Witcha Gonna Do? (Witchington #1)(47)
Twenty minutes later, I’m using a dolly to wheel the frozen matriarch of the Sherwood clan, who still has the towel draped over her head, to the witch’s den, which is without a doubt one of the most bizarre things I’ve ever done, and I’ve eaten cold cod’s-oil pizza on purpose. Of course, turning around and seeing the parade of bedraggled magical misfits and a surly unicorn shifter just adds to the outlandish effect. Eli walks into the den behind me with a Sherwood sister under each arm. Vance carries Tilda’s dad and her oldest sister through the door next. Birdie follows with Leona, apologizing the entire walk across the opal dragon guarding the den. Then there is Tilda, apologizing to a frozen rooster named Barkley as she hefts the overweight fowl, who manages to look unhinged, confused, and pissed off all at the same time.
Tilda looks around the now-crowded witch’s den as she chews her bottom lip, concern forming a deep V between her eyes. “You think they’ll be safe?”
Without thinking first about who is watching or why I am doing it, I reach out and take her hand and give it a reassuring squeeze. “Between the protective dome and the dragon magic guarding the witch’s den, they’ll be safe.”
Tilda leans into me, resting her head against my shoulder. “Thank you for helping me. I know the spell isn’t making you do this, and with your parents safe now, you could just walk away.” She smiles up at me as if she knows me better than I know myself. “Hell, you could take The Liber Umbrarum once we get it and sell it for more than enough money to live out the rest of your life in luxury on a private island somewhere warm.”
“Maybe that’s my real plan.” I make it sound like I’m kidding, but the smart part of me probably isn’t.
Forget probably, it would have for sure been my plan before Tilda. Steal the book, sell it, get my parents somewhere neither the Council nor the Resistance can get them, somewhere they can be free from all of this bullshit. It is a no-brainer—or at least it would have been.
“Nah,” she says with a shake of her head. “For all you try to hide it, you’re really a softie underneath it all.” She looks up at me, her gaze direct and sure. “You forget as an outré I have to utilize my skills of observation and instincts to ferret out what most witches get from using their magic.” She lowers her voice so only I can hear her. “I see you, Gil Connolly. I mean, you’re good at hiding it, which is why you were such a jerk to me in the beginning, but I see the real you with the soft gooey center.”
“You see what you want to see.” It’s the truth, and yet I can’t deny that I wish Tilda could be right.
Maybe in another life I could be that guy, but not in this one.
Tilda rolls her eyes and shakes her head at me before heading back to the house. I’m about to follow her, not because of the duíl magic, but because there’s nowhere else that feels as right as being with her when Vance grabs me by the shirt and yanks me back a step.
“Sooner or later she’s gonna find out that she’s a spellbinder—yeah, Griselda told me years ago—and that you knew the whole time. She’s gonna be rightly mad,” Vance says, his tone hard with warning. “The clock’s ticking for you.”
Yeah, like I need to be told that. My clock is always ticking—that’s the thing about being from the wrong side of exile, you are always looking over your shoulder to see what direction disaster is about to come from next.
The damn time bomb just waiting to go off is ticking so loud in my ear I can still hear it an hour later over the sound of the train as we rush down the tracks heading north toward Salem.
The train is a small one, but there’s plenty of room for us. Behind the engineer’s car, ruled over by a goblin with a taste for excessive speed, is a lounge car filled with couches, a continental buffet, and all of us gathered around a magicked map of the museum as everyone memorizes the entrances and exits just in case the book heist goes sideways. Behind that car is one filled with four sleeping berths, each with a huge window for all the sightseeing we won’t be doing any of.
Tilda is holding court, outlining her plan for the heist. I may have come up with the idea, but she figured out the logistics, the timing, and everything else.
“I’m the one they’re expecting, so I’ll be the one they see. Well, Gil and I will be.” She looks over at me and smiles. “We’ll be good little guests during the party, dancing and drinking and drawing the attention of everyone there. That will give Eli and Birdie dressed in servers’ uniforms plenty of freedom to dose the guards by the book’s case with a puff of the temporary zombie powder I swiped from Griselda’s house. The book weighs fifty pounds, so you’ll swap the book for the block of agate. You’ll have about half a heartbeat after lifting the book to make that happen before the nonmagical sensors go off, so whatever you do, don’t hesitate. After that, you’ll head out the back to the train. Vance, that’s where you’ll be making sure we can get out of Dodge as soon as we have the book. Gil and I will stay as long as we can to divert attention away from Eli and Birdie and then we’ll head back to the train. Then it’s back to Wrightsville and defrosting my family.”
It really is a sight to see. She has a calm confidence that is the sexiest thing ever.
“So we each have a handle on our jobs?” Tilda asks, looking at each witch, who nods. “Then, after we get back home, use the book to fix the spell I glitched all over, I’ll return the book to the museum, and take care of whatever repercussions there may be so you all don’t have to worry about it.”