Page 41 of The Witch is Back

“Mom—” Bastian made a move to help her but she waved him back.

“My darling boy.” She stroked her familiar’s head, smiling absently as it purred and craned its head under her touch. “You’re my son and I love you. I know you didn’t think of it as ‘abandoning’ Emmaline.”

That was the truth. And it killed him that his parents couldn’t know the real reason. Or the main one, he admitted.

“You were both young. Too young, but those mistakes are mine and your father’s also.” Her lips pinched before she shook that off. “Looking back, it’s easy to see you chafed at the gilded cage we’d made for you, even though you liked Emmaline. Of course you wanted to live your life a bit first, experience it away from being a Higher family son or a fiancé. We don’t blame you for that.”

I was doing it for the family, he wanted to yell. For us. For Emmaline, so she didn’t have to go through with it. Surely his childhood friend would’ve hated herself when she realized the consequences of their marriage. That she’d have stolen the essence of who he was through the Joining clause.

For if the crash of emotions had clarified anything, it was that she’d been hurt by his disappearance. She hadn’t been mourning the loss of his powers.

But...she was still hiding something. There had been a touch of guilt at the end, just a hint, that kept him wary. Unable to let go of the old suspicion.

His mom grimaced and his gaze shot to her. He was halfway out of his chair before she clucked at him bad-temperedly. “Don’t start feeling sorry for me, Bastian Aloysius Truenote.”

“Mom.” An automatic grimace at the dreaded middle name. Suddenly he was thirteen and trying to explain how the furniture had magnetized to the ceiling.

His reaction made laughter return to her face before it turned considering. “You got to live your life. But Emmaline...she was the one left behind.”

He flinched. “She moved to Chicago.”

“Yes. But not immediately. You know what witch society is like. Higher sons can do no wrong, especially when a family’s as old as ours. They blamed her for your leaving, and her mother did nothing to quell the rumors.” The dark glint in her eyes told Bastian exactly what Diana Truenote thought of that lack of maternal instinct. “She got whispered about, laughed at, teased, humiliated.”

He considered how small he could make his body to match how he was feeling.

“And she endured it in silence. The poor girl.” His mom gazed at a point off in the distance. “I did what I could, but our interference only made it worse. I was proud of her when she left. Nobody expected Emmaline Bluewater to do anything but wilt under her mother’s hand. Nobody expected her to do much of anything.”

Familiar suspicion bubbled up with its twin, regret. And yet the regret trumped suspicion as he pictured what it must have been like. “I didn’t mean for it to look like I ran from her.”

“I know. You thought of you. You were young and selfish, and the young are selfish. But that girl adored you, Bastian. Really and truly loved the air you breathed. When you left, it devastated her.” His mom continued to calmly peel the flesh from his bones as her words sank into the heart of him. “She came over here every day for a month to ask about you. Wanted to make sure you were okay. It was so obvious she wanted to ask if you’d passed on any messages, but she couldn’t bring herself. You remember that Emmaline: shy, halting, blushed if you looked directly at her.” She shrugged. The movement triggered a hacking cough, the rattling sound alarming him.

Knowing she’d only scowl if he offered help, he gripped the chair’s arms, resigned to being useless. A pattern, it seemed, with him.

Winded when the fit trailed off, Diana scratched behind her familiar’s ear. Caught her breath. When she continued, her voice was hoarse. “I know it’s hard to hear, and I don’t want to hurt you. But I want you to know, your leaving has been good for her. It got her out of her mother’s shadow, got her to experience some of the world. I even heard her giving some lip to Natalia Fieldstone at the last Equinox ball when that unpleasant woman commented on Emmaline’s hair being the color of mud.”

Bastian’s mouth made a barely there curve. “Yeah, she’s got a tongue on her now.” It was different. New. But he could admit spirit suited Emmaline.

Emma.

I’m not her, she’d cried.

And I made myself strong.

How?

“I’m glad she told you, though.” Diana reached out a hand and as if it had crossed the gap between them, Bastian felt her soothing touch across his cheek. “No marriage can be built on pretense. Truth builds; lies tear down. Now at least with the air clear, you can see what you’re left with. Build on it.”

She couldn’t know how painful her words were. The truth might have set them all free—if he was only free to share it.

For the rest of his life and his marriage, he would have to look at his wife with doubt, and she would look at him as nothing more than a spoiled, selfish kid who’d run out on her for no reason.

“You could always start giving me grandchildren,” Diana suggested, chuckling as Bastian’s face flushed with heat. “Well, she is going to be your wife,” she pointed out. “You’ll share a bed.”

Bastian studied his shoes. “We’re not talking about this.”

“Oh, come on,” she teased. “I know she isn’t a supermodel, but Emmaline is pretty in her own way.”

That wasn’t the issue here. Yes, Emma was pretty in her own way. With the long sweep of brown hair, those expressive eyes framed by dark lashes, and the slow smiles that robbed a man of his breath until he felt the only way to regain it was by stealing it from her lips.

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