Witchcraft (#2 Witchblood Series) (4 page)

Suddenly I realised the wind had
stopped plastering my hair to the side of my face and stinging my
eyes. We had stopped. The odd and rather disconcerting thing was,
we had stopped hundreds of feet up in the air. Luke appeared to be
hovering, yet his wings didn’t flap like a bird of prey, nor did
they vibrate like a hummingbird. He simply hung in mid-air. I
gulped and tightened my grip around his neck, breathing in his
heavenly floral scent and trying to ignore the rushing feeling and
drumming in my ears, as my fangs started to break through the
surface of my gums.
Oh, shit!
I clamped my mouth shut.

‘
Jessie, we’re here, but no
doubt
he
will be waiting for
you when we land, so I just wanted to apologise again. I am truly
sorry I did this to you. I’m sorry I was weak,’ Luke
said.

‘
Right! So you’d prefer me to be
dead then? Is that it? I suppose it would be less hassle for you.
Luke, I’m glad you let Daniel save me. Okay, sometimes I wish I
could see Alex and sometimes things are tough, but it’s better than
being dead!’

‘
You don’t know what you’re
missing Jess, and that’s my fault.’

‘
No, you’re right I don’t, and
frankly I don’t need to know. But what I do know is that I wasn’t
ready to die, not then. I don’t think you were weak; I think you
were strong. You let Daniel save me, knowing it went against
everything you’d been taught, all because you loved me. What I
don’t understand is why that has to change now?’ I said.

‘
You’re right, you
don’t
understand and you never will,
and that is why everything has changed. You are one of them now.
You…’

‘
Oh, one of
them,
hey? God Luke, you’re so prejudiced. I’m
not evil, you know that. Hell, I’m not even a normal vampire.
Because of the witchblood genes I’m not even tied to them. I can do
what I want, make my own decisions, and you know I haven’t bitten
anyone,’ I said, my voice rising and echoing around the
clouds.

‘
That’s a lie! You may have kept
your willpower, but Sebastian has other ways of keeping you in
line, and you know it.’

‘
Sebastian’s a decent man. He’s
always been honest to me, which is more than you can offer! They
don’t kill people, Luke.’

‘
Jessie, are you so blind? What do
they drink? What do
you
drink?’

‘
Blood, I know, but people don’t
mind. They give it freely, and I’m not like them
anyway.’

‘
You’ve bitten Daniel, and it will
only be a matter of time before you bite someone else. It’s in your
blood.’

‘
How did you know about Daniel?
Are you spying on me? Ugh!’

‘
It doesn’t matter how I know, and
I don’t care. It was bound to happen. You can’t help
it.’

‘
I’m not the blind one here Luke,
it’s you! Take me down.’

‘
Of course.’

Maybe it was anger, or a desperate need
to be rid of me, or maybe angels always descended sickeningly fast
to avoid detection, but I was glad I didn’t have a full
stomach.

I expected us both to end in a crumpled
heap on the floor, but naturally Luke landed gracefully, and after
setting me back on my feet, he shot off into the clouds without a
backward glance. I must have really pissed him off! I stared up
after him, but even with my vampire vision, he was gone.

‘
Jessie! You’re back? Where is he?
Are you alright?’ Daniel said, as he came tearing out of the back
kitchen door and across the garden to me, which being a vampire
took all of about half a second! Luke was right, I thought with a
smile, Daniel
was
waiting.
He’d always be waiting for me.

‘
Now t
hat
is disgusting!’ Eva’s voice was right on cue,
half a second after Daniel!

I followed her eyes to my wrist, where
the bone was still jutting through the skin, my dark blood
congealed and the skin healed all around it. Oh dear! This was not
going to be good! Something told me I should have taken the witch’s
advice, got over my queasiness and fixed it straight away!

‘
Eva, leave her alone. Let’s get
you inside, we can fix your arm later. I take it Luke played
the
knight in shining armour
role nicely?’ Daniel muttered, daring me to tell him
otherwise.

‘
Um yeah, I suppose so. I was
doing all right on my own until the entire coven of witches turned
up, and then things got a bit tricky,’ I said, trying not to think
what would have happened if Luke hadn’t turned up, just as I was
about to have my first human snack!

I followed them back into the house and
stopped in the doorway. There was a woman sitting at the kitchen
table. She looked up at me expectantly as I entered the room, her
eyes a bright, twinkling emerald colour.

‘
Jessie, this is Francesca, a
member of the Malden coven,’ Daniel said.

‘
And if you’d done as we told you
and not answered the door, you would have met her a lot less
painfully,’ Eva added.

‘
Look, it wasn’t my fault. I’ve
got to answer the door one day, and as far as I knew, you were
meeting the coven representative at Exodus. Then Susannah turned
up, and said she was my cousin. She looked the part and knew all
about the meeting. She was really friendly. I could hardly leave
her waiting on the doorstep…’ I trailed off.

‘
You could have, and you should
have, and then we wouldn’t have to re-set your arm,’ Eva
said.

‘
Did you say the girl’s name was
Susannah?’ the woman named Francesca asked, her brow creased with
sudden worry.

‘
Yes,’ I said, nodding.

‘
It is not Jessie’s fault, I
think. Susannah
is
her cousin.
In fact her mother, your aunt, was supposed to be the
representative coming to meet you, but unfortunately no-one knew
that Susannah had defected to the Coven of the Blood Moon. She went
missing three nights ago, which is why your aunt sent me. They’re
still searching for her.’

‘
I think the angels took them
somewhere. Luke mentioned the council?’ I replied, looking to
Daniel for confirmation.

‘
Yes, they will have done,’ he
said. ‘I take it they wanted Jessie because they had heard of her
half-blood status?’

‘
Yes. Susannah had of course been
told all about Jessie, but I think there must have been another
reason too, for them to take such a risk,’ the witch
answered.

‘
The book. She wanted the book,’ I
said, looking to Eva.

‘
Don’t tell me you showed her the
book, after all I told you!’ Eva asked.

‘
I didn’t, but she asked to go to
the bathroom. I showed her where, and I came to phone you guys.
Then I found her in my room, staring at it,’ I said with a shrug.
There was no way Eva was going to blame me for everything. So, I’d
made a couple of mistakes, but I wasn’t as inept as she was making
out.

‘
Great! So after all I went
through to get that book for you, you go and give it to the worst
possible recipient you could find?’

Ahhh!
It
seemed my day was going to consist mostly of arguments. I looked to
Daniel, who stood silently watching us, and breathed in before
launching my defence.

‘
Is that how little you think of
me, Eva? Yes, she got the book. She sucked me into some kind of
vortex thing and I risked everything to save that book by jumping
out of what she called ‘ley lines’. That’s how I broke my arm. I
dislocated my shoulder too, but that went back,’ I added with a
retch as I remembered the sickening crack, when it clicked back
into place.

‘
You still lost it,’ she said with
a frown.

‘
I fought Susannah for it and won.
Then the head witch, I think her name was Carrigan, arrived and
electrocuted me, and yes, Luke and the other angels saved me. But
the book’s here, Eva,’ I said, pulling it from the waistband of my
jeans, where it had made bright red welts along my skin.

‘
And I suppose you think you
deserve a medal?’ Eva said, her frown transforming into a
single-browed glare.

I wasn’t sure which I preferred, anger
or sarcasm.

‘
Have you ever apologised to
anyone Eva?’ I said.

‘
No, I haven’t, and I don’t intend
to start now,’ she said, as she stepped towards me, took the book
and left the room.

‘
Wow! She’s got an attitude
problem,’ I mumbled, as I headed over to the fridge to get myself a
fresh blood pack to heat up.

As I crossed the room back to the table,
I noticed the witch’s eyes following me with interest.

‘
Why is she still drinking blood
packs? I thought only newborns were given those, until they’d
learnt some control?’ she asked Daniel.

‘
It’s her choice. She refuses to
feed like us, and as we told you at Exodus we have no direct
control over her mind, unlike other newborns,’ he
replied.

‘
She looks pale, different,’ she
added.

‘
Hello, I am here you know. Or
have I turned invisible all of a sudden?’ I asked
irritably.

‘
I’m sorry, how rude of me. Let me
introduce myself properly. I’m Francesca, as I said before, but you
can call me Franny. I’m a good friend of your aunt, your mother’s
younger sister, Sally. Sally is now the High Priestess of our
coven. The responsibility should have been your mother’s, but of
course we now know she ran away and married your father instead,
and sadly died in childbirth.’

‘
I’m sorry, I…’

‘
Child, it is not your fault;
never think that. Laurie would have known the risks she was taking,
having you at home and not seeking medical help.’

‘
But I never knew. I wasn’t told
any of it. I didn’t know anything until last month,’ I
said.

‘
It is all such a shame, but now
here you are, and we want to help you understand your new
heritage.’

‘
Right, so Sally is the High
Priestess and
her
daughter is
Susannah, the witch who tried to abduct me, and enrol me into the
dark coven - what was it called again?’ I asked.

‘
The Coven of the Blood Moon,’
Franny said, shaking her head. ‘I can’t believe Susannah would join
them freely. They must have her under a powerful charm.’

‘
I don’t know, she seemed pretty
sure of herself. She really wanted me to join…’ I said tailing off,
as I saw Daniel frown at me and ever so slightly shake his
head.

‘
Anyway, if my mother should have
been the High Priestess, what does that make me? My powers are
useless, and I’m only half witch anyway. Obviously my dad wasn’t a
witch or a wizard, or whatever.’

‘
The witch-blood is only passed
down through the female line anyway. Yes, there are Mages, who are
men with magical talents, but they are separate from us. Your power
will be weak because you are untrained and uninitiated, and I can
help you with the both,’ she added.

‘
Hey, hey, hold-up,’ Eva said,
barging back into the room. ‘Sebastian said she was not to leave
Manchester without his permission. She’s going nowhere.’

‘
Eva’s right. After this morning’s
sabotage attempt, I think it would be prudent for Jessie to stay in
the house. At least until we know she is under no further threat.
We can protect her here,’ Daniel said.

‘
Of course, that is what we
expected, which is why I have been given leave to stay on a week. I
can perform the initiation here and then help Jessie understand her
powers. I believe you have found the remaining family Book of
Shadows?’ She asked.

I looked to Eva before answering,
reluctant to earn her wrath yet again, but she nodded for me. After
all, Franny had already seen me hand it over.

‘
There had been rumour of a
powerful book of shadows being hidden in London for years. Maybe
Laurie brought it with her, and lost it or sold it, but I knew
someone who owed me a favour, and was capable of securing it for
me...

‘
The less said about that little
deal the better,’ Daniel interrupted darkly.

‘
I thought it could help Jess, but
I had no idea it belonged to her,’ Eva said.

‘
You are probably right. The book
did go missing around the same time as Laurie, so she possibly used
it as payment to secure her passage to Europe. Jessie, have you
noticed anything different about the book? How does it make you
feel?’ Franny asked, looking at me intently.

‘
Oh! Not you as well?’ Eva said.
‘It’s just a book, an old and rather unusual one I’ll grant, but
Jess is convinced it’s alive, strange girl.’

I shot Eva a wicked glare, and wished I
could summon up a spell to seal her big mouth shut.

‘
I do not! I just feel, well…’ I
really didn’t want to say how the book made me feel, as I knew it
made me sound completely wacko. Yet here was another witch, a
family member, asking me how the book made me feel, which was a
strange question in itself, so maybe I wasn’t so nuts after
all.