Page 53 of Big Little Spells

“It didn’t end that well,” Georgie says into her cup, earning a slightly wounded glare from Emerson.

“It didn’t go poorly. It was an important step in figuring out how to stop the flood. So really, it went great.”

Georgie still has her face in her cup, but she looks at me over the rim. “He magicked her right into Jacob’s yard, with an ancient book she could only have gotten from Frost himself, after she went charging up the hill alone without telling anyone.”

“It was before I remembered everything,” Emerson says with an injured sniff.

Georgie shakes her head. “Can you honestly say you would have acted differently if you had remembered?”

Emerson has this way of angling her chin and lowering her shoulders that is meant to look very regal, or presidential is maybe the better word.

But I always know what this look means: she’s lying.

“I can’t possibly know what I would have done in that moment if I’d remembered everything,” she says loftily. “Because I didn’t.”

Georgie smiles and raises her cup toward me, clearly well aware that Emerson is lying too.

“You two should go check in on Ellowyn once we’re allowed to leave this enduring horror,” I say. “I can take on Nicholas just fine.”

This is not true, on any level, but it’s hard to deny the fact I want to try. I need to face him down alone tonight. For...a wide variety of reasons.

You could try, he’d said to me about fighting him off.

I intend to try a lot of things.

“And if I can’t actually take him on, well, you all know exactly where I am,” I continue, channeling daisies. Maybe a little pointedly, and at my sister. “You can rush in and rescue me.”

“You know I will,” Emerson tells me fiercely.

I do know that. It’s more comforting than I want to admit.

Around eleven, the prom begins winding down. Teens are looking around for escapes, or pockets to make hiding spells that will allow them to grapple in the dark, away from prying adult eyes. For a second, I’m almost wistful for a time when that was my biggest worry—who I’d let talk me into their hiding place.

At eleven thirty precisely, the Joywood convene on stage and hold the closing ceremonies—after all, even the leaders of the witching world want to go get their adult Beltane on. There’s the normal incantation, but I look at Georgie. She’s mouthing along with every word, clearly thinking about the changes in the spell from the book.

Nicholas said it was me who had to figure out how the book could help us, but he has to be wrong. Georgie is into this stuff, and she knows it backward and forward. But her mouthing falters a little as the bow-tied teacher from before comes up to her. Sage, I remember. The man is a tweed-covered herb.

That is not nice, Rebekah, I scold myself. Georgie did not ask what you thought of this guy.

Emerson and I watch as Sage says something that makes Georgie laugh. Then bite her lip. She looks back at us.

“Go,” I say without her even having to ask. “Enjoy some bonfires.”

Sage, amazingly, blushes, even as Georgie frowns. “But Ell—”

“You know Ellowyn would be way more graphic,” I say loudly to cut her off before she can mention how sick Ellowyn felt. Because I don’t think anyone outside of our circle should know. “It is Beltane.”

Georgie nods. Then she takes Sage’s offered hand and they walk off together. I feel like if I was a decent friend, I would be more excited for Georgie that she found a guy she likes at prom, of all things. When I glance beside me, I watch Emerson frown after them. “What’s wrong?” I ask her.

“Nothing’s wrong. It’s just...” But she shakes her head and turns to me, the Emerson Wilde battle light in her eyes. “I could at least walk up with you.”

We walk with the crowd, filing out of the same exit the Joywood are herding us toward, and spinning out our spell as we go, so it should look to anyone watching us that Ellowyn, Zander, and Jacob are walking with us. I try to concentrate on maintaining the illusion and not on the fact it smells like sweat, perfume, cologne, and at least three flavors of that terrible punch.

I understand why Ellowyn thought she might be sick. I’m feeling a little queasy myself.

“You could come with me,” I say to my sister. “But why? To keep an eye on me? To ward off more adlets?”

She shudders. “Not funny.”

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