Chapter 80: Indebted

The library smelled faintly of fire, the whole back of the plantation house still in renovations. I sipped my tea past the crushing horror in the eyes of the witches sitting in a semicircle before me. The empty, hollow feeling of the place, the worn and weary touch of the Santos family magic reminded me in sharp pangs just how far most covens still had to go to recover from what happened only eight weeks ago.

It felt like a lifetime and looked like one on the face of their leader, Paula Santos. But the lines around her eyes deepened by pain and loss had lessened somewhat, and the optimism in her voice helped my guilt over abandoning her family for the sake of my own.