“You’re obnoxious,” I tease. “But would you mind if we focus on what really matters? Graduating high school?”

Between losing my parents, transferring schools, and missing four months while I did my best impression of a waterspout, I’m about as behind as I can get and still be a senior. Which means if I don’t finish the extra projects I’ve been assigned and pass all my finals, I’m going to be a senior again next year, too. And that is not acceptable, no matter how much Macy would like me to stick around another year. I mean, if Hudson can make up classes after being dead, for God’s sake, I can make them up, too.

“You know that’s the real reason I’m burying my head, don’t you?” I finally admit. “Because there’s no way I can deal with the ridiculous amount of work I have to make up and try to figure out what to do about Cyrus or the Circle or—”

“Your mate?” Macy smiles ruefully and holds up a hand before I can protest. “Sorry, couldn’t resist. But you’re right, as much as I’d wish it otherwise, you seem to really want to graduate.” She walks over and grabs her laptop off her desk. “So, as your self-appointed best friend, it’s up to me to make sure that happens. You’ve got a presentation due for Dr. Veracruz’s class on magical history, right? I heard some other seniors talking about it.”

“Yeah.” I nod. “Everyone had to pick a subject discussed in class this year, then write and present a ten-page paper about some aspect of that topic we didn’t have time to go over. She says it’s so that we all get a more well-rounded knowledge of the different parts of history, but I think she’s just trying to torture us.”

Macy climbs back on her bed and types something on her laptop. “I know just the topic for you to research!”

“Oh yeah?” I ask, rolling over and sitting up.

“Yes,” she says. “You guys discussed mating bonds, right? I’ve been dying to take this class just for that reason. Well, you’re a walking example of something not discussed in class.”

I shake my head. “Unfortunately, I missed that lecture, but Flint told me it’s possible to be mated to more than one person in your lifetime. I’m not the only person to ever have more than one mate.”

Macy pauses her typing and looks up at me, one brow arched. “Yes, but you’re the only one to ever have a mating bond severed by something other than death.”

“It’s never happened to anyone else?” I repeat, my heart pounding in my chest. “Really?” It seems so hard to believe, but also too terrible to believe. If no one has ever experienced this before, how are we going to fix it? What are we going to do? And why, why, why did it happen to Jaxon and me?

“No one,” Macy reiterates. “Mating bonds never break, Grace. They just don’t. They can’t. It’s a law of nature or something.” She pauses and looks down at her hands resting on her keyboard. “Except, somehow, yours did.”

Like I really need to be reminded of that.

Like I wasn’t there.

Like I didn’t feel it snap with a force that nearly tore me in half, a force that nearly destroyed me…and Jaxon.

“Never?” I must have misheard that part. Surely I’m not the only one.

“Never,” Macy insists, deliberately enunciating each syllable even as she looks at me like I’ve suddenly grown three heads. “Not kind of never, Grace. Not almost never. Never never. Like never in the history of our species never. Mating bonds cannot be broken while mates are alive. Ever.” She shakes her head for emphasis. “I mean never. Ever. Nev—”

“Okay, okay. I get it.” I shake my head in surrender. “Mating bonds never break. Except Jaxon’s and mine did break and neither of us is dead, so…”

“Yeah,” she agrees with a frown. “We’re in totally uncharted territory here. It’s no wonder you feel so messed up. You are messed up.”

“Wow. Thanks for that.” I pretend to pull a dagger out of my heart.

But Macy just makes a face at me. “You know what I mean.”

“I do,” I agree. “But there’s one part of this whole thing I just can’t figure out. I’ve been thinking about it for days, and it’s why I’m so skeptical about the whole this never happens thing. I—”

“Never,” she interrupts, waving her hands around for emphasis. “It literally never happens.”

I hold up a hand again to get her to pause, because I’m really trying to work toward a point here. “But if that’s true, and mating bonds never break, why exactly was there a spell to break mine? And how did the Bloodletter just happen to know it?”

3

Keep Calm and

Wingo On

“Hey, do you know what’s for dinner tonight?” I ask as Macy and I make our way down the dragon-sconce-lit hallways to the cafeteria. We both worked up a massive appetite researching mating bonds for the last three hours—although no closer to discovering someone else whose bond had been severed or any mention of a spell to do it. “I forgot to check.”

“Whatever it is, it will be terrible.” She makes a disgusted face and sighs. “It’s one of the bad Wednesdays.”

“Bad Wednesdays?” I should probably know what she means, considering I’ve been eating in the dining hall nearly every day for the last three weeks, but I’ve been more than a little preoccupied. Most days, I’m lucky if I can remember to wear my uniform, let alone what the cafeteria is serving…well, except for waffle Thursdays. Those are indelibly imprinted in my brain.

Macy gives me the side-eye as we head down the stairs. “Let’s just say I suggest the frozen yogurt—and maybe a dinner roll, if you’re feeling brave.”

“Frozen yogurt? Seriously? How bad could it be? The kitchen witches are awesome.” I mean, what could they possibly serve to engender this kind of disgust in my cousin? Eye of newt? Toe of frog?

“The witches are awesome,” she agrees. “But one Wednesday a month, the witches take off early for Wingo nights. And tonight is one of those nights.”

“Wingo nights?” I repeat, completely mystified even as my imagination conjures up images of witches with giant raven wings flying around the top of the castle. Then again, how would I have missed that?

Macy looks shocked that I haven’t heard of whatever this ritual is. “It’s a witchy version of bingo. I can’t wait till I’m old enough to play.”

“Old enough to play?” I rack my brain trying to figure out what sort of bingo the kitchen witches might play that would be adults only.

“Yes!” Macy’s face lights up. “It’s like bingo, but every time they call a number on your card, you have to do a shot from whatever potions they’re serving that night. Some make you dance like a chicken, others turn your clothes inside out… Last month, they even had one that made them walk the entire room roaring like a T. rex.”

She laughs. “Let’s just say, when you finally score a bingo and win, you’ve totally earned it. The kitchen witches are addicted, even though Marjorie always wins, since she’s such a drama queen. Which then becomes a whole thing on its own because Serafina and Felicity accuse her of charming the balls—”

“Exactly whose balls are you charming?” Flint asks as all six-foot-whatever of him pops up behind us. As per usual, he’s got a huge grin on his handsome face and mischief in his amber eyes. “I’m only asking because I’m pretty sure it’s against the rules.”

“Don’t you start, too,” Macy says with a grin and a shake of her head. “I was talking about Wingo and how the kitchen witches get their wands in a twist over—”

“Wingo?” He stops dead at the bottom of the stairs, his easy smile replaced by a look of horror. “Tell me it’s not Wingo night already?”

Macy sighs. “I wish I could.”

“You know what? I’m really not that hungry.” Flint starts to back away. “I think I’ll—”

“Oh, no. You’re not getting out of it that easily.” Macy loops her arm through his and starts tugging him forward. “If the rest of us have to suffer, so do you.”

Flint grumbles, but Macy just propels him along even as she agrees with him.

The two of them whine the whole rest of the way, until finally I say, “Nothing can be this bad. Heck, I survived public school cafeterias, where frozen yogurt wasn’t an option even on the good days.”

“Oh, it’s that bad,” Macy answers.

“Actually, it’s worse,” Flint warns me.

“How? How could it actually be worse? I mean, who’s doing the cooking?”

They give me identical looks of horror as they both answer at the same time. “The vampires.”

4

Wednesday,

Bloody Wednesday

“The vampires?” Not going to lie. I recoil a little as I think about what Jaxon—and Hudson—eat.

“Exactly,” Flint tells me with a disgusted face. “Why Foster decided to put the vampires in charge on the kitchen witches’ day off, I’ll never know.”

“Who should have been in charge?” Mekhi asks as he walks up behind Macy. “The dragons? Roasted marshmallows only get most of the student body so far.”

“At least marshmallows are food,” Flint tells him as he pulls open one of the dining hall doors with a flourish, then gestures for me to go inside.