Back in a Spell (The Witches of Thistle Grove, #3)

by Lana Harper

“So you want me to go out with the trickster god of circus and burlesque,” I said to Jessa, looking up to fix her with a flat stare, “is what you’re telling me.”

Wishing I were different, stronger, better . . . that everything was different, but in a way that would let me make peace with myself. Discover the version of me that had it in her to be happy and confident, truly at home in her own skin.

I’d spritzed myself with Tom Ford Santal Blush—the one Jessa referred to as Taylor Swift’s Blessing after she read somewhere that it was T. Swift’s favorite perfume—for

I think they host some events over at Castle Camelot, too. But fuck if I’d ever set foot on Blackmoore property, much less give those tools my money.”

And my brother really could be the most spectacular fuckweasel that way.

There was a way they could come to feel the presence of a certain special witch even from a distance. It just couldn’t possibly be happening right now, and definitely not to the two of us. It couldn’t be.

So underwater goddesses had jokes, apparently. How whimsical.

“Probably, yeah,” Gareth agreed. “Which is why I’d suggest you not say anything about it right now. Nothing at all, to anyone but me.”

Dumb idea from a dumb boy

gave a grudging nod, hating absolutely everything about this. But Gareth had a point; we couldn’t afford this kind of negative attention, not right now. Especially not as we were considering expanding Camelot again, trying to restore some of the lost dignity to our family name.

Hiding this will seem sus

“Well,” I said, drawing a deep breath. “I think whatever happened at the lake had another unintended effect. I think he and I . . . I’m fairly sure we’re witchbound, now.”

You’re in no danger from this person. He holds no power over you, nor any license to do you harm. You are who you are, and his opinion of you is not dispositive of anything.

I nodded, taking a deep breath. “Yes. I deeply regret to inform you that we are, apparently, witch married to each other now.”

I’d worn an ivory angora sweater that slipped invitingly off one shoulder—which was, now that I allowed myself to consider it, more the kind of thing you’d wear for a second date than a difficult, mind-bending conversation about magic.

Damn, Nina, not even a “please”? And yet tacking that on hadn’t even occurred to me.

She’d come here for me, and I’d never even told her what this town really was. What I was.

My family didn’t exactly excel at being that kind of considerate, especially when it came to normies.

But I left out my witch bond with Morty. It didn’t seem directly relevant to what had happened, and I had the absurd impulse to protect it—to protect him—from their scrutiny.

“By wit or by might, we take what is ours,” we both recited, in clumsy duet. I hated the motto, always had, and suspected that deep down at least, my older brother felt more or less the same. It made us sound like awful playground bullies by edict, stomping around wrenching candy out of other children’s hands.

Maybe everyone in this whole damn town wasn’t that far off about us.

No, if I managed to break this spell, Gareth and I would never even let them know how it had been done. And above all, no, I would not keep this from Emmy for a second longer. No, no, no.

“Of course it matters,” he insisted, gently but indomitably, as if the importance of my feelings were a fact as incontrovertible as the direction of the rising sun.

And somehow that feedback loop between us, me feeling my own pain mirrored and felt and affirmed by someone else, helped instead of making it worse.

“So much pain, and you just keep it locked up inside like a fucking soldier, marching on. And shit, I thought I’d had it tough.”

“Got it,” he said, closing his eyes. There was something infinitely endearing, almost tender, about his earnestness. How seriously he was taking this lesson, like the most avid student. I wouldn’t have expected teaching him to feel so . . . pure.

The swan’s tentative movements gained elegance as Morty found more purchase, a deeper confidence in his own casting. Then, the bird stretched that sinuous neck toward us, lifting its wings in a gentle flutter. Extending its head as far as it could reach, to peck the icy, avian equivalent of a kiss onto my cheek.

“Morty!” I gasped, sputtering laughter as the ice swan continued to sway its neck from side to side, pressing more kisses onto my face with its sharp little bill like some overfamiliar European relative. It even reached its glittering wings out toward me, as if for a hug. “Are you serious right now?”

The swan would not quit getting in my face no matter how I dodged its parries, and there was something both completely darling and desperately comical about its efforts to plant another smooch on me.

“Oh, it’ll bother me, no question,” he admitted with a shrug. “But it’ll also be worth it, for you to get to know them.”

“Probably a lesson in there somewhere,” Morty said, with a slantwise little glance. “Maybe something about not trying to marry people lacking in a sense of childlike wonder. Or respect for you.”

My philosophy tends to be, as long as you learn something from it, there’s not much point to regretting anything. Or anyone.”

“Turns out I can’t say no to you.”

It was falling in love; the dizzying, almost vertiginous drop of it, that initial and absolute enchantment with another person.

“You can’t,” I informed him, pressing a kiss against the warm back of his neck. “I was merely fucking with you; the glass is bespelled to stay pristine. It’s actually kind of a tricky casting, and it takes a ton of maintenance, but honestly? Worth the effort. I mean, behold that flawless view. So pure.”

“On the one hand, ravages a turkey leg and blooming onions like there’s no tomorrow. On the other, requires her windows so pristine she resorts to magic. It’s confounding.”

Whatever else Morty was going to be to me, I suddenly knew his presence in my life—his mind and heart braided with mine through the bond, his body ensconced in me—was intended to be a gift. Something to enhance, to protect, to bring joy.

Something meant to heal. And maybe, if I let myself, I could be the same for him.

The fact was, Delilah Harlow was remarkably beautiful, like the saltiest of Disney princesses. She would have been hugely appealing to me under different circumstances,

Apparently, when I wasn’t looking, my feelings about it had changed.

I’d wished for power, strength, comfort—and the goddess had granted it, by giving me the most literal version of what I’d asked for.

She’d enhanced my magic, flung open the doors to the hurricane cellar in which I kept all my locked-down emotions, and bound me to a partner who could hold me as I passed through such a blistering transformation.

I wanted it back, worse and more than I’d ever wanted anything.

books were safe from harm. “So, not just goddess-touched by Belisama, then. Much more than that.”

But I’d bet you know more than most of us do, don’t you, Nina? Considering she’s made you into a demigoddess in her own image. Turned you semidivine.”

As if I had permission to be there. As if I were one of them, at least in part. Even Morty himself had told me that I felt like one of them to him, through the bond.

And we wouldn’t even have heard of it by way of rumor, I thought hopelessly, because so few of the others talked to our family if they could help it.

“Forget,” I began, lifting my hands to cast the oblivion glamour. The words that actually emerged from my mouth sounded more like some savage echo catapulting around a mountain range, shrieking, OBLIVION.

This is a mistake

This was beyond wrong. This was terrible. I had hurt Delilah, erased her memory, possibly caused damage not even yet perceptible. And I’d done it anyway; for myself, my family, in one semi-unthinking instant.

This is why people hate you guys

He shot me a bleak, revolted look over his shoulder. “Am I going to narc on you, you mean?” he bit off, every word edged with acid. “No, I won’t be ratting you out, never fear. Wouldn’t you just hit me with a nice dose of oblivion, anyway, if I even tried?”

“Oh, is that right?” he shot back. “I think your record speaks for itself there. Besides, this is your mess, your problem—and your decision. I’m not going to be the one to take that away from you, the way your precious family is so happy to.”

“But I also won’t be part of this,” he added, thrusting an arm into his coat. “Involved in any way. I want you to shield the bond; I don’t want to feel any more of you, not until you’ve sorted your shit out. Decided who it is you actually want to be. And I don’t know how to muffle it myself.”