Tears welled up in my eyes, spilling over before I could stop them. The emotions I’d been holding back for so long—fear, relief, pride, joy—all crashed through me at once.
“It works,” I sobbed. “It really works.”
Casimir quickly removed the cord and pulled me into his arms. Koa and Zane joined the embrace, surrounding me with their warmth and strength as I cried against Casimir’s chest.
“You did it, beloved,” Koa breathed into my curls. “You incredible, brilliant woman.”
“That’s our girl.” Casimir pressed a kiss to my temple. “We’resoproud of you, Serafina.”
“Suck it, Harrow bitch!” Zane whooped. “Moonbeam’s got anti-siphon armor now!”
Foster mumbled something about walking Brumous and retreated from the lab. Too much raw emotion for him probably.
“I’m sorry,” I hiccupped, dabbing at my face. “I don’t know why I’m crying.”
“Because you’ve accomplished something incredible,” Casimir said. “Something that might protect not just you, but others as well.”
“I wanted to believe it would work, but I was so scared it would fail,” I confessed.
“You thought you’d fail at blowjobs, too, remember?” Zane teased, making my jaw drop even as my face flamed red.
“Fail?” Casimir’s arm tightened around my waist. “She’slethal.”
“Our sweet ambush.” Koa’s whisper stirred the hair at my nape as I hid my face in Casimir’s chest.
“Hey, in all seriousness, what if we could make the ward permanent?” Zane said. “Then you wouldn’t have to keep redrawing it.”
“What, like a tattoo?”
“Yeah, but not justanytattoo.” I didn’t have to look at Zane to know he was dancing around with excited energy. “Amoonlighttattoo! You know we mentioned our nephilim friend, Kerry Harker? He has a ward branded on his arm that only needs to be recharged once a year rather than completely redone. You could do something similar with your lunar magic!”
“I could tattoo itwith moonlight?” The idea made my heart skip with excitement.
“Theoretically, it’s possible,” Koa said. “Then you could use the moon to recharge it rather than draw on your own reserves.”
“That’s amazing!” I exclaimed, finally lifting my face to see theirs. “I could tattoo it on all of you, too! That way, you’d always be protected!”
I was ready to run to the library and start researching moonlight tattoos, but Casimir kept me in the cage of his arms.
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.” His lips twitched with the hint of a smile. “We need to do more testing before we can call this a complete success.”
“How?” I paused, my enthusiasm dampened a bit. “We can’t exactly test it againstrealsiphoning.”
“We’ll find a way. I want to be one hundred percent certain it works before you make it permanent on your skin.”
“If the testing is successful, you could share this with others, Seri,” Koa suggested. “Maybe save someone else from going through what you did. It’s unique. I’ve never read of anyone attempting to design a ward specifically for this purpose.”
“Angelo del Vecchio’s family magic shop would be an ideal distributor,” Casimir added. “They have connections throughout the supernatural community.”
“That’s your choice, though.” Zane gave a little shrug. “It’syourcreation. You can do what you want with it.”
I hadn’t thought about sharing my ward with others. The idea that something I created could help protect others was overwhelming in the best possible way.
“If it could help even one person, it’s worth it,” I said.
“Our beautiful, compassionate beloved,” Koa whispered.
“Just creating revolutionary magical theory like a boss.” Zane grinned.
