“Oh, my baby,” she breathed into Pippin’s neck before setting him back down on the floor and embracing Evan and Ainsley at once. Numbly they fell into her arms.
When she came towards Joel, he tensed. But as she reached her arms around his waist, she suddenly seemed so small to him. So fragile. He realised he’d been remembering her through his childlike eyes; she had seemed so strong back then, so callous. But now he could see that she was far from that. She was small, and flawed. She was his mother.
He brought his arms around her and returned her embrace. As he did so, he noticed the smell of hyacinth clinging to her hair; it was a smell he only now realised he loved.
“Fallows . . . Jefferson,” Maximus was saying, his words jumbled as he tried to make sense of the scene. “He’s dead?”
“Yeah, and you might have noticed that his body’s on our freakin’ porch!” Ainsley exclaimed. “And, by the by, where the hell have you been for the past few months?”
Maximus rubbed the back of his neck with his hand. “Where are the aunts?” he asked hoarsely.
“They’re gone,” said Evan. “Hiding.”
“We’ll have to summon them,” Maximus stammered. “We’ll have to call them back. We’ll need help . . . with the body . . .”
Joel stood in a daze, watching Evangeline, wondering who she really was and what she was thinking. Jefferson was dead—what did that mean for Evangeline? Would she be free of him now? Free from the pull of the Fallows coven? He was watching Maximus, too, and trying to suppress the jumble of emotions that were rising inside of him.
Maximus was looking at the floor, then at Evan and Pippin and Ainsley, fondness in his eyes, as though he’d missed them in his absence. He didn’t look at Joel, though. He looked everywhere but at Joel.
“I’m so sorry for leaving you,” Maximus was saying in a low voice. “I had to. She needed me.” He stepped forward and touched Evan’s arm. “We heard you summoning us, though, my clever son. I’m just sorry that we were too late.”
Evan cleared his throat. “That was Joel, actually,” he said. “It was Joel’s idea.”
Maximus nodded, but said nothing.
“Did Jefferson do this?” Evangeline asked, gesturing to the destruction around them. She was talking to Joel now, and he realised this with a strange bolt of alarm. He would have to answer her.
“It was Isla,” he said in a voice that sounded different, vulnerable. “And Kaden.”
She clutched her chest. “Kaden has been here?”
Right, thought Joel. Kaden was her son, too.
“Kaden came after you?” Maximus pressed, concern filling his voice. Still he only looked at Evan.
“Not exactly.” Evan glanced at Joel. “I think he came for Isla.”
“And he freakin’ killed her!” Ainsley reported.
“And then he brought her back to life with Jefferson’s Resurrection power,” Evan put in.
“Which he absorbed after killing Jefferson,” Joel added finally.
With the subject of resurrection now raised, all eyes were on Evangeline. No one said anything for a long moment.
“We know,” Joel said quietly. “We know your story.”
“We freakin’ saw it!” Ainsley cried.
“How you were resurrected,” Evan elaborated. “Why didn’t you tell us, Dad?”
Maximus bowed his head. “Because I . . .” he swallowed. “I couldn’t.”
“You let us suffer,” Joel shot back, anger rising in his voice. “You let us think she abandoned us of her own free will. You let us think she didn’t care about us!”
Still Maximus wouldn’t look at him.
“Joel.” Evangeline’s voice was soft, soothing. “We couldn’t tell you. We couldn’t risk it. It was safer for you to believe a lie than to live with the torment we lived with.”
Joel kept his focus on his father, who’d aged considerably in the months he’d been away. His greying hair was shaggy and his eyes seemed tired and dull. “Why won’t you look at me?” Joel finally asked him.
The mansion fell silent.
“Look at me.” Joel’s voice echoed in the emptiness.
Maximus didn’t. Or couldn’t.
Joel laughed bitterly. “Do you really hate me that much?”
“Joel,” Evan began. “Dad doesn’t hate you—”
“Yes, I do,” Maximus interrupted, meeting Joel’s gaze now.
A sudden rush of blood went to Joel’s head. So there it was. All these years and it was finally out in the open. His father hated him.
Maximus stiffened. “I hate the me I see in you.”
Joel swallowed, not daring to speak.
“I hate that you’re so much like me,” Maximus went on, tears pooling in his tormented violet eyes. “I hate that when I look at you, I see myself,” he went on, the words escaping in a wheeze. “I hate that you make the same stupid mistakes I made, time and time again.”
Joel’s jaw clenched. “Trying to bring Maggie back is not a mistake,” he said huskily. “I’d do it again, and again, and I’d never stop.”
Maximus inhaled deeply. “I hate the life I’ve made you live,” he continued, as though Joel had never even spoken. “I hate the pain I’ve caused you.” His words were angry now, uttered in broken sobs. “But most of all, son, I hate the way you hate me.”
Joel’s throat tightened. “I don’t hate you, Dad.”
“You should. I do.”
Joel’s heart gave a painful tug. Maximus was merely a shell of what he had once been—a far cry from the arrogant teenager they’d seen in the Venatus spell.
“I don’t hate you, Dad,” Joel repeated quietly. “I never could.”
Maximus wiped at his eyes. “Thank you,” he whispered.
“Uh . . . guys?” Ainsley’s voice cut through the moment. “Joel?”
Joel turned to him.
“Where is she?”
Joel followed his gaze to the entryway floor.
It was empty.
Maggie was gone.
JOEL RACED THROUGH the undergrowth of the forest, bracken tearing at his jeans.
“Maggie!” he yelled, fumbling through the freezing cold darkness. “Kaden!”
Only the wind responded, howling back at him.
Behind him, Joel could hear Evan’s footsteps crunching across the forest floor. The snow had melted, leaving slushy pools of muddy earth that soaked into Joel’s jeans as he raced through the darkness.
She had to be there, somewhere. She had to be. A body can’t just disappear.
“Joel, wait!” Evan called after him.
Joel kept going, not caring where he was heading. He’d found Evan this way, hadn’t he? He could find Maggie, too.
“Joel!” Evan finally caught up with him, seizing his arm and forcing him to slow down. They stumbled to a stop amongst the towering pines.
“We have to find her,” Joel panted, his breath fogging the night air in fractured rasps.
“And we will,” Evan answered breathlessly. “But not like this.” He pushed stray strands of hair back from his brow. “Not running through the forest blindly.”
“Then how?” Joel demanded. “Her body is missing, Evan! We have to find her. What if Kaden took her? They could be anywhere!”
Evan glanced up at the moon. “What if it worked?”
Joel clasped his hands together to stop them from shaking. “Resurrection? You think it worked?”
“I don’t know.” Evan closed his eyes for a second, thinking. “Maybe.”
“Then where is she?”
Evan exhaled slowly. “I don’t know.” He opened his eyes and fixed them on Joel. “When we saw it happen in the Venatus spell, Evangeline jumped, right? She projected. So maybe Maggie’s jumped somewhere, too.”
Joel pressed his palm to his forehead and groaned. All of a sudden, it felt like his chest was caving in on itself. He couldn’t lose Maggie, he just couldn’t.
The brothers could hear Maximus calling for t
hem in the distance.
Joel stared at Evan. “What do we do?”
“Find her,” Evan urged. “Use your powers, Joel. Your instincts. Find her.”
The constricting feeling in Joel’s chest grew worse. “I don’t think I can,” he faltered.
Evan took his shoulders. “Yes, you can,” he insisted. “Try.”
Joel focused all of his energy on looking for Maggie. On sensing where she might be. His body grew weak and he wavered.
Evan steadied him. “You can do this, Joel,” he insisted. “I won’t let you fall.”
Joel leaned against Evan, listening to the night. Listening to Maximus’s frantic calls, and beyond that, to the sounds of the forest. He heard wood mice moving beneath the shrubs, owls fluttering their wings, sap running in the trees.
And finally he heard Maggie. She sounded distant, hollow. She sounded like . . .
“She’s with Isla,” Joel murmured.
A gale suddenly rocked past them, cutting through their clothing.
“Kaden has her?” Evan pressed, concern clouding his voice.
“No.” Joel shook his head. “She has Kaden.”
JOEL AND EVAN raced back to the mansion, their path lit only by a glimmer of moonlight. Maximus ran to greet them with Evangeline at his side. On the lamp-lit porch, Ainsley was standing beside Topaz, while Ruby rocked Pippin in her arms. Off to the side, Opal was wearing her housecoat, puffing nervously on a cigar.
“Keys!” Evan shouted, holding up his hand.
“Way ahead of you!” Ainsley yelled back, tossing the car keys to Evan.
Evan clambered into the Jeep’s driver’s seat while Joel bounded in through the passenger’s side door.
“Take care!” Ruby cautioned them.
“We’ll keep Ainsley!” Topaz hollered.
“Kick some A, First and Middle!” Opal cheered.
As the engine rumbled to life, Maximus and Evangeline slid into the Jeep’s back seat.
“We’re coming with you,” Maximus said firmly.
The brothers swapped a resigned glance, then Evan pressed his foot on the gas. In seconds the Jeep was tearing through the forested hills, dark branches scraping against the windows as they narrowly dodged the trunks that lined the drive.
Halfway down the hill, the tense silence inside the car was interrupted by the sound of Joel’s ringtone. He fumbled to retrieve his phone from his pocket and pressed answer without even checking who the caller was.
Maggie, he thought.
Or maybe even Kaden.
It was neither.
“J-Dog!” came Charlie’s voice across the line. “You need to get down to the school, ASAP.”
Panic rose in Joel’s chest. “I’m on my way. What’s happening?”
“There’s a fire, dude. I saw it from my house . . .” He trailed off and the line crackled.
“Charlie?” Joel yelled into the receiver.
“Yeah,” Charlie came back to him. “Sorry, there’s a lot . . . there’s a lot going on here right now. Crazy stuff, y’know? Anyway, I’m here at campus, and I think Maggie’s in there. Kaden too, by the looks of things.” There was a shuffling sound and he lowered his voice. “Joy’s with them right now, but Maggie looks . . ”
“What?” Joel’s heart was racing. “Maggie looks what?”
“I don’t know, Dog,” Charlie conceded with a low whistle. “She’s mad about something. Really mad. I think her and Isla are having a chick fight. Which is cool-o, but . . . there’s a fire, so they really need to evacuat-o. Y’know what I’m saying?”
Joel bit his lip. “I’m on my way.”
He hung up the phone.
Evan cast him a sideways glance, but neither of them spoke.
It was one of those times they didn’t have to.
JOEL CLUNG TO the dash as Evan swerved off the main road and onto school grounds. The smell of smoke had filled the air for miles, and they could see that dancing flames had already taken root around the stone walls surrounding the boarding house.
“The storm, Joel,” Evan murmured, looking up at the wild red sky. “It’s the storm from our dreams.”
Joel leaned forward in his seat. “I’m not afraid.”
He could see Charlie waving at them from across the yard, a dark silhouette against a fiery background. Evan’s grip tightened around the steering wheel as he shot a look at his brother. His expression said it all.
We can’t face this.
Joel stared right back.
Yes, we can.
Evan hit the brakes as they swerved into the school parking lot.
“I have to go after her, Evan. I have no choice.”
With that, Joel flung open his door and jumped out onto the tarmac before the Jeep had even stopped rolling. He was immediately confronted by a wind he’d only known in his nightmares. He put his head down and ran without thinking. He headed straight towards the flames, for he knew that Maggie was somewhere inside the stone boundary, inside a prison of fire.
“Dude!” Charlie called, his eyes wide as he raced across the parking lot to intercept Joel’s path. “Those chicks are crazy, man. Seriously. I don’t know what set them off, but they’ve totally flipped.”
Joel angled past him and made a beeline for the boundary wall. He had to get to her, he had to. He could hear footsteps pounding after him. Charlie? Evan? Maximus, or perhaps even Evangeline? He didn’t know, and he didn’t care. All he could think about was getting to Maggie.
The air began to feel even hotter as he neared the orchard. Some of the trees had caught fire and their bark was shrivelling away into ashes. Joel could see them now—Maggie on one side of the apple grove, Isla and Kaden on the other, and Ms Joy in the middle.
Ms Joy seemed to be reasoning with them, or trying to, anyway. But the girls were staring only at each other, unmoving, unblinking. A gale whirled around Maggie, spiralling at her fingertips. Fire was lapping at Isla’s ankles, but she didn’t flinch. Neither did Kaden.
Joel sprinted across the orchard, covering his mouth and nose with his sleeve as smoke billowed in the gale.
“Maggie,” he wheezed, his lungs already strained from the explosion at the mansion.
She looked over at him and his heart skipped. She was alive.
He opened his mouth to call out to her again, but before he could say anything, she raised her palm towards him. He braced himself as a powerful wind caught him, throwing him back onto the orchard path. He hit the ground with a smack, and a bolt of pain shot through him.
Suddenly Evan was at his side, hauling him to his feet.
“We’ve got to get out of here,” Evan was saying.
Joel could see the fire beginning to creep up around them now. With every second that passed, the flames rose higher and spread even farther.
“They’re doing this,” Joel stammered. “Isla and Maggie, fire and wind . . . They’re going up against each other.”
“Exactly,” Evan said, dragging Joel back towards the parking lot. “They’re going to burn this place to the ground.”
Joel strained against Evan. “I can’t leave her!”
Evan stopped in his tracks and gripped Joel’s shoulders. “Your Maggie’s not here anymore,” he said. “She’s gone, and you know it.”
The fire’s heat stung Joel’s eyes and began to burn his lungs.
The wind shifted again, bringing Ms Joy’s voice within hearing.
“Girls,” she was yelling. “Enough!”
At a safer distance now, Joel turned to stare. He could see that Maggie’s cold eyes had fused onto Kaden now. She raised her hands and a squall began to form before her. It rushed into Kaden, throwing him to the ground. Then Isla raised her hands, sending fire rippling across the pathway. Maggie drove it back with a surge of air.
“Isla’s protecting Kaden,” Joel realised. “It’s Kaden who Maggie’s after, not Isla.”
“We have to get out of here,” Evan choked. “Please,” he begged, his voice trembling. “I can
’t face this. It’s the dream . . . I can’t.”
“I know,” Joel said benevolently. “But I have to.”
“Joel—”
With that, he broke free from Evan’s grip and ran back towards the flames. He cast a final glance over his shoulder to see Charlie, Maximus, and Evangeline hovering at the orchard entrance, beckoning towards him with panic-stricken expressions.
“I’m sorry,” Joel managed before racing farther into the orchard.
As everything around him took on the orange glow of flame, he dropped to the ground and began crawling across the singed grass to where Kaden was crouched against the boarding house wall.
“Isla will kill her,” Kaden murmured distantly.
“Don’t let her,” Joel pleaded with a ragged breath. “For Isla’s sake. Maggie’s her best friend, her family. You have to stop her.”
Kaden looked down at the ground. “They’ll kill us if we get in their way. Isla can’t control it; she can’t stop. Neither of them can.”
Joel flinched. “We have to try. We did this to them.”
“So?” Kaden said, his voice suddenly hard and full of resentment. “Someone did this to me, too—but I didn’t see anyone coming to my rescue, did you?”
Joel covered his mouth with his sleeve, breathing through the smoke. “Is that why you did it?” he rasped. “It was your twisted way of getting even with the world? You stole Isla’s life to make up for the one that was stolen from you?”
“This is owed to me,” Kaden seethed. “It was promised to me. Power, status, family . . . And now that Jefferson’s out of the way, I’m next in line to take leadership. We can lead the Fallows coven together, Isla and me. She’s powerful, and I made that happen. I was born for power, and so was she.”
Joel gazed emptily at the girls in the storm; the girls who were the storm.
“You’re right,” Joel muttered. “You made her powerful. Well done.”
“Don’t patronise me,” Kaden baulked. “I didn’t think it would be like this,” he went on desolately. “I thought she’d still be Isla, like I’m still me. If I’d known that turning her into a hybrid would have changed her, I never would have—”
Blackheath Resurrection (The Blackheath Witches Book 2) Page 21
