Page 31 of Blood Coven

“And get him to fix the back door,” Azalea added as she grabbed her cloak and opened the front door.

Alone at last, Juniper took a deep breath of relief. Thankfully, her mother forgot about the extra storage under her feet, where Juniper had hidden the extra flour. In a few days’ time, she would feign its discovery, blame herself for misplacing it, and laugh at her youthful absentmindedness. She wiped her sweaty hands on her skirt, then hiked it up as she walked up the stairs to wake Matthias. By the time she finished stomping her way there, Matthias opened the door and faced her head-on.

Still exhausted from jagged rest—Juniper often heard him speaking in his sleep and his cries from the frightful nightmares that woke him—he wore only his nightclothes, his hair a matted mess. Juniper fondly recalled how he struggled to keep it from becoming an unruly mop as a child. Their mother had always kept it short to prevent tangles.

Juniper cleared her throat. “Good morning, Matthias.”

“And to you,” Matthias replied cautiously. “What are you doing at my door?”

“I need to speak to you about something. Come.” She beckoned for him to come downstairs. She moved swiftly, the house a part of her; she could navigate it blind. Matthias stomped heavily behind her.

In the kitchen, Juniper filled two bowls with oats, prepared two mugs of tea, and put out a loaf of day-old bread for them to nibble. A jar in the center of the table held fresh-made butter, one of the things Matthias splurged on when he went to the market.

After learning what their mother planned if the displacement failed, Juniper knew she needed to warn her brother. She wanted to give him the opportunity to make the right choice. Only having just gotten him back, it pained her that the information she would give him now might drive him away, but his safety was her concern. He had the right to make his own choice. Part of me hopes he will leave now and take the curse with him, as much as it will hurt. Azalea did not think him capable of living with the moon curse, but she knew people could adapt to anything.

She could stall no longer. “I must begin by stating that, in most situations, I will always side with Mama. However, watching you leave when I was a child and not understanding why my older brother and protector was abandoning me… It broke my heart. I will not lose you again, Matthias, because I love you.” Juniper spun her mug around and around in her hands. “I fear that Mama is going to do it again, only this time with Ana.”

“Ana?” Matthias’s eyebrow shot up. “But I do not even know the woman—she is not... No one can replace Riina.”

“We are not blind, we are women,” Juniper said wryly. “I want Ana to be safe from her husband, and I want you safe from heartbreak. Staying here will be the safest thing for you and for us, however—”

He cut her off before she could go on. “I do not think you need protection.”

To accent his point, Matthias looked around at the potions, poisons, and other things he did not know but suspected to be vile. He had no idea what they were used for, he simply had a bias against all things witchcraft.

Juniper couldn’t blame him, not after what witchcraft had done to him. But it is people like him—people who cannot accept that it is not all good nor all evil—who are at the root of witch burnings. Juniper stopped spinning her tea. “When you were young, Mama was ra—”

Matthias flinched. “I know, Juniper.”

“And out of that came me. Why she kept me, I will never know…but I am grateful. When you left, someone tried to burn the house down as we slept inside. I would have died had it not been for Mama. She nearly died, saving my life. People are growing braver, and there are attacks every other week—what we can do is no longer protecting us. The witch hunts around the world are inspiring people in town, and we need protection.”

“Won’t you have a Wolf?” Matthias asked.

“You need to leave Ocleau, take the moon curse, and learn to live with it. Because if you stay…” She looked down at her tea, the steam billowing before her. “Tell me the truth, Matthias, do you love Ana? Or will you be able to stick around and face Mama when she sends Ana’s husband to rip out her throat? Because Mama is going to make you watch her new pet kill Ana. To ensure your loyalty, Ana will likely be her husband’s first victim.”

Matthias’s flinch told Juniper everything she needed to know. He always did his best to conceal his secrets, but he only lasted so long before something made him spill. Juniper knew the right words to make him slip. The death of a woman he loved—or one he believed he may come to love—was the one thing that kept him up at night. Juniper heard him talking in his sleep.

She reached over and held his sturdy hands in hers. “You should leave while you still can.”

He leaned his head to the side, sadness in his gray eyes. “I can’t leave Ana or…”

“Your daughter,” Juniper whispered. He’s planning on putting his family back together with Ana in Riina’s stead.

Matthias nodded weakly. “I need the curse out of me so I can take them away from here. Please, Juniper, I beg you. Do not tell Azalea.”

“I fear for you,” she said as she got to her feet. She cast one more look at her brother before retiring to her bedroom. She could not look at him any longer; the agony ripped her apart. Either he stayed, and his life was torn to shreds, but she would have her brother back. Or he fled now, and she would never see him again.

PART III

THE WOLF

21

OCLEAU

THE YEAR OF THE CURSE

BLAEZ

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