Conjured

by Chelsea Luna

  The three of them were completely engrossed in the game. I tugged Peter’s arm.

  “Do you want to try?” Peter handed me a softball.

  “No, I have to run to the restroom. I’ll be right back.” I rose onto my toes and kissed him quickly on the lips.

  I know, I shouldn’t be chasing monsters, but something was up. Something was different this time. I exited the gym and walked out into the hallway.

  “Why are you so anxious, Miss Ramsey?”

  I reluctantly turned towards the nasally voice.

  “Actually, it’s Miss Longfellow,” I corrected.

  “That’s right,” Mrs. Pratt said. “How could I forget? You and your mother changed your name now that Victor is out of the picture.”

  Hawthorne’s principal was wearing a purple dress with a white fake fur wrap. It was a little much, if you asked me, but I guess no one was asking.

  “We did.” I had to be discreet about searching for the man. I didn’t want to make Mrs. Pratt any more suspicious of me than she already was. The last thing I needed was her breathing down my neck.

  “It’s so sad that Victor is gone. Isn’t it?”

  “Not really.”

  Mrs. Pratt smiled. “I mean, you were a Ramsey. The world was at your fingertips. Mansions. Drivers. Maids. Cars. But now all that’s gone. I’m assuming you will not be attending Hawthorne Prep next year. The tuition might be a little steep for your mother to afford. What is she doing now? Is she working?”

  I took a deep breath when she mentioned Emma. I didn’t want another accident to happen. I may or may not have given this woman a heart attack a few months ago. I didn’t want to risk it. Mrs. Pratt was a nasty hateful person, but I never wanted to hurt her. And I definitely wasn’t going to harm her now. Regardless of the cruel things she said about me and my family.

  I inhaled deeply and relaxed my stance. “What my family does and what I do outside of school doesn’t really concern you.”

  Mrs. Pratt’s eyes tightened. “Tread lightly. If I remember correctly, I owe you a suspension.”

  “Is that what this is? Are you suspending me?”

  “Not yet. But you didn’t answer my question. Why are you so anxious?”

  “I’m not.” I was going to lose the blonde haired man if I didn’t get away from Mrs. Pratt soon.

  She folded her arms across her chest. It was a big gesture, especially with all the fake fur. “What are you doing out here? This is a restricted hallway tonight. The party is inside the gym. Behind you.”

  Think quickly. “I have to get something out of my car and this is the quickest way outside.”

  “What do you have to get?”

  “My date’s inhaler.” Total lie. Peter didn’t have asthma, but that’s all I could come up with off the top of my head.

  Her eyes narrowed to the size of pinholes. “I’m to be notified if a student is having an emergency.”

  “It’s not an emergency, but it will be if you keep me here. I have to go.” I tried to walk away, but her hand shot out to restrain me.

  I have no idea what look I gave her or what my face looked like, but I can only imagine. She didn’t touch me. Her thick hand hovered a few inches from my arm. Uncertainty filled her face. Nervousness.

  She was afraid of me.

  “Is there anything else?” I stared at her hovering hand, careful not to move.

  She pulled her arm back and tucked it safely under her armpit. “I’ll be watching, Alexandria. Something’s not right about you, but I can’t put my finger on it yet. I wouldn’t step out of line if I were you. Because I’ll be right there when you do.”

  I bit my tongue and turned on my heel. I’d have to keep my eye out for Mrs. Pratt. She was dying for me to slip up and make a mistake. My life was complicated enough. I didn’t need school troubles, too.

  The hallway was dark. I turned the corner, but hid against the wall instead of going out to the parking lot. The man was leaning against the lockers down the opposite hallway. He’d waited for me during my run in with Mrs. Pratt. We made eye contact. He dramatically twirled around and disappeared down an adjoining hall.

  This was such a bad idea.

  Following a strange man down a dark hallway? Especially one with red-eyes. But I could defend myself, right? I was a pureblooded witch. Wasn’t I at the top of the pecking order in the supernatural world? I was strong enough to fight off the red-eyed spirit in the mirror.

  I peeked around the corner to see if Mrs. Pratt was still watching me. She was gone. The lights were on in the hallway adjoining the gymnasium, but this corridor was dark and empty. The laughing and music were being drowned out the further I walked away from the gymnasium.

  The man was about one hundred feet in front of me. His walk was casual. Almost a stroll. He never checked behind to make sure I was following. I kept my distance, but like a magnet, an incredible urge to follow this strange man pulled me towards him. I couldn’t turn around if I wanted to.

  He made a left past the cafeteria and I instantly knew where he was headed. The Bell Tower. The tail end of his long black dress coat disappeared up the stairs.

  I’d only been in the Bell Tower once. And I didn’t like it then. The Tower was an old, un-renovated part of the building and completely exposed to the outside. When I was up there, it didn’t feel like I was at school. It felt like I was in a medieval lookout tower.

  One stiletto heel hesitated on the bottom step. I check the hallway to make sure no one could see me. Students were not allowed in the Bell Tower.

  I raced up the darkened stairwell. Landings divided four sets of zigzagged stairs. At the top was a wooden door left slightly ajar. The frigid air whipped through the small crack.

  I hesitated. The small voice of reason inside my brain screamed at me to turn around. But the mystery of it was too much. I had to know. I had to see if his eyes were still red. I had to find out who he was.

  I pushed open the heavy door and stepped outside.

  The cold air struck like a snake’s bite. The entire Bell Tower was brick - the floor, the walls, the steeple ceiling. In the center of the squared room was the gigantic iron bell covered in ice. The room was open to the elements on all four sides by half walls, so you could look down onto Hawthorne’s grounds.

  Stacks of lumber leaned against one corner and folding chairs were neatly placed against a half-brick wall. The Bell Tower had an abandoned feeling to it. Rightfully so, no one came up here anymore. Well, besides Logan and Anne Marie to make out. And me and my mysterious blonde stranger.

  “Hello,” a smooth voice said.

  I couldn’t put my finger on the slight accent. He was standing on the opposite side of the bell. He took a few steps forward and fully came into view.

  Snow was blowing in from all sides, but I didn’t care. I couldn’t pull my eyes away from the man. His eyes were bright red. Almost an electric neon red.

  He covered his eyes. When his hands fell away, the red was gone and they returned to their normal color. Emerald green. The shape was cat-like. Feral, my Grandmother Longfellow had called them.

  Just like mine.

  He took three quick steps towards me and, on pure witchy instincts, my hand shot up with my palm out. I flicked my wrist at the pile of lumber stacked against the corner wall. The wood crashed to the brick floor in front of him, erecting a small barrier between us.

  For a half a second, he looked shocked.

  Shoot. I’d just used my powers in front of stranger who might not have been threatening me. I had to calm down. I was way too jumpy.

  The man’s mouth lifted into a wide smile displaying a row of white teeth. An emerald eye winked at me. He flicked his own wrist and the pile of lumber rose from the ground and neatly stacked itself back against the wall.

  That’s when I knew.

  “Liam,” I whispered.

  He cordially bowed. “Hello, Alexandria. That was very nice, but what else would I expect from a family member?”


  CHAPTER 26

  “Family member?”

  All the bits and pieces I’d gathered about Liam over the past few weeks fell into place. The striking green cat-eyes that were so much like my own. Grandma Claudia’s obsession with our family history and her fascination with Liam. What was the term Emma used when I asked why the other witch families didn’t like the Ross family?

  Notorious.

  I’d say so. The most evil pureblooded witch of all was the head of the Ross family and had been so for thousands of years.

  “Yes, you’re my great- to the hundredth probably - niece. Didn’t you know that?”

  “No.”

  “I see that along with hiding you, they’ve also kept you sheltered.” Liam propped an elbow against the stack of lumber. “But it looks like you practice.”

  “Practice?”

  Liam inspected his fingernails. Then, without warning, he flicked his hand. A metal folding chair lifted three feet from the ground and hurled in the air towards me. The speed of the chair was quick, but not fast enough.

  I waived my hand at the oncoming object and deflected Liam’s throw. The chair halted mi-air and reversed direction. The chair lowered itself back onto the stack on the ground. The gesture reminded me of when Vanessa launched a book at my head. I was glad I’d practiced my levitation technique.

  “Very nice. You must know what you are,” Liam said.

  “I know what I am.”

  The emerald in Liam’s eyes gleamed. “Pureblooded. And extremely talented for your age, but what else would you expect? You’re a Ross.”

  A gust of wind roared, blowing wet snowflakes into the Bell Tower. It was snowing hard enough to be considered a blizzard.

  “This weather reminds me of Siberia.” Liam glanced down four stories below. “Frigid and fierce.”

  I didn’t want to do the small talk. Liam was here for a reason. He didn’t come out of hiding after three hundred years to talk about the New England weather. Or to crash a small town high school dance. “Why are you in Hazel Cove? What are you looking for?”

  Liam looked confused. “You, of course.”

  “Me?”

  “You’re pureblooded. We already established that,” Liam said, as if that explained everything.

  “We did.”

  “And I am ecstatic that you survived the Gamma Omicron Delta attack. They really boil my blood. Had I known about you before, that scenario would’ve never played out as it did. Trust me. Gamma wouldn’t have laid a finger on you.”

  The blood was draining from my head and pooling into a big knot in the pit of my stomach. Liam was in Hazel Cove for me. I should’ve seen the signs. The red-eyed spirit in the mirror told me Liam was coming, but I assumed he was coming to Hazel Cove or to the area in general. Not specifically for me.

  Liam was coming after me. Just like he came for….

  “Is that’s why you killed Sarah Ross?”

  Liam clapped in delight. “Sarah Ross! I haven’t heard that name in centuries!”

  “But that’s why, right? Because Sarah was a pureblooded witch and she was born on Halloween. Just like me.”

  “All purebloods are born on Samhain.”

  “On what?”

  “Samhain. That’s the Celtic Festival that eventually became Halloween,” Liam said, looking at me like he was explaining the lecture for the hundredth time to the not-so-smart child.

  “And yes, that’s why I took Sarah. She was pureblooded, but more importantly she was a Ross. My own blood ran through her veins, like it runs through yours.”

  “What about Jamie Ross?” My branch of the Ross family tree ran directly from Sarah’s little brother. “Why didn’t you kill him? Or did you have your fill of killing ancestors by that time?”

  “The little brother?”

  “He was obviously pureblooded, too.”

  “Ah,” Liam said. “You mustn’t assume these things. Conceiving a pureblooded child is against the law.” He used his fingers as quotation marks when he said the word “law.”

  “I know. That’s why Gamma tried to kill me.”

  Liam rolled his eyes. “Gamma is a joke. They think they’re protecting humans, but most of the time they don’t even know what they’re dealing with. Usually, Gamma hunts harmless half-breeds who get a little flaunty with their weak magic.”

  Liam thought Gamma was a joke? That was a scary thought.

  He brushed the snow off his coat. “Gamma really irks me when they stumble upon purebloods, which you should know, are very rare. They feel the need to strong arm their form of justice. So they kill the pureblood when it’s an infant. Did you know the law against purebloods has been in effect since before the time of Christ? Partly due to me, I expect. Half-breeds and witch hunters fear purebloods.”

  “How old are you?” I had to ask. He didn’t look a day over thirty.

  “Very old.”

  “But why didn’t you, or Gamma for that matter, kill Jamie?”

  “Little Jamie Ross. The parents were half-breeds and they knew it was against the law to have a child. They had Sarah, anyways, but they realized I’d come for her. So the mother deviated from the marriage bed to conceive Jamie - who would only be a half-breed. Good thing, too, you come from Jamie’s line.”

  “I know.”

  “I assume that whatever witch hunters were around at the time knew that Sarah was a Ross and opted not to kill her for fear of my wrath. Even witch hunters know how much I love my family line.”

  I felt sick. Liam was going to kill me any minute now and there was nothing I could do about it. He was a million times more powerful than me.

  On second thought, maybe it was better this way. I was here alone. No one else would be endangered by being around me. Peter, Emma and my friends would be alive and safe once I was out of the picture.

  “Back then hunters had respect for me,” Liam said. “Now days, well, I might have to make myself known again. I’ve been lying low for too long. To think that Gamma was minutes from killing you! William is lucky his son killed him. He wouldn’t want to face me.”

  “How do you know about that night?”

  “I have my ways, both human and non-human. I know about your past and what happened in the cemetery. You can thank your stepfather for that.”

  “Victor?”

  “A real eel-like fellow, no? Slithery, that one.”

  Victor was dealing with Liam. That explained why Victor was so spooked the day we saw him at the Gamma farmhouse. It also explained Victor’s appearance at my house tonight. He knew Liam was in town. He knew Liam was after me. That’s why he wanted me to stay away from James.

  Victor had sold me out again.

  “I didn’t know anything about you until recently,” Liam said. “Your family did an excellent job of hiding you.”

  “Victor found you and told you about me?” I asked in disbelief. Did Victor hate me that much? Did he seek out the ultimate killer when Gamma failed to kill me?

  “Oh no, no. I’d heard rumors of the Ross pureblood, but there are lots of rumors floating around. It wasn’t enough to make me come see for myself. So I sent a little reconnaissance.”

  “I don’t follow.”

  “Your fascination with the red-eyes? Those are spirits, darling. They do what I say. I sent a few to Hazel Cove and the news they brought back was enough in itself to bring me here. But the real icing on the cake was your Grandmother Ross.”

  I swallowed. “You killed Grandma Claudia?”

  “Oh no, dear. Of course not.”

  “Who did?”

  “Claudia, being the researcher that I heard she was, must have known I was coming for you. She conjured a spirit to get information about where I was and when I was coming. But when doors like that are open, spirits get a little…jealous of the living. Especially if you don’t know how to handle them. And trust me your Grandmother Ross was no expert in the dark arts.”

  Ice formed around my heart as he told me what I’d been waiting t
o hear for weeks.

  “Not to mention, Claudia was a half-breed. Spirits always try to possess the conjurer. She fought back, but, unfortunately, she wasn’t strong enough. The spirit didn’t take possession, but the damage done to your grandmother was too severe.”

  My blood boiled.

  “But when your grandmother made contact with the spirit, I knew you were for real. Another Ross pureblood! It’s been over four hundred years since the last one!”

  “Lucky you.”

  Liam ignored my comment. “I had some things to take care of before I could make the trip to Hazel Cove. I sent a few spirits to keep an eye on you until I arrived.”

  “So I’m not crazy. I was being watched.”

  Liam nodded. “They’ve been following you. But I must say, that is a great Il Gaurdenarium spell on your house. Very smart. Regrettably, it doesn’t stop spirits. It’s only effective on actual warm-blooded beings. I’m sure you’ve noticed the cool draft.”

  A house full of spirits watching my every move. For weeks. That’s why it was so cold. Why Emma was constantly turning up the thermostat. Why I felt eyes on me. At home. In the cemetery. At Grandma Longfellow’s house. Everywhere.

  “And what about the red-eyed people?” I asked.

  “Momentarily possessed by a spirit.”

  “Possessed?”

  “No one can see a spirit in its true form. It’s only energy. Of course, we can communicate with them in various ways, you experienced that yourself when you conjured with the mirror. Spirits can manifest into different forms when they have a receptacle, like a mirror or another object. What form did you see in the reflection when you conjured?”

  “I saw myself, but my eyes were red.”

  “Ah, the spirit was wary of you. It didn’t want to reveal itself. The spirit showed what it desired. You.”

  “Did I unleash it by conjuring?”

  “Did the spirit break through the receptacle? The mirror, in your case?”

  “No,” I said. “It tried to, but I smashed the glass before it came through.”

  “Then that particular spirit wasn’t unleashed.”

  “But my eyes were red afterwards. Just once. In my bathroom mirror.”