The Witchling Apprentice

  “Sorry, but I’m not your girlfriend, and even if I was allowed to date—which I’m not—I wouldn’t choose you,” Cassie told Nate. Her hands finally followed her mind’s lead and pushed him away as she reached to grab her shoes.

  She didn’t stop at his shocked face. ‘King of the School’ Nathaniel Bay had just been turned down. Cassie couldn’t believe she actually could do it, but it felt good. She didn’t want to be toyed with, and that was all he did now. The nice Nate was gone and had been for a long time. She regretted not pushing him away when he first steadied her from falling. She wouldn’t make that mistake twice. No matter how enticing those baby blues were, Cassie wasn’t going to be Nate’s flavor of the week.

  It only took Whitney five minutes to change out of her dress, but Cassie took longer. Owen would be waiting and ready to give her crap about it, but Cassie didn’t care. She was slightly lost in her own world of confusion. The dance was strange, and Nate was strange. Wasn’t the test supposed to change everything? Wasn’t the school and everyone supposed to open their arms and stop all the secrets? Cassie just wanted to be normal.

  “Earth to Cas,” Whitney said, tapping Cassie’s head. “Are you home? Too much loud music ruined your hearing?” Whitney guessed.

  “Something like that,” Cassie mumbled as she pulled her sweatshirt over her head.

  “What did Than want to talk to you about?” Whitney asked.

  Than. Yeah, that was Than talking to her. That would be the best way to differentiate between what her heart and head disagreed about. Than was the one talking to her, not the Nate she remembered.

  “Something about seeing me at the bonfire,” Cassie replied, looking to Whitney for an explanation.

  “Yeah, he’ll probably be there, but that doesn’t matter. You’ll have me and Owen to keep you company. You won’t have to deal with Than’s crowd,” Whitney replied. She was almost as overprotective as Owen at times.

  “But I probably need to stop by my place to tell my uncle,” Cassie added.

  She really didn’t want to, but Uncle John could smell anything. If he smelled bonfire smoke on her and she had to explain, he would turn into a bear to deal with. It would be easier to just go with them and hope he was asleep for the night, but there was always the chance he would be up or waiting for her to return and catch her. Cassie really didn’t want to deal with that. She still didn’t know how she was going to tell him about the exam. She hoped Aunt Maria would be home soon. That was the only thing that would save her from his wrath once he found out.

  “Ahh, really? Come on. We can lie to him. He’ll never know,” Whitney protested as she bundled her dress and Cassie’s borrowed one back into their white bags before standing to leave.

  Cassie untied the updo Whitney had worked so hard to make. She shook her hair loose and grabbed her own book bag to follow Whitney.

  “You know how he is. If I don’t tell him, he might never let me out again,” Cassie replied as they made their way to the locker room door. She wasn’t exaggerating, and Whitney knew that.

  Whitney reluctantly nodded.

  “But he’ll say no.” Whitney pouted while stepping out into the still-darkened gym and turning to go out the back door.

  “Who will say no?” Owen asked from the shadows. Cassie hadn’t even noticed him and could barely hear him.

  Owen stepped into the dim gym light and waited for a response. Whitney began to leave, and Cassie followed. It was no use talking in the gym with the music going. Outside it was still noisy, but at least Cassie was certain she hadn’t lost any hearing from the excessive bass next to the locker room.

  Owen stepped in front of Cassie and Whitney to get a reply to his question. He was back in full older brother mode.

  “Her uncle,” Whitney replied.

  The cautious look on Owen’s face morphed into a smile.

  “Of course he’ll say no. That’s why we should just go to the party and deal with it later.” Owen was also perfectly okay lying to Uncle John. He thought her uncle was more unreasonable than Whitney did and neither had a clue what it was really like to live with Uncle John. “Better to ask forgiveness than permission.”

  “Not in my house. I don’t want to go home afterward and be in trouble. It’s fall,” Cassie complained as if that explained it all.

  Everyone knew John was worse to deal with in fall and spring. Cassie imagined it was some sort of seasonal disorder, but she had yet to find how to treat him for it. If she had, she would slip it into his morning coffee.

  “Yes, so let’s not tell him,” Whitney replied. “It’s fall. That means he’ll be asleep by the time you get home.”

  “And if he waits up for me and I come home smelling like a campfire?” Cassie glanced between her two best friends.

  They looked at each other, having a silent conversation with their eyes only. Shaking her head, Cassie rolled her eyes at them. There was no way they were going to convince her otherwise. They didn’t have to live with John.

  “I’ll talk to him,” Owen finally offered.

  “You’re going to tell him that you’re taking me out into the woods at night, and you think he’ll be okay with that?” Cassie asked in disbelief. Very few people would stand up to her uncle, and Owen wasn’t one of them.

  Owen shrugged. “It’s me or Whitney, and I think I have a better chance. Unless Whitney has been taking lessons from her mother, then …” Owen faded off, and Whitney hit him.

  “So you think I’m right?” Cassie asked, wondering why they’d both changed their minds.

  “No. But you do need a better sweatshirt. It’s cold outside if you haven’t noticed.” Owen began to walk away.

  Cassie looked at Whitney, who shrugged. Now, Whitney was one of those that didn’t mind standing up to her uncle. But instead, Owen had decided to do it. They were switching places. One more strange thing to add to her day.

  Cassie followed Owen outside. He was right. It was colder outside, but that wasn’t Cassie’s fault. She had planned to just pick up her stuff and go home, not stay at school for hours. Cassie turned to begin walking home when Owen reached out and grabbed her arm.

  “I drove over,” he explained. They both lived close enough that they walked to school most of the time. She hadn’t even thought about driving. “I’ll take you back home.”

  “Oh yeah,” Cassie replied, wanting to slap her own forehead for the lame response.

  “Oh yeah,” Owen repeated, just to tease her.

  “Coming with us?” Cassie asked Whitney.

  “Nope, I’ll meet you guys there. My mom gave me her car for the night,” Whitney explained. Cassie nodded. “I’d give you a kiss, but I don’t think our date is done yet,” Whitney teased.

  “I don’t kiss on the first date,” Cassie teased back.

  They had spent so much time together there once was a false rumor going around that they had something going on the side. Cassie and Whitney didn’t care, since it was started by someone they preferred to ignore, but it didn’t go over well with Owen. The rumor only got around the school for half a day before he had it stopped. Owen was someone people listened to at school, but talking to her uncle was going to be a first.

  Cassie followed Owen to his car in the parking lot. She didn’t need him to show her where it was—you couldn’t miss the chipped lime green paint job he had tried to do himself the summer before. Art wasn’t one of his strong points.

  “You really want to talk to Uncle John?” Cassie asked, as she shut the door and turned all the vents to herself. She didn’t have a coat with her, and it was much chillier than she expected. She would be grabbing a sweatshirt, and maybe even some mittens, before going to the bonfire if she was let out of her prison.

  “Want to? Heck no. I know as well as anyone he isn’t fun to deal with, but you shouldn’t have to stay home all the time. He’s way too protective,” Owen replied, driving away from the school and honking at Whitney as they passed her getting into her car. Cassie wanted to la
ugh. Owen was almost as protective as her uncle.

  “And what if he says no?” That was actually not exactly how she pictured it, but it was better than telling Owen he would be lucky to get out of the house without a black eye for asking. ‘Overprotective’ was an understatement with Uncle John.

  “Then we will have to just sit around your house playing video games,” Owen replied. “But don’t worry. I can be persuasive, too.”

  He wiggled his eyebrows. Cassie had to laugh. Persuasive wasn’t one of his qualities.

  “Sure,” Cassie replied as Owen gave a quick right turn after the sudden left turn. It wasn’t sudden because Cassie knew where they were going but more so sudden because Owen was speeding through a yellow, almost red, light.

  It didn’t even take five minutes to make it to her house. Hopping out, Cassie wondered if she should just send Owen home. She had already had the longest time away from home that she could remember in close to forever, she didn’t need to go out again. However, telling Owen to leave wasn’t an option as he got out and hurried to the front door. He let himself in before Cassie could stop him, as if she would send him home if they waited even a moment longer.

  “Is that you, Cassie?” John yelled from the family room in the back of the house.

  “Yeah, and Owen,” Cassie replied, giving Owen a look that said go away.

  “Came home early?” he asked from his spot in the Lazy Boy recliner chair he sat in most of the time.

  “Actually, sir, we came home to get warmer clothes,” Owen replied, bravely stepping up to tell Cassie’s uncle they were going out.

  “Warmer clothes?” John asked, eyebrow raised. He actually looked a little amused that Owen would speak to him.

  “Cassie wanted to go with Whitney and me to the fire tonight,” Owen added quickly, spitting out the words almost too fast to understand them.

  John jumped up from his chair, quicker than Cassie expected.

  “No way,” John replied, standing to his full height, which was inches above Owen.

  For his part, Owen was being quite brave. He attempted to stand eye-to-eye with John and didn’t back down. That wasn’t a scene Cassie saw often. John was intimidating lying in his chair; standing, he was beyond intimidating. His massive upper body was twice the width of a normal-sized person and his unruly brown, almost black, hair that needed cutting gave him additional height. But for all the physicality that made her uncle imposing, it was his eyes that you didn’t want to look into. He was outright scary.

  “She doesn’t go to the fires. The Council of Elders agreed to that. You know the rules,” John told Owen, his eyes blazing in an unspoken challenge.

  Normally Owen wouldn’t have been that brave, but now he didn’t even shrink away.

  “The rule was she didn’t get to mingle with everyone until she joined the coven. I don’t think anyone is going to mind now that she passed her apprentice test yesterday.”

  Cassie’s mouth dropped open. She hadn’t planned to tell her uncle this soon, but even so, Owen was being so brash. She was going to let Uncle John know once he was well fed and in a happy mood. You didn’t tell the giant bear that was her uncle things that bluntly.

  “What?” Uncle John roared, and Owen finally backed away from the older man, keeping Cassie behind himself.

  Cassie wanted to run away, but John turned his full gaze to her. His anger was more than evident in his red face. She didn’t need to see his eyes to know he was beyond upset.

  “You did what?” he asked, his face burning as he tried to rein in his anger.

  Cassie was speechless as she watched the vein in his forehead bulge. One thing Uncle John was very good at was hearing everything. She didn’t need to repeat herself.

  “She didn’t want me to tell you, but I knew you wouldn’t let her go otherwise.” Owen was able to talk again at least. He sent an ‘I’m sorry’ to Cassie with his eyes. He wasn’t going to be forgiven for a long time in Cassie’s book. She stared back at him sourly.

  “Not possible. She couldn’t have taken the exam. You need permission from your guardian to do that,” John replied, keeping his anger only slightly in check. “I’m your guardian, and I sure as heck didn’t give you permission to do anything like that.”

  “The exact wording is your parents’ permission,” Cassie squeaked out. John was terrifying to look at, even if he hadn’t yet broken furniture or the walls as it often came to with his unchecked anger.

  John glared at Cassie. “I’m your guardian,” he repeated slowly, blowing a breath out between each word.

  “But my parents are dead,” Cassie added. It was a low blow to be so blunt, but she had no other way of telling him. Yes, Owen was now on her bad list. It would have gone much better if she had time to come up with a way to tell her uncle.

  John’s anger instantly softened. “We don’t know that. Your mother might still be alive.” John hadn’t given up hope as everyone else had.

  “No. Both of them must be dead because they said that I wouldn’t have been able to do the exam if either my father or mother were alive and didn’t give me permission.” Cassie stared at the floor. She knew how bad it felt when she found out the truth; she hated that not only did she go behind her uncle’s back, but now she had to tell him the truth about her mother.

  “That can’t be true,” John tried to deny everything.

  Cassie didn’t want it to be true either. But she had read the coven rules many times. She needed parental permission. That was the only requirement for taking the exam.

  “Cassie, may I?” Owen asked, finally speaking. He motioned to Cassie’s hair. She gave him an odd look but bobbed her head yes.

  Owen turned Cassie’s back to her uncle and lifted up her hair. John sucked in his breath.

  “What?” Cassie asked, turning to look at her now-stunned uncle.

  “When you join the coven there’s a mark that forms on the back of your neck. That’s the proof that you passed your exam,” Owen explained what he had done.

  “But you said she just did it,” John finally spoke. “How could she have chosen a mate already?”

  “What?” Owen asked, reaching back and lifting up Cassie’s hair again, this time looking behind her also.

  “What?” Cassie repeated what Owen had said as she turned and saw his slight smile drop.

  “When did you have time alone with Than?” Owen asked, his calm demeanor turning into anger.

  “Than?” Cassie replied. What were they talking about?

  “Than? As in Nathaniel Bay?” John asked, not explaining what was going on either, but obviously upset at something.

  “Yeah. That’s Than’s mark,” Owen added, sulking a bit.

  “What’s Than’s mark?” Cassie looked between her uncle and friend.

  “Can it be undone?” Owen asked John, hope lingering in his voice.

  John shook his head. “She’s already proved that she doesn’t need my approval for anything. She’s made her choice. That’s that.” John dejectedly sat back down in his chair. His anger was all gone now, and he was back in his normal hibernation spot.

  “Choice about what?” Cassie asked.

  They had thrown around the word mate and Than in the same breath. She didn’t like the sound of that, just as she hadn’t liked Nate declaring she would be his girlfriend without asking her. Cassie looked at Owen, but he was already staring at the doorway. She turned to her uncle, but he was just as disagreeable.

  “Take her to the fire. Maybe she can see what she’s getting into because she isn’t my problem any longer,” John grabbed the remote as he laid back.

  Cassie knew him well enough to know that it was just words. He loved his sister greatly, and the news that she was truly gone was going to take a long time for him to adjust to. Cassie wanted to miss her parents as much as he did, but she never knew them. She was angrier at being left alone than sad at finding out the truth.

  “Let’s go,” Owen said, he already was turned to the door.
/>
  She gave her uncle one last look. She probably should have stayed to keep him company, but her curiosity of finding out any of the town secrets was too appealing. John seemed to think she would learn more at the bonfire. She had to hope so since no one had let her in on the secrets yet.

  Cassie hurried outside behind Owen. He didn’t even pause to see if she were following. She slid into the passenger seat of his car and studied him as he pulled out of the driveway. She could tell he was still silently angry.

  “What’s going on? What did I do?” Cassie asked. Wasn’t she the one that was supposed to be angry? Owen had told her uncle about her exam when she had asked him not to. He had broken her trust.

  Owen stopped at the end of the driveway and looked at Cassie.

  “He really didn’t say anything to you?” Owen cautiously asked. The anger was replaced by hurt now. Something was going on, and she had no clue.

  “Who said what? You guys are confusing,” she complained. Cassie rubbed her forehead before pulling her fingers through her hair to detangle the crunchy curls.

  “Did you agree to…” Owen paused and thought for a moment. “Did you agree to date him?”

  Cassie laughed. It had to be a joke. Owen, as well as everyone else, knew that Cassie couldn’t date, let alone would she date Nate. He was part of the popular crowd, not even close to what she was looking for in a guy. Owen didn’t laugh. He was still serious.

  “No,” she replied. “Besides, he has a girlfriend. Why are you worried?”

  Owen let out the breath he was holding. He smiled as he blew his dishwater blond hair off his forehead. His mood changed instantly.

  “Maybe there’s hope after all,” he said under his breath as he whipped out onto the street and headed north out of town.

  CHAPTER 3

  Cassie arrived at James Park with Owen in a much better mood. She could almost say he was back to himself, but she would have been lying. He was still slightly distant, and she had no clue why. They had been best friends since they were little. She didn’t want that to ever change; especially over something they had said she’d done, but hadn’t.