Page 112 of Truly Madly Magically

It’s a price worth paying if I get him. If I get us. All of this life, all of this love. This is worth paying for.

There’s more cost to come though, because that great toll rings out across the witching world once again.

“Joywood. Riverwood.” She seems louder tonight. Deeper, somehow, as if she’s made her way into my bones. “Come before the Undine for your final trial.”

We all look around at each other, in the shadow of the redbud trees and the gravestones of our ancestors. Everyone looks as exhausted as I feel. Hurt and injured. So much energy used for the ritual, for finding me, saving us.

Of course she calls us in now.

I’m surprised she didn’t call while I was stuck in a fire. If she had, maybe that pull would have saved me so I didn’t have to lose my ghosts.

I won’t let myself believe they’re lost. I sent them back. They’ll recover. They’ll be back, and maybe it won’t ever be like it’s been. Maybe it shouldn’t be, because Zander and I have to be just us, surely. We have the baby on the way.

Five is definitely a crowd. Like back in that linen closet, a thousand lifetimes and not that many weeks ago.

But Elizabeth and Zachariah changed the course of my life.

Our lives.

I won’t forget that. Ever.

“We’ll handle finishing and distributing the cure,” Maureen says. She puts her hand on Jacob and gives him a squeeze that has a little of the color seeping back into his complexion. “We’ll be there soon. Be well, Riverwood coven. Be strong.”

I help Zander to his feet. Emerson doesn’t help Jacob rise so much as hug him, hard, when he does. Frost and Rebekah stand with Georgie, and we are us again. The Riverwood, and this might be our last stand, but we’ll do it together.

So we let the Undine tug us across the river to face the evil bastards who tried to kill us once tonight already.

27

THE JOYWOOD, NATURALLY, look resplendent.

Again, like they knew. Certainly not like they’ve been engaging in trying to kill me by fire. Though Happy Ambrose Ford, their crusty Historian, seems to be missing. I wonder if he was the one wielding Skip, the dark blood magic demon weasel, to attempt to kill me.

And I have no doubt it was the Skipweasel whose dark, ugly magic was all over me before the fire took hold. At least I can remember him—for the moment.

Rebekah tries to glamour us up a bit, but the ritual took a lot out of her too, so really, what we have going for us is that our clothes are now clean and Zander doesn’t look quite like he’s been recently burnt to a crisp. Only a little singed around the edges.

I can tell he’s still hurting, and yet I have to put that away and focus on this trial. Meanwhile I hurt too, and miss Elizabeth and Zachariah like phantom limbs.

They are back on the other side where they belong, I remind myself. Fiercely.

Because this last trial, only an hour before the clock turns over to Samhain, is ours and ours alone.

It has to be.

We can handle it. We’ve come this far already. No number of assassination attempts from the Joywood has taken us out yet. I chant this to myself again and again as the local crowd takes their seats on the grass in the dark.

The Joywood don’t look surprised to see me, whole and here, but I hope that faint twitch in Carol’s right eye has something to do with the fact that I just won’t go away.

Ever, I think, staring right at her.

The Undine’s eyes shine brighter than ever as she stands before us, but before she begins to the lay out the trial the way she has in the past, Carol strides forward.

“Before we can engage in the trial, we must address a horrible tragedy that has occurred at the hands of the Riverwood.” She really says that. With her whole chest and her mouth set in that brave way she uses when she’s being the most evil.

We all stare at each other, because...what? We just fought them off. There was fire and oily black magic and they’re accusing us of something?

Emerson looks as if she wants to argue, but even she can’t seem to find the words.

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