Treasures, Demons, and Other Black Magic (31 page)

I scrubbed my foot along the coarse salt at the entrance. Scarlett gasped. Yeah, that was lazy of me, but I was pretty sure — seeing how the blood beyond was pouring over the edges of the pentagram — that whatever spell Sienna had worked was finished here.

The putrid smell of Sienna’s dark magic, now released to linger in the air, turned my stomach.

“I think the salt was to anchor the damping spell,” I finally said. “If we looked for it, I’d guess there’s an outer ring as well, around the clearing.”

“The spell inside?” Scarlett prompted.

I shook my head. “I don’t know. Not only witch magic, I don’t think. And she didn’t kill all these people for a dampening spell. The pentagram isn’t sealed. I assumed that meant the spell had been completed, but maybe we interrupted her?”

“I’ll get a necromancer to look at it,” Scarlett said.

“No!” I cried.

Scarlett laid her hand on my arm and tugged me away from the door. Desmond stepped over to talk to Audrey.

“I didn’t mean Mory,” Scarlett said. “I just meant your Gran and Danica should take a look. If it’s not solely witch magic … or sorcerer, as far as I can tell.”

“No,” I answered. “It’s Sienna’s magic. It’s chaos unleashed.”

Scarlett was still stroking my arm. Usually her magic soothed me, but it didn’t now. Perhaps I didn’t want to be soothed.

“She can’t come back from this … killing humans,” I whispered. “This many people can’t go missing from Tofino without an explanation …”

“You didn’t think … Jade. My Jade …” Scarlett’s voice caught. “You didn’t think Sienna could be saved?”

I shook my head and stepped away from my mother. But yes, deep in my heart I had still hoped … utterly stupidly, utterly blindly hoped.

Audrey had crossed to the shapeshifters. They tightened their ring until they were gathered around her. If I was an artist, I would have been struck by the dangerous beauty of the scene. A naked woman surrounded by predators.

But I wasn’t an artist.

I turned to Mory, whose eyes were dark saucers on her too-pale face. She had the fingers of both hands twined through her necklace, as I normally would have myself.

But I didn’t. My necklace and knife weren’t the kind of shield my raw soul needed now. Such a balm didn’t exist.

Just as Sienna’s magic shouldn’t exist.

Just as I — born of witch and guardian dragon — shouldn’t exist.

“No ghosts, Jade,” Mory whispered as I crossed to her.

“Could they have passed over?” I asked, hopefully.

“No,” Mory moaned. “I mean, not the shades, not from such a violent death. We should ask my mom … but no.”

I looked back at the hut. Scarlett was working magic — creating some sort of shield around herself in order to step inside. The blue of her magic illuminated the stains on the floor, running over the edges of the pentagram and soaking into the dry wooden slats …

Oh, God. Damn it, Rusty. The ghost of Mory’s brother had led us to the biggest concentration of Sienna’s magic that he could feel. Sienna herself could block him, but not while she was expending large amounts of magic. Such as the amount it would have taken to perform the sacrifice in the hut. I guessed dampening spells were only effective against the living, not shades or ghosts. Though the ward had kept Rusty out of the hut itself.

“Tell your mom about there not being any ghosts here,” I said.

Mory nodded and chewed her lip.

“Now, Mory. Call her now!”

I looked down at Kandy, who was still in wolf form at Mory’s side. She obviously wasn’t subject to Audrey’s orders, and hadn’t gathered around the werewolf with the other shapeshifters. “And stay with Kandy.”

“What?” Mory cried. “Why Jade?” The fledgling had her phone to her ear.

Desmond, Scarlett, and Audrey turned to look at us.

“She’s already completed the sacrifice. Maybe only moments before we got here,” I said to no one in particular. “With the knife, you understand? She’s completed the sacrifice, and she has what she needs to activate it. Maybe in the knife or tied to the spear. It’s a two-part spell.”

Then I turned and ran into the forest, back toward the beach, knowing I was too late.

Again and again. Always too late to stop Sienna.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

I ran, heedless of the undergrowth blocking my way or the branches scraping my face. I ran, not bothering with the path, not bothering with direction, knowing, knowing, that any second, any breath, I would taste Sienna’s magic. It would rise up and overwhelm me. But I would fight.

It was never going to be any other way.

I lengthened my stride until my legs burned — not with pain, but with magic. The shapeshifters were behind me, moving as one unified force. The witches were mixed among them, and the necromancers were already ahead of me … perhaps still in the parking lot.

Magic flared along a long line to my left. For a moment, I saw it warp through the thick cedar trees. Someone behind me screamed — a witch, I thought, but I didn’t stop. I corrected my course to follow this thick line of death magic — all blood and earth and dankness. It — as I had feared — was a delayed spell tied back to the park ranger’s hut. Sienna had gained that ability in England somewhere, by killing a witch named Azure Dunkirk. It seemed important to remember such things now, instead of being constantly surprised by everything happening around me.

This was the path I was walking now. There was no denying it any longer.

Well, I was running, actually.

The forest broke open before me. The night wasn’t as dark now, though nothing had actually changed. Nothing except me … fundamentally me …

I crossed the highway in two strides. A stand of trees, maybe fifty feet across, was all that stood between me and the seething mass of magic I could now feel on the beach.

Dense peppermint magic bloomed to my right and then barreled into me. I twisted off my feet and slammed into — actually, slammed through — a cedar tree. It cracked and snapped in half. I tumbled, throwing my hands out to slow myself. I dug troughs through the earth and ferns and cedar needles, ending up elbows deep before I stopped.

“I taught you to fall better than that,” a cool voice whispered from right next to me.

I pushed up off the ground, spun in midair, and came up to my feet holding a blond, too-pale, blue-eyed vampire by the neck.

His magic was different. It didn’t dance in his skin any longer. It still tasted of peppermint but it was richer and darker now, and the other spice that had always eluded me was more present. His eyes were rimmed in red, his fangs longer than before.

“You can’t barrel into this fight alone, alchemist,” he said. “You’re always running for trouble rather than away.” Then he laughed. Or, rather, he gurgled, as I was still holding him aloft by his neck.

“Kett,” I whispered. “Not dead?” Yeah, I had my Captain Obvious hat on.

I set him down on his feet but didn’t loosen my hold on his neck. What with the red eyes and fangs, I wasn’t an utter idiot.

The shapeshifters fanned out behind and around us, hidden within the trees but near. I could also sense that the necromancers had moved to join the witches.

Kett tilted his head, thinking. “More dead, perhaps,” he said. I couldn’t tell by his tone if this secondary reincarnation was a bad thing or not. “You look … appalled, alchemist.”

“I … I saw …”

“Yes.”

“I felt …”

“Yes. I shall miss the life debt bond as well.” He grinned. The expression was so utterly human on his completely inhuman face. “Did you really try to feed me your blood, Jade?”

I felt his breath brush across my cheek and ear … damn, he was faster than before.

I wrapped my arms around his shoulders before he could step away again. I pressed a kiss to his lips. He was like holding cold marble. His lips were unyielding. He brushed his fingers through my hair, and something broken in me healed.

“With or without the bond, I’ll always be able to find you, Jade Godfrey,” he whispered against my lips, answering my unasked question.

“I’m glad you’re alive,” I said, still clutching his shoulders. I was slightly worried now that he was just an apparition.

He raised an eyebrow. His fangs were nowhere in sight suddenly.

“Okay,” I said. “ ‘Alive’ might be the wrong word. I’m glad you’re here.”

“You saved me from the true death a second time, warrior’s daughter. My master prevailed on her maker to bequeath his blood, but only after she named my connection to you. As your friend …” — Kett laughed as if amused by the idea — “… I am valuable to the Adept. Not just vampires. Not just the Conclave.”

“Because I’m an alchemist or because I’m half-dragon?”

“Both,” Kett answered. “Shall we renew the life debt?” He nodded toward the beach.

He was joking. More than just his magic had undergone a transformation.

I threw my head back and laughed. It was completely inappropriate timing, but I needed to laugh … or to cry.

“You hightail it off into the forest without an explanation,” Desmond said as he stepped through the trees. “And I follow, only to find you wrapped around a vampire.”

This statement — as much as Desmond’s utterly disgruntled tone — reinforced my laughing fit. Kett joined me.

“I thought you were barreling into a shitload of trouble —” Desmond said

“She was,” Kett interrupted. He turned toward the beach, loosening my hold on him. I figured that if Desmond could see him, then he was real. I let him go.

“The black witch has triggered a rather elaborate spell on the beach,” Kett said.

“You don’t have to sound so impressed, vampire,” Desmond muttered.

Desmond and I followed him through the trees until we had a view of the shoreline, but were still sheltered by the forest.

I looked out at the scene Sienna had once again constructed. The rest of the shapeshifters, witches, necromancers, and skinwalkers gathered behind and beside us. No one spoke. We were beyond the planning stages, the gathering of information. It was time to react, and hope that, combined, our individual skills prevailed.

Sienna was standing on a jut of rocks a few feet out into the surf. The tide was lower now. As far as I could see, she was simply standing on a rock, holding the native spear above her head and chanting. No pentagram, no book.

Magic churned in the ocean all around her. Blood — her own — streamed down from her slashed forearms. The sacrificial knife was stuck in a belt that rode low across her hips. She wore a simple calf-length black dress. Her legs, arms, and feet were bare. Every vein in her body stood out black against her pale skin.

Kett shifted to my left. Desmond stood on my right and slightly behind. The shapeshifters — most of them already in half-beast form — spread out around us.

Scarlett stepped up to my shoulder. I didn’t look away as she murmured, “The necromancers say she has the souls somehow trapped above her. Dozens of them. Mory is having trouble keeping Rusty from answering her summons.”

Shit.

“She’s fueling the spell with the souls of all the people she murdered in the hut?”

“And everyone she’s ever killed. You were right. The necromancers will try to disrupt this connection. The skinwalkers will guard them as they cast. The witches will provide shielding …”

“And we’ll barrel through,” I said.

“Yes, but —”

“It’s okay. That’s what I do best.”

“The shapeshifters and the vampire will get you through. And you … you will …”

“Try to get past her shields.”

“Yes. I love you, Jade.”

I turned and met my mother’s gaze. Our indigo eyes were the same color, but hers shone bright with witch magic.

“I love you, mom.”
 

Scarlett nodded and turned away. Her movements were stiff, as if her limbs wanted to be doing anything but walking away.

I looked back through the shapeshifters and sought my Gran’s gaze. She looked stern, reaching for Scarlett’s hand and adding her daughter’s power to the linked line of witches. A tall witch with light brown hair had a nasty cut on her cheek. I gathered she’d been the one who’d screamed in the forest when the delayed spell snapped into place, but she didn’t falter now. None of us could falter now, not with what was happening on the beach.

Dark magic literally boiled the water around Sienna, turning the white surf black in the moonlight. I couldn’t feel or taste the energy she drew from, but I could imagine what the necromancers saw. The trapped, tortured souls of Sienna’s victims coiled around my sister’s head.
 

“We have to go,” I whispered.

“Not yet,” Kett said. “We wait for the witches.”

I unsheathed my sword, bringing the two-and-a-half-foot blade up over my shoulder and in front of me.

“We stay in formation,” Kett called out. “The alpha here, me here, and Kandy just behind the alchemist. No one steps in front of the warrior’s daughter. Protect her on both sides at all cost. We move across the beach as one.”

I glanced back at Desmond, waiting for some growled retort about being ordered around by a vampire. He simply grinned at me, and — in a flash of explosive magic — transformed into his half-beast form.
 

“Hello, McGrowly,” I said. “Fancy meeting you here.”

McGrowly chuckled. It was a terribly unpleasant sound, which probably scared every small animal within hearing range to death.

Naked, Kandy wrapped her arm around my neck from behind. She must have transformed out of her wolf form somewhere in the forest, maybe in order to carry Mory. With a hug that would have choked a human, she pressed a kiss to my temple. I squeezed her arm with my free hand and she let go.

A rush of magic flashed behind me — all bitter chocolate and berries — and Kandy transformed into her half-beast form. McGrowly grunted, impressed. I guess he didn’t know Kandy had been practicing.

I could feel the witch magic now, first seeping along the ground at our feet and then slowly rising up in front of me. They were creating a shield. Impressive, but I wasn’t sure how long it would hold against the putrid, boiling magic I could taste from fifty feet away across the beach.