For me.
“You got through the wards,” I said.
“They fell.”
I nodded. “I killed Jasper.”
“I noticed. But I’m slightly more concerned about getting you through the fire right now.”
The heat of the blaze was already scorching my skin. Kett slowly pivoted again.
“I killed Jasper,” I murmured. And as I did so, I realized that the estate magic was now wholly mine to command. Well, Declan, Jasmine, and me. Hope flooded through my chest. “Maybe …”
“Yes?” Kett asked patiently.
“Put me down. I need my feet on the ground … in the dirt.”
He set me down, but I couldn’t stand on my own. So he grasped my forearms, holding me upright.
I reached for the magic still roiling underneath my feet. I reached for the magic of the house. It came to my call — thin, but I could feel it. I could also feel Lark’s magic in the mix, as if she was trying to help. Perhaps she was the one holding the flames at bay.
And with no real understanding of how I did so, I reached out and smothered the fire with the estate magic, pressing the flames down to be absorbed into the dirt floor and the foundations of the house. The magic sucked the billowing smoke away from the beams and rafters, leaving them charred and smoldering hot. But I had doused the inferno completely.
Kett laughed huskily. He lifted my wrist, pressing a kiss only an inch away from my bracelet.
I wrapped my hands around his face. “Jasper’s dead,” I repeated for the third time.
“I look forward to spending the remainder of eternity with you, Wisteria.” Kett’s tone was intimate but formal.
“Well, I’m not sure you have a choice now.”
“There is always a choice. I simply choose to remain, rather than return to ash.”
“You won’t be able to call me ‘little witch’ anymore.”
He laughed. “There will be other terms of endearment. But might I suggest we discuss them somewhere where the roof isn’t caving in on us?”
“Agreed.”
Kett swept me into his arms again, moving carefully through the smoldering remains of the basement. We were heading toward where I thought the kitchen stairs were supposed to be.
“The stairs are gone,” I murmured.
“No matter,” he said. “I can feel fresh air from this direction. And I am capable of climbing.”
As we moved through the basement, the magic embedded throughout it appeared to be still holding the burned beams in place. Though for how much longer, I wasn’t certain.
I could see light ahead of us but little else. Kett moved easily, smoothly. His sight was apparently much better than mine.
Faint voices filtered down to us, calling back to one another. Perhaps Declan and Jasmine had seen the fire snuffed out and were searching the main floor, trying to find another way down into the basement?
I opened my mouth to let them know we were coming to them. To caution them against —
Something massive collapsed ahead of us. More light flooded through the ceiling.
I heard Jasmine scream. A second section of floor gave way.
Then … nothing.
Kett moved forward so swiftly that the dirt walls blurred around us. He set me down before I even knew where we were.
I stumbled, realizing I was staring at a pile of gray-streaked white marble on the compacted dirt floor.
Marble?
“Kett?” The vampire was gone.
Blinking in the suddenly bright light, I stumbled around the white stones, realizing that the still-settling rubble was from the hand-carved entranceway stairs, now one floor lower than they should have been.
The pile before me shifted. I scrambled away, pressing myself against the dirt wall. The stones moved once more as Kett emerged. He was shrouded with white dust — and carrying Declan and Jasmine in a bundle of limp limbs.
I stifled a scream as I lunged forward, fruitlessly trying to help Kett hold their weight as he lowered them to the ground.
They must have raced into the house when the fire vanished, not realizing how badly it had weakened the foundations. Then their weight had collapsed what appeared to be part of the entranceway, and the marble stairwell with it.
Declan immediately rolled to his side, coughing.
But still cradled in Kett’s arms, Jasmine wasn’t moving. Her hair had fallen across her face.
I reached for her, but Kett shook his head sharply at me. He settled into a crouch, gently keeping Jasmine tucked against him.
I paused, my hands still outstretched toward my cousin, terror flooding through my entire body.
Kett was holding himself too still. His gaze on me was too steady, too … sad.
“Jasmine?” I whispered. I crawled forward without touching her.
Declan stopped coughing, heaving himself upright until he was kneeling beside me. “Thank God. The vampire found you,” he said. “We were looking for …” His gaze fell on his sister, growing concerned. “Jasmine shoved me to the side, then the floor … caved in …”
“Please,” I whispered, brushing the hair from Jasmine’s face. But I wasn’t sure who I was pleading with. “Please.”
“Please, what?” Jasmine spoke without moving or opening her eyes. Blood trickled down from a hidden wound I’d uncovered at her hairline.
Joy flooded my system. I pressed my hand over my mouth to stop myself from crying out.
But Kett continued to hold himself so terribly still. Looking at me with such steady regard.
“Let’s get out of here.” Declan stumbled as he rose, but he made it to his feet.
“We shouldn’t move her,” Kett said.
“What?” Declan paused, turning back.
“Why?” I asked. But I could already see the answer in every chisel-edged feature of his face.
“The vampire likes holding me,” Jasmine chortled quietly. Then she started coughing up blood.
“Shit!” Declan cried. “Where’s Rose?”
I tugged my sleeve down over my hand, carefully wiping the blood from Jasmine’s chin.
“I don’t feel so hot,” she murmured.
“Goddamn it,” Declan said. “Where the hell is Rose?”
“Dead,” I said. The words felt empty, dragged out from deep within my soul. “Rose is dead.”
Jasmine opened her eyes, pinning me with her bright-blue gaze. “Betty-Sue,” she said. “He’s dead, isn’t he? We’re free?”
“Yes,” I said, starting to sob. “We’re free.”
She reached up shakily, touching my face, then looking at the tears she’d collected on her fingertips. “I’m dying, aren’t I?”
I glanced up at Kett.
He nodded.
The vampire didn’t want to move Jasmine, and we didn’t have a healer.
“Yes,” I whispered.
“What?” Declan shouted.
“Bleeding internally,” Kett said, not looking away from me.
“Maybe the magic of the estate …” I reached for the energy I had just wielded to put out the fire. But it felt thin, distant.
“Hold my hand,” Jasmine said. “If I’m going to die, I’ll do it holding your hand, Betty-Sue.”
I grabbed her hand, sobbing raggedly. Completely and utterly powerless to save her.
Declan knelt next to me, pressing his hand to Jasmine’s head. “This is insane,” he said thickly. “We have to do something. There must be something within our power …”
Then a harsh realization hit me. A terrible realization.
Followed by a flood of desperate hope.
It wasn’t within my power or Declan’s to heal Jasmine, but …
I lifted my gaze to meet the silvered eyes watching me.
“Kett …”
“No,” he said, not even letting me finish the thought. “She’s too badly injured. Magic is tied to blood —”
“And most of hers is still inside her.” My voice was stronger, my
mind racing as I quickly tallied all the reasons I was going to pose the question that he was trying to stop me from asking.
“Blood that is not flowing correctly, Wisteria,” he said patiently.
“Jasper is dead,” I said.
“Yes.”
“Leaving me as the sole name on the contract.”
“Yes.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Declan asked.
“Remaking me,” Jasmine murmured. Her intense gaze was glued to me. Witch magic burned within her eyes.
“It’s not even a question,” Kett said.
“It’s out of the question!” Declan roared as he shot to his feet.
Ignoring him, I placed my hands on either side of Kett’s face, unintentionally smearing Jasmine’s blood across his pale skin.
“Please,” I whispered. I leaned over Jasmine slung across his lap, pressing light kisses to his immoveable lips as I spoke. “Please. We can have forever together in the next lifetime.”
“And if I kill her?” he asked darkly. “You won’t be able to bear looking at me.”
“I don’t have to see you to love you …” My voice broke. “But I can’t live without Jasmine. Even if you turn me against my will to fulfill the contract, I’ll be a shell. Empty. I can’t exist in a world without Jasmine. Please. Please. Give her a chance to be the person you need. To be the family you want. Please, Kett. For me. For our future. For our forever. Take Jasmine.”
“This is insane,” Declan muttered behind me, pacing.
I kept my gaze riveted to Kett.
“She won’t be your Jasmine,” he said coldly. “You’ll love a memory either way.”
“Maybe …” Jasmine whispered. “But maybe I’ll prove you wrong.” She lifted her hand, placing it over mine on Kett’s cheek. “Let’s be monsters in the dark together.”
Kett laughed harshly.
Jasmine’s hand slipped away from mine. “I want to be the storm,” she whispered. “But I’ll settle for the next sunrise.”
A terrible groan of pain was ripped from Declan.
A flood of tears washed away my vision.
Kett wrapped his hand around the back of my neck, pulling me forward and kissing me tenderly. “Promise me.”
“Anything,” I said, gasping for breath through my sobbing. “Anything you want.”
“I’ll take the next lifetime,” he said. “Stay alive until I come for you.”
“It’s yours.”
“Get the contract,” he said. “From my bag. If we’re going to circumvent its binding, I’d like to do so without sacrificing myself in the process. Quickly, Wisteria. Quickly.”
Blinded by my tears, I dug into the invisible bag that I knew Kett wore at his hip. My fingers brushed paper.
“You need to scratch out Jasper’s name and sign it in his stead,” Kett said.
“I don’t have a pen,” I cried, unfolding the contract and dropping all the pages of parchment except the last. “And I’m not the coven leader.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Kett said patiently. “Jasmine can countersign for herself.” He looked down at her. “Is this what you want?”
She nodded, her face almost tranquil. Peaceful. She was struggling to keep her eyes open.
My sobs became ragged, torn out of me with a terrible pain. The worst pain I’d ever felt. Worse than being stabbed. Worse than dying.
“Thumbprints,” Kett said sharply. “Thumbprints will have to do. Wisteria. Now.”
He pressed his thumb against mine, drawing my blood with a sharp pinch.
I pressed my thumb over top of Jasper’s signature at the bottom of the page. Then I carefully lifted Jasmine’s hand, smearing her thumb in the blood dripping from her temple. I rested the contract and her hand on her chest.
“I can’t do it for you, Betty-Lou,” I said. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. You have to do it yourself.”
She nodded, the movement no more than a tired dip of her chin. But she managed to turn her hand, pressing her bloody thumbprint to the contract.
I leaned forward, breathing my magic across the parchment. “Jasmine Belinda Jane Fairchild accepts the terms of the contract with Kettil the elder and executioner of the Conclave. Witnessed by her coven mate, Wisteria Fairchild.”
The magic embedded in the parchment heeded me. It shifted across our blood, rendering our thumbprints into our signatures.
Kett brushed his fingers across my face, touching my neck where he’d bitten me for the first and only time. “Go now.”
He dropped his hand from my neck, but I couldn’t move. I couldn’t bring myself to leave.
“Go, Wisteria.” Kett’s eyes blazed with the red of his magic. His nearly two-inch-long fangs appeared. “Go.”
Declan grabbed me from behind, dragging me away.
I lost hold of Kett. I lost hold of Jasmine. “Betty-Lou!” I cried, incapable of doing anything else.
Jasmine smiled at me. “I love you, Betty-Sue … and Bubba.” Then she turned her trusting gaze up toward the fanged monster within whose arms she was about to die.
“Declan,” Kett called. “Collapse the entrance. Whatever happens, whether either of us survives, we’ll need to be sheltered through the next sunrise.”
Declan grunted in response as he hoisted me in his arms. Then he slung me over his shoulder so that he could climb up and over the remains of the collapsed marble staircase.
I craned my neck, wanting to watch for the moment Kett struck … for the moment he drained whatever blood still stirred in Jasmine’s veins. But Declan pulled me out of sight before I saw my cousin … my love … my heart … die.
Declan set me onto my feet just beyond the front stairs to the main entrance of the manor. Then he turned back and carefully collapsed what remained of the front entrance. From the corner of my eye, I caught a glimpse of the burned-out windows on the main floor, the charred siding, and the bubbled paint, but I couldn’t bring myself to turn around and watch Declan work. To see more of the destruction we had wrought.
The remaining elders of the Fairchild coven, the three children Jasper had kidnapped, and Lark were arrayed on the grass at the edge of the drive. The brownie had positioned herself between the children and our parents. A shimmer of magic danced around her like some sort of protective shield.
“What are you doing?” Dahlia cried out. She stumbled a few steps forward before falling onto the grass. “Where’s Jasmine?”
Grey knelt beside his wife, holding her gently. But his gaze was glued to me.
Declan stepped up beside me, brushing his fingers against my hand. I could still feel the magic he’d used sparking off him.
Then Jasmine died.
The magical bonds that Jasper had so painfully crafted between us — the bonds that we had turned against him, twice — snapped. The power of three dissolved.
Pain shot through my chest, ripping my heart asunder. I fell to my knees, screaming.
I was only vaguely aware of Declan doing the same beside me.
Then the pain faded, leaving just a wash of numbness and an ache deep within my bones.
“Jasmine’s dead,” I whispered, staring down at the pavement between my hands. “Jasmine’s dead.”
Dahlia shrieked. Grey bowed his head, sobbing. I was aware of the other elders talking, asking questions, but everything was distant.
My hand found Declan’s shoulder. Using his strength, I made it to my feet, but he remained kneeling beside me. I wasn’t certain why I’d bothered standing, though. I had nowhere to go, nothing I could do.
My mother and father stepped up to my left. Grey half-carried, half-dragged Dahlia to join them.
I didn’t understand what they were doing. Attacking us? After all that had happened?
But then Declan rose and took my hand. Violet took my other hand. Forming us into a rough circle.
Unbidden, the magic of the estate rose up, channeling through all of us. Echoing and reinforcing our own personal power and energy, t
raveling from witch to witch through our joined hands.
Jack slipped between Declan and me. Following some instinct, he pressed his hands to our hips. And I felt the coven magic accept the boy into the loop the others had called forth.
Then to settle that magic — to heal it — the elders, Declan, and Jack unanimously anointed me the head of the Fairchild coven.
And though my heart was a deadened husk, I accepted.
I had already done enough damage by walking away the first time.
Chapter 13
Later, I remembered asking Declan to take the children and me to Rose’s. But I didn’t remember climbing into a vehicle, or how or when we reached Fairchild Park.
I stood in the darkened ballroom where I had once danced with a vampire, even though there’d been no music. I gazed out at the grounds. I couldn’t see the moon, but I knew that the roses contained within their white picket fences would begin to bloom soon.
Afterward, they would fade. Without my Aunt Rose’s touch, her gardens would dwindle, until only a brittle skeleton of their former vibrancy remained.
The house around and above me was quiet, everyone asleep within.
I didn’t sleep.
Though I wasn’t awake.
“You’re doing that thing again,” Declan said quietly. “Holding your magic too tightly.”
I looked away from the paned-glass window, not wholly aware of how I’d come to be curled on the chaise in Rose’s office.
Declan was leaning in the doorway. He was wearing his leather jacket as if he was going out.
“How many days has it been?” I asked.
He grimaced, then ran his hand across his face as if doing so would hold all his emotion at bay. “Five.”
“The front door of the manor was open,” I murmured, returning my gaze to the window and hazily recalling another conversation I’d had with Declan. But whether we’d spoken yesterday or three days before, I didn’t know. “When you checked.”
“Yes —”
“If she survived, she would have texted by now.”
“You don’t know —”
Unleashing Echoes (Reconstructionist 3) Page 24