I swallow down the nausea and look closely at the fusion of metal and skin. “How did you know this would work on me?”
“We didn’t, not for sure.”
I try not to think of what their Plan B probably involved if the bracelet hadn’t worked.
“You took a big risk,” I say.
Sarah nods. “We did, but we had to try to save you from your dark magic. We’re at the point of no return. We’re in new territory here, and I’m not going to stand here and tell you I know exactly how we need to go forward. But we have to do whatever we can to help you access your white witch powers.” She pauses and takes a deep breath. “I should have done more before, brought you here sooner.”
“What if the white magic is gone?”
“It can’t be,” Sarah says, sounding determined. “If it is, every member of the Bane dies. Your friends die. You die.” The way she says it lets me know that despite her earlier assertion, she and the rest of the Bane will kill me if I prove too much of a danger and the covens don’t end me first.
A tremendous weight settles on my shoulders at the enormity of the task before me. This is fate-of-the-world stuff, and I hold it in my hands. A huge ball of doubt settles in my stomach. How can I possibly believe I’m strong enough to defeat the covens now, after I’ve killed a powerless human? But what choice do I have but to try? I can’t just sit here a harnessed prisoner while the covens kill without remorse because of my defection, because they view me as a threat.
This situation is so far removed from what I expected when I ran away from home so I could live a normal life. Where I find myself bears absolutely no resemblance to normal, not even the normal I knew before fleeing my coven.
I started all of this with that one fateful decision. It’s up to me to end it. I may fail, but it won’t be because I don’t try.
“Okay,” I say.
“This will be harder than anything you’ve ever done.”
“Of that I have no doubt.” Nothing worth having ever comes easily. And a world without the covens’ threat to humanity, to my friends, is definitely worth having. “So what now?”
“Now we plan for the inevitable arrival of the covens. The Bane have stayed hidden for a very long time, but that’s going to come to an end.”
“Can’t you just stay here until they go away?”
“Do you really think they’re going to go away without finding you? If your white witch powers are still accessible, you pose the single biggest threat to the covens’ way of life. They’re not going to leave Salem until they root you out and kill you. It’s our job to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
I eye the bracelet melded to my wrist. “How do we find out if the powers are still there?”
“We take off the bracelet and pick up where we left off, only at a more accelerated pace.”
I shift my gaze to Sarah. “Do you really think that’s safe? What if I kill you and everyone else here?”
She points at the bracelet. “We’re not taking it off immediately. There’s a lot you need to know and understand before we take that step. We’ll go through what we’re going to do after the bracelet is removed before we even think about actually taking it off. We’ll take plenty of precautions.”
I shift in my uncomfortable seat. “What do you want me to do?”
“Remember everything we did before you decided to act as judge, jury and executioner.”
I flinch at the term “executioner,” but that’s exactly what I turned into when I killed Barrow. It was one thing to kill a dark witch, quite another to murder a human who had no power beyond the weapons he wielded even if he was a murderer.
“You let your rage rule you that night, and it had deadly consequences,” Sarah says. “We have to encourage the white magic to force its way to the surface, to override the dark and everything you were taught growing up. You have to learn very quickly what it took the Bane decades to control, plus master the full force of the white witch powers. That’s a tall order, but it’s our only hope of surviving.”
“How long before we take off the bracelet?”
“That depends on you.” Sarah takes a few steps across the room. “We’ve never done anything like this before, never had the opportunity, so we’ll be learning as we go, all of us.”
I wish I had learned everything I needed to know, and mastered my white witch power before I encountered Barrow. But wishing doesn’t do me any good now. “I’m sorry, about everything.”
Sarah turns toward me. “I want to believe you are, but words are empty until they are backed up by actions. Don’t tell me you’re sorry or that you want to do the right thing. Show me.”
“I will.” A surge of determination wells up within me despite the doubt pecking away at it like a vulture at a dead animal.
A knock sounds at the door, and Sarah goes to answer it. Amanda walks in with a tray of food and heads toward me. Her eyes are harder when she looks at me than Sarah’s, and I get the distinct impression that she doesn’t have the hope that I’ll redeem myself that Sarah holds. I can’t say that I blame her.
“You need to eat,” Sarah says. “What you’ll be doing in the days ahead will require strength.”
Instead of leaving me alone to eat the cheeseburger and fries, Sarah dives right into my training by going back over everything we’ve already been through in the days since she first agreed to help me. Of course I can’t actually feel my power right now since it’s temporarily in hibernation, but just hearing Sarah’s instructions, remembering what it felt like to move through the darkness inside me to find the light, helps to settle me and prepare me for what lies ahead. I want to rip off the bracelet and do it all for real, but I have no choice but to trust Sarah and her methods. Trying it my way had been a colossal failure.
Though there is no clock in the room, I feel as though the hour is late when Sarah finally gestures with her hands in a way that indicates we’re done for the day. As she heads for the door, the sudden fear that she’s leaving me here for good slams into me.
“Can I see my friends?”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea right now,” she says without hesitation.
I can’t help but wonder if it’s because she wants to ensure my cooperation, if she thinks it will cause me to relapse, or if my friends don’t want to see me and she doesn’t want to tell me that yet. It doesn’t really matter why. It all boils down to the fact that I can’t see with my own eyes that they are okay.
“Can you at least unchain me? My back is killing me.”
Sarah stares at me for a moment, then nods to Amanda, who crosses the room and unhooks the chains at my wrists then my ankles.
“Consider this a gesture of reward for your cooperation today,” Sarah says. “Do anything that we see as a threat, and they’ll be back on faster than you can take a breath. And next time your neck will be chained to the back of the chair as well.”
Anger makes me fist my hands, but I force myself to unfurl my fingers. One step at a time, I have to earn her trust and a little more freedom. One step at a time, I have to learn to trust myself again.
Without another word, Sarah and Amanda leave the room and lock me inside with my thoughts, my anxiety and my regrets.
Chapter Two
The world is on fire. I walk barefoot through a red-hot landscape, each step scorching my skin and drawing howls of pain from my parched, raw throat. The flames lick at my body, threatening to consume my skin, my bones, every last speck of my being.
And I deserve it.
Where else should a murderer filled to bursting with black, roiling evil be than hell? Still, I want to fight it, to convince fate that I’m not evil. That I can be good if I’m just given another chance.
Laughter assaults my ears like metal claws scraping across glass. I spin and see Amos Barrow standing on the other side of the flames. His face is charred beyond recognition, but I know it’s him. I’ll never forget that sight as long as I live.
But I’m in he
ll. That means I’m dead. God, I’m going to have to see that image for eternity. Tears streak out of my eyes but evaporate in the heat, leaving stinging paths along my cheeks.
Can I atone here? Is there anything I can do to make forever less painful? I drop to my knees and look upward, but I don’t see anything but a black void and the orange tinge of the flames. I feel as if I’m falling into that void. My heart thumps hard as I feel bits of myself slipping away. Terror shoots through me when I can’t remember my name. Who am I? Why am I here? I reach out in a blind panic and manage to latch on to answers.
Jax Pherson, that’s my name. I’m a dark witch. And I murdered a man, a human with no supernatural powers. Now I am paying the price. As if to put an exclamation point on that thought, the flames closing in around me catch my hair on fire. No matter how much I beat at the flames, they won’t go out.
“I’m sorry!” I scream. “I’m sorry! Please forgive me!”
Barrow continues to laugh, and I know the sound will drive me mad. And forever is a very long time to be crazy.
Suddenly, I can’t breathe. The air is too hot. Each time I try to inhale, flames ride the air into my mouth and leave me choking. Air, I need air. The edges of my vision begin to fade as I suffocate.
The darkness stirs within me, but this time it’s not enough. This time, I cry out in agony as I succumb to the flames.
I jerk awake gasping, desperate for air to fill my burning lungs. The flames, they’re so hot on my skin. Unbearable. I inhale in great gulps, and slowly I realize the air isn’t scorching. In fact, it’s quite cool. My skin isn’t melting. I’m not in hell. Not technically.
As more of the nightmare slips away, I force myself to focus on the ceiling beams. Gradually, reality replaces the dream, not that reality is a whole lot better. I’m still a dark witch, still a killer, and still a prisoner. But I’m not burning. Instead, I’m lying on a thin mattress in the corner of the dungeon-like room where the Bane brought me after I killed Barrow.
I close my eyes tightly, as if that might keep out the images haunting me. But it does no good. The details of the past few days replay in my mind, beginning with the horror of seeing Fiona Day’s body. Tears leak out of the closed corners of my eyes and roll down my temples into my hair.
Fiona became like a grandmother to me during our short acquaintance. Not only did she and her family provide Egan and me with information to help us understand our history as dark witches, but she also showed me what I might become if I could find a way to rid the covens of their dark powers. If I rid myself of that same power.
She was the kindest person I’ve ever met, a descendant of pre-Salem witch trial witches, which meant her family had not taken in the dark magic that fuels the covens today. Instead, they’d fled and become observers, keepers of a three-century repository of information about witches and Salem. She believed I was some sort of chosen one meant to end the covens’ evil reign for good. How wrong she’d been.
The sight of her lying there on the floor of Wiccan Good Herbs, a hole in her chest and her life’s blood pooling beneath her, turned a switch in me. The need for revenge swelled to the point of consuming me. Only now that the blackness had been suppressed inside me could I feel the oppressive guilt of what I’d done—not only killing Amos Barrow but also letting down Fiona.
I consider getting up, but the thought of not being able to go any farther than the confines of this barren room keeps me right where I am. I attempt to push the pain and regret and guilt away by replaying Sarah’s lessons about accessing my white magic. A couple of times, I think I can really feel it, even harnessed as it is. But that must be the fatigue playing tricks on my brain. No matter how much I try, I can’t focus for long. I wonder if I’ve ever been so tired, so lethargic. I can’t determine if it’s still the after-effects of the tranquilizer or if the events of the past several weeks have just finally caught up to me with a physical and mental KO.
But I can’t just fall into a restful sleep that will hopefully prepare me for the work ahead. Each time I drift off, I’m greeted with images I want to forcibly purge from my memory. I’d be willing to forget who I am if I could only stop remembering Fiona’s death. The sound of Barrow’s screams as I sent the equivalent of lightning bolts through his body. The look of pain on Keller’s face as he’d faced the very real possibility of having to put me down like a rabid animal.
I must fall asleep again at some point because I come awake with a gasp when someone touches my shoulder. A potent fear pulses inside me, a lingering effect of whatever nightmare I’m having this time. As sleep recedes, I notice Sarah rising to her full height beside me and taking a step back. I can’t identify the expression on her face, but I get the weirdest impression that part of it is sorrow.
“Another nightmare?”
I nod as I push myself up to a sitting position. “I can’t sleep without them. I guess it serves me right.”
“Perhaps.” She doesn’t sound entirely convinced, and I wonder what thoughts are going through her head. But I’m too tired to ask, and I’m not entirely sure I want to know.
“Time to work, I guess.” Although I don’t know how effective I’ll be when I feel as though I’ve been dropped off a skyscraper then run over by a really large truck.
“I think perhaps a shower and some clean clothes might make things a touch easier.”
At her mention of a shower, I realize there is almost nothing I want more than to scrub a couple of layers of skin off. It’s like if I can shed enough I can truly start over. With a grunt that would sound more at home coming from a person three times my age, I get to my feet.
“Once we leave this room, know that you’ll be no closer to escape. This facility is locked down.”
“Where would I go?” I ask. “Anyone I care about is probably in this building somewhere, and all I want is to see with my own eyes that they are okay. Even if they all hate me.”
“That’s all you want?”
I meet Sarah’s eyes and get the distinct impression that this question is a test just as much as me trying to control my power will be. “Make that the first thing I want. Then mastering my power and somehow earning everyone’s trust again. And finally defeating the covens once and for all.”
A part of me whispers that none of these desires will ever be satisfied. I don’t deserve my friends. I’ve proven my magic is stronger than my willpower. And if I can’t control myself, how in the world am I going to defeat hundreds, thousands of dark witches?
Sarah nods. “Good answer.” She gestures for me to follow her toward the door.
Once we’re outside the room, it looks totally different. Gone is the dungeon décor, replaced by plain white walls. The stone floor gives way to large blocks of gray tile. I never thought I’d appreciate generic drywall, but it’s so much brighter than the stone-and-timber room that I feel as though I’ve just been exposed to sunshine after being in a cave.
Sarah’s heels click against the tile as she heads down the corridor to the right. I get the feeling this Sarah of the slick clothes and high heels is the real Sarah Davenport, not the average, forgettable librarian. But if the Bane’s goal is to stay hidden, the public Sarah was much better at it. I wonder if perhaps we have that one thing in common, having to hide who we truly are in order to survive. Then I remember the vague image of her in that field beside the cemetery in those few moments after I killed Barrow.
“What was with the red cloaks?” I ask as I follow her. “Cloaks always look cool in fiction, but aren’t they a pain in the ass in real life?”
She glances over her shoulder at me. “A bit of homage to our founders.”
“Little Red Riding Hood?” I don’t know why I’m joking. I can only recall one time when I felt less like joking, and that was in the days after my mother’s murder. Maybe I’m not just dangerous but also truly unhinged. Really, who makes jokes when they’ve killed a person and face potential annihilation?
Sarah slows, allowing me to come alongside
her. “Penelope.”
As in Penelope Davenport, one of the original members of the Bane.
Sarah’s answer surprises me, and I pull myself from my crazy thoughts and pay attention.
“Her grandmother gave her a red cloak for her birthday only weeks before the witch trials began,” Sarah says. “Once the accusers started pointing fingers, her parents told her to burn the cloak because it drew too much attention. Survival demanded witches not draw attention or seem too reclusive. They had to keep a delicate balance. So instead of burning the cloak, she hid it at the bottom of her trunk. She hoped that she might be able to wear it again once the hysteria passed.”
“But she never got the chance.”
Sarah shakes her head. “When her family accepted the dark power, she realized that the human accusers were the lesser of the two evils. Her grandmother spoke out against the new covens, and her own son, Penelope’s father, killed her for it. That’s when Penelope knew she had to disappear. When she left her family, she took the cloak with her in honor of her grandmother.”
For a moment I’m stunned by the story of Penelope’s grandmother, and in my mind the woman looks like Fiona. I swallow and blink against tears. My heart breaks that I’ll never see her again, never watch as she bundles herbs, never talk to her about what witches are supposed to be like.
“They were all so much stronger than me,” I say, wishing I had a tenth of the strength of those early witches who resisted the dark magic.
“Let’s hope that’s not really true.” Sarah stops outside a door. “They were fighting for their own survival. You’ll be fighting for the survival of us all.”
Magick (Book 3 in the Coven Series) Page 2
