by May Dawson
Behind him, half-a-dozen of the boars that had killed my uncle turned the corner.
But there was nowhere to go. We were surrounded by monsters.
“Is there anyone in those buildings?” I asked, pointing down the quiet road to the building on either side. One was the church, and except for the light at its steeple, its windows were dark. “Besides the church. Truby’s trying to lure me into the church.”
“Deidra—” Tristan said, concern flashing across his face.
“Go check the other buildings for me. Please. And then get out of here.” We didn’t have time to argue about it or for me to doubt myself.
“I’ve got this,” I promised him. I might still be wearing the bracelets, but if my fear grew hot enough, if things were desperate enough, they’d come off like they had when I fought Julia. I glanced back over my shoulder, looking for Nix and Cade. The bracelets coming off wasn’t something I wanted to depend on. I’d have a better chance with these damn bracelets off.
He couldn’t hide the doubt in his eyes, but he nodded. “I’ll check the buildings for survivors and then get back.”
Relief flooded my chest. Tristan was trying so hard to have faith in me. It gave me more faith in myself.
I ran toward Ryder. The boar thundered behind him, their hooves shaking the ground, their broken mouths opening…
Something hurtled between two buildings toward me. I jerked to one side involuntarily, but Hanna was right there. Her sword was a flash in the moonlight, and the head of a vamp went sailing across the dusty street.
“We’ve got your back,” Hanna called. “Help Ryder!”
Two more vamps leapt out from between the buildings, and Hanna backed up, carefully choosing her footing.
The last thing I saw was Julia reach her side, her own sword in her hand. The vamps leapt, and the two of them moved forward as one, slicing with their swords.
“You’ve got to get back!” Ryder yelled at me, his voice hoarse. “They’re unstoppable.”
But we couldn’t go back. Behind us, the other Hunters were trying to get the rest of the civilians out of town, but monsters kept attacking the cars. There was no way out. Unless we fought our way out.
“I know,” I said. “Almost unstoppable.”
No matter how calm I sounded, fear was a bitter, metallic taste in the back of my mouth. I couldn’t die facing these damn things when I hadn’t had the chance yet to get revenge for Liam’s death. If I screwed up now, people would die.
But if I was scared…
I should be powerful.
Ryder reached my side and his steps stuttered, as if he wanted to run on. But he turned, there at my side, facing back toward the monsters that thundered behind him. His breath was ragged.
“Get back with the others,” I said. “I’ve got this.”
“Like I said,” Hanna stepped up beside me. “We’ve got your back.”
“The buildings are clear.” Tristan called as he raced down the steps of the building nearest us.
“Not now they aren’t,” I said. “You guys have to get away from me. I don’t know what will—”
“Come on,” Julia interrupted. “Don’t wimp out now.”
“If any of them get past you, we’ll take care of them,” Tristan said.
Fear throbbed at the back of my throat. It was too easy to imagine my magic flaring the way it had that night. It could be me who killed my friends instead of these boars. My chest ached like I’d just been running that damn mountain of Cade’s. The pressure that built inside me had to be released.
“Deidra!” Nix and Cade ran toward us, barely sparing a glance for the monsters that were converging on us.
Nix sheathed his sword in one smooth motion, reaching out for me to grab the bracelets. As his thumb stroked off the cuffs, he murmured the words of the spell and they fell off, making a metallic clang on the pavement. His thumbs stroked the inside of my wrists, just for a second. Nix nodded to me. “You can do this, Deathwish. All right? And then you come back to me. I’m not done with you yet.”
“Trust me, I’m not done with you either,” I shot back.
I stepped forward, raising my left hand. My right hand still gripped my sword’s hilt tightly.
Golden lightning arced around my fingers.
The boar were almost to us. Their hooves shook the ground underneath my feet, raising dust.
“Deidra, go,” Tristan said, his voice calm. “You said Truby was waiting for you in the church. Take him out. He’s the one controlling these creatures.”
The scent of the boar, like dried blood and animal musk, washed over me. They were almost here.
Have some of that fear.
I let my eyes drift shut, feeling the tension in the air, the death that crackled around us, ready to take my friends.
The world went still for me.
The pressure in my chest was so intense that I couldn’t breathe. My eyes and mouth flew open, desperate to release it. I could feel the pain like power now, flowing through my muscles as I dropped my sword. The blade rang out distantly against the pavement as I stretched my other hand forward. Sparks danced between my fingers.
Magic blasted away from my hands. The boar that was right in front of me, its mouth opening, was suddenly blown away, bouncing away across the ground. All the boar were flying away from us, slamming into the pavement over and over.
Behind us, someone screamed.
“Tristan, Cade, Nix, with me. Help me make it to the door of the church, then I go on alone,” I said, kneeling to gather my sword off the ground. Magic was still arcing between the fingers of my left hand, which looked like it was on fire. “You guys, help the civilians.”
Hanna clapped my shoulder quickly with her hand, giving me a nod. Then she took off running with her bloody sword.
“I’m going to kill a witch,” I said, my voice dark.
This was my chance to get revenge for Liam.
Together, Cade, Nix, Tristan and I walked down the road toward the witch. Some of the boar were still and dead, but we came to one that was trying to get up. Without hesitating, Tristan raised his sword above his head and cleaved down, driving the sword through its neck.
I walked past the boar’s mouth without fear, knowing Tristan was alongside me, cleaning up, while I headed for my worst enemy.
But Cade was right by my side. “Deidra. Let me do it.”
“This is my fight, Cade. Truby’s expecting me.”
“If you have a fight, I have one too.”
“Cade.” Nix called, his voice low, dangerously soft.
I stopped there at the bottom step of the church and turned back.
Nix and Tristan stood a few yards behind us, turning in a slow circle.
We were surrounded by dozens of monsters.
“Just buy me time,” I told Cade. “Please. I can do this.”
If they went in with me, and I brought the church down on top of all of us, I would hate myself. It didn’t matter if I died, as long as I killed Truby. But I didn’t want them to die too.
Cade hesitated, then jerked his head in a nod reluctantly, as if he understood all that I didn’t say. “You need me, I’ll come.”
“I know,” I said. I headed for the church, and once again, I spoke without bothering to turn around to make sure he could hear my words. “That’s why I kissed you back.”
Chapter Forty-One
As I walked up the steps of the church, closer to my enemy and further from my friends, the fear in my chest eased. If I came apart at the seams again, my magic spilling out the broken threads and destroying everything in its path, there’d be blood on my hands. I would be the monster that some people thought I was.
The inside of the church felt cool and peaceful, a strange contrast with the rapid buzz of my blood in my ears. The moonlight that trickled through the stained glass windows barely illuminated the rows of plain wooden pews.
I paused inside the doors, feeling the constant press of fear at the base
of my throat. The press of magic. That was the strangest thing, the way the same feeling that made my eyes dilate and my heart pound was also the thing that made magic burn through my veins. I made my way up the aisle.
Truby sat on the steps that led up the dais at the front of the church, his chin in his hand. Bright eyes met mine in the darkness. Kate sat on the dais, cross-legged, staring dreamily at nothing. My heart twitched at the sight of her, clearly spell-bound. Because of me.
“Here I am,” I said. I studied Truby, who wasn’t the kind of man who would draw one’s eye on the street. He wore a wrinkled button-down shirt over his thin fame, and his dark hair was brushed back from deep widow’s peaks. “What do you want?”
“I’ve been trying to reach you,” he said. “Trying to help you.”
“You’ve been trying to help me?” I demanded. “Was that before or after you killed my uncle?”
“He wasn’t your uncle.” He crooked a finger at me. “Come here. Don’t be afraid of me.”
“I’m not afraid of you.” I was afraid of me. This town was full of people. If the town had been empty, I could have let my magic explode as wildly as it wanted, and I could bring this building down on top of us both. That was the one sure way to get rid of him.
My gaze flickered to Kate. If only she wasn’t here. If only there weren’t so many innocent lives at stake.
“Look into my eyes, beautiful girl,” he said. “See something familiar?”
Reluctantly, I looked into his eyes. Despite how plain his face was, his eyes were unusual: a vibrant shade of emerald green, fringed with long, lush lashes.
They were just like mine.
“Anyone could tell by looking at you that you’re extraordinary,” he said, his voice self-satisfied. “I can’t believe they thought they could bind your magic and convince you that you were no one.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“You’re my daughter,” he said. “Not his.”
He said the word his with such derision.
He meant Conner Ainsley. The man who raised me. The one who’d pushed me on the swing, until my pink sneakers kissed the deep blue sky.
The man who’d gathered me in his arms and run with me toward the house. Hide and don’t come out no matter what you hear, he’d whispered. He’d taken my face in his hands, which were suddenly trembling, as my mother screamed again. I love you, Deidra Ainsley.
Deep down in the marrow of my small bones, I’d known as I crept into my secret spot behind the heater that he’d been saying goodbye.
Then he’d gone into the house, heading for a battle he knew he might not win.
I shook my head. I didn’t really remember my mother, and it was hard to see in photos, but Liam had said once I had my mother’s eyes. “My mother’s eyes were green too.”
“You want them to be, don’t you?” he asked. “Do you think you got all that power from her, and yet she couldn’t save herself?”
My anger flared, and the pressure in my chest throbbed in response.
“You were there that day.” It was a statement, not a question. I’d thought that vamps killed my parents. But that had been a fairy tale.
“I wanted to reclaim what was mine.” He cocked his head to one side. “Your mother hid you away from me.”
“So you killed her.”
“No,” he said, his voice suddenly broken. “I loved your mother. I always had. Even if she chose another man…a Hunter…even if he dared to raise you as his own.”
If Truby was being honest, Malcolm wasn’t really my grandfather. Maybe that was why he hadn’t wanted to see me.
“Then what happened?” I demanded. I couldn’t trust anything he said. I desperately wanted to hear everything he had to tell me though before the Hunters came to stop him.
“I finally found you. I just wanted to see you,” he said. “This was before…before the day your mother died.”
“What are you talking about?” My voice was harsh.
“It was the day before. When she opened the door, you walked right past her, barefoot onto the porch. Right to me.” He smiled. “Do you remember any of this?”
“No,” I said.
“No surprise, I suppose.” He looked disappointed. “They took so many of your memories away. Your mother hated that. It was why she wanted to get away from them again.”
“My parents loved each other.” My mother hadn’t wanted to get away from Conner.
“Yes, they did.” He admitted it like it pained him. “And they both loved you, even though you weren’t Conner’s. Enough that they chose you.”
“They chose me?” It was a strange choice of words. Some nagging part of me said I should just try to kill him now, that I was being foolish to stand here and have a conversation with him.
“The Hunters didn’t want you,” he said, cruelly, like he wanted the words to hurt me. “You were born a monster, Deidra. From the beginning. So much power and a child’s understanding. There are many witches, but so much raw power? There’s never been anyone else like you.”
I was so special. Lucky me. “So who are you claiming murdered my mother?”
“The Hunters,” he said. “It was the Council who came looking for you the next day. If only your mother had taken you and come with me, like I begged her to.”
No, that wasn’t true. He was trying to convince me to turn my back on the good guys. To go with him. He wanted my power.
He tilted his head, studying me. “You could have grown up with her. Do you remember anything about how much she loved you?”
“I think you’re lying,” I said.
“I know,” he said. “I don’t have any way to prove it to you. But I think the Hunters will. You really think they’ll ever accept you?”
“The past doesn’t matter,” I said, swallowing the lump in my throat. “What do you want from me now? What’s all this about?”
“I want you to come with me.”
“Yeah, that’s not going to happen. Are you going to free my friend?”
“Yes, of course,” he said. “I’m not a monster. Neither of us are, no matter what they think of us.”
He rose. “Sooner or later, Deidra, your powers are going to terrify them too much to keep you. It already happened once before. You’ll always be the witch to them, the unwanted child.”
He held out his hand. “But come with me. I can teach you to control your powers. You can use them for good.”
“Like you have?” I asked sharply. “Killing Hunters?”
“They killed my family first,” he said. “They killed the woman I loved. And they’ve tried to make you into something you aren’t. To take a beautiful, powerful witch and make you think that you’re a monster, that you should be grateful that they tolerate you—”
“That’s not true,” I said.
“You belong with me, daughter of mine,” he said. “You can feel it in your blood, can’t you?”
As I hesitated, he turned his head suddenly, as if he was listening to something.
“Here come the real monsters,” he said. “Well, Deidra, my monsters gave you the chance to show them your powers. I’m sure your masters will be very impressed.”
I rushed toward him, sure that he was up to something, and he shook his head at me as if he didn’t approve.
“When you’re ready, come to New York City,” he said. “You’ll figure out how to find me. You’re a bright girl.”
When I tackled him, there was nothing but air. I hit hard on my shoulder first and rolled across the dais.
Suddenly the room was full of Hunters. Cade, Nix, Malcolm, a dozen Hunters I didn’t know.
They stood with swords in hands, looking around in confusion. Cade strode to me without hesitation, his gun held low in his hand. “Deidra! Are you all right?”
I frowned up at him, my mind still reeling from everything Truby had said, the things that might be true and the things that might be lies.
I should tell Cade that Trub
y claimed he was my father, but something stopped me from saying it here, where so many people could hear us.
“I’m fine,” I lied. “Except for the part where Truby is still alive.”
Cade rested his hand on my shoulder, and the two of us walked back down the aisle and stepped out into the quiet night. It felt like a different world from the one we’d been in a few minutes before, when the town was full of screaming and death. The corpses of vamps and boar were left scattered in the street, but the living monsters had all disappeared.
“Looks like we won,” he said.
He didn’t sound like he meant it, and I didn’t feel like we had either.
Chapter Forty-Two
It had been a long, silent drive back to my hometown. I would’ve been surprised that Malcolm had let me take the trip, but maybe he sensed it was the only way to avoid me any longer.
I was going to break down the door to his office when we got back, if I had to. Whether he was my grandfather or not, he owed me answers.
Maybe that was why he had kept me at such a distance, because he wasn’t really my grandfather. The thought made me feel suddenly alone, especially sitting next to my vacuous best friend who was normally so full of life. I pushed away the all-too-familiar surge of loneliness. If he weren’t my grandfather, why hadn’t he immediately corrected Julia’s father? Maybe Truby was lying.
When we pulled up in front of Kate’s house, she kept staring out the window, smiling and unseeing.
“Kate, we’re here.” I leaned forward, trying to get her attention, then put my hand on her leg. When she didn’t respond, I looked to Nix.
“Nix,” I said, and there was a pleading note in my voice that I’d never heard before. I pressed my lips together. It was different when someone you cared about was in trouble than when you needed someone yourself.
Nix twisted in his seat, taking in Kate’s face, then mine, and something sympathetic flashed in his eyes. A few seconds later, he opened her door and slid in next to her. “Kate?”
She turned her wide eyes on him expectantly, but didn’t say anything.
“It’s good that the spell took so long to wear off,” Nix told me kindly. “She won’t remember anything. She won’t remember seeing you.”