by D. N. Hoxa
“We need you to put the word out to the Bone families. We need people if we’re going to have a chance against them. Anybody who is willing to help.”
“Have you forgotten, Eli? We’re no longer coven leaders,” Joseph Davis said.
“You’re the only leaders we’ve ever known,” Bender said. “People will listen to you if you explain. They have to.”
“They won’t,” Catrina Reigns said.
“You’ll never know unless you try. We can’t do this alone. After we’re done here, we’re going to speak to the Green coven leaders, and the Bloodies. We’re going to ask them for help as well. This happened to us and is happening to the Greens. It’s only a matter of time before it happens to the Blood coven, if it hasn’t already,” Bender said.
He was right. Something like this could have already happened, and we wouldn’t know because of fucking secrets. I hated them, though I knew I wouldn’t even be alive without them.
“And what if nobody comes?” Alice Rivera asked with half a voice. “Bone families might listen to what we have to say, but we no longer have power over them. We cannot order them to do anything.”
At that, she was right.
“But you can ask them. Nobody wants to be covenless,” Bender said.
He turned to me with a smile. I grinned. He was never going to hear the end of it for using my line.
“Are you insinuating that we bring the coven back?” Monica Raymond said.
She no longer looked old and tired, or about to sleep. She was now very alert.
“Absolutely,” said Bender. “It’s time we took back our lives. Once we catch those bastards and make them pay, there will be nothing to hold us back.”
“It’s been a decade,” Catrina Reigns said. “We wouldn’t even know how…”
“Sure you do,” I said. “One step at a time.”
“Every time I look at you, I’m reminded of what I lost,” Alice Rivera said, looking down at the table.
“So use that. Use it to do a better job in the future,” Bender said the exact same words I would have.
“Our people need their leaders. They deserve them,” Monica Raymond whispered.
Bender didn’t miss a beat. “You can figure everything out another day. For now, what we need is your help. Will you do it? Will you give us the chance to catch those beasts and make them pay for what they did to your children?”
Perfectly put.
How could they say no?
***
When we left Alice Rivera’s house two hours later, I felt like I could breathe again. Darkness had enveloped everything around us, and Bloomsburg was as quiet as ever. With my gun in hand, I scanned the street a few times before I allowed myself to relax. The sun was gone, though. It was only a matter of time before those vampires came after me.
“I’m so glad that’s over,” Bender said when we climbed into Turtle again.
“I just hope they don’t kill each other in there.” After we’d given the leaders every detail we had—the wolves, the vampires, the ring, the plan—we left them to figure out the best way to address the people. I was also in a hurry because I didn’t want those vampires to catch me inside a house I didn’t know. The streets were a different thing.
“One down, two more to go,” Bender said. “Where to next?”
Catrina Reigns had given us a spell stone with a blocking spell in it. She claimed it was one of the strongest spells Bone magic could produce. Bender activated it as soon as we walked out the door, but I was still worried. Those vampires worked for people who could enchant a ring to turn them into a beast. I doubted even the strongest spells could withstand theirs. Still, it was good to have the extra protection.
“If we go back to New York, we’ll just put ourselves on a silver platter for them, don’t you think?”
Bender nodded. “At least until dawn.” Then he closed his eyes for a second. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
“I have no clue what you’re thinking, but I’ve slept until noon today, and I could go on for another ten hours like this.” Assuming I wouldn’t be attacked and wounded.
Bender laughed. “I was thinking that we should head straight for the Green coven, then head back to New York when the sun comes up.”
“Oh,” I said, grinning. “Then, yes, I’m thinking what you’re thinking.”
“Delaware, here we come,” Bender said.
He floored the gas pedal all the way. Turtle still wouldn’t go past eighty. It was going to be a long drive.
Nineteen
Maybe going inside the Green community just like that without warning hadn’t been the best of ideas. I had the ring to help me get through undetected, and I’d held Bender by the arm as we walked through, half hoping that the ring’s power would extend to him as well, but who were we kidding? We both knew we’d raise the alarms.
That’s why seven Green witches had us surrounded in the middle of the street, their guns pointed at our faces.
It took all of my will not to reach for my gun, or at least a knife, but I held my arms up anyway. My beads buzzed, waiting for the second I’d unleash them against the witches if any of them thought to shoot first and ask questions later.
“You’re in Green territory,” one of the witches around us said. He was as old as Bender, only much bigger. The muscles under his thin blouse were very obvious. “Go back where you came from.”
“My name is Eli Bender, and this is Winter Wayne. We’re here to talk to your leaders,” Bender said.
Muscle guy took a look at me again. He probably recognized my name. I was in his home illegally when I took down that beast, anyway.
“Our leaders didn’t say they were expecting anyone,” he finally said.
“They’re not expecting us. We came anyway. It’s about the kidnappings. About the beasts many of you died fighting. I assure you that they will want to hear what we have to say,” I said.
Bender might have what it took to talk to leaders and such, but I’d dealt with ordinary people all my life. I knew how to get to them faster.
“The ECU is handling the kidnappings and the beasts,” Muscle guy said.
I grinned. “Did you not hear? The beast escaped. The ECU can’t handle shit.”
Those witches were surprised. They began to look at each other with raised brows, and little by little, their guns lowered. Good. I didn’t like to be a target.
“Don’t move unless we tell you to,” said Muscle guy, then nodded at the man closest to him. The next second, he began to run up the street and disappeared into the darkness.
With a sigh, I lowered my arms. Bender did the same when he saw that nobody was shooting at me yet. It took the Green witch a good five minutes to come back running. He then whispered something in Muscle guy’s ear. My patience was wearing very thin. By the time he asked us to follow him, I was a mess of nerves.
I’d already known that the Green leaders would agree to meet with us, to listen to what we had to say. The tricky part would be getting them on board. With the Bone coven, we were right at home—well, Bender was, not me—and he knew exactly how to speak to those people, but here, we were strangers. A fairy and a Bone witch trying to tell them that they knew more than the Executive Control Unit. It was a lot to ask, I knew that, and that was why I was afraid they’d kick us out. If they did, there would be no point in even requesting a meeting with the Blood coven.
Muscle guy and his friends, all with their guns still in hand, took us to an old, wooden one-story house with bad lighting. We weren’t complaining, though. When we walked in, four people were waiting for us. I only recognized Theodora Sullivan and the two men I’d seen in Peterson’s basement. The other woman was a stranger.
The room we were in was small and round, with a brown sofa in the middle, a fireplace across from it, and a pretty green carpet. Both men were sitting down while Theodora Sullivan stood with her arms crossed in front of the fireplace, and the other woman rested her hip against the sofa. The ho
use was far from the fancy one of Alice Rivera, but it was much more warmer and inviting.
“You two must either be very stupid or very brave to come into our coven the way you did, and ask to speak to us,” the man sitting on the right said.
His blue eyes looked tired and his crooked teeth yellow, but maybe that was because of the weak lighting coming from the chandelier and the two lamps at each end of the room.
“We’re neither,” Bender said. “My name is Eli Bender. I’m a Bone witch, and I think you already know Winter.”
“Yes,” the woman resting against the sofa said. “A witch, a fairy, and neither.”
What?
“We’re here because we have information to share with you, and we want to ask you for your help,” Bender continued before I could say anything. I was glad he did.
“Well, speak fast, Eli Bender,” the guy with the crooked teeth said.
“Over ten years ago, right before the Bone coven broke apart, the children of our leaders were kidnapped and killed.”
They all came to attention immediately. “Excuse me?” Theodora Sullivan asked, her voice high pitched.
“They were kidnapped on the exact same dates as your children, the first three at least, and later on, they were found dead around the Bone community. It’s what caused our coven to fall apart,” Bender explained.
Jaws dropped and eyes widened, but nobody made a sound.
“That’s not the only reason why we believe that these beasts are the ones who did the same thing to us all those years ago. We know how they’re doing it. We know who they’re working with, and we know how to get to them. But to do that, we’re going to need your help.”
“When?” Theodora Sullivan said, putting her blond hair behind her ears with shaking hands. She came to stand in front of us.
“Two days ago—” Bender started, but she cut him off.
“No, when were they found dead?”
Shivers washed down my back. “The first body was found on February second.”
The woman let out a cry.
“Theodora, please,” the man on our left said. “This doesn’t mean anything.”
“Actually, it does. The kidnapping dates match perfectly,” Bender said and left them to do the math themselves.
“How do you know?” Theodora Sullivan said. Her son Oscar was kidnapped from the family’s accounting office. He was the second kidnapped person.
“I was in charge of the investigation conducted then, and I’ve been on the case for five years. From what Winter told me, details she got from William Peterson, there’s no room for doubt. These beasts are responsible for the attacks on our coven, as well as yours.”
“The ECU has every man at their disposal on this case,” the man with the crooked teeth said as he stood up.
“We know that the beast I caught escaped,” I said, though maybe I should have let Bender handle it. People judged him differently because his ears were round at the top. “We also know they have Peterson because he gave me that information. You can leave this case in their hands and wait for them to crack it, but February second is only a few days away.”
“How dare you,” the woman standing next to the sofa hissed. “My daughter is not dead!”
“Ester, please,” the other man said and stood up to go to her. I could only guess that they were Cara Hughes’s parents, Ester and Ronald Hughes. Which meant the guy with the crooked teeth was Austin Marshall. It was good to put the names together with their faces.
“You’re right, Ms. Hughes. She’s not dead yet, and we can get her back with your help,” I said.
“Who gave you the authority to investigate this case?” Roland Hughes said, that superior look on his face while he hugged his wife.
“I did.” I raised my chin to show him that I wasn’t going to cower. “My coven broke apart because of this. The people who suffered at the hands of these beasts deserve revenge. Ten years is a long time.”
It was just another way of reminding them that if we didn’t stop those beasts, long years of pain and suffering awaited them, too. I didn’t mean to be cruel, but that was the truth, and I was willing to use every low blow I had to get them to help us.
“What do you need?” Theodora Sullivan said.
“Theodora,” Austin Marshall warned.
“My son has been kidnapped!” she lashed back. “So has yours. If it means I’ll get him back from wherever he is, I’ll sell my soul to the devil. I’ll turn the whole world upside down. We’re going to help them.”
“She’s a fairy!” Ester Hughes cried. “They’re Bones! This doesn’t concern them.”
“Of course it does,” Bender said, a disgusted look on his face. For once, that look wasn’t directed at me. “We went through the same thing you’re going through. My niece was kidnapped and killed ten years ago, and I’ve held that weight on my shoulders for far too long. These beasts are strong, stronger than anything we’ve come across so far, and to defeat them, we’re going to have to work together, Bone, Green and Blood.”
“I saw it myself,” Austin Marshall said. “One of them killed ten of our best men. Ten.”
“Which is why we’re here,” I said.
“Our former leaders have already agreed to help,” Bender continued. “And we’re going to the Blood leadership as well. These beasts are not going to stop unless we make them.”
“Tell us what you need,” Theodora Sullivan said again, but this time, nobody warned her to stop.
“We need people,” Bender said without missing a beat. “We have a plan that we believe is going to lead us right to the beasts. When that happens, we’re going to need as many people as you can spare to help us take them down once and for all.”
“You’re asking us to send our people to their deaths!” Roland Hughes cried.
“You’d rather let the ECU werewolves do it? Because they’ll do it, but they’ll do it for the money. Green witches will do it for themselves. Trust me, I know the difference,” Bender said.
“We’ll do it,” Theodora Sullivan said.
“That’s not your decision to make,” Austin Marshall exploded.
“It is!” she shouted.
Her voice rang in my ear for a few seconds after. She sure had a strong voice, though she was very petite.
“If they can lead us to those creatures, we’re going to do everything in our power to make sure this doesn’t happen to anyone else. This is why the coven exists. To help its people when in need, and our people are in need.”
“You can’t be serious,” Ester Hughes said to her, shaking her head and crying like a little kid. No matter what she thought of me, my heart still ached to see the pain written in her face.
“Don’t you want Cara back?” Theodora Sullivan said to her. “Don’t you want your baby back home?”
“Of course I do.”
Ester Hughes wouldn’t even be standing if it wasn’t for her husband holding her. Damn it, I hated these situations.
“Then we’re going to do this. We’re going to do everything we can.”
Theodora turned to us again. With the back of her hands, she wiped the tears from her cheeks and raised her chin. When she looked at me, there was no sign of disgust, or even judgment. This woman really didn’t care how I looked.
“Tell us the plan,” she demanded, and for once, I did so with absolute pleasure.
Twenty
It took us three hours to go over the details with the Green leaders because they wanted to know everything that had happened to the Bone coven first. I think they needed to know it all because they needed to convince themselves that they were doing the right thing by helping us., Telling them what it was like to see a coven break apart painted the picture of their future for them, and they needed that picture to know it was worth going against the ECU.
In the end, even Ester Hughes no longer wanted to throw up when she looked at me.
The Green witches who had escorted us to the house followed us until we were
out of their community, too. I wondered if they would agree to come fight with us. I wondered if anyone would agree to it, Bone or Green. The best we could do was ask.
“Three more hours until dawn,” Bender said as we searched around the car for anything unusual or any sign or smell of vampires. When we were positive that nobody around us was coming to kill us, we got in the car. Maybe Catrina Reigns’s spell stone was really working. I checked my phone, hoping to see that I’d received something from Finn, but no. No text, no missed call. The waiting was going to continue.
“Take us back to New York,” I said and rested my head on the window. It was nice to be in the passenger seat for a change. All my life, I’d always been the driver. With Bender at the wheel, I could relax, at least a little.
“They could be waiting for us there,” he warned, but I already knew that.
“If they are, we’ll be prepared.”
I’d killed them before, and I’d do it again if I had to. For now, I just wanted to enjoy the radio and think about how I was going to survive those beasts, then reward myself by thinking of Julian for a little while, too.
***
Color me surprised. My office was still standing.
“I don’t get it,” Bender said as he stood next to my car, hands on his hips, looking at my office across the street.
“There’s nothing to get. They’ve probably been here and didn’t find me.” Those vampires could have been all around us for all we knew. I looked and looked, but there was nothing I saw. Just a few people minding their own business.
Bender was right. It was strange that they hadn’t even broken a window, when they had already burned down his house. As it was, I had enough strange shit on my plate, so I was choosing not to think about it. The sun would come up in fifteen minutes. If those vampires wanted to live, they wouldn’t come after me now, even if they really were all around us.
“It’s just weird,” Bender said as we crossed the street. “They burned my house because of you.”
“Thanks for the reminder,” I mumbled. I already felt a shitload of guilt. No need to rub it in.
