For the first time in two years, she felt something big and painful ease between them. All three of them wanted one thing—to help Keri.
Carla could almost feel Keri’s sigh flutter through her blood.
A magically sent voice said, “Has Carla retrieved the mortal yet from the astral plane? We can’t risk her breaking her connection to the mortal. We must not harm mortals.”
Silver, she thought, and the prongs dug deeper, but Carla managed to keep her voice civil. “Pam is fine. I can’t get to her on the astral plane because the psychic interferes. I need to break this connection he has with me in order to help Pam.”
“Silver,” Chandra added, “if you don’t want to help Carla, that’s your choice. But you do not have the right to try to stop other witches from helping her. We choose our own paths.”
A new voice said, “I want to help.”
A second voice added, “I will join the circle to send power as well.”
“Me too.”
More witches joined in, all offering to circle their powers around Carla and help. Gratefully, she said, “Thank you. Thank each of you for your gift.” Circling powers was a form of meditation. It worked better if they could open up to their sixth chakra, but even with only the first four chakras, it helped. Witchcraft always responded to positive energy.
“And what if this psychic, who Carla and Chandra claim is so dangerous, attacks the Circle Witches? What if Carla gives him access to us?” Silver demanded.
Oh dear, she hadn’t thought of that. Carla looked at Jerome. “Is it possible?”
“He’d have to grab on to a power trail. It’s unlikely, but he did track you through Keri, or something …” he trailed off, unhappy that he didn’t have the answer.
“Each of you should make your own decisions,” Silver continued.
Carla knew the Circle Witch couldn’t hear her father as he didn’t have the magic to communicate in the Circle.
Silver added, “But I have to remind you that we have worked very hard to keep our Circle safe.”
The first witch that offered to help said, “I suppose I’ll have to withdraw then.”
“I’m sorry, Carla,” another witch added.
Carla didn’t blame them. She should have considered this before she let her mom approach them. “No need to apologize. We must protect the Circle at all costs.”
“My daughter is a witch in need and you all turn your backs?” Chandra’s voice rose.
“Mom, they have a point.”
“I’m not turning my back,” Darcy broke in, her voice rich and firm. “I will open my third eye and help you, Carla.”
“Show-off,” Silver muttered. Then she said more clearly. “I am advising the witches with the best interest of the Circle as a whole, not any one witch.”
Carla looked over her dad’s head to her mom, and, dropping the magic that pushed her voice through the Circle, she said, “She’s going to try for the position of Moon Witch Advisor. But she doesn’t have high magic, she can’t open her sixth or seventh chakra. I’m not sure about her fifth chakra.”
“In these desperate and dangerous times,” Silver went on, “it’s becoming apparent that we may have to consider electing an advisor among ourselves.”
Chandra looked back at the monitor. “The Ancestors choose the Moon Witch Advisor. We don’t elect them.”
“That was before the curse. I am seeking to protect the Circle so that we can do as much good for mortals as possible while dealing with the loss of our powers.”
Carla stood up and rubbed her temples. “Darcy has tremendous power. She has shown us all that there is hope. Yet you want to turn our backs on our beloved Ancestors?” She was furious, sickened by the idea. The drilling in her head didn’t help. “The Ancestors chose to not reincarnate but stay in Summerland as our spirit guides. Each of our lifetimes is a journey of learning and growing, each of us on our own separate path. What binds us is our reverence for the Ancestors and seeking the very knowledge and lightness of soul that they have attained. We do not elect a leader, but we listen to the advisor our Ancestors give us. We still make our own decisions.” Few people understood that witches were fiercely independent.
Silver said, “The Ancestors are not providing us with a leader—”
“Advisor!” Chandra snapped.
“—and so we must take matters into our own hands. For instance, many of you would have jumped to Carla’s aid, out of a sincere desire to help anyone in pain or distress, but you didn’t think of the dangers. I did.”
“Actually,” Darcy said, “I had considered the danger and considered Carla’s life and value to be worth more than the very minimal risk. This psychic has worked hard to get to Carla, and he has used her dead twin sister trapped in a knife to do it. I don’t see how he could reproduce those efforts that quickly.”
“Says the witch who has a witch hunter to protect her. The rest of us do not. We have no protection,” Silver’s voice hardened on the last words. “And yet, you didn’t think of warning us.”
“Enough,” Chandra said. “Silver, if you continue down this path, you will cause a split among us. In the meantime, I am going to follow my path and help my daughter.” She raised her hand to break the magical connection.
Darcy’s voice caught her. “I’ll open my third eye when you need me. Just let me know.”
Chandra said, “Thank you, Darcy. You’re a credit to all witches.” Then she broke the connection with the Circle Witches.
The smell wrenched Sutton back to consciousness. His skin was on fire and there was a rage in his head. He smelled witch blood. The dark, spicy scent filled his head with a clawing craving. He began to struggle, then realized he was chained and lying on the dark wood floor. He saw the stones of the massive fireplace from his right peripheral vision. It all came swimming back to him—he was in the living room of the Branch Bed and Breakfast. Carla had pulled him from his body.
Shit! Now he was chained up. Rearing his head up off the floor, he looked down his body. He’d been stripped to his boxers and chains wrapped around him, anchoring his arms to his sides, his legs together. There were massive padlocks holding the chains.
A muffled scream shattered his confusion.
He smelled copper. Even better, he smelled the rich spice of warm, living, witch blood. His veins lit on fire, the craving taking hold. His nose tracked the scent and he found it to his left. Brigg Cusack and another rogue stood holding a witch. She was a big woman, close to six feet, with spiked salt-and-pepper hair, dressed all in black with a thick silver dog collar around her neck, matching bracelets around her wrists. Her eyes were wide with helpless terror over the thick duct tape wrapped around her head to keep her cries muffled. She had two slices, one through her pants on her thigh, a second one on her bare arm.
Her tiny top and low-rider pants left five or six inches of bare skin. Sutton knew what was coming next. He wanted it, and hated himself for it.
Brigg moved quickly, flashing his knife at whip-speed and cutting the witch on her side. Sutton couldn’t stop looking at the thin river of blood welling up from that slice, then dripping down in streams of pure bliss.
Brigg turned his head from the witch and said, “Welcome to your Ceremony of Induction. Oh, wait, first there’s a test, isn’t that right?”
The bastard was toying with him, mocking the induction ceremony he would have had into the Wing Slayers—had he not gone rogue. He narrowed his eyes. “You failed your test. You’ve lost your soul, asshole.” How long had he been gone from his body? How long before Phoenix and Key got back? Where was Drake? He was trying to focus and think, but the words, witch blood, kept pulsing in his brain. Want it, need it, mine. He struggled against the chains, but he was fighting a bigger battle in his head—against the curse taking root deep in his brain.
Brigg regarded him with the baby-blue eyes in his smooth face. “The outline of the tattoo on my back is gone. It vanished. Witch blood makes us fucking powerful, dickhead.�
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“The Wing Slayer erased the tattoo when he took your soul. And how powerful do you need to be to cut up a helpless witch?” He tensed all his muscles trying to break the chains. “You’re afraid of me, so you’re not that strong.”
“Not afraid. Just making this interesting. Witches cursed us and stripped Wing Slayer of his god powers. He’s nothing to us. We’re taking back our heritage by killing every witch. Then we’ll have our immortality back.” He pressed the flat of his silver knife into the vivid crimson tide pouring out of the witch. Then he walked to Sutton, stood over him. “Smell that?” He inhaled the scent, then looked down at him. “Think you can resist?”
He didn’t answer, his body fighting a raging battle. Part of him wanted that knife on him. Oh, God, he wanted it. His veins felt as if a thousand butane torches were burning him. He wanted relief.
He wanted the power!
He’d felt it before, two months ago when he’d touched Carla’s blood. He’d fought it then, but now he was losing the battle. He craved the sensation of pure power sliding over his fingers and sinking into him.
He heard his father’s voice whisper in his head to fight against it. Get free, kill the rogues, and then himself.
While he still had his soul.
Brigg dropped down to his haunches, waving the knife up to his face.
Droplets of the witch’s blood splattered on his chest.
His body arched into the cool pleasure followed by a kick of power that raced through him, more powerful than an orgasm, it made his heart thud and his cock fill with blood.
Sutton wished to God his father was here now to shoot him in his heart. “Kill me. Go ahead, do it. Or don’t you have the balls? Maybe you’re afraid you’ll miss my heart, and I’ll break out of these chains. You know I’d kill you and turn you shade.” He was goading Brigg, the rage in his brain turning into a vicious bloodlust. He fought not to look at the witch. Not to breathe. Not to …
Brigg slapped the knife onto his chest, wiping every drop of the blood onto his searing skin.
His body convulsed, he heard moans come from his mouth and he bit down hard on his lip. Tasted his own blood. But he didn’t care about his blood.
He wanted witch blood. The power fed through his skin, blasted into his veins and sang. His whole body began to rock and hum to the tune. It raced around inside of him and made him feel all powerful, all-fucking-powerful!
He shook his head, trying to clear the vibrating hum kissing and licking his nerves.
He heard the witch cry out and break into sobs behind the tape. He began to fight, to thrash against the chains holding him. He had to fight this!
Her sobs increased.
He forced himself to look, and his stomach seized up while his nerves screamed for more blood. They had cut her so many times he couldn’t count the cuts, and they were covering their hands in her blood. He fought harder, he had to stop them from hurting her any more. Had to stop them from turning him rogue. They were keeping this witch alive for him to kill. One witch kill and his soul would be gone. He fought the restraints, fought with everything he had.
“Now!” Brigg said.
The two men fell on him, smearing her blood on as much exposed skin as they could find. His stomach, his chest, his thighs. He managed to use his body like a whip and smash the legs out from under Brigg … then the power-kick took hold and his mind exploded with fireworks. The last thing he heard was the front door burst open and Phoenix snarl, “They’ve blooded him!”
Carla sat with her mom on the small patch of grass surrounded by the flower beds in the backyard. They needed the feel of the elements—the late-afternoon sun, the cooling air, the damp earth beneath them. Even though this was not spell magic, they still needed the earth, air, fire, and water to feed their chakras.
Between Carla and her mom was a ceramic bowl filled with water.
For fire, they had candles placed to the north, south, east, and west. They had chosen a white candle for purification, a blue candle for psychic and spiritual awareness, a purple candle for speeding healing, and a gold candle for protection.
As added security, her dad and Joe stood back and watched. Joe had more men out front, but he was giving them as much privacy as possible.
Carla took a deep breath, soaking in the elements to saturate her first four chakras.
She was concentrating with everything she had to do three things: keep out Styx, not call Sutton, and control her powers, all in an effort to mentally pull out the probes.
“I’m here.” Darcy’s voice materialized in her head.
Carla opened her eyes and looked across the water bowl. Darcy’s image shimmered there. If she reached out, she would be able to pass her hand through it. “Silver’s right, you’re a show-off.”
Darcy grinned. “I’m projecting my image into what I can see with my third eye. That way we have a circle.”
“Join hands,” Chandra said.
Carla took her mother’s hand, letting Chandra take the lead. Darcy might be the most powerful, but Chandra had lived before the curse and had real experience. Carla watched as her mother laid her hand across the image of Darcy’s hands. Carla did the same. Magic was symbolic in many ways. Just the symbol of holding hands would create the circle.
Chandra looked at her. “Once you open your communication chakra, you must work fast, Carla. Darcy and I are going to circle your mind with our powers, but you have to pull the prongs out. Fast. No matter how much it hurts. Because Styx is inside you, our protection will only hold him down for a few minutes.”
Carla took a breath. This was her weakness and she knew it. Facing pain made her want to analyze, not act. But she would do it. She steeled herself, using all the energy of the earth to shore up her bravery. “I will, Mom.”
Chandra turned to the shimmering image. “Darcy, ready?”
“Yes,” her likeness answered.
Carla closed her eyes and concentrated. She felt the energy of herself, Darcy, and her mom beginning to mingle, moving in a slow trail around the circle. She and her dad had discussed the need to be absolutely precise, like doing surgery. She’d done her best to isolate each prong. It was time. Using her chakras, she funneled the energy up to her fifth one. A quick tightening of her throat, and the chakra opened with a pop.
She didn’t let surprise at the ease of that throw her off. Immediately, she began directing the energy to her brain. Once she established the flow, she started pulling chunks of power from the swirl of her mom’s and Darcy’s magic around her, like braiding hair, she kept adding pieces of power.
The first streams bounced back.
Carla worked with single-minded determination, pulling the returning power back into the “braid” of combined power and funneling it up.
The prongs in her head grew hotter and more painful, as if they sensed that something was trying to get to them. She felt her mom’s hand tighten on her to keep her focused and not let herself doubt or think negative thoughts. She took in a breath, relieved to find that the stream of energy attacking the shield was doing it with less effort on her part. She’d established the pattern and now the energy followed it.
She felt the first crack in the shield. She sent her healing energy to the fracture. Seconds later she felt thick ropes of furious energy snaking down from the crack. Styx! He was trying to choke off her magic.
“I got it,” Darcy said.
Carla left Darcy to deal with the psychic. She pushed the power harder against the shield, and, like safety glass, it formed spider cracks, then disintegrated.
She was in!
“Now,” Chandra said.
Carla couldn’t see her brain, but her powers would go where she directed them. She concentrated hard on the first prong. Her powers grabbed it and pulled it free. She actually heard a wet pop.
Then she felt a blast of fierce pain that made sweat break out on her body and her stomach heave. In response, her powers retracted and her chakras quivered in shock.
The three remaining prongs began moving. Pounding up and down like a jackhammer in her brain. It was excruciating, jarring out all thought. Her body started to tremble. She had to let the pain wash over her. If she fought it, her chakras would close up. She summoned up Keri in her mind, remembering the time Keri had fallen on cacti on one of her searches for her precious eagles. Carla and their mom tried to dull the pain as they pulled out the cactus needles, but Keri grew impatient, and in one magical shove, she drove all the needles out at once.
Carla tried to emulate Keri. Without hesitation, she reached for the next prong and yanked it out.
The pain slammed her as if she’d ripped out a bone without anesthetic.
You were always so much braver than you knew. Carla felt her sister’s words whisper to her and her heart swelled with grateful love. She found the third prong and tried to magically latch on to it. A red mist of sheer agony exploded behind her eyes.
“No!” Styx screamed, ramping up his psychic battering. “I’ll lock you in a box forever, you fucking bitch!”
The memory of the box chilled her, while the pain made her hot. She lost her grip on the third prong. “Keri, help me get ahold of it,” she said, furious at her own weakness.
Then she felt her mom’s and Darcy’s comingled powers shoving against his assault, pushing him back when Darcy’s stream of power suddenly thinned.
Styx rammed against them harder.
Carla’s powers shriveled and tried to run back to the shelter of her chakras. She struggled to stay calm and keep the powers flowing to give Darcy a chance to regroup. Her brain almost sizzled with the fiery pain.
Carla, hurry, rip off the damned Band-Aid.
Keri’s words brought her powers out of hiding, and together, she and her twin reached for the third prong.
“Carla,” Darcy said, her voice weak, “I have to go. I’m sorry!”
No! Keri screamed.
Pain exploded in her head, snapping her link to her powers. Can’t do it. Keri’s words faded as her essence settled back into the scar at the base of Carla’s spine.
Soul Magic Page 21