by Jayne Faith
Well, they could make the trip, but they wouldn’t be able to use collective magic. My plan was based on the assumption that Lynnette wouldn’t be so stupid as to take the coven into the middle of the Samhain shit-storm without the power and protection of the group’s collective magic.
I hated the thought of ditching them, and part of me felt like a traitor. I could hardly believe I’d come around to agreeing with Barnes and SC about not involving the coven. I wasn’t succumbing to the house arrest they wanted to impose, but it still irked me that I was basically going along with their desire to keep the women all swept out of the way.
The hardest part was going to be slipping away from Deb. The coven was supposed to convene at Lynnette’s. From there, we’d pile into the three rented SUVs that she had hidden in her huge garage and then caravan away.
The new moon wasn’t exact until around dawn the following day, and SC was planning to put us under guard just after sundown tonight. Lynnette had given SC the impression that the coven would be complying with the house arrest, and I almost felt a little guilty that they’d be suckered into her ploy. Someone was sure to get in trouble when SC discovered that none of the witches were at home where they were supposed to be.
When Deb and I had our overnight bags packed and were about to leave my place for Lynnette’s, my phone went off with a loud jangle.
“Damn, Barnes and Lagatuda want me and Damien to come by,” I said, keeping my head down as I pretended to send back a reply to the fake message I’d set up to ping my phone. I carefully averted my eyes. I was a terrible liar, and I knew it.
“Oh no, why?” she said. “They don’t suspect that we’re up to something, do they?”
“I don’t think so, but I’d better go just to make it look good,” I said. “Take my truck to Lynnette’s, and I’ll get Damien to give me a ride and then drop me when we’re done at SC.”
“Okay, good idea,” she said. “I’ll see you at Lynnette’s.”
I slumped with relief when I heard the truck rumble away. Deb almost always knew when I was up to something, but she must have been preoccupied with the coven’s covert mission.
I ditched the overnight bag and got my backpacking pack from the pantry where I’d hidden it. I held Loki’s face in my hands.
“Damien’s going to check on you while I’m gone,” I said. I kissed the top of his head. “Be a good boy.”
Then I went to the back yard where my mountain bike was chained to the gas line that went into the side of the house. I unlocked it, kicked away the leaves that had collected around the tires, and swung my pack onto my back.
I let myself out of the gate and then hopped onto my bike and headed toward Foothills East. When I was a few blocks away from my place, I stopped and pulled out my phone. I scrolled to the app that allowed SC to track me and communicate with me through their system and deleted it. Then I restarted my phone, just to make sure the change stuck, and shoved it back into the pocket on the side of my thigh. Lagatuda would be furious with me, and Barnes would probably blow a gasket when they figured out I’d deleted their app, but tomorrow was the last day I was on the SC payroll anyway.
I also sent a text to Rogan: I got away and am heading to the cave.
I’d managed to recruit Rogan to go with me to Nevada. I had no qualms about involving him because he couldn’t be hurt. And if by some strange fluke he did get killed in the battle, it was what he wanted anyway.
I pedaled hard, keeping to alleys and side streets, in case SC noticed I’d dropped off their sensors and decided to come looking for me right away.
By the time I turned off the paved road onto the dirt lane leading to Tablerock, my shirt was glued to my back with sweat under my pack. I stopped and walked my bike away from the road, down a slope so that no one driving by would see me.
I stopped to catch my breath and tap out a text to Damien. First, I turned off all GPS and locator functions on my phone.
Deb is going to be looking for me, and she’ll be pissed, but I can’t let her or the rest of the coven know where I am. I’m fine, just not playing into Lynnette’s plan to force the coven into the middle of a battle. I swear I’m okay, so please don’t worry. Check on Loki tonight?
I was a little earlier than the time I’d arranged to meet with Rogan. My eyes kept flicking to the sky, searching for the black-winged shapes of his demon pets.
Reluctantly, I pulled out my phone. There was a text from Damien that said he thought it was dangerous for me to be in a location no one knew about. And there was a missed call from him.
And then there were the texts from Deb. I read through a few of them but then tucked my phone away. It would only make me feel guilty and anxious to keep reading the messages that I had to ignore.
I stood on a rock so I could see the sun lowering toward the horizon. The sky turned peachy over the city, and I watched as night fell. I knew there would be a lot of people furious with me later, but for the moment I almost felt peaceful.
My phone stopped vibrating for a while, but then it started up again. This time, it was Deb trying to call. Three calls, and then nothing.
Alarm pinged in the back of my mind. She’d left a voice message. I played it.
There was rustling and a scream in the background. My heart lurched.
“Ella, the Baelmen have found us!” Her voice was raw with panic. “I don’t know how they got here early, but we’re—”
The call had cut off, ending the message.
My hands shaking, I dialed Rogan and he picked up on the first ring.
“The Baelmen are attacking the coven. I’m at our meeting point. I’m going to start running back down the road. Please, leave now and look for me!”
“I’m on my way.”
I let my bike tip to the ground, tore off my pack and dropped it, and began sprinting. I ran, my shoes pounding the pavement in the weakening light of dusk. Headlights glared in my eyes, and a car scraped to a fast stop next to me. It was an old Jeep, and Rogan was at the wheel. I threw myself into the passenger seat.
“The Baelmen,” I panted.
“I know,” he said grimly. “They’re early.”
“How?”
“Not sure. Gregori may have stashed a few away, somehow. I can’t imagine they’re the Samhain Baelmen. Even Jacob Gregori doesn’t have the ability to speed up time.”
I called Damien and told him what was happening and where I was headed. He took off for Lynnette’s.
Then I dialed Lagatuda.
“We’ve been trying to locate you for hours. What the hell happened?” he demanded.
“The Baelmen are here,” I said, ignoring his question. “Lynnette Leblanc’s house. I’m headed there now.”
There was a second of shocked silence. “But that’s not possible.”
“I know, and yet it’s happening,” I said flatly, finally starting to catch my breath.
He let out a string of curse words. “We’ve already deployed the team to Nevada.”
“How far out are they?”
“Too far to help us in the next few minutes,” he said, talking fast. “I’ve gotta call the higher-ups and get them to turn around. I’ll call you back.”
He disconnected.
I turned to Rogan, who was swerving around cars and gunning the engine whenever the road was clear ahead.
“All of the resources were deployed to Nevada,” I said. My stomach plummeted as the reality of it really sank in. “Lagatuda is getting his bosses to call them back, but I don’t think they’ll arrive in time to be much help. I think we’re on our own.”
I grabbed the ceiling handle near the top of the door and braced my other hand against the dash as he began disregarding stop signs and red lights, laying on the horn and weaving through the traffic.
When he slammed to a stop in front of Lynnette’s place, we jumped out. Damien’s Lexus screeched up to the curb right behind us, and he slammed the door and ran to where we stood. I squinted up at the looming house. It
was completely dark and eerily silent.
“No,” I choked out, and began running. “Please, please let us not be too late.”
Chapter 26
AS SOON AS I crossed the magical threshold of Lynnette’s home, sound exploded against my eardrums, and I realized the apparent silence had been due to her noise-dampening ward.
I reached for my whip and held it coiled in my hand as I burst through the front door.
Currents of magic buffeted me. I kept running, following the sounds of unearthly screeching, through the house and out the French doors to the back yard.
I pulled up short when I took in the scene. The women had formed a magic circle, but the glow of the sphere flickered every time it was hit by a neon-blue-laced blast of smoke-black magic from one of the hellish creatures swarming the yard.
The women were shooting magic out through the sphere, lighting up the yard like a fireworks show. But I could see they weren’t going to be able to hold out for long. I quickly counted the Baelmen—six, I was fairly certain. Two dead on the ground and four still in flight.
“Ella! Get in the circle!” Deb was screaming at me.
“Go, I’ll cover you,” Damien said behind me.
Magic rushed over me and surrounded me in a multi-colored orb. Like a gerbil in an exercise ball, I began running across the yard toward the women. Two of the Baelmen dived at me, screaming and bouncing away when they impacted Damien’s protective sphere.
When I was halfway to Deb and the others, the magic surrounding me faltered, and then it winked out. I looked over my shoulder to see Damien down on one knee. Rogan was defending himself and Damien against a Baelman trying to dive-bomb them like a demonic bird of prey. Damien looked dazed, but I couldn’t turn back to see if he was hurt.
I pushed faster toward the women. Then a Baelman dropped to the ground in front of me, landing in a crouch.
I skidded to a stop, unfurled my whip, and grasped for earth and fire magic.
The creature looked up, its hellfire gaze trained on me, and its lips stretching to show its razor teeth. It raised an arm, flashing the curved sword-like bladed claws that grew off the end of each index finger. It almost seemed to savor the moment of our face-off.
It sprang at me with unearthly, blurring swiftness. My right arm came up, a reflex born of hours of practice, and sent the whip curling toward the Baelman as my magic flowed into it and amplified in the charmed weapon.
The creature leapt up, using its wings to propel the jump higher, just out of the way of the whip.
Then it changed direction and dove at me, baring its claws. Without time to lash out again, I took the defensive. I lunged and rolled out of the way at the last second and scrambled to my feet to see the Baelman gearing up for another dive.
The creature’s wings froze, and it dropped straight down at me. My whip lashed out again. The Baelman dodged, but I could tell my weak elemental magic wasn’t doing much to intimidate it.
It was out of reach of my whip. Screams from the circle drew my attention. I needed to end this. Eyeing one of the boulders left from Lynnette’s magic target practice, I got a running start. I jumped up to the rock and pushed off to launch myself higher. Twisting in the air, I snapped my wrist again. The end of the whip caught the Baelman’s ankle, curling around it. As I crashed back down to the ground, I yanked as hard as I could before the creature could react to stay aloft. It flailed its wings but couldn’t catch air. With a screech, it landed on its back.
In the next blink I realized I was bathed in a pulsing halo of maroon magic. A current of it shot down the whip and surrounded the Baelman, too. It went rigid as I quickly penetrated its mind.
There was someone it called “father” or “maker”—actually, some combination of the two words in a language I only understood through the creature’s understanding. The Baelman’s maker had given it one purpose in life, to kill Lynnette and her coven. The faces of the women flashed like a slideshow, whirling through the creature’s mind. I had a split-second to see that I was not included among them, but Amanda was.
Rogan was right. This Baelman must have been created earlier and had been given its mission some time ago, before Amanda had been killed. And Jacob had not kept his word about Deb—her face was on the hit list.
With a spike of adrenaline, I realized my whip had nearly sliced clean through the creature’s ankle. I gave it one more yank, and then the Baelman was free, leaving its severed foot behind and frantically taking flight as white liquid frothed and dripped off the end of its leg.
I took the opening to race the rest of the way to the magic circle. A vertical white line appeared in the sphere, and I squinted against its brightness. It was an opening, a slice barely wide enough for me to slip through.
“Hurry!” Deb screamed.
I turned sideways and threw myself inside the protective sphere shoulder-first, stumbling and crashing into a couple of the women. They righted me and then pushed me forward into the center, near Lynnette.
“I won’t be able to hold the circle when the collective magic hits me,” she called out to us. “I’ll have to drop it.”
I nodded, already opening myself to receive and channel the streams of magic from the other women. I let it swell, building up until it was almost painful, and then raised my right hand and opened the floodgate. Fire magic, earth magic, and my own blood-red energy streamed from my fingertips to the triangular hologram that Lynnette appeared to hold floating between her hands as a target.
The protective half-sphere around us winked out, and the Baelmen were ready. There were three left in flight—Rogan and Damien must have killed one—and they descended on us.
Lynnette turned and whipped a giant boulder of magic at the nearest one, and it exploded in a fiery burst of magic sparks, leathery skin, and white goo. I reeled as her blast seemed to create a vacuum in our collective magic, sucking more of it through me.
One down, two to go.
The remaining creatures pulled back when their comrade was obliterated. They circled higher, apparently regrouping. Lynnette was taking aim, but they were high enough that they were difficult to spot in the dark of the night.
When they dove, it was clear they were aiming for Lynnette. Twin streaks of pale flesh and wing, accompanied by glass-shattering screams. They separated, obviously trying to evade one big hit, but Lynnette was ready. Her hands moved apart, and two more holograms formed. I kept streaming magic into the central one, and the power amplified from the central hologram into the other two.
She pushed her palms outward, and there were two ground-shaking booms. The Baelmen vaporized. There was literally nothing left of them except an oily mist and the smell of death in the air.
Victory flashed hot in my chest, even as the chill of magical exhaustion descended over me like a cloak of snow.
Shivering, I rushed to Deb. We fell into each other’s arms, but there was no time to celebrate.
Around us, women were collapsing. Some stayed on their feet, and bent to try to help the others. Deb and I hurried over.
“We didn’t close the circle right away,” Deb said, her voice hoarse and shaking. Her face grim, she lifted Elena’s limp wrist to check her pulse. “Some of the women expended themselves early. Their bodies and minds have shut down as a defense mechanism.”
“Are they going to be okay?” I asked.
“If they get emergency healing, they should be. Let’s get them inside.”
We focused on working together to lift Elena.
“They protected me,” Deb said softly as we carried the unconscious woman. Elena’s long hair trailed along the ground. We walked around a still-bubbling puddle of pale Baelman blood. “Because I’m pregnant. They didn’t want me to endanger the baby.”
The look on her face—a teary mix of guilt and gratitude—nearly broke my heart.
Dazed, those of us still conscious carried the collapsed witches inside, and Rogan and Damien helped. There were two more Baelman corpses near the hou
se. I hadn’t even realized that more creatures had arrived. That made eight dead Baelmen in total.
“You guys killed these ones?” I asked Damien.
He nodded, and I swallowed hard, looking up at the sky. I knew we’d killed them all—I’d sense any live ones if they were nearby—but I couldn’t help wondering if there were more out there.
Damien was pale and winced when he moved but seemed mostly okay. Rogan appeared completely unharmed and untouched by magical exhaustion.
“I’ve got three Level III healers on the way,” Lynnette said as we all scrambled for blankets to cover the unconscious witches.
She knelt next to Jennifer, whose freckles stood out on her slack, pale face and took her limp hand. Lynnette pressed it between her palms for a moment. She went around to each fallen witch, worrying over them with unexpected softness.
The healers arrived and began working on the unconscious women first. Lagatuda and Barnes came not long after with an SC crime scene crew that took care of the Baelman bodies in the yard.
I huddled under a quilt next to Deb on one of Lynnette’s velvet sofas, watching all of it as if it was something happening far away. Deb seemed equally dazed. The healers spent hours on the unconscious women and eventually moved their still forms into bedrooms to allow them to keep recuperating away from all the commotion.
“Are they really going to be okay?” I asked Deb.
“If the healers know what they’re doing, the women will wake up with the equivalent of bad concussions. Dangerous if they don’t take it easy for a while, but with the proper rest and care, they should all recover. I’m sure they’ll be fine. Lynnette called in the best.”
When the healers were ready to turn to the rest of us, I prompted Deb to go before me. Objectively speaking, I probably had a worse case of magical exhaustion due to my low aptitude and resulting low threshold, but I was wary of letting anyone but Deb heal me.