Moonset

“It’s going to take me at least an hour to wash out my hair,” Jenna said, hand on her hip. The five of us had reunited at the front of the school, staring out the glass doors. Mal’s hair was limp and hanging down over his eyes, and both Cole and Bailey looked wiped out. Bailey had been crying, and even Cole’s eyes were a little red.

But they were together. All four of my siblings. Something inside me loosened, finally seeing for myself that everyone was okay. I looked to my left, and saw that Quinn and Ash had wandered farther down the hall, giving us a moment of privacy.

“I think things are going to be different now,” I said.

Cole looked up from under his bangs. “No more secrets?”

Mal straightened. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but maybe Cole’s got a point. Remember, we’ve got to be in this together.”

Jenna shrugged, sighing. “Do we really have to get all sentimental and in touch with our emotions?”

“I think it’s a good idea,” Bailey laughed.

There was just a moment, where we were all smiling and looking at each other. Then just like that, it was over, and everyone followed in Quinn’s wake. “We’ll see,” I said.

Bailey hung back, grabbing my arm. She was worried, but serious. “It’s not over,” she said.

“What’s not over? We stopped him, Bay. Everything’s going to be okay.”

She bit her lower lip. “I know it’s my fault.” I tried to argue, but for once she didn’t back down.

“It snuck inside me, and most of the time it was like I was sleeping, but every once and awhile

I’d wake up. I could see, but I couldn’t do anything. But I saw Luca cut himself. I saw him offer the blood. One of them escaped. He’s here now.”

“Who is?”

Her eyes got wide. “The Prince.”

One of the Abyssals had escaped? My heart thudded once—hard—and dropped like there was a sudden influx of gravity. “Are you sure?”

But Bailey didn’t have time to answer. Ash suddenly appeared, and linked her arm through mine. “Come on, hero, I’ll give you a ride home.”

We caught up with the others, who were waiting at the side entrance of the school. Quinn eyed the pair of us, focusing on our entwined arms. “Follow right behind me.”

Ash rolled her eyes. “Right, like I’d kidnap him looking like this. Have you met me? I could do so much better.” Ash dragged me away, heading towards the side entrance while Quinn and

Jenna headed for the rear. She dropped her arm the moment we stepped back outside.

“Get rid of it,” she said, turning on me before the door had even finished closing. “Throw it on the roof, in the garbage, I don’t care.”

“Get rid of what?”

She stared up at me. “You know what. I don’t know when you found time to get it out of my car, but if they find it on you, you won’t get to bluff your way out of what they do to you.”

The spellbook. Of course. “I left it in your car,” I said, starting to panic. “I didn’t get a chance to sneak it away. They had someone watching us the minute we woke up.” She bit her lower lip, shaking her head. “That’s not funny, Justin. The book isn’t in there. I checked. ”

“Then you made a mistake,” I said, moving for the parking lot. Before we even crossed into the actual lot, Quinn’s black SUV approached.

He waited just ahead of us while we got into the car, and though I tried to circumspectly look for the spellbook even with him sitting right in front of us, I didn’t see any sign of it. And I couldn’t start digging under the seat until he pulled away.

“Just drive,” I said, squirming down in my seat and feeling in all the gaps between the seat and the console.

But the book wasn’t there. Neither was the bag I’d brought along with us. All of my stuff was gone. Even Quinn’s athame. “So what happened to it?” Ash said, her voice low as if Quinn would be able to hear her from fifty feet in front of us.

My fingers brushed against something, in the spot where the spellbook had been. Thin, like paper, but harder. I trapped it between two of my fingers and pulled it up. The postcard that had been left in the book.

Something about it didn’t look right. It was still the Golden Gate Bridge, with a glimpse of San

Francisco in the background. But it’s not the half of the postcard I had before. I flipped it back over. Two words were written on this half.

Well played.

Another wave of cold swept up my spine. The spellbook was gone. Bailey believed one of the

Abyssal Princes had escaped. Sooner or later Robert Cooper was going to pop back up wanting revenge. And Cullen Bridger, the last living link to Moonset, was sending me congratulations.

I glanced across the car at Ash, whose face was screwed up in concentration and exhaustion. It had been a long night, and tomorrow might be longer still.

“I think you owe me a makeup date,” I said.

THE END

About the Author

Scott Tracey (Avon Lake, Ohio) lived on a Greyhound bus for a month, wrote his illustrated autobiography at the age of six, and barely survived Catholic school. His gifts can be used for good or evil, and he strives for both for his own amusement. Witch Eyes was his debut YA novel.