The look of determination holding her pale gaze firm and her expression set told me she wouldn’t take no for an answer. I was honored and accepted it, holding it in my hand. It was a green crystal, extraordinarily stunning. “It’s beautiful.”
“That little gem has gotten me out of quite a few jams in my day.” Serenity looked to be in her late sixties, maybe seventies, her skin loose and wilting on her thin frame. She’d seen some shit in her lifetime, I was sure.
“Does this unzip the protective field around this place?” I thought back to how Stace had created a slice in midair with hers. “Do all witches have one?”
“Only high priestesses and their most trusted inner circle.”
“And ours can’t do what that one can do,” Stace added, eyeing the crystal in my hand. “Serenity is from a long line of powerful witches. One of her ancestors enchanted the crystal as a way to travel to and from places undetected and hide in plain sight. It’s brilliant.”
She waved off Stace’s comment as a slight blush colored her cheeks. “Oh, pish tosh. It’s a simple spell, really. Katy, repeat after me. Aperi oculos.”
“Aperi oculos.” The crystal heated in my palm, or maybe my hands were just sweaty from nerves. But then it glowed, brighter and brighter, creating a ring of green illumination that expanded from the crystal until the oval was about the size of a door.
“Picture where you want to go, much like when you teleport. The crystal will open a gateway to that place where you can walk through undetected. You’ll be completely invisible as long as you have it on. Remove it, and you remove the enchantment.”
“Wow,” I breathed and stared at the crystal, concentrating on the ruins. Slowly, a perfect image of the dilapidated stone structure appeared inside the smoky green oval. It was dark, raining, and the cold seeped into me. I reached my arm through the opening and back out, fascinated by the raindrops that’d collected on the goose bumps that’d sprouted as a result of the temperature change.
Serenity’s warning drew my attention. “Wear the crystal at all times, Katy. I can’t emphasize that enough. If you take it off, do so deliberately once you know you’re safe to be seen, and always know where you placed it. Always. Lose the crystal and you lose the ability to pass through the concealment veil.”
“But we got through it before.” And now I had a key in the form of a brilliant crystal the same color as Clay’s eyes.
“With Stace’s help,” Serenity fired back, her eyebrows raised. “And only because she knew you were there. Look around. The veil works both ways. It conceals us from the outside. It also conceals the outside from us. Stace is able to teleport out no problem. She can’t teleport back in. No one can. The only way through the veil is with one of the crystals.”
I slipped it over my head and glanced down at where it landed. I didn’t want a crystal or anything else, for that matter, resting between my boobs and drawing attention to them, so I retied the leather necklace to shorten it. Now that the crystal sat higher above the girls, I felt better and tucked it under my shirt to keep it hidden. A gem like this would draw attention, and quite possibly the wrong attention. If it fell into the wrong hands, we’d be seriously screwed.
“I won’t let it out of my sight.”
Serenity nodded firmly, accepting my answer. “Now, go talk to Cressida. We’re not going anywhere.”
I wrapped my fingers around the crystal as I turned to Bryan. “Will you be okay?”
He shrugged one of his magnificent shoulders. “I need to make more elixir to heal bones.” He stood and pulled me into his arms, hugging me close. “Be careful, Katy. Get what you need from Cressida and come right back.”
“That’s the plan.”
We kissed our good-byes, and without looking back, I walked through the gateway, immediately shivering from the cold. Why didn’t I think to bring a jacket? Brilliant, Reed. Inside the concealment veil, it was sunny and warm all the time, not a cloud in the gorgeous blue sky. It was paradise.
Unlike the real world, where the sky hung low, the dreary drizzle a constant this time of year, the temperature barely moved the needle from morning to night. At least in Montana, where I grew up, the temp fluctuated throughout the day, cold in the mornings, warm during the day, then cold again at night as it should be. It shouldn’t be in the forties when you wake up and never change.
I felt every one of the chills vibrating through my body. Jebus, why was it so cold? I hunkered down, wrapping my arms tight around me and tucking my hands into my pits to keep them warm. The mist from my breath swirled above me as I took a step, then froze when voices sounded through the darkness. Two males hid somewhere in the inky night. I had no idea of the time since I didn’t have my phone and had no need to carry a burner inside the veil.
“Graves is the best head of the Council we’ve had, getting rid of all those unwanteds.”
“Yeah, now if he just could do something about all the magically enhanced brats around here.”
“All in due time. Got a light?”
The flicker of a small flame caught my attention. Oh, you have got to be kidding me. These two? It was Weak 1 and Weak 2, the two Council members Virgil Graves had assigned to test his daughter at her tribunal. Even combined, their powers were no match for a first year
