by R L Medina
She smiled and released Jesse from her hold. The older witch sank against the wall, wheezing. Her eyes met mine and the quiet determination I saw there twisted my heart.
I turned to the supreme. “The GRIMM will stop you.”
“And how will they do that? They couldn’t even stop my little attacks. They won’t be able to stop what’s coming.”
My insides curled. I lifted my chin, fighting the urge to shrink away from her. “The wizard will help them.”
Her eyebrow arched. Amusement flickered on her face. “The wizard? The same wizard who is helping us?”
I reeled. The wizard was on their side? The wizard was the mole? Nausea rolled in my gut. That meant Grayson was in even more trouble than I’d realized.
“Oh, you didn’t know?” She smirked.
A million questions raced in my mind. Had the wizard always been working with Luna Negra? Why would my mom tell me to find him if he was working the supreme? Did she not know?
Shock still running through me, I sank onto the ground.
With a snort of derision, the supreme turned on her heel and left, slamming the door behind her. The lock clicked, echoing around us.
I met Jesse’s gaze. “How are the GRIMM going to win now? She has the wizard and the extraordinaire.”
Her sad smile filled me with despair. I’d been holding onto the hope that the mysterious wizard would help us. That somehow, the GRIMM would pull a wild card and win the war before it even started.
“It’s not over yet. She was wrong about your magic. It’s not useless and your parents would never be ashamed of you. They loved you and they would be proud of who you are.”
I blinked away the tears threatening to rise.
“Listen, I know it seems like a long shot, but I know it could work. The reversal spell. Your gift of healing could save us all.”
A grunt of disbelief escaped me. I shook my head at the older witch. “How?”
Her blue eyes lit with hope. “Jimena took on too much power. Even with the blood of the poor witches she sacrificed. She shouldn’t be able to wield all that magic at once by herself so she must be using some kind of binding spell to do it. But earth magic isn’t her affinity. We could use a reversal spell to undo what she’s done. Undo the ritual.”
“But I thought you couldn’t cast without your conduit.”
“We can use yours. We just have to break the blocker keeping you from accessing the magic.”
“Then what? I wasn’t even able to reverse this lock.”
Jesse shifted closer to me, a fervent look in her eyes, “But that was iron magic. She used earth magic to bind the blood of others with hers.”
“I thought that was blood magic.” I shook my head, confused.
“Blood magic comes from earth magic. You can reverse what she’s done to herself. Think of it as healing her. Restoring her back to her previous self. Without all her power.”
My heart sped up. It seemed almost too easy. Why hadn’t the GRIMM already thought of it? Was it really possible? Could I do it?
“We just need another conduit or something to hold onto all the power because if you and I tried to wield it on our own, it would rip us to pieces.”
“We could disperse it among all the witches?”
Jesse frowned. “No. We don’t want them to gain the power either.”
I sighed and rubbed my eyes. “How are we going to get the right conduit to use?”
“I haven’t figured that part out yet.” She rested her head back against the wall and took a deep breath.
Worry gnawed at me. I tried to push away the horrific images flashing through my mind. It was hard to see any scenario where we all walked away from this alive or unscathed. My eyes burned with tears as I thought of the others.
Was this always going to be my destiny? Dying at the hands of my parents’ killer. A promise made in blood cannot be undone. Papi’s face floated before me. All he’d done and my mom too to try to keep me safe, keep me guarded from Luna Negra, had been for nothing.
Their deaths were for nothing. Anger uncoiled within me. It was only in fiction that the good guys won, and the bad guys were destroyed or brought to justice.
In the real world, evil won every day.
The door opened, snapping me to attention. Ignoring the pain shooting up my leg, I stood up and turned to find the witches returned. They weren’t alone.
Cassiano.
Relief filled me at the sight of him. Surprise flickered on his face when he spotted me. His reaction confused me. If he wasn’t there for me… why had he come?
My heart sank. No. He was the other mole.
I reeled. “You? You’re the mole?”
He blinked at me.
I waited for his response. An explanation—something. My head spun.
Please say it’s not you.
“Mole? He’s the wizard,” a witch answered.
The breath was knocked out of my lungs. Cassiano? Cassiano was the wizard?
No. No. No. Impossible.
How could I have missed it? My brain raced, trying to put all the pieces together. He hadn’t come to rescue me. He was working with the witches. Shame filled me. Why hadn’t I seen it before? First Gloria, now Cassiano? How could I have been so stupid?
The headmaster’s words echoed in my mind.
Stupid child. You know nothing.
Was he a part of it too?
“It was you the whole time?” I sputtered.
He sniffed. “I was beginning to wonder if you would ever put it together.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Why would I?”
A darker realization struck me.
Anger curled in my belly. “You knew I was searching for you. To help Grayson.”
He shrugged a shoulder. “Everyone has been searching for me. I’m the last wizard. The most powerful GRIMM alive.”
“And so humble too,” I shot back.
Ignoring my response, he stood with the witches and surrounded us. “Your mother could have been great like me. But she threw it away. Chose the witches over me.”
“And you’re still crying about it?”
Anger flashed on his face. He stepped forward, making me flinch. Maybe pissing off a wizard wasn’t a good idea.
“You are nothing like her. Useless.”
My face flamed at his insult. I opened my mouth to respond but stopped myself. A sick realization spread through me. Grayson had warned me that we knew the wizard. Cassiano had been hiding Grayson the whole time. Sparring with me, training me, and watching as I searched for him.
Red dotted my vision.
“You. You’ve had Grayson all along.” My words came out low, laced with my anger.
Rage unfurled inside me. How could I have been so blinded?
“Where is he? What have you done to him?”
He clucked his tongue and gave me a pitying look. “I haven’t done anything to him. Merely kept him safe from the GRIMMs.”
“Why? What do you want with him?”
“Don’t you understand how important he is? How special? He has a built-in conduit that never has to be respelled to work. He can’t just do magic. They’ve turned him into an extraordinaire. The ultimate weapon.”
“He’s a person, you asshole. Not some object.” My body trembled.
Cassiano shook his head. “No. He’s much more.”
“Tell me where he is! I won’t let you hurt him or use him for whatever you have planned.”
His eyebrows knitted together. “I hardly think you’re in a position to threaten me, Miss Vasquez.”
My fists curled. If there was ever a time, I wished I could cast magic, it was then. I wanted to unleash all my fury on him.
As if sensing my emotion, he sighed. “I tried to teach you the best I could. You just don’t have the skills. I blame your mother, the traitor.”
I scoffed. “You’re a lying traitor and you think you have any right to talk about my mom? Why are you e
ven here? Working with the very witches you claimed to hate?”
His eyes narrowed. “They’re going to help me replicate the chip. In exchange for my help. I’ve done my part, and now it’s time for them to do theirs.”
My blood turned to ice. Grayson.
“You can’t.” My words came out sounding breathless.
Cassiano scoffed. “Words for the mediocre person. I’ve spent my life doing what everyone claims can’t be done.”
“What will happen to Grayson?”
He cocked his head at me. “My goal is to replicate what’s been done to him without removing the chip altogether. That’s why I need the extra hands.”
“But why couldn’t you just steal a chip from the GRIMM yourself?”
His lips pursed. “I have. Many times, but the specimen rarely survive. That’s why your friend is so special. It must be his affinity for shadow magic. It’s a rarity.”
The callous way he spoke about his failed experiments made my stomach turn to lead. How could my mom have ever been friends with him? Did she not know how messed up he was?
Before I could ask anything else, the supreme stormed in, her eyes lighting on Cassiano.
“You didn’t bring him here?”
He frowned at her. “I’m not going to risk moving him when the GRIMM are in a frenzy. And I don’t trust you. You can perform the spell there.”
Panic welled inside me. I turned to the supreme. “It’s a trap. He’s a double agent helping the GRIMM. That’s why he wants you to do it there.”
Her eyes slitted and darted to Cassiano. Annoyance flickered on his face as he looked from me to her.
“I’ll pull the shield down so you can see for yourself. No trap. Most of the GRIMM have abandoned the academy since the attack, anyway.”
My heart leapt into my throat. “And the students? Brady, Javi and Shiloh are they okay?”
The wizard glanced at me. “How would I know, Miss Vasquez.”
His coldness burned me up. Is that what happened when magic took priority over everything else? They were so obsessed with their power and themselves that no one else mattered.
“Let’s go,” the supreme ordered, waving her witches out.
“Wait! Take me too. I can help you with the spell.”
They laughed, seeing right through my plea. I blinked back tears of frustration, refusing to cry in front of them. Desperation filled me. They were going to Grayson and I was going to be left behind.
“I’ll do whatever you want, please.” The words rushed out of me.
The supreme walked up to me and shook her head. “You can’t do anything for me.” Her gaze flickered to Cassiano. “I told you, she’s nothing like her mother or father.”
He grunted. “I know that. What do you expect from an ordinaire’s daughter?”
I glared at him.
“Ordinaire? No, her father wasn’t the ordinaire.”
Cassiano blinked in surprise.
The witch smirked. “Don’t tell me you didn’t know either. That your precious protegee fell for a werewolf.”
Shock flashed on the wizard’s face followed by disgust. I met his hateful gaze with one of my own, wishing with everything I had, that I had developed the werewolf gene and could tear him apart right there.
“Come on. I don’t have time to waste. We have to prepare for our next move against the GRIMM.” The witch smiled at me.
In true Jimena form, they stormed out, without so much as a glance back as they left. I turned and looked at Jesse’s weary face.
My throat turned dry. Everyone I loved was about to be destroyed and I was stuck unable to save even myself.
What am I supposed to do now, Papi?
20
I turned to my friend. “Jesse, we have to get out of here. Tell me you have a plan. Something. Please.” My voice wavered with emotion.
Her blue eyes met mine. “Even if we could muster enough magic to break both your lock and the door, where would we go? To save your friend? How? Do you know where he is?”
A sob escaped me. No. I still didn’t know where Grayson was, and I had no way to find him. The wizard tracker had been left behind with Brady and I had nothing of Grayson’s to locate him. Everything was a mess. Hopelessness and fear weighed me down.
I’d never felt so helpless before.
“He told me to stay away. He knew who the wizard was, but he got cut off before he could tell me.”
Jesse looked at me. “Cut off?”
“Yeah. He came to me in a dream. Dream casting or something.”
“You’ve held this dream connection with him before then?” Jesse asked.
I nodded.
“Then it might not be too late. The connection might still be there.”
Hope stirred inside me. “You mean we can find him?”
She gave me a small smile. “We can try.”
“Yes. What do I have to do?”
“Just let me put you into a deep sleep and I’ll look for the threads and try to restore them.”
“Without a conduit?”
She nodded to my ring. “The blocker is down. Your ring will be our conduit.”
I gaped at her. “They left the magic blocker down?”
Jesse smiled. “No. I broke it down when they left. With the supreme and wizard yielding so much magic, they didn’t even notice me casting my own spell. With your conduit. Don’t worry, I respelled it with some of their magic.”
I looked down at my ring. “Why didn’t they take this from me?”
“It’s shielded. Double shielded, actually. They can’t remove it unless they took your finger off. But they didn’t count on us being able to break down their magic blocker to be able to use it.”
My eyebrows rose. “You mean me. They didn’t think I was strong enough to get past their blocker.”
“Nor me. And I wasn’t strong enough to do it until that wizard came. His conduit can’t hold all the magic, so I used some of it. Now, should we find your friend?”
“I’m ready. Do whatever you have to.”
I tried to shove the wave of panic down. If this worked—really worked—maybe I could find his location. Rescue him before it was too late.
Jesse’s magic hovered over me, making my skin tingle and itch. I fought the urge to scratch, not wanting to break or interrupt her spell. My mind reeled as I tried to focus myself on the present. Establish a connection like Jesse explained. Whatever that meant. The witch’s approach to magic was far different than what I’d been taught at the academy. No surprise there, but for someone who was still new to it all, I wasn’t sure which direction to follow.
The confusion wasn’t helping my concentration.
Just focus. Empty your mind, Jesse had said. How did you do that? It wasn’t like my brain was a trash can that could be dumped and ready to refill.
Pushing away the dark scenarios that flickered in my mind, I thought about Grayson. Memories of him flashed before me.
That first day that felt so long ago. Our fight. Our first kiss. His gray blue eyes stared into mine. My heart raced as the images flew by.
Grayson.
I saw him lying on the ground, eyes closed. My heart dropped to the floor. I ran to him, fear chilling me to the core.
No. I was too late.
Reaching out, I tried to shake him gently. My fingers passed through his arm as if I were touching air.
“Grayson?” My voice echoed around me, sounding strange.
His eyes flew open. A happy cry escaped me. Forgetting we were in a dream scape, I threw my arms around him only to find myself hugging air.
I whipped around.
He stood before me, his blue-gray eyes making my heart skip.
“Rose.” My name fell from his lips and bounced and floated around us as if gravity couldn’t hold it.
“I told you to stay away.” Though he was reprimanding me, he smiled.
“And I told you I don’t do well with orders.” I smiled back.
H
is grin widened. “How did you find me? How are you pulling off this spell?”
I snorted. “Because I’m so bad at magic, right?”
“No. I didn’t mean it like that.”
I shrugged off his words. “I had a friend help. But, Grayson, listen, you have to tell me how to get you out of there. The witches and Cassiano, they’re coming for you.”
His brow furrowed. “You’re with Luna Negra?”
“It’s okay. I’m fine. It’s you they’re after now.”
“Because of the chip?”
I nodded. “Cassiano sided with them. He needs their help to duplicate what the GRIMMs did to you.”
Grayson snorted. “He thinks he can survive being chipped?”
“Grayson, he’s the wizard.”
His face hardened. “I know. He’s been keeping me shielded. At the academy.”
The academy. The words hit me like a brick.
I gaped at him. “What? Where? This whole time you’ve been at school?”
A strangled cry escaped me. How could I have not seen it?
He reached out for me, his fingers hovering over my face. “It was the one place the GRIMM weren’t looking. He was on the team hunting for me so he made sure that no one would find me.”
Heat spread up my neck. The whole time I’d been looking and worried for Grayson and he’d been there all along. We’d gone to class, ate in the cafeteria, slept in the dorms while he’d been trapped, held hostage right under our noses.
“I want to kill that wizard.”
His eyes widened at my remark. “I guess that makes two of us.”
“Where in the academy are you?”
“One of the hangars. It’s shielded though and booby trapped. You won’t be able to get in without setting everything off.”
Fear filled me. “I’m still trapped here, but I swear to you, I’m going to get out and come for you. Just hold on.”
His eyes bore into me. “Rose—”
“No. Don’t tell me not to come, Grayson. I’m coming. You don’t get to decide. I’m going to free you and then together we can find everyone else and make sure they’re okay.”
Though I knew my plan was nearly impossible, I refused to give up. If there was even a tiny chance of rescuing him, I had to take it.