Battle of the Hexes: A Paranormal Academy Series (A Witch Among Warlocks Book 4)

by Lidiya Foxglove

  I never really considered how dangerous illusions could be.

  “Montague, are you okay? Harris’ familiar told me you were down and being poisoned.”

  “I was knocked to the ground and they had me tied up with magical bonds,” he said. “No poison, though.”

  “How did you get out of it?”

  “Your mom showed up.”

  “My mom is here?”

  “Yeah, your mom and all your grandfathers.”

  The wolves burst onto the scene and no further explanation was necessary.

  The tide had turned. These ghosts from the Haven were working out just like I planned. They were some extremely angry ghosts.

  Maybe a little too angry. Within moments I saw a ghost wrap itself around the ferret familiar. The little creature struggled and thrashed as the ghost sucked its air away. I screamed.

  “It’s not a real ferret,” Montague said.

  “It’s a—a person,” I said.

  “But you would be even more sad if it was a ferret.”

  “That’s probably true, but—this isn’t what I wanted either!”

  “They’re the ghosts you gave permission to enter this world, so I think you’re the only one who can control them,” Montague said.

  “Okay, I know, I read the manuals,” I snapped, but now I was feeling panicked in a different way because the ghosts were going way too far.

  Stuart always told me I had to talk to the ghosts I summoned with authority, so I tried to pretend I was Arya or Galadriel or Sailor Moon. If this sounds conflicted, well, yeah. It wasn’t easy to imagine myself worthy of bossing ghosts around. I just needed to feel it.

  “Spirits, I honor your wish to fight, your desire for revenge, but shed no blood unless you must. We are not here to cause senseless pain, but to pave a better world. This is my battle. I called you here. And I’m not here to match a bad deed with another bad deed, because then it will never end. We just need a place where we can safely be Wyrd witches, LGBT warlocks, vampires with tuner cars, familiars who fall in love, and everything else. You all went to the Haven because you didn’t fit the ‘order’ of Etherium. You deserved a place where you could be who you were. I want to give that to future wizards. So please—make this a better world!”

  “Very nice,” Montague said. “Very cute. But…did it do anything?”

  “Yes. It did.” I dared a little confidence as I gestured to the scene. The ghosts stopped trying to murder ferrets, but they didn’t hold back too much. They had all been wronged by the council, so this was personal to each and every spirit I had summoned.

  I don’t really how I knew that the ghosts understood me. It was a wizard thing, I guess. A necromancer thing. I just…felt it. I felt that I was strong enough to speak with confidence, and I said what I really believed, and then…I let go.

  I couldn’t control every ghost or every thing that happened. I just had to trust the process that led me to this moment.

  Catherine was standing in front of Firian’s body. She was under assault by the spirits and the wolves, but she was holding her own.

  More than holding her own. She wove her fingers through the air and one by one, my grandfathers started slowing down, freezing in their tracks.

  “You must be Sally’s men,” she said. “You’re the ones who lured her away from the family with promises you never even kept. She lost her magic and her good name and I heard that you’re broke on top of it all. Go home,” she said. “Go home and never come back!” Her words held the force of magic and the wolves were all forced to step back.

  One of the wolves turned into my mom. I guess I should have recognized my own mom, especially since she was the smallest wolf, but I wasn’t great at telling wolves apart when they were all running around as a pack.

  “Catherine, please,” my mom said. “You’re just mad that my mom had the life she wanted. You have the life you wanted too, so what business is it of yours?”

  “Because I had to live under the shadow of her shame. I had to explain to everyone what happened, and prove that I was different. And then—you lured my children away, Emily.”

  “Oh, you really think I’m that powerful?”

  “I think you’re wicked like your mother. She fought a demon just so you could join him. Blood will tell,” Catherine said. “And I have tried to save yours. I have tried to spare your daughter the fate of my children, but she’s yours. You’re both…hopeless, but you’re lucky. You’ll never have to see your children turn their back on you.”

  I saw it coming, a second too late. Catherine struck my mom with a spell that threw her toward the precipice of the mountain path. I lunged for her. I was too far away to do anything. I saw my mom’s look of shock as she scrambled for purchase, fingers scrabbling hopelessly against the rocks before she fell with a scream. And all my grandfathers were stuck, frozen, unable even to look back and see what had happened to her.

  “Why?” I screamed at Catherine. “Or is that an illusion too?” Please…

  “That was the last thing I wanted to do, but your mother served demons. Do you really think—“

  “I saved her life!” I cried. “She was with my dad and they were finally happy! So I do really think! Firian…my mom…” I spread my hands. “Spirits—come to me and bring your anger and your hate, send my great-aunt to a dire—“

  Ina leapt up the rock. “Silence, child,” she said, shooting a spell toward me that sealed my lips shut.

  “Mmm-mm!” I said, which, you know, is what everyone says when their lips get sealed shut.

  Then she reached a hand down and helped my mom climb up behind her.

  “I’m okay,” Mom said. “Ina cast a spell to break my fall.”

  “Mm!” I said, with relief.

  “Charlotte, are you okay?” Mom asked. “Why can’t you talk?”

  “I shut her up,” Ina said. “She was going to cast a spell that would haunt her. She still hasn’t seen such things as dark as we’ve seen, and she doesn’t need to have blood on her hands. I’ll handle this. Mother, dear…” Ina walked up to Catherine, holding her wand with the tips pressed into her palms.

  “Don’t kill me, Ina…” Catherine started crying. “Not you. Please. I just wanted to keep you from harm.”

  “Harm! Is that all? Is that why, when I was in the Haven, a mere shell of myself, brought back from the dead and touched by demons, separated from my beloved, you came to me and said—I will never forget what you said. Do you remember?”

  “It was a while ago, I don’t know. I’m sure I was upset.” Catherine looked away.

  “Say the words you said to me then. Four words. That was all you said to me. Say them now and I’ll let you live.”

  “Ina, what happened to you?”

  “You know what happened to me!” Ina growled. “A childhood of you breathing down my neck telling me what to do, how to be a good little witch, a brief escape with the people who loved me, and then an adulthood of captivity and torture—sanctioned by you…” She pressed the wand to Catherine’s lips. “Burn…”

  The tip of the wand glowed red. My mom watched, not interfering.

  “It serves you right!” Catherine screamed. “That’s what I said…”

  Ina pulled the wand back. A line of angry red was seared dark on Catherine’s lips.

  “You thought that was best for me,” Ina said. “Hmm. Maybe it was. I’m not afraid of anything anymore. I’ve had so many wounds seared into my flesh, I’ve screamed myself hoarse, I’ve cried for people I thought I would never see again. And I learned. I learned to be the good little witch you wanted. You came to see me when they promoted me from patient to teacher… You were proud. I learned to behave. I learned to hurt others instead of being hurt. Maybe I reminded you of yourself, that day…you love to hurt people.”

  “I don’t love to hurt people. I hated what you had to go through in the Haven, but I trusted their therapy. I try to use other methods. Yes, I threw Emily off the rocks but first I cast a protect
ion spell on her. I just wanted to frighten her. I don’t want you all to be caught by the council and go back to the Haven! I did all of this for the honor of our family.”

  “Mm mmm?” I demanded, pointing at Firian.

  Catherine snapped her fingers at Firian. “It was just a joke.”

  Just like that, Firian transformed. He was still unconscious, but the knife was gone. The blood was gone. The deathly pallor vanished.

  Oh, thank every god that ever existed.

  “You should have paid more attention to the witchly arts, Charlotte,” Catherine said. “You shouldn’t have sneered at female skills. You would have seen past my illusions.”

  “Aunt Catherine!” Mom said. “This is too much. How did you even pull this off?”

  “My familiar is skilled at illusions as well. We were able to cover the field between the two of us, with help from the other familiars of the council. I’m a member of the council, so protecting Ethereal territory is my job, after all. That’s what I did. I made you think your friends were hurt to get this taken care of with minimal damage.”

  “Minimal damage? You made my daughter think her Firian was dead?” Mom looked pissed. “You and your magic can rot.”

  “I used my illusions because I didn’t want to kill my niece either, so hate me if you like, Emily, but it could have been much worse. There was only one Piers said he wanted to handle on his own.”

  “Oh yes,” Ina said. “All your ‘pain’ is an illusion, but your illusions are far worse than being whipped or beaten. I remember how you used to play little tricks on me and Sam for ‘discipline’ so we never knew what was real or not. I would put on my favorite dress to go out and when I left the house it turned into some ugly dress you bought me. You thought that sort of thing was harmless but it was so hard to trust anyone or anything! I want you to swear a blood oath to me that you will never come near me or any of your family again, nor any of their loved ones, nor seek to affect any of our lives from a distance, and that you will never contact us, not even Samuel’s spirit. The honor of the Caruthers family will live on with the blood of wolves and the magic of Wyrd, and have nothing to do with you.” She took a knife from her pocket and handed it to Catherine.

  Catherine was resigned now. I almost felt sorry for her as she cut a line in her own skin and made her promise, but my mom looked pissed off at her too, and when I thought about what she did, I wasn’t too sorry. Anyway, I hadn’t lived through the years of hell they had.

  “Goodbye, Ina,” Catherine said. “I’m sorry it had to come to this.”

  “Me too,” Ina said, with an edge.

  Catherine hurried away down the path, as Ina snapped her fingers at me. ”You can speak now, Charlotte. I hope you’ll forgive me for what I did to you at the Haven. They asked me to do it and I couldn’t say no. I needed to get that message to Ignatius.”

  You still enjoyed it, I thought.

  “You’re stronger now,” Ina said.

  “I was pretty strong already,” I said.

  “What did you do to Charlotte at the Haven?” Mom asked, looking at us both, but I didn’t really want to talk about it and Ina just smiled coldly. Montague put an arm around me.

  “Well, I think Tolstoy said, all happy families are alike, and none of them are wizards,” he said. “Let’s check on our family, Charlotte.”

  His hand entwined with mine, and I realized he was right. I was happy to see Mom again, but I didn’t sign up for Ina. I wasn’t sure how long it would take before I really stopped feeling weird around my family, or if I would ever feel close to my grandmother and grandfathers. Deep down I was looking forward to seeing my human Grandma in her glorious normalcy, and I’d been feeling guilty about that. Montague had complicated relationships with his home town and his vampire family too, to say nothing of Harris or Alec and their families.

  But the thing that wasn’t complicated was the family I had chosen to love for myself. My guys and me and the future we would build.

  Hopefully.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Charlotte

  Firian was still unconscious, but that terrible pallor had left his skin.

  I went to Firian’s side. and took his hand in mine. Warm. Warm and alive. He stirred a little, groaning. “Is it over? Was I helpful? I got knocked out, didn’t I? Oh, fuck. I’m the green mage.”

  I smiled. The green mage was the most useless class in Fortune’s Favor, the one that always got taken out first. “A little bit. But it’s okay. Just rest up.”

  “And the others…?” Firian asked.

  “We should check on Harris. He went to confront Piers.”

  “Yeah, I’m not too worried about Piers,” Montague said. “He’s not going to hurt his own cousin and Harris is good at defensive magic. Let’s make sure Alec really is all right and then we’ll all go down together.”

  “Go ahead,” Mom said. “You can relax now, darling. The spirits will cover the territory. Enjoy some time with your men.”

  “Mom! Jeez. I’m not here to enjoy myself.”

  “That was last night,” Montague said, as I jammed an elbow into his ribs.

  Firian was on his feet, brushing leaves off his clothes. He was unusually quiet, but just started walking with us. The wind had turned colder, and he conjured up a slouchy reddish-brown cardigan and stuck one hand in a pocket, and slipped the other around my waist. His fingers splayed protectively across my hip. I looked at him.

  I knew what he was thinking. I still remembered plain as day when he lost his magic before, how it was a loss of identity for him, and how he tried his best to cover up his grief because his job was to make me happy. I hated that. I wanted a partner, not a slave.

  But we’d have to talk about it later.

  “I’m just glad we’re all okay,” I said softly.

  “Yeah.”

  “I hope so, anyway…”

  I felt miles better when we found Alec, in the same place where I saw his wings fall around him. He was back in his human form, tied up and gagged, left on the cold forest floor, struggling to break free of the cords that circled his wrists and ankles. That seemed to be the tactic: tie the guys up so they couldn’t break the illusion.

  “Mm!” He stopped struggling when he saw us. His wrists were bleeding from how much he’d been trying to escape.

  “Oh no. Poor Alec. This looks painful.” I tore the gag off his mouth.

  “What the hell happened? They grabbed me and tied me down, and you had this look on your face like I was dying right before your eyes. Then you left, and they were just guarding over me, doing nothing, until some ghosts showed up and ran them off!”

  “Catherine created illusions to make me think you were all dead or horribly injured. I saw your wings get cut off. She hoped I would lose morale and just give up…but I didn’t. Even when I thought it was hopeless, and you were all dead and dying, I kept going.”

  Alec grinned. “Oh, our girl is proud of herself. So maybe Harris was right, calling you the Chosen One.”

  “I really just…did what I was practicing…,” I said. “But heck yeah, I am proud of myself. I had help, of course, but still.”

  “You actually did practice,” Firian said. “That’s how good wizards become sans-pareil. It’s not really being chosen. It’s just practice. Just like Fortune’s Favor. You have to grind, and you did.”

  “That is the most ‘familiar’ thing you’ve ever said,” Montague said.

  “I’m sorry I was so useless. I tried to charm the familiars, but that went nowhere. Fuck, I was so much more powerful when I was a warlock,” Alec said.

  “You just need to practice too,” Firian said. “That’s what Melanie would say, isn’t it?”

  “Melanie. Yeah. She would say that.” Alec smiled sadly. “I never told you my familiar’s name.”

  “Well, I know these things,” Firian said. “When a witch and warlock love each other very much, their familiars always introduce themselves in the Ethereal world, just so we kn
ow.”

  “Oh really?” Montague said.

  “I never met yours, unfortunately,” Firian said to Montague.

  “I know. She died before…”

  “You’re the group familiar now,” Alec said.

  Firian paused.

  “Firian…might have to give up his magic for good,” I said. “If what that other familiar said was true, he’ll die if he doesn’t.”

  “Why?” Alec said. “He’s not dying now.”

  “Because I might be pregnant.” I meant to tell them when Harris was here, but it was coming out anyway. “And it might be his.”

  “I thought that was impossible.”

  “So did I.”

  “You’re pregnant?” Alec said. “You mean…you were already pregnant before last night?”

  “I don’t know for sure! But supposedly, if I have a baby with a familiar, they’ll die.”

  “How do we know she was telling the truth either?” Alec asked.

  “I’ll look into it. But I think it is true. It’s okay,” Firian said, pre-empting Montague and Alec from saying the things they obviously wanted to say. “If that’s the only bad thing that comes out of this, it’s not really bad at all. I didn’t think I would ever be able to have a kid with Charlotte.”

  “You’re wearing a glum cardigan,” I said.

  “Cardigans don’t have emotions.”

  “Yeah, right. Cardigans have more emotion than any other garment!”

  “That’s not true,” Montague said. “Hats have the most emotion.”

  “You don’t get to have an opinion on a concept I just made up, wise guy. Firian…” I bit my lip. “I wish I could help, but at least you can admit that you hate this. For my sake, you’ve been trapped as a fox, and trapped as a human, and now…maybe it’ll be permanent. I hate it, so you must hate it more. Don’t pretend you’re okay with it for my sake.”