“No, you won’t.” Oliver wasn’t using his amplifying amulet, his back to the assemblage, and I felt myself pale. I looked past him to the crowd, visible now that the house lights had come up. I found my mother, clutching her hands to her chest and crying. My gaze fell then to Ivy, who was ready to live at last—without me. And then I found Jenks, looking aghast and unable to reach me because of the bubble between us. He’d be fine. He’d go live with Trent, the bastard, and his children would play with Lucy.

They’d all be fine without me, I thought, my throat closing as I fumbled in my pocket for the amulet that Pierce had given me. I was not going to Alcatraz. I’d call Al first.

“I did no wrong,” I said, reaching out and tapping a line, feeling my hair start to float as the broken jaggedness filled me. “I know black magic, and I will use it when threatened. I’m not a black witch—”

“Take her,” Oliver said, motioning for security, and Pierce stiffened, surrounded by his new peers.

I motioned for him to relax. Al was waiting for me. I could hide out in the ever-after until things cooled off, and then come back. I could always do a disguise or something. Who was I kidding? They’d know it was me.

“Oliver, you already tried Alcatraz,” Trent said, his voice calm and smooth. “As I recall, that was a dismal failure. You need something more permanent.”

I turned toward Trent, livid. Like a lobotomy? “What are you doing?” I all but hissed, and he retreated, putting more distance between us as Lucy howled.

“There’s nothing to stop her from escaping again,” Trent said matter-of-factly. “I’ve a better idea.”

Someone grabbed my arms from behind me, and I struggled, grunting when a zip strip was slipped over my wrists. As Pierce stood, made helpless by his new position, the jagged ley line left me.

“What do you have in mind?” Oliver asked as I shook the security off and stood in the hot spotlight, hearing some people cry for my blood and those I once trusted either silent or plotting against me. Trent had said to trust him, but every instinct I had said to fight.

“I can curse her,” Trent said, and Vivian’s eyes widened. “Send her to the ever-after, which is where she’d flee anyway, but curse her so that she can’t return unless summoned.”

“You son of a bitch!” Jenks shrilled, a hot red dust spilling from him.

“Like the demon she is?” Oliver said, smiling wickedly, but I could do nothing except stare. Was there such a thing, or was this part of his plan? Put some fake curse on me so I was off the coven radar? Brooke had offered me something similar. What would my life be like now if I had accepted?

“Well, she is a demon, isn’t she?” Trent said with a nasty boys’-club smile on his face.