A Witch's Rite (Witch's Path Series: Book 5)

by N. E. Conneely

  Giving him a strong tug, I saw her fingers tremble. I pulled at Wells again, and one of her hands broke free. Before I could do anything else, she wrapped both arms around his chest and dove.

  Taking a deep breath, I held on as she pulled Wells deeper and I went under. I tried to get a hand on his belt, but her arms were wrapped around him and she kept dragging him away. He gave me a panicked look and grabbed my forearm. He thrashed and I pulled, but we were still moving away from shore.

  As I went farther underwater, my already-limited vision deteriorated until I was unable to see anything. The water was simply too murky. Feeling around, I grabbed his jacket with my free hand and pulled as hard as I could while I kicked us away from her. I felt him struggle against her, but it was with less force than he had previously. He was losing strength. I pulled and kicked harder, but all my efforts were for naught. The woman pulled us deeper and farther away from shore. I thought about summoning my sword, but I worried that I would injure Wells by mistake.

  My chest ached, and my vision was beginning to cloud, but I pulled at Wells one more time, hoping I could break him free. She pulled him from my hands, and I shot to the surface, gasping for air.

  Sucking deep breaths of air into my lungs, I looked around, hoping she would surface. Around me the pond was still, ripples from our fight fading away. In the distance, I could see a creek exiting the pond. A shallow rocky stream entered the pond, but I knew she wouldn’t take him that way.

  Taking a breath, I dove under. He was a good man, and I had to save him. The murky water made it nearly impossible to see anything, but I swam around, feeling for Wells in hopes that lady luck would favor me. Since my eyes were little good, I reached out to the plants, looking for anything in the pond that would aid me. Unfortunately, almost all the plants were at the waterline. While they were happy to report that they had not found Wells, they did not help with my search of the pond.

  I had to surface several times while I was searching, each time knowing it was that much less likely that Wells was still alive. I kept moving closer to the stream in case she tried to escape that way and even explored the mouth of the stream. It was shallow enough that I could walk, and I gazed into the stream, looking for anything that could be Wells. Luck was not with me.

  Returning to the pond, I gave one more pass over the last area I’d been with him. When I grew chilled, I feared I would become ill if I stayed in the water any longer and admitted defeat. Swimming back to shore, I wished I had made different choices before Wells went into the water. There were several ways I could have dealt with him, and I had chosen diplomacy when I should have used force. Knowing that I had tried to save him did not help. I had failed. He had been underwater too long to survive. When I found Michelle and Westmoreland, I would have to explain how Wells had died. Now we had lost two of our group to Ned and his games.

  Wells had been a respected acquaintance. He had treated Michelle and me fairly and had even helped us kill a demon. That was a sad way for a good man to die. The best I could do for him was tell of his bravery and ensure that Ned and this maze were dealt with.

  Onshore, I used an elven trick to pull the moisture out of my clothes. There was still some mud in them, but it was better than wet garments and shoes. I had an additional set of clothing in my pack, but I did not want to use it yet. I could be out here for a very long time.

  For some time I sat at the edge of the pond, thinking about Wells and how he had died. There were many things the woman could have been, but I was guessing she was a nixe. It was a species that could shape change and historically lured people into water and drowned them. These days they refrained from drowning people because their council killed anyone who violated their laws.

  That information would be cold comfort to Wells’s loved ones since it was unlikely that I would be able to find the nixe. She would not have displayed her natural face while committing the murder, and I had no other way of identifying her. There would be no justice for Wells. After a time, I turned away from the pond. Wells was dead, and no amount of gazing at the water would change that.

  As much as it hurt, I focused on practical matters. I would not be able to carry both backpacks, so I needed to consolidate. Going through his pack, I pulled out the food and the clothing I thought would fit me. It brought me no pleasure to take Wells’s things, but if the rest of the maze was going to be like this, I needed every advantage I could find to help me get back to Michelle. Wells’s water was transferred into my own canteens, I took two of his canteens and filled them in the stream that ran into the pond, then treated them with the iodine tablets. By the time I used the rest of the water, they would be ready to drink.

  Before I left, I closed up his pack and set it adrift in the stream. Watching the water carry it away, I said, “May the earth hold you in her warmth and cherish your memory for season upon season.”

  It was not much of a send-off, but it was what I could do. I turned away from the waters. It was time for me to continue this journey. I found two maze openings on the upstream side of the pond. In honor of Wells’s desire to search for new things, I took the left path.

  This time I did not reflect upon the strange properties of the walls or the sample in my office but on my surroundings. I could not afford to fall victim to a trap. I had to find Michelle and carry news of Wells’s death to his fellow officers.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Michelle

  We turned a corner, and the right hedge wall dead-ended against a cliff. It wasn’t a rock but a vertical face of clay interspersed with stones.

  I gave it a once-over. “Well, that’s new.”

  “Do you think we could climb it?”

  “I was wondering the same thing.” It was only about twenty feet high, and there were a couple of places that looked large enough for us to stand. The problem was, it wasn’t really a solid surface to climb. This type of formation was prone to crumbling. We would never know if our foothold was about to go.

  Another issue was that I couldn’t really see the top. With the hedge behind me, I couldn’t back up enough to get a good view. I knew it was sloped, and somewhere up there trees started growing again. We might be able to get out of the maze, but there was no guarantee that up there was any better than down here.

  Patrick poked the clay. “It’s not really the right stuff to climb.”

  “And we don’t know what’s up there.”

  “Maybe it’s not worth it.”

  “I think it is. What’s our other choice? Wandering around in here forever? I know we need to rescue Gudger, but I’m not sure going through maze is the best way to do that. Eventually we’ll come across something more thrilling than big rhododendrons, and I doubt it will be interested in our health and well-being.”

  “You’re right, but…” Patrick sighed. “If we leave the maze, how are we going to find Wells and Elron? What if Ned just kills Gudger?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know what will happen to Gudger or how to find the others, but I think we’ll have better luck figuring this thing out from the outside. It doesn’t make sense that I couldn’t hear Elron and you couldn’t hear Wells. There has to be some spell or effect of the hedges that I’m not detecting. If we leave the maze, we’ll be on the outside of the magic and I should be able to get an idea of what we’re up against.”

  “True.” He stared up the cliff again, then turned back to me. “Look, I’m sorry I’m not being very helpful. I’m not sure why I’m even here. With you around, my skills are unnecessary. I’ve been useless as a cop and as a hedge-practitioner.”

  I wasn’t entirely sure what to say to that, so I settled for the best truth I had. “It’s not like being a witch has done marvels for me. I’m stuck in the maze same as you.”

  He snorted. “I hear ya.”

  Nodding, I said, “Good, because as it stands our partners are in just as much trouble as us. We need to rescue ourselves so we can rescue them. Besides, you have the trap and documentation of the
snails. If we can get those out of here, we have proof of crimes and something to study.”

  “And in the justice system, documentation is king.” He gave me a self-deprecating smile. “We must save the evidence.”

  “That’s the spirit.” Or close enough considering our circumstances. I pointed the conversation back in the proper direction. “Here’s my theory on getting up that thing. I don’t think it’s safe to do that with a pack on, but I’ve got some cord and we can tie that to the packs and to us so when we get to the top, we simply pull the packs up after us. How does that sound?”

  Patrick looked at the cliff and our packs. I hoped he didn’t see the parts I’d left out, like the fact that the climb wasn’t going to be truly safe no matter how we went about it. The only good way to scale something like that was with an anchor at the top and a belay, but we didn’t have any way of setting that up.

  “It’s probably the best plan we’re going to get.”

  With that, I dug out the coiled rope, nice strong stuff that could support both our weights if it had to, so the weight of the packs wouldn’t be an issue. Luckily, Elron had overruled my protest and shoved two twenty-five-foot bundles in my pack. I tossed one to Patrick and set about getting my own cord firmly tied to myself and my pack. I didn’t want to get to the top only to find that a knot had worked loose.

  “I’ll go first,” Patrick said. “Don’t climb directly under me. Move at least a couple of feet to the side.”

  “Got it.” I’d already planned to do as much, but he didn’t need to know that right now.

  Patrick jammed his foot into the clay, found a handhold, stepped up, and kicked his other foot into the dirt. Bits of earth crumbled under his foot. He moved his hands and repeated the procedure.

  When he was about five feet off the ground, I wedged my foot into the wall. I had my handholds picked out, so I got as good of a grip as I was able and started up the cliff. The handholds were fairly easy. There were small clumps of grass and lumps of earth I could hold on to, but most of them crumbled if real force was applied. One disintegrated under my hand, and I had to stretch to reach the next one.

  Since the lumps weren’t solid enough to support weight, I had to keep digging my toes into the clay. I was really grateful for the steel toes in my boots. Not that it was overly fun or comfortable to smash a foot into solid earth, but at least it wasn’t pressing against my toes.

  I was about eight feet off the ground and looking for my next handhold when movement at the edge of my vision caught my attention. There was a gray shape shifting around only inches above Patrick’s head.

  “Patrick, there’s something above you.” I kept my voice low and calm.

  He froze. “Is it a snake?”

  “I don’t think so. It looks gray and furry.”

  “Is it coming closer? What’s gray and furry?”

  “Not yet. A lot of things are gray. I’m having trouble seeing it clearly. It’s behind a rock and mostly in the shadow.”

  “Do I keep going up?” Patrick asked.

  “That’s your choice. Maybe if you stay there, it’ll move off.” I kept an eye on it, but it seemed content to shuffle around where it was.

  “I can’t stay here forever.”

  “Well, I don’t know what to tell you.” I had to work to keep the exasperation out of my voice.

  “Can you spell it?”

  “Sure, I’ll just let go of the cliff, whip out my wand, and start blindly casting spells while I dangle above the ground.”

  “I didn’t ask for the sarcasm.”

  “It’s free of charge.”

  A moment later Patrick said, “Well, I have to move, so I’m going up.”

  “Good luck.” I lifted my foot up and jabbed it into the clay. Looking around for a handhold, I saw the rock above his head wobble. “Patrick, duck!”

  My warning was too late. The rock tumbled off the side of the ledge, bounced off a lump of dirt, and glanced off his head as it plummeted to the ground.

  Patrick’s grip loosened, and he started to fall. I stretched out a hand, but I was too far away.

  Everything slowed down as I watched him fall. I had to do something. Magic. I had magic. My power shoved the rock and pack out of the way, and I thought of the one spell that could save his life.

  “Orzu.” I couldn’t be sure exactly where he would land, so I aimed the spell at a fifteen-foot length of ground. While I couldn’t see a difference, the earth under him should be soft, almost like a trampoline.

  I heard soft sound above me and looked up in time to see a possum hurling in my direction. Possums were nocturnal. Since it was out during the day, it might have rabies. Screaming, I ducked and leaned away. The possum zipped past me, and I could see that its eyes were partly closed and its lips were pulled back to show its teeth.

  Sucking in a deep breath, I relaxed incrementally. It wasn’t attacking me. The poor thing had gotten scared, played dead, and fallen off the ledge. Though that didn’t dispel the possibility of rabies. It shouldn’t have been out this time of day.

  I looked below me, and sure enough, Patrick was on the ground. Nothing appeared to be bent at odd angles, but from my position, it looked like he was out cold. I hoped he was all right, or as all right as anyone could be after a fall like that.

  The possum hit the ground and bounced a couple of times, ending up on solid ground about ten feet to my right. Thankfully it was well away from Patrick.

  My foot slipped, and I pulled it out of the hole and jammed it back in. The foothold gave way. My hands clenched, trying to keep me on the cliff face. The other foothold shed some dirt, and I tightened my grip as I tried to dig my foot back into the clay. My foot bounced off a rock, and I swayed to the side. Then I was falling, holding dirt in one hand and a clump of grass in the other.

  This wasn’t one of my better days, I thought, as I fell back into the maze.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Ned

  “Ned? Ned, come here.”

  That was Hayato’s voice. I jumped to my feet, glanced at the still-sleeping shifter, and hurried to my desk. Hayato was glaring at me from the bowl of water. “Is the captive awake yet?”

  “No. He hasn’t stirred.” I kept hoping he would wake up because watching someone sleep was not particularly fun.

  “Have you tried to wake him?” Hayato scoffed.

  “Yes. Short of using more dust, he isn’t going to wake up quickly.”

  Hayato tapped his fingers. “As soon as he wakes, inform me and send a package of the goods to the witches.”

  “Now?” I tried to keep the surprise off my face. “I thought you wanted the entire shipment at one time.”

  The tempo of the tapping increased. “If your guests are who I believe them to be, I need to make arrangements, including getting some of your precious powder.”

  “Of course.” I could manage that, though I didn’t like the idea of putting my creation in the hands of those witches. They hadn’t been doing a good job lately, what with lost and seized shipments. “The usual spot?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is there anything else I can do for you?” My words were polite and unconcerned, though I was neither of those things. None of these developments had been good news, and I dearly wished I could go back in time and simply get rid of the hikers who’d sent the police up here.

  Hayato nodded. “Inform me as soon as the captive wakes up.”

  “I look forward to contacting you with good news.” I wasn’t sure if he heard the last words because his picture faded away.

  Taking a deep breath, I focused on the current issues. I needed to move the snails, get the product to the drop point, and watch the officer. While I could wait to do the first two until after my guest woke, I had a limited amount of daylight and needed to make the best use of it.

  I checked on the hostage, but he was still out. With a frustrated sigh, I went back to my workroom and grabbed two four-pound bags of powder and set them in a backpack. These bag
s of powder were the blend I’d sent Hayato before and claimed was pure indoor-snail dust. It should be enough to keep him happy. If it wasn’t, I could always give him more, claim it hadn’t been safe to move a large quantity with the police around.

  The doorknob turned, and a second later there was a quiet knock. “Ned, I can’t open the door.”

  “Coming.” I hurried to remove the spell and bar from the door. Bella could be the answer to some of my problems. I opened the door and motioned her in, ignoring the slight trail of water she left behind. It wasn’t her fault nixe always had damp clothing hems. It was simply how she was made.

  Bella leaned against a table, brushed her long golden hair over her shoulder, and batted her blue eyes at me. I still couldn’t decide if the blue tint to her skin made her eyes brighter or if her eyes made her skin color more noticeable.

  “One of the officers is dead. I drowned him in the pond. Though he put up an awful fight, and the elf kept interfering.” She made a face. “I’m afraid I lost track of the body.”

  I waved off her concern. “No matter. We have one less policeman running around, and that is progress enough.”

  She heaved a sigh. “And here I thought you would be annoyed that I lost the body.”

  “While the body would’ve been nice, I need you to do something else for me.” Though at some point I would have to explain to Hayato what happened to the body. He’d specifically requested that I keep the remains of any of the group if they did not survive the maze.

  She tipped her head back and smirked. “How may I best assist you?”

  Knowing her distaste for boring work, I tried to make it sound interesting. “Can you keep an eye on the officer? He’s a very dangerous man, and I can’t have him escaping. I would do it, but there are some other things I need to attend to, and there’s someone I simply must speak to as soon as my guest is feeling talkative.”

  Her eyes darted between my face and the bedroom. “You want me to watch someone sleep while you frolic?”