The Birds Don't Care If You're Pretty by Ava Caldwell

Author:Ava Caldwell [Caldwell, Ava]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2024-09-02T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TEN

GWEN

The river bubbled cheerfully along Main Street. It was Monday and I didn’t have a shift after school, so Luke and I strolled hand-in-hand, perusing shop windows, warmed by the afternoon sun. The scene was so wholesome, it tempted me to forget the seriously messed up magic I’d done in the cemetery two nights ago. But I couldn’t. Images of Thomas’s terrified face had tormented me since that night. Luke had been casual with me—gentle, even. I knew he was waiting for me to bring up the subject of malevolent magic on my own terms, and it was driving me crazy.

Finally, as we passed the artisanal dog treat shop, I blurted, “Are we gonna talk about what I did to Thomas Fitzgerald or what?”

“Okay,” he replied. “I’ll start by saying thanks. You saved me from getting my face smashed in. You’re my hero.”

“And?” I was expecting—hoping—for some sort of reckoning.

“And maybe the next time he wants to harass a girl for fun, he’ll think twice. If you ask me, you did the world a favor.”

I thought of all the skeezy things Thomas had done over the years, wondering if Luke had a point. I didn’t think Thomas or any of the Mundanes fully understood what had happened to him. But today at school, when he spied me across the quad, he booked it in the other direction. I had to admit that it felt good. Unfortunately, Valeria and the rest of the coven kept their distance when they saw me, too, their eyes narrow with mistrust.

“Okay, maybe Thomas deserved a good scare. But still, I discovered I have malevolent magic. Malevolent, as in evil.” I paused, afraid to voice my next thought aloud. “It makes me wonder if there’s something wrong with me.”

Valeria had said malevolent magic came from anger, hatred. She was right. I’d felt it in my core. It had drained me to pull all that negativity into the world, as if the universe itself had pushed back against it. After I’d controlled Thomas, I’d been exhausted, barely able to drag myself into bed. All night, I could feel the magic still humming in my veins, haunting my dreams. If malevolent magic ran in families, Elizabeth Foster must have had this power too. Was that why the coven had revoked her magic?

Luke stopped suddenly, pulling me to a halt. “If you’re waiting for me to tell you you’re a horrible person because you have this power, keep on waiting. It’s never gonna happen.”

“But the Book of Shadows says⁠—”

“The book says that inside every witch, there is good and evil. We all have darkness within us. You just happen to have the ability to use your darkness in a powerful way. That doesn’t make you some kind of villain.”

“I’m not sure Valeria would agree,” I said bitterly.

Could I blame her? Malevolent magic had killed Petra. The moment I controlled Thomas, everything had changed between us. Any amends we’d made were broken now; her suspicion hovered over us like a dark cloud.

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