Chapter 52.2

Imani, Nick, and all the other rank and file witches had successfully kept the Forest Preserve clear of citizens during the big fight. On Elizabeth’s command, many of the witches had returned to the site of the battle to remove all evidence of the struggle, which proved to be a daunting task. After all, Simone had completely uprooted several large trees and thrown a car halfway across the clearing, none of which were easy to clean up.After Imani delegated a cleanup crew, she joined Tessa, Chloé, and Nick in contacting all of the students still on campus. They offered a simplified version of events, explaining only that a faction within the coven had gone rogue, and that the threat was now over.

It was quickly revealed that, as much as everyone hated Cassandra’s actions, her knowledge of planar mechanics was the cornerstone upon which the repair plans had been created. After regaining consciousness, she stated in no uncertain terms that she would never lend her experience to the aid of a coven that treated her so poorly.

Repairing the Planar Gate, unfortunately, was no longer possible.

This knowledge forced the acting Headmistress, Elizabeth, into a tough spot. In a perfect world, she would be able to allocate extra resources to the protection of Aurelius University. However, after taking several hours to dig through the mess of Cassandra’s old reign, she learned the coven she now led was in a sorry state. Resources were already stretched thin, and many facets of the organization had been restructured to allow Cassandra maximum influence. Her habit of gathering blackmail on fellow witches had not stopped at the other Coven Heads; she’d strong-armed many other people into various deals and trades meant to further consolidate control.

The other problem was a lack of clear information regarding Davenport’s support. While it was clear she’d been manipulating things behind the scenes, Elizabeth didn’t get the impression that the Coven had been completely unified against her.

“This coven is a fucking mess,” Elizabeth sighed, sinking back into her chair. In front of her, mountains of paperwork lay scattered on a large desk, combinations of financial statements, field reports, and personnel files. “I knew money was tight, but this? It’s a miracle we can keep the lights on, let alone keep tabs on magical occurrences scattered across the Midwest.”

The large office was somewhat crowded at the moment. Palesa, Elijah, and Imani had been asked to join this meeting, as had Amara, Vee, Tessa, Chloé, and Nick.

Of all people, Chloé was the first person to speak up, surprisingly. Though she wasn’t visible, her voice indicated she was resting next to Amara. “Um, how does that affect us? Are you saying we aren’t gonna get any help with the soft spot here?”

“In a perfect world, we’d be able to reassign a small team of witches to this campus. They’d live in this manor, stay in communication with you, and keep tabs on Ekstàpoli to watch for possible leaks. However, with the state the coven is in, I don’t see how that’s possible. The biggest advantage of the Gate, apart from, y’know, holding the rest of the planes at bay, was that watching over the campus only required a single witch.”

“We’ve got Tessa, don’t we?” Amara said. “Isn’t that enough?”

Elizabeth took a deep breath before responding. “You do, and she’s not going anywhere. However, if I’m going to be Headmistress now, I can’t ignore the fact that Tessa opted to obfuscate critical information from us for months. We’re going to be under a lot of scrutiny from other covens, and I simply can’t let the only witch at Aurelius University be one with a track record of insubordination.” She looked at Tessa next, smiling softly. “Don’t get me wrong, I know why you did it, but I need to act like I’m cracking down on this coven.”

“Nah, don’t worry about it,” Tessa said dismissively. “I’m used to being the black sheep. Do what you need to.”

“Headmistress Bishop, if you don’t mind, I’ve got an idea of my own,” Elijah said, stepping forward. He swallowed nervously, and the whole time he spoke he avoided looking anyone in the eyes. “I, uh, would like to suggest that we allow Imani to transfer to Aurelius University. She could act as our liaison while Altessa is on probation.”

Imani gasped in surprise, but stayed quiet in favor of letting Miss Bishop respond. “A wonderful idea, Elijah, but that doesn’t solve the monetary problem. We can’t afford to put two students through college here.”

“Ah, yes, um… about that,” Elijah muttered. “You see, back during World War Two, when Hitler’s regime was taking over, many common citizens did their best to gum up the works. They weaponized their own incompetence, they followed every single rule to the letter of the law, double and triple checking every step of the process to try and make things move as slowly as possible. It was a really effective way to slow down their efforts, and many lives were saved because of these methods. Actually, did you know some doctors invented a fake disease? They claimed it was horribly deadly, and the threat scared soldiers away, keeping hospitals safe from their searches, and in many ways that—”

“Mr. Jun!” Miss Bishop said curtly.

“Right, right, sorry. Anyways, um, what I mean to say is that I’ve been aware of Davenport’s scheming for a while. While I never suspected that she would stoop this low, I knew she wouldn’t hesitate to grab for power if given the chance. With that in mind, I… might have fabricated a series of financial statements and requests for material components.”

Miss Bishop pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration. “You mean to say you’ve been embezzling funds from the coven?”

“F-for good reason!” Elijah stammered. “I-I want to request that this money be used to fund Miss Mabaya’s education here at Aurelius University!”

“You haven’t spent it yet?” Miss Tsopnang asked.

Elijah shook his head. “No ma’am. I always intended for it to go to young Imani here.”

Imani, with another look of surprise, finally broke her silence. “Elijah! Why would you do that? If Davenport had found out, she would have ruined you!”

“Oh, she knew the whole time. She held it over my head to convince me to help with her stupid siphoning plan.” Elijah stepped closer to Imani, gently placing a hand on her shoulder. “Imani, you try to hide it, but ever since you came to this campus, you’ve been so alive! You love being in the field, studying problems as they crop up, not poring over books with a crusty old fart like me.”

Tears sprang into Imani’s eyes, and she leapt forward to throw her arms around him. “Ohhhh Mr. Jun! That’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever done for me!”

After the two of them hugged, they both looked back to Headmistress Bishop with bated breath. She looked deep into Elijah’s eyes, then into Imani’s, and finally sighed in resignation. “Fine. If this means you give back all the money you stole, we’ll consider it the first part of your punishment. You and I need to have a long talk when we get back, Elijah.”

Imani leapt into the air. “Yes! Oh, this is so exciting!”

“This isn’t a vacation, Miss Mabaya,” Headmistress Bishop warned. “We’ll be expecting regular field updates, and because I’ve formally reprimanded Tessa, you’ll technically be in charge of keeping an eye on her.”

Amara looked over at Tessa, who didn’t seem all that worried about her new coven partner. In fact, she noticed a very slight stir of attraction in her friend’s aura. After chuckling quietly to herself, she lost the fight against a yawn she’d been struggling to hold back.

After spending an entire day cleaning up the coven, she was feeling particularly drained.

“As for the rest of you,” the Headmistress continued, “I’m formally designating you independent agents of the coven. It’s your job to keep watch over this campus, to prevent harm from befalling everyone that lives here while also working to prevent the general populace from learning about magic. You are to include Imani in of your planning, and the failure to relay information to her will be seen as a slight against the coven. Is that understood?”

One by one, all the girls, and Nick, nodded in agreement with Miss Bishop’s decision. The rest of the evening was spent discussing details of their new arrangement: how the chain of communication worked, what resources they had available to them, as well as several in-depth discussions about various facets of planar metaphysics.

Amara hated lectures. She always had trouble with dry, abstract ideas, and it was a miracle she didn’t fall asleep at any point during their briefing. The only thing keeping her awake was her concern over her dwindling inner fire. Ever since losing control of herself in Purgatory, she’d been extra cautious about keeping herself well fed, but also being conservative with her abilities. Here, in the middle of the coven’s manor a mile outside of Aurelius University, she felt more depleted than she’d been in weeks.

In time, the meeting came to an end. Imani and Elijah left first, with the former bounding in excitement and babbling about what she wanted to pack for the upcoming semester at her new school. Amara tried to follow closely behind, eager to return home and finally get some rest, when Elizabeth called out to stop her. “Miss Lamour, could you stay with us for a moment?”

With a silent groan of frustration, Amara nodded slowly before looking at her friends. Tessa wore an insufferable smirk, as if Amara had just been caught cheating and asked to stay after class, but Vee was much more sympathetic. She gave Amara a reassuring smile, silently mouthed that everyone would wait for her outside, then closed the door behind her. With the room now empty, Amara turned to face Coven Heads Bishop and Tsopnang.

Surprisingly, the first person to speak was not Headmistress Bishop, but Palesa. When she spoke, she did so carefully, with precise words.

“Amara. Your actions last night were reprehensible, and there lies no trace of forgiveness in my heart. Even now, in this room, I still find myself frightened of you. It will take months, if not years, to recover what you stole from me.” Palesa turned to look at Elizabeth, and the two women laced their fingers together before she continued. “With that being said, I also cannot deny that your presence was likely the deciding factor in stopping Davenport’s scheming. Because of you… Liz and I no longer have to live in fear. We can be open about our feelings for each other.”

“For that, Amara, we thank you,” Elizabeth said. “But never forget that these conflicting ideas can both be true at the same time. The world is hardly ever black and white, and people rarely view themselves as evil. In throwing the first punch, you very nearly united the entire coven against you. We urge that you remember this the next time you find yourself in a similar situation.”

With a nervous nod, her face flush with guilt, Amara said, “Y-yes, Miss Bishop, Miss Tsopnang. I’m truly sorry for the pain I caused, and I thank you for letting me go back to school and stuff.”

Headmistress Bishop smiled, then politely gestured to the door. Releasing a heavy sigh, Amara quickly left the room and rejoined her friends. They all pestered Amara with questions about what the Coven Heads wanted, though their curiosity didn’t last long in the face of just how tired everyone was. They left the manor quickly and without ceremony, eager to go home.

A thick blanket of night surrounded Ekstàpoli. The group of five Aurelius University students, exhausted both from their fight this morning and the following community service, walked back to campus together in relative silence.

Tessa was exhausted, at times leaning so heavily on Nick’s shoulder that Amara swore she’d fallen asleep while walking. Nick, despite having been spared the morning’s intense combat, had apparently been running around all day to help rally students and coven witches, and he yawned almost as frequently as Amara did. Chloé was impossible to read, as her exhaustion rendered her invisible. Vee seemed the most alert of all of them, which didn’t surprise Amara in the slightest. After all, she was known for cramming her schedule with twice as many classes as necessary and never once complaining about the workload.

Circling around Lysander Hall, the five of them quickly agreed that they wanted nothing more than a good night’s rest. After promising to check in with one another the following morning, they all split up to return to their respective homes.

As Amara said goodbye and started walking, she didn’t question Vee’s presence in the slightest. After all, they lived in the same block of apartments, and walking home together had once been routine for them. At least, before the chaos of Amara’s transformation and the resulting drama. However, as snow crunched underneath Amara’s boots, and light flurries began drifting down from above, Amara finally asked herself the obvious question.

Vee playfully bumped into Amara, cutting off her train of thought. “Hey. What’cha thinking about?”

Looking up, Amara smiled as she found Vee’s brilliant blue eyes. “U-um, I guess I’m a little nervous?”

“Nervous? You? I can’t imagine why,” Vee said, laughing softly. Above her head, several snowflakes seemed to catch an invisible current, swirling around in a tight ring of sparkling light before resuming their fall towards the ground. “I get it, though. I feel the same.”

Reaching out, Amara grabbed Vee’s hand, their fingers lacing together as effortlessly as the final piece of a jigsaw puzzle. They both smiled at each other before turning back to focus on their walk home. Amara tried to say something, but her thought was cut off by another heavy yawn. As if in protest of how hard she’d pushed herself today, the yawn ended with a small flurry of sparks leaping from her mouth. They crackled in front of her, causing her to jump in surprise.

“I haven’t seen you this tired since Purgatory,” Vee admitted. “Although, even then, you didn’t seem tired. More… hungry.”

“I’m shocked you’re not as beat as I am,” Amara said. “We had that whole fight with Davenport and Gautier, then spent hours cleaning up the quad again, and then we had to sit through, like, a magic lecture? I could barely keep my eyes open.”

“I’m used to being exhausted. I used to regularly wake up just before dawn to work out, remember?”

“Ugh, working out, another thing I need to start doing,” Amara groaned.

“Wait, really? Why?” Vee asked.

“Nick’s idea. School’s starting back up soon, and I have no idea how strong I am, so I need to retrain my muscle memory. It would be difficult to explain if I, like, ripped a door off its hinges or effortlessly picked up a really heavy box because I didn’t know how heavy I was supposed to make it look.”

“Huh,” Vee muttered. “I guess I never thought of it that way. I can turn my powers on and off, so I don’t need to think about stuff like that.”

“Lucky you!” Amara squeezed Vee’s hand tight.

Both girls laughed again, and before the conversation could continue, they found themselves at the small gate positioned near the entrance to Amara’s apartment. The building didn’t start immediately, as another ten feet of sidewalk extended past the gate, and Amara paused before heading down this path. She pulled her keys out, thrilled she remembered to fetch them from the roof of Lysander Hall, then looked over at Vee.

“So, um… this is my place,” Amara said quietly.

“Oh, is it? Gosh, I don’t think I’ve ever been here before,” Vee said, holding back another laugh.

“You know what I mean!” Amara blushed furiously as she tried to gather her thoughts. She absentmindedly scratched the back of her neck while averting her eyes, then continued. “I meant, like… ugh, I’m so bad at this! Do you want to come inside with me?”

When Amara looked back at Vee, she was already halfway to the front entrance. “I’d love to, but I seem to be the only person approaching the building. Are you gonna use your powers to unlock the door from the sidewalk?”

Smiling back at the love of her life, Amara laughed one more time before running to join Vee. She swiped her ID, then held the door open for Vee as they walked inside.