18. Lorin

Chapter eighteen

Lorin

G oing to town for that long was exhausting.

Lorin definitely felt like his battery had been drained by the end of it, but he'd also felt a weird sense of fullness too as they traveled back to the cabin. Kit had shifted in the car, curling up to nap against his thigh like he was dead tired too.

Glenn had demanded Lorin's number after he'd finished helping them load the back of Lorin's grandma's car up, and Lorin, for once, couldn't see why he shouldn't give it.

Even the bitchy café lady hadn't been enough to break his stride. Whereas before he might have agonized over it for days to come, hiding away to avoid the situation happening again or having to think about her words, this time it didn't seem that huge. Not only was he feeling more comfortable, it seemed like that had reflected outward to others. Like Millie.

He was finding a peace within himself that he'd fought his entire life for.

It was five in the morning the next day when he received a call that made him forget that peace for a moment. Still half-asleep, he answered it, only to hear Glenn's cheery voice down the line. Lorin hung up with a groan and rolled back over on the sofa to spoon Kit's fluffy form.

Glenn got better at calling at a more reasonable hour after that, and a few days later Lorin wasn't surprised to find Glenn stopping by for a cup of tea, or calling for a chat just to catch up. Kit seemed to like his presence too, and that of his familiar, his vocabulary expanding piece by piece to include new words of simple syllables to communicate with them.

Pretty soon his grandma wasn't the only one Lorin thought of to ask for a ride into town. He still had some items on the list for the cabin, and he hadn't been able to return the books he'd borrowed yet. Glenn had agreed without question since he was closer than his grandma and didn't have to double back the way she did. Lorin was really going to have to look into getting a car for himself at some point.

Glenn picked up Lorin and a shifted Kit that morning, dressed in his new clothes and shoes, and drove them straight to the library, following them inside.

"If it isn't the mystery book man!" Stella appeared from behind them, rounding the counter and placing herself at the computer, her smile wide and welcoming. "And you brought friends."

"Mystery book man?" Glenn asked.

"He keeps checking out books we don't have in the system," she said. "I have zero clue where he finds them."

"So word didn't get out yet?" Glenn said to Lorin with a laugh.

Lorin shrugged sheepishly. "I don't really talk to anyone. My grandma isn't a gossiper either."

Stella tilted her head to the side. "Word about what?"

Glenn looked at Lorin, not saying a word. He was leaving the decision to him, which he appreciated, but if he wanted to know more about his powers then he'd have to clue people in to what they were.

There really was no way around it.

"I, um…" He scuffed the toe of his boot against the marble floor. "Apparently I'm a pathfinder."

The silence that descended upon them after he said those words was louder than any scream Lorin had ever heard. He swore he could hear the blood rushing through his veins with how still and silent everything around them went.

He looked at Kit, who shuffled closer and looked at Stella suspiciously.

It made all the difference in the world to Lorin just to feel him close. Warm and solid. Muscles tense and body taut. Like he was ready to pounce on anyone who even looked at Lorin weird.

But there was nothing weird on Stella's face. Her smile widened and her eyes sparkled with curiosity and excitement. All things positive. All things Lorin could recognize and handle.

"A pathfinder! How did I not put it together?" she exclaimed, breaking the silence. "I guess since we haven't had one in our community for ages, it just didn't register right away! Oh stars and skies, this is the best news ever!"

She whipped around and opened a drawer, rummaging through it for a moment before she resurfaced with a tiny wooden box in her hand.

"This belongs to you, I think." She presented the box to Lorin with a little flourish.

"Me?" Lorin asked, wrapping his fingers around the box and pulling it closer.

"Every magical community has one," she said. "It belongs to a pathfinder. Either one that lives in their community, or one that comes for a visit. Open it."

He held his breath as he popped the lid open and found a brass key resting against a dark blue cushion.

"Key," Kit managed helpfully.

Lorin couldn't even be happy about his progress with another word. All he could feel was building panic. "To where?"

"That's for you to find out." She looked around the library. "You're the pathfinder."

"Very new," Lorin choked. "Practically an infant. Like a sprout of a pathfinder."

She smiled and placed the key in his hand. "But able to see things we can't. No one else can find the entrance."

"Great…"

"Fun!" Kit exclaimed, his hoarse voice still managing to sound excited. He tugged on Lorin's arm to coax him to move.

Lorin allowed himself to be pulled but still protested, "I don't know what I'm looking for!"

"Door," Kit said with a roll of his eyes.

"He's not wrong," Glenn called after them. "I'll stay here with Stella. You two have fun! Don't just make out in the stacks!"

Lorin's entire face flushed brilliant pink. "We don't do that!"

"Yes," Kit said, and Lorin could see it on his face, the abrupt change in his priorities as he started, dragging him with more force all of a sudden. "Do…that."

"Oral history is usually the best spot," Stella called out.

It was like she and Glenn were made for each other, snipped from the same aggravating cloth.

"Tha-nks," Kit called back, as loudly as he could manage, voice breaking in the middle but showing no signs that it hurt him.

Lorin was caught in a whirlwind, whisked through the stacks toward the very back of the library. Oral history was a dark and secluded spot under the balcony of the upper floor, completely removed from most of the rest of the library. He'd heard rumors back when he was young about kids making out back here, but he hadn't actually thought they held any truth. Whenever he was in here, it was always just to read alone.

As Kit pushed his back flat against the stack and caged him in, he reconsidered that. He blinked down at Kit's amber eyes, the brightest thing in the dark, lined with feathered lashes. His heart pounded.

"We're supposed to be searching," Lorin said, his voice a whisper not just because they were in a library. He couldn't take his eyes off Kit's mouth. Kissing Kit hadn't been far away from his thoughts since that first time, but the timing was always off. They always had shifting troubles, or magic building, or cabin chores, or Glenn dropping by, or secret keys to unknown places turning up. Life was full and Lorin wasn't entirely sure how to carve out time for this, too unused to it.

Lorin did have some experience. It had been few and far between, but it was there. What he didn't have experience in was this. The softer, slower stuff. The relationship part.

Kit didn't appear to have the same problem. Lorin didn't know whether that was because he'd been in relationships before, or if it just came naturally to him, but once he'd thought about it he couldn't stop.

"Do you pin every boy to the stacks to try and kiss them?" he found himself asking.

Kit smiled slowly and shook his head the tiniest bit. He leaned closer, sliding his arms around Lorin's shoulders to rest all his weight on him as their faces came closer. Lorin's hands found their way to Kit's hips naturally, sneaking under his soft sweater, the left one still holding the key.

"Mate," Kit said.

Just one simple word to clear up any doubt.

Lorin leaned in to kiss the word from his lips. To taste it on his tongue. Whether Kit had done this with anyone else before was irrelevant. It was just them now. Mated. Bonded. What did anything else matter?

Kit kissed back enthusiastically, winding his fingers through Lorin's hair and making pleased noises in the back of his throat as he chased Lorin's tongue around like it was a game.

Lorin began to feel lightheaded and giddy, wanting to laugh at how young this made him feel. His teenage years had been lost to tumultuous seas, but this felt like he was capturing some of that back. He didn't care if they got caught or if Glenn and Stella knew.

Lorin's right hand climbed Kit's spine under his sweater, feeling scalding skin against his palm. He was kissing Kit so hard he had him bent over backward, with Kit wrapping a leg around his hip to help steady him and keep Lorin close.

They stumbled, hitting the opposite wall without their mouths separating. Now that the beast had been unleashed, neither one of them seemed able to stop it. Or maybe it was that neither of them wanted to.

Lorin braced them with his left hand, the key still held loosely between his finger and thumb.

He felt a sudden jolt move through him, like touching a live wire, and Kit shuddered against him in response. A feeling of weightlessness joined the sensation and had him opening his eyes just in time to see the world tilt and Kit's eyes spring open in shock.

That was all the warning they got before the wall they had been kissing against swung inward, sending them crashing to the floor.

Lorin did his best to save them, but all he could do was cradle the back of Kit's head as they hit the floor with a thump . They both wheezed, getting their bearings for a second.

Lorin curled his body back up, trying to take some of his weight off Kit. "Are you okay?"

Kit nodded, looking no worse for wear, his mouth red, pout swollen from Lorin's vigorous attention.

Lorin flushed, trying not to get distracted. He looked around them and saw that they'd fallen into a room that looked like it belonged in a museum. Tomes and scrolls filled every surface and bookshelf, writings and symbols all over the walls. Sconces were already lit up with blue flames.

"I think…we found the pathfinder room."

Kit frowned, doing his best to look around from his spot, trying to view it all upside down. "Key?"

"I guess it didn't need to actually go into a lock."

Lorin straightened up, gripping Kit's hand to help him back to his feet too. They stood side by side in a room that Lorin felt strangely possessive over the moment he laid eyes on it. It felt like it was a part of him, somehow. Like it belonged to him. It was calling out to him, beckoning him deeper inside, glimmering before his eyes like a treasure chest. He was taking steps farther in before he realized what he was doing.

His steps were quiet, barely audible despite the floorboards looking old and worn. He felt movement behind him, but he couldn't force himself to turn around and check what it was. All he could do was stare at the space in front of him and revel in how right it felt to be there.

Nothing had ever felt like it belonged to him instantly except Kit. And now this room.

He found himself in the middle of it, surrounded by countless books and scrolls, and felt his ears ring with potential.

There was so much information held there. So much to explore and learn. He hadn't known there was a hunger inside him that yearned for that. He hadn't thought he'd ever be the witch eager to mold himself into his calling, but learning he was a pathfinder had lit a spark of potential. It had piqued his curiosity. Given him a small sense of direction.

This…

This was solidifying it. This was the core of him. This was who he was meant to be.

He heard footsteps behind him again, but he couldn't focus on them. Voices he recognized as Glenn's and Stella's. They were whispering, sounding awed, but Lorin wasn't there fully. He wasn't in the room completely.

He walked between shelves, touching the spines of books. They tingled under his fingertips. The marks on his nails and fingers darkened right before his eyes. They spread.

They covered the exposed skin and reached toward the back of his hand. There was a hum in the air. A breeze in his hair he was sure wasn't really present in the room with them. There was a taste of ozone and electricity on his tongue, and all of his senses ran wild with the notion that he had finally found his place.

A hand wrapped around his own.

He looked to the side and found Kit standing next to him. In the middle of the pathfinder's room. Lorin's room.

A circle complete.

Kit smiled at him, proud and sincere, and Lorin felt the need to just make the world perfect for him. There was a drive inside him to use his newfound resources to give Kit his shift back. He pushed all of his magic into the feeling, pushed all the power he had access to into the need to find the right answer.

He didn't know exactly what he was doing, but it felt right. It felt like something inside him knew. Sparks flew where his skin was brushing against Kit's. The magical exchange between them burned bright and Lorin leaned into it.

It was all for Kit.

He had to do it for Kit.

He closed his eyes at the sensation, feeling it burn through his veins until it moved him forward as if he were a puppet. Kit trailed after him because Lorin refused to let go of his hand. He felt like it would break whatever trance he'd managed to put himself in if Kit wasn't touching him.

He walked between rows, between shelves, deeper into the room, feeling like it had no ending. Like it would keep stretching and growing until he found what he was looking for.

And then the same driving force froze him in place. Glued him to the floor. Made him turn his head toward the shelf where the dark purple spine of a book glowed in front of his eyes, calling to him, leading him on, urging him to take it.

He reached out and plucked it off the shelf, gasping when he saw the cover image. It was so familiar. He had seen that exact same image before in flashes, as hazy memories while he floated in ice-cold water.

Plucked from Kit's past.

A circle of witches staring at a half person, half animal in the middle of it. Their faces ugly and angry. Their hands threatening as they reached for the shifter.

He clutched the book tight in his hands, and just like that, the sensation that had been pulling him toward it was gone.

It was just him and the answers he was looking for held between his fingers.

He'd found it. The pathfinder inside him knew. And for once, Lorin chose to trust himself.

Kit

Kit recoiled from the picture on the book's cover, hissing as a flood of memories surfaced in his mind.

Pain.

Humiliation.

Anger.

Lorin's eyes, backlit by the overwhelming magic racing through his body right now, moved to him. The dark brown he'd come to know was now a burnt honey color, and even though he trusted Lorin implicitly, that book's presence made him wary. He couldn't help the pure animal instinct to run from the room. Get out. Find a cave and curl up like he'd done on the night he'd escaped, exhausted and dirty.

He took a step back, whimpering.

Lorin dropped the book to the ground and closed the distance between them, taking him in his arms and holding the back of his head. Kit did his best to breathe, his eyes on the book on the floor over Lorin's shoulder even as he buried his nose and mouth in Lorin's sweater. His scent was the same.

"It's okay," Lorin murmured, hushing and soothing him. "You're safe."

"Coven," Kit whispered into the hot fabric in front of his lips. His fingers came up to grip the hem of Lorin's sweater desperately. "Coven—"

"I know," Lorin cut him off softly, holding his head tighter and squeezing him closer with an arm around his waist. "I saw it when we shared memories. It's just a book. They're not here, I promise."

"Why?" Kit asked, frustrated by his limited vocabulary but trying his best to try and get the answers he needed. "Why here?"

Why is a book from that coven in here? Do the pathfinders know something about it? Why haven't they done anything?

Lorin understood without the extra words. "I don't know…"

"Guys?" Glenn called in concern, his footsteps moving closer. "Everything all right?"

Lorin pulled his head back and coaxed Kit's face up to his so he could look down at him. He traced over his features for a moment, a thumb moving to stroke his cheek. "Are you okay? We can leave."

Kit leaned into the calming touch, feeling his heartbeat start to slow. He took a deep breath and then shook his head the tiniest increment. "Stay."

Lorin's brows pinched, his eyes fading to his natural color again. "Are you sure?"

Kit nodded, eyes straying to the book again and then narrowing. "Answers."

Lorin nodded back. "Answers."

He placed a small kiss on Kit's temple before letting him go, picking up the book again and dusting it off before cracking the pages open. His eyes lit up brighter.

"There you are," Glenn said, rounding the corner. "You know, this place is bigger than it looks at first glance."

Kit sent him a wan smile, folding his arms over his chest.

Glenn noticed. "What's up Kitty Kat? Why the long face?"

Kit said nothing, just looked over at Lorin. Glenn followed his gaze, his eyebrows winging up in the corner of Kit's vision. "Wow. The new digs came with new contacts? Talk about perks of the job."

Lorin sent Glenn a glowing glare. "I think I found a coven book from the people who trapped Kit."

Glenn sobered completely. "What can I do to help?"

"Call my grandma? And maybe make sure no one else comes in?"

Glenn nodded. "On it. I'll ask Stella to close the library for a while."

They watched him leave before Lorin wandered closer to Kit. "Let's go find a table."

Kit nodded and they found a heavy wooden one at the center of the room, with two chairs carved with vine designs. Lorin carefully pushed some scrolls aside and laid the book between them, even though Kit couldn't see what Lorin could.

It felt nice to be included though, since this was his life.

Lorin began reading, flipping through the pages. His frown grew and deepened, his mouth turning down as his gaze moved over invisible words. His fingers shaped what had to be symbols or drawings, tracing their lines.

Kit followed their path, trying to draw the lines in his mind's eye, envisioning gruesome shapes and jagged nightmares splintered into fragments across the pages.

There was a sense of evil emanating from the book itself, and Kit didn't think he was just imagining it. He almost didn't want Lorin reading or touching it. But if it held the secret to his shift…

Lorin's soft inhale had Kit's eyes snapping back up to his face. It was a sea of emotion. Triumph. Disgust. Apprehension.

Kit soaked in all of it, shaking from anxiety. "What?"

"I found it," Lorin breathed.

Kit looked back at the book that Lorin was now white-knuckling. The blank pages mocked him.

Kit laid a hand on Lorin's wrist. "Read."

Lorin gave him a worried look, then set his jaw and took a deep breath. "The entries start with the idea. It goes back centuries, when a witch realized that a shifter-familiar bond was more powerful than a regular familiar one."

"Power?"

It was laughable and oh so expected. Of course it was power. When wasn't it when it came to victimizing others?

Lorin nodded and he forced the next words out. "The idea was formed to trap shifters in their animal shapes, so they'd be easier to contain and control while they forced the familiar bond on them. They state that the bond was easier to force when they were animals too. That they had less resistance of mind."

Kit felt sick to his stomach, pushing back from the table to get up and pace.

"Kit…" Lorin abandoned the book and followed him. He grasped his hand to stop him, linking their fingers.

"Unfair," Kit said, his voice coming out warbly with emotion. His eyes were wet, but he didn't let the tears fall.

How many had they done this to? Taken mates and family from? Forced to live shifted for the rest of their lives while they drained them of their power?

Unfair was the simplest word to describe it.

Lorin swallowed, his own eyes looking a little shiny. "I know it is. I'm sorry this happened to you. To everyone they took."

"Don't know…" Kit said sadly, his hands shaking. He didn't know how many. Even if they tried to help, he had no idea how many had lived this nightmare.

What if someone got left behind? What if someone had slipped through the cracks and spent their entire lives trapped like that?

"We'll find out," Lorin told him. "Together."

"And you'll have support from the elders." Lorin's grandma walked in, her staff clicking on the wooden floor as she approached. Glenn was close on her heels, dragging two more chairs after him.

"Grandma…" Lorin started as she settled into a chair between Lorin and Kit, leaning as close as she could, her eyebrows pinched and her expression somber.

"Fill me in?"

Kit listened as Lorin did as he was asked, wishing they could see what Lorin was seeing, because he knew firsthand what those words looked like in real life. He knew what they'd see if they could. The pain on the shifters' faces as the ritual took their very essence away from them. He wished she could see the evil on the coven's face as they subjected someone to a lifetime of enslavement.

Lorin shared as much detail as he could, reading the entirety of what the book said about that specific ritual, listing the ingredients and incantations, all the way down to describing the illustration with as much precision as he could muster.

With each word he said, Kit saw Lorin's grandma's face pinch tighter, her fingers curling around her staff until her knuckles were white. Her lips flattened into a thin line of disapproval and Kit knew her just well enough to recognize that she was seething. She was enraged.

"Barbaric," she hissed through her teeth. "This isn't what magic is for. This isn't how it's used. It's a perversion of it to the highest degree."

"I've never heard of anything like this," Glenn said, holding a hand over his mouth as if he'd be sick. Kit felt very similar. His stomach was turning and his entire body was covered in a thin layer of sweat.

It was like being there all over again. Separated from his skulk. Alone and captive with no way to escape.

"And it's best that nobody ever does," Lorin's grandma said. "This is one of the most vile things I have ever encountered. The mere idea of it should be left to fade into obscurity. There will be no more of this if I and the other elders have anything to say about it."

"And you do?" Kit asked.

"Oh, sweet child," she said. "Of course we do. This room is filled with the proof of that. Pathfinders are the key and the lock to things that should never see the light of day again. And for those who cross the line, the punishment is Binding."

Glenn gasped, and Kit and Lorin snapped their heads around to look at him. He looked as green as his sweater, his pupils blown out wide.

"Binding?" Lorin asked. It was clear he hadn't heard of it before.

"Their magic is locked away," Glenn explained, taking a deep breath. "It's torture. Like what they did to Kit, but more severe. Painful. It can drive you out of your mind, have you crawling in your skin. What they're doing to the shifters would be a blessing in comparison. It's only used in the most extreme circumstances. For the highest violations."

Kit inhaled sharply and looked at Grandma's stony gaze. She didn't look self-righteous or vengeful. In fact, she looked like she would rather do anything else, but was resolved. "It's what must be done."

"You weren't going to offer it to me?" Lorin asked suddenly. "When I asked for my magic to be taken away."

"I was going to find any other way," she said, her face twisting uncomfortably at the very thought. "Never that."

They shared a moment before Lorin nodded resolutely. The simple "Thank you" he uttered said more than Kit or Glenn could parse out.

When the moment passed, Kit turned to Lorin, the growing despair and terror in his chest shifting to carry a hint of hope. Of possibility. They could lock them away for good. They could really end it.

Lorin looked back at him with a determination Kit couldn't help but feel rush through him like a river. "I will do anything for you. We will stop this."

"Does it say how?" Grandma asked, gesturing to the book.

Lorin pushed his chair back from the table slightly and pulled Kit into his lap before he turned back to the book—a solid reassurance. Even in his human form Kit still fit there perfectly, so he curled up, nose in Lorin's neck as he listened to him flip the pages, looking for more information. He could almost convince himself they were back in the cabin, when things had seemed simpler.

No one spoke as they waited. Glenn left once to grab some water for them and check in with Stella. Lorin's grandma seemed to be meditating, staring into the middle distance with both hands clutching her staff.

"It looks like we were right about what helps," Lorin said finally.

Kit jerked his head up as his heart jumped, narrowly avoiding knocking Lorin in the chin. "Right?"

"Magic," Lorin said. "My magic being shared with you is what counters the ritual done on you. According to this, the ritual has to be repeated occasionally to…to stop the shifter from gaining control of the shift again."

"What happens if it's not repeated?" Glenn asked.

"The magic shared with the shifter breaks the binds eventually," Lorin read out. "The shifter gains control of their shift again. They stop being a familiar."

"No!" Kit gasped, the words registering in his mind like the worst curse he had ever heard.

He just wanted to be himself again. He didn't want to not be Lorin's. That wasn't what this was about at all. He gripped Lorin's shirt, shaking his head and pleading with his eyes.

"I don't think that will happen to us, Kit. I wasn't the one forcing this on you. You sought me out yourself. Your fox is my familiar with no outside interference," Lorin assured him.

Kit deflated, allowing himself a hint of relief.

"But—" Lorin continued, and Kit tensed again. "—even if it did break the familiar bond, I'm still your mate. You're still mine, Kit. Always mine."

"Yours," Kit repeated. "My mate."

Lorin brushed a lock of white hair out of his face, leaning in and stealing a kiss like they were alone in the room. It burned in the best way, making him feel feverish and delirious. He kissed back, wrapping his arms around Lorin's neck and inhaling him until he heard the clearing of a throat.

They broke the kiss and Kit gave the two witches across from them an uncharacteristically shy glance. "Sorry."

"I had a daughter with a mate. I understand," Grandma said with a wry expression. "But we do have more pressing matters at hand. Kit, you don't remember where they took you when you were first taken?"

Kit shook his head.

"Long," he said, mimicking the walking with his fingers on Lorin's forearm.

"You walked for a long time?" Lorin asked and Kit nodded. "Anything else you remember?"

Kit scrunched up his brows and tried to force himself to remember, but he'd been scared and captured and pretty sure he'd been hit with a tranquilizer of some sort because he knew he wasn't fully aware for the entirety of the trip they took him on.

"Cold?" he said, unsure if that was because of the weather or just generally because of the fear he was feeling at the time.

"Right," Lorin's grandmother said.

Kit flinched. He knew he wasn't helping at all, but he was doing the best he could. "Sorry," he said again.

She leaned over, forcing his face up with a thin knuckle under his chin. "You do not apologize for any of this. This was not your fault, and you will not be taking any of the blame on yourself. Have I made myself clear?"

Kit widened his eyes and nodded, feeling like any other response would be seen as the wrong one. But her conviction did help, threatening as it was. The woman was scary.

She let go of him. "Our first order of business is figuring out how to find this wretched coven. I hope they're the only ones dabbling in the grotesque. Any ideas?"

"We can reach out to other pathfinders," Glenn suggested. "Maybe they'll have different resources?"

"I'm assigning that to you," Lorin's grandmother said with a nod. "Find as many as you can. Try to be discreet about it. We don't want to tip them off."

"Got it." Glenn gave her a tiny salute.

"I'll be contacting the other community elders," she said. "We have to work together to stop this."

While she was talking, Lorin was flipping through the book, and Kit felt the moment he found something because he froze, his hand shaking on the page.

"There's a tracing spell," he whispered, and his grandma fell silent.

"What does the spell look like?" Glenn asked cautiously. "I'm assuming anything out of that book isn't your standard spell."

Lorin looked up at them all, horror written on his face. "It turns the user into a bloodhound. It doesn't let up until the object or person is found. If they're not found in time, they can go mad."

"I'm familiar with this spell. This book is not the first to write it down. It's the same premise as the Seeking. Sending your essence outside of yourself is a dangerous practice," Lorin's grandma said, voice contemplative.

"Do you think you can use it?" Lorin asked.

"There's a variation that came to light. One that the person who wrote this obviously hadn't come across at the time of writing. If a coven casts it on a subject who knows the object that is being sought, the effects are alleviated to a degree. Manageable."

"Wait…"

The words sank in at the same time in Kit's mind.

On a subject who knows the object.

There was only one person in the room who had met the coven they were seeking.

"No," Lorin said. "Absolutely not. It's too dangerous."

"We can attempt other avenues," she agreed.

"How long?" Kit asked quietly, and the room fell silent. Grandma didn't respond, so Kit repeated, "How long?"

She met his gaze. "There's no way of knowing. It could be days. It could be months."

And other shifters would suffer in the meantime, while Kit cowered away in a cabin in the woods, safe and happy. He closed his eyes. He was terrified. He didn't want to go anywhere near that coven, but he felt a sense of duty and responsibility on his shoulders.

"Kit, you do not have to do this," Lorin said, like he was reading his mind. "Please. This spell—"

"I would never allow Kit to go through anything I thought was truly too dangerous for him, Lorin," his grandma said. "If he's willing to go through with it, I'll gather the elders."

Kit took a deep breath and let it out, swallowing all his fears. There was no other choice. "Yes."

"Then wait for my call in the coming days."