Moonset - Scott Tracey

“Are you mad?” Illana was taller than her husband, I realized. It was also clear that their marriage wasn’t full of sunshine and crossword puzzles. “You cannot bulldoze this through as you might once have, Robert.”

I started to smile. “The law is the law.”

He didn’t like that very much. “We are the law,” he replied coldly. “You are an inconvenience.”

“But the law protects me. A coven leader has the right, or rather the obligation, to lay a charge of Maleficia if he knows it has merit.” Thank god I read all those books while I was under suspension. “And the charge can’t be dropped just because you don’t like me.”

“Laws can be changed,” he said, his eyes growing more narrow by the moment.

“That’s enough, Robert,” Illana said, sounding exhausted. “The boy is right.” And then I was on the receiving end of that patented Illana Bryer death stare. “Completely inappropriate though he may be, he is also right. You cannot charge him without proving your own guilt. Any crimes he committed only occurred because he was brought to this town, and into contact with these people.”

“What say you?” Alexander asked, looking around the table. “Eventide arranged for the children to be brought here, hoping to draw the warlock out. Which they did, and with minimal casualties. Like it or not, they helped stop the warlock.” And then he waited, but no one else spoke up, no one offering a protest. “I think that’s your answer, Robert.”

Robert Cooper didn’t say anything.

“Then if we’re done here,” Quinn announced, “I’m taking my charges back home. If you plan to interrogate them, you can send someone to the house.” After a moment’s consideration, he added, “Tomorrow. After noon.”

“I’m not done yet.”

Quinn gave me a death glare of his own. “Justin.”

“No. They need to hear this.” I turned from him to address the rest of the Coven leaders.

“We’re not them. And you need to stop treating us like we are. Things need to change. We’re not Moonset the next generation.”

Illana cleared her throat. “We’ll take that under advisement. Now then, if that will be all,” she said as she indicated the door.

Quinn led us out of the office, but before I could follow after the others, a hand on my shoulder stopped me. I turned, facing Illana.

“You don’t tease the hornet’s nest as much as you destroy it, do you?”

My forehead knotted up, and I glanced back into the conference room to see him staring at the two of us. “I can see why Quinn thinks your husband’s a dick.”

There was choked laughter coming from behind me, but Illana’s face remained smooth.

“Robert may not be the most … impartial viewpoint where you all are concerned,” she said, choosing each word carefully, “but he acts as he does out of precaution.”

“We didn’t do anything wrong,” I said, exhaustion starting to settle in. I don’t know why I thought I could convince Illana, but part of me did.

Her lips thinned. “Don’t overestimate yourselves. You won two victories tonight. But along the way you broke so many rules, violated trusts, and acted completely inappropriately. In my day, children would never speak to their elders like that.”

“Maybe we’ll teach him some manners,” Quinn interjected. “We’ve got all the time in the world.”

Illana stared at me, one of those hard stares that made it impossible to look away. “Just remember something,” she said softly. “Your parents did great deeds once, too.”

Thirty-One

“You piteous wastes did not take my life. I gave it.”

Sherrod Daggett Final Words

“It’s going to take me at least an hour to wash out my hair,” Jenna said, hand on her hip. The five of us had reunited at the front of the school, staring out the glass doors. Mal’s hair was limp and hanging down over his eyes, and both Cole and Bailey looked wiped out. Bailey had been crying, and even Cole’s eyes were a little red.

But they were together. All four of my siblings. Something inside me loosened, finally seeing for myself that everyone was okay. I looked to my left, and saw that Quinn and Ash had wandered farther down the hall, giving us a moment of privacy.

“I think things are going to be different now,” I said.

Cole looked up from under his bangs. “No more secrets?”

Mal straightened. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but maybe Cole’s got a point. Remember, we’ve got to be in this together.”

Jenna shrugged, sighing. “Do we really have to get all sentimental and in touch with our emotions?”

“I think it’s a good idea,” Bailey laughed.

There was just a moment, where we were all smiling and looking at each other. Then just like that, it was over, and everyone followed in Quinn’s wake. “We’ll see,” I said.

Bailey hung back, grabbing my arm. She was worried, but serious. “It’s not over,” she said.

“What’s not over? We stopped him, Bay. Everything’s going to be okay.”

She bit her lower lip. “I know it’s my fault.” I tried to argue, but for once she didn’t back down.

“It snuck inside me, and most of the time it was like I was sleeping, but every once and awhile

I’d wake up. I could see, but I couldn’t do anything. But I saw Luca cut himself. I saw him offer the blood. One of them escaped. He’s here now.”

“Who is?”

Her eyes got wide. “The Prince.”

One of the Abyssals had escaped? My heart thudded once—hard—and dropped like there was a sudden influx of gravity. “Are you sure?”

But Bailey didn’t have time to answer. Ash suddenly appeared, and linked her arm through mine. “Come on, hero, I’ll give you a ride home.”

We caught up with the others, who were waiting at the side entrance of the school. Quinn eyed the pair of us, focusing on our entwined arms. “Follow right behind me.”

Ash rolled her eyes. “Right, like I’d kidnap him looking like this. Have you met me? I could do so much better.” Ash dragged me away, heading towards the side entrance while Quinn and

Jenna headed for the rear. She dropped her arm the moment we stepped back outside.

“Get rid of it,” she said, turning on me before the door had even finished closing. “Throw it on the roof, in the garbage, I don’t care.”

“Get rid of what?”

She stared up at me. “You know what. I don’t know when you found time to get it out of my car, but if they find it on you, you won’t get to bluff your way out of what they do to you.”

The spellbook. Of course. “I left it in your car,” I said, starting to panic. “I didn’t get a chance to sneak it away. They had someone watching us the minute we woke up.” She bit her lower lip, shaking her head. “That’s not funny, Justin. The book isn’t in there. I checked. ”

“Then you made a mistake,” I said, moving for the parking lot. Before we even crossed into the actual lot, Quinn’s black SUV approached.

He waited just ahead of us while we got into the car, and though I tried to circumspectly look for the spellbook even with him sitting right in front of us, I didn’t see any sign of it. And I couldn’t start digging under the seat until he pulled away.

“Just drive,” I said, squirming down in my seat and feeling in all the gaps between the seat and the console.

But the book wasn’t there. Neither was the bag I’d brought along with us. All of my stuff was gone. Even Quinn’s athame. “So what happened to it?” Ash said, her voice low as if Quinn would be able to hear her from fifty feet in front of us.

My fingers brushed against something, in the spot where the spellbook had been. Thin, like paper, but harder. I trapped it between two of my fingers and pulled it up. The postcard that had been left in the book.

Something about it didn’t look right. It was still the Golden Gate Bridge, with a glimpse of San

Francisco in the background. But it’s not the half of the postcard I had before. I flipped it back over. Two words were written on this half.

Well played.

Another wave of cold swept up my spine. The spellbook was gone. Bailey believed one of the

Abyssal Princes had escaped. Sooner or later Robert Cooper was going to pop back up wanting revenge. And Cullen Bridger, the last living link to Moonset, was sending me congratulations.

I glanced across the car at Ash, whose face was screwed up in concentration and exhaustion. It had been a long night, and tomorrow might be longer still.

“I think you owe me a makeup date,” I said.

THE END

About the Author

Scott Tracey (Avon Lake, Ohio) lived on a Greyhound bus for a month, wrote his illustrated autobiography at the age of six, and barely survived Catholic school. His gifts can be used for good or evil, and he strives for both for his own amusement. Witch Eyes was his debut YA novel.