Nadia had to turn to him then. “You have … friends now. You have us. You know that, right?”

What she really wanted to say was, You have me.

It was a long moment before Mateo met her eyes.

The betrayal there, the desolation, was almost more than Nadia could bear to see. How could he endure feeling it?

Only then did she realize how much of that betrayal—that anger—was for her.

He asked, “Is this what witchcraft is? One big trick you people play on the world?”

You people. He didn’t see any difference between her and a servant of the One Beneath.

“A witch isn’t the same thing as a Sorceress—”

“Stop it! I don’t want to hear anything else about the—the First Laws or what a Steadfast is or any of it!” Mateo sprang to his feet. “Whatever it is you do, it’s part of what screwed over my whole life before I was even born.”

“Mateo—Mateo, I’m sorry—”

“For someone who’s so sorry to hurt me, you’ve done a really good job of dragging me and Verlaine into it. Who else’s life are you going to ruin?”

That wasn’t fair. It wasn’t.

Was it?

Whether that was true or not, the worst part was—Nadia didn’t blame Mateo for being angry.

Why would anybody trust a witch, any witch, after learning this?

“I should go,” she said quietly.

“Yeah. You should.”

Mateo gave her a ride home, the same way he would have before, but he never spoke one word to her, not once the entire time. As he drove away, she wondered whether he ever would again.

Verlaine had suspected that something was up for Nadia and Mateo tonight. What she didn’t know was whether it was a magical something, in which case she felt kind of left out and would consider going all the way to annoyed, or a dating something, in which case, fine, she could get all the details from Nadia tomorrow.

She sighed as she rolled back on her bed. After years and years of being treated like a social pariah, Verlaine was still wrapping her head around the idea of having … okay, maybe friends was too strong a word. But they were people to hang out with. People she expected to tell her about their days, and people she found herself waiting to talk to. It was more than she’d had in far too long. So shouldn’t she be less lonely, instead of more?

But now that she could dream of not being alone—all the dreams she had about finding love, about some guy finding her, had come rushing in.

College, she’d told herself. I’ll find somebody in college. The guys won’t be such jerkwads then. They’ll be more mature. I’ll meet somebody awesome. Verlaine didn’t even know exactly what this awesome guy would be like; she imagined him looking a little like Jeremy Prasad but acting way, way nicer.

Now, though, Verlaine was done with being alone. Done with being a patient good girl. Her life had started changing, and she wanted it to change completely.