as he was big—a perfect substitute for the glamoured not-dog. So I pretended he was.

“We got a wildcat here,” Boar chuckled. “Oof! Oye. No going after the family jewels!”

Without magic, I was no match for him, and soon he was squishing the side of my face into the dewy grass with one hand while he threatened to rip my arm out of its socket with the other. “Do you yield?”

I strained, trying one last maneuver.

“Good thought, but too late in your execution,” Boar said. “Now, you done eating grass?”

“Fine!”

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