Wild is the Witch (52)

Because being together can lead to love, and you can’t be loved without being known. If I show Pike who I am after everything he told me, he will never accept me, let alone love me. And I refuse to keep up this lie so that we can be together, because he can’t choose me if he doesn’t know who he’s choosing. And I want to be chosen.

After everything that has already happened to his family at the hands of a witch, he met another one who went and cursed him.

My lungs strain with the effort to take a full breath, and I push my palm to my sternum, pleading with my body and mind to get me through this. I can’t have an anxiety attack right now, can’t lose myself to it and make it about me when Pike just shared so much of who he is. This is his story, his past, his life, and I have to absorb it all until every cell in my body understands what an awful thing I did.

I remember that situation with the witch who defrauded Pike’s family. It was a huge deal in the witching community because it was one of the only recent cases where a witch was both rid of her ability to use magic and sent to jail. Or it was, until Amy. I remember sitting around the dinner table, talking about it with my parents and grandmother, remember how disgusted they were to learn of it.

I want to reach out and tell Pike that we aren’t all that way, that damning every witch for the actions of one isn’t fair. That we could be together and he could trust me and we could be happy.

But it isn’t true.

If the curse is unleashed, it will spread for miles and miles, affecting Pike and everyone he has ever loved. If what I know about curses and amplifiers is correct, some of them won’t survive, and it will be my fault.

That’s unforgivable.

The best thing I can do now is lay to rest any hope of what Pike and I could have been in another life and instead focus on this life and this curse and making sure it never touches Pike. Making sure he can live the way he wants to, not with magic he was cursed to carry by the girl he fell for.

My thoughts are interrupted by a faint, metallic smell that tinges the air. I catch it just briefly before it’s gone, but I’m sure of it. I stop and look around, trying to find the source, but it’s long gone by now, carried away by the wind.

Then I smell it again, and I know the owl has gotten worse. Magic leaks into the air like a poison, and I search the ground for any signs of him. But there’s nothing here. Cassandra’s spell has faded, and the magic inside the owl is draining into this mountainside, too much and too fast.

I rush around Pike and start running, faster and faster, my legs burning. If there’s enough magic that I can smell it, then it won’t be long before Cassandra senses it, too. If she hasn’t already.

“Iris, are you okay?” Pike yells behind me, running to keep up. “Iris, stop!” he says, reaching out for my hand, pulling me back. It takes everything in me not to yank my arm away and keep running, desperately trying to reach the owl.

“We’re close,” I say, my voice frantic, looking everywhere except his eyes. “We have to find him.”

“That’s what we’re doing,” Pike says, confusion lining his face.

He pulls out his map and compass, and I put my hands on top of my head and pace back and forth, needing to move.

“If he’s still where he was earlier, we’re about twenty minutes away,” Pike says. He tucks his things back into his pocket and cuts through the trees, deeper into the woods where a northern spotted owl can hide.

The metallic scent gets stronger the farther into the forest we go. He must be in bad shape, perhaps from his wing or the bear or both. Magic is everywhere, coating everything, and all I can hope is that the trees absorb most of it, keep it from the humans and other animals in the area.

It’s so much worse than I thought, and I can’t stay still. Even when I tell myself to walk at Pike’s pace, to not make a scene, I can’t listen. I run ahead, willing the owl to come into view, searching the trees and the stumps and the hollows. My boot catches on an exposed root, and I fall to the ground, hard. My knee crashes into a sharp rock on the way down, and I cry out.

“Shit,” I say, pulling my leg to my chest. Pain radiates from my knee, and I rock back and forth, angry at myself for being so careless.

Pike comes up from behind me and drops to the ground, gently placing a hand on my back. “What did you hurt?”

“My knee,” I say, taking a shaky breath.

“Let’s have a look.”

I can already see the blood seeping through my pant leg. Pike carefully lifts the fabric so he can get to the cut, and I close my eyes, cursing when I see how bad it is.

“It’s pretty deep,” Pike says, inspecting the gash. “I can bandage it up, but it’s going to need stitches.” He sighs and gives me an apologetic look. “I think it’s probably time to go home.”

“What? No,” I say, too aware of the panic that’s entered my voice. “We’re so close.” I try to ignore the pain in my leg and the blood running down my shin.

“I know, but this needs medical attention. I don’t want it to get infected.”

“Just bandage me up, okay? We can clean it, wrap it up, and look for the owl, then I can go to urgent care as soon as we’re done.”

Pike looks at me, obviously conflicted by what I’m saying.

“Please,” I say. “We’re so close.”