by TJ Green
“What are you doing?” Caspian asked, turning to watch her. He funnelled the air away with a gesture, and it streamed out of the door and down the stairs.
“I think we’re looking in the wrong place. Can someone help me move the table?”
Hunter shooed her out of the way, lifting the table up on his own, and moving it next to the door. By the time he turned round, Avery was already on her knees. In the centre of the pentagram, woven discreetly into other symbols, was the sign of the Triple Goddess, with the waxing, full, and waning moons next to each other.
Briar crouched next to her, watching Avery run her fingers over it. “This must be it. Can you feel anything?”
Avery touched it gently, terrified she might do something before they were ready for it, and then looked at Briar, triumphant. “I can feel a faint line all around the full moon.”
They both twisted to look up at the others who surrounded them in a tight circle.
“What now?” Avery asked. “Do I press it?”
But before anyone could answer, they heard footsteps racing up the stairs. It was Dylan, breathless with excitement. “Alex has found Madame Charron! Come quickly.”
“Go,” Genevieve said, assuming control. “I’ll wait here until you’re back. No one is pressing anything until we’re all ready.”
Avery rose to her feet, and ran to follow Dylan. “Thanks!” she called over her shoulder.
“I’m coming, too,” Briar said, trailing her out the door. Without hesitation, Hunter followed.
***
They skidded to a halt in front of the door to the séance room, and Dylan paused, hand on the handle. “You should know that he was about to use the crystal ball when he started to examine the large, full-length mirror that rests on the floor against the wall.”
“I remember it,” Avery said, barely containing her impatience.
“It has an ornate frame. Alex noticed arcane symbols around the edges, a sigil denoting a doorway. He decided to try mirror scrying.”
Without another word he pushed the door open, and they entered silently, Dylan shutting the door behind them.
It took a moment for Avery’s eyes to focus, because the room was as dark as night. They had drawn the heavy curtains, and the only light was from the fire in the fireplace and a single, black pillar candle placed on the floor in front of the mirror. The room was warm, adding to the sense of claustrophobia. The candle flame burned with unnatural stillness, and behind it, staring into the mirror, sat Alex, cross-legged and immobile. He was oblivious to their arrival.
It was hard to see his face at first, only his deeply shadowed reflection, all hard angles and planes from the firelight. They moved closer, behind and to his right, careful not to disturb him.
His lips were moving, and Avery could hear him murmuring, but was unable to make out the words. She was focused so completely on his face and the flame that it was with a shock that she realised the rest of the mirror was completely black. Nothing of the rest of the room was reflected at all. It was a void. A chill raced down her arms and she shivered, despite the heat.
Avery lowered herself to the floor, staring at the mirror intently. She slowed her breathing and stilled her mind, willing herself to focus. A figure emerged from the darkness. A woman, her face pale and thin, the rest of her body swathed in layers of voluminous clothing. Her lips moved in response to Alex’s murmurings. Back and forth they went, their conversation impossible to follow. It seemed to last an age; her face became impassioned, and then furious. And then her eyes widened with shock as a huge, clawed hand appeared on her shoulder, dragging her backwards. She vanished in a cloud of billowing smoke.
Another face appeared, and Avery jumped, suppressing the scream that bubbled in her throat. A demonesque figure filled the mirror, huge and terrifying, and she felt a ripple of fear run through the room. It was nothing like the formless, writhing shapes filled with flames they had encountered in the summer. This assumed a man’s shape, but its face was a skull from which thick, grotesque horns protruded. Fire burned from within, lighting his eye sockets and jaw with flames. It fixed Alex with a questioning glare and started to speak, and the most hideous, unearthly sound boomed around the room. This time Avery yelped, jerking back in shock. Her heart pounded so hard she thought it would leap out of her chest.
Simultaneously, a howl filled the room, emanating from behind her. She turned, dreading what she would see, but found that Hunter had changed into a wolf, partially ripping his clothing in the process. He snarled, head lowered, glowering at her, but Briar intervened, a hand on the wolf’s head, utterly fearless. Hunter dropped onto his belly, his head in Briar’s lap, and she stroked him, her hands buried deep in his soft fur. She met Avery’s gaze, eyes solemn.
Avery glanced at Dylan and Ben, and saw them both sitting on the floor, transfixed on the mirror; reassured that they were okay, she turned her attention back to Alex.
He was still immobile, sweat beading on his brow as he murmured a response to the demon. It didn’t seem to like what it heard, because it threw back its head, opened its jaws wide, and shot flames out into the void, until nothing could be seen except fire; then it was gone, and the mirror was just a mirror again.
Alex fell backwards onto the floor with a thump, and the candle extinguished, a thin stream of smoke rising into the air. Avery untangled her legs and crawled to him. She couldn’t have walked if her life had depended on it.
“Alex! Alex, are you all right?”
Fear gripped her like she’d never experienced before. It wasn’t like the terror of facing the Wild Hunt. This was something deeper, more personal. What had he done?
He stared vacantly at the ceiling for what seemed like endless moments, and Avery was aware of the deep silence around her. She reached forward, wanting to shake him, but knowing that might shock him too much. “Alex! Please speak to me.”
And then he blinked, the trancelike state leaving his eyes, and he turned his head towards her and smiled weakly.
“Thank the Goddess,” she whispered.
“Water,” he croaked.
She looked around, and Dylan’s hand appeared, thrusting a water bottle in her face. She took it and passed it to Alex, and after taking a deep breath, he eased himself upright and took a long drink, before finally meeting Avery’s stare. “Well, that was pretty fucking scary. Remind me not to meet Verrine again.”
Thankful he still had a sense of humour, Avery laughed, and the tension in the room dropped.
“Can I open these curtains?” Ben asked, his voice shaky. “I’d really like to see daylight.”
“Me, too,” Alex called over his shoulder. “Go ahead.”
“In a moment,” he answered. “I’ve just realised my legs won’t move.”
Avery raised her hand, twitching back the curtains with a gesture, revealing the three long windows backed by swirling snow. She then turned her attention to the fire, where the flames had burned down to embers only, and with a word, she reignited it.
Light and heat flooded the room, and Alex sighed.
“Please tell me you didn’t promise that thing anything?” Avery asked, fear coursing through her again as she remembered their exchange.
He smiled, her usual, adorable Alex, his jaw covered in stubble, his hair falling around his face, and his dark eyes holding her with warmth she never wanted to lose. “I’m not a nut job. He didn’t like the fact that I was talking to Madame Charron. Apparently some secrets should stay hidden. I was warned off, and told not to contact her again. I told him I’d do what I wanted and he could get lost. He didn’t like that.”
Relief rolled through her, and she felt weak all over again. Just as she was about to ask more, she heard the sound of thudding feet as if a herd of elephants was stampeding down the hallway, and the door flew open, Reuben standing at the head of the group. His hands were raised, fire balled in his palms. His eyes swept the room, and when he registered they were okay, he lowered his arms. “What the hell ha
ve you been doing? We heard a howl—and we were down in the cellar!”
“You got into the cellar?” Dylan asked, incredulous. “It’s out of bounds for us. What’s down there?”
“Necromancer shit. What have you been doing?”
“Raising demons,” Alex answered. “Do you think someone can make some coffee before we get into it?”
21
Avery leaned against the window frame, holding a hot cup of coffee, and watched the snow. In the last fifteen minutes, since Cassie had made coffee and tea and rustled up a pack of biscuits, the snowfall had become thicker, muting the outside world. Avery felt that some time in the last hour she had stepped back in time. The house was getting to her. Its layers of history and secrets lay on her spirit as thick as the snow on the ground.
She turned away, watching Briar lean against Hunter, his arm protectively wrapped around her. Hunter had returned to human form looking shocked and unsettled, his clothing ripped, and told them that the demon Verrine’s voice had literally forced the change to his wolf. “That has never happened to me before, and I hope it never happens again. That was horrible.”
“Are you sure you’re okay?” Briar had asked him, her eyes roving over him as if he was nursing a hidden injury.
“I’m fine. Lying in your lap was worth it.”
Briar had flushed with pleasure.
Avery allowed herself a smile. It was good to see Briar happy. She turned her attention to the roomful of people as they listened to Genevieve finish telling them what they had found in the attic.
El whooped. She was sitting next to Reuben, her short sword on the table next to her, glinting in the icy cold light from outside. “Well done! So we’ve found a way to open the hidden door.”
“In theory,” Caspian said in his low drawl. “The proof is yet to be found.”
As Genevieve finished pouring her second cup of tea, she said, “You better tell us what happened here, Alex.”
Alex was still sitting on the floor in front of the fire, sipping on super strength coffee. “I was going to try to reach Madame Charron with my crystal ball, as I said, but before I started, I decided to check the room again. I realised that the mirror had symbols all around the frame that reference doorways and safe passage. I had an idea that perhaps she used this mirror to talk to spirits. Mirrors are a popular way to enter the spirit world. I hoped this would be a hotline to her. I was right.” He paused, taking another sip of coffee. He still looked pale, as if the communication had taken much of his energy. “Within only a few minutes of me searching the void, I found her. It was as if she was waiting for me—well, someone. But she was nervous, her spirit flitting away and back again. Anyway, long story short, she confessed that she was told by her mother about how her family had arrived here from Romania, and how Grigore had built the house, and that there was a dark and terrible family secret. But she didn’t know what it was. She thought it was related to her own psychic abilities that had been passed down to her. Her mother and her daughter had them, too. She thought that maybe something had gone horribly wrong and that someone’s spirit was trapped in the void, so she decided to investigate, like a spiritual detective. She became frustrated with her failure, and in her effort to succeed, she reached too far. She found Verrine. He promised to help her.”
Verrine. Avery shivered again. His unintelligible, screeching voice still echoed in her head, and his appearance… She doubted she’d sleep well for a while.
Alex continued. “By then, Madame Charron was an accomplished medium, but she also embellished her séances by either toning them down or enhancing them, depending on the group. She was confident in her ability to manage spirit guides, and had used them before. But Verrine was different. He certainly didn’t present himself to her as he appeared to me. Not at first, anyway. He offered to show her the family’s dark secret, and he led her to Lupescu’s chained spirit—metaphorically speaking. He encouraged her to set him free, so she did.”
“And unleashed a monster,” Eve said. She sat at the table, watching Alex with fascination.
Genevieve edged forward in her seat. “So that’s how the witch did it. They chained his spirit. That would have meant separating it from his body.” She looked astonished. “That’s hard, dark magic.”
“And surely,” Caspian asked, also leaning forward in anticipation, “that means Madame Charron broke a spell, without having magical ability. As you said, she’s a medium, not a witch.”
“She broke it because Verrine helped her,” Alex explained. “I have no idea about this hierarchy of demons crap, or whether it really exists, but he’s powerful, able to transform himself into any feature he chooses. He saw what she needed and manipulated her. A witch chained Lupescu’s spirit, but he helped her break it.”
“So, Verrine couldn’t break it free on his own?” El surmised.
“Perhaps the original spell bound it to a family line. Maybe that’s why when Sofia died the spell remained, passing down the generations, until Evelyn broke it, and his dark and twisted spirit fled back to his body. And the deaths started.”
Jasper nodded solemnly. “Demons love chaos. They would love the chaos that a vampire would bring.”
“When did she realise what she’d done?” Avery asked.
“As soon as she released him. She saw Lupescu for what he was. From that point on, she had to try to find a solution.”
Dylan was sitting at the table, fiddling with his camera while he listened. “It took her a while, obviously—over a year, during which time Lupescu ran rampant.”
Alex nodded. “She had to find a witch to help her, and it wasn’t easy. Let’s face it—you can’t exactly advertise that sort of thing.”
Caspian asked the question that everyone was thinking. “Did one of our ancestors help her? And if so, why don’t we know about it?”
“White Haven again,” Eve suggested. “The witches that were isolated from the rest of the coven. There was no one to tell—except descendants.”
Alex, Reuben, and Avery all snorted, and Reuben said forcefully, “No one told us!”
Genevieve shuffled impatiently. “Did she tell you who she used, Alex? It may help us now.”
He grimaced. “No, I’m afraid not. But it was another sort of binding spell. They bound him to her, but she was bound to the house. And when she died, Lupescu was released and went on the rampage again until Felicity contained it. Don’t ask me any more details, because I don’t know them. I don’t know what Felicity did, or who with. She was about to tell me more—I asked about the hidden panel—but Verrine dragged her away before she could answer.”
Reuben started drumming his fingers on the table. “We can debate this later. Can we get on with opening this door?”
“Not yet,” Genevieve said, as everyone started to rise. “What did you find in the cellar?”
El answered that as she slid her short sword in to its scabbard. “A necromancer circle to summon spirits, and a demon trap. That’s why Rupert kept the door locked. It’s pretty fresh, drawn in chalk, salt circle and the works. We can show you later.”
“Good,” Genevieve said, rising to her feet. “Let’s get on with this, then. Grab whatever vampire-killing kit you need. This could get ugly.”
***
The group assembled in the tower room, and Avery pressed the moon symbol in the centre of the floor, depressing it by a couple of inches.
Nothing happened.
“Bollocks. What now?” she asked, looking around at the others.
“Maybe it’s a double mechanism?” Eve suggested. “You always need someone else to help.”
Jasper looked weary and frustrated as he rubbed his hands across his short hair. “Let’s check the other moon images again.”
“It’s pointless,” Cassie said, echoing his frustration.
“We haven’t checked the rising moon image of Death, have we?” Caspian pointed out as he strode to the panel. He examined the half-moon visible over the tower on the horizon,
and ran his fingers over the edge. He turned to them and grinned. They didn’t often see Caspian grin; it transformed him, making him look ten years younger. “Bingo. On the count of three, Avery? One, two, three!”
They both pressed the images together and with a loud click, the panel of The Moon swung outwards, revealing a passageway.
Whoops of joy filled the room, and Caspian rolled his shoulders and stepped inside first. “Here goes,” he murmured and threw a couple of witch lights ahead. “There’s a passage running between the panelling and the wall for a few feet, and then it disappears into the wall.”
They filed in after him, and he led the way through the musty, cobwebbed passage, dust rising around them. It was narrow, with just enough width for one person to pass comfortably. The wall was straight on one side, and the curved panelling lined the other. A dark opening appeared in the wall and they turned into it. Immediately, a set of steps appeared and ran downwards, turned left and then heading down again.
Caspian called back over his shoulder. “We must be next to the outside wall, and I think this goes directly to ground level.”
The stairs were steep, the steps small and slippery underfoot, and Avery started to sweat. It was hot in here, stuffy, and the dust kept rising, getting in her hair, her eyes, and up her nose. She sent a waft of air around them, and immediately felt better. Eventually, they reached a small landing on what they estimated was the ground floor, and the stairs turned again. Avery was now completely disorientated, unable to work out whether they were at the front, middle, or rear of the house. The air became damp and musty and Caspian stopped, causing everyone to stumble into each other.
“A little warning, please,” El grumbled.
“Sorry. I think we’re under the house now. We’ve reached a flat area.”