Page 8 of Snips, Snails and Werewolf Tails

ELSPETH

When I walk into the coven building two days later, Blair, Sybil, and Isla are hard at work trying to try ease tensions between the vampires and the werewolves.

"I've asked the Fae to try and smooth things over and intervene," Sybil says as soon as I walk through the door. "But even the Fae Queen thinks this situation has escalated too far."

"It's harder stuffing the cat back into the bag once you've let it out," Isla says.

All three of them look stressed and I know this is partially my fault. It was my texts that set things off. I was only trying to give the coven a heads-up about Lucian's warning, but when Sybil fact-checked the threat with Mickael, it set him off and things blew up from there.

"This is such a mess." Blair shakes her head and rolls her eyes at the same time with a healthy dose of dissatisfaction. "This is exactly why playing with wolves is a bad idea."

"Who said anyone was playing with wolves?" Isla asks.

Blair shoots a look in my direction, and I pretend to ignore her. I am trying to stay out of the conversation as much as possible, but the three of them must notice that I'm acting strange.

"What is going on with you?" Sybil asks. She's staring at me, which makes the other two stop and look at me as well.

"Nothing," I lie. "I'm fine."

"We can all clearly see that something is up with you," Blair says. "You might as well fess up and tell us what it is before we have to pull it out of you." Blair would have made a really good school bully. She has all the defining features of one—no sense of pity, no fear of offending anyone, and enough powerful magic to back her words up without breaking a sweat.

For a second, I hesitate, knowing that once I tell them about Lucian, there's no going back. Still, Ineedto be honest with the sisterhood, especially now that things are so turbulent between two of the factions that the coven is responsible for protecting.

"Fine." I sigh and tell them that I distracted Lucian and prevented the coven from hearing about the threat right away.

I expect them to be mad at me for keeping all of this from them and being naïve. But I don't expect the stiff warning all three of them say simultaneously.

"You need to stayfaraway from the werewolf alpha," Sybil says with uncharacteristic severity. "Clearly you like him, but we all only learned how to weave our emotions into our magic last year. Getting involved with him has already come back to bite you in the ass."

"Who said I wassmitten?" I bark at her in annoyance.

"Oh please," Blair says with an overly dramatic roll of her eyes. "We can see it all over your face."

I instinctively lift my hand and press my palm to my cheek, as if to cover the emotions flushing my skin. Blair's reaction is proof that my coven sisters think I'm weak. They came around to the idea of Sybil bonding with a Fae, but they won't let me see a werewolf because they don't trust me to control myself. They don't trust that I'll be able to handle my magic once my emotions are involved.

"Well, since you all seem to know better than me," I hiss at the three of them at once, "I'll leave you to figure out how to handle the current situation."

I spin around on my heels and leave.

"Where are you going?" Sybil shouts after me. "You can't just set a fire and then walk away and leave it to burn."

"Oh, I'msurethe coven doesn't need me to put out this little brushfire," I say spitefully over my shoulder. "And I have some of my own work to do."

I can almost hear their silent thoughts as I leave, questioning what work I might have, and I am happy to let them continue wondering. I don't feel like sharing any more information with them when they make it clear with nearly every word that they don't see me as their equal. Idon'tneed my hand held. In fact, I'm better off on my own.

I go back to my apartment and head straight out to my garden to collect a few necessary ingredients. I am going to use my own magic to quell the tensions between the werewolves and the vampires. I have someverypotent herbs and flowers in my garden, and the few grimoires on my bookshelf are more likely to house recipes for potent concoctions.

When I get back inside, I reach for one of the spell books that I know has a potion to subdue aggression. The potion itself is made from rose petals, valerian root, and lemon balm, and bound with a few household ingredients. But as I go out into my garden to pinch off the reagents that I need, I happen to walk past the wolfsbane. It's not abadidea to have a few buds of it on my person, especially when I am considering doing something as brazen as marching straight into the werewolf pack territory on my own.

I reach down and pinch off a few buds to tuck them into my bodice. Then, I work on the potion. When it's finished, and I've chanted the incantation, I pour the tonic into a small bottle and place it carefully into my pocket. Then I head toward Back Bay, where the werewolves live.

I find the entrance to the den where Lucian and his highest-ranking pack members can usually be found right behind cafes. It's entirely hidden from sight. My sisterhood would definitelynotapprove of me going there.

I trip on the steep, narrow staircase leading to the door, and have only just lifted my hand to knock when the door opens.

I come face to face with a werewolf I have never seen before. He looks back at me with startled yellow eyes that glow in the dim shadow of the doorway. I open my mouth to say something, but I'm not quite sure how to introduce myself.

"Uh, I'm—" Thankfully, I don't need to finish my sentence because the shifter steps aside and I see Lucian standing behind him.

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