The Roses Academy- the Entire Collection

by Tara Brown

I open my arms and clear my mind. I snap my fingers and let the sparks fill the darkness. “I CALL YOU TO ME! I CLAIM THE MAGIC!” My screams become part of a wind that has suddenly rushed the swamp.

  The mud comes alive; it crawls up my legs.

  I scream into the night air and let the crawling sensation cover my body. It enters my mouth and fills me up. The magic and spark come alive in my whole body, the way it always has my fingers and arms. My whole body is buzzing and on fire. My scream becomes part pain.

  Just when I think I can't take one more second, it stops as abruptly as it started.

  The night is still and calm.

  I glance at her. “I feel it burning inside me.” My words feel funny in my mouth, powerful in potential.

  She grins and pulls a knife from the pocket of her muumuu. My eyes widen. “What?”

  She points to the waters. “You gotta offer dem spirits some of your blood.”

  I take the blade and hold it against my hand.

  “No, you kill me first. You take da power and kill your momma.”

  I lower the blade and shake my head. I look back at Whit who is walking toward us.

  “I'm stronger den any witch here. You need me inside you.”

  I swallow. “What about Ramón? You can't die.”

  She laughs like I'm the crazy one or I've said something hilarious. “I no die. Momma Holt no die. I'll stay here and guard da swamps. We gots two kinds of magic, cherie. One is physical and da other is inside our souls.”

  Whit just nods slowly and bites his lip.

  “I can't, Grandmamma.”

  She smiles at me. “You gots to. She gonna be here in a moment. She figured out your plan maybe.”

  My lower lip trembles as I gaze back at the cabin. I shake my head again. “I can't do it. You have to just teach me how to do it, how to fight her.”

  She laughs. “You gots no chance, she done killed others. She gots them inside her. Her sister and her together is strong. Dem Roses gonna collect dis debt whether you change da future or not. Why not use da gifts of time?”

  My insides burn with the magic.

  “You drive dat through me before she come,” she says, raising her voice a little.

  “She's here now.” I turn my face to see my momma walking down the garden path. She looks sober and angry. She grins bitterly at Grandmamma and waves. “Hello, Momma Holt.” She says the name like it tastes bad in her mouth.

  Grandmamma grabs my hands with desperation in her eyes. I take a breath and drive the blade into her belly as Whit tackles my momma to the ground.

  Instantly, the tears blind me. Grandmamma falls forward into my arms. She grabs my face and plants a kiss on me. I inhale and something sweet fills my mouth. She screams out and I scream in.

  She falls to the ground and I feel it. Her fire and power stretch me somehow, making room for all of it. My body acts instinctively. I pull the blade from her belly and slice along my hands. I squeeze my fists, but I sense she's inside me doing it for us both. My blood, our blood, drips into the black water near where Grandmamma floats facedown.

  Whit flies backward toward the cabin. He lands with a thud.

  A growl builds in my throat as I look back at her.

  She smiles at me. “This is impressive. I never knew you was so resourceful, Lorelei.”

  The tears are still running down my cheeks, but the fire in me is blazes with hatred and fury.

  I point a finger, releasing a bolt of lightning. “You made me kill her,” I seethe.

  She cackles as she dodges the strike. She snaps her fingers, looking evil in the dark night.

  “You stupid, fucking little bitch.” She shakes her head. “Why you couldn’t just lose weight and be a decent size is beyond me.” Her words cut me.

  Walt strides toward her. I shake my head subtly. I don’t want him to get hurt or hear her venom. I don’t want it to be true anymore.

  She laughs like a madwoman and shoots a bolt at me. I fall back into the cold water.

  “You forced me to hurt your sister. I love her, I don’t want her to die. I want her to be my best friend and travel the world with me. I wanted my sister back.” She spits her words and shoots another bolt. Then she moves her hands and the water pulls me down into it like a gator. It rolls me around. I'm sputtering and gagging when it stops. She is on the shore looking lost and haunted.

  She shakes her blonde head. “I just wanted things to work out but that freak Ramón interfered. He kept me from casting on you. He had protection spells all over you. He even made it so I couldn’t fire him.” She glowers back at the cabin. “I suspect that useless old woman had something to do with that.”

  I feel the pain with her words and my rage builds. I sit up and wipe the mud off my face. “You couldn’t have just left us alone, gone and found another person to steal?”

  Her blue eyes dart at me. “No. No, I couldn’t. Do you know how hard it is to find a true Blackwater witch?”

  “Why couldn’t you just let it go? Just live the life you had?”

  She is hostile and ready to snap my neck. “HOW ARE YOU SO STUPID, LORELEI? I AM STILL AGING YOU NITWITTED LITTLE BITCH!”

  She sounds like ghost Em. I'm trembling with power. Grandmamma is sending instincts through to me. I feel the water with my fingers. I look at her and make a jerking motion with my fingers. The water rises and splashes down on her. She's sucked into the swamp waters with me. Only the swamp seems to come alive. The water is churning and tossing like it's battling her.

  I realize what I'm seeing when she surfaces. It ain't her. It's Maria. They're fighting in the water and dragging each other down into the swamps.

  I climb to the shore, covered in mud and plants. I'm sure I have leeches in a few places. I shudder at the thought. I grab Grandmamma and drag her body from the waters. My sobs leave me in heaves and coughs. Whit scoops her body up and holds her to him. I grip her hands and sob.

  “Grandmamma, please wake up.” I put my hands over the knife wound and call the spirits. I just know, like the magic is guiding me.

  “Child.” I hear her. I open my eyes but she's still limp in his arms. In the commotion of the waves and violence in the swamp, I hear it again.

  I turn and see her standing at the door to the house. I run to her. Her white eyes are spookier than before.

  “You gotta do da same thing to your momma that she done to Maria.” Her voice is the same. She is the same. I squeeze her and pull her into my arms. “You're okay?” I shake my head and sob again.

  She pulls me back, shaking her spooky head. “You gotta help Maria.”

  I look back at the water and nod. “I don’t know what to do.”

  Her voice is soothing and strong. “You know, child. You just let dem lead you. Dem spirits, dey know da way. Let da old witches inside da magic guide you.”

  I nod and walk back down to the water where they're still fighting. Lightning and sparks shoot from the waves. I have a remarkable feeling. I walk to the tree near the water and clasp my hands around a small branch. I close my eyes for a moment and when I look, there is a branch in my hand.

  I stand on the shores and call them, “Ancient witches, sisters and mothers, come to me. Fill me with the love and the light of the one power. I call upon you, Mother Earth and Father God. I call upon you, Mother Moon and Father Sun. Bless with the powers of the old.” I take a step into the water and feel it as my feet hit the muddy banks. The water churns and stirs.

  “Mighty mothers of old, witches of the earth, the fire, the water, and the air—fill me.” The winds pick up and spin around me. My momma and Maria stop thrashing. They bob in the murky waters, watching in silence. The water joins the spinning air and becomes a tornado of water. Dirt flies from the banks of the swamp and becomes debris floating on the water and air. Lastly, a strike of lightning shoots from the sky, landing in the tornado surrounding us. We are locked within the huge electric walls of water, dirt, and air.

  My hair whips around my face and my d
ress is nearly being ripped off me. The force of the winds is incredible. Momma is frozen with scratches and bruises on her face. Maria has beat the tar outta her.

  It would make me smile if everything weren’t turning into a pile of crap in front of my very eyes.

  Seeing the faces of my momma and Maria, I know—instantly I know what I have to do. A slow smile crosses my face.

  Maria sees it and nods once.

  I hold the stick out at them and scream, “ETERNITY YOU SHALL SPEND AS THE SPIRIT THAT YOU BROKE. RETURN THE SOUL TO THE BODY THAT YOU STOLE!”

  Momma's eyes widen. She shoves Maria and tries to shoot me with fire, but the water leaps up and douses it. The tornado reaches into the circle we are in and grabs Momma and Maria. They spin and scream inside the churning walls. I catch glimpses of them flying past me.

  The screams become shrieks and then they stop. The wind stops and the mud and water drops back into the swamps all at once. I see the white of my momma's leg fall into the water as the air stops.

  My chest heaves and my breath is the only sound in the whole swamp. I turn to see Whit's confused face and the peaceful look of Grandmamma.

  “Lorelei?” I cringe when I hear my name spoken from her lips, but when I turn to face her, I see it instantly. She isn’t my momma. She is and she isn’t. She's my aunt Maria.

  Momma stands up from the water and splashes. She screams and howls but the swamp forms into hands and they pull her down into the black water. I shudder at the sight of it all and start to back up. I want out of the water. The feeling of the power leaving me makes me shiver. I wrap my arms around myself and creep backward. Maria smiles sweetly at me.

  “You saved me.” Her accent is thick. She ain't ashamed of it the way Momma was. “What time is it?”

  I shrug.

  “She killed me at 2:47 last time. I just wanna know what time it'll be when she is her strongest.”

  I shudder and remember waking at 2:47 every night.

  I'm about to reply when I realize what has happened. I turn back around and shake my head. “What about the party? Are they being murdered right now?”

  Whit nods. “We need to get back.”

  I run for the car. My aunt and Whit follow. I climb in and start it. Whit gives me a look. I frown. “What?”

  He motions with his hand. “Shove over. I don’t ride bitch.”

  My jaw drops. The Southern girl I am is stunned and the me from before is annoyed. “So you think I do?”

  He nods and shoves me over. I sit bitch and fume. Maria-Momma climbs in and laughs. “This is weird. My hands are so real, not like before where I had to force them to be real.”

  Whit gives me a sideways glance. “This is going to be fun, listening to all the new experiences she has.”

  I scowl as she climbs in the back seat of the car and closes the door.

  He drives fast, revving the engine. I'm glad we aren’t in my truck anymore.

  We skid into the driveway, under the oak alley. I smile when I see the house looking so nice until I notice the smoke rising from the roof. My stomach twinges and cramps. He stops the car.

  I climb out and notice the way it feels, just like before. The night is dark and the air is thick. The romance of the evening lingers in the smell. The horrors linger in the thick smoke and fog that hover over the house like a blanket of bad omens.

  I snap my fingers, making the sparks, only now they are charged lightning bolts that strike the ground like my footsteps do. I climb the front steps, past the front door pillars. The pain and screams linger in the fog like I can taste them there.

  I open the front door and instantly have to fight the pain and agony of the sights I see. Em and Daddy are dead on the ground, both bled dry. Whit shoves past me and picks her up. “We gotta get her to consecrated grounds. She needs to rest for a couple of days.”

  He turns and walks for the doorway. When he gets to the front porch, he slams into something I can't see.

  He bounces back, staggering. I walk forward and through the spot where he stopped. He tries again but he bounces back.

  I whisper, “The spell is still there. Momma cast the spell, stopping her from leaving the grounds.”

  Maria is roaming the grounds, touching everything she sees and marveling at her body. I roll my eyes and walk to where he is. I take the limp cold hand of my dead sister in mine and feel the words come. They rise up like they're crawling out of me.

  “Mother Earth and Father God, come to me with love and light. Protect your child as I cast my will around her.” Energy shoots from my hands into hers. Her skin warms slightly as I say it.

  “Lands of mine and my kin, erase the deeds and magic within. Take the words and deed done by one whose heart is cruel and transfer them all to her.”

  Energy and power shoot from the ground up my legs and into my hands. My head snaps back as light shoots from my mouth and around the house. It makes a dome of light around the whole property. The dome lights up and sparkles like it's fizzling out. Suddenly, I'm exhausted and hear a whisper inside my mind about conserving my energies.

  The spell becomes a single ball of light that blasts off into the distance. Whit grins. “Spooky.”

  I laugh. He walks across the threshold and down the stairs.

  Chapter 20

  The mound of dirt she is under bothers me. He swears she needs to be buried, but I'm not convinced.

  “Three days,” he whispers when he sees me eyeballing it.

  “She's gonna be pissed when she wakes up and finds herself in a shallow grave.”

  He laughs. “Better than being dead.”

  “You don’t remember anything from before? The way it was before the Ari girl changed the time?”

  “No. I've heard about them, the time changers. She must be half angel, especially if she's with the Roses Academy.”

  My brow lowers. “Angel?”

  His dark eyes flash. “If you only knew about the things out there. I've seen rogue killings so many times. The vampires are always clueless of the fact the Roses don't like what we are. As long as we kill the guilty and evil, they don’t say anything, but rogue killing is frowned upon. They'll kill you, they have the right to. It's best to leave them alone and stay out of their path.” He shakes his head. “I don't like that you're on their radar.”

  I frown. “That must be how I evaded them before; I never rogue killed anyone except the old people in the cabin. I was always careful to kill evil people. I could feel them, like their sins made their blood different.”

  He smirks. “It's meant to be that way. You aren’t meant to be killing innocents.”

  I look at the mound of dirt. “What if she doesn’t like killing evil and wants innocents?”

  He lies on his back in the grass of the cemetery we found. “Not sure. What can we do? We have to keep her safe. We have to force her to feed the right way.”

  I nod and watch him lying there. “You killed Ramón.”

  “I did. I never said I was innocent of rogue killing. I try to keep it to a minimum. Besides, he was a witch.”

  I chew my lip and think on it. “I never saved him. I saved Tessa and Maria and Angie and Em but not him.”

  He smiles and reaches for me. “You did your best. You only had one shot at fixing it.”

  Maria walks up, looking upset. “I've been looking all over the bayou for y'all.”

  “What's wrong?” I ask.

  She holds her hands out. Blood stains her white skin. “She killed me. She done killed me again.”

  I frown. “How?”

  “She came in the night and made me cut my own wrists. I think she still has a claim on the body, like she’s possessing me.” Her bayou accent is so thick.

  “Are you a ghost?” I ask, before I realize she is solid and not in the bayou where she most likely died.

  She shakes her head again. “No. I died in the woods and then I woke and I'm this. My skin is burning and I could drink a lake dry. Feels like cotton's in my mouth.” H
er mannerisms are so different than my mother's were.

  I give Whit a sideways glance. He groans, “I knew it. I sensed you hours ago. Shit.”

  “She's a vampire?” I ask.

  His red face and annoyed look answer the question for him. He has me and Em and Tessa and Angie now. Angie and Em are in the dirt. He will be able to track us all, sense us all. I wonder if it's like a constant noise in his mind.

  He's up and dragging her away from the grave before I can say anything else. He seems grouchy about the whole thing.

  The thick, dark night distracts me. It brushes against me like a painter on a canvas. Something about the dank air makes me get lost in thought, forget about the other problems we have.

  A voice interrupts my ponderings, “Finally. I thought he'd never leave.”

  I gasp when I see the handsome face of Marcus. I frown. “What are you doing here?”

  He grins and sits on the grass where I'm lying, waiting for Em and Angie to wake up. He scoffs at the mounds of dirt. “He is a brave man. Four women to listen to at all times. That sounds rough.” He speaks so refined-like. His accent is so opposite Whit's Scottish. I can hear the difference now. Marcus sounds like he’s English but also Eastern European and Whit sounds like a rugged Scottish heathen.

  I furrow my brow. “How did you find me?”

  He grins and I can't stop staring at his lips. “Remember that little thing I got you to say?”

  I nod.

  “Well, when the switch happened, I remembered you because we said those things to each other. Ari's little gift sends you back in time, but you never know what changed or happened. She sends you back blank unless a vampire compels you to remember.”

  “Why? Why would you want to remember me?”

  His eyes light up. I'm lost in them. “You're a natural witch with vampire strength. Your blood can make me feel things I haven’t felt in a long time. You aren’t dead, you’re an unending supply of emotions.” He smirks. “I have to admit, I admire Whit for doing it. It’s smart, getting a witch to love you and changing her halfway. Not a lot of us would have thought of it.”

  My stomach starts to feel funny. It’s already sensitive since I changed the other night. I don’t know what he means and for whatever reason, I can't defy him in thought or action. I want to obey him.