The Witch's Key

by Sarra Cannon

  I probably should have brought some kind of invisibility potion with me, but it seemed we were mostly hidden by the tall fences here. On the back side of the fences, there was a stretch of trees through which you could just barely see the backs of the next row of houses.

  “What’s our plan here?” I asked. “After what happened last night, I feel like winging it has not exactly served us well.”

  Kai smiled. “Maybe you’re right,” he said. “I’ve been looking into all of this for so long on my own that I keep forgetting I have someone else to look after now.”

  “Maybe I’m the one looking after you,” I said. “I mean, you were the one trapped in a net last night. If it hadn’t been for me—”

  “I never did get a chance to properly thank you for that,” he said, stopping and taking my hands in his.

  Okay, if his absent touch in the car sent my heart racing, this moment with him standing so close and taking my hands was about to give me a heart attack.

  “It’s really no big deal,” I said, pulling away. “I was just teasing you.”

  I left him behind, making my way into the stretch of trees behind the house. He’d said it was the fifth one down, so I made my way behind that white house and pretended to be studying the windows, looking for movement, while he walked toward me.

  What was wrong with me? Why was I so afraid of getting close to him?

  I didn’t really want to think about it. All I knew was that I was happy being his friend for now. I had no idea if he was interested in me for more than just that, but I so did not have the capacity to handle anything else.

  And still, my heart raced at the sight of him. Especially with that smirk on his face, like I’d just done exactly what he expected me to do.

  I closed my eyes and groaned.

  Focus, Lenny. You’re being ridiculous.

  I took a deep breath and looked at the house. Except that this time, I really looked at it instead of just pretending.

  “Oh my God,” I whispered. “Look.”

  Kai turned, following my eyes toward the brown sedan that pulled into Julie Peterson’s driveway. A man got out and walked around to the back of the car.

  “That’s Bates,” he said, narrowing his eyes. “What’s he doing here?”

  “Good question,” I said. “I don’t think we’re going to be able to see enough from out here. I knew I should have brought an invisibility potion, but those are really tough to make if I want them to last more than two minutes. It’s too bad neither one of us can just spontaneously make ourselves invisible.”

  I said it with a laugh, but Kai shrugged.

  My eyes widened.

  “Wait. You can make yourself invisible?

  “Yeah, but I don’t do it a lot,” he said. “It takes a lot of my energy. And it kind of tickles.”

  My jaw fell open slightly.

  “You could sneak up there and see what’s going on between Bates and Ms. Julie. You could listen to their conversation,” I said. “We need to figure out what their connection is to the missing girls, because I have a feeling after last night that it’s about more than just cupcakes here. Plus, it would be nice to see if Julie Peterson has any injuries. Uncle Martin stabbed Algrath last night. Maybe the injury will show up somehow in his human form, too.”

  “Good point,” Kai said. “But Martin told us not to engage. To watch from a distance.”

  “Oh, so now we’re going to start following the rules?” I challenged.

  Kai laughed and shook his head.

  Meanwhile, Bates threw open the car’s trunk and grabbed a large leather duffle bag.

  “Moondust, maybe,” I whispered.

  “I’ll go check it out,” Kai said. “But if there seems to be any trouble, I want you to promise not to come chasing after me. Whatever happens, you run.”

  I shook my head.

  “The only way we’re leaving is together.”

  “I promised your uncle I’d look after you,” he said. “If anything happens or it seems like I’m in any kind of trouble, just run Lenny. I won’t let anything happen to you. Promise me.”

  I held my breath. Why did he care about me at all? Had something happened between us all those years ago when we first met?

  I wanted so badly to ask him about it, but we were going to miss our window to get Kai into the house.

  “Okay, I promise,” I said. “But just don’t let anything happen.”

  He smiled, sending a wave of electricity through my body.

  “I’ll be back in a few. Sit tight,” he said. He made a face. “Oh, and uh, close your eyes and turn around for a second.”

  “What? Why?”

  “Just do it. Please. I’ll explain later.”

  I didn’t want to waste any more time, so I did as he asked.

  I only counted to three, though, before I opened my eyes.

  “Can I turn around now?” I whispered.

  But Kai didn’t answer.

  I spun around, expecting to see him still standing there giving me a look, but instead, he was gone.

  I swallowed, shivers running down my spine as I stared at the space between me and the back of the Peterson’s house. Kai was there, somewhere, but there wasn’t a single trace of him.

  I shook my head and sat down just behind one of the larger pine trees behind the house. I had some time to kill, so I pulled out my phone to make sure Martin hadn’t called or texted with news about the warehouse or the attack site.

  There was nothing, though, so I put my phone back in my bag and started thinking about everything that had happened so far. I still had so many questions and no real answers, unless we’d been right about Julie Peterson. That would be something, at least.

  Still, how had Algrath known where to find us last night?

  Had he followed us? Or tracked us in some way?

  Was he tracking us right now?

  What was going on inside that house? Why was he taking so long?

  I needed something to keep my hands and mind occupied, or I was likely to just follow Kai inside that house.

  I absently picked at the plant near my foot, tearing apart the leaves as I thought through all the questions and possibilities. There had to be some connection between Bates and the demon, and here was Bates at the Peterson house, which meant there was some tie between Ms. Julie and the demon, too.

  Could it really be her? Or were we missing something important?

  And if it was her, where was she keeping the others? Surely, she wasn’t keeping all five girls in her house, or Olive would know about it. If Julie Peterson had the girls, she was keeping them somewhere outside of town.

  I needed to talk to Olive. See if she suspected anything about her mother, or even if she was somehow working with her mother.

  The thought of that made my stomach hurt. No, I couldn’t believe Olive would do something like that to her friends.

  But we were getting close. We had to be, or else that demon wouldn’t have attacked us last night. He wanted to get us out of the way so no one would interrupt him the night of the ritual.

  I pulled apart another piece of the plant before I looked down and realized just what I was doing.

  I gasped and jumped to my feet, wiping my hands on my leggings. Thank God I wasn’t allergic, but this was just another sign that we were moving in the right direction.

  Sure, you could find this in a lot of the woods around town, but the fact that there was some right here, so conveniently located behind Julie Peterson’s house, brought us one step closer to proving it.

  This whole time, waiting for Kai, I’d been sitting in a huge patch of poison ivy.

  No Way Out

  Poison ivy wound its way around the trees here behind the house. Not that unusual, but it was an awfully convenient location for Julie Peterson.

  I glanced around, looking for any sign of lavender, but no one had planted any specific gardens out here or anything. It was just wild vines, weeds, and debris from the trees. I cli
pped off some of the poison ivy and put it in my backpack to study later. If only I had access to one of the bundles left at the girls’ houses, maybe I could compare them.

  I was thinking through the logistics of breaking into the evidence locker of a small-town police department when Kai suddenly appeared around the corner of the house, shaking his head.

  I wiped my hands off, closed up my bag, and threw it over my shoulder as I joined him.

  “What happened?” I asked. “What did they talk about?”

  “Nothing happened,” Kai said. “No one is in there.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked. “We literally just watched Bates go inside. How can no one be in there?”

  He shook his head, obviously just as confused as I was.

  “I searched every inch of that house, thinking maybe there was a secret entrance to a basement or a special room somewhere, but there’s nothing that I can find,” he said. “It’s as if Bates walked in and just disappeared.”

  “Without a trace,” I whispered. “Just like the girls. There’s something going on here. Let’s go.”

  “Where?” Kai asked, though it was obvious where I was going.

  I wanted to see the inside for myself. Bates hadn’t just evaporated. He was either inside somewhere we couldn't see, or he’d gone through some kind of portal in the house.

  “We need to figure out where he went. Maybe that’s how we find the girls,” I said.

  “I think we should let Martin know what we’re doing,” Kai said, running after me. “It’s one thing to tiptoe through a house while invisible. It’s something else entirely to walk in and start looking for a secret portal to a demon’s lair. You’re going to get yourself in trouble again. What if Martin doesn’t get here fast enough next time?”

  “Do you understand how close we are to the truth?” I asked, turning on him. “If there’s a portal in this house, it most likely leads to wherever he’s keeping Peyton and the others.”

  “Yes, but if we go in there now and get ourselves killed, how does that help anyone but the demon?” Kai asked.

  I wanted to punch a hole in the side of the house. We didn’t have time to sit here and discuss this. Bates’s trail was getting cold every second we waited.

  “We aren’t going to get ourselves killed,” I said, motioning to my backpack. “I brought some provisions this time around. I’m more prepared. The reason Algrath nearly got us last time was because we weren’t prepared. Besides, we aren’t going to try to fight him. We just need to see where he’s hiding. If we can locate the portal, we can come back later with reinforcements. But every second we wait makes it more difficult for me to track Bates’s footsteps. So, come on, already. I’m done discussing it. Stay out here alone, if you want to.”

  Kai’s eyes widened. “You can track his footsteps?”

  “Yes,” I said, glancing around the neighborhood before sneaking around the front of the house and walking through the front door. I wanted to make sure no one was watching us, but it was a quiet day on this street.

  We slipped into the house and shut the door behind us.

  The inside was absolutely pristine, but it was still a house of secrets. Secrets I wanted the answers to.

  I reached inside my backpack and took out a bag full of dirt. It was nothing fancy or magical in and of itself, but it was part of the toolkit my parents always used to pack as Slayers. Plain dirt was more useful than most people could have imagined.

  “What’s that for?” Kai whispered.

  “Watch,” I said, crouching down just inside the entrance.

  I grabbed a small handful and scattered it around me in an arc.

  “Vestigia revelare.”

  I held my breath, waiting to see if it would actually work for me like I’d seen it work for my parents so many times before.

  A few seconds later, a boot print appeared in the dirt directly in front of me, heading straight down the hall toward the kitchen. I followed it to the last print and repeated the process.

  The footprints took us through the kitchen, into the breakfast nook, and then straight into a wall on the other side of the house.

  Frowning, I studied the wall. I pushed on it, kicked it, searched for any kind of keyhole or seam in the wallpaper, but there was nothing to indicate a door or portal here at all.

  “Ostendo.”

  Nothing revealed itself, though, and I shook my head.

  “Solvo,” I said, trying again.

  Nothing happened.

  “I don’t know how they have it all sealed off, but at least now we know where it is,” I said. “Let’s take a quick look around the house and see if we can find any lavender bundles before we head out. Then, we’ll go tell Martin what we found and see if we can bring him back here to help us open this portal.”

  Kai sighed. “I don’t like this, Lenny. Something doesn’t feel right,” he said. “I’m getting a weird energy vibe. I think we should get out of here.”

  “The house is empty,” I said. “This is our chance to look for proof Olive’s mom is directly involved in this kidnapping and not just some Moondust dealer. If we can find that lavender, we’ll know it was her.”

  “I think it’s pretty obvious she’s involved. Don’t you?” Kai asked, his voice raised. “Normal people don’t just have mystical portals in their home. Moondust is one thing, but this is a step too far. We need to get Martin right now. Call him. Tell him to meet us here, and we’ll wait for him outside.”

  Wow. Kai was really serious about this. He was scared.

  “Okay,” I said. I pulled my phone from the front pocket of my bag and dialed Martin’s number. “We’ll let Martin know what’s going on and see if he’ll come to help. It’s going to be okay.”

  Why wasn’t it ringing?

  I pulled my phone away from my ear to make sure I’d dialed correctly. Basically, since his number was programmed in, pressing the auto-dial button should have called him right away, but the phone didn’t ring.

  I hit cancel and tried again, but the same thing happened.

  “What?” Kai asked. He’d found a broom and had been sweeping up the dirt and footprints.

  I shook my head.

  “No service inside the house, maybe? I don’t know. I’m not used to phones, so maybe I did something wrong,” I said.

  Kai set the broom against the wall and grabbed my hand.

  “We’re leaving,” he said. “Something is very wrong here. Can’t you feel it?”

  I couldn’t feel anything but the tight grip of his hand around my wrist. He was overreacting.

  I pulled my arm away and was about to try to call Martin one more time when a low-level hum grew in intensity, making the house shake slightly.

  “What’s that?” I asked.

  It was almost like a mild earthquake at first, but then it suddenly stopped, leaving us in total silence for a long moment.

  “Run,” Kai said, taking my hand again. This time, he pulled me toward the door, and I followed willingly.

  But when he went to open the front door, it slammed shut and darkness descended on the entire house, blotting out all of the sun from the windows.

  “Oh, no,” I said, dropping to my knees and immediately getting into action, pulling items from my bag. I’d seen this before. “The Devil’s Snare. This is not good.”

  “What is The Devil’s Snare?” he asked.

  “A trap,” I said. “We’re locked inside this house until we can kill the trap demon controlling the spell. Can you hold them off?”

  “Hold who off?” Kai asked just as a window in the living room smashed, scattering glass all over the floor.

  Two demons crawled in through the opening, their pointed teeth bared as they ran toward us.

  Kai cursed and held his hands out straight in front of him. I had no idea what he was doing, but I didn’t have time to worry about it. I had to get my things set up.

  “I need two minutes,” I shouted.

  “I’m on it,” he sa
id.

  A second window smashed, and I dropped the small bag of herbs I’d brought.

  You can do this. Just focus.

  With trembling hands, I picked the bag up and located the large bottle of blessed salt my mom had probably packed more than a year ago.

  I opened the top and turned around, creating a ring of salt around me to keep the demons out. I would have enclosed us both inside, but it wouldn’t be strong enough against so many for very long.

  I just needed a couple minutes to get everything ready. I hoped he was up for it.

  I glanced up just as Kai clapped his hands together.

  A bright light burst forth from him, and I had to shield my eyes against it.

  Apparently, so did the lesser demons pouring in through the broken windows. Several of them screeched and backed away, shading their eyes against the light of the newly conjured weapon in Kai’s hands.

  My jaw dropped, and I couldn’t force myself to look away, even though I still had to squint to see it.

  Kai had somehow managed to conjure a very big, two-handed hammer out of thin air. It looked like something I’d seen in a video game once called a great maul, but I had never seen anything like it in real life. I couldn’t tell from here if it was surrounded by golden light, or if the entire hammer itself was made of pure light.

  “What are you looking at?” Kai asked as he swung the hammer toward the first demon, knocking it back against the wall and shattering a painting of Olive and her mom. “Get to work doing whatever you’ve got to do. I can’t hold this forever.”

  His words snapped me out of my shock, and I sat down on the floor in the center of the circle of salt. I would have to trust that whatever he was doing back there would be enough to get us through this.

  It would have to be, because this time, Martin wasn’t going to come to rescue us. When a Slayer was caught in The Devil’s Snare, their energy was completely blocked off from the outside world. From the street, the house would have looked totally normal, but inside, we were stuck until these demons were dead.

  What have I done?

  I suddenly felt sick to my stomach, but I would have to be angry with myself for getting us into this situation later. Now, I had to figure out how to get us out of it.