by J. Kowallis
“Dad? Can you stand somewhere different?” I ask.
“Why?”
“Just, please.”
He nods, though I can tell he’s curious, and moves the group to the north side of the altar. “Does this work?”
I sigh and nod. “Yeah.”
“Then let’s get this show started, shall we?” He looks nervously at Mom, and she at him. They still haven’t said much to each other in the last couple weeks—in person, at least—but according to Lotte, Mom’s resentment has started to thaw through everything that’s happened.
Coll and I take our places in front of my father, who looks directly at us, while the others form a half-circle around us on the other side.
“Please, face your helpmate,” he smiles at me, “and clasp hands.”
I turn to Coll and take his other hand. Before the ceremony even starts, the magic of our combined hexen’s cross begins to glow through our skin, showing the full cross of Woden, the symbol of the prophecy. It only makes us hold on tighter.
“This is a simple ceremony, as a binding commitment doesn’t have a gray area. You’re committing to each other. By choice. Not only that, but you both know the importance of the choice you’re making, the implications of it. As you should. You’re both old. Enough.”
I sense a tone in my dad’s voice that makes me narrow my eyes at him. Mom laughs softly as well. Spirits know she’d been begging this from me for years. Dad only smirks. And Coll grips my hand tighter.
“Bindings, as you know, are more than simple weddings. It’s a choice made by two hexens, willing to sacrifice, desiring to put the other first, and eager to tie themselves to the other for eternity. Storybooks can talk about love at first sight, mates, or soul mates, or couples who are ‘MFEO,’ but even those cannot compare to a binding. Because you chose one another despite the odds. So, as representative of the Grim clan, I bind you, Taran Julie Grim, and you,” Dad holds a hand over top one set of our clasped hands, “Collens R. Donovan . . .”
Dad continues to talk as I look up to Coll in question. R? Just last week he told me he didn’t have a middle name.
He motions with his eyes to focus on my dad again, zero amusement in them, and I thoughtfully turn back. The moment I do, I catch a glimpse of something that completely re-shifts my thoughts. A movement. Something in the nearest trees. If I remember correctly, that’s where the nearest curve of the river Mole runs.
My mouth slowly starts to drop and my heart flutters like the wings of a hummingbird. I know what it is. Or should I say, who it is.
“Dad,” my voice sounds dead. Cold.
Coll breaks grip with my left hand and turns to see.
Moving from the shadows of the trees and gliding as if on top of the grass. Her woad-dyed sheath drifting around her ankles.
Hellia Morrigan grins at us and drifts closer.
“Coll,” my breath shakes. “Remember that feeling?”
“Aye. We should ‘ave canceled.”
“Will the protection spells hold?” I ask.
Coll just shakes his head. Whether that means he doesn’t know, or we’re-all-screwed, I’m not sure.
Angie moves around both of us, putting herself between Hellia, and me and Coll. Following right after her is my slow, limping móraí. Behind me, Mom gasps and Lotte lets loose a high-pitched scream. For sure, Hellia looks otherworldly, as if she recently clawed her way out of purgatory—her pale, woad-painted skin opaque but glowing with a sheen of translucence. And that raven hair wildly floats in the air.
“Nyrke de magie. Cosai dra féinen,” Angie vocalizes, her voice harsh and low. She waves her hands in rune patterns, approaching Hellia’s specter. Móraí’s voice chimes in with hers, rough and airy. “Nyrke de magie. Cosai dra féinen. Nyrke de magie. Cosai dra féinen!”
Hellia waves once with her hand and the log Angie jumped over earlier flies through the air and strikes Angie in the head. At the same time, the specter reaches out and rips the air, squeezing, ever tighter.
Móraí grabs at her thin, wrinkled throat and falls to her knees, gasping.
“No!” I lunge forward, but Coll holds my hand fast.
“Nyrke de magie,” he grunts. “Cosai dra féinen.”
I whip my head around to stare at him, but he’s got his focus locked on Hellia. He picks up the chant Angie started and I gasp, pulling at his hand. He tightens his grip and repeats the spell a second time. “Coll, my móraí! She’s going to die!”
He glances at me, his eyes shifted into the wild fixation of a wolf. “Yeh can’t help her if you’re dead. Now chant!”
I whirl around to see Dad slowly move toward his mother, his eyes trying to assess Angie at the same time while also staying out of Hellia’s sight. Blood trickles down the side of Angie’s head. She’s got a gash that has to be about six inches long. Hellia lifts her hand and the log flies again, narrowly missing Dad’s body as he falls to the side, avoiding it.
“You, bitch,” I growl under my breath. I don’t know if she understands English, but by the widening smile on her face, I’m sure she gets the sentiment. Together with Coll I start to recite the spell, holding out my hand and stepping toward her. Dad, on his hands and knees repeats the same words right along with us, his attention hooked on Hellia. And I feel the effect of his magic again—what Angie said just weeks ago—as the earth under my feet shakes, rumbling with intensity.
Unaffected by the growing tumultuous wind and the fury of the earth caused by my and my dad’s magic, Hellia’s gaunt, white face angles upward and she holds out her hand like she’s offering it to someone. Screaming over the building, whirling wind, I belt the spell, praying to the ancestors that Móraí and Angie are all right.
The wind beats against me, knotting my hair, tearing at my dress.
Then, without any other action, Hellia’s hand closes as if holding the hand of someone else and disappears into the air.
Coll and I both immediately stop chanting and a terrified scream shatters the air from behind me. The feeling I experienced all day is nothing compared to the cavity that guts me when I turn around. Mom places a hand to her mouth, muffling her screaming.
Lotte is gone.
Where she once stood is marked only by the impression from the bottom of her sandals.
“Where did she go?!” Mom’s words are stifled, but I understand her clearly. My own body shakes, and I turn to Coll, hoping to find some sort of answer. He looks just as horrified as I do and even more manic.
“Where is she? Where is my sister?” I ask, my voice barely louder than a mouse. “Coll?”
He shakes his head, his jaw an iron vice.
For a moment, my breath stops as I remember something. Something about my sisters. When Coll and I were pulled back in time by Craniarann, we arrived just after the execution of Hellia and her own sisters. Back then, I’d seen something in her Ravn siblings. Something I never voiced to Coll at the time. They looked just like Lotte and Alina. Almost exact replicas.
My knees give out and I fall to the ground. Coll immediately crouches near me. “What is it?”
“Alina,” I whisper. “Someone . . . someone call Alina!” My voice builds until I nearly scream her name.
Coll reaches into his suit pocket and pulls out his cell, passing it to me. “I don’t know her—”
I punch in the numbers I only barely remember and hold the phone to my ear, my hand trembling. Carl answers on the fourth tone.
“Carl,” my voice shakes, “Carl, I—”
My brother-in-law’s voice, his single bellowing question, tells me everything I need to know.
“What in the hell just took my wife?!”
Alina. And Lotte. Both gone. I reach out to clutch Coll’s jacket, just so I have something to stabilize myself.
Hellia took my sisters. I don’t know where they are. I don’t know how she did it. And I don’t know how I’ll ever get them back.
COMING SOON
Hexen’s Wane
Acknowledg
ements
I’m pretty sure I say the same thing almost every time I start one of these long-winded “thank you” speeches. But . . . where do I start?
I dedicated this book to her, and rightly so. My mom is everything. So, Mom, I love you. I can’t say that I would have gotten this far, not only in my writing and publishing career, but in life without you. You’re my cheerleader, my counselor, my teacher, and yes, even inspiration. I hope you know how much you mean to me, even if I may not say it on a daily basis. You’re my queen, my mother.
Lauren, you’re my sister, my friend, my sounding board and text-message critic (everyone should have someone to critique their texts, just saying). Not only that, but your amazing talent brought life to the covers for these books and I’m so grateful for that. Gosh, you even sit back patiently as I try to bounce story ideas off of you even when you have no idea what I’m even talking about and THAT is true creative dedication and friendship. Not to mention the fact that I’m sure I eventually drove you nuts at the end of the cover design process for this book. So many tweaks, so many changes. Thank you for putting up with it. And thank you for supporting me on the nights I cry over the phone about . . . everything. Thank you for being in my life. Thank you for making me feel like I can do anything.
Liesel, McKella, Bryan (yes, you, Bryan. Even if you left us), Hexen’s Binding wouldn’t be the same story without you. Liesel, you helped me keep an eye out for crutch words and descriptions that didn’t make any sense at all. McKella, you made sure the emotions made sense in the first place and swooned when I swooned. Bryan, thank you for keeping my men, men and making sure I knew what in the world I was talking about sometimes.
Readers, friends, book reviewers, and the book community at large, I owe everything I write to you. Yes, I can always continue to write for myself because it’s simply what I enjoy, but the real thrill is seeing each and every one of you connect with it and feel something. Thank you for you love of this story and these characters. Thank you for your support. And thank you for your friendship, even if we’ve never met.
Praise for
Hexen’s Cross
“Kowallis delivers an all-star performance in this tale of family, prophecies, betrayal, and discovery. Germanic folklore meets modern academia, and the results are simply magical.”
-Tish Thawer,
Best-Selling Author of The Witches of Blackbrook Series
“Kowallis’s blend of mythologies is immersive and impressive, and the volatile chemistry between the two protagonists propels this dynamic narrative forward into the series’ next volume.”
-Publishers Weekly
“Exquisite world building, a family of secrets, a badass heroine and a bad boy to boot? Yes, J, yes!”
-Lauren Bird Horowitz,
Award-Winning Author of The Light Series
“With layered characters, interesting mythology, and a good plot, Hexen’s Cross is a unique take on the old tales that will leave you gripping the pages until the very last sentence. This is a new must read!”
-The Reading Faery
“This book is magical and it is everything I never knew I needed!”
-legenbooksdary
ALSO BY J. KOWALLIS
THE ENERTIA TRIALS
AFTERIMAGE
“Action packed to the brim and so brutal.”
– The Bookish Crypt
ENCENDER
“This series just keeps getting better and better.”
– Legenbooksdary
DUALITY
“A pulse-pounding, anxiety inducing, heart-breaking rollercoaster ride that you won’t want to end.”
– The Bookworm Coalition
DOMINION
“[This] series shifted the paradigm of the dystopian genre.”
– Dreamland Teenage Fantasy
J. Kowallis graduated from Weber State University’s creative writing program and lives in Utah with her Mini Schnauzer, Etta. She enjoys dreaming about, flying to, and writing about distant lands (real or unreal). You can visit her at jkowallisbooks.com.
Connect with J. Kowallis
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–Facebook www.facebook.com/authorjkowallis–