Mist, Murder & Magic

by Dionnara Dawson

  Maddie tried to lurch to her feet. ‘You—’ she gasped out. Being turned into a werewolf was the worst thing that had ever happened to her. ‘My family—’

  ‘Oh, I know.’ Abby crooned. ‘Your mother and father kicked you out when you told them, didn’t they? And that led you to us. How’s that baby sister of yours, by the way?’

  Maddie howled at her.

  ‘Oh, shush. How else do you think my pack is so large, stupid pup?’ Abby smiled, proud. ‘You could never thwart me, Madeline. You were never strong. You were never a good wolf.’

  A streak of brown fur blinded her in the sunlight and tackled Abby off her feet with a startled cry. Luca’s sharp teeth clamped down hard on her throat and tore, sprouting a fountain of red blood that splattered onto the soft dirt. Abby gargled a cry, then thudded to the ground.

  Maddie’s vision swam before her as Luca shifted into human form, spitting out blood and flesh. He turned to a backpack on the ground and dressed, then draped a long t-shirt over Maddie as he lifted her into his arms. ‘I told you,’ he said in her ear. ‘Not without me. I got you.’

  Chapter Seventy-Seven

  Hella

  Hella couldn’t help but think of this as goodbye as she knocked on Grace’s door. She never used to knock, but it would feel weird to waltz in now. She knew that, if all went according to plan, they would live to tell this story—whether anyone believed them or not. But sometimes, plans went awry. Something could always go wrong.

  One of the Cambion kids opened the door and recognised Hella. He smiled, showing swaths of obsidian Marks along his arms and hands. ‘Hella,’ he said, then glanced at Tommy. He waved them inside.

  Grace called up from the basement. ‘We’re almost ready!’

  Elliot was waiting by the door, a backpack over one shoulder.

  ‘Is that all you’re taking?’ Tommy asked.

  ‘All we had time for,’ Elliot said.

  ‘Well, maybe they won’t need to be gone for too long,’ Hella said, feeling uncomfortable that so many fates rested upon her shoulders.

  Elliot suddenly smirked at her. ‘Nice outfit,’ he teased.

  ‘Shut up,’ Hella shouldered him and they both laughed.

  ‘Mum will love that.’ It was such a normal comment that for just a moment, Hella forgot everything that complicated it. Grace wasn’t really Hella’s mother. In fact, today, Hella looked more like her birth mother. It was the leather pants. She tried not to let her smile slide off her face as the children gathered around them. She wanted them to be at ease, as though they were all packed to go camping or on a school trip, rather than evacuating the town which was about to be a battleground.

  ‘Okay, kids, huddle up. Now, I want you to all make sure that you stick together, okay?’ Hella said, bending down. She had never spent much time with them, but now, she looked at each of them in turn, memorising their faces, their eyes. The eldest was maybe twelve years old. They all nodded to her, checking their mates were present. Some even held hands. ‘Good,’ Hella said, standing up as she saw Grace watching her.

  ‘We need to go,’ Tommy said, trying to keep the urgency from his voice.

  Grace nodded. ‘Yes, of course. We’re ready, aren’t we kids?’

  They all chorused ‘yesses’ and walked out the door.

  Elliot held Hella back. ‘What’s really going on, Hell? Mum wouldn’t say. Are we going to die?’ His voice was low so the others couldn’t hear.

  ‘Oh, no, El. Of course not. This is just a precaution.’ Hella put her hands on his shoulders. ‘It’s okay, little brother. You’ll be fine, don’t worry.’ She leant in and gave him a tight hug that he reciprocated immediately. ‘I promise, everything will be okay.’

  ‘What’s going to happen?’ he asked, voice muffled against her hair.

  ‘Don’t tell them,’ Hella said, ‘even Mum, but there’s going to be a battle and I’m expecting some fireworks. I just don’t want anyone around—just in case. Warlock House and Faerie House are evacuating, too.’

  Elliot considered. ‘What about the humans? In the stores nearby? Wandering around?’

  ‘We’re working on it. Don’t worry. Come on, let’s go,’ Hella said, pushing him out the door.

  ‘You’re not coming with us, are you?’ he said, finally realising.

  ‘No. I’m not. My place is here.’

  ‘You mean in the battle?’ he said, his green eyes darkening.

  ‘You guys, we need to move,’ Tommy called, ushering them all outside.

  She turned and waved him off. ‘Yes, El, in the battle. I’ll be fine. Come on.’

  ‘No, Hella, you can’t. I don’t know what’s going on, but you won’t survive another battle like the last one.’ Elliot hugged her fiercely.

  ‘Of course I will,’ she said firmly. ‘But I wanted to give you something. Here. This belonged to my old guardian, Remy.’ Hella produced Remy’s blue-studded amulet, identical to her own. ‘Keep this. It’s a sister to mine. When all this is over, have mum use it to call to me. I expect the phone lines will be down.’

  There were tears in Elliot’s eyes. ‘You swear you’ll be fine?’

  Hella smirked at him, letting her flames flare up purple and hot along her hands and arms, through her hair. ‘Hell yeah. I’m the promised witch.’ She winked at him as he tucked the amulet away safely. They were all ushered out the door.

  ‘That was a nice thing you did,’ Tommy whispered to her. Tommy had given Grace instructions on where to go and what would happen. ‘Giving him the amulet.’ Tommy and Hella were on their way to the store.

  ‘Well, maybe now it’ll be of some use. I’m still connected to it, and if it means I can communicate with them when the time comes—after all this—then at least they’ll know that I’m okay,’ Hella said, trying not to think of all the ways she could not be okay.

  ‘He’s really worried about you, but your mum doesn’t know what’s going on, does she?’ Tommy asked.

  ‘I don’t think she really wants to know,’ Hella admitted. ‘She has her hands full with those kids, she just needs to worry about them and Elliot now.’

  As they walked, dread built up in Hella’s stomach. Or was it in her chest, or her ears? It was basically everywhere. They walked through the park as the sky darkened; shadows gathered around them. ‘So, you know what you’re doing?’

  ‘Of course,’ Tommy said, looking up at the sky. They had an hour or so before sunset. Before it all started. ‘They’ll have time to move out, don’t worry.’

  She just nodded, ticking everything off in her mind. ‘And The Force?’

  ‘I haven’t heard anything.’

  ‘If they’re going to evacuate people, they’re running out of time.’ Hella had worried about this. The Force weren’t in the business of preventing anything, just keeping the numbers and data on shit that had already happened. Never doing anything about it. She might need that back-up plan after all.

  ‘Do you want to tell me what that back-up plan of yours is?’ Tommy asked, as if reading her thoughts.

  ‘I can’t.’ Hella said, and as Tommy opened his mouth—the question why on his lips—something growled from a cluster of shadows. They both stopped walking.

  ‘Who’s there?’ Hella called. A streak of darkness erupted at her and slashed at her with mist-like talons, forming in and out of a human-esque shape. She raised her hand and sent out a blast of purple fire and heard the demon shriek. The darkness—the demon—stumbled to the ground, still growling. Hella dug deep into her chakras and felt her chest burn with her magic. She raised her hands and ball of purple fire exploded out of her and hit the demon, who vanished in a splatter of black blood that disappeared as it hit the ground.

  ‘Wow.’ Tommy said, as they watching the space where it had vanished.

  Hella kept walking. ‘Come on,’ she said. They started walking again, to the store.

  ‘Now, tell me, why wouldn’t you want to share your plan
with me?’ Tommy said, picking up where they had left off.

  ‘Because you would stop me from doing it, but desperate times might call for desperate measures. There are hundreds of people here that could be killed if we don’t get them out somehow,’ Hella said as they walked. Why must everything always be left to her?

  ‘Then I choose to trust you,’ Tommy said. It was a sign of their growing friendship, she thought with a smile. ‘Does Harrow—or anyone—know?’

  Hella shook her head. ‘I couldn’t. Too many things can go wrong if I bring other people into this. You’ll just have to trust me.’ There were a hundred ways she could try to get the humans of Mill Valley’s attention: start a fire, tell them there’s a major gas leak, have Tommy start an earthquake… the list went on and on. But her way ensured a wide-eyed audience who would surely run screaming through those tunnels. She didn’t have time to try the ‘maybe’ plans; the sky was beginning to change, an edge of pink touching on the clouds. It was time for something drastic.

  As they reached the store, Net greeted them by basically pulling them inside. ‘Get in here,’ he said, as if hiding his own children. The look in his teal eyes told Hella she wasn’t far off—he was truly worried for them. Hella saw Piper, too, but her birth-mother was stoic.

  ‘Right, now that you’re here safely, I’m off.’ Tommy grasped her firmly by the shoulders. ‘You be careful, okay? Please.’ He pulled her into a quick hug. ‘I expect to see you alive at the end of this, Hella.’ He pointed a finger. ‘Okay?’

  Hella smiled tightly. ‘You too.’

  As Tommy left, Harrow came out of the shadows. ‘What are you doing here?’ Hella asked, her voice rising. This was not part of the plan. ‘You’re supposed to be in the tunnels with Amara.’ Panic rose in her chest. ‘Harrow, you can’t be here, you’ll get killed.’

  He embraced her as if Nerretti and Piper were not there. Indeed, they obligingly turned away, Piper pretending that the boy who had tried to kill her daughter wasn’t wrapping his arms around her now. Hella melted into him, pressing her lips down on his desperately.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Harrow said.

  Her mind had fogged over. ‘For what?’

  ‘About before, at Faerie House. You and Tommy were right to go and save the werewolves and vamps. I never should have said it was a waste of time. They’re people too. And I’m staying right here, Hella.’

  She opened her mouth to argue, but he shook his head. It struck her that he was completely calm, as if he were at peace with where he was meant to be. With her. ‘I’ll always fight by your side. You can’t get rid of me, so don’t waste your time trying. What can I do to help?’

  ‘You…’ She hated to throw it in his face. ‘Harrow, you don’t have any magic, and you’re still injured.’

  He just smiled at her. ‘Maybe it’s time I learn how to throw blades as well as you.’

  Every cell of her body wanted to argue with him, to protect him, even throw him outside and drag him down to the tunnels herself. Tommy would keep him there. But he was rooted in place, his will unshakable.

  ‘I know what I’m doing,’ he told her. ‘I know what I’m risking by staying here, Hella.’ He took her hands in his. ‘Please don’t try to send me away. I belong with you. Magic or no, I’m the ice to your fire.’

  She crushed herself to his body. ‘Fine, you can stay.’ She broke away from him. ‘But this time, you don’t die.’ It was an order.

  ‘Oh, all right.’ He sighed into her hair. ‘I love you.’

  Hella blinked back tears. ‘I love you, too.’ There weren’t many moments left, so she held on tighter while she could.

  ‘Guys, I hate to break this up, but we have to get ready,’ Net said, incredibly sheepishly. A reddish blush highlighted his cheeks.

  One day, perhaps, after all the battles were fought (if that was even possible), maybe Harrow and Hella could be a normal boyfriend-girlfriend somehow. If Harrow wanted that, too. Hella thought he did.

  ‘Yep, coming Net,’ Hella said.

  Everything was already set up—which was a good thing, because the sky finally darkened to a glowing scarlet horizon and Hella cringed at the colour of blood spread across the sky. It was a bad sign. ‘You and Net have to hide, at least in the beginning,’ she told Harrow. She went upstairs, just a few steps, to the side room where the weapons were kept. Hella handed two short swords over to Harrow. ‘Don’t throw, stab.’ She pecked him on the cheek.

  Piper laid out the rest of the spell in the main room. A gigantic pentagram had been carved into the floorboards with herbs of thyme, rosemary and sage sprinkled around the edges. At each point was a large amethyst crystal, each stained with both Hella’s and Piper’s blood to amplify the spell. Together, they stood in the centre, the five points surrounding them.

  ‘Are you sure about this?’ Piper asked, referring to the other part of her plan.

  ‘I’m sure. It’ll scare them enough. There are faeries posted there.’ Hella looked around the pentagram. There was more than one plan unfolding here tonight, and Piper knew only a fragment. Only what she needed to know.

  ‘How exactly is this going to work again?’ Piper asked. ‘Are you sure they’re coming here?’

  ‘Azazel is coming for me,’ Hella assured her. ‘He wants me. He covets my power. He might be hesitant about attacking faeries for their blood, but he doesn’t care about them. He wants me,’ she told her mother. ‘He came to me, here in this store, to offer me the chance to walk with him. Now he thinks I want that, too. He’ll come.’ Hella took a deep breath, praying to the stars. ‘Once Azazel arrives, he’ll find out pretty quickly that I lured him here and then he’ll attack. We are protected from the demons as long as we stay in this pentagram, and we have to send out waves of magical power enough to obliterate them.’

  ‘What about the event in the library?’ Piper said.

  ‘Yes, I’ve lured everyone in town to the library. There, an identical pentagram has been placed. While we’re here, battling the demons, I’ll astral to that pentagram and show off my magic. The humans will freak, and run. The faeries—Sensus—will pose as human police and get them to evacuate through the tunnels.’

  ‘You’re really going to expose magic to humans?’ Piper said, sounding incredulous. ‘That’s a bad idea.’

  ‘No, it’s necessary.’ The ground began to shake. From the window above the door, she could see the sky beginning to darken. ‘It’s time. He’s coming for me. Get ready.’ The witches held hands, focusing their chakras. Hella knew that Piper was trusting her. She didn’t try to talk her out of anything, she just let her do it.

  ‘What about Harrow and Net?’ Piper asked.

  ‘Shh,’ was all Hella said. She couldn’t think about them right now. It would split her focus, and being both here, fighting probably thousands of demons, as well as putting on a magic show for the people in the library, was going to be hard enough. Piper squeezed her hand as—for the umpteenth time—the door of Witches’ Wares broke open, shards of wood flying inward. Hella sent a silent prayer to the stars that everything would work out okay, that Harrow would be safe and with her after all this.

  Unlike the battle of the angels, they had not bothered to dress the store with spells; there was no point, and it would have wasted precious time. As for the flying debris (which had last time buried itself into Harrow’s shoulder), Hella was ready for that, too. She flared her powers, channelled with Piper’s, through the pentagram. The pentagram held up a flaming purple wall of protection, the debris burying itself into the wall. Azazel stepped through the door first, his eyes glowing yellow as night descended.

  ‘Hello, little witch. Oh, and hello Mumma witch.’ Azazel turned to face Hella and, behind him, she could see the packed mist, indicating her estimate of thousands of demons might have been lowballing it. Once the demons killed them, Hella thought, surely their plan was to take the town and probably the country. ‘Did you do as I asked, Hella?’ His eyes dr
ifted to Piper, looking carefully at the white streak in her magic as it flowed through her hair. ‘Did you ask who your father is?’

  Piper squeezed her hand in a way that said, Don’t listen to him.

  ‘I’m beginning to gather you’re not quite as much of a hostage as you led me to believe, little witch.’ Azazel flowed more into the room. He looked at the pentagram with interest. ‘Hmm. Clever witch.’ He reached out a clawed hand and was rewarded with a powerful zap that went right through to his eyes; Hella could see the glimmer of purple fire in the yellow. Azazel frowned, it was not comparable to a human mannerism—this was a scowl that entirely changed his features. While he had strolled through the door in human form, this revealed his demonic nature where before only his eyes pointed him out as something other.

  ‘Sorry to have misled you. But I needed you to come to me. And to bring your friends.’ Hella squeezed Piper’s hand, hard. Now. Together they focused their powers, which ran through the pentagram and sent out a pulsating wave of magical energy. Azazel surged forward, heedless of the pentagram, and his kin behind him followed into the store. The blast cut through the first wave of them, and Hella took her moment, giving Piper another squeeze.

  She would have to alternate this very carefully; if she astralled out, she would be unconscious here. She would need to take it a few seconds at a time. Hella was glad her astral-location was so close. It would make it easier.

  Hella focused her chakras and astralled to the pentagram in the town library where everyone had gathered. She blinked into appearance, and let her powers be seen: the full glow of the purple fires raging over her body, up her arms, through her hands and in her hair. She stood before hundreds of people, many of whom gawked at the sight of her.

  ‘I know why you’ve all come here,’ Hella began. ‘You were told it was to discuss the recent killings in and around Mill Valley.’ Everyone crowded closer to her. Some people let out distressed cries, believing that Hella was on fire. In this projection, she had made sure everyone could see her.