by Lily Velez
Whine, whoosh, whine, whoosh.
A swing. My eyes slowly yawned opened and I winced at the brightness of the sun, throwing up a hand to shield my face. To my left, a brown-haired boy with cognac eyes swung back and forth on a playground made of wood, his pale hands tightly gripping the swing’s thick chain.
I sat up, my head spinning. I had finally managed to speak with Alison, but her words were an enigma. Stop the demons? But how? I didn’t know what I’d done to ‘banish’ that demon at the rugby game, if I’d banished it at all.
Nearby stood the Connelly home, and arguing voices from within filled the silence. I padded over to an open window and peeked inside.
“I can’t believe what you’ve done,” Alison was saying, her face red and tear-stained.
“At least I did something,” Redmond threw back.
“Endanger one son for the sake of another?”
“Would you have rather I let Connor die?”
Alison blanched, her eyes doubling in size as her body stilled all over. “How dare you ask me such a thing?”
“You dote on Jack to the exclusion of the others. You don’t think the boys notice it? The firstborn witches in your line are unfathomably powerful, but that doesn’t mean Jack’s the only one who needs his mother’s love. He was able to give Connor back to us. That’s something to celebrate.”
“And I’m thankful beyond words. But look at what it cost Jack. The clans will never look at him the same way again. They fear him now, Redmond.”
“Let them believe what they will. Why should we care?”
“Because I know what it feels like to be ostracized by your own people from a young age, and I purposed that none of my boys should ever know that pain. But you went behind my back in this and asked Jack to do something I didn’t even know was possible, something he wouldn’t even know was possible had you not told him. How can I trust there won’t be a second time or a third? It terrifies me more than anything else that we’ll lose him sooner than later.”
Redmond exhaled a long breath, the fight draining out of him. He rubbed his forehead. “I stressed the importance that he never do it again. But it was the only way, Alison. I will always do whatever it takes to protect our boys and keep our family together.”
Alison’s eyes were shining. She shook her head as tears raced down her cheeks. “And that’s what scares me the most,” she said. “I want nothing more to do with demons and dark magic, Redmond. There has to be a point when you and Maurice stop trying to change fate. Returning Connor to us is one of the greatest gifts you could’ve ever given me, and I will be thankful for it until my dying breath, but we mustn’t expose Jack to such darkness ever again no matter what. You have to promise me that.”
Redmond studied her for a long moment. “You’ve seen something,” he said. “You’ve seen Jack’s future.”
More tears slipped down her cheeks. “Only a possible future, a new path that recently unraveled for him and one we must avoid at all costs. For should he, as powerful as he is, be exposed to magic that dark again…” She trailed off, pressing a hand to her throat.
“What is it?”
She swallowed thickly. “It’ll be the end of him,” she said.
Thunder roared overhead as the sky quickly swelled like a bruise, gray clouds rushing in to block the sun’s golden rays. Within seconds, the heavens instantly transformed. Night fell, the black canvas above studded with an ocean of stars. When I returned my attention to the Connelly house, Alison was alone, paging through what looked to be a family album.
This was my chance.
Moments later, I was inside, slowly making my way toward the living room and wincing at every creak the floorboards gave off. Above me, feet pounded up and down the second level, and I could just make out the muted voices of boys horsing around. I couldn’t be sure, but it almost sounded as if they were playing rugby indoors.
The windows in the living room glowed in a flash of lightning. The accompanying thunder seemed to shake the very foundations of the house. Alison continued flipping through the family album, each page covered in a shiny, plastic sleeve that glistened in the lamplight.
“He finally found you,” she said.
I blinked and glanced around the room. I hadn’t seen anyone before, but maybe I’d missed them. I hadn’t. I was very much the only other person present.
Wind whistled as it rushed past the windows, making them tremble in their frames. I furrowed my brow. No, not wind…what was that? I honed in on it, taking another step forward. My heart shuddered. It was black smoke. Thick tapestries of black smoke wrapping around the house like colossal serpents.
The shadow demons.
“They’re called Wraiths,” Alison said. She had turned in the couch and was looking in my direction.
I looked over my shoulder, but no one was there. She was addressing me. I hadn’t expected to acquire an audience with her so easily once given the chance, so it took me a moment to move past my surprise. “Why are they here?” I asked, realizing that what I’d wrongly assumed was a memory was instead another fear or nightmare.
“They’re the little-known byproduct of dark magic used against the mind.”
That gave me pause, but I had little time to think about it. The black smoke was suddenly slithering into the room, filling it quickly as if the house had caught fire. “We have to get out of here!” I exclaimed. I knew she wasn’t real, but I couldn’t just leave Jack’s mother to this nightmare’s hellish end.
In a blur, one of the shadows detached from the mass and shot out at Alison, a ring of black forming around her neck in a chokehold. She coughed and thrashed against her captor, a captor that quickly evolved from mere smoke to a towering, horned creature that made my stomach fall to my knees. It was the most terrifying thing I’d ever laid eyes on.
The surrounding shadows hissed, the sound of a hundred venomous snakes whispering into my ears, making my skin crawl. The Wraiths continued populating the space around me, enclosing me and Alison in a thickening band of shadows. Though they had no form, red eyes gleamed from various parts of the smoke as if with hunger.
I held my ground. I was mildly aware of the fact that I was trembling, but as I watched Alison struggle against her assailant, I knew I couldn’t stand to find out what they’d do to her. She needed me, and I wasn’t going to let them take her.
I squared my shoulders. “Let. Her. Go.”
“You have no power here,” the horned Wraith said, its words sounding as if they’d gone through a voice modulator of the most disturbing kind. “Leave.”
I took a defiant step forward. “I’m not going anywhere. I’m not afraid of you.”
“Oh, but you are. And how delicious your fear tastes.”
My heart shivered, but I kept my head high. “I’m not afraid of you,” I repeated, making my voice as hard as iron. This time, the horned Wraith and its kin snarled, so I said it again. “I’m not afraid of you. I’m not afraid of you. I’m not afraid of you!”
With each proclamation, warmth gathered in the pit of my stomach like a growing fire. I locked eyes with Alison, and she nodded at me inasmuch as she could. Her words from before came to mind. You have to stop them, she’d said. It’s the only way to help. Without warning, the warmth in my stomach shot through my right arm so that it was like fire sleeved my skin. I looked down at my palm, fingers splayed. It was as hot as if I held a flame. The heat continued to build, refusing to be contained. I nearly cried out in pain.
Roaring at my defiance, the horned Wraith shoved Alison away and charged for me. And then I knew what I had to do. Just as it lunged at me, I threw out my hand to stop it, aiming the scorching heat its way. A hellish shriek pierced my ears as white light flooded the room. I squeezed my eyes shut as the deafening screams of the Wraiths surrounded me.
When I dared to look again, the shadow demons had vanished, nothing but plumes of smoke rising in their wake. In front of me was a blotch of scorched hardwood floor marking where th
e horned Wraith had last stood.
“You see?” Alison asked, smiling softly. “You are one of Them.”
“One of what?” But she had already disappeared, and all around me, the room shimmered and gave way to a new scene, to a familiar, yellow-tiled kitchen.
I was immediately greeted with laughter. Alison and her four sons gathered around Redmond. The man sat at the kitchen table with a lopsided cake before him covered in brightly lit candles and an excess of chocolate icing. His wife and sons were singing Happy Birthday. The room smelled like vanilla, and was filled with love and warmth. I wanted to stay longer to bask in it, but I knew I couldn’t.
A noise from above pulled me upstairs. As I ascended the steps, the wall to my left continuously changed. From crayon doodles on the wall to new paint to cover those doodles to multiple frames coming and going, showing the boys as they aged.
At the top of the stairs, giggling came from a room down the hall. As I made my way for it, the walls transformed around me, taking on the bones of another house entirely. I pushed open a cracked door and discovered a gathering of young women in lavender dresses, bouncing on their heels with uncontainable excitement as they surrounded a friend of theirs.
It was Alison. She stood before a long mirror in a simple but beautiful wedding gown. There was a crown of flowers in her hair. It contained dried lavender and baby’s-breath and pale roses. The bridesmaids didn’t notice me standing there, but Alison smiled knowingly at my reflection in the mirror, as if she’d been expecting me.
“You’re here at last.” She turned away from the mirror. The bridesmaids were gone. She held out her hand. “Come closer. There’s something you’re here to ask me, isn’t there?”
I closed the distance between us and took her hand. It was warm, full of life. I wished Jack could hold it now, could see his mother like this, beautiful and radiant and young and happy.
I did have a question in mind. It wasn’t the one I was here for, but I had to know her answer. “Would you change anything?” I asked her. “If you could do it all again, would you still marry Redmond? Would you still have a family?”
She smiled. “I would change nothing. Because that’s the beauty of life. We take the mess with the magic. A life with one and not the other is only a life half-lived.” She squeezed my fingers. “Now what is it you must tell me?”
I needed to tell her about The Wise Ones and ask what she knew concerning the sluagh. I opened my mouth to begin, but the words were odd-feeling on my tongue. I had the impression that there was something else I was supposed to do, something more.
And then two words came to mind. They didn’t make sense. I didn’t know why I felt I needed to say them, but I leaned forward and whispered them into Alison’s ear nonetheless.
“Wake up.”
As soon as the words left my mouth, the ground trembled and the walls shuddered. I gasped and tried to pull away, but Alison’s grip on my hand was unyielding.
“Thank you,” was all she said before everything came crashing down upon us.
25
I threw my arms over my head to shield myself from the falling debris.
No debris came. When I opened my eyes, four faces were peering down at me. I was back in Serenity Falls.
“Oh, thank God,” I breathed, sitting up. “You wouldn’t believe what I—”
There was a sharp gasp from beside me, and all of us turned to find Alison gulping for breath. She blinked furiously, trying to make sense of her surroundings, thrashing back against her wheelchair. She didn’t know where she was or why.
“Mam?” Jack rushed to her, taking one of her hands. I didn’t know if it was the familiarity of his voice or simply the gentleness of his touch, but she slowly relaxed, the tension gradually draining out of her. The rigid muscles in her body loosened one by one, the arm that had been stretched heavenward floating down to rest upon her lap. The clouds in her eyes cleared. A healthy flush of red slowly pooled into her cheeks. Even her chocolate hair seemed to regain some of its luster.
After a few moments, her eyes switched to me as I stood. “You’ve unlocked me,” she whispered. She looked down at her hands, at her body in its wheelchair, as if seeing it all for the first time. “I’ve been imprisoned for so long.”
“What do you mean imprisoned?” It was Connor who asked, his brow furrowed.
“A dark enchantment,” said Alison. “A curse.”
“Someone did this to you?” Connor’s tone was blatantly doubtful.
Jack cut a sharp look in his direction. “Who cast the curse, Mam? Did you recognize them?”
“The witch in the hood,” Alison said. “A face cast in shadows.”
“Whose face?”
“I don’t know how much time we have,” Alison said. “I feel myself fading, weakening.”
“It’s all right,” Jack said. “We can help you regain your strength. You’re safe now.”
“We’re far from safe. They’re coming. They’re coming for all of you. I’ve seen it all, and I’ve been powerless to stop it.”
My heart missed a beat. “Are you talking about the sluagh? Do you know anything about them? The Wise Ones sent us here. They seem to think you know something about how to stop them.”
“The sluagh aren’t working of their own volition,” Alison said, looking completely different from that withered woman we’d first walked in on. Years had melted away from her face. Where she sat was more a throne than a wheelchair. “Someone’s controlling them.”
Jack nodded. “We know. They’re working for The Black Hand.”
“No. Hunters play no part in this. The opponent we face is far more formidable. There is darker magic at work here. Forbidden magic.”
“What are you saying?” I asked. My chest was tight. The Black Hand had seemed a formidable enough enemy. What could possibly top them? “Who’s our actual opponent?”
Alison met my eyes, her soft brown irises flooded with fear. “A Reaper.”
The word was like a strike of electricity. The boys visibly recoiled from the word. Lucas and Rory even stepped back.
“What’s a Reaper?” I asked, the hair on my arms rising.
Jack was the one to respond, his face noticeably pale. “Reapers are witches who slay other witches in order to reap their magic. Their Masteries specifically. Their goal is to acquire more and more power each time until they’re an unstoppable force.”
“And this Reaper is unimaginably powerful,” Alison said. “They have great darkness at their command.”
Great darkness in the form of demons? “Could this Reaper have been the one to summon the demon that burned down The Wise Ones?” I asked.
“Most likely,” Jack said, raking his fingers through his hair, his face ashen. “If a Reaper’s behind the stolen souls, then we’re already too late.”
“No,” Alison said, shaking her head. “The Reaping has not yet been performed, nor is the Reaper interested in Masteries alone. They mean to use the stolen souls as a sacrifice in a dark ritual. They mean to awaken ancient evil.”
The floor was tilting. I grabbed the edge of a table to steady myself.
Jack squeezed his mother’s hands. “Can you see who the Reaper is? In the visions you’ve had, have you seen their face?”
“The witch in the hood,” Alison repeated. “A face cast in shadows.”
“What is she saying?” Connor asked. “That the Reaper is the same witch that cast this curse on her? Why won’t she give us a name?”
Jack shook his head. “They must’ve placed a block on her mind to keep her from revealing their identity.”
Alison seized Jack’s arm as if she hadn’t heard the exchange. “You must recover The Book of Fates. It alone contains the spell that can bind the Reaper and stop the ritual before it’s too late. As you already know, the girl plays a role as well.”
Jack’s eyes slid to me and then back to his mother. “What role specifically?”
“She’s one of Them, Jack. The last of h
er kind. If all else fails, she’s our only hope. But time is running out. The ritual draws nigh.”
“When will it take place?” Jack asked.
“When the Blood Moon fills the sky. The earth where the mother goddess sleeps awaits.” Alison suddenly clutched her chest, her breathing becoming labored.
“Mam? Mam, are you all right?”
She was wheezing. She pitched forward, stumbling out of the wheelchair until she was on her hands and knees. Her coughs came out wet and chesty. Jack helped her to her feet, and when she opened her mouth, it was painted red. Blood dribbled down her chin, trickled out of her nose.
“Get the nurse!” Jack ordered Lucas, who scrambled out of the room. With a wave of his hand, Rory cleared the sigil from the floor and rapidly began returning the candles and crystals into his backpack.
Alison broke free from Jack’s hold and tried to walk on her own, but she tripped over herself and fell into Connor’s arms, Connor whose face was painted with panic. “What do I do?” he exclaimed to Jack. “What do I do?”
“Connor,” Alison said, her voice small and thin. She touched a palm to his cheek weakly. Her skin had lost all its color, her facing aging rapidly. Threads of gray appeared in her hair. She was reverting back to the frail woman I’d first seen. “I pray one day you may forgive me for my neglect.”
Connor’s face grew sallow, his body going tight.
The door burst open and a pack of nurses rushed in to help Alison, but no sooner had they taken half a dozen steps into the room, her body went completely limp in Connor’s arms.
26
Alison was stable.
Or as stable as one could hope. Unfortunately, the doctors had no explanation for what had happened to her but worried a sudden onset of stress had been the culprit. As such, they’d cleared the room, allowing only one visitor to remain at Alison’s bedside while she slept. Connor, surprisingly, had volunteered, the hard lines in his face softened into an expression I hadn’t yet seen from him.
The entire experience had me phoning my dad’s hospital for an update, but the nurse who answered fed me the same words they always did. No improvements. Dejected, I assumed a roost in an empty nook of Serenity Falls and distracted myself from Alison’s ominous and enigmatic words by going through new text messages my phone had notified me about earlier but that I hadn’t had time to check yet. There were a few texts from Natalie, asking if I were dying in a ditch somewhere or if I’d been kidnapped by an axe murderer. I realized I’d never responded to her after missing our video chat date. I fired out a quick update.