Page 71 of Until the Stars Fall

Eyre frowned. “Wait, I thought you lost your magic.”

Guilt twinged through my chest, but Hannah answered before I could open my mouth.

“She had reasons for keeping it a secret,” she said, “but I think it’s okay to tell you now. She’s a powerful witch, and Beck’s been working with her on practicing her magic.”

Eyre’s jaw dropped.

“I’m sorry for not being honest. I’m not highly trained, but I’m highly motivated.”

“Yeah okay. That explains a lot.” She was silent for a moment, long enough for me to recall her conversation with Beck. What must she think of me?

“But you know,” she continued with a small smile, “you’d have to be initiated into the coven to make the magic stronger.”

My face flushed, but I pursued the idea anyway. “I’m not trying to invite myself in or anything, but I’ll do everything in my power to get Beck back in his body. Anything and everything, even if he doesn’t want me back.”

“Again, how so smart and yet so dumb?” Hannah slid something off her cutting board into the cauldron. “Surely you know the size of Beck’s heart by now. We always vote on new initiates, but I think we’ll all agree. Especially Beck, so we’ll count his vote as a ‘yea.’ We’ll talk to Zola when she gets back with the lilacs, and I know Summer’ll be okay with it.”

“I’ll feel better with the full coven, and Zola will too. This spell is high-level magic,” Eyre explained. “It calls for a double-ended tether.”

“What does that mean?” I asked. “What’s a double-ended tether?”

Before either of them could answer my question, Zola came back, rolling a cart with the final spell ingredients, and Eyre jumped up from her spot on the floor. “Did you bring me that big bag of salt?”

I repeated my question. “Hannah, what’s a double-ended tether?”

Zola looked up from handing Hannah the lilacs. “The spell calls for a double-ended tether?”

Hannah nodded, but I nearly shouted. “What is a double-ended tether?”

Zola pressed her lips together. “A tether is a person. Someone you have a spiritual connection with—an etheric cord—who can act as your anchor in the living world and bring you back. Often it’s a family member, but not always. Etheric cords are common, but those needed to act as a tether in a spell are more rare.” Her eyes slid to Hannah. “What’s the arrangement of the tether?”

Eyre paused and leaned over the book. “From the spellcaster to the spirit walker, and from the spirit walker to the trapped spirit.”

“We all love Beck. And Eyre, I know he’s like your brother. But none of the rest of us could be your tether,” Zola said. “Only one possible arrangement could work.”

Hannah’s mouth set in a determined line. “Me to Gemma, and Gemma to Beck. That’s the only way.”

Zola nodded in agreement. “But listen. Being someone’s tether, having a tether, isn’t something to take lightly. You have to trust each other implicitly, or don’t do it at all. Any one of you tugs the wrong way, not in concert with the others, and either Gemma—or Hannah and Gemma—goes barreling into the spirit world, and we can’t get any of them back, or Gemma comes out too soon, and Beck’s trapped. He could even pull you both in with him. You’ll literally have each other’s souls and lives in your hands.”

I trusted both of them with my life, my soul. Even if Beck would never forgive me.

But I turned to Hannah. “Nannapie, I don’t want to ask this of you.”

“Good thing you don’t have to ask me. I volunteer. I trust you, Gem, and I trust Beck too.”

“I’ll keep you safe, Hannah, I promise. And so will he.”

“I know, and I’ll keep y’all safe too.” She winked at me. “Let’s go get your honey back. What else do we need to do? We’re running out of time.”

Eyre glanced at her watch. “We only have three and a half hours left to prevent ourselves from crashing on Gaia, and even less time to save Beck. We’re ready here, we just have to set the ship on autopilot and get Summer for the initiation and the spell.”

Zola smiled at me, showing all her teeth. “An initiation? Does that mean what I think it means?”

I nodded. “If you’ll all have me.”

Zola crossed the room and hugged me. “We wouldn’t have it any other way.”

CHAPTER TWENTY

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