Someone’s dying shriek pierced my ears, tearing me out of the dark tunnel of oblivion into which I’d sunk. Murgatroyd’s fingers loosened around my throat. Dustin stamped on his wrist, which elicited a scream of agony.
The front door burst open and Mother and Matilda raced out. Matilda held one of Regina’s umbrellas, her face set with terrified determination. As she cleared the stairs, she let out a war cry that echoed around the courtyard.
Someone else staggered onto the porch. Bloody, gasping for air, but alive. Somehow alive.
“Logan,” I croaked. Sheer, blinding joy paralyzed me, and the agony in my burning throat evaporated in the rush of emotion.
Logan swung his head around, and when he saw me, his bruised, bloody face lit. Someone had stabbed him in the side. Blood stained his white shirt and dripped steadily onto the porch floor. Clutching himself, he staggered toward me, reaching out with his free hand.
Murgatroyd grabbed for Dustin’s sword, but Dustin got there first. Sweeping it up, he buried it to the hilt in Murgatroyd’s chest.
The colonel gasped, shock bleaching his cholerically red face. Blood stained his uniform jacket in an ever-increasing odd-shaped circle. He drew his breath and blood bubbled over his lips. He tried to speak, but before he could make his voice cooperate, he died, the awareness dimming from his eyes like water down a drain.
Logan took a misstep and crumpled. I managed to get to my knees, and grabbed him before he crashed to the porch. His weight forced me backward, and we toppled over together.
I murmured his name over and over as I cradled him to my chest. He was so cold. Fear clutched at me.
“Had to see you first,” Logan choked into my ear. “Fought my. Way out of the rug. Tried to suffocate me after stabbing me. But I. Had to see you...one. Last. Time. Dem.”
“You’re not going to die!” I told him, my voice savage. “You aren’t. You hung on this long, you can keep doing it, damn you, sea witch!”
“Dem.” He tried to stroke my hair, but he was far too weak to control his hand. Tears spurted down my cheeks. I wasn’t going to lose him now. Not after this.
Dustin flung himself over the porch railing, sword raised. I peered through the porch railings to see him repeatedly stab a ravager crouched over a woman’s body. Her bright red hair puzzled me until I realized there were witches and soldiers in the courtyard. A dozen or more. They were all engaged with ravagers – so many of them my heart sank.
The redheaded witch turned her head, face squeezed with pain, and I recognized her. Cordelia. Logan’s sister. She had a piece of driftwood clutched in one hand. Sea witches had no magic they could use away from the beach, yet she’d still joined the fight.
Soldiers and witches must have realized ravagers had made it to the road and followed them, fighting and dying, until they reached Moody Mansion. How many people were dead now? How many ravagers remained alive?
Another soldier rushed to help Dustin. They stabbed the monster over and over until it collapsed, shuddering, to the ground where it melted into steaming goo. Dustin knelt by Cordelia, smoothing hair away from her blood-streaked face. The other soldier raced off to intercept another ravager headed their way.
I clutched Logan tightly, wishing I could see the entire courtyard. From where I lay, I counted eight ravagers, but clearly there were more beyond my sightline. Screams of agony and cries of encouragement filled the air.
My mother, still in her nightgown, the autumn sunlight gleaming against her dark hair, ran barefoot into view. Another witch, someone I didn’t recognize, raced by her side. Together they faced a huge ravager, which rose up to its full, menacing height, hissing at them.
Mother’s lovely face filled with grim determination. She stood behind the other witch, clutching her around the waist in the classic power-sharing stance.
Sticks and small stones whipped through the air, striking the ravager all over. Enraged, it swiped at the offending missiles. One thick branch speared it through the head, and it fell to the ground, melting into green, steaming gel.
“You! Witch whores!” the Regent screamed. I jerked my gaze away from Mother and up into the leering, twisted face of David Trumbull. He stood above us, Murgatroyd’s sword raised high above his head. He clearly intended to run us both through where we lay, weak and helpless, together.
“I want you to see me killing you!” Froth bubbled in the corners of his mouth. His eyes glittered with mad glee. “Die, witches!”
Before I could summon my magic, a gigantic claw sheared through the Regent’s throat, severing his head in one blow.
Trumbull’s head crashed to the porch floor and rolled until it landed against the railing. Incredibly, its mouth still opened and closed, and its eyes held a terrible awareness. The body performed a jittery death dance until the ravager grabbed it and shoved it, neck first, into its huge mouth. Blood rained down upon Logan and me. Hot, stinking drops spattered across my cheeks, and instinctively I shut my eyes.
The ravager chewed, grunting with pleasure as it consumed the Regent’s body inch by bloody inch. If it noticed us, it gave no indication. When its saliva hit flesh, the Regent’s skin bubbled and bones dissolved into crunchy pulp. The savage grotesquery of the process mesmerized me, driving all reason out of my head. It was like looking into the face of madness.
I couldn’t draw a deep breath because of Logan’s dead weight against me. He’d passed out. I could feel his heart beating against my chest, so I knew he still lived. My throat burned, raw from Murgatroyd’s attempt to strangle me. Focus zoomed in and back out again, and I could not take my gaze away from the ravager chewing up the Regent’s body. The sounds it made sickened me.
The Regent’s legs stuck out of the ravager’s mouth. They twitched as if the Regent still lived, although I knew that was not possible. The bottoms of his shoes were scuffed with wear. His socks were black.
Logan stirred against me, moaning thickly. The ravager paused in its leisurely consumption of the Regent’s legs, its eyeless head swiveling around until it seemed to sense us. It casually tore what was left the Regent out of its mouth and threw it over the porch railing.
Snarling, it sniffed the air. Terror sluiced over me. I tried to keep still, but Logan muttered incoherently, only half conscious.
I had no room to raise my arm and summon a fireball. My aim wasn’t there, and I had no time to try to roll Logan off me.
A stray sunbeam glimmered off Murgatroyd’s sword. The Regent had dropped it on the floor, lamentably out of reach.
In my head I saw Mother and the other earth witch summoning rocks and sticks.
Heart galloping, I looked away from the sniffing ravager and focused on the sword. Logan shifted, groaning my name. The ravager snarled and leaped for us, claws extended.
The sword flew up into the air and buried itself in the ravager’s head, skewering its brain. An enraged bellow erupted from its foul mouth, and it toppled backward, crashing to the porch floor where it disintegrated.
Relief coursed through me, rendering me weak and limp. My head throbbed sickeningly. I sucked in a burning, painful lungful of air, and carefully rolled Logan onto his back so I could sit.
“Dem,” he croaked, his eyelids fluttering.
“I’m right here.” I stroked his cold forehead. Someone screamed in the courtyard. I knew I couldn’t stay with Logan. I had to destroy ravagers.
Logan feebly protested when I moved away from him. Resolutely, I walked to the porch steps, grimacing as I skirted the Regent’s head. His blood stained the porch floor, and for a moment, wild, horrible hilarity choked me. A Trumbull had murdered Tatiana on this porch, and her blood had soaked into these boards. Justice had come full circle.
Three ravagers remained. A dozen bodies sprawled across the bloodstained cobblestones.
Mother and her partner faced off one of the ravagers. Dustin and three guards had another pinned, but the third tore the throat out of a terrified earth witch while his partner screamed his name. The rav
ager turned and ripped out her entrails, feasting on them before she collapsed to the ground.
Shrieking defiance, Matilda ran at the ravager, Regina’s umbrella held out in front of her.
When she stuck the pointy tip into the ravager’s back, it roared, and swung around, swiping with its claws.
It caught Matilda up, spearing her on the tips of its claws, and tossed her aside, still bellowing.
Reeling with dizziness, I lurched down the stairs, fists clenched, and ran at the ravager, intercepting it before it could get to Matilda, who lay in a heap.
“Ravager!” I screamed. Its head swiveled in my direction, and it hissed before opening its mouth to roar. I hurled a fireball at it, aiming for the back of its throat, and the monster exploded in fiery chunks that rained down around the courtyard.
Tears streaming down my cheeks, I flung myself down beside Matilda. Her dress, soaked with blood, was ripped in five places, one for each of the ravager’s claws. Her chest heaved as she labored to breathe. Blood bubbled across her thin lips, but when she saw me, she managed a smile. Her eyes blazed.
“Did. We win?” she gasped out.
Choking on tears, I nodded.
“Don’t be. Too hard on. David,” she wheezed, more blood dribbling down her chin. Her teeth were stained red.
“I won’t.” I took her hand between both of mine and squeezed. She coughed, spraying blood across my face, but I didn’t flinch.
“A good death,” she said, almost conversationally, and her eyes glazed over as she went limp and lifeless against the cobblestones.
Weeping, I covered my face with my hands, shuddering with sobs. Someone placed a soft hand on my shoulder.
“Dem,” Mother whispered, kneeling beside me. Crooning, she wrapped her arms around me and rocked me back and forth as we both cried.
“Is it over?” I wept against her neck.
“It’s over,” she promised me, stroking my hair. “Oh, Dem, it’s finally over.”
Chapter 32
Six weeks later Logan and I stood on the deck of the Sea Cursed in front of Mother and John Clark. The members of Regiment Thirteen, the co-regents’ elite guard stood at attention around us. Dressed in their best clothes, Logan’s family and mine sat on the benches around the stern. His sister Chelsea, her golden brown hair shining in the sun, held a basket full of rose petals she’d strewn across the deck.
Several boats stuffed with witches and non-magicals ringed the Sea Cursed. People stood at the railings to watch us.
Waves lapped against the hull, and the salty scent of the ocean perfumed the air, competing with the masses of fragrant flowers threaded through the rigging and strewn across the deck.
John Clark’s nose would forever be crooked, and more gray hair than red covered his skull. He’d kept his beard, and that was almost all gray. One of my first acts as co-regent of Galveteen was to make him a colonel in my army and head of Regiment Thirteen. He looked so handsome and proud my heart swelled.
Mother was still too thin, but John’s cooking was slowly building back her curves. She wore a bright green dress and had her dark hair piled atop her head, which lent her a regal beauty I hoped to aspire to. Logan and I had appointed her as head of earth magic on our new council. We had non-magicals serving as well, including Walrus Moustache, who still headed the fishing fleet.
After the fight with the ravagers, non-magicals and witches alike had accepted Logan and me as their new co-regents. Over the past weeks we’d worked hard to establish a good rapport with everyone, and had vowed a transparency to our regency that would hopefully placate anyone who doubted our good intentions.
Today I wore a long white dress with a train that trailed four feet behind me. Logan had asked that I leave my hair free, and it blew in the soft breeze. Curly tendrils tickled my cheeks. A circlet of fresh yellow and pink flowers graced my head. Earth witches had magically enhanced the blooms and woven them together for me. Logan had placed the circlet atop my head just before we’d boarded the Sea Cursed and headed out to sea for the ceremony.
A terrible scar zig-zagged over his ribcage down to his hip, a permanent reminder of David Trumbull’s cruelty. At night, I liked to trace the scar with the tip of my tongue before climbing on top of him and claiming his mouth with mine. Healers had worked over him for days, magically speeding his recovery, and I would be forever in their debt for saving his life.
Sometimes he cried out in his sleep. “Ravagers!” he’d shout, thrashing against the sheets. “Dem! Ravagers!” I’d soothe him the best way I knew how – with my lips and my hands until he calmed beneath me. He told me I had nightmares, too. He’d wake me when I began moaning, shaking the dream apart until only fragments remained clear. Always they featured the ravager slowly consuming David Trumbull’s body while his severed head watched in abject horror.
“Today we gather for the handfasting of our co-regents, Demetria Wood and Logan Reed,” Mother announced in a loud voice so everyone could hear.
Cheers erupted from the gathered crowd.
“Othala bless the regents!” someone shouted, and others picked up the chant.
Mother smiled and told us to hold out our arms. When we did, she wrapped a white ribbon around our wrists to bind us together. Logan smiled at me, his eyes full of such love my heart stuttered, and I could only beam back at him.
“Now and forever, under Othala’s protection, you are bound together. So it is done!” Mother pronounced.
Witches and non-magicals cheered, waving arms in the air. Flower petals rained down from the sky, tossed by earth witches into a sea-witch generated magical breeze.
Logan grinned at John, who had tears in his green eyes. “Told you I was going to marry your daughter.”
“It’s about damn time,” John said gruffly, before hugging us both so hard we gasped for breath. “I want grandchildren. A dozen of them at least!”
We pulled apart, and John wiped his eyes with his thumbs. Mother moved to his side and wrapped her arm around his waist. Her bright smile rivaled the sun. One of the first laws we’d repealed was the one forbidding marriage between a witch and a non-magical. Mother and John had lost no time in marrying each other, and their radiant happiness inspired everyone they met.
“I’m too young to be a grandmother,” she said, giggling.
I groaned. “I wish you’d told me that before I went and got pregnant.” I struggled hard not to laugh.
John and Mother gaped at me. Mother squealed, and John grabbed her up and swung her in a tight circle. “I’m going to watch my grandchild grow up. I’m going to be there to see it,” he said, incredulous joy spreading across his face.
“You’d better be!” she said, and kissed his cheek.
“Othala bless Demetria!” he shouted, raising his arms in the air. Witches and non-magicals repeated it back, over and over.
“Othala bless Logan!” I cried, and people echoed me with enthusiasm.
I turned to my husband – what a concept – and found him smiling at me, his eyes sizzling blue.
“I should kill you for telling them you were pregnant before you told me,” he said, but his shoulders shook with laughter.
“You were there when it happened. Technically, you were first,” I said, stepping closer to him. “I’m sorry. I was going to tell you tonight, but how could I have passed up the opportunity Mother gave me?”
He reached out to tuck some hair behind my ear. “I love you, my earth witch,” he said huskily.
“And I love you, my sea witch,” I said, wrapping my arms around his neck as best I could with our wrists tied together. Our lips met for a hungry, joyful kiss.
My husband, my love, my co-regent. Galveteen was safe. In fifty years, when Logan and I were old and the child in my womb middle-aged, storm clouds would gather above the island and two witches, as yet unborn, would be struck by magical lightning. They would venture out to sea and cast the spell of Reutterance. They’d come back heroes, and Logan and I would step aside, allowin
g them to take our places as co-regents. But until then, we had work to do rebuilding the confidence of everyone who’d lost family to the ravagers.
We’d decided against giving more magic to the surviving witches. We wanted the non-magicals to trust us and work with us, not be intimidated by our power. Also, we wanted to follow Mary-Angela Vincenzo’s vision. After all, she’d been the first to save our sector, and we owed our lives and continued prosperity to her.
“Othala bless the regents!” The cheer went up from hundreds of throats as the fragrant petals continued to fall around and on us.
Logan kissed me as if nobody was there watching. As if we were alone again on the deck of the Sea Cursed, and this was the first time we’d ever found ourselves in each other’s arms.
“We did it,” I murmured against his greedy lips. “We really did it, Logan.”
“Proud of you, Dem.” He trailed kisses along my jaw and back to my lips again.
“I’m proud of me, too,” I confessed. “Imagine me loving every second of being a witch!”
“The most powerful earth witch on Galveteen.” He smiled against my mouth. “And the most beautiful, too.”
We reluctantly moved apart, as much as the ribbon tying our wrists together would allow. Turning to face the crowd, we raised our linked wrists high.
“Othala bless Galveteen!” I shouted, and a roar of approbation burst from everyone’s lips, drowning the sound of the waves against the hull. And so it was done.
The End
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Sea Cursed: An Adult Dystopian Paranormal Romance: Sector 13 (The Othala Witch Collection) Page 30
