by Sammie Joyce
Rose screamed in frustration and beat her fists against Gavin’s chest.
“Just give up the necklace, Rose! This can all end, you just have to hand it over.”
With all her strength, Rose shoved him away. It had been a good plan, but she’d underestimated Hellith. Somehow, she’d been able to sense that Rose had gotten the bracelet off. She’d made a replacement that would prove impossible to remove while Rose was still living.
Gavin was staring at her as though he’d never seen her before. “Did you ever even really love me?”
That brought Rose up short, her anger replaced by confusion. “Of course I love you, Gavin. What kind of question is that?”
“If you really love me, then why is the idea of being with me so repulsive to you? Why, Rose?”
His questions would be infuriating if it wasn’t for the real hurt in his voice. “It’s not being with you I have a problem with, Gavin! It’s being without Asher, Jagger, and Mace. No, don’t look at me like that, just listen. When you were gone, I was more than miserable. I felt like I was dying, like one of my limbs was missing and I was slowly bleeding to death.”
Gavin’s face softened. “I felt the same.”
“Then how do you think I feel now? Three of my limbs are missing! I’m bleeding, suffering, dying, and here you are, making deals with our greatest enemy! Deals that will trap me in the living death of being without the men I love.”
His face hardened again. “I should be enough for you. You should love me enough that you don’t need them.”
Rose shook her head slowly, tears running down her cheeks. “I haven’t just lost them. I’ve lost all of you. Your betrayal is no worse than your absence. I should just let Hellith kill me.” In that moment of hopeless despair, Rose actually considered it.
She couldn’t, though. Her dragons needed her. If she died, it would destroy them.
“Rose, don’t you understand? I’m doing this FOR you, for us!”
“Us? Do you even know what you’re saying? Us—the five of us. You, me, Asher, Jagger, Mace… we’re a team, Gavin. They’re your brothers. They love you, just as I do.”
He seemed to hesitate, and Rose pressed her advantage. “I know things have been bad recently, but think about all you’ve been through together. I’ve only been here for a short part of it. You grew up with them, fought wars with them. They don’t want to take me away from you. They want to make me complete, and love me just as much as you do.”
Uncertainty flickered in his eyes.
“Don’t listen to her, Gavin. Your brothers want you gone.”
With Hellith’s voice came a shimmering red light, so faint it almost wasn’t there. It wormed its way into Gavin.
He shook himself, refocusing his gaze on Rose. “My brothers don’t love me. They want me gone, so that they can have you all to themselves.”
The fight went out of her. Rose slumped to the floor. What was the point? Even if she could convince Gavin, Hellith could just spell him into believing her. Without access to her own magic, Rose had no chance of stopping it.
“Just go away, Gavin.”
“Your time is running out, girl,” Hellith’s voice rang out. “I’m not going to be patient with you much longer. One way or another, I am going to get that necklace, even if I have to drain the power out of you first. Your dragons are not here to help you. You are defenseless against me.”
Rose didn’t reply. She wasn’t sure if she could, even if she wanted to. What if Hellith was right?
Her necklace had only started displaying powers after she’d met her dragons. Now, three of them were who knew where, and the other was under an enchantment, here in body, but in mind, just as distant.
Would her necklace work without them? Rose couldn’t believe she hadn’t thought to enquire about this before.
She tried to think past the fog of despair. Was Hellith enchanting her too, or was it just the hopeless situation getting to her?
One thing she was sure of: Hellith had no intention of letting her and Gavin go. Once Hellith had the necklace, she would probably kill them, or possibly hold them as hostages. Try as she might, Rose couldn’t think of a single way to defend herself, let alone escape.
Maybe Gavin would snap out of the spell once Hellith started torturing her, but even if he did, Rose didn’t see much hope there. She and Gavin together weren’t nearly strong enough to hold Hellith off long enough to escape, even if Rose did have access to her powers.
“Time is up, Rose. If you’re really the chosen one as they say, give me the necklace. I have no desire to harm your people. I simply want to live free of fear that I will be hunted down as I was in the past.”
“Liar! You killed the guards, you said you were coming for me!”
“For the necklace. Once that is gone, you will have no power to oppose me. I will go to another continent, if you like, somewhere deserted, far from human eyes. We need never see each other again.”
Rose wanted to believe her, but everything she had learned about Hellith told her otherwise. “I’ll never give it to you.”
“Then I will take it.”
Rose felt herself being pulled forward by an invisible arm of magic. She struggled, but she was no match for it.
“Gavin! Gavin, help me!”
“This is for the best, Rose.”
She was brought right up to Hellith. The glowing red eyes made Rose frantic with fear, but try as she might, she couldn’t break free.
“Give it to me.”
“Never!”
“Then I will take it.”
One of the scales on Hellith’s sides formed into an arm, grabbing the necklace around Rose’s neck and pulling.
It didn’t come off. The chain didn’t even bite into the back of her neck. The necklace was resisting being removed.
It started to glow. Rose jerked in surprise when she felt a drain on her own power. She wasn’t using magic—the collar she wore prevented that.
It was the necklace. It was pulling her own power to protect itself. Evidently, the collar didn’t prevent it. Rose didn’t know how much power she had to give before she was completely drained, but whatever she had to give, she would.
That necklace was one of their best chances against Hellith. Rose couldn’t let her get it.
She didn’t fight the pull of power from the necklace, though she was sure she could have. Unlike Gavin and Hellith, the necklace respected her free will, even though it had a will of its own.
When it acted of its own accord, though, it never drained her power.
Rose supposed that no other situation had ever been this dire.
The room around her was flickering. Rose struggled to hold onto consciousness.
Could the necklace resist removal if Hellith first drained its magical energy, along with Rose’s? That magical energy would replenish itself, but probably not before Hellith took the necklace. It wouldn’t work for her, of course, but just keeping it from the witches and dragons allied against her would be a major blow.
“No… Gavin…”
If Gavin heard her, he did nothing to come to her rescue. Rose tried in vain to call out to Asher, Jagger, or Mace, but the collar was still blocking her.
As much as she fought against it, she couldn’t avoid the approaching unconsciousness. A body could only handle so much.
Rose felt a tear drip off her chin as she blacked out.
When she woke, Rose was back in the small cave room. She supposed she should be grateful that she had woken at all. Hellith must have decided to keep her alive, probably to threaten her life if the witches and dragons did anything against her.
She pressed a hand to her chest.
The necklace was gone.
Despair rose within her. How on earth were they supposed to fight Hellith without it? Had all of their efforts over the past nine months been for nothing?
Rose listened for the sound of breathing other than hers, but the cave was silent.
“Gavin?”<
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There was no response. Gavin wasn’t here. Someone had taken the lamp out of the room, so it was completely dark again. Rose got up and felt her way around the room. She could feel the slits in the stone where the door was, but it didn’t open.
That wasn’t entirely surprising. Hellith couldn’t have her wandering around the cave, possibly finding a way to escape. The collar was still locked around Rose’s neck. She tried fruitlessly to pull it over her head, but there was no way she was getting this one off.
Her head was pounding, and she was already exhausted just by walking around the cave for a few minutes. Rose knew it would take time to recover. She lay down on the cold stone. At least no one had removed the supplies she’d put in here earlier.
Discovering them with her head wasn’t the best way to do it, but Rose was still grateful they were here, despite the new throbbing at the back of her skull.
Rest was the best thing for her right now. When her dragons came, Rose needed to be ready to do everything she could to contribute to her own rescue. Magic was out with this collar, but she at least needed to have enough energy to run.
Sleep didn’t come easily. The stone floor was far from comfortable, and as tired as she was, she was also worried. Why wasn’t Gavin in here with her? Hellith had gotten what she wanted from him. Surely, he should be here, secure with Rose, waiting for whatever Hellith had planned.
Or maybe Hellith hadn’t wanted Gavin. Maybe she had all she needed from him, and she’d killed him.
Rose flinched at the very thought. No, Gavin couldn’t be dead. Surely she’d know. She’d feel like a part of herself had died.
But she already felt like that. She’d felt like that since the moment he’d betrayed her. Would she really feel his death, or was she just comforting herself with empty assertions?
Rose rolled over, trying to find a more comfortable spot. If she couldn’t sleep, she could at least plan, giving her body as much rest as she could while she did so. She forced herself to lie still and stop seeking more comfortable positions. She deepened her breathing and closed her eyes.
Feeling slightly calmer, Rose tried to think.
They would no doubt find her with a life sensing spell. If tracking spells worked so close to Hellith’s power, rescue would have come already. Her dragons were probably flying around all the mountains near the mansion with witches on their backs. When they got close, the witches could cast life sensing spells.
Those spells differentiated between animals and humans, so they would be able to tell once they’d found Rose and Gavin. Then they would come in for the rescue.
If she was to have the best chance of escaping with them, Rose needed to work out how they would come. There was probably only one cave entrance, so that made the direction of their approach easy. The main cave was too small to have more than one or two dragons shifted at once with Hellith there, which made things more difficult.
Rose ignored the ache in her back from lying against the cold stone as she thought about it. Asher and Jagger would probably shift and storm into the cave. Mace would wait outside, ready to fly her and Gavin out.
Asher and Jagger would try to draw Hellith’s attention, while witches shielded them. They wouldn’t be here to fight Hellith, just keep her occupied long enough to rescue Rose and Gavin. Asher and Jagger would attack, probably backed up by offensive spells from some of the coven.
Other coven members would be sent to search for Rose and Gavin. They’d need to disable Gavin, then get him and Rose outside to Mace, past Hellith.
There were so many things that could go wrong, but Rose told herself it was stupid to worry about flaws in a plan that may not even be the one they decided to adopt. She’d just have to wait, as hard as it was.
She wanted to pace, but she was too exhausted.
Eventually, her eyelids started drooping. She let them. The more rest she had, the better. She tried to think of better times. Rose remembered shopping for dresses with Annabelle. It seemed a lifetime ago.
She filled her head with pleasant thoughts of the Autumn Festival as she fell asleep.
Chapter Twelve
Rose was woken by the sound of screaming. For a moment, she was elated, sure rescue was here. Then she realized the horrible truth. There were no general sounds of chaos, which would surely accompany a rescue. There was just one scream.
Gavin’s.
She ran straight for the sliding door. Rose’s face smacked into the rock. She recoiled, clutching her nose. Though she couldn’t see, Rose was sure that the wetness on her hands was blood. She couldn’t tell if her nose was broken, but it was certainly painful enough to be.
“Gavin! GAVIN!” The sound of his screams tore through her like a rusty knife. Rose threw herself against the wall again, but only succeeded in hurting her shoulder as well. She barely felt the pain. She had to get to Gavin.
She was just about to make another attempt at the door when it slid open. Rose hurtled into the main room.
Gavin was on his back, screaming and writhing, clearly in terrible pain. Hellith was holding him down with one claw. It didn’t look painful enough to cause Gavin’s screams, so Rose assumed Hellith was using some form of a pain spell on him.
She didn’t know why Hellith was torturing him, but she wasn’t surprised either. Obviously, Hellith had no intentions of honoring any bargain she made with Gavin.
If she was being smart, Rose would have assessed the options, their possibility of working, and the danger each one posed. She wasn’t being smart, though. She was frantic with terror for Gavin, with agony for his pain, and she thought only of getting him away from Hellith.
Rose ran toward them, determined to snatch Gavin out from under Hellith’s claw. About twelve feet away from him, she ran smack into an invisible wall. Shrieking in frustration, Rose clawed at it, even as she realized that would never work. Magical barriers didn’t come down in the face of physical force. They needed magic to bring them down.
Hellith turned to Rose and smiled at her. By the increase in the volume of Gavin’s screams, she was increasing his pain levels.
Rose suddenly realized why the door had opened. It hadn’t been any doing of hers; it had been Hellith. The evil grin told her that Hellith enjoyed the torture more when she saw how it was torturing Rose as well.
Rose lashed out with her magic, but of course, her magic didn’t come. She tore at the collar around her neck with her hands, but that only grazed her palms. Even if she had managed to get it off, her magic probably still hadn’t replenished from the attempt to keep Hellith away from the necklace.
With nothing else she could do, Rose fell to begging.
“Hellith, please, stop! Take me, you can torture me! Just leave him alone. Please, I’ll do anything.”
“Don’t worry, girl, you will be next, once I’m done with him. Or maybe I will do you both at once, hm?”
“Why are you doing this?” Rose struggled to speak past her sobs. If she was to have any chance of getting Gavin out of this, she needed to maintain her senses. She wondered if she was deluding herself. What possible chance of convincing Hellith to stop did she have? Why would Hellith listen to her?
Gavin’s screams stopped abruptly.
Rose felt her knees give out. No, he couldn’t be dead. He couldn’t.
“I guess your time is up.” Hellith used her claw to toss Gavin’s body in Rose’s direction. She tried to catch him, which sent them both tumbling to the ground. She pressed a trembling hand to his neck. Had she not already been on the ground, she would have collapsed in relief when she felt a pulse.
Clearly, torturing him while he was unconscious didn’t have any appeal for Hellith.
Rose grabbed Gavin’s shoulders and started dragging him toward the smaller cave. He was heavy and it was slow going, but she managed it eventually. She scurried back into the main chamber and grabbed a lamp, her eyes on Hellith.
Hellith was watching her smugly. Rose understood the look. Hellith could take her and
torture her at any point, and there wasn’t anything Rose could do about it.
The door to the cave closed behind her, but she knew it was no protection against Hellith.
Rose rolled Gavin over, checking him for any kind of wound. She couldn’t find anything, though of course, without magic, she had no way of knowing if Hellith’s spell had done any internal damage.
She tore a strip off her shirt and soaked it in water. Rose started wiping the sweat off Gavin’s face with the cool cloth. After a few minutes of this, his eyes fluttered open.
“Rose?”
“I’m here.” She helped Gavin sit up. He winced as he did. “How are you feeling?”
“I… I don’t understand. Why would Hellith hurt me?”
“She’s Hellith, Gavin. She was never going to let us go.”
Gavin shook his head slowly. “I… what have I done?”
“Why don’t you start from the beginning? When did you first start working with Hellith?”
“When I left, I wandered for days. I didn’t know what to do. Then Hellith came. She said she could help me, that you and I could be together forever. At first, I didn’t believe her, but somewhere along the line, what she said just started making sense. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
Sweet, glorious relief bloomed inside Rose. Hellith had enchanted Gavin from the start. He’d never betrayed her.
“It’s not your fault. She had you under some kind of spell.”
Gavin didn’t look convinced. “Maybe, but I don’t think it took effect immediately. I only started to believe her after a couple of hours; it must have taken that long for the spell to worm its way into me. If I’d fought her from the start, or at least run, none of this would have happened.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“I was so desperate to find a way to be with you… I was willing to listen even to Hellith. I should have fought while I still had enough sense not to believe her.”
“If you fought her alone, you would have died. And I don’t think the chances of survival would have been very high if you tried to escape either. I imagine she’s faster than you, and even if she’s not, she could have used magic to bring you down.”
