Covenkeepers

by Denise Gwen

  The images grew opaque, blurred; the images shifted, changed. Mama, Nana, and Bettina stood above the cavernous black pit where her father was serving out his life sentence in the carbonite freeze. They wept as they gazed down into the pit.

  But where am I?

  She gazed closely into the crystal ball, but did not see herself, yet she’d been there that night. She’d seen it happen, along with her family, but why didn’t she appear in the crystal ball’s images? What was the crystal ball trying to tell her?

  The images of her father’s torture scene returned, shifted and roiled, and the next scene that shimmered in the crystal ball made her heart pound with a dull ache. She saw Nana, Mama, and Bettina, their wrists and ankles secured by heavy chains, their bodies dangling from giant hooks screwed into a rock wall in a cold, dank dungeon; their clothing, stripped to rags, their ribs and hip-bones jutted out from their bony frames; they were slowly starving to death. In the dark shadows of the corners, enormous rats crept close, waiting for the moment to pounce, the moment when their prey breathed their last.

  Bettina’s face, covered by a curtain of tattered blonde hair, hung low. Maddie knew if she saw her sister’s face, she’d see a look of utter despair.

  Perhaps it’s best I can’t see Bettina’s face. I might lose it and start crying, and there’s no time for crying now.

  The rats drew closer. First, one vicious rat nipped at Bettina’s feet. She kicked it, sending it flying, but others quickly took the place of the one she’d kicked away. They drew closer to the witches. Utterly powerless, trapped in their chains, and weak from starvation, the witches were incapable of putting up a good fight.

  The color drained from her face, her skin ashen, Nana appeared to be near death.

  “Oh, no,” Victoria whispered. “Who are those people?”

  “My family,” Maddie choked out.

  Victoria gazed at her, horror-struck. “What’s happened to them? How did this happen?”

  Maddie couldn’t help it. In the face of her friend’s anguished expression, she burst into tears. “I don’t know.”

  The images of the crystal ball shifted and roiled again. Coldness seeped into Maddie’s veins, turning her blood to ice. Images of vampires shimmered into view—vampires, with their translucent skin, a shiny pallor of their faces, their fangs; the dark, malevolent expressions on their cold, cadaverous faces.

  A flock of vampires congregated around a tall, masterfully built vampire. At the sight of his face, Maddie recoiled in disgust. She recognized this face. Were he alive, he might be handsome. Were he charming…but oh, how sad, he was not. A member of the undead, he commanded the vampires to draw near and worship at his feet.

  When he bowed his head down, the girls gasped as one at the figure he held in his arms.

  Maddie thought she might puke. Her legs wobbled out from under her and she caught ahold of herself on the table edge, digging her fingers into the wood to steady herself.

  “Maddie!” Victoria cried.

  “I know!”

  Oh, this is horrible, horrible.

  “It’s you!”

  Maddie closed her eyes. She really did feel faint. Everything went blurry and dark. She forced herself to open her eyes and gaze at the horrific image. But the crystal ball made no mistake; she saw herself cradled in the arms of Drakkur, Ezekiel’s evil son. Drakkur held her close, in a grotesque caricature of a lover’s embrace. He reared his head back, preparing to give her the vampire kiss, the bite of eternal life. His fangs drew out, bent his head, plunged his fangs into her neck, and pierced the skin; rivulets of blood dripped down her pale white skin, soiling her virgin-white wedding dress. As she watched in horror, Bride Maddie swooned in the arms of her husband-lover. Drakkur smiled with a secret delight as he feasted upon his virgin bride.

  At the moment of communion of this most unholy marriage, the other vampires surged forward, running their fingers across the bloody streaks stretching down the length of Maddie’s milky-white skin. They sucked the blood off their fingers, tasting, relishing her blood.

  “Oh, no!” Maddie cried.

  The image shifted again, returning to the dungeon scene. As vampires unlocked the manacles, Nana, Mama, and Bettina, released from their torment, collapsed to the stone floor. In the next moment, free of the castle, standing in a meadow in the bright sunshine, they cried tears of relief; they looked healthy and happy again. Tears filled Maddie’s eyes as she watched her nana transform back to health and to life.

  The scene shifted back one more time to the cavernous pit where her father resided in his carbonite prison; amazingly, the carbonite freeze melted away from around his body like a hot-burning wax candle. A platform lifted him back up from the abyss. At last, he broke free from his state of suspended death. As the last droplets of carbonite freeze melted, he tore off the shell encasing him and fell to the ground, gasping and panting. He looked frail, sick, deathly pale, but he’d survived. Mama and Nana rushed over to him; Bettina wiped mucous from his face. They kissed and wept over him as he revived in Mama’s arms.

  The images shifted and dissipated again and transformed back to murky clouds, thunder and lightning. The girls jumped in fright as a pair of large black eyes pressed up against the perimeter of the glass, the eyes so large, it appeared as if someone’s head were trapped inside the crystal ball. The black eyes gazed directly at Maddie.

  “Come to me, Madeleine,” Drakkur purred. “Come to me and be my bride.”

  Maddie cried out. Victoria tightened her grip on Maddie’s arm. Maddie winced as her friend’s fingers pressed deep into Maddie’s flesh.

  “Come to me, Madeleine, and I promise I shall release your family from their torment. You will be very happy with me, Madeleine. We shall rule heaven and earth forever.”

  The crystal ball dissipated back to cloudy murk. Maddie really did feel faint now. The room swirled around her. She staggered to one side, righted herself, then fell to her knees. As she collapsed into a faint, she heard Victoria’s screams and then she heard nothing, nothing at all.

  7

  “Maddie, Maddie, get up, Maddie!”

  Maddie sensed herself coming back into awareness, and as her eyelids fluttered open, she lifted her head and gazed around the room in confusion.

  “What am I doing in Nana’s bedroom?” she asked.

  A vacant hollowness filled her chest, an eerie sensation of dislocation. Something awful had just happened, she knew it; she knew it with a cold, hard certainty, yet, for the moment at least, her mind drew a complete blank.

  A pair of eyes stared down at her—Victoria, leaning over her, a worried look creasing her brow. Maddie gazed up into her friend’s blue eyes. “Oh, thank goodness!” Victoria cried out. “I didn’t know what I’d do if you didn’t wake up.”

  Maddie raised herself up to a half-sitting position; resting on her elbows, she gazed around the room with curiosity. Bits and pieces of memory flitted back to her. She glanced over at the crystal ball, but it betrayed nothing of its horrifying images. No creepy images roiled in the globe to frighten her; no more visions of vampires gazing with bloodthirsty hunger into her eyes; no more images of her family in distress—

  She sat up sharply, wincing at the burst of pain at her temples. “How long was I out?”

  Victoria shrugged. “Oh, I don’t know. Just a minute or two. Honest, Maddie. If you’d stayed out any longer, I was going to call my mother, or maybe an ambulance or something.”

  Maddie scrambled to her feet.

  “Hey, shouldn’t you be taking it easy or something? You were out cold.”

  “There’s no time,” she muttered. She glanced over at Malamar, crouched in a corner, looking scared. “Come on, let’s get to work.”

  “Where are we going?” Victoria asked, as Maddie scurried out of Nana’s bedroom and hustled down the hallway to her room.

  I can’t expose her to any more danger. She’s already in enough danger.

  At the sound of Victoria’s soft f
ootfalls behind her, Maddie whirled around to face her friend. She stopped dead in the hallway, short of her bedroom doorway. “Ah, look, Victoria. I’m really sorry, but this part is something I need to do alone. You ought to run on home.”

  Victoria thrust her fists on her hips. “Why? What’s going on? Why are you running away?”

  “I’m not running away,” Maddie said patiently, while casting a sidelong glance at her closed bedroom door. So far, nothing had happened—yet. But she didn’t know how much longer it’d be before something did happen. And once something happened—Victoria would need to be long gone from this house of horrors.

  Maddie stepped forward and placed her hands on either side of Victoria’s trembling shoulders. “Look, there’s a lot I need to explain to you, but I don’t have time to do it right now. Just believe me when I tell you this.”

  “What?”

  “I’ve got to leave here tonight.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “To Salem.”

  Victoria’s eyes widened. “You’re a real live witch, aren’t you?”

  Maddie nodded.

  “This girl really knows how to pick up a clue,” Malamar said dryly.

  Maddie bit her lip, suppressing a giggle. “Malamar, really—”

  “But why must you go to Salem?” Victoria pressed.

  “Because that’s where Ezekiel took my family when he kidnapped them.”

  “Ezekiel? What kind of name is that?”

  “That’s the name of the master warlock of Salem Castle.”

  “You’re not pulling my leg?”

  “No, Victoria, I’m not. Now, listen.”

  “Listening is not this girl’s strong point,” Malamar said.

  “That dungeon you saw, in the crystal ball. Remember that?”

  “Um, yes?”

  “Well, I happen to know exactly where that dungeon is. It’s one floor above the pit where Ezekiel sealed my dad up into a carbonite freeze.”

  “Wow, and here I thought my life was complicated with my parents getting divorced.”

  Maddie nodded again as she released Victoria and edged down the hallway toward her bedroom. She wished now she hadn’t invited Victoria home. They were wasting precious minutes with this silly conversation.

  “Tell her to get going,” Malamar said. “We’re running out of time.”

  “I know,” Maddie muttered, forgetting that Victoria couldn’t hear Malamar.

  “Yeah, divorced parents—it really sucks, you know? Some nights I can’t remember whose house I’m going to, you know? And then my dad went and got remarried—”

  “Victoria.”

  “What is it?”

  “Victoria, I hate to be rude, but it’s time for me to leave . . . and . . . for you to go home.”

  “Oh.” Victoria’s blue eyes filled with tears. “I’m so sorry. Here I am, rattling away, jabbering, and you’ve got to save your family. I get it. I totally get it!”

  “Good.” Maddie fetched a sigh of relief. “Will you do me a favor tomorrow, at school?”

  “Anything! What do you need?”

  Maddie didn’t know exactly why she was bothering with the pretense anymore, now that things had gotten so serious—there almost wasn’t any point in pretending she was a normal girl attending school—but a certain levelheaded part of her realized it might be beneficial to maintain the fiction. “I want you to pretend to be my mother tomorrow and call me in sick. Can you do that for me?”

  Victoria goggled at her. “Well, sure. I’d be happy to do it.”

  “Great. I really appreciate it.” She gave Victoria a quick hug. “And don’t breathe a word about what you saw here tonight to anybody at school, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  A sudden, soft weight landed on her right shoulder. Silky fur grazed her cheek.

  “Wow, I didn’t know your cat could jump that high. He’s so fat.”

  Malamar huffed with deep annoyance. “I’m not fat. I’m fluffy.”

  “Okay,” Maddie said. “Gotta go. See ya.”

  Despite herself, despite the gravity of the matter at hand, Maddie giggled softly to herself as she hurried down the hallway to her bedroom and flung open the door.

  But the moment she crossed the threshold to her room, she realized what a mistake she’d made in forgetting the house’s evil powers. Malamar dug his claws into her shoulder, as she skidded to a stop and shrieked in terror.

  Oh, this is so wrong!

  “Maddie, Maddie!” Victoria cried out. “What’s wrong?”

  “Oh, no,” Maddie whispered.

  Her room was filled, shoulder-to-shoulder, with vampires.

  ****

  The vampires drew back their lips, revealing their bared fangs. They hissed at her and growled deep in their throats.

  Okay, this isn’t good.

  Someone grabbed her by the arm and she screamed.

  “Stop, it’s me, it’s me,” Victoria said.

  “Oh, Victoria, I told you to go home.”

  “I can’t. Oh, hey, take your hands off me. Maddie! Help me!”

  “Victoria, I told you to leave!”

  “Are those v-v-vampires?” Victoria sputtered, her eyes wide with horror.

  “Get lost!” Malamar spat at them.

  The vampires edged closer, spitting and hissing at Malamar.

  “Victoria!” Maddie shrieked. “Run away!”

  The bedroom door slammed shut behind them, blocking their escape.

  “Silence!” a voice boomed.

  The vampires stopped their hissing and spitting. The terrible noise of their snarling, terrible and terrifying, was replaced by a dead silence. Into that awful silence, Maddie found her gaze being irresistibly drawn to the imposing figure seated in the center of the room.

  Oh, you have so got to be kidding me.

  “All right,” Maddie said, “that’s enough.”

  The vampires hissed as one, a sibilant whisper.

  “It’s not bad enough a flock of vampires have broken into my house,” she said in a low, dangerous voice. “It’s not bad enough you’ve abducted my family. It’s not bad enough you’ve invaded my bedroom, but to see you sitting in my favorite armchair—that’s just beyond enough.”

  “Your favorite armchair, eh?” the vampire asked, a hint of sarcasm in his voice.

  “The only chair I like to sit and read in every night before going to bed,” Maddie said. “The chair I sit in while sipping my evening cup of chamomile tea and reading a novel, my very favorite armchair in the whole world.”

  “How sad,” the vampire said, his voice laced with sarcasm.

  “Guess I won’t be using that armchair anytime soon, if ever. Thanks a lot.”

  “You always were a mouthy little thing, weren’t you?”

  “Yeah? And you’re a jerk.”

  Too late, Maddie realized, she may have said more than was wise.

  The assembled vampires inhaled sharply and grew utterly silent.

  The air in the confined room grew so still, Maddie heard birds twittering away outside her bedroom window.

  Maddie inhaled, held her breath.

  The massive figure seated in the chair stirred. His dark eyes lifted and, as his terrible gaze fell upon her, a stabbing pain stung Maddie between her eyes, a stab so searing, it shot through her like an electric bolt. She didn’t want to reveal any weakness to this awful man, but she winced in pain and looked away.

  Her weakness exposed, she forced her gaze back to him.

  The malevolent vampire placed his elbows on the armrests and laced his long, elegant fingers together. He steepled his fingers in front of his face, regarding her with a contemplative expression. “My dear,” he purred.

  “Lord Bartholomew.”

  This is bad. This is really bad.

  “In your short life, my dear,” Bartholomew said, “you’ve only met me on one prior occasion.”

  “Yes,” she said, her voice quavering.

  “And, as a
result of that interview,” he continued, “I knew you’d never forget my face.”

  “Nor your regal bearing,” she said, surprised to find voice in her throat, “or your evil temperament.”

  “Yes, my dear.”

  Lord Bartholomew. All knew of him. A high-ranking vampire from Eastern Europe and a lieutenant of Ezekiel’s, Lord Bartholomew didn’t normally reside at Salem Castle; for him to be here under these circumstances, well, she knew it was bad.

  “You’re right, my dear,” Bartholomew said, as if reading her mind. “I don’t abide by this modern theory of Ezekiel’s, that witches and vampires can—and must—form alliances, live together in harmony, that sort of thing.”

  “You’re a snob.”

  “Yes, a bit of a snob, indeed, really, I am.” He pulled his lips back into a sneering smile. “No, clearly, I do not share Ezekiel’s belief. I do not believe the classes should mix, but apparently, Ezekiel does feel strongly enough about the situation at Salem Castle that he’s asked me to travel here all the way from Romania to attend to this matter concerning Ezekiel’s wayward little witches.”

  From her peripheral vision, Maddie noticed a vampire gliding toward Victoria. Before she had a chance to do or say anything, the vampire grabbed Victoria by the throat. Victoria cried out in alarm.

  “Master,” the vampire crooned, nuzzling Victoria’s neck. “I am so very hungry.”

  “Why do you bother me with these inane cares and concerns of yours?” Bartholomew asked.

  “May I, master?”

  Bartholomew waved his hand with a distracted manner. “Abate your thirst.”

  Victoria whimpered. “Maddie?”

  “No!” Maddie cried. Yanking her wand from her pocket, she pointed it directly at the vampire’s taut belly and cried, “Exporeateum!”