Moon Daughter Rituals should be observed during each full moon. To release that which no longer serves you, you’ll need a pale blue candle, bowl of water, pen, paper, and a handful of sage to burn.

—Notes from the di Carlo grimoire

It started innocently, like Pleasure took human form and dragged a cool finger down my spine, tracing little circles over my flushed skin. I lifted my arms and arched into the sensation. Happiness, pure, radiant, and all-consuming, filled me.

If I’d been angry a moment before, standing high up on the cliffs, it was a forgotten memory the second I walked across the sand. If I’d been worried about invading demons, I no longer could recall why. Now all I knew was bliss.

I was so preoccupied with happiness, I just wanted to dance; sway my hips and feel another body moving in time with mine. Rhythmic, joyful, unfettered. As if my desire summoned a dance partner, invisible hands roved across my bodice, down my sides, gripped my bottom.

I gasped. I didn’t slap my bold partner. They’d given me what I wanted the second the thought entered my mind. And I liked it.

Music and laughter drummed all around. The beat was life. Enticing. It called to my most primal witch instincts. I moved without thought, giving myself over completely to nature and my senses. I spun away from my invisible dance partner, and my skirts and hair flew around.

The serpent and root dress I’d slipped on earlier reminded me of the wilderness—I tossed my head back and soaked up the dying rays of the sun. Maybe I’d left my body and was a cloud. It felt so good to just be free, to move and forget. Here, near the crackling fire and invisible dancing people, I didn’t think about murders, or curses, or creatures of the underworld, and the devil’s horns.

I didn’t think about stolen amulets and diaries.

Dancing, down here on the beach, I only knew peace and joy and pleasure. I didn’t need to worry about anything. I could stay here, drifting from one good sensation to the next, forever. He was coming for me. My king. My damnation. I don’t know how I knew, but I did.

Balance. Light and dark. The sun and moon. Good and evil. A snake winding through a bed of wildflowers. Offering a taste of the most forbidden fruit. Scales of justice were tipped; a choice hanging there for me to decide. To right a wrong, or damn us all.

A tiny voice screamed in warning, this was all terribly wrong, but was silenced as music and movement swept around me, through me. Whispers grew louder, more frantic. I shoved them aside.