by SM Reine
And Graham was free.
His paws pounded against the stage as he rushed toward us—toward Donne and Ofelia and me.
I didn’t think before reacting. I stepped away from Donne and put myself right into his path.
“Leah, no!” Donne shouted.
The werewolf’s body slammed into mine. The audience screamed—or maybe that was the blood rushing through my head. I couldn’t tell the difference.
My back smashed into something hard. Everything spun around me.
I grabbed his head in both of my hands, and my fingers began glowing.
“Let me help you, Graham!” I cried. “I know you’re in there!”
There was no sign of recognition in his eyes, which were more of a sickly, brassy yellow than Donne’s vibrant gold. He tried to bite me. I jerked my head aside and his jaws slammed shut where I’d been the instant before, so close that his fur grazed my cheek.
His weight suddenly lifted off of me. Donne had wrapped his arms around Graham’s ribcage, and he roared as he threw his father across the stage.
Ofelia hauled me to my feet. “Okay, now we run.”
“Now? But I thought—”
“She’s right. We have to get out of here,” Rage said, appearing in front of us. He was bleeding from several scrapes on his arms. Fear sucked the breath from my lungs.
Had he been bitten?
I twisted to look for Donne. Ofelia tried to push me away, but not before I saw.
Donne was facing down his father and the energy between them had changed.
Graham was done transforming to his wolf shape.
Now Donne’s flesh was rippling. Bones snapped. His scream was louder than the entirety of those screaming in the audience, and it penetrated deep to my heart.
He was changing, too.
“It’s not the full moon!” I protested, as though that could change what I was seeing.
“Graham’s triggered him,” Rage said. He rushed Ofelia and me down the stairs, one hand on each of us. It was quiet backstage. The crew was gone. “They’re pack. They’re linked too closely not to set each other off like this.”
“But he’ll change back, right? Once the morning comes, Donne will change back?”
I could tell by Rage’s expression that he didn’t think the outlook was very good.
The coven emerged from the darkness, led by Ravyn and Storm. They were carrying chains, ropes, and guns. My heart skipped a few beats at the sight of them.
The idea that those weapons were meant to be used against Donne made me feel sick to my stomach.
Ravyn was wielding a set of chains as thick as her wrists, looped around her shoulders and waist. “What’s the outlook?”
“Donne’s shifted too,” Rage said. “Ofelia’s werewolf is keeping them from going into the crowd, but that means there’s only one way they can run.”
That statement was punctuated by an ear-shattering roar. The three werewolves were fighting at the top of the stairs, barely feet away from us.
“We’ll help protect the crowd,” Storm said. “Not sure how much more we can do than that if both of them have changed, though.”
Rage’s hand tightened on my arm, but he nodded. “Do what you can.”
“What are we going to do?” I asked as he continued down the hallway, taking Ofelia and me further from the fight.
“There are wards on the tour bus,” Rage said. “They’ll prevent the wolves from reaching you.”
I could hear the coven shouting behind us. I was too scared to look back and see what they were doing. I’d gotten awfully attached to the mini pizza bagel-loving witches in the few hours we’d spent together, and now the idea of them getting hurt was almost as painful as the idea of Donne getting shot with tranquilizers.
“We can’t hide. We have to help,” I said.
Ofelia stopped walking. “I agree. The two of us are tarot witches. This is what we’re meant to do.” She smiled at me. She looked tense, but not afraid. “It’s time for us to make a miracle happen.”
XVI
Freshly painted wards were dripping above the doorway to Rage’s dressing room. The marks glowed pale green, similar to those on the gazebo back at the mansion.
The coven had been busy.
“Basic fortification and privacy wards,” Rage explained as he pushed Ofelia and me toward the door. “Won’t block your magic from escaping, but it’ll make the walls hold up a few minutes longer against assault.”
Ofelia lifted a penciled eyebrow at Rage. “Are you normally assaulted backstage after concerts?”
“If I’m lucky.” He threw the door open. “I’ll hold them back as long as I can, but don’t take your time.”
Ofelia nodded sharply. “I’ll see what we can do.”
Sudden fear filled me at the idea of Rage standing against those werewolves—men who wouldn’t hesitate to rip him apart, and wouldn’t be capable of regretting it until they turned back into their human forms.
“Rage, wait—” I tried to say.
He shut the door.
Ofelia and I were alone in the dressing room, but the walls barely muffled what was happening outside. I could still hear the coven shouting and the growls of wolves.
Tears tracked down my cheeks.
“Oh my goodness.” I paced in the confines of the room. There were a few articles of leather clothing hanging in the closet, some makeup on the counter. Nothing that could help the people outside. “Oh my goodness.”
“Goodness.” Ofelia snorted. “Okay. Let’s get casting, Mary Sunshine.”
I was pretty sure that was meant to be an insult, but I let it slide. “I don’t know how to cast.”
“No big deal. The tarot witch thing is new to me, but I’m starting to figure it out. It seems to be like normal magic, but there are fewer rules, more instinct, and—”
“No, Ofelia, I don’t know how,” I said. “I’ve never cast magic before. I didn’t even know I was a witch until, like, yesterday.”
I could see the moment that my words sank in. Her whole demeanor shifted from scared-but-determined to just plain scared.
“You’ve never cast a spell before in your entire life?” Ofelia raked her hands through her hair, staring up at the ceiling. “Oh my fucking God.”
I really wished she wouldn’t talk like that. “Rage was starting to teach me about herbs on the bus, but…”
“But what?” she snapped.
“It was too hard.” My whole body burned with shame. “I couldn’t wrap my head around it. I thought I’d have more time.”
“Fucking hell,” Ofelia said. “You’re not even a normal witch. Fuck.”
“You must have better words in your vocabulary than that,” I said. Panic had brought my mother’s words out of my mouth.
The look Ofelia shot me was pure venom. “It doesn’t matter if it’s too hard. We’re the only people who can save this werewolf before he hurts someone—like Cooper.” She shuffled through the bags Rage had left in the room and gave a triumphant cry. “Here!”
She dumped the contents of a duffel out on the floor. For some reason, Rage had brought salt, candles, some colorful rocks, and other odds and ends with him.
“What are those for?” I asked. It looked like he was planning on doing arts and crafts while on tour.
“I’m so fucking screwed,” Ofelia muttered. She tossed the candles to me. “North is that way.” She pointed. “Set the candles out at the four cardinal directions and stay out of my way.”
It was easier to obey than argue, so I did.
Ofelia spread salt in a circle around the candles and pulled me inside.
“Basic circle of power.” She arranged crystals between the candles. “Really basic. We don’t have time for anything else. We’re just going to have to keep the energy inside the circle as much as possible.”
I’d seen something about circles of power in Rage’s Book of Shadows, so I wasn’t completely unfamiliar with the concept. “Now are we going to u
se herbs to build energy, or…?”
A faint smile flashed over Ofelia’s lips. “Not completely useless, huh? No, we’re doing something else. It’s a lot simpler but much more difficult.” She gripped both of my wrists, staring hard into my eyes. “Open yourself and let the energy flow through you. That’s all you have to do. Think open thoughts.”
“Open thoughts? What does that even mean?”
“Think of doors opening. Trails leading into fields with no border but the sky. Big, wide valleys. The vastness of the ocean. Open thoughts, Leah.”
Open thoughts. Okay.
I visualized all the things that she was describing. Unfortunately, the vastness of the ocean only reminded me of The Forbidden’s mansion overlooking the beach, and that reminded me of Donne—which made it impossible to focus on anything other than the werewolves growling outside the door.
How could I think open thoughts when monsters wanted to break in and kill us?
They were getting closer.
Rage shouted on the other side of the wall, and the air grew thick with his anger. The energy was so much stronger than ever before. It was almost choking.
That was how he was summoning his power. He was using his anger to fuel it.
If he was casting spells, then it meant that the werewolves weren’t far, and only Rage was protecting us. He was our last defense.
Fear for the singer crashed over me.
“Focus, Leah,” Ofelia said.
“I am focusing!”
“Open thoughts. Open your fucking thoughts.” She dug her fingers into my wrists harder. The points of her nails stung against the tender flesh of my inner arm.
She began chanting under her breath. It sounded like she was saying nonsense words. Or maybe some language I didn’t know.
It worked.
Where we were connected by her hands, I felt something flowing out of me. Uncomfortable heat swirled through my body.
I’d had to have my appendix removed when I was a teenager. Getting a shot of morphine through my IV had felt a lot like this—the heat that quickly took over my entire body, numbing and making me sick at the same time.
It was magic, but it felt like a drug.
My anxiety ratcheted up.
“Wait, Ofelia,” I gasped.
The look she gave me was clearly one of admonishment. She didn’t stop chanting.
Fever washed over my skin. In contrast, Ofelia was freezing, like being clutched in the grasp of icicles. My heat wasn’t enough to counteract her chill. It felt like she could have consumed every ounce of my warmth and still managed to freeze my core.
“It—it hurts, Ofelia.” My teeth chattered.
“You’re fighting it,” she said. “Keep thinking open thoughts. Let it flow. Take from me.”
But I would freeze. I couldn’t let her power into me like that.
Now the whole circle surrounding us was glowing. The magic took tangible form, tangling like the threads of a cobweb.
Silent wind whipped around us, blasting through my skirt and lifting my hair.
Outside, Rage shouted. “Graham—don’t!”
And then he was cut off.
Something banged hard into the other side of the door. It shook on its hinges.
Ofelia gripped me harder and the cold surged. It crashed through my fever like a wave. I shuddered.
“Open yourself,” Ofelia said. “Open yourself or my magic will tear you open!”
I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to force her away from me. “No!”
Another slam against the door.
The wards flared in warning. They were weakening, and fast. I didn’t need much experience to be able to tell that we only had a few seconds of protection left.
What was Donne going to do if he woke up human in the morning and realized he had killed Rage and me?
What if he never woke up human again at all?
The thought of my mate being trapped as a wolf cleared my mind, shoving the fear away.
“Yeah, that’s right,” Ofelia said encouragingly. “You’re on the right track.”
I looked down to see that I was starting to glow again. It hadn’t taken sex to get me shining this time. All I had to do was think about Donne and how much he needed my help.
“Open thoughts,” I said.
“Open thoughts,” she agreed.
It was still hard to focus on all those images she had given me—fields and oceans and open doorways—but every time another werewolf slammed against our door with a snarl, it steeled my resolve.
The images became clearer and clearer in my mind. The ice of Ofelia’s power stopped warring with the heat of my growing magic, and instead, they flowed together.
I could almost hear music playing somewhere very distant.
And then I was open.
The song that Rage had been struggling to hear for so long was no longer distant. It cascaded over me in a symphony of strings.
I opened my eyes, but I couldn’t see the dressing room anymore. I could only see Ofelia, who was a vibrant, glowing creature with luminous eyes. She looked like she had been cast from jewels. She was sapphire and ruby, the gems of night. Starlight yanked from the velvety expanse of darkness.
My body was also glowing, but I was more like sunshine. Light erupted from every crystalline facet of my skin.
Power flowed between us. It circled our bodies inside and out.
Ofelia and I were energy flowing through the earth, erupting from the cracks in the stones like waterfalls gushing from a mountain. We were the wind through the flowers. We were the tiny buds that flourished into sweet, juicy fruit.
We were something the Earth hadn’t seen in a long time.
Something that had been forbidden from existing.
Just as soon as we were released into our purer, glowing forms, something crashed down to shut us off. It felt like being dragged away from all my power.
“Quickly,” Ofelia said. “We have to help Graham.”
Suddenly, I could see through the vision of our beautiful wilderness. We were still standing in Rage’s dressing room with all its leathery clutter and inky-dark eyeliners.
The door had exploded open while we were distracted by our shared vision. Neither Rage nor Donne were anywhere in sight.
Graham stood in the doorway.
Ofelia reached out to him. “Don’t be afraid.”
He lunged, jaws opened wide.
I tried to pull back with a shriek. Ofelia clung to me with one hand, holding me in place.
With the other hand, she pointed at Graham. “No!”
He collapsed mid-step as though he’d smashed into an invisible wall. The sight made my heart shatter. “Don’t hurt him!” I cried.
“Can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs,” she said through gritted teeth.
“He’s not an egg, Ofelia!”
I could feel her drawing harder on my power, sucking it from the depths of my body to gather it around herself. “This is his only chance. Trust me. I can do this.”
Ofelia sounded so confident that I almost believed her. But it was hard to watch Graham thrashing inside the cage of our combined magic. Harder still to realize that some of that power had come from me.
It wasn’t just Ofelia hurting him. I was, too.
“He’s not changing back,” she said. Frustration made her hand tremble where it gripped me. “I think it’s because of us—because you’re still fighting me. Relax!”
Was it really my fault that Graham was stuck?
The fight went out of me at the idea of it. I surrendered, totally and completely, and allowed Ofelia into me.
Whatever it took to save Graham.
She was right. Once I stopped fighting, Graham grew calm, too. He swayed on all four legs.
Open thoughts…open thoughts…
Ofelia guided the power through the werewolf. There was something very graceful in the way that she manipulated our power. She didn’t move her hands at all—she simply
focused, and it formed a glittering web of energy around him.
He shuddered. His legs gave out on him.
And slowly, he began to change back.
Excitement pounded through me as I watched the change occur in reverse. Fur fell from his flesh, exposing the man’s skin. The tail retracted. His facial bones rearranged and shrank.
Piece by piece, Graham returned to his proper human form. He was naked, flushed with fever. Hot enough that he steamed under the waves of Ofelia’s chilly power.
But he was human.
Most importantly, he was alive—and so were we.
“What just happened?” I asked. “Is he cured?”
“Cured of being a werewolf? I don’t think so. Cured of the madness? I hope.” Ofelia shut her eyes again, turning inward. Magic flowed around us again. “Now where’s that other guy? The one with the mohawk?”
Donne came around the corner an instant later. Graham’s reverse transformation hadn’t triggered his son to change back. He was still a massive, hulking beast.
There were strips of leather caught in his teeth. I couldn’t see Rage anywhere.
My excitement guttered.
Had Donne killed Rage?
“Donne, wait!” I shouted.
He barreled toward us, leaped over Graham’s supine body, and smashed into the circle of power.
The line of salt broke.
His shoulder struck my body, knocking me to the ground. The instant that I broke contact with Ofelia, all of the magic that we’d gathered around us vanished.
Powerful jaws closed on my skirt and Donne dragged me away from Ofelia. I was flat on my stomach and couldn’t fight back.
Instead, I grabbed at everything sliding past me, like the vanity and the boxes of costumes and the door to the closet.
Any time I brushed something with my fingertips, Donne yanked a little harder, wrenching me away from potential salvation.
“Hey! Put her down!” The other woman grabbed one of the chairs and swung it with all of her strength. The legs smashed into Donne’s head.
The chair shattered, but the impact didn’t faze him in the slightest.
Lucky for Ofelia, his teeth were too busy being used to drag me out of the room for him to counterattack.
Ofelia tried to launch another attack with the chair’s remnants, but Donne was too fast. He hauled me out of the dressing room. I kicked and struggled, attempting to stop him from removing me, but it was useless—I had no traction, nor did I have the strength of a huge freaking werewolf.