Wolfe would call me a coward. Maybe he’s right.
The perfumery is low on violet and narcissus, and I head to the trails where I know I can find more. It’s a calm evening, a beautiful twilight settling over the island, and I hum to myself as I fill my basket with flowers. I start imagining the different perfumes I can make, what combinations I’ll use and what kind of magic I’ll infuse them with. I make perfumes most days, and I never tire of it, never get bored or restless. Using magic for my hair and makeup is nothing more than a convenience for me, but when I’m in the back room of the perfumery, finding the perfect blend of fragrance and magic, I feel completely at home in myself.
At least I did until I met Wolfe. Now I have to ignore a part of my magic that urges me to use more, and I will never forgive him if my low magic no longer feels like enough. I will never get over it.
My basket is overflowing, and instead of heading north, back the way I came, I walk farther south. The southwestern part of the island is heavily wooded, and as I walk through the trees, I start to wonder if maybe there is a home among them, protected by magic. It feels impossible; I’ve explored every part of this island many times over, and yet I’m learning that there is an abundance of impossibilities that are anything but.
I scan the woods, searching for any clues that point to human life—gardens or smoke or gates that might confirm the things I don’t want to believe. If there is a home on this island that none of us know about, it would be in this area, farthest from the houses and shops of the new coven. But I see nothing.
The sky gets darker as I move deeper into the trees, and I suddenly realize how far from home I’ve walked. I turn to leave when I hear a branch break in the distance.
I squint into the darkness, but all I see are the shadows of evergreens.
“Who’s there?” a voice asks, and I recognize it instantly.
I don’t know what comes over me, but I turn the other direction and run, not wanting him to see me. Not wanting him to know I was looking for signs of a magical house or forgotten coven.
It’s so dark now, I can barely see where I’m going. My foot catches on an exposed root, and I fall to the earth hard. My basket lands several feet away from me, the flowers scattered across the forest floor.
For a moment, it’s painfully quiet.
“Mortana?”
I look up, and Wolfe is standing over me. I try to respond but can’t find the words.
“What are you doing out here?” he asks. He offers me his hand, and I slowly take it, ignoring the jolt that moves through me when I do.
“I got lost,” I say, getting to my feet, unwilling to meet his eyes.
“You got lost? On this small island where you’ve spent your entire life?” I’m looking at the ground, but I can hear the mockery in his tone, can imagine the smirk on his face.
“It’s dark out,” I say weakly.
I walk to my basket and start filling it with my spilled flowers, and Wolfe bends over to help me. When I’ve retrieved everything I can see, I stand back up.
“Are you hurt?” Wolfe asks.
“No.”
He doesn’t respond and instead starts walking, picking herbs and plants and adding them to my basket. I follow him slowly, my chest aching as I see the care he takes with each and every plant, the way he gently removes them from the earth and sets them in my basket as if they’re glass that might shatter at any moment.
It’s difficult to see, but something stains his fingers. I stop and take his hand, pulling it close to my face. “You’re bleeding.”
“It isn’t blood,” he says, watching me. “I was painting.”
“You paint?”
“Yes.” The word is tense, as if he has admitted to something he meant to keep hidden.
“What do you paint?”
Wolfe starts walking again, and I follow behind him. “People, mostly.”
“Your coven?”
“Yes, my coven.”
“Why?” I ask, wanting him to keep talking, to keep sharing this part of himself with me.
“Because if I don’t, how will we be remembered?”
The words take my breath away, the raw honesty of them. I want to say something to ease the anger in his voice, the pain, but there is nothing. My coven doesn’t know his exists, a hidden life concealed in magic and the shadows of the trees.
“I will remember.”
Wolfe turns to me, putting some cedar in my basket. “And will you tell your mother? Your future husband? Or am I a secret you will carry to your grave?”
“I—” I stop myself because the answer hurts too much to say out loud. I stare at him, more shadow than person in the dense forest. He knows I can’t tell anyone, that our protection and his depends upon the mainland believing that dark magic is gone. But it’s a painful truth, one that will claw at my chest for the rest of my life.
I’m stunned when his fingers find my face, gently trailing over my cheek and tucking a piece of hair behind my ear. “That’s what I thought.”
He turns without another word, but I’m stuck in place, my hand coming to rest where his fingers were just moments ago.
“I need to get home,” I finally say, forcing myself to move.
Wolfe slows, putting a narcissus stem in my basket. “What are you really doing out here?” he asks, ignoring my comment entirely.
I turn and follow the sound of the waves, wanting to get to the shoreline, where the moonlight will illuminate my way home. Wolfe falls into step beside me. I don’t respond until I’ve reached the beach and breathed in the salt air, letting it calm me from the inside out.
Finally, I turn to Wolfe.
“I came out to harvest and started thinking about our conversation, and I don’t know. I think I subconsciously went searching for proof that what you’ve told me is true.”
“You don’t believe me?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Then why would you be looking for proof?”
I take a deep breath. “Because I don’t want to believe you.” I walk closer to the water and sit on the sand, tired and embarrassed and confused.
“Why not?”
“Because it’s easier than the alternative.”
“And did you find any proof?” he asks, sitting on the ground next to me. His tone gives nothing away, but there’s a softness to him that I haven’t felt before, and I don’t understand why. Maybe he can see all the threads he’s torn loose from me.
“Well, I found you. Either you’re following me, or you have a magical house on this island that I got a little too close to.”
“I’m not following you,” he says.
I pause. “I know. So how does it work? How did you know I was out here?”
Wolfe shifts next to me, and I realize he’s uncomfortable too, not knowing if he can trust me. Not knowing if he has shared too much or if I’ll go home and tell my mother everything I’ve learned.
“There is a spell on the house that can sense heat signatures in the woods surrounding it. It was originally used to alert the witches to nearby animals. Before their crops began yielding food, the witches needed to eat. We now use it as a kind of security system.”
As he speaks, the anger inside me grows, but it’s more than that. It’s sadness that this place I have loved with every part of me has kept secrets so large they threaten to break everything my coven has worked so hard to build.
“If you hadn’t been there to stop me, would I have eventually bumped into your home?”
“No. The magic would keep you walking in a loop through the forest.” He watches me as he answers.
“I hate that you have an explanation for everything,” I say, but I think what I really mean is that I hate that I believe what he says. I hate that his words have made me ask questions I’ve never thought to ask.
“I hate that you require so many,” he says, and I think what he really means is that he hates that we don’t know about the life he lives, as if it isn’t worth knowing about.
And I don’t know what to say, because part of me wishes I didn’t know. Part of me wishes I could go back to before the rush and erase everything that came after, because I’m so scared of learning more.
So scared of asking all the questions I want to ask.