“That doesn’t change the fact that we’re in this situation and we have to deal with it now,” Paris pointed out.
“No, it doesn’t.”
“I need to know,” Paris hesitated.
“You need to know what?”
“Are we going to try to save Laura?”
“Of course we are.”
“And if we can’t?”
I opened my mouth to answer but no words came out. Even if things went absolutely perfect, that still didn’t mean that Laura and Matilda would walk out of this unscathed. I was about to say just that when an alarm started blaring from inside the sorority house.
Kelsey had done her job.
When the fire alarm erupted, everyone at the party looked startled. The guests immediately started filing out of the backyard and away from the house. It’s human nature to move away when an alarm signals and that’s what I was hoping for.
“It won’t take them long to figure out this was a diversion,” Paris said quietly. We hadn’t moved from our spot by the fence.
“I know.”
“What do we do when they figure it out?”
“We fight.”
The yard emptied quickly, with some of the sorority sisters disappearing inside of the house to investigate the alarm and others filing out with the guests as they left the party.
“Do you see Brittany?” I asked, craning my neck to try and get a better view of the yard.
“I think she left,” Paris said. “I hope she left.”
We both jumped when the side door of the house flew open a few feet from us.
Jessica was standing at the top of the steps – and she didn’t look happy. She pointed at me accusingly. “You did this.”
“Did what?” I held my palms up and affixed what I hoped was a quizzical expression on my face. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“You stupid bitch!” Jessica raged. “What did you think this would accomplish?
I realized that the sky had darkened in the last few minutes and Paris and I now were well and truly cut off from witnesses – and escape.
And so it began.
Thirty-Five
“Get everyone back out here,” Jessica ordered, glancing around at her minions expectantly.
“They’re gone,” Laura replied. I noticed she refused to make eye contact with me.
“They all left.”
“They’re probably just on the front lawn,” Jessica snapped. “Go and wrangle them back.”
The alarm suddenly stopped blaring.
“Tell them it was a false alarm,” Jessica said.
“Laura, don’t,” I took a step toward her, willing her to look in my direction.
Laura raised her eyes to mine. I saw surprise reflected there, even a little guilt. There was no remorse, though. There was nothing even akin to remorse.
“Do as I say, Laura,” Jessica said, her voice icy.
Laura moved to do her bidding, but I was nowhere near done. I figured the longer I could stall things here the more likely it was that help would arrive – and the party guests would find something better to occupy their time. I was starting to wish that I had told Aric my plan – even if he yelled -- but he had refrained from asking my intentions and I had done the same. It was too uncomfortable for both of us.
“It’s not too late, Laura,” I said.
“Not too late for what?” Laura asked, her voice small and pitiful.
“You don’t have to be a part of this.”
“What are you talking about?” Laura looked decidedly uncomfortable.
“I know what you’re planning here.” It was a bluff, but I figured it was better to go with the bravado than attack Jessica from a point of weakness. “You can still walk away from it.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Laura lied.
“Really?” It was time to lay all the cards on the table. Besides, talking had always been my super strength. Screw this mage stuff. “I think you know exactly what’s going to be happening here.”
Jessica fixed her dark eyes on me curiously. “And what is it that you think you know?”
“I know that you’ve been recruiting heavily the past two semesters,” I offered. I was bolstered by Paris’ steady presence behind me. She wasn’t saying anything. She wasn’t trying to escape either. I wasn’t sure, if our positions were switched, that I would be that brave.
“We’re a sorority,” Jessica replied blandly. “We recruit. It’s what we do.”
“Not at the levels you’ve been recruiting,” I countered. “And you’re looking for specific girls.”
Jessica didn’t respond. Instead, she let me continue. I was fine with that. I was starting to find my footing in this mess. Of course, that could have just been wishful thinking.
“You’re looking for needy girls,” I added. “Girls who don’t feel they belong anywhere else. You’re looking for girls who take on the personality of the people they happen to be surrounded by at the time.” I glanced over at Matilda pointedly. She had the grace to remain silent and look mildly ashamed. “You want girls who are easily molded. And that’s how you pick your recruits.”
Jessica glanced over at Laura, her mouth a tight line of hate. “Do you hear what she really thinks of you, Laura? She thinks you’re weak. Just like I told you.”
I ignored the jab – and the stab of pain that crossed Laura’s face at Jessica’s goading.
“You also want girls who are, shall we say, open to the possibilities of the world,” I pressed on. “You want girls who can be nudged into believing in witchcraft.”
Jessica rolled her eyes. “Witchcraft? That’s absurd.”
Her words sounded hollow – and it wasn’t just because I knew she was lying.
“The thing is,” I said. “You’re running your own little scam here. You want girls who believe in witchcraft, but the bulk of the girls here don’t have any real power. They’re just fodder. When you stumbled on Laura, though, a girl with real power, you realized that you’d hit the jackpot.”
I returned my gaze to Matilda. “Sure, Laura came with some baggage,” I added. “Is that when you decided that recruiting non-witches could still be a benefit? When Laura insisted on bringing Matilda along?”
I was out on a limb here.
“You’ve been a busy little bee, haven’t you?” Jessica pursed her lips angrily. She was trying to prove she was still in control, but I could tell that my words were having a negative effect on her.
“I have,” I agreed. “You haven’t exactly been stealthy, though. I mean, did you think no one on this campus – a campus full of supernatural beings – would notice that you were trying to consolidate a power base?”
“What does that mean?” Laura asked the question of Jessica, but her gaze was pointed in my direction.
“I have no idea what she’s talking about,” Jessica lied.
“You can’t tell me that you don’t know, Laura,” I said. “Jessica has been draining your aura for months. You had to have felt that.”
“That’s a lie!”
Laura was watching Jessica with a mixture of suspicion and fear. “Why is she saying that?”
Jessica didn’t answer, so I took the opportunity and did it for her. “She needs your power, Laura. Didn’t she tell you that? There are only a handful of real witches here.
There’s not enough power to do what she wants. I mean, she’s a witch, but she’s obviously not powerful enough to enact her plan without stealing power from others.”
“That’s enough,” Jessica said, moving down the steps angrily.
“And even your power isn’t enough for her,” I said, refusing to take a step back and cede any ground to Jessica. “That’s what all the other recruits are for.”
“They don’t have power, though,” Laura said dubiously. “They have no real place here.”
“That’s not stopping Jessica from using them,” I said. “She’s been stealing their life essence,
just like she’s been feeding off your actual power.”
For the first time that afternoon, Laura looked as though she was wavering. “But how is that even possible?”
“If I’ve learned anything from coming here,” I answered. “It’s that anything is possible.”
Jessica must have grown sick of me controlling the conversation, because she was suddenly trying to draw everyone’s attention back to her. “And what about you? Covenant College’s own little mage. Zoe Lake. A mystical mistake masquerading as a simple college girl.”
Hmmm. What did that mean? I refused to give up the headway I was making. “I’m not the one trying to take control of the campus,” I pointed out. “I just want to go to class and hang out with my boyfriend. You’re the one trying to suck people dry.”
“No worse than your little vampire friend. Rafael is his name, right? Oh, you didn’t think I knew about him? Your little meetings with him?”
“I don’t really care,” I countered. “He’s not the one trying to claim the title of the most evil of the land.”
“Not evil,” Jessica shot back. Apparently she had given up the pretense of pretending that witchcraft wasn’t real. “Just powerful.”
“I think where you’re concerned they’re one and the same.”
“If you knew all of this,” Jessica said. “Then why did you come? Why did you play right into my hands?”
“To stop it.”
Jessica smirked. “Just you and your little witch friend here?”
I wasn’t sure how to answer that. I had expected Aric to roll in with a pack of wolves to shake things up at a certain point. So far, though, there was no sign of him.
“Well, as you said, I’m a mage,” I replied. “I figure I’m meant to stop you.” That sounded grand – and empty – even to my own ears. It was too late to take it back, though. I was grandstanding and I was pretty sure Jessica realized that, too.
“You’re not going to be a mage for long,” Jessica said ominously.
“Oh, yeah?” The spell. “That would actually be a nice change of pace.”
“You really have no idea how much power you actually wield, do you?”
“Sure,” I replied sarcastically. “I have the power to make grown men cry in thirty seconds flat and I have the power to irritate everyone in my general vicinity in half that time.”
“Power is wasted on you,” Jessica spat, ignoring my attempt at levity. “You don’t know how to use it and you definitely don’t know how to use it to your advantage. I won’t make that same mistake.”
I watched as Jessica reached into the pocket of her skirt and pulled out a small, purple vial. There was some sort of liquid inside of it. A potion.
“What’s that?” I asked, although I had a feeling I already knew the answer.
“It’s the source of your power,” Jessica replied. “I’ve managed to make a special brew that will strip it from you and give it to me – someone actually worthy of wielding it.”
I had to act carefully here. “And how did you manage to make it?”
“Your roommates have been pilfering specific items I needed for the spell for a while now. I really couldn’t have done it without them.”
I shot an accusatory look at Laura.
“Oh, it’s too late,” Jessica smiled at me. “In a few seconds, all the power you refuse to realize will be mine.”
“It won’t hurt you,” Laura offered lamely. “It will just strip you of your power. You’ll be fine.”
Apparently that was supposed to make me feel better. “So, you betrayed me?”
“You betrayed me first,” Laura shot back.
“And how did I do that?”
“By picking Kelsey over me,” Laura said. “Where is Kelsey, by the way?” She glanced around curiously.
“She left,” Paris spoke up for the first time. “Right before all of the alarm excitement.”
“Meaning that she’s the one who set off the alarm,” Matilda said. “That sounds like her.”
I watched Laura carefully. I couldn’t get a full read on her. Part of her seemed ashamed of what she had done, but I was beginning to think that was an act. The question was: Who was she performing for, me or Jessica? “So all of this is because I became friends with Kelsey?”
“No, all of this is because you abandoned me,” Laura said.
“You’re so insecure that you’re willing to risk everyone – not just me but everyone – because I made a new friend? That’s a little pathetic, Laura.”
“You’re the pathetic one,” Laura sneered. “I’ve been working with Jessica under your nose for months and you’re just figuring stuff out now. So much for being the great mage of Michigan.”
I snorted derisively. “If that’s what you need to tell yourself, then go ahead.” I turned to Jessica expectantly. “Well?”
“Well what?” Jessica asked.
“Do it. Drink your potion. Gain my power. Become me. That’s what you want, right? To become me? Maybe Aric will be interested in you if you gain my power. That’s how this all started, isn’t it? You convinced yourself we were only together because of this mage business.”
Jessica looked incensed at the charge. I hadn’t really believed the words when I first uttered them, but now I realized that I was right. That was how this all started.
“This has nothing to do with Aric,” Matilda said, her face drawn and taut. “That’s just ridiculous. Tell her, Jessica.”
Jessica didn’t answer, though. Her dark eyes glinted with mirth. I watched as she lifted the vial to her lips, powerless to stop the inevitable. I could only hope that whatever followed would be a strong reckoning for Jessica.
Jessica wrinkled her nose distastefully and swallowed the potion, closing her eyes to relish the rush of power she was sure would follow.
I waited and watched. There was nothing else I could do.
Thirty-Six
“Light the candles.”
Jessica was standing in the same spot, her arms outstretched and her eyes closed as her face pointed toward the heavens. “It will take a few seconds for the potion to take hold. I want to be ready when it does.”
Laura and Matilda moved to the fire pit and started lighting the candles on bamboo stakes planted in the yard around it. Once they were all ignited, I realized they formed the shape of a pentagram.
Great. That had to be a good sign. (That was sarcasm, in case you missed it.)
I kept watch on Jessica out of the corner of my eye but I gave the rest of my attention to Matilda and Laura. I was out of time.
“You can still go,” I offered.
Matilda glanced back at me but then went back to her task. It was hard to tell what she was doing, but it looked as though she was drawing items out of a small bag under the picnic table.
“It’s too late for them to go,” Jessica laughed hollowly. “They’re part of this. Don’t you see that? They want to be part of my power.”
“Your power? You’re going to share? Somehow I doubt that. It’s not exactly in your nature.”
Jessica glared at me. “Why don’t you keep you mouth shut? You’re not magical anymore. You have nothing left to say here.”
“If that’s true, why not let us go?”
Jessica smirked. “I’m not done with you yet. That’s why.”
“Because you want to suck Paris’ power,” I replied knowingly. “You’ve got another witch here to drain. It’s too convenient for you to pass up.”
“You’re smarter than you look,” Jessica said, moving toward Laura and Matilda with purpose. I saw that there were only a handful of other sorority sisters present. Where had everyone else gone?
I glanced at Paris. We could try to run. We probably should try to run. Neither of us made a move, though. We both stood and watched.
“Get in your positions,” Jessica instructed. She looked over in our direction. “Paris, why don’t you join us?”
“I think I’ll pass,” Paris replied dryly.
/> “Suit yourself.” Jessica shrugged indifferently. “You don’t need to be part of the circle for me to steal your power. The boost I just got from Zoe has elevated me to the next level. I’m not bound by a circle anymore.”
“Good for you.”
The remaining witches took up positions around the fire. They each stood by the lit candles – so they also were situated into the shape of a pentagram. They stretched out their hands and clasped them with the witches to either side of them, creating a weird tableau that defied visual logic. With the candles flickering, shadows started playing over their faces, and they started chanting.
“That looks like the craziest Red Rover line ever,” I offered.
The witches ignored me.
“Now what?” Paris asked.
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “We could leave?”
“I don’t think that will stop them from tracking us down.”
“No,” I agreed. “We don’t need to make it easy on them, though.”
“I kind of want to see what they’re going to do,” Paris admitted.
The truth was, so did I. So we waited – and watched.
The pace of the chanting picked up, and I could see bright tendrils of colored smoke start to waft through the grouping. Shades of purple intermingled with hues of green. Arms of red circled around lines of gold. It would have been pretty – if it weren’t so terrifying.
The power started to build and the colors mingled. The sight mesmerized me until a rough hand grabbed my elbow and jerked me out of my reverie.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Aric’s face swam into view as I snapped back to reality.
“What?”
“What are you doing here?” Aric’s face was drawn with concern – and anger.
“Did you really think I would stay away?” I scoffed.
“I told you to stay away.”
“I had to come. I had to see.”
“Well, you’ve seen,” Aric said, pushing me toward the gate forcefully. “Now you have to go.”
I glanced around, still getting my bearings. That’s when I noticed Aric wasn’t alone. He had a troop of werewolves with him – and they looked ready for a bloody war.
3 Conjuring Page 22