The Blackwater Legacy (The Bloodlines Legacy Series Book 2)

by Apryl Baker

  I draw several long, deep breaths before I finally manage a few words. “I’m okay. Micah?”

  “He’s good,” Jason calls from across the room. “I got him, Sis.”

  Alesha and Sabien are both muttering and pacing. My mother looks a bit terrified, but my uncle? He looks as grim as death itself, and his voice reflects that when he speaks. “This doesn’t make any sense. You shouldn’t be reacting to her magic as if you were a vampire or some other type of dead thing.”

  “Saidie…” I blink, trying to bring my vision back into focus. I’d seen something when I was touching her. A crack in the space around her, a crack where all those things were flooding in. If we could somehow send them back through and then seal it, it should stop them from hurting her.

  “Doan touch her, chere, or you woan like wha’ happens.” The warning is clear in Aleric’s voice. Luka hisses. I hate when he does that. I don’t want them fighting.

  “I have to touch her.”

  “The hell you do.” Luka snatches me up in his arms faster than I can blink. “You stay away from this dark magic.”

  “Let me explain.” I cough, still trying to catch my breath. It takes me a few minutes, but I finally am able to explain to them about what I’d seen and my thoughts.

  My mother nods after several long minutes. “It would work, but you’d need to be able to see the crack, and that means touching her, Alex, which is deadly to you.”

  “Then what do you suggest?” I’m all out of ideas myself.

  “Has Sabien taught you anything of vision spells?”

  “No.” Sabien comes to stand by his sister. “She hasn’t been around much lately.”

  Nope, not feeling guilty over that. I warned him if he pushed my mother off on me, I wouldn’t be over as much. That’s all on him.

  “It’s not a simple spell, but it would allow me to see what you see. I think we have everything we need upstairs for it, unless we’re out of ginger?”

  “No. I picked up some last week at the farmer’s market in Tazwell.”

  “If you’re willing to let me teach you the spell, we might be able to get your friend up and back to normal in a few hours.”

  As much as I want nothing to do with Alesha, Saidie is more important to me than my own anger. I nod, and she gives me a tentative smile.

  “Come along, Jason. You need to learn this too.” When Bree starts to follow us, Alesha stops. “I’m sorry, Bree, but this spell is one the Blackburnes created and one we only pass along to our children.”

  Neither one of us wants to go, but we both follow her out of the basement and back to the kitchen. Me to save Saidie, and Jason to make sure I’m not alone with her.

  It’s going to be a long couple of hours.

  Chapter Twenty

  The kitchen stinks. Jason and I have the back door open as well as all the windows, and still it does nothing. Alesha laughs as we gag. This is not pleasant. The tiny vial she’d pulled out of the back of the “herb” cabinet is our culprit.

  “What the hell is that?” Jason covers his nose and tries not to throw up. I am right there with him.

  “It is the rot of the grave.” Alesha sets the vial down on the table. “This must be collected at midnight on Samhain from the grave of someone with a soul as black as the rot that grows on the headstone. The spell cast upon Saidie is black magic, darker than most. The rot is what will allow us to call upon the souls that are attacking her. We must counter Madame’s death magic with a little death of our own.”

  “Each drop of blood spilled is a tiny death.”

  “Very good, Peanut.” Alesha flashes me a smile while she gets out a wooden mixing bowl. “How did you know that? Sabien has no knowledge of necromancy, and I wasn’t aware the Winters clan delved into it either.”

  “They don’t, at least not to my knowledge. I don’t know how I knew it. It just popped into my head.”

  “When you touched Saidie, that is when the auras started?”

  I nod as I watch her gather various herbs and tools. She looks so at home here, but I guess that’s because it was her home. She lived here for a long time. Emma said Jason and I had lived here with her and Dad once. Maybe that’s why I love this house. It has good memories, just not ones I can remember offhand.

  “It is said that a person born into necromancy will have the abilities and knowledge to perform the death magic locked inside them, and once their magic wakes up, the key turns and all that knowledge spills out.”

  “Without having to learn it?” Jason comes and sits next to me at the kitchen island, his eyes following her every movement. We are all still smarting from our earlier fight, but for Saidie, we are putting it aside. I can feel Micah pacing like a caged animal, sensing my trepidation. He hates that he is banned from the kitchen. I can only imagine the snarling that Luka is doing.

  “They have to learn to control it, but no, they won’t need to learn it in the traditional sense. I believe Saidie may have all the tools she needs to control it without much help. From what Aleric told me, she’s done some amazing feats. It’s why Madame was so intent upon stealing her magic.”

  “Stealing her magic?” Jason’s eyes widen. “The only way to do that is…”

  “To drink her dry.” Alesha sets down a pewter stone, the one I’ve used myself to grind and muddle different herbs. “Madame believes her to be descended from the very first necromancer and I don’t doubt it. The Blackwater family is legendary in their necromancy abilities.”

  “Then why did her mom freak so much?”

  Alesha leans back against the stove and considers her words. “The gift skipped her mother and her grandmother. Her great grandmother was the last to inherit it. Her mother probably thought it was only a legend told in their family, a fairytale meant to frighten naughty children, and was shocked to see it up close and personal. It can be disconcerting to have your world turned upside down in one dark moment. I’m sure Natalie will come around. Saidie is her daughter, after all.”

  I can understand having your world turned upside down. I’d spent nine years in a mental institution because of my own nightmares. Disconcerting is hardly the word I’d use to describe it, though. More like gut wrenching terror.

  “Now, you’ll both need to remember this and write it down when you get home. These are the herbs we will use to create the potion I will drink. We have some common ones like thyme, a bay leaf, and lavender. Those are mostly for protection. The ones that are for vision are bilberry and eyebright. They enhance vision. The next one we will use is rosemary to cleanse the recipient of the spell from any uncleanliness.”

  “Uncleanliness? Shouldn’t a shower take care of that?” Jason frowns, staring at things laid out on the counter.

  “No, baby boy. I meant uncleanliness of the spirt. Sometimes we think ugly thoughts, and this will help clear our hearts and our heads so only purity remains. Sometimes it doesn’t work if the soul is too black.”

  Like the ugly dark cloud around Luka? I still don’t understand why his aura is so black. “What if a person has a black aura? Does that mean they’re evil?”

  “No, it doesn’t.” Alesha shakes her head. “It just means something bad happened to them and they’re holding onto a lot of negative feelings like rage and hatred. It can also mean sickness in the body. There are any number of reasons a person’s aura is black.”

  “Then what does evil look like?”

  “There’s no clear answer to that, Peanut. An evil person can have the brightest, most beautiful aura you’ve ever seen, because their intent is pure. Evil it might be, but it’s still pure. You can’t tell evil just by a person’s aura. You must get to know the person and judge that for yourself.”

  I study her aura. It’s dark red streaked with a deep forest green. “What does red mean?”

  “It means the person is very grounded to the earth, adept, able to survive anything thrown at them.”

  “Is that how you survived the cliff when you jumped to get away from the p
eople chasing you?”

  She froze, and stared at me open-mouthed. “How did you know that?”

  “I saw it.”

  “What?”

  “Well, I dreamed it. I kept dreaming about it over and over until the day Uncle Sabien showed up and told us you were dead.”

  She drops the glass she’s holding and gapes at me. Jason and I exchange curious glances. What is wrong with her?

  “One of your friends has The Sight, doesn’t he?” Her words are barely above a whisper.

  “Yeah. Conner. He said it was from his Celtic heritage.”

  “Sweet Gods,” she mutters. “How am I going to keep you safe if anyone finds this out? Even the Winters’ may turn against us.”

  I edge closer to Jason the more crazed her eyes get. What is she talking about? She’s starting to freak me out.

  “Alex, do you ever dream of anything besides the cliffs or your nightmares from that day in the park?”

  I nod, unsure where she’s going with this. “Yeah. I dream of being a wolf, I dream about…a man.”

  “A man?” Her voice gets sharper. “What man?”

  “I don’t know who he is, but he’s popped up in my dreams a few times. He seems to think I belong to him.”

  “What does he look like?”

  “Tall, dark hair. Brown eyes. Handsome, I guess.”

  Her eyes get a little wilder and she grips the counter. “Did these dreams start before or after you met Conner?”

  “After.”

  She starts cursing. “You aren’t a catalyst. You’re a cyphon.”

  “What does that mean?” She’s scaring me, and I can feel Micah coming. He’s pounding up the stairs, feeling my fear. As soon as he wraps his arms around me, I’m calmer and I can breathe.

  Her eyes flicker to Micah. “He’s not leaving. I need him.”

  “Fine, but you must leave.”

  I turn to see Luka standing in the doorway, his eyes sweeping over the scene.

  “No, he doesn’t.”

  “This is family business, Alexandria. He is not family. He’s…”

  “He’s what?” I interrupt, my voice so soft, I barely hear it.

  She purses her lips. “He’s not family.”

  “No, Mother, that’s not what you were going to say.” Anger flashes like wildfire through my veins. “He’s Romani. That’s what you were going to say. He’s not some dirty piece of linen to be used and tossed aside as witches have done for centuries. He’s a person, same as you and me. More than that, though, he’s mine. My mate, and I love him. He’s my family. Luka, Micah, and I are a package deal. If you can’t get over your racist bigotry, and realize that by not accepting one of us, then you accept none of us, we’re done. He’s my heart and Micah is my soul. If you can’t deal with it, then you and I will never have any sort of relationship.”

  Jason is staring at me with his mouth hanging open. I know I probably shocked him by standing up for myself twice in one day. Just a few months ago, I wouldn’t have. I would have hidden behind my walls. I spent so many years hiding, it became who I was. Micah and Luka are responsible for bringing me out of the darkness into the light of the world. They are why I am strong, why I don’t back down from a fight. They give me strength where I had none.

  “I will try.” Alesha rolls her shoulders. “I promise to try.”

  “Do better than try.” I keep my voice cold. There will be no give on this. If she wants to be a part of my life in any way, she will treat Luka with the respect he deserves. It’s not his fault witches used his people as slaves for centuries.

  She nods. “I will.”

  “Now, why are you so freaked out?” Jason pulls the conversation off Luka and back to what she was so upset about. “What’s a cyphon?”

  Luka hisses. What is it with the hissing today? He’s starting to irritate me. I hate that sound. It reminds me of cats, and I’ve had enough bad experiences with cats to last me a lifetime.

  “Is a fairytale.” Luka comes to stand behind me, dropping his chin on my head. “Is bad…how you say…”

  “Bad juju,” Alesha supplies.

  So I really am a freak show?

  No, Blue, you’re not, and even if you are, I love you. So does Luka.

  Luka nods and presses against me. He’s trying to get as close to me as he can with Micah still wrapped around me. It’s not an easy thing to do. Jason rolls his eyes at us. Just wait till he finds his mate. He’ll understand. He likes Bree, but she’s not his mate. That, I know with certainty.

  “A cyphon is a witch who can gain the ability of others simply by touching them. Not just witches, but all creatures.”

  “All creatures?”

  Alesha looks troubled. “Did she touch any of the trackers?”

  Micah exhales slowly. “Yes. She and I took one down together.”

  “What?” I ask. “You’re both starting to scare me.”

  “It means you might have gained the ability to shift into a cat as well as a wolf, Blue.”

  “So you’re telling me, every magical creature or person I’ve touched, I might have gained some or all of their abilities?” Crap, crap, crap. Not good, not good at all. I didn’t want this stupid magic to begin with. Then a ray of light appears in the form of the man behind me. “I haven’t gained any of Luka’s abilities.”

  “You wouldn’t. Gypsies are impervious to cyphons. Something in their blood protects them. We’ve never been able to replicate it, no matter how many times we’ve experimented through the centuries.”

  Experimented? Luka had told me about those experiments. Herds of his people rounded up and horrible things done to them, all in the name of being able to reproduce their magic. It was senseless and worse than anything in history. If they thought Hitler was bad, they’ve never seen what a witch could do to a person when they wanted something.

  “If anyone finds out about this, Alexandria…” Alesha’s shoulders slump. “It may already be too late if my father knows.”

  “Your father?”

  “The man in your dreams. He sounds like my father. If he knows what you can do, it just got a lot more dangerous.”

  “Your papa, he is bad man?” Luka asks softly. Anyone who didn’t know him would have missed the dangerous lilt vibrating in his words.

  “Very bad.” Alesha goes to pick up the shattered pieces of the glass she’d dropped earlier. “My family has been trying for centuries to breed someone close to my daughter’s abilities. If my father knows…there will be no stopping him.”

  “He will no touch her.”

  The steel and promise of pain in his voice has my mother’s head swiveling up. Her eyes widen at whatever she sees in his face.

  “Agreed.” Jason’s voice is as cold and hard as Luka’s. “No one is touching a hair on my sister’s head.”

  Some of the same panic I’d been victim of the day I found out shifters were real and hunting me and Jase tries to creep in. I need to focus on something else, something that will keep my mind off the panic. Something I can do to be productive.

  “This is a problem that can wait. We don’t know if he knows about me, or if he is, in fact, the man haunting my dreams. We can’t do anything about me being a cyphon, but what we can do is help Saidie. The longer we sit here worrying about things we can’t change, the farther she slips away from us. So tell me what I have to do.”

  Alesha looks like she wants to throw both Luka and Micah out, but I guess my expression dares her to try it. In the end, she explains it and walks me step by step through the process of muddling the herbs and adding them to the small wooden bowl with a drop of grave rot and my own blood to bind them together. Soon I have three tiny vials of what she dubs our own Sight.

  Now to see if it works.

  Chapter

  Twenty-One

  Alesha does kick Bree out of the basement completely. She’s not showing off her spell work in front of someone other than a Blackburne if she can help it. Micah and Luka both agree to wait outsid
e the door. It’s the only concession I am willing to make. Aleric refuses to budge, and none of us is about to try to make him. I don’t think either my mom or Uncle Sabien are at all happy about having a vampire under their roof. Not sure I am either. Luka’s brother or not, Aleric is downright scary.

  Saidie won’t even look at me. She’s gotten worse while I was unconscious. Her eyes are wild, and she’s curled up in a ball on the floor, rocking back and forth, a keening coming from her that is downright pitiful.

  “Aleric, can you pull her out of the corner? We need to set the mirror up behind her.” He nods and does as I ask. The second he touches her, she starts to scream, her arms and feet flailing at anything and everything, fighting for all she’s worth.

  “Shh, Draga,” Aleric whispers. “Be at ease, ma belle lumière. You are safe.”

  She stops fighting, but her screams are just as loud as before, and tears stream from her eyes. My own fill up, helpless to help her.

  “Sabien, you and I are going to have a talk about sending this girl to that monster.” Alesha’s words are hard, clipped.

  “She was the only necromancer I knew.” He keeps his attention on Saidie, more worried than he’s letting on. Guilt flashes in his eyes, and I know he’s going to spend a lifetime trying to make it right. I don’t think he honestly had any idea who he was sending her to.

  “I could have helped her.”

  “You weren’t here, though, were you?” He sounds a little cross. “How was I supposed to know you knew anything about death magic?”

  Instead of answering, Alesha sets up the mirror and motions for Jason to come closer so he can watch. When she’s done, she holds out her hand to me. “Peanut, you have to take my hand.”

  Why does she keep calling me that? I’m not her Peanut anymore. She lost the right to call me that when she left me bleeding and in tears on the ground, watching her drive away. I don’t want to be here; I don’t want anything to do with her. I want to go hide away from all the hurt trying to push forward.