by Tara Brown
“Sam, what’s happened?”
Luke was suddenly at his side, “Is it Hanna? Is she okay?”
He covered his face to hide his pain. He was ashamed of himself.
“Is she hurt?”
“Where is she?”
He tried to speak but his voice cracked. He whispered instead, “She doesn’t want to be with me.”
He felt Luke help him to his feet, “Did she do this to you? Tell me you fought back.”
“Lucas.” Ari scolded him. Luke laughed nervously.
Sam shrugged him off, “I’m fine.” He turned and walked inside the house.
Danny was in the kitchen eating and playing his DSI, “Hey Sam. Did Anne tell you she met some Internet dude? She’s going on a real date. Like gross. I pity that poor sap.”
Sam nodded and trudged through the kitchen to the stairs. He ran up them until he was in his room. He closed the door and collapsed on his bed. He missed his mom.
He hadn’t seen her since she had been taken. The Wiccans assumed she had been caught by the government, like the girl they had taken from the island. He let them take him when he found out she was missing. He promised the Wiccans he would find the missing child and his mother.
He realized his mother had not ever been inside of the facility when he got there. He met the nephilim children and stayed with them until they were rescued. The girl who had been taken from the Wiccans was Sarah. She was a fire witch. He smiled, thinking about finding her there. She had been taken from her elementary school for burning the gymnasium down. When she touched him, his magic sparked with hers and he was able to see the future. He saw Aimee long before she ever came for them.
The kids in the center were all the same, they all got their powers before they should have. They were frighteningly dangerous and out of control. Danny and Anne had the least-frightening powers. Sarah got nervous and lit fires all the time. He constantly put out the seductive powers, which made him popular with the female guards.
The government had been using them. Danny was made to predict things and used as a human walkie-talkie. Sarah was made to sneak into places and firebomb them. She could make herself invisible whenever she needed it. Anne could make a shield that stopped everything from working. She was like a walking EMP weapon.
Sam had hated being captive and could have escaped at anytime, but he couldn’t take them with him. Not all of them. He couldn’t guarantee he could make it back to get the ones he left behind. He couldn’t protect them from themselves. They were too volatile. He knew one day Aimee would come and save them all. Then he could get back to Hanna. Back to waiting for her to wake up.
He felt anger growing inside of him as he thought about the years wasted.
“Sam.”
He looked up at Lydia standing in the doorway of his room.
“You have everyone pretty worried, Sam. Is Hanna okay?”
He shook his head, “They’ve turned her. I saw her gleaning the need off of someone.”
Lydia looked disgusted, “Why would she do something like that?”
He shrugged, “They have her. Sending her there was mistake. I will never forgive you, or Lorri.”
He pulled his ring from his finger and placed it on the nightstand.
“Sam, don’t be foolish.”
“Make the pain stop, Lydia. Please. Break the match.”
“I won’t, Sam. It will break your heart. You’ll never feel love again. You'll die.”
He turned his back to her, “I won’t ever love again, anyway.”
“What’s going on?” Lorri's voice filled the room.
“Hanna and Sam have had a fight.”
“Yeah, I figured. She just sent me a message to come and get her in Greece. She wants to come home.”
Sam turned around and shook his head.
"Don't be a pain in the ass, Sam."
Lydia put her hands on her hips, “Hanna is a Rose. You can’t leave her there, if she wants to come home. That’s wrong. Sam, you and her need to try to fix this.” She stormed out of the room.
Lorri nodded at his ring on the nightstand, “Bugging your finger?”
He shook his head, “Not doing this anymore. I’m done. The moment I went searching for my mom and became bent on saving the kids, was the last moment of peace I’ve had.”
“I’m going to kill her.” Lorri rubbed her eyes like she was exhausted.
Chapter Nineteen
Ophelia
The woman in the snow globe waved at her and blew her a kiss. Ophelia looked at the six balls of light, “Do you see her often?”
‘Other than this snow globe, we have not seen her since birth. We each remember her from the minutes we had when we were born, before we were taken.’
She frowned, “Why can’t you go there?”
‘There is a guard around the tower. No one may enter but our father and the maids.’
“How did Annabelle make this snow globe then?”
‘One of the maids sacrificed her life to create a live link to mother’s cell. It’s made of her blood and soul.’
She frowned, “Gross.” She was grateful she had gotten Sam to take her to grab it. He made her promise a favor if he did it. She had cried when she saw her house. Her parents were out. She knew they were looking for their daughters. She imagined they were terrified, as she was.
Thoughts of Jake filled her mind. She wondered if he was still thinking about her or if it was all a lie. She couldn’t believe her life had taken the turn it had.
She left the snow globe and walked down the stairs to the kitchen.
“She needs to convince them to give her their power after she kills her brother.”
“Shh.”
She stopped as she opened the fridge door. She stood frozen at the fridge, holding the jug of orange juice.
Were they talking about her?
“Ophelia honey, do you want to come in here?”
She carried the orange juice with her into the sitting room next to the kitchen. Lorri and Lydia sat on the chairs.
Lorri raised an eyebrow at the juice.
“I was getting a glass, I swear.”
“So you heard that, I assume.”
She nodded, “You want me to kill my brother? The brother I haven’t ever met and don’t really believe exists?”
“The way the witch who birthed the others did the spell was so that whoever was the last standing, would be graced with the power of them all. It’s the only way to defeat him.”
She raised an eyebrow, “They told me you’re Lucifer. If that’s true how is he stronger than you?”
Lorri looked her directly in the eyes, “He has allowed the shadow to fill him up. He is full of the hate and pain of the world. He is the actual Satan, human kind believes me to be. The reason we guard is to keep the darkness your mother cursed the earth with out.”
Ophelia nodded, “I know, Annabelle and my sisters told me this. Adam raped her in the garden.”
“Shhh child. Do not speak the words.” Lydia looked around nervously.
She frowned, “Why?”
“Better to be safe than sorry.”
“Look, I get that this is very real to you all, but the part that’s real to me is my sister. Do you know where she is?”
Lydia glanced at Lorri who nodded, “We think she’s in Alaska, if she’s still alive.”
“Still alive?” Her stomach started to twist.
Lorri nodded, “Look kid, the people who have her have all the darkness in the world inside of them. Bad things are kind of their gigs.”
“Can we go get her?”
“Not until July 7. It’s when you’ll be at your strongest.”
She tried to contain her anger, “Are you fucking insane? I’m not waiting over a week to get her. Especially, if she might die. Freaking nut bags. My parents have probably called the police. Everyone knows we're missing. Jesus Christ.”
She got up and stormed up to the room where Sam was staying. She tapped on h
is door.
“Yes.”
She opened it and smiled, “Hey.”
He stood at his bedside with a big bag. She frowned, “What are you doing?”
“Leaving.”
Her heart sunk. She hated the house and the stupid people in it. The little kids were creepy and the girls her age were bitchy. She paused watching him and blurted out, “Can I come?”
He shrugged and put a hand out. She ran out, “Be right back.”
She ran to her room and snagged her snow globe and ran back to his room.
“Sam, don’t do this.”
Lydia’s voice rang through the halls. Sam frowned at Ophelia who grabbed his arm as they flashed.
She opened her eyes when they stopped moving to see the most amazing castle she had ever seen.
“Wow. What is this place?”
He walked away from her, “Giselle’s place.”
Ophelia gulped, “The vampire’s house?” She barely recalled the night the vampires had been outside Lydia's. What she did remember was horrifying. She smiled watching Sam. She remembered him mostly. Him and the way he made her mind fuzzy.
He was already inside. She looked up at the huge creepy castle. She walked in amazed. The foyer was the size of her main floor of her parents’ house. Sadness filled her as she thought about them. Were they out looking for her right now? Were they scared?
Lorri told her that she was a danger to everyone, now that her father knew she was alive. He would know he had been betrayed. She couldn’t imagine being a baby smuggled out as a dead infant, as her mother grieved the loss of yet another baby girl. She gripped the snow globe against her chest and tried not to cry. She couldn’t fight the fact she felt something for the snow globe lady, even if she didn’t understand it.
Chapter Twenty
Sam
He stormed to Aimee’s new room. She was huddled on her bed crying.
“I need your help.”
A disgusted look flashed across her red and puffy face, “What? Are you kidding me?”
“I need help. I need to find the spell that breaks my match.”
“Can you break mine too?”
He slumped onto her bed, “You’re being a drama queen. You aren’t matched. You were in love, Aims. Humans don’t die from falling out of love. What happened?”
“I broke up with him, duhhhh. I thought the crying and not even wanting to kill made that obvious.”
“Is he okay?”
She glared at him with her steely-grey eyes, “What? No—of course not. He’s upset. He cried on the side of the road and yelled at me.”
“What did he say?”
“He said I was making a mistake and that we are supposed to be together. Then he got really mad and asked why the fuck he was staying in random hotels with my dad, and giving up his dreams, if we weren’t going to be together. Then he called me my sister and left.”
“You know that’s not true, right?"
"It is true. I am my sister. I loved him and Aleks at the same time. I dated them both. I judged her for the same shit."
He rolled his eyes, "You saved his life, breaking it off. Think of the shit that's wrong with you."
She sniffled, “It didn’t feel like it. It felt like I was destroying it.”
“Did you go get your dad?”
She nodded, “I took him to my gram’s. We sold his house a while ago and it closed the other day. He cried a lot. I’m an asshole. Everyone hates me.”
He put an arm around her, “Aims, you're being a sobby baby. Remember—fierce death dealer. You need some of that 'I am woman, hear me roar'. You aren’t an asshole. No more than any of us. We can’t have mortal connections. They die too easily.”
“Well, my dad's staying with my gram in her new condo that I got Lorri to buy her. It’s in the south of France. No one knows they’re there. Not even Shane.”
“He’ll be happy, Aims.”
“I wish they could all be happy. I wish I’d cut the ties with them all, long before I became a Rose. I don’t mind my life being fucked, but I hate that they're all separated and scared and I can’t be there. I wish I knew what was going to happen.”
Sam pulled a gold plate from his backpack, “Then I have something to cheer you up.”
She glared at him, “Gold dishes?”
“Annabelle’s golden scrying plate. Ass.”
She snorted, “What in the eff could you possibly want to show me in that plate? You aren’t even magical. Wanker.”
He sighed and pinched his noise, “I’m not hammer head, but Ophelia is and she is here.”
She burst into snotty laughter, “You’re a moron.”
“Be that as it may, but you can see if it was the right choice.”
She stopped laughing and looked at him, “You think she could see that?”
He nodded, “And more. How to get Alise back. I bet she can.”
“Uhhh that Ophelia chick is wandering the halls and Hanna just called from Roland’s place. She’s coming over.” Giselle popped her head in.
Sam smiled, “Ask Ophelia to meet us in the den, please.”
Giselle frowned, “I am not your servant. Besides, I got me a vampire date.” She turned and shouted into the hall, “Jeeves, get that witch in the den and I’m hungry.”
She walked away.
Aimee tilted her head, “I miss poor Giselle.”
Sam nodded, “I agree.”
“I HEARD THAT, ASSHOLES.”
Sam smirked, "Guess we are assholes."
Aimee laughed and picked up the golden plate.
“Wonder what her date will be like?”
“He will no doubt be young and attractive, and hopefully eager to fill my role as Jeeves the slave.”
Sam snorted as Hamish appeared in the doorway.
“Young Miss Ophelia is headed to the den.”
“Thanks Hamish.”
“You are quite welcome, Miss Aimee.”
Sam rolled his eyes at her grin as they walked out of the room. Giselle had gotten moody and snotty since they had moved into the castle. Aimee kept calling her mean-high-school Giselle.
Ophelia was standing in the den waiting for them when they got there. She seemed out of place. He felt sorry for her for a small second.
“Dim the lights and light a bunch of candles.” Sam grabbed the plate from Aimee and placed it on the small table. He grabbed a glass of water from the bar and poured it into the shallow plate.
“Make sure the candles are behind the spot. They need to be behind where she is going to read.” He smiled at Ophelia, “You need to look into this plate and relax your mind. We will ask questions and you will see answers, okay?”
She nodded, looking lost, “This is how a witch gets answers?”
He nodded, “I saw the Wiccans do this tons. Plus this plate is really magical.”
She fidgeted with her fingers and looked into the water.
“Calm the mind, Ophelia. Push away every thought and worry. Just relax and breathe.” He tried to speak as low as he could.
Chapter Twenty-One
Ophelia
The water looked normal. She wanted to help them so they would help her get her sister and her life back, but she doubted her own abilities. She knew there was magic. Too many things had occurred for her to doubt that, but at the same time, she had never seen a vision.
She cleared her mind and watched the water in the golden plate. Just as she felt the last cog in her mind stop turning, the water rippled. She looked closer. The bottom of the plate fell away, revealing an incredibly deep hole filled with water.
“Okay, I think you can ask now.” She felt detached and fuzzy.
Aimee blurted quickly, “Did I make the right decision to break up with Shane?”
The water turned stormy and dark suddenly. Waves started to lap across the tops of the hole. A handsome man with dark-blond hair and bright-blue eyes sat alone in a room. He was drinking a beer with the TV on, and his police uniform shirt open
to reveal a white undershirt. He looked like a slob. He looked miserable. In a flash he was at a scene of an accident. A woman in blue jeans and a baby-blue t-shirt held her hand to her face. Blood dripped from her forehead. He wiped the blood away. She smiled at him. The next flash, he was holding a baby in a hospital room. The lady from the accident smiled from a hospital bed. His eyes still had sadness in them.
“He’s going to save a woman, fall in love, and have a baby. He looks happy, I guess. Haunted still, maybe. So I guess you did. His life looks like he moved on.”
“My turn. How can I break my match?”
She frowned. She didn’t understand the question. She watched as the water churned again, and when the picture cleared, a beautiful woman stood at the edge of a lake. An older woman walked to her. Her back was to Ophelia. The scene looked old fashioned. They both wore old-fashioned dresses and bonnets. The young woman opened her dress and the older woman whispered, “Fod yn rhydd o’r cadwyni o gariad”, then she pulled a dagger from the holster on her hip and dragged it across her hand, making bright-red blood appear. She coated the dagger in the blood and then plunged it into the heart of the woman. Ophelia gasped and the woman screamed in agony. The older woman pulled the dagger out. No wound was there but a scar remained. The older woman turned to face Ophelia. She gasped again, seeing the younger face of Lydia walking away from the screaming woman.
“I have to cut myself and say some shit and then stab you. Lydia did it in the mirror to a young woman. She is so beautiful. She looks like she is in agony though.”
“You know what to say right? Not just some shit?”
“Yeah God. The words are repeating in my head right now.”
Aimee cut Sam off, “Will I get my sister back?”
Ophelia thought of her own sister momentarily, as the water splashed and rolled inside of the hole. She waited for the water to clear but it didn’t. She started to feel sick. She dropped to one knee.
“I don’t think I can do anymore right now.”
Sam was behind her smelling amazing. She felt rejuvenated as her body leaned back into him.
