Wayward Son - Rainbow Rowell Page 0,30

try to imitate him.

“Thank you!” Baz shouts. “We’ll be back with shows at six and nine!”

We back slowly through the edge of the audience. People are taking our photo and grabbing at my wings.

“Keep going,” Baz says.

Queen Elizabeth and her court watch us go by, clapping genteelly.

Baz takes a deep bow.

Then we all start walking faster, as fast as we can without breaking into a run, trying to stay ahead of the dispersing crowd. As soon as we get through the exit, we do run. Down the steps. Past the queue. Past the fairies and the peasants and the vaping warlords. I can’t stop laughing. I haven’t felt this good in a year.

BAZ

We run through the gravel towards the Mustang, and Penny actually leaps into the back seat.

Simon catches up with me and traps me against the car. He’s kissing me before I see it coming, bending me back over the boot. “You were amazing,” he says, taking a breath. “You didn’t even need a wand.”

I hold on to his shoulders. “I’m a little disturbed that you find slaying vampires this exciting.”

He kisses me so hard, my head tips.

“Guys!” Bunce shrieks. “We are literally fleeing a crime. And also still in Middle America.”

She’s right. I give him a push.

“So hot,” Simon says. “Got to see you fight without picking a fight with you myself.”

Bunce throws a plastic bottle over my shoulder, and it smacks Simon in the wing. “I swear to Stevie I’ll leave without you both!”

I look past him. There are a dozen or so people headed our way.

“I promise to be just as hot later,” I say. “I’ll start fires all the way across the Midwest.”

Simon breaks away from me, still with that strange light in his eyes, and jumps into the passenger seat.

I’m not going to be the only one who fusses with a door—I hop into the driver’s seat and start the car, and we roar out of the car park, kicking up a thundercloud of dust and rock.

23

PENELOPE

My mother is going to kill me. She’s going to throw me in a witch’s hole herself; she won’t even call the Coven. We have broken every rule today. The World of Mages doesn’t have many, but we’ve shattered them all:

Don’t pester the Normals.

Don’t interfere with the Normals.

Don’t steal from the Normals.

Above all, don’t let the Normals know that magic exists.

Above even that, don’t let the Normals know that we exist.

Magicians have to live amongst Normals because their language is the key to our magic. But if they knew about us … If Normal people knew that magic existed, and that someone else had it …

We’d never be free.

My mother is going to take away my ring. She’s going to lock me in a tower.

In the old days, magicians would magickally alter their faces if they’d been witnessed doing magic in public. You can only erase memories one at a time (and the ethics are dodgy)—you can’t mindwipe a whole crowd.

Your only options after a big, unfixable scene are, one, to disappear or, two, commit to the sin wholeheartedly: Put on a cape and top hat and go on the road. Once you tell Normals that it’s all a trick, you can do anything in front of them. You can make the Statue of Liberty disappear.

Baz was clever. To pretend it was all part of some show.

I’m not that sort of clever. I can’t pretend.

I killed those vampires in front of hundreds of Normals. Mum won’t care about the vampires; you can get a medal for slaying vampires. But I used so much magic, right out in the open.

I can only imagine what Simon and Baz did. They have wings and fangs and superstrength between them. Baz has an actual magic wand.

Hopefully it was all so obvious and over the top that no one will believe it was real. No real magicians would be so careless.

Morgana the mighty, everyone’s going to see this. All our friends. Our teachers.

Micah’s going to think I went directly off the deep end as soon as he dumped me.

I suppose I did.

24

BAZ

I should be very upset right now.

Bunce is a wreck in the back seat; you can see the waves of guilt and fear and shock rolling through her. Appropriately! Our parents are going to cut out our tongues when we get home. We’re definitely facing a trial before the Coven. Undoubtedly. The moment we’re back on British soil.

But we’re very much not on British soil now, are we?

And Simon Snow doesn’t have