by Lily Webb
“Don’t make yourself crazy. I’ll probably be too busy to spend any time with you even if you came.”
“Well, then I guess I’ll see you later tonight. Good luck and have a great day.”
“Thanks, you too.”
“Every day I get to wake up with you is great.”
“Ugh, go before your saccharine sweetness makes me throw up.” Beau laughed and blew me a kiss as he bolted out the door. As soon as it clicked shut, my eyes darted to the garbage can and a war broke out in my mind.
I could quickly open the letter and read it, then take the trash to the can outside. It was almost full anyway, so it needed to go out, and that way Beau would never know I’d looked at it… but it still felt horribly wrong of me to do. Then again, wasn’t it my responsibility as Head Witch to keep tabs on goings on around town? For all I knew, Beau could have a stalker — or worse. For Lilith’s sake, my grandmother got kidnapped solely because of her association with me, so what if Beau was in trouble too but didn’t want to tell me?
That was all it took to convince me I had to read the letter. I leaped out of the kitchen chair, nearly spilling my coffee in the process, and plucked the letter out of the garbage. The handwriting on the front wasn’t anyone’s that I recognized, which further worried me, so I yanked a knife out of the nearest drawer and slid its tip beneath the envelope’s seal.
Inside was a plain piece of printer paper folded twice over to fit. With shaking hands, I unfolded the letter. My eyes raked over the words written in the same loopy script — and my heart dropped into my stomach when I reached the end. I couldn’t believe what I’d read.
It was a poem and a disturbing one at that.
A lost puppy dog cowers from its shadow,
Despite having finally found its clan.
Fear not, little doggy, though you should know:
If I can’t have you, no one can.
Instinctively, I dashed into the bedroom for my cell phone to call Beau, but as soon as my fingers brushed it, I thought twice. Seeing the letter had visibly upset him, which meant this probably wasn’t the first one he’d received, and I didn’t want to upset him further. He had enough on his plate to deal with today, and so did I.
But I couldn’t ignore the letter, either. It seemed like a threat at best and a promise at worst, but who sent it and why? Despite being Moon Grove’s biggest PV reporter, Beau was the nicest, most modest guy I’d ever met, so I found it hard to believe he’d made any enemies in the industry.
My phone vibrated and illuminated as my alarm screeched to wake me up for work, but I was already wired for all the wrong reasons.
Luna growled on the bed behind me. “I thought you were gone.”
“No, but I’m leaving now,” I said and exited the room in a hurry before she noticed the letter in my hand. I had plenty of time to shower and get cleaned up, but I didn’t want to waste a second dawdling so I swapped my pajamas for the dirty but still passable pair of robes I’d tossed in the laundry room the night before, tucked the letter into their inner pocket, and snatched my wand and broom from the hooks where they hung by the front door.
If anyone could help me figure out what the letter meant and who’d sent it, it was Heath and the rest of the Council.
Chapter Two
“Zoe, are you listening?”
Heath’s voice jolted me. The entire Council, which was now so large it formed a ring around me, stared expectantly, unblinking.
I cleared my throat. “Sorry. Can you repeat that?”
Heath narrowed his eyes at me and though it was almost imperceptible, his shift in tone said he wasn’t happy with me. “I asked if you concurred with my assessment that this new Council can do great things if we learn to work together.”
“Right, yeah, of course.” I looked around the crescent-shaped table at each new member and kept eye contact for a beat to convince them I hadn’t been daydreaming about getting up and walking to the Channel 666 offices. Truthfully, I cared about and wanted to get to know each of them, but the only thing I could think of was the letter burning a hole in my robe pocket. I hadn’t gotten the chance to ask Heath his opinion on it yet, and at this rate I worried I wouldn’t.
“The Council’s ranks might’ve expanded exponentially, but that doesn’t change our goal,” Heath said, filling in my awkward silence. I wanted to say something more, but thought better of interrupting him; I was already flying on a damaged broom. “Our duty is to ensure the safety of our citizens from all different walks of life, and to see to it we move into the future with open eyes and open minds.”
Maybe it was the harsh overhead lighting, but he seemed more tired and rundown than usual. Dark bags drooped under his blue eyes, and the twinkle of mischief that often danced in his pupils had vanished.
“Here, here,” said Sam Duncan, Beau’s father and newly elected representative of the shifters in Moon Grove, and pounded the table to emphasize his support. Despite the difference in age between Sam and his son, they could have passed for siblings — but not even Sam’s warm brown eyes and welcoming smile could take my mind off the letter; in fact, it only sent my train of thought racing back to it. What if right this second, while we sat around saying a million words that ultimately meant nothing, Beau was in trouble? Whoever wrote that terrible poem could be chasing him as we spoke and there wasn’t a thing I could do about it.
Or I was myself crazy over nothing.
“To that end, I’d like to propose an event,” Heath said, and I looked up at him, curious where he was heading — so did everyone else. “As a town, we’ve been through a lot and I worry that, despite our work to bring everyone together, there’s still some fractures that need healing.”
Everyone exchanged puzzled looks, and Heath chuckled. “I can tell from your faces that you know what I mean. Well, what better way is there to bring different communities together than with food?”
“What are you getting at?” I asked.
“A banquet, a feast like in the old days. I think we should host it right here in the town hall and invite the whole town,” Heath said, beaming. We’d definitely done crazier things before. “Who knows? If it goes well, maybe we’ll make it an annual tradition. What do you all think?”
“It sounds like a great idea to me,” Sam said through his own smile. Others nodded or grumbled their agreement.
Heath pounded a fist against the table. “Then let’s put it to a vote while we’re all gathered and on the same page. We can work out the details later. All those in favor of hosting the feast, raise your wands — I’m sorry, your hands, bad habit — and say, ‘Aye.’”
Twenty-six hands rose in the air, one for each member. Heath smiled so brightly it looked painful. “It’s unanimous, then. Excellent.”
The members started a round of applause, a polite golf clap, but I couldn’t help thinking that, as romantic as the idea of the banquet was, it probably wouldn’t bridge the divides between the various paranormal communities in Moon Grove the way Heath hoped it would.
The reality was that no amount of cheerleading and back patting would prepare the freshmen members for their new positions, nor the existing members for the implications of an expanded Council. We’d all have to dive in headfirst and make the best of it.
“Let’s get down to business planning this bash then, shall we?” Heath asked and raked a hand through his salt-and-pepper hair, reinvigorated.
A slender, elder vampire sneered down his hooked nose from across the table. “As lovely as that sounds, I think we have more pressing matters to discuss first,” he said and swished his gray ponytail off his shoulder. His bloodied eyes raked over Heath and me in the silence that followed, and as much as I tried to resist, I couldn’t fight back the shiver that tingled down my spine.
The vampire steepled his long, thin fingers under his chin and leaned forward on his sharp elbows. “As you know, my people have seen quite a bit of upheaval lately.”
It took everything I had not to snort.
“Upheaval” was putting it lightly. Just a few months ago, when I was still new to town, the vampires’ long-ruling king murdered a reporter and brainwashed a councilwoman. Not long after that, the president who replaced the king played a role in a scheme to kill me and infiltrate the Council by turning some of its members into vampires. Neither reflected well on the undead community.
“Yes, Pascal, the Council is painfully aware of the vampires’ struggles,” Heath said.
“Well, being as I now speak for my people, I want to make clear that you’ll have our full cooperation going forward. If you say bite, we’ll say how hard.” Pascal smirked at his own joke and the tips of his sharpened fangs peeked out over his lower lip. It was far from reassuring, given the track record of leadership in the vampire community.
“Much appreciated,” Heath said without looking at the vampire. Before his nomination to the Council, I’d never heard of Pascal Lyon, but that wasn’t saying much; I didn’t know many vampires at all. After their president kidnapped several of my colleagues and family, I found it hard to trust them.
“That said, I would be remiss if I neglected to ask you about the fate of Julien Delroy,” Pascal said and the energy in the room electrified at the mention of the disgraced vampire president. “My people deserve to know, as does the rest of Moon Grove.”
Councilwoman Dawn Bloodworth exchanged an uncomfortable look with Councilman Blaine Rathmore, her political opposite and best friend. They’d both recently become vampires themselves — at Julien’s hand. Somehow, I doubted they appreciated Pascal’s line of questioning any more than the rest of us.
Heath glared at Pascal. “We have placed Mr. Delroy in a maximum security prison outside Moon Grove for the safety of everyone. Please pass the message on to your constituents. It’s all they need to know,” he said, and charged on before Pascal could object. “I don’t want to get bogged down in negativity for our first official meeting. If we’re going to make this banquet a reality, we’ll need committees to tend to it.”
Heath droned on about the various committees he thought we’d need and explained the function of each until I feared I might fall asleep — along with everyone else in the room. “I think we should plan to host the banquet this weekend on, say, Friday evening? That should be enough time to get everything in order. We’ll draft and distribute an announcement, but make sure to spread the word to your communities in the meantime.”
Half an hour later, I’d nearly nodded off when Heath elbowed me in the ribs. “Is everything okay?” he whispered in my ear. He must’ve adjourned the meeting while I wasn’t paying attention because the chamber echoed with the sound of shuffling chairs and belongings as everyone stood.
“Yeah, I’m just a little distracted. Can we talk for a minute?”
“Discussion of food has a way of distracting even the best of us,” he said, his eyes twinkling with silent laughter. “But sure, we can talk. I’ve got some loose ends to tie up with a few of the new members, but head to my office and I’ll meet you there in five minutes.”
I nodded and he left to chat with the new representatives. As much as I wanted to get the inside scoop on all the newbies, I wanted Heath’s opinion on the letter more so I made a beeline for his office down the hall. A cement-colored gargoyle I didn’t recognize glared at me with its bright orange, feline-like eyes as I approached, but it must’ve recognized me because it stood aside without asking me if I had permission.
To keep myself from going crazy while I waited, I paced back and forth across Heath’s office. The words from the poem looped in my head. I’d read it so many times I could recite it from memory but no matter how many times I recalled the words to look for clues, no great revelations came to me.
Despite all the horrible possibilities that raced through my mind, the letter could just as easily be an innocent declaration of admiration for Beau from a fan or colleague. Of course Beau had admirers — he was good-looking, good-natured, and Channel 666’s execs plastered his face all over PV and advertisements. I shuddered to think how much fan mail he must get bombarded with every day… but something about the poem made me think more than admiration motivated its author.
The door to Heath’s office flew open and he strode in confidently with his shoulders back and his head raised high. All the signs of exhaustion I’d seen on his face during the meeting seemed to have vanished; the magic of his extroversion at work. “What’s going on? You look like you’ve seen something horrible and trying to get your attention during the meeting was like trying to hold sand,” he said and kicked the door closed behind him.
“I know, I’m sorry. I got myself all psyched up for today and I totally blew it,” I groaned and forced myself down into one of the chairs behind his desk to keep from fidgeting.
He rested a hand on my shoulder and gave me a sad smile. “You’re normally as focused as a spell and not even something as exciting as a feast could hold your attention. That’s how I knew something was wrong. What is it?”
“I almost don’t want to tell you. As soon as I do, you’re gonna laugh at me for being ridiculous.”
“If it was enough to derail you, I highly doubt the issue is laughable. I promise, I won’t.” He walked around the desk and sat on its surface, his hands neatly folded in his lap. Not for the first time, I didn’t feel like the equal he needed and deserved on the Council.
“You know Beau is living with me now, right?”
He nodded. “Yes, of course. What about it?”
“Well, something came in the mail for him today. It didn’t have a return address, which I thought was weird, but I tried not to make a big deal out of it.”
“That is strange, but not unheard of.”
“Right, but he seemed like he would rather have taken a walk with werewolves than open the letter or tell me anything about it.”
“That’s also strange,” Heath said, his smile crinkling the corners of his eyes.
“I knew you’d laugh at me.”
“I did no such thing. I take it the two of you had a bit of a tussle over this letter?”
“Not exactly. He told me to throw it away, so I did.”
Heath eyed me. “You did?”
“I swear, I did. But I mean, come on, I’m a journalist. There was something about it that was setting off all my alarm bells, so as soon as he left for work I dug it out of the trash and opened it.”
Heath burst out laughing. “I wouldn’t expect anything less of you. What did the letter say?”
I plucked it from the pocket of my robes and held it out for him. “Here, see for yourself.”
With one eyebrow raised, he took the letter and read over it in a matter of seconds. As he did, both his eyebrows gradually climbed his forehead. “Well, no wonder you seemed distracted today.”
“See! Isn’t it weird?”
“It’s beyond weird. In fact, it’s borderline disturbing. Do you know who sent this?”
“No, I don’t have a clue. The weirdest part though is that when I asked Beau about it, he froze up, so I don’t think this is the first one he’s gotten. It really shook him, and he’s not the type. Nothing bothers him.”
“If this isn’t the first one letter like this he’s received, I can’t say I blame him for being spooked.”
“So I’m not overreacting, is that what you’re saying?”
“Zoe, given everything you’ve been through in the last few months, I don’t blame you for seeing danger in everything. That said, this letter is worrying.”
I slouched back in the chair, relieved. Heath was one of the most level-headed and rational people I’d ever met, so if he saw a reason to worry, that made me feel better and worse. Part of me hoped he’d tell me I was being silly so I could go about my day.
“You don’t have any idea who might’ve sent this or where it might’ve come from?”
“Nope, nada. Based on the handwriting, I would guess it’s from a female, but that’s just a shot in the dark. Beau might open up to me if I as
ked him about it again, but given his transition at Channel 666 and everything he’s got going on there, I don’t want to stress him out any more than he already is.”
One corner of Heath’s mouth curled upward. “Have you left your reporting days behind so quickly? Why not back channel it and ask Sam what he knows about any potentially threatening admirers? If anyone would know, I’d think it would be him.”
I stared at Heath as if he hadn’t just said the most obvious thing in the world — and kicked myself mentally for not thinking of it first.
Heath turned the paper over and over in his hand, held it up to the light to look through it, and even sniffed it. “For what it’s worth, I don’t think there’s anything magical or dangerous about the letter itself. As far as I can tell, it’s just paper.”
“Thanks, that’s the other thing I wanted to ask you. I could’ve gone to Raina with it, but I didn’t think she’d take me seriously.”
“I don’t know about that, but I’m flattered, regardless.”
“And thanks for not making me feel like I’m crazy.”
Heath chuckled. “Does this mean you’ll be back to normal tomorrow? As much as I enjoy being the ringleader of the circus, I could really use your help to wrangle our new friends for this banquet. I can only stretch myself so thin.”
“Yes, absolutely. I promise I won’t let whatever this is keep me off kilter. We’ve got a lot of work to do to get Moon Grove’s people to trust us and each other again, but especially the vampires. I hope the banquet will help.”
“I’m glad you brought them up,” Heath said as he forced himself off the desk, seemingly grateful for the change in conversation. “What do you make of Pascal?”
“I don’t trust him one bit. But then again, I don’t trust any of the vampires.”
Heath grunted his agreement and stroked his chin. “I’m glad to hear you say that, because I don’t trust them either. What’s their goal? They finally got representation on the Council, which they’ve wanted for decades, so what else could they want?”
