As Wicked As They Come

by Emma Dean

Mika didn’t know what to say to that either. She’d forgotten how attuned foxes were to pain, which meant Hunter, Finnick, and Ash knew too exactly how much she was burying underneath all the rage.

  She turned and pressed her face to his chest. “I wasn’t ready to let go of the Claire I thought I knew,” Mika murmured. “The sister in my head and not the one who’d tried to kill me in the challenge. When I found out she was a blood witch too and had hidden it from me…I realized I didn’t know her at all.”

  “I’m sorry, little witch.” Lucien held her tight and kissed the top of her head.

  They both knew there was really nothing anyone could say or do to make that better. The loss of the sister she’d thought she had was worse than Claire’s actual death.

  They stood like that in silence for a few moments as they both processed and recalibrated. Lucien had always been good about giving her space, but also invading it when he felt it was necessary.

  It was officially night, and the owls started to make their hunting calls. The murmurs of the nocturnal creatures filled the silence between her and Lucien. Mika wrapped her arms around his waist and hugged him close.

  “So, does that mean you won’t marry us?” Lucien asked.

  Mika burst out laughing and shoved him away. “Why are you so fixated on that?”

  Lucien ran his hand through his shoulder-length hair and smiled at her. She was one hundred percent aware that he’d let her push him back and Mika didn’t know what to do now. She didn’t know how to have this conversation at all.

  “I thought we were going to watch a movie,” she said archly, planting her hands on her hips.

  “I thought you weren’t scared of me,” Lucien challenged.

  His sharp grin showed off his canines and Mika licked her lips.

  “I’m not afraid of you.”

  “Then why don’t you want to marry me?” His golden eyes flashed playfully at her.

  Mika laughed again, hearing exactly how loud and awkward it was. “I thought you said ‘us.’”

  “Stop deflecting,” Lucien growled, crossing those delicious arms over his chest. “Would you say no to us?”

  His question was serious this time. The smile dropped from Mika’s face and she felt her palms grow sweaty. “A blood bond is more binding. Why is marriage so important?”

  Lucien shrugged. “I want a big ass party so I can dress up and watch you walk down an aisle in a dress that makes everyone cry.” He said it so nonchalantly and so easily.

  “Do you daydream about our wedding?” she asked, trying to keep the disbelief out of her voice but her eyebrows betrayed her, and she felt them nearly rise into her hair.

  “Hey, guys can dream about weddings too,” Lucien said a little defensively.

  Mika blinked. “True, I just don’t think I’ve ever met a guy comfortable enough to admit it out loud.”

  Crickets chirped as they stared at each other.

  “Marriage is kind of stressful for me to talk about,” Mika finally admitted. “Mostly because Claire tried to use it to trap me into the life she wanted me to have, as did my grandmother before her. But I can promise that we can have a massive party to celebrate spending the rest of our lives together. No matter what we decide to do.”

  “Bigger than the Samhain Ball?” Lucien asked.

  Mika laughed. “Only if you help plan it. Then yeah, bigger even than Samhain.”

  Lucien wrapped his arms around her again and stared down at her with an unreadable look on his face. “With my entire pack in attendance?”

  “And Corbin’s eyrie. Should shock Ethan’s Santa Fe witches enough, don’t you think?”

  Lucien grinned at that. “Oh, we should go for as much shock value as possible. I say we invite Corbin’s coyote allies too.”

  “And Kenzie’s raccoon friends.”

  “Definitely.” Lucien held her face and kissed her. “It will be the party of the century.”

  Mika grabbed Lucien and pulled him down, kissing him hard. “I never would have thought you were such a romantic.”

  “I’m still buying you something pretty to wear, even if you decide not to do the wedding thing.” Lucien’s promise somehow sounded like a threat. “Jewelry or a tattoo?”

  Mika couldn’t help but laugh. “Hm, what do you want? If I have to wear something, then so do you.”

  Lucien took her hand and pulled her toward Wolfsbane House. “I’ll think about it. Are you ready for that movie now?”

  “Only if it’s a romance,” she teased.

  “I love The Proposal. Let’s watch that. Or, Pride and Prejudice,” Lucien suggested, scooping the plates up with his free hand as they left the forest. “Whichever.”

  Mika squeezed his hand and smiled as she followed him. “Whatever you choose is fine with me.”

  26

  The sun sank below the horizon slowly. Mika watched it as she knelt at the top of her summoning circle. Ethan was directly across from her at the bottom, Lucien to her left at the west point, Corbin at the east point, and then Audrey and Malachi on either side of Ethan.

  Waves crashed below against the cliff. The temple was totally silent, hushed as if it held its breath waiting to see what would happen next. No one spoke as they waited for the sun to completely set.

  Morgana appeared in her ghostly form, kneeling just behind Mika. “It’s time.”

  Without a word Mika held up her hand, palm facing Ethan as she concentrated on the uncapped vials in the center of the circle. They rose from the stone, floating counterclockwise. Mika murmured in Ancient Gaelic, pouring one vial at a time.

  “Raven, banshee, necromancer, blackthorn…” The blood from each vial poured into a silver bowl she’d etched sigils onto that all represented the goddess. “Blood witch. Daughter.”

  Finally, all the blood mixed, potent and powerful, simmering with enough energy to level all of San Francisco.

  All she had to do was open a door, a real door that would allow the Morrigan to step from her prison to this realm.

  “North.” Mika tilted her fingers slightly and the bowl rose from the floor, coming toward her. She dipped her fingers into it and painted the sigil on her forehead before directing it across the circle.

  “South.”

  Ethan followed suit.

  “East. West.”

  Lucien and Corbin were next, dipping their fingers into the blood without hesitation, drawing the sigils she’d had them practice over and over to make sure they were absolutely perfect.

  Anyone could perform blood magic.

  “Life.”

  Audrey dipped her fingers in as the bowl came around and drew a line down her face from her forehead to her breasts.

  “Death.”

  Then Malachi did the same, but he drew the line from temple to temple over the bridge of his nose.

  “The mother, the maiden, and the crone.” Mika swirled her hand and the bowl poured into the circle in the counterclockwise direction, blood filling the sigils she’d carved into the stone.

  “Goddess of War, of Fate, of Death…I summon you.”

  Every sigil and line written in blood on their faces started to glow right as the moon rose from the ocean. The sigils within the circle itself started to glow a breath later.

  It was officially moonrise.

  One last step.

  Mika took the witch knife waiting on her lap and made a cut from her palm to the inside of her elbow on both arms. She held her hands over the circle, palms up toward the moon. “I am your daughter, and I sacrifice my power this night to call upon you.”

  The circle itself started glowing a ruby red and Mika ignored how much blood she was losing, the terror she could feel seeping from everyone as they watched. But they shouldn’t be afraid, not if she did this right.

  Soon, her mother goddess would come and heal her after Mika had willingly given up her power from moonrise to moonset.

  Her hands started to shake from the blood loss and her lips felt cold, but Mika held fast
and ignored the way the others started to shift uncomfortably.

  “Can you feel it?” Morgana whispered from behind her shoulder. “The universe is being pried open.”

  Wherever the Morrigan had been locked away, it wasn’t a natural place. It didn’t want a door forced upon it, and it certainly didn’t want to release its prisoner – not that it had a choice.

  A deep rumbling swept through the world, and Mika could feel it in every pore. It felt like bricks the size of houses rippling through the fabric of the universe, creating a door in a place where there should be nothing, forcing a portal into existence.

  Mika wasn’t just summoning a goddess, she was summoning the bit of blood in her own that was the Morrigan’s, she was calling it back to her – to the ravens and banshees and necromancers.

  The air inside the circle started to ripple as Mika’s blood trickled upward in direct defiance of gravity. It trailed in glorious patterns that reminded her of vines, creating that door into nothingness through her power, grounding it directly in her blood. Mika’s existence became nothing more than a conduit for the power required to create the blood-door.

  It flared once and the bright red liquid turned hard and black.

  Sweat dripped down her forehead. Mika felt cold and clammy. Her eyes fluttered as she tried to retain consciousness.

  “Only a little longer,” Morgana whispered encouragingly. “I can feel her.”

  It took everything she had to keep kneeling, hands up, waiting to see if this complex spell given to her by a god would actually work.

  For a split-second fear lanced through her and Mika doubted. What if Lucifer had betrayed her?

  Then the door cracked open and Mika shoved the doubt and fear away. Jessica would kill him. It didn’t matter that he was the prince of hell. Jess would find a way if she was motivated enough.

  Mika had to trust the family that had formed around her, no matter how hard and strange it was. She couldn’t rely on their strength and skills if she constantly doubted.

  The black door made with black vines and roses swung open. The blood from her wrists was only a trickle now. But they all did exactly as she asked. No one moved from their anchor points.

  Familiar boots stepped through.

  Mika looked up and the Morrigan stood before her. Her endless black eyes shifted into bright green as she stepped into this realm. “She has your eyes,” Mika murmured. The Morrigan looked more human here, and in this form, she looked just like Aine.

  The raven on the Morrigan’s shoulder launched into the sky with a victory screech.

  “Mika,” the Morrigan murmured, voice rippling with a chorus of female voices. “My daughter.”

  The door closed behind the Morrigan once she was fully on this plane, and then it crumbled into a pile of ash.

  Mika collapsed as every ounce of magic and power and strength left her. The sigils in the stone and on faces went dark. It was just the full moon’s bright white light then.

  Still no one moved, just as she’d warned.

  They had to anchor the circle until the Morrigan healed her. Until then the goddess couldn’t be released – just like a demon summoning. It was all that protected her.

  A warm touch on her forehead startled her. Mika hadn’t expected the goddess to feel mortal at all, but here she had a physical human form.

  “I accept your sacrifice and thank you for it.” The Morrigan’s words were ritual, they were precisely what the spell cited, and then…

  A prickle on her arms where the cuts were. Next she felt liquid heat gush into her mouth.

  Mika’s eyes flew open and she looked up. She found herself cradled in the goddess’s arms, a wrist to her lips and blood in her mouth – a goddess’s blood.

  It tasted like what she imagined bottled lightning would taste like. The energy and power crackled through her so fast and hard she felt shoved from her body momentarily. All at once she was healed and connected to the universe in a way she’d never been before.

  Mika could see and feel patterns. She could sense god-like beings across this plane and others, she could see the strings of destiny tying everything together, shifting and re-weaving when free will got in the way.

  Nothing and everything was promised, and there…

  The darkness in the future Eisheth had told her about – the mystery of what was to come that had every god-like creature in a fit.

  And then she was herself again, in her own body, on all fours with the goddess standing over her. Mika breathed hard as the power made her blood rush through her body with a heat close to boiling. Every ache and pain disappeared as she was remade.

  Mika could feel every breath the others took, she could feel their fearful anticipation.

  Pushing back to a kneeling position, Mika looked up at the Morrigan. “I accept your gift, and free you from this circle without promises or expectation.” Mika had no magic until the sun rose again, but she was ready for that.

  Unsheathing Excalibur from her back, she carved a line through the circle etched in the stone.

  Helle, not being bound as the Morrigan was, stood outside the circle in her human form and the goddess crossed over – rushing to hug her lover. They both laughed as they held each other tight. The Morrigan wiped tears from Helle’s face and smiled before turning back to them.

  “Mika, my daughter.”

  Mika found herself smiling up at the goddess, just…relieved.

  The spell had worked. She hadn’t died, and neither had anyone else.

  “Ugh,” the goddess said, wrinkling her nose at something none of them could see. “I appreciate what Eleanor Marshall did, but this cloud over everyone’s memory won’t do.” With a wave of her hand, Mika felt something in the world unravel.

  “There, that’s much better.”

  “What was that?” Mika asked carefully, terrified of the answer, of what she suspected the goddess had done.

  “The Purge of Memory is undone,” the Morrigan stated smugly. “The texts have been repaired. Memories have been returned, and now they will all remember what we are, what we are capable of, and what they’ve done to us. They will remember there is blood to pay.”

  Mika felt horror ripple through her. Yes, she wanted to bring those who needed to pay to their knees. She wanted to make them feel the fear she felt, but she wasn’t prepared for them to remember now.

  If what the goddess said was true, and she had no reason to lie, then Mika’s timeline had just moved up. Soon, everyone would know what a blood witch was and what that meant. Soon, they would know what she was.

  The goddess was free though, Mika would have more power than before. She had…

  Mika stared at the goddess as she realized why now.

  “It has been a long time,” the Morrigan mused as she eyed them all. “There is much I’ll need to do. I will need to catch up on all the gossip as I search for my captor and get settled.” Her grin was vicious, and Mika anxiously wondered what the goddess had planned. “But before I do, there’s something I need to address.”

  “Morgana.” The Morrigan studied the glowing form of the last witch queen with pain in her eyes. “I can free you from this torture.”

  The ghost witch looked from the goddess and then to Mika. “Perhaps…perhaps once all this is over.” Morgana smiled down at Mika and caressed her face. Thanks to the goddess’s blood, Mika could actually feel the ghostly touch. “I cannot abandon my only living sister in her greatest time of need.”

  It was such a stark contrast to the way Claire had abandoned her, Mika felt tears prick her eyes and hated them for what they meant. Claire hadn’t had the heart to treat her as an actual sister and not a rival. Their entire relationship had been nothing more than a lie.

  But she had real sisters now, and it took some of the pain away from losing the one she’d been born with.

  The Morrigan smiled down at Morgana. “Then let me at least give you the freedom to roam where you need to go until you call upon me for your final passi
ng.”

  Morgana nodded once and the Morrigan grinned viciously. “I bestow upon you the power to affect the physical world, and to go wherever it is you need to, Morgana Le Fay, in service to the witch queen.”

  There was a sinking in her stomach and Mika took a deep breath.

  “Mika Morganna Gabrielle Marshall.”

  Oh no.

  “Come here.”

  No one else dared speak as she stood. No one protested as they watched from their anchor points. What could they say to a goddess?

  Mika walked towards the Morrigan, feeling the wind on her skin like never before. Excalibur seemed to weigh nothing in her hand.

  “All of you, follow me,” the goddess demanded.

  Helle shifted into a raven with a screech and flew toward the broken bridge jutting out over the dark ocean.

  With the moon so bright Mika could see everything, thanks to the white glow that reflected off the stones. The rest was greys and blacks and navy’s. But she didn’t hesitate in her steps despite the apprehension she felt.

  What the hell was the Morrigan going to do now?

  Morgana disappeared and reappeared beside the goddess, and Helle landed on the Morrigan’s staff in her giant bird form.

  Behind Mika, the others followed. She tried to take comfort from their presence, but she had a feeling they were supposed to bear witness and nothing else.

  “Kneel, Mika Morganna Gabrielle Marshall.”

  Shit.

  Mika went to one knee, offering Excalibur to the queen as was expected of her – as the memory of Aine had warned her to do.

  The Morrigan took Excalibur and inspected it. “It seems I owe my daughter gifts.”

  She didn’t dare respond.

  “And a crown.”

  Fuck.

  Her stomach dropped. Mika couldn’t deny this. She couldn’t refuse. She could only…try to ask the goddess to see the logic.

  “I have no territory,” Mika murmured. “I have nothing to protect.”

  It wasn’t an outright lie, but a little twist of the truth.

  “True, you have no territory in your name, but Morgana is your direct ancestor. You two share clan-blood.”

  Double fuck.