Page 13 of Unbound

“Do you want to step out and come back in?” Marie asks. “I know that would make you feel better.”

“No,” I tell her. “I’m okay.”

I rationalize that she probably wouldn’t have offered if it weren’t possible. I shake my head a few times, adjust my purse across my body, and give her a look that says I’m ready to keep going.

“Where would you like to start?” Marie asks.

“I don’t even know,” I reply slowly, looking around as I take everything in. I walked through a portal, and now it’s like I’m standing in Disney’s Port Orleans Square. I don’t understand how portals work. I don’t think I’ll ever understand, and I think it’s one of those situations where the more I try to understand, the more my head will hurt.

But I’m here, and there are giant buildings and a sky above me. There’s even a slight breeze gently rustling the trees that surround the courtyard.

“How about a tour?” Marie asks.

“Yes, please.” I look toward the largest building. “What’s that?”

“That is our main building,” she begins. “It’s where we host our coven gatherings and any sort of formal celebrations. It also houses Crescent Moon Academy.”

“Academy? You mean a magic school? Like Hogwarts?”

She laughs. “I mean, I suppose that’s a fair comparison, though we teach other things as well. Our science program is among the best in the South, if I may say so myself.”

“But you teach magic here?”

“Yes,” she replies simply. “Everyone who attends Crescent Moon Academy is capable of magic. Most of the witches here come from long lines of magic, but we do occasionally see someone where the gift skipped a generation as magical and non-magical families merged. This particular school has been here for nearly two hundred years. I went here, as did my father.”

“This might be a dumb question, but are male witches called wizards or warlocks?”

“Typically, we say warlocks because wizard sounds a little too comedic.” She laughs. “But witch can be used as a broad term for anyone with the gift. Throughout history, however, females have tended to be more blessed with the gift than males.”

“Makes sense.” I shrug.

Marie motions for us to walk, and I fall into step beside her. It’s quiet except for the soft music from the bar and the gentle chorus of crickets coming from the dark, presumably magical forest surrounding this place. Marie opens the large front door, stepping aside so I can walk through first.

The place looks like any grand former plantation home in the South. It has a fancy foyer with a big, expensive chandelier, but the moment I step inside, I can tell there’s something more to the building. It expands far beyond the size it appears from the outside, and I can sense all sorts of magic pulsating from every square inch.

“Straight ahead is our gathering room,” she says as we walk forward. The large double doors are closed, and she quietly cracks one open so I can peer inside. At first glance, it reminds me of a church. There’s an altar at the front, but instead of a cross, there’s a large crescent moon glowing against a floor-to-ceiling window. My mind immediately goes to thinking it’s some sort of projection or hologram, but now that I’m here, I know better.

It’s magic.

Rows of chairs face the altar, and there’s more pagan and voodoo-themed artwork decorating the walls. The place smells strongly of sage and has a rather calming air to it, which is a striking difference from any feeling I’ve ever gotten stepping inside a Christian church.

“We have formal meetings in here,” Marie tells me. “Anytime there’s important news or an important decision for the coven to vote on, we meet here.”

“Okay.” I nod, my mind reeling as I try to take everything in.

“The school can accommodate several hundred children,” she goes on. “There are dormitories on either side, divided for boys and girls. Classes, of course, are mixed. We start with third grade. That’s typically the age when most active powers make themselves known.”

“So if a magical family had a kid, they wouldn’t necessarily know if they had powers until that age?”

“Powers usually make themselves known pretty early on, but typically,” she says as she closes the doors so we can step away from the gathering hall, “the majority of the coven doesn’t have active powers. We all have the ability to cast spells, tap into our intuition, and see or hear things non-magical people can’t. But powers like telekinesis aren’t something everyone here can do.”

“Really?”

She laughs at my genuine shock. “Really. I meant it when I said it, Wren. You come from a line of powerful magic. For as little as you’ve been allowed to tap into your powers, look at what you can already do. I can sense so much greatness inside you. It saddens me to know that you’ve gone nearly thirty years of your life suppressing who you truly are.” She puts a hand on my shoulder, then laughs. “Now, don’t go getting a big head and thinking you’re some prodigy.”

“I’m far from it.” I resist the urge to ask if she can just go ahead and locate some of the Blackwoods on the East Coast and see if I can go to their Covenstead instead. But the words quickly die inside me when I realize I wouldn’t only be meeting my family.

I’d have to tell them what I just did. Or undid, I suppose.