Ainsley held up a hand as if she were in class. “Remember when we talked about the shifter being strongest when it’s in mist form?”
“That was your theory, if I recall,” Sydney spat.
Ainsley continued as though Syd hadn’t said anything, “If we attack when it’s in human form, we might stand a better chance.”
“She’s right,” Langston said. “The mist is fast. It swooped in and attacked me before I had any chance to ready myself. If it’s in human form, it might be slower. You might be on more of an equal footing.”
Sydney grunted. Ugh. Why are they even listening to her? “First, we don’t know if the shifter’s supernatural energy is different based on what form it’s in. Second, there is no we, Ainsley. You can’t help; you have no magic.”
Langston gently moved Ainsley out of the way and stood face-to-face with Syd. “I don’t have magic anymore either, but I’m still going to do whatever I can. And so will Ainsley, so just fucking get off her back for once.”
Sydney narrowed her gaze at him; he’d never spoken like that to her before. “The minute she screws up, I’m throwing it in your face.”
“Great,” Jax said, clapping his hands with finality. “Now that we’re all squared away, can we go?”
Syd led them into the forest’s blackness, hoping the shifter didn’t show up. They needed this win. Once they had Saskia’s spells and the symbols, everything would be okay.
Langston turned his phone’s flashlight app on.
Syd grabbed his phone and turned it off. “No, the light might draw the shifter.”
Langston snatched it back. “You have a witch’s superior eyesight. Ainsley and I don’t.”
“Stay close and follow our steps. Your eyes will adjust to the moonlight soon.” Syd forged ahead, not waiting for a rebuttal.
They’d only walked for twenty minutes when Khourtney started complaining. “How much farther is it?” She hated anything active and considered moving from one end of the hot tub to the other a bonafide workout.
Sydney stared at her map. It shouldn’t be too far now. “We go straight until we see a large boulder. After that, we walk until there’s a break in the trees. There should be a fork in the path where we veer right and then a small clearing. Oswald said to look for headstones—large rocks actually. They have names and dates carved into them. Hers should be there somewhere.”
“Wow, this map sounds super accurate,” Justin retorted.
“It’s accurate,” Sydney snapped. She had no idea if it was. Oswald was going on lore passed down through the ages. Neither he nor she knew if any of it was true, if Saskia had ever really existed, or if she was buried in the forest. But they had no choice but to proceed as directed.
Ainsley hadn’t uttered a peep during the entire hike. The middling had to be scared shitless. They all were.
A fork appeared in the path in front of them.
“What's that?” Justin asked in a panicked tone.
Syd stopped short, her breath seizing in her throat. She stiffened, listening. “What?” she asked, doing her best to downplay her own alarm. The trees rustling around them sounded like static in her ears. Then she saw the deer’s carcass. Its black eyes stared out at them, a splattering of fresh blood on its cheek.
“Its chest has been ripped open!” Khourtney cried before covering her eyes and turning away. Syd realized it was the first time Khourt had seen one of the corpses.
To her surprise, Ainsley walked closer, even kneeling next to the eviscerated animal. “All the organs are gone, just like the others.” She put her sleeve over her nose and grabbed a nearby stick, proceeding to lift a flap of skin away from the animal’s chest. Ainsley lowered the skin and tossed the stick aside before standing back up. “I don’t think it’s been dead long. The blood is still wet, and the poor thing still has its eyes, which means the other animals and insects haven’t had a chance to get to it yet.”
“Or something interrupted the shifter before it finished eating,” Jax said. “Like us.”
The thought that it could be close, maybe even watching them, made the fine hairs on the back of Sydney’s neck and arms stand up. She couldn’t help but look over at Langston. His mouth twisted in a near grimace, his fists ready at his sides. She wondered if the others noticed the slight quaking in his legs.
“It was here not long ago,” Ainsley said softly.
“We have to keep going; we’re very close. It won’t be so stupid as to attack all of us,” Sydney said, although it was all bravado and hope.
“Unless it wants me—to finish what it started.” Langston stared down at the corpse.
“It’s not getting anyone,” Jax said, his tone authoritative.
“Come on,” Justin said. “Hanging out around its kill is dangerous. We need to keep moving.”
They trudged on, Syd reminding herself that it wouldn’t be long now. Just a little farther. Her insides fluttered as she scanned the pathway, praying they wouldn’t stumble over anything else. She’d seen enough mutilated animals for ten lifetimes.
She glanced down at her map one last time. “It should be up here, to the right.”
No one spoke. Since finding the deer, there had been no more mention of how tired anyone was. No one asked how much farther they had to walk. Sydney guessed that no one wanted the shifter to hear them.
A row of medium-sized boulders stretched across the ground in front of them. “Those must be the headstones.” Sydney picked up speed, her belly turning over slightly as she got closer. “Quick, everyone check names.”
The only way to see the worn etchings was going to be by using their flashlight apps. Time and the elements had weathered the stones to the point that the writing was indecipherable in places. “Do it as fast as possible, and then turn them off,” Syd directed as she crouched in front of the first headstones. She saw a Michael, a Jonathon, a Mary, and someone with the last name of Pearson, whose first name was unreadable.
She saw Ainsley out of the corner of her eye, bending down and wiping a thin deposit of snow from the front of a broken headstone. “I think I’ve got something,” she called out.
“Of course,” Sydney muttered, “the middling to the rescue again.” But Syd raced over with the others, anyway. Her legs, sluggish from the combination of cold, the long walk, and her exhaustion protested.
“Did you know Saskia’s last name?” Ainsley asked with a bewildered note to her voice. She was kneeling on the snowy ground, her fingers tracing the poorly etched name. Getting no reply, she turned to face Sydney. “It says Lockwood. Is Saskia your ancestor?” Her voice was equal measures of shock and dismay.
Syd felt the blood drain from her face, and the clearing begin to spin. “Lockwood?” she asked in disbelief. Her intuition felt six pairs of eyes on her at once. She hadn’t known this. Oswald had failed to mention this rather gigantic detail—unless he hadn’t known either.
“What’s going on, Sydney?” Justin asked impatiently. “What’s the deal?”
“I don’t know. Nothing. I mean, I had no idea what her last name was. Oswald just said her name was Saskia.” She crouched down next to Ainsley, getting as close as possible to the tombstone. “Are you sure?” She inspected the letters and saw it illuminated under her flashlight’s beam:
Saskia Lockwood Born 1556 Died 1593
Beloved daughter, wife and mother
Syd dropped further onto the cold, hard ground. Her vision darkened until she saw nothing but a blur.
Langston’s voice came from behind her. “Maybe we should keep checking, look at every stone, just to be sure.”
“Yeah, I bet Saskia was a really popular name back then,” Jax quipped.
“There’s got to be a mistake,” Justin said. “We should keep looking.”
Sydney wheeled around in her seated position, facing him with clenched fists. “Is it so impossible for you to believe that I descend from a powerful witch? My mother is High Priestess if you’ve forgotten. I already come from gr
eatness. This is just more evidence.” The words flew bitter off her tongue.
Sydney knew she sounded like a bitch, full of fear and insecurity, but she was sick of being undermined—especially by Justin. He was supposed to be her best friend, but he’d begun to feel like her adversary.
“Nobody is saying you’re not a great witch, Syd,” Langston said. His words pulled her back. Despite what she’d done to him, he was still protecting her, still making sure she was okay. He squatted down and put his arm around her, rubbing her back in small circular motions.
“It can’t be a coincidence that this Saskia shares the Lockwood name,” Ainsley said with an authority she didn’t have.
“You don’t need to defend me,” Sydney spat.
“Oh my God, you’re unreal,” Justin barked back, shaking his head. “If it weren’t for her, we wouldn’t have the invocation in the first place.”
Justin’s words stung to her core. They’d never been at odds like this before, not before Ainsley showed up. A middling was changing everything between them, and he didn’t care.
Steeling herself, she said, “Whatever, let’s do the spell.” She’d deal with him when this was all over, and everyone was safe.
Jax and Ava dropped their bags on the ground in front of Saskia’s name. Langston pulled out the grimoire and moved next to them.
It was time for her to take charge again. “We need to draw the pentagram and sit around the circle, one of us at every point.” Syd shooed everyone away and traced the symbol into the snow. She held out her hand toward Ava, “Candles.”
Ava rifled through her bag and pulled out six large, white pillar candles, handing them to Syd and Jax. They placed five on the points of the star and set the sixth in the center.
The wind was still, but the air was chilling—a heavy blanket of icy dampness. Sydney did her best to calm her nerves, so she could help Jax lead the spell. Her mind raced and blanked in turn, the way it did when under pressure in the Main Hall. But the consequences tonight could be far worse than a negative mark in testing.
Jax emptied the rest of the bags, lining materials up in between them. They needed the power of candlelight, so she closed her eyes, moved her hand across the space in front of her, and heard the soft whoosh of wicks igniting. She told Khourtney and Jax to do a quick protection spell around them, just in case the shifter decided to make an appearance. There was no way she could let anything happen while they were communing with Saskia.
“You did that?” Ainsley said, sounding very much in awe.
Sydney ignored this. Ainsley’s delayed respect wasn’t welcome. She gathered the spell’s ingredients, while Jax retrieved his mortar and pestle. Langston helped her add the grave root, salt, wormwood, willow, and yew. “Now grind them together while saying the spell. Jax will lead.”
While the others began repeating the mantra, Sydney moved to the middle of the pentagram and sat cross-legged in front of the candle. She took the mortar from Jax and the grimoire from Langston. “Everyone hold hands and don’t break the chant.”
They did as told, included Ainsley, who also sat along the circle. Syd noticed the wind picking up dramatically. It was working. Taking a small trowel, she forced it into the rigid earth directly in front of the headstone. It took effort since the ground was cold and hard, but she managed to get a good-sized chunk to spring forth and dropped the dirt into the mixture. She could see just enough with the candlelight to read the spell and began the incantation as the others continued their rhythmic chant.
The flames flickered, casting shadows and making the forest look malevolent, a fact she quickly shoved from her mind.
Closing her eyes, she noted the way her body grew warm, and she allowed the heaviness of the Dark magic to build up inside her. It was an urgent pressure—like something beneath the layers of her bones and muscles wanted to break free. She fought the urge to release it, repeating the chant instead. A sudden gust whipped around them, shaking the tree branches overhead and dropping snow all around them.
It was time for the last ingredient. Grasping a small knife that had been bathed in holy water, she sliced the palm of her hand and released a small trickle of blood into the mortar. Blood was the key. A sacrifice was needed to unlock the space between the two astral planes. Since she now knew that Saskia was her ancestor, Sydney felt sure her blood would guarantee a connection.
The center of the mortar burst into flames. The screech of an owl circling overhead made her breath hitch. Fighting the compulsion to cover her ears, Sydney kept her palms open at her sides. “Per lux spirituum, et invocabo Lockwood et deprecati sunt ei Cornelius, et exaudi nos vocatio ad evigilare faciatis!”
Her heartbeat quickened as the words left her mouth. Sydney’s body grew stiff, her skin slick with sweat. The air around them began churning so loudly, they could’ve been in a hurricane. Her hair whipped, hitting her face and obscuring her view. The flames and the blaze in the mortar burst into massive fireballs before going out, leaving them all in hushed blackness.
Chapter 12
Ainsley
The fire had illuminated the entirety of the forested area around them before pitching them into darkness. Ainsley gasped, her muscles caught in a twist of fatigue and anxiety. “What’s happening?” she said, her words barely registering beyond a whisper.
Instantaneously, the candle wicks glowed again with a steady flame, their warm radiance allowing Ainsley to see the others. Her eyes trailed around their circle, stopping when she noticed a translucent figure hovering above Sydney’s head. She jerked back, trying to wrench her hands out of Justin and Ava’s.
A dark-haired woman floated above them. Saskia. “Um, guys,” she began. It came out as little more than a hoarse whisper, so Ainsley pointed at the apparition with her chin.
Justin and Ava glanced up and let go of her hands.
Justin nodded, whispering, “I see her. It’s okay.”
Ainsley kept her eyes on the floating woman. She didn’t look the way Cassidy had, hanging in space. This was more ethereal, almost angelic. It was beautiful. Saskia appeared confused, unsure where she was or even that they had summoned her.
Sydney quickly wrapped her bleeding hand in a handkerchief and gained her feet. “Thank you for coming,” she said in a frail voice that Ainsley didn’t recognize.
“It was not my decision.” The ghostly woman wore a white dress that billowed out around her, her long hair floating away from her head like someone suspended underwater.
Images of Cassidy flashed in Ainsley’s mind. The way her hair had stuck out around her, too, the sickly way her mouth stretched open. Then Cassidy was replaced by her father’s pleading eyes that last night on the rooftop.
Saskia’s sharp voice broke Ainsley’s hypnotic state.
“Who are you, and why have you awakened me from my eternal rest?” Her mouth formed a thin line, her skin transparent with a bluish tint to it. Ainsley suspected it was the shade a new corpse might take.
Ainsley held her breath and looked between Sydney and Saskia, attempting to gauge what would happen next.
Sydney nearly curtsied. “I apologize for disturbing you, but we need your help. It’s a matter of life and death.” She kept her shoulders back and her hands steady, but Ainsley saw the mild tremor beneath the handkerchief that was staunching her blood.
Justin stood slowly with his hands up in surrender. “We’re truly sorry we had to call on you.”
“Call on me?” Saskia’s head moved from side to side so quickly it appeared like a glitch on a video game. “Whose blood was used to summon me?” She glared at them all, one by one.
Ainsley’s felt frozen in place, barely breathing. What if Saskia wouldn’t help them? Worse, what if she punished them for conjuring her spirit? Maybe Justin was right, and this was considered a mortal sin on both sides of the deathly plane.
Everyone looked at Sydney, who stepped forward. “Mine. It was my blood, but please understand—”
Saskia raised a tran
slucent hand. At once, Sydney grasped at her throat. She struggled, clearly trying to speak but unable to get the words out. Only small scratching sounds escaped from her mouth.
“Our people forbid necromancy, yet here I am called by the blood of my own. You are from my lineage, I can feel it. How dare you use magic as this to wrench me back onto this Earth!”
Sweat beaded on Ainsley’s forehead and upper lip, her body trembled. The others seemed equally flustered. “It was,” she choked out the words, “my idea.” The words hung there, unable to be called back. What would the ancient witch do to her now?
Saskia’s stare left Sydney, and she retracted her hand, her eyes narrowing onto Ainsley. Sydney clutched her throat and sucked in gulps of air. Saskia glided over, pausing in front of Ainsley.
“You?” she asked. “But you are no witch.”
A prickling sensation began in Ainsley’s stomach and moved down her arms and legs. “What are you doing? Stop it,” she called out. Shivers ran from the top of her head, down her spine, out her arms, and down her legs as the dead witch examined her.
“But you are something,” Saskia said in confusion, before releasing whatever magic she’d used on her. “Although I have no idea what.”
Ainsley collapsed forward, letting out a huge breath as she tried to steady herself in spite of her spotty vision. She’d never experienced anything like that before. Dark, bitter cold prickled so deep inside her that she wondered if death itself were near. She never wanted to feel it again.
Sydney cleared her throat, doing her best to regain Saskia’s focus. “Most revered Ancestor, you must know that if we, the apprentices of your ancient and eternal coven, call for you, it is not in haste.”
Ainsley had never heard Sydney use such a tone or language before, but maybe it would help Saskia relate to them better.
Sydney put her hand over her heart. “We come seeking your help. I’ve made a huge error. I stumbled upon the underground room—the one that held a shapeshifting entity.” Her eyes shifted from Saskia to the ground. Shame dulled her features. “I didn’t know what it was, and I didn’t understand the symbol on the door, so I opened it.” She closed her eyes, sighed. “I’m afraid the shifter is once again loose.”
Wilde Abandon (Ashcroft Academy Book 3) Page 9