Page 72 of Summertime Hexy
“No,” I admit. “I want you to stop punishing yourself for doing itrightthe first time.”
She scowls, but it doesn’t land.
We’re both too tired to pretend we’re not scared.
Footsteps crunch softly behind us—Thorn, with a weathered satchel slung across his chest, followed by Milo balancing a ceramic bowl in both hands like it contains the fate of the universe.
Because, in a way, it does.
Thorn opens the satchel and pulls out ritual components with a kind of reverence that only someone old and half-made of myth can manage: a jagged silver dagger wrapped in red silk, a vial of moon oil, a length of black thread wound with copper, and four polished stones—each one pulsing faintly with residual magic.
“The Grove will remember this,” Thorn says, kneeling beside Hazel. “What we seal tonight must be born of more than power. It needs something real.”
“Love,” Milo says quietly. “It needs love.”
Hazel’s hand curls into a fist.
I step closer to her. “We have that.”
She swallows hard. “Yeah,” she says. “We do.”
We arrange the stones at the cardinal points, each tied to one of us. Milo’s hands shake as he presses his stone into the dirt. Thorn moves like wind and ritual memory. I grip my own so tightly my palm aches.
Hazel presses hers in last.
Then she reaches for the thread, fingers trembling.
“We bind this Grove,” she says softly, repeating the rite. “In blood. In love. In truth.”
Her voice catches.
I kneel beside her. “We don’t have to rush.”
She shakes her head. “No. I need to do this before I fall apart.”
Thorn draws a deep breath. “The circle is complete.”
The wind stirs around us, slow and deliberate, curling through the trees and lifting the candle flames. The salt glows faintly blue. The ley lines beneath us shiver, humming low, like they’re waiting.
Milo starts the chant, his voice soft, steady, younger than it should be for this kind of magic.
Then Thorn joins.
Then me.
Hazel doesn’t speak right away.
Her eyes flick to mine.
And in that second, I seeeverything.
The fear.
The love.
The need to believe she’s enough.
She lifts her hand, blade glinting.
