Fatal Allure Collection

by Woods, Martha

  “Hello,” I say.

  “Amy,” she says, her voice void of any emotion. “They’ve got Damon.”

  “What?”

  “The Sisters. They took Damon last night,” she says.

  Chapter 14

  My head starts to spin as I take in her words. All of those feelings I thought were over and done with come crashing over me like a tidal wave. The Sisters have Damon. He is either going to become their slave or be dead if he isn’t already. I try to picture Damon laid out on a table as a buffet for a vampire and just can’t. The image is too painful. I close my eyes tight as I feel my heart clench. Here I’ve been flirting with a vampire while he’s been out trying to save the world from their evil.

  “Why are you telling me this?” I ask softly.

  “Because I thought you would want to know,” Faye says. She isn’t accusing in her words. She’s quiet on the phone, letting me soak everything in. A part of me wants to hang up on her, but I can’t.

  “I think you can help,” she tells me finally.

  “I thought I helped enough by making him care for me,” I snap.

  “That wasn’t particularly helpful, no, but now that they’ve got him his feelings for you are irrelevant,” Faye says.

  “Is he alive?”

  “I think he is. Tristian believes him dead. It’s easier for them to believe that he is dead than to think of him being a blood slave for the undead,” Faye says. “They believe that no hunter can fall under a vampire’s seductive spell.”

  “I can’t picture Damon falling under their spell. Don’t you ward all of them against that?”

  “I do, but I think that was weakened when I made him forget you,” Faye says. Her tone changes, she’s become tender. Apparently, she doesn’t like it when her spells don’t go according to plan.

  “Can you come to the shop?” she asks.

  “I can. Why do you need me?”

  “I need another witch. I need someone who believes me that Damon is alive,” she says. “Are you ready to be Awakened?”

  I close my eyes. I am already being plagued by James’s ghost. If I’m Awakened what else will I see? I’m already accidentally slipping into Vincent’s mind. If I do that fully where will that put me with the vampires? But it’s Damon. I can’t leave him to the Sisters. Wasn’t I just telling Vincent I wanted to stake them so I could be back in Damon’s arms? Could a person’s feelings really change that fast or is it vampire magic that is clouding my judgment? So many questions and nothing is really clear.

  “I’ll be there,” I say.

  “Just come into the shop. The door will open to you,” Faye says. “I’ll prepare.”

  “Do you need me to bring anything?” I ask.

  “Bring a blade, a silver blade,” she says. “Oh, and leave a note for your vampire. I don’t want him showing up at my shop. You won’t be seeing him tonight.”

  “Wait, how did you—?”

  “Amy, you can’t hide things from me. It’s all in the cards.”

  Right. “I’ll see you in an hour,” I say.

  Faye hangs up the phone. So much for hiding things from her, but at least she didn’t sound like she was damning for my choices. I go into my bedroom and retrieve the long silver knife that Damon gave me. It is blessed; it will cut through vampire flesh as if it were just putty. I haven’t ever used it, but Damon was able to describe what it does in excellent detail. Vampires have the strength, but hunters have the weapons.

  I leave a brief note to Vincent, not actually explaining everything. I only tell him I’ll be out, not to follow me, and that I would see him the following evening. I’m not sure it is enough to keep him off my trail, but a girl can try. I walk out the door and think of Damon’s empty apartment. If he survives all of this – hell, if I survive all of this – I wonder if we can go back to the way things were. I try to remember how happy I was, but that feels so distant, so far away. I still crave his arms around me, but I crave something else as well. I touch my neck and wonder if he could be with me if I’ve been with a vampire, or if that has somehow tainted me in his eyes.

  As I drive to Faye’s shop, I wonder what this whole ceremony of Awakening will entail. Is she going to sacrifice some chickens over my head and make me drink the blood? I should have asked her more questions. I’m not really down for animal sacrifices. I find myself speeding to get there and slow down. I really shouldn’t be hurrying to this, but I feel a tremendous sense of urgency. I look up at the sun high in the sky and realize I’m racing time. I don’t know how long this ritual will take, but I want it done before the sun goes down.

  When I pull up to Faye’s shop, there is a closed sign out front. I touch the door and feel the lock give as I push it open. I walk inside, the smell of sage almost assaulting all my senses. The door locks by itself behind me and I jump. I guess she wasn’t kidding about the door only opening for me.

  “Faye?” I call out.

  “In the back,” she says. “Come on back here. Leave your shoes and socks by the door.”

  I take off my boots and socks, letting my bare feet touch the ground. As soon as my feet touch the wood I feel the energy flow into me I didn’t know was there. It is different from the vampire blood. Instead of seeing things that are there more acutely, I’m seeing energy – the forces that surround us every day that we can’t see. I hold tightly to the blade that Faye has told me to bring, feeling the metal in my hand and reminding myself exactly what is real. It takes a moment for me to get a hold of reality. I look around to see if James is there, but since I’ve talked to Faye, he hasn’t bothered me. Then again, the spirits before only came out at certain times, mainly at night when I was sleeping.

  I walk behind the counter and through the beads that lead to the back of Faye’s shop and where I assume she lives. It’s a two-story building, but I’ve never been any further than the front of the store. It takes a moment for my eyes to adjust the pitch-blackness of the room. Faye is sitting in the middle of a chalk circle. Five candles are glowing, and I see they form a pentagram on the floor – made out to be the symbol of Satan by some Christians but actually just a pagan sign. Faye looks up from the bowl where she is mashing together some herbs. The smell of sage is even stronger in here. Behind her is an old wooden chair that looks like it is straight out of an old fairy tale. The wood has a silver shine to it, and there are vines around it that almost look alive.

  “You’ve picked up an extra spirit,” Faye says to me. I look at her, she's clothed in black as usual. This time, it is a full out black dress that has a hood she has pulled over her head. She looks like a scary witch tonight; her eyes are even glowing. I swallow hard.

  “Yeah, I’m hoping to find a way to make him disappear.”

  “You’re not going to be his vengeance.”

  “He’s not the type of person who deserves that,” I say.

  Faye nods her head, not arguing that point, and motions me to sit in the chair. I take a seat, and the vines come alive, moving over my hands and legs, keeping me seated. There are no thorns on them, but I feel them hold fast. I try to struggle against them, but I can’t move; fear begins to creep up through my veins. I drop what I was holding.

  “What is this?” I say, my voice not sounding as strong as I would like it to.

  “I can’t have you trying to run until the ceremony is over,” Faye says calmly as she goes back to crushing the herbs. I see her add some sort of liquid to her brew.

  “What’s going to happen to me?” I ask.

  “I’m not entirely sure. I don’t know what your full power is. Each witch is different. Sometimes we are called different things. Mediums, fortune tellers, psychics or simply crazy. We are just humans that have been touched by magic for some reason. Some of us are Christian, Muslim, Jewish. It isn’t really a religion. It is just a way of being. My power is to see the past, the present, and the future – sometimes all at the same time. It is why I don’t like to leave my shop.” She turns to meet my gaze. I’m trying t
o relax into the chair, but it’s hard. “You don’t see any of those things.”

  “I see the dead,” I say. I don’t know if I want to tell her I see so much of the dead I can actually find myself inside the head of a vampire, granted I imagine that Faye already knows this.

  “I know,” she says.

  “Am I going to be able to cast spells or something when you Awaken me?” I ask.

  “I can teach you spells if you would like. Your future is foggy to me, I can only tell things with you for the most part when they have come to pass. That’s how it is with most witches I have encountered,” Faye says. She stands slowly and faces me. “Are you ready?” she asks.

  I’m not. I don’t think there is a way to actually prepare for something like this. It is strange enough to find out I am little outside the realm of normal and even more terrifying to dive into it fully. Thoughts are flashing through my mind faster than I can hold onto them, and the vines seem to increase their hold on me.

  “I don’t know how I can help when I’m Awakened,” I say.

  “I don’t either. The cards just tell me it is time,” she replies.

  Then she begins to speak in a language I don’t understand. The candles start to flare to life and I feel something inside of me begin to force itself out. The center of my head feels like it is on fire, or like there is something trying to wiggle its way from inside my skull and out into the open. I let out of a cry of pain and I start to struggle more as Faye comes closer. My adrenaline is pumping. I feel a cold sweat break out across my skin. Faye dips her finger into the brew she has been making and rubs it on the center of my head and the pain explodes. All I can see is white light everywhere. I can feel myself screaming, my throat is so raw, but all I can concentrate on is the building pressure in my forehead. Distantly I can hear Faye’s chanting pick up. She’s talking faster but I can’t concentrate on what she is saying.

  “Please stop,” I hear myself begging, but she doesn’t. The light is becoming more blinding and I’m positive that I’m going to die. I feel her press the cold bowl against my lips, I feel her urging for me to drink but every fiber of my being is telling me not to.

  “Drink, Amy, you have to do this. If you don’t the pain will never stop,” she whispers, but it isn’t like she is whispering to me out loud. It is as her voice is somehow slipping inside of my mind. I try to remember all the reasons I’m doing this. Damon’s face flashes across my mind, and I drink the liquid. It has a bitter taste to it that rushes through me. The pain in my head doesn’t so much stop as it feels like someone is drilling a hole in the center of my brain to relieve the pressure. I feel Faye pick up the knife I dropped on the ground the moment the vines took hold of my hand. She presses the tip of the blade against my forehead. I feel her carve an X into it, and blood begins to trickle down my face. The white light begins to dim, and soon I can see nothing but darkness. The candles flare out. I blink my eyes and don't see anything.

  Chapter 15

  The room slowly comes into focus. I don’t know how long I sit there unable to move, but the vines let me go. I reach out a hand to touch the center of my forehead where I know Faye cut me but feel nothing there. I feel like there is something there I can’t quite perceive, but I can only feel smooth skin slightly damp from whatever Faye put on me. There is dried blood on my face I want to wash off, little trails that let me know that I was indeed cut. I look for her around the room and see her sitting in a chair some distance from me with a tiny candle illuminating her features.

  “How do you feel?” she asks.

  “Like I’ve just gotten rid of the worst migraine imaginable,” I say. I can feel her smile in the darkness. “How is this going to help Damon? How do you even know he is alive?” I press. I don’t have any time to waste.

  “His spirit hasn’t come to me. Like you, I help those that come to seek vengeance. I’m not a fighter. My body is too weak, but you’re different. You have the potential to fight,” she says.

  “What are you going to do, give me some spells that I can shout at the vampires that will turn them into dust?” I ask.

  “Magic doesn’t work that way,” Faye says, but I can feel her smiling. She stands up and disappears through a door, leaving it open. She flicks on a light that reveals a small kitchen. I watch Faye pour a glass of water. She brings it out to me, and I take a sip. My throat is parched, and I find myself gulping the water down quickly.

  “Your blade can now slice through a vampire easier than it could before,” Faye tells me as I drink down my water. “It is touched by your magic, not only made holy.”

  “I don’t know how that is going to help me against three vampires,” I say.

  “If you can break Damon’s mind free you won’t be fighting alone,” Faye says.

  “How can you be so sure of this? How do you know what I can and can’t do?” I ask.

  “Vampires can compel me,” Faye says, and I blink at her.

  “But you’re a witch,” I say.

  “Each witch is different. Vampires often times enslave us to work magic for them, to protect their resting places, to keep them safe from hunters. The older a vampire gets, it seems, the more precious their life is to them,” she says, sounding bitter over it. “But some witches they can’t do that to. Like you.”

  “I’ve been inside a vampire’s head,” I say tentatively.

  “That doesn’t sound like a very pleasant place to be.”

  “It isn’t. And if I can get further into their heads they’ll have more of a reason to kill me,” I tell her. My voice sounds surprisingly calm in my own ears.

  “We can ward your home,” she says.

  “I still have to go out and work.”

  “Then we will ward you, train you. You can’t run away now,” Faye says.

  I feel the weight of her words, and somehow, I feel like I should be scared, but I’m not. I might be going into a vampire nest alone, and I could die. I think of trying to find Vincent, begging him to help me again, but if he knows I’m completely Awakened, he might turn on me. I might have just said goodbye to a vampire I think I could have cared about. That I do care about.

  “What is it I need to do?” I ask her.

  Faye gets me another glass of water, then begins to tell me more about the Sisters. They live in a house on the outskirts of town, what I imagine is like Olivia’s place. There are three of them: Charlotte, Claudine, and Caroline, all of them were sisters when they were turned around the 1300s. They had been captured and raped by pirates until a vampire came aboard the ship and turned them. Since then, they have been living together in a small nest, becoming less human each century, and keeping men under their control to feed off of. Each vampire has their own unique gift; theirs happened to be to become the one a person most loved. Everyone they kept worshiped them.

  “If I do break their spell, how do I know the people they keep won’t turn on me?” I ask.

  “Damon is the only one you need to focus on. He’ll remember you the moment you shatter their hold on him. I’m going to call Tristian and have him as your backup as well,” Faye says.

  “Tristian doesn’t care very much for me,” I say.

  “No, but he owes me a favor. He’ll like you more if you help him defeat the Sisters,” she says.

  “I feel like I’m going into this blind,” I say.

  “A bit. I’ll go with you, and I’ll cast a spell of invisibility. I can only hold it for twenty minutes, so you’ll have to work fast to do whatever it is you do,” she says.

  “I’m not sure of my abilities, but you seem quite confident,” I say.

  “I told you, I can see the future,” she says with a smile.

  “Tell me this: do we all come out alive?”

  “I can’t. The future isn’t set in stone. Are you willing to die for Damon?”

  I close my eyes and feel the same resolve I felt days before when I was lying bed crying over him. I would die to save him, just as he could have died to save me. It isn’
t that it is fair, but it is something that I want to do. By no means do I think I’m a superhero, I really don’t think I could pull this off as smoothly as Faye thinks I could.

  “Let’s do this,” I say, picking up my knife and throwing it from hand to hand. It oddly feels like an extension of my arm, somehow, I know how to wield it better than anything that Damon has ever taught me. As if some inner knowledge has now opened inside of me.

  But I guess that has happened. I guess that what happens when a witch Awakens.

  Faye has me eat a chicken salad as she begins to prepare for tonight. I’m not sure what goes into making me invincible, but I am just going to have to trust her. She gets things ready for me to hand to Damon as well once the spell is broken: a cross, a stake, and a knife. The best way to kill a vampire is a stake through the heart or decapitation. I know with my blade I can quickly take off the head of a vampire, not something I really want to enact, though. I know a number of vampires that wouldn’t be pleased with that and I’m not in much hurry to attract even more of the attention of Vincent’s maker.

  It’s dark by the time we climb into my car. Faye called Tristian to let him know our plan – he didn’t think much of it. For whatever reason, though, he said he would be there. But I also heard him add that he hoped he wasn’t going to die for me. I definitely am not on his well-liked list.

  Faye gives me directions to the nest. It is way out in the country, at least an hour drive. She spends most of it not talking to me and clinging to the oh-shit handle again. I spend most of the time trying to feel the energy inside of me. It isn’t that I feel stronger, but like I can feel and draw on the energy around me. I can see a blue aura of some sort around Faye that grows brighter and dimmer, moving with her. I wonder if she sees something like that around me.

  We come to an old farmhouse with acres of land and not a neighbor in sight. What is it with vampires and choosing places to live that basically look the set for a horror movie? We have to turn down a dirt road to get there, and Faye has me pull off on the side of the road some ways down from the house, so the car is not in sight.