Page 66 of Vengefully Matched

“The Loculus,” Priscilla breathed, and Agatha reached for her, without thinking, pulling her out of the chair as the giant glass coffin began to solidify and thicken.

“It will take you in.” Agatha’s eyes were wide with terror.

“Priscilla Guinevere Hart,” said a voice—Otho’s, maybe. She wasn’t sure if they’d used him for the enchantment or not; the glass coffin prison hadn’t been called out in years—decades even, maybe. “You are being summoned for questioning in the attempted murder of one President Agatha Vanderbilt Voisin, as well as the destruction of numerous Witchery Council properties.”

“I’m the president,” Agatha said indignantly, but it was no use, the Loculus was not spelled for conversation, just capture. She hugged Priscilla tightly, rubbing her fingers together in a haphazard magical spell that shackled them together, and to the thick trunk that made up one of the legs of the table.

“This way, it won’t be able to take you.”

Priscilla’s eyes darted as the gray wisps of magic surrounded them, the glass pieces locking them together in a full-sized, impenetrable coffin. Agatha had only ever studied the Loculus in theory. She had certainly never authorized its use.

Which meant that someone must have made a report to the International Council of Witchery. Her only option was to use the top secret security spells, designed to protect the president and stop her from being taken without her consent. They were tedious and took months to set up. Using them now would be leaving herself vulnerable until they could be rewoven, but there was no other way.

She swallowed, muttering them anyway and rubbing her thumb across her fingers. It was worth it to protect Priscilla.

“Fuck. If the ICoW is involved, I can’t do anything to stop them, other than protest it.”

Priscilla spun in Agatha’s arms, as though looking for a way out. “Okay, so there’s no emergency exit on this,” she said weakly. “But it’s fine. It won’t run out of air, and someone will come for it eventually if it doesn’t arrive where it’s been summoned.”

“How could you possibly be certain?” Agatha would have put her hands on her hips, but there was barely any room as it was, so instead she squeezed them gently, before remembering that her hands were on Priscilla’s hips.

Priscilla looked down at her, and something flared in her eyes. Hunger, or maybe anger. Possibly both.

“I know,” she said, through gritted teeth, “because this happened to my parents once, when they were young. They used to tell it as a bedtime story: the time they got trapped in a Loculus and had to fake an engagement so that my dad could clear my mom’s name.”

“Wait, you mean to tell me that Benedict and Persephone Hart, the Harts, met by faking a relationship to avoid legal consequences?”

Priscilla’s cheeks flushed. “Well, when you put it like that, it obviously sounds much more similar to our situation, but it really was not. They were rival professors. There was some amount of green face paint pertaining to the Wicked Witch of the West, and a sexy Gandalf costume involved. It’s nothing like this, honey.”

The nickname slipped out so easily between them, and fuck if that didn’t do something to her heart. Agatha stared at her for a moment, a long one, and then the insanity of the entire situation, the parallels to the Harts, widely known to be one of the witching world’s greatest love stories, the absurdity of someone out there being immortal and trying to kill Agatha, all of it drove her right over the edge of control.

She hesitated, the feeling building between them, every breath sounding too loud, the air around them heated, and then she surrendered to it, leaning forward.

She crashed her lips against Priscilla’s, and for a brief, terrible moment, she thought maybe she’d misread the other woman’s heaving chest and dilated pupils.

Until Priscilla Hart kissed her back, lips against lips, parting them with her tongue, moaning into her mouth and running a hand so gently up Agatha’s neck that she sagged backward, bolstered by both the cuff on her ankle and the glass prison that enclosed them.

Damn, she had been right to use up that protection spell.

“I think,” said Agatha, when they finally broke apart, “that when we get out of this, you and I need to have a long talk about what we’re doing. And then right after, I’m going to put in a petition to stop the use of the Loculus permanently, because I don’t know about this as a humane punishment.”

Priscilla raised her eyebrows.

“I could think of worse prisons than one that involves being shackled to a beautiful woman who just mauled me.”

“It was much less a mauling and much more a deeply romantic kiss, thank you very much. And the shackle is my fault. I wanted to make sure the Loculus stayed put, and that they didn’t bring you in before I was ready to defend your honor.” It was true, too, that she didn’t hate being so close to Prissy.

“Oh?” Prissy pushed her back against the edge of the coffin, tracing the edge of her jaw with a long fingernail, running it back down her neck.

“Yeah,” she bit out. “Why, do you want me to propose?”

Priscilla shook her head, stepping back the inch that their prison allowed. “I don’t want to do that again unless I mean it. No fake engagements.” Her face was serious, the arousal of a moment before wiped away.

“That makes sense. Given the whole Evelyn situation.”

“Evelyn!” Priscilla exclaimed. “Evelyn.”

She pulled out her phone.