“Every house is.” Aidan stepped in front of me as if he could shield me from them.
It was sweet but ridiculous. He needed my help to calm him so I placed a hand on his arm, which had his shoulders loosening and releasing part of his tension.
“So what do we do? Stand here and look pretty?” Beth raised her hands over her head, stretching again. “’Cause I’m exhausted.”
“Wolves are notoriously impatient.” The older lady chuckled behind us. “Some things never change.”
“We’ve been on the road for over twelve hours.” I glared at Beth and turned my attention to the four witches heading our way. “So please forgive us.”
“There’s nothing to forgive.” The older lady held out her hand. “I’m Olive, the head priestess of the coven.”
“Emma.” I smiled and shook her hand. Something crackled between our palms, and I jerked back.
A low growl emanated from Aidan’s throat. The two men surrounded Olive.
“What happened?” Beth glanced from me to the witch.
“I don’t know.” Was I losing my mind? “Did you feel that?”
“Feel what, dear?” Her forehead lined with worry.
“It was like a pop or sizzle when we touched.” I was sure I hadn’t imagined it. It didn’t hurt, but I hadn’t been expecting that.
Coral came over and patted me on the shoulder. “That’s how witches can identify each other if they meet in places where they can’t verbalize their connection. It’s nothing to be alarmed about, and you only feel it the first time you touch.”
“You’ve been a witch since you were a baby and didn’t know that?” The darker-haired woman stepped forward and extended her hand.
“I just recently learned I’m a witch.” I shook her hand, this time fully expecting the sizzle between us. I looked at my coven friends. “It didn’t do that when I touched you when we first met.” This didn’t make sense.
“That’s because your witch powers hadn’t been uncovered,” Amethyst explained.
“I’m Moon.” She pointed to the man with shoulder-length hair. “And that’s Jasper.” She pointed to the other man. “And Jabbar.”
I lifted my hand that held Aidan’s. “This is Aidan, and that’s my best friend, Beth.”
“We’re honored that you came here.” Moon nodded at me.
“Let’s get them inside and settled in.” Olive waved us on as she pulled out a key from her dark green dress. She moved quickly for her age, and we were in the house within moments.
Inside, it took a minute for me to comprehend what I saw. The house appeared older on the outside, but inside, it was sleek and modern. The walls were painted a light brown, and it had an open floor plan so the kitchen and den were connected. There were two large couches as well as a loveseat and recliner with a painted brown coffee table in the center. There was a large flat-screen television over the stone fireplace.
“There are only three bedrooms, so hopefully that’ll do.” Olive winced when she looked across the room.
Samuel nodded. “Yeah, it’s fine. I’ll take the couch.”
“And Amethyst and I can share a room,” Coral said as she bumped her shoulder into Amethyst.
“Okay, good.” Moon grinned.
“Will we meet the other coven members?” I was intrigued and wanted to meet everyone.
“Tomorrow.” Olive took a few steps toward the door. “It’s not safe to go out at night right now.”
“Why not?” Aidan glanced out the window as if he was expecting a threat to appear.
“Because of the wolf stalking us that we already told you about.” Jasper’s voice was deep and no louder than a whisper.
“Is that normal?” Amethyst’s purple eyes darkened.
“No, it’s not.” Olive sighed and glanced out the window. “It started recently. We can’t figure out why. They also don’t come together.”
“Has anything happened to cause it?” This story tugged at me, but I wasn’t sure why.
“Strangely enough, it was after that earthquake.” Moon pursed her lips. “That in itself was unusual. There’s no telling what kind of power was released.”
“Why do you think it was power related?” And it was very interesting, this whole story. Do you think those wolves might be The Hallowed Guild keeping an eye on the witches?
Yeah, so we need to be careful. Aidan was so tense it had to be hard for him to move.
“There was no epicenter.” Olive arched an eyebrow. “That’s a sign of magic if there ever was one.”
Unsure if we should tell her why, I decided to let my witchy friends own that decision.
“Well, times are different now.” Amethyst caught my eye. “So … there’s no telling.”
“We’ll let you get settled.” Olive motioned to the door. “Please make yourself at home. We will come by in the morning to introduce you to the others.”
“Perfect.” Amethyst smiled. “Thank you.”
The four of them headed out the door, and when it shut, the room became silent.
I looked at Amethyst. “Why aren’t we telling them everything?”
“There is a reason you’re to unite the wolves and witches.” Amethyst blew out a breath and gave me a smirk. “It’s not just the two races.”
“The divisions are within the races too.” That was new news to me. “Wow, but you guys don’t seem like enemies.”
“We aren’t, but we aren’t allies either.” Amethyst sat on the couch. “There’s a lot of mistrust, so we treat each other with honor and respect and even help at times, but we aren’t true friends.”
“How come?” Beth frowned. “I thought witches bonded over nature and some shit.”
“That’s really beautiful, Beth.” Coral snorted. “You speak so eloquently.”
“Bite me,” Beth growled.
“Do you think they might fight?” Samuel looked over at Aidan. “I’d love a good girl fight.”
Aidan didn’t bother to react. His attention was solely on the information at hand.
“The division started after the original witch. Her prophecy had the covens fighting over who was the strongest and should bear the savior. It was crazy. From what I’ve been told, witches were lining up to volunteer, or rather plead, to be the one, as if we could choose.” Amethyst’s forehead wrinkled. “It was preposterous to even consider we could decide where the marked ones were born.”
“So then what?” There had to be more to the story.
“As we told you previously, there were several marked girls before you, each one born to a different coven, which fractured us further. It was a competition.” Amethyst shrugged. “So now we all keep to ourselves and only help when needed or forced to. A witch would never turn down a request from another coven because then they would appear weak.”
“But covens don’t like asking for help because it also makes them look weak.” Aidan huffed and ran a hand down his face. “Damn, you guys are more similar to wolves than you know.”