by Casey Lane
“Don’t do it,” Hunter whispered in Bianca’s ear. “I know she’s despicable, but don’t give her a reason to tear you apart with her magic.”
“Don’t you want to hear the rest of the story, dear step-daughter? Dear niece?” Riona’s chuckle grated at Bianca’s raw nerves.
“No,” Bianca growled through gritted teeth.
Riona ignored her. “I waited a respectable amount of time before introducing myself to your father. Almost a year after your mother’s death, I charmed my way into his heart. We were married soon after that. I waited while he amassed more wealth, and I checked the mirror often to see if I could get the portal to reopen. When I could no longer handle faking my undying love for your father, I … removed him from the equation. A little magical manipulation on his will was easy enough—you may have noticed that everything came to me after his death,” she added with a sly grin.
Bianca had spent the first few weeks in the wake of her father’s death too heartbroken to notice much, but she had eventually wondered why everything had ended up in Riona’s name. She assumed then that any inheritance her father had left her was probably in a fund she couldn’t access until she was older. In reality, it sounded as though that fund, if it still existed, most likely had Riona’s name on it.
“The only thing left,” Riona continued, “was to find a way back to this world—and to take from you the one gift your mother left you with.”
“Gift?” Bianca said.
Riona held her hand out. “Give me your necklace.”
“What?” Bianca took a step backward, wrapping her hand around the pendant at her neck. The tiny apple shape she’d worn for as long as she could remember.
“Do you know what’s inside that trinket?” Riona asked.
“Yes, of course. Protection spells. Woven specifically for me by my mother. No doubt they’re the only reason you haven’t been able to finish me off yet, as you did my parents.”
Riona gave her a pitying smile. “Bianca, if I wanted to finish you off, you’d already be dead. The reason you’re alive is because I still want something from you. That necklace.”
Bianca knew she was the only one who could remove the necklace. Her mother had reminded her of this often. Don’t give it to anyone, she’d said. Even if they beg. Someone might try to take it by force, but they’ll soon discover it’s impossible. “What will happen to the necklace if I die with it on?” she asked, though she suspected she already knew the answer.
“Nothing will happen to the necklace,” Riona said. “The magic within it, however, will vanish.”
“But I don’t understand why you want it. What could you possibly need protecting from?”
Riona moved closer, slow step by slow step. “Your mother lied to you, Bianca. Inside that necklace is what I’ve always wanted most.” She hesitated, her hand raised slightly toward Bianca. “My sister’s beauty. Your beauty.”
Bianca shuffled back another step, clinging to Hunter’s arm. “That makes no sense.”
“Your mother was a vain woman, Bianca, despite anything you may have been told to the contrary. Inside that bauble is her wish that her daughter would be even lovelier than herself. And as long as you wear it around your neck, its magic continues to work for you.”
Bianca shook her head, refusing to believe Riona. Her mother hadn’t been that shallow or selfish. If she’d said she wanted to protect her daughter, then that was the truth.
“Give. It. To. Me.”
“No!”
Riona launched at Bianca with fingers outstretched. She collided with her, and the two of them went down. Bianca kicked and wriggled and struck out with her fists. “Hunter!” she yelled, turning over and tearing at the ground as she tried to pull herself free.
“Hunter, pin her down!” Riona shrieked.
But instead of assisting his mother, Hunter leaped to Bianca’s aid. He grabbed Riona by the shoulders and yanked her off Bianca, and when Riona spun around and threw a crackling ball of magic at him, he dodged, swung his fist, and struck the side of her head. She crumpled to the ground.
“Run!” Hunter gasped, taking Bianca’s hand and sprinting away from his fallen mother.
Chapter 5
They raced through the forest, Hunter tugging Bianca along behind him. They leaped over the gnarled, twisting roots of a giant tree, and Hunter ducked down on the other side, pulling Bianca to the ground beside him. They waited in the shadows, the sound of their gasping breaths and pounding hearts mingling with the chirp, sigh and shuffle of night creatures in the trees above.
“I don’t hear her,” Bianca said after several minutes.
But then Riona’s sing-song voice shouted out above the forest sounds. “Come out, come out, wherever you are.”
Bianca clenched her hands together. “She’s going to find us,” she whispered. “She’s so much more powerful than both of us. Her magic will sniff us out.”
Hunter rose up a few inches, his eyes darting all around. “I’ll … I’ll lead her away.” He bent down once more and spoke in earnest. “Give me the necklace. She’ll see I’ve got it, and she’ll come after me instead. That will give you a chance to get away. I’ll come find you after I’ve lost her for good.”
“I …” Bianca hesitated. She had never removed the necklace, not for anyone or anything. Then again, she’d never been in a situation like this, thrown into another world and battling her evil step-mother’s magic in an attempt to stay alive. Surely these were the kinds of circumstances one could make exceptions for. And if, somehow, Riona spoke the truth about the magic the apple pendant contained, then it shouldn’t matter if Bianca handed it over and never got it back. Being alive was more important than being beautiful.
“I’m on your side, Bianca,” Hunter said, gripping her hands tightly in his. “I’ve always been on your side. My mother’s cruelty is … it’s escalated since we met you and your father. I used to find ways to excuse her actions, but not anymore. She’s gone way too far.” He gave Bianca’s hands a brief squeeze. “I won’t let her hurt you ever again.”
Hunter had proven himself to her so many times. He had just attacked his own mother for her. Of course he was on her side. Of course he wasn’t trying to trick her. Besides, the necklace would be useless to him if all it could do was transfer her beauty to his face. How odd that would be.
She pulled her hands from his and unlatched the clasp at the back of her neck. She dropped the necklace into his open palm and pulled him into a hug. “Thank you, Hunter,” she whispered. “I couldn’t have survived these past two years without you.”
“Head that way,” he said as he pointed. “Do you see the stream there? Cross over to the other side and stick to the edge of the water. That way I’ll be able to find you.”
“All right. Be careful, okay?”
“You too.” He jumped up and over the tree roots, heading back the way they’d come. She stood and ran in the opposite direction. As her feet pounded the ground, she tried to figure out if she felt any different without the apple pendant around her neck. But it was impossible to determine any difference, what with the highly elevated levels of adrenaline and fear coursing through her body. One hand rose to her face as she wondered if some of her features may have changed, but everything felt familiar. Riona must have been lying.
Bianca reached the edge of the stream. It was just a little too wide for her to easily jump to the other side, and while the glittering black water probably wasn’t deep, she didn’t want to risk wading through it. Who knew what might be lurking beneath the surface? She looked downstream and saw a trail of stones bridging the water further down. She ran toward them. Her foot was upon the first flat stone when she heard a cry in the distance. Was it Hunter? She looked over her shoulder but saw nothing more than a winged lizard-like creature launch itself from a branch and fly away.
What was she doing? She couldn’t leave Hunter to face his mother on his own. Bianca didn’t think Riona would intentionally harm her own son,
but what if it was an accident? What if she struck too hard with her magic? If he ended up dead, she’d never forgive herself for fleeing in the opposite direction while he faced his awful mother for her.
She began running. She passed the tree she and Hunter had stopped at. She kept going, following the sound of shouts and grunts. The sounds came to an abrupt end, plunging the forest into eerie silence. Bianca continued on, and moments later she stumbled passed a bush with silvery, reflective berries and found them—Hunter kneeling on the ground beside a motionless Riona. She lay on her back with a knife protruding from her chest. From the spot where Bianca imagined her heart must be.
Her hands rose in shock to cover her mouth. “What … what happened?” she asked.
“It—it was an accident,” Hunter stammered, staring down at his hands. “She caught up with me, and I tried to fling the necklace away and out of her reach, but then I—I was on the ground, and she was over me. She had a knife—I don’t know how. Where did it come from?” He looked up at Bianca for a moment, bewilderment in his gaze. “I couldn’t believe she would actually hurt me for … for this.” His eyes fell on the patch of ground beside him, where the necklace lay. “I managed to take the knife. I don’t know—I must be stronger than her. Then we were fumbling, and it was all so quick, and then …” He shuddered, hunching away from his mother’s lifeless form.
Bianca forced her shaking legs forward and knelt beside Hunter. “It was an accident,” she said, wrapping an arm around his shoulders. “Self defense. You didn’t mean it.”
His fingers reached for the silver chain and slowly lifted it. “At least she didn’t get this,” he said in a voice that sounded half strangled. The tiny apple pendant swung between them, and Bianca felt sick that he’d had to kill his own mother for this insignificant thing. “You can have it back,” he whispered.
Bianca swallowed as she took the necklace. She wanted to toss it away into the night, but she couldn’t. Not now that Hunter had given up so much for it. She pulled back the clasp, raised the necklace, and reattached the two ends behind her neck. “I’m sorry, Hunter,” she said, placing her hand gently over one of his.
He lifted his head and looked at her. “You should be,” he said. “But not for me.”
She frowned. “What do you—” But her words were cut off as the necklace jerked and tightened around her neck. Her fingers rose immediately to it, but the chain only tightened itself around her throat.
Hunter pushed himself to his feet. “I may be only half magical, but I’ve always had far more magic than you, fairest one. And unlike you, I know exactly how to use it. Thank you for being so trusting. This is far more pleasant than having to use my own hands.”
“Hunter,” she gasped, her nails scratching desperately at her neck. “I don’t … under … stand.”
“My mother’s not the only one who’s been biding her time and playing nice. I’ve been waiting too. Waiting for my chance at freedom. Freedom from my overbearing mother, from my spoiled step-sister. Now, I finally have it. And with both of you out of the picture, I have your father’s wealth too, and the threat of you ever trying to claim it as your own will be gone.” He spread his arms out, looked around, and laughed. “My future is my own, Bianca. In whichever world I choose.”
The chain cut into her skin and cut off her breath. Hunter turned and headed away from her, and as darkness clouded her vision, his stalking form was the last thing she saw.
Chapter 6
As her eyelids fluttered and a blurred version of the forest came into view, Bianca sucked in a deep breath. Her hands went to her neck, but there was no chain, no cut. Not even a bruise. Her gaze moved to where Riona’s body had been, but the patch of ground was empty. Had Hunter come back for the body?
“Hey, you’re awake.”
She sat up and scrambled a few feet away at the sound of the voice.
“It’s okay,” the boy said. “I’m here to help. I cut the chain off your neck.” He gestured to the ground between them where the silver chain lay. The apple pendant was crushed into dozens of tiny pieces.
“H-how did you cut it off?” she asked. “And how did you crush the pendant?” She didn’t think it possible as long as she wasn’t the one doing the cutting and crushing.
The boy held his hand out, and a knife that glowed and glittered like burning gems appeared upon his open palm. “Guardian knife,” he said. “It can cut through most things. The apple I whacked with a hammer. A guardian hammer,” he added, “just in case.”
She blinked and looked at the boy a little more closely. He was around about her or Hunter’s age, and his smiling face seemed familiar. “Wait, I know you. Don’t you live a few floors below me in my building? We rode in the elevator together once or twice.”
“Twice, yes. I don’t actually live there, though. I had an assignment that took me there once, and then a follow-up visit. I remember speaking to you in the elevator. I sensed you had magic in you, which was strange because you’d said something about living at the very top of that building. I said, ‘You live out here?’ And you replied, ‘Out where?’ I answered, ‘In this world,’ and at that, you looked very confused.”
Bianca blinked again. This boy spoke too much. “I thought you were a little strange,” she said. “I remember now.”
“Well, only as strange as you,” he said with a shrug and a good-natured grin. “And since we’re on the subject of strange, you look a little …” He tilted his head to the side. “Different.”
Bianca’s eyes fell upon the smashed pendant. Riona must have been right. It wasn’t protective magic within the apple. It was a wish, a spell, to make Bianca beautiful. And now it was gone. She touched her cheek gingerly and asked, “Am I ugly?”
“What? No, of course not.” The boy laughed. “It’s just that the first time I saw you, you were so lovely that it hurt to look at you. Now …” He shrugged. “Now I think I must have imagined it, because you’re pretty, but in a normal way.” He frowned. “That sounded odd. I’m not sure I’m making sense.”
He did make sense, though. Enough sense for Bianca to know that her mother had indeed been as vain as Riona had said.
“I won’t ask how you found yourself in the fae realm with an enchanted necklace strangling you, since clearly it’s none of my business, so instead I’ll ask if you want me to take you back home.”
“No,” she said, the word coming out abruptly. “I-I don’t think I ever want to go back there.”
“Oh. Well is there somewhere else I can take you?”
She paused, scouring her mind for an answer. “I don’t know. I don’t think I have anywhere else to go.” Tears gathered in her eyes and threatened to fall, but she blinked them away.
“You can stay with my family until you figure out what to do next,” the boy offered. “There are seven of us in the house already, but my mom always makes space for visitors.”
“Seven?” Bianca repeated, her eyebrows rising.
“Yeah, Mom and Dad, me, and my three sisters and three brothers. But there’s always the couch.”
“Uh …” Bianca bit her lip as she considered his offer. “Forgive me for saying this, but after the evening I’ve had, I don’t think I ought to trust you.”
He nodded. “Probably wise.” Then he slid one hand into the top of his boot and pulled out a dagger. A normal one that didn’t glow and sparkle. He held it out toward her. “You can carry this if it’ll make you feel safer.”
She looked at it, then back up at him. “You could probably disarm me in a second.”
His lips spread into a grin. “Well, yeah, but I’m not going to. Promise.”
Bianca eyed the dagger. She could try to find her way back to the portal on this side of the mirror, but would it still be there? And did she even want to go back to a world where there was nothing left for her? She certainly didn’t want to run into Hunter again. Slowly, she wrapped her fingers around the dagger’s hilt. “Okay,” she said. “Thank you.”
> “Sure.”
They both climbed to their feet, and Bianca walked away from the mirror and The Dark Room and toward a new life.
About the Author
Rachel Morgan spent a good deal of her childhood living in a fantasy land of her own making, crafting endless stories of make-believe and occasionally writing some of them down. After completing a degree in genetics and discovering she still wasn’t grown-up enough for a ‘real’ job, she decided to return to those story worlds still spinning around her imagination. These days she spends much of her time immersed in fantasy land once more, writing fiction for young adults and those young at heart.
Rachel lives in Cape Town with her husband and three miniature dachshunds. She is the author of the bestselling Creepy Hollow series and the sweet contemporary romance Trouble series, which is published under the name Rochelle Morgan.
For more stories of magic, mystery, action and romance set in the Creepy Hollow world, visit creepyhollowbooks.com!
rachel-morgan.com