I’d like to say he was joking, just keeping it light, but I had a feeling he was dead serious.
Breakfast sat heavily in my gut, and sweat trickled down my pits and spine.
Fear, I thought, clenching and unclenching my fists.Every instinct in me said I should run.Grab Lula, Abbi, and Card, and shove all of us out of the room.
Wild images of locking the witch’s box in chains, of burying it beneath the stone floor, of pumping concrete into the safe room to contain and hide the book for good, whipped through my mind.
I wanted out of here.I wanted us all out of here.
But that choice wasn’t mine.Even if I could talk Lula into not trying to use the book (an option I knew was hopeless, but which I wasn’t entirely giving up on, either), we still had to take it somewhere safe.
Leaving it here wasn’t an option.The hunters couldn’t keep the gods from finding it, no matter how protected their hideaway might be.
It had to be taken to Ordinary.And Lula and I were the only two people who could attempt it.
I understood the logic of the situation we were in.But my self-preservation instincts were howling.
I wiped a palm over my mouth, scratching at the sweat in my beard.
Lu threw me a concerned look.I shook my head.
We’d had our talk before breakfast.I wanted us to find another weapon.She wanted to use the book.
I’d lost the argument (again).I wouldn’t be able to talk her out of this until we had given this whole spell-casting thing a real, concerted, guided effort.
That didn’t make me want to toss my breakfast any less.
Just knowing she was going to open the book, and that I’d have to consume the magic, those concepts, and try to read it, made me want to set the thing on fire.
Maybe that was why Card had insisted we bring a fire extinguisher.
Lu tugged the shadow cloth off of the witch’s box.Card made an impressed sound.
“That cloth is brilliant.The box is too.I can’t sense the book at all.”
“Told you,” Abbi said.
“Witches?”he asked.
“Witches made the box,” I said, trying to control my breathing.The book whispered, leaves shivering under winter’s hand.“Cloth was loaned by the hunters.”
“They have quite the stash of things tucked away in this place,” he said.“Can’t imagine they got it all on the up and up.Which I approve of.How are you doing, Brogan?”
“Me?Fit as a fiddle.”I couldn’t seem to get my words and breathing lined up.
“You’re panicked, which is to be expected.”
Lula raised an eyebrow and took a minute to size me up.
“Who are you going to believe?Me or the wizard?”
“I can feel your nerves from here,” he said, like I’d been talking to him.“As I said, I would be more worried if you were perfectly calm.”
“We’ll take it slow,” Lula said.“We’ll be careful.”
“We?”I asked, trying to smile.“Not sure 'careful’ is a state you and I have ever visited.”
“This is a good time to try it.”
