Join Me in Pieces

Chapter 3

"He asked you to marry him?!" Rowan exclaims, eyes wide.

Evanora winces and gives a hiss, "No..."

Despite wanting to keep this information on the down-low as much as possible, Evanora knew that she had to tell someone. Rowan was Evanora's most trusted friend and accomplice, and would probably be assisting with the coven even more so now that Evanora would have other political priorities on her hands from now on...

So the two of them sat on the couch in Evanora's living room, as this would likely be one of their last times to talk and hang out there before Evanora would be moving to the vampire compound.

Rowan gasps, "You did not go to him with this. Tell me you didn't."

"Oh, but I did," Evanora says, wincing harder.

"Are you crazy?!"

Evanora swallows, "He said 'yes'."

Rowan blinks, "Is he crazy?!"

Evanora rolls her eyes, "Look, it's not like I showed up with flowers and got down on one knee. We sat down and had a discussion, and he agreed to my idea. It's a political alliance."

"What if he kills you?! Or turns you into a vampire?!"

"Witch's blood tastes repulsive to vampires, everyone knows that. Once we're married, he can't kill me or it would be an act of treason. I just have to stay alive until then," Evanora mutters, "Which shouldn't be a problem because, y'know, the Philosopher's Stone. I don't think he's out to kill me. Hell, I could probably kill him way easier than he could kill me, and I'm fairly certain he knows that."

"Then he's gonna turn you into some kind of sex slave."

"He knows I'm too powerful to try and do anything like that." Though this was a bit of a fear of Evanora's, she forces the thought away, "He called me a 'force to be reckoned with' today. I'm sure he just knows that we will be the most powerful alliance to have ever formed, and he wants to take advantage of that," She says, "Look, this war has to end. This is the only way."

"What about the coven?"

"You'll take over as coven leader."

"What?!"

"I trust you more than anyone else to take over. But you can't tell anyone the true reason I'm gone, not yet. Just...say I'm handling some private matters. I mean, it certainly won't be private for long, but..."

"Are you sure this is the right thing to do?"

Evanora sighs, then looks over at Bean, who was currently asleep in the window sill, sunlight on his black fur.

"Bean likes him," Evanora says, "If my familiar doesn't think he's dangerous, what can go wrong?"

x

"Are you okay?" Justin asks.

Chris sat at his desk, leaning on his elbows, staring off into the distance.

"Yeah, why?" He asks, clearly functioning on autopilot.

"You don't seem like it," Ryan says.

Chris had brought in his closest advisors to discuss the meeting he'd had with Evanora so that he could break the news to them, and try to figure out the next steps.

"I'm just...still processing," Chris says.

"Well, Townsley is right about one thing," Ricky says, "There is no written law about inter-species marriage."

"Witches marry humans all the time because they have the same lifespan. Maybe there was never anything written about vampires because up until Townsley, the idea of a witch living as long as a vampire was unheard of," Vinny says.