“With the Morgan girl,” Clarence added, and my chest tightened.
I cocked my head behind me to see Zephyr, Phoenix, and Beck standing at the far wall, back’s straight and eyes cold.
“Yes, Fallon Grimaldi was with me,” I returned my gaze in front of me and swallowed the dryness in my throat. I didn’t want Fallon to be involved, and now she was. “I forced her to join me. I needed someone to take the blame. It seems my plan didn’t play out so well.”
“No, it certainly did not. The truth always comes to light,” Clarence stated.
I squared my shoulders. “Except one. I still don’t know what you wanted with the Book of Blackwell or the Book of Danvers.”
“Pruitt?” Viola asked him, the keeper of secrets, the demander of truths.
Augustine Pruitt sucked on his teeth before saying, “I didn’t take their damn books.”
“Someone did,” Agatha pointed out. “Someone who has access to your chamber, a house guest perhaps? Someone who has been staying with you?”
“Are you insinuating that Carrie Driscoll stole books from the bibliotheca?” Pruitt asked, but it came out as a statement. “Carrie is innocent—”
“We will discuss Carrie later,” Viola cut in, knowingly. For the first time, I was on the same page as the Viola Cantini. We were the only two people in the Chamber who knew the truth about Carrie and Fallon, and she had no idea how much I knew. “This meeting is about you, Julian Blackwell. Why would you risk your life over a few books?”
“Risk my life? With all due respect, don’t play down what is right in front of you. It’s obvious, isn’t it? After everything my coven has endured, the lives we lost, Beck’s mother, Phoenix’s parents, little Johnny, your wife, Clarence! We cannot go on like this! If only you understood what it has done to us, I have no doubt any one of you in Sacred Sea would have done the same,” I said, trying to manage a steady voice. “Don’t be so surprised at how far any of us are willing to go to save our coven.”
Clarence cast his eyes away.
“The facts remain,” Pruitt stated. “We can no longer trust a rogue and cursed Heathen. I gave you an opportunity, welcomed you into my home, and you have only shown your true character. Who knows what you would do next?”
“Norse Woods can’t trust him either,” Clarence muttered.
Viola nodded. “I agree.”
Agatha’s eyes widened, frightened with the direction of where my fate was heading. “But what if hecanbreak the curse? What if he has found the answers? If we can break the curse, the town won’t live in fear of them any longer. No more lives would be endangered,” she turned to Mina Mae, who had been seated quietly in the corner as always, desperately searching for any last chance of hope to save me, “The flatlanders would be safe—”
“Agatha—” I tried to say, but she cut me off.
“No! Augustine, listen to me. Give us a little more time. Julian can do this. I know he can—”
“Agatha!” I ordered again, trying to stop her from making a fool of herself.
She ignored me, adamant. “Everyone has suffered, not just Norse Woods. Sacred Sea has lost people. Flatlanders have died. This curse has put a black cloud over our heads since the beginning! Please, we need more—”
“MOM!”I shouted, silencing her as a tear slipped from my eye.
And the room went silent as well. Glances exchanged, and I turned my head for a moment to contain myself. Even though I had all the answers to break the curse, I wouldn’t. She was only prolonging the inevitable, and I couldn’t stand to see her like this, filled with so much hope.
Pruitt cleared his throat, disrupting the awkward emotions filling the room. “If Julian breaks the curse, he is free, but we will not allow him to roam freely within the town.”
“No,” Agatha whispered in a shaky breath, her hand trembling as it reached for her chest, and Pruitt continued, “I’m sentencing Julian Jai Blackwell to The Wicker Man after seven days in the Wiccan Cell. If the curse is not broken within the next seven days, Julian Blackwell shall burn.”
“NOOO!”Agatha wailed out in a harrowing cry, one that pierced my chest when Pruitt slammed down his gavel.
As I walked out of the Chambers, the Heathen’s remained aloof, trained beasts to withhold objection before the Order. I didn’t blame my brothers for turning me in. We were wretched Heathens, after all. And all wretched things had a creator. The curse was ours—the only real monster existing inside all of us. In their eyes, I’d burnt our last hope to ash. Our freedom now at rest, lying at the bottom of our fire pit we’d spent so many nights talking around, planning together.
What was worse, I felt no remorse for what I’d done.
I knew this day would come.
In the prison cell, there was no sun, no moon, no stars, no sky. There was no ocean, no woods. There was only me and my solitude. Dark, dreadful solitude. A waiting game. For the first hour, I’d walked along the wall of iron-like bars separating me from a former life that seemed centuries away. The bars contained a magic I couldn’t get through. I knew because I’d tried, burned layers of my flesh in the process.
I’d spent my second hour finding sleep, but it would never come. There would be seven days of this. Sweet, deathlike solitude for seven days. My back hit the wall, and I slid to the ground…
