Page 68 of Wicked Warlock
Nova cupped his cheek for a second. “Good to see you’re finally back to being you.” She winked. “Take your time. I’m good down here for now.”
“Nova! What the hell is going on?” Liesin walked into her cave, looking more pissed off than his father. “What are they doing here?”
“None of your damn business.” She turned and smiled. “Tell the others I said hi.”
With both hands, she shoved us through the door. My body was consumed by the bright yellow light. The door slammed behind us and Nova, along with the underworld, was gone. I was yanked back and flew out of the other side into a dark cold forest. Beckett jumped to the side and caught me before I smacked into a tree.
Penny stood in the dark, just glowing a soft white light. She dusted off her pants then pulled a twig from her hair. She blew out a sharp breath. “What a ride.”
Professor Charles leaned against a tree, brushing her hands down her shirt. “Indeed.”
I flexed my fingers, feeling amazing for the first time since I’d gotten stabbed. I let my magic flow around my hands and down my body. It was like floating in a warm bath. I smiled at them. “What next?”
“Next, we get some sleep.” Beckett rolled his shoulder and cracked his neck. “And then in the morning…”
Penny chuckled. “In the morning, we join Evermore and Warwick. The way they’re meant to be.”
Chapter 33
Beckett
The sun shined down, and a cool breeze filtered through the trees. I stood at a small podium at the back of the school. The students gathered all around Penny and me. This wasn’t like the other rally we tried to have with everyone and their mother attending. It was more intimate than that, more important. We’d done what we set out to do and now it was time to tell the students.
I cleared my throat. “I’d like to thank you all for coming here today. A lot has changed over the past few days. The council is no more.”
A rumble of voices went through the crowd and everyone stood there staring at me. They whispered to each other, cupping their hands over their mouths and leaning in closer to gossip. I cleared my throat again, getting their attention. “I know there has been rumors that Evermore attacked Warwick and some of the heirs did not survive. We lost our home and everything we had. But it’s simply not true.”
I held up my hands and two portals opened on either side of me. They glowed a bright blue that matched my excitement and the color of the sky. Cross stepped through covered in weapons and his eyes glowing gold. Ophelia followed behind him, strolling out in her leather pants, leather jacket, and faux-hawk braid down the center of her head. She too had weapons draped around her body and a potion pouch strapped around her hips. From the other portal, Logan stepped out with his blond hair falling into his face and down to his chin. I wasn’t used to this rugged side of him or the way he now dressed. Gone was the preppy, clean rich boy. Now he was there in dark jeans and a dark button-down shirt that wasn’t tucked in and was open at the collar. He had his sleeves rolled up to his elbows and a sword strapped to his back.
The crowd all hissed in shocked breaths.
“As you can see—”
They grew even louder when a cloud of neon green smoke billowed out and tarot cards flew through the air. Maze sauntered right up next to me. I covered the microphone with my hand. “Good of you to be here, man. I know you’re trying to keep an eye on Tilly.”
“I wouldn’t have missed it.”
I uncovered the microphone. “As you can see, we are all still very much alive. And with a new addition. You all know Astrid Lockwood as the fifth and final heir for us warlock. But what you don’t know is Astrid is the sixth queen of Evermore.”
“That’s not possible,” a boy called out from the back of the crowd.
Penny stepped up to the microphone. “I can assure you that it is. We were once united as one, with six queens, one for each cast of magic. We weren’t always warlocks. We weren’t always separated into houses. We were once as one, under the occult cast, and there was one queen. I know this to be true because I was there. I know this to be true because I was that sixth queen.”
They all sucked in shocked breaths and silence fell over the crowd as they stared up at us. A shimmery effect opened right beside me, and Astrid stepped out of her own portal. Her long dark red hair glowed with golden smoke. Her cheeks were pink and healthy. She smiled up at me and for a moment I thought the sun spotlighted only on her.
“Did I miss it? Am I late?”
The crowd erupted into cheers, whistles, and claps. Her cheeks turned even darker and she gave them all a little wave. I wanted to drag her to my side to kiss the hell out of her in front of them all, but instead I kept my cool. “It has been our mission to rejoin Evermore and to stop segregating ourselves. And that starts with us. We need to rejoin the schools. We need to take our rightful place among the higher powers and we need to do it now. Matteaus warned us that there is something on the horizon. Something that’s going to jeopardize life as we know it on this planet. Without all of us standing together, we will fail. We have banded together to try to stop this. And now we are asking you, will you join us? Will you move to Evermore Academy and take the first step in combining our worlds and bring it back the way it’s meant to be?”
There was a beat of silence and then cheers erupted in the middle of the campus. Astrid leaned into my side. “I think the wing is completely ready for them all to move in.”
“You worked your magic?”
“Nothing a little manifesting can’t handle. There’s room for them all at Evermore, and the abandoned wing, where the warlocks used to be, is now ready to welcome them back.” She winked. “It’s kind of good to be queen.”
I stepped up the microphone once more. “The portals will be open all day for you to move your things to Evermore. Professor Charles will be waiting on the other side to tell you all where to go.”
When all the students began to run around the campus back to their houses to collect their things, I stood shoulder to shoulder with the heirs—my family, the ones who I started this journey with.
