by Brea Viragh
Nasira fought against nausea, tasting her dinner and coughing. “Brock?” she asked.
“He’s next. I promise, since he and Elon are human, I will make sure to take extra care with them.” Morgan bent beside her. He gave a single flick of his wings. “It might take me longer.”
“Just protect them.” Nasira gagged. “We have this.”
“I know you do.”
“When you come back with the boys, remember what we talked about.” Karsia struggled to her feet, helped along by Morgan’s outstretched hand, and sent him a pale smile.
“You want me to keep everyone away from you. Damage control.” It was clear the thought upset him.
“Exactly right.”
A small kiss on his chin and Morgan disappeared. When Nasira turned her head, she saw Aisanna, Astix, and Karsia standing together looking similarly sick to their stomachs.
“How do you stand it?” she asked Karsia.
Though she swayed slightly, she didn’t fall over. “I’ve never been conscious before.”
“I can understand why.”
“He’s been practicing. A few weeks ago, he was only able to transport himself. We’re all getting stronger.”
“Guys, I hate to interrupt, but look.” Aisanna raised her arm toward a point on the horizon.
Nasira watched the clouds roll in, a great black wave of them visible even in the twilight, and blinked at the unnatural shift in visuals. Deep blue sky retracted until there was nothing but red. Trees bent and moved in the wild wind.
She sucked in a breath and stilled momentarily. “What the hell is that?” she asked. Unnecessarily. She knew what it was. It was what they’d been waiting for.
She tore her eyes away from the clouds to glance at the moon, full and riding high. The night sky, normally a deep husky hue of blues and purples, was tinged with crimson.
“The veil,” Karsia whispered.
A rush of power crept over their skin and blew their hair behind them. A rush of rogue magic and potential and possibilities. Some of them good, Nasira knew, and some of them bad. Beyond their wildest imaginings.
Energy buzzed through her body. Sizzled along her skin and bones.
“We need to hurry,” Astix demanded. She shouldered her bag. “Morgan will be back with Brock and Elon in minutes. We have to trust them to keep everyone away from us while we set up the spell.”
“And hope the Harbinger comes?” Aisanna asked with a hint of sarcasm.
Astix shook her head. “They’ll come. We’re just setting the stage for them.”
Nasira spent a few wistful minutes trying to picture herself as the Harbinger witch. Born into times of great change and capable of restoring the balance. Ushering in an era of peace or darkness.
She wasn’t sure she could handle the responsibility. Nor would she want to. Trying to handle life as a witch was hard enough without throwing around words like prophecy.
Evil intent hung in a heavy dark cloud near the horizon. It coated the surface of the water and stretched toward the shore. It existed for chaos, pure and simple. And it was done waiting, hoping someone would step forward. Its energy was about to be unleashed and when it was, it would destroy the city, the state. The continent. Anything or anyone determined to stop it would meet a horrible death.
This is what I signed up for? You’ve got to be kidding me.
Nasira rubbed a hand over her face. This wasn’t her imagination taking flight. This wasn’t the plot of a novel or a movie where the stars were guaranteed to win through grit and guile. This was life.
She glanced over where dust and sand billowed, stirred by the wind. This was going against everything she’d always said about her life—every rule and restriction she’d ever made for herself—and throwing her into uncertainty without anything more than hope and the presence of her sisters.
She’d always known there was a little spark of magic inside of her, even without her mother’s reminders. It was time to put it to good use.
You have gifts. Gifts beyond average human reckoning. It’s written in your blood, my cherished daughter.
Bast’s voice echoed through her head and Nasira grit her teeth. She did have magic. She was strong. She didn’t need to check things off a list to feel powerful. She just was.
Doing her best to ignore the stabbing pains in her gut urging her to run to safety, she stepped forward and, after a split-second hesitation, hastened after the other three. Her internal guidance telling her to remain alert. Her feet made no sound. Aisanna, Astix, and Karsia were at her sides.
Energy prickled along her exposed skin and a tremor of unease brought goosebumps.
“We’re in the right place,” Astix muttered as they walked, keeping their shoulders pressed tight together. An impenetrable line. “Can you feel it?”
“I think I’d feel being run over by a truck less than I do this,” Karsia agreed.
“Never mention getting run over by a truck again. Ever.” Aisanna shook her head.
Summoning her courage and hoping this would be over soon, Nasira grabbed hold of the sistrum rattle stuck into the waistband of her pants and pulled. The smell of death accosted them the closer they got to the water’s edge. Like they’d unsealed a container of dead animal parts that had been left out in the sun and closed tight. Allowed to bake for weeks. Months.
Warm, sticky air replaced the cool spring wind.
Karsia and Aisanna ran ahead. Astix stopped, her feet grounding to a halt. She laid a hand on Nasira’s arm, drawing her away so only she would hear. “Naz, wait.”
“What is it?”
“You said Bast talked to you. Vane. They told you pieces of information you would have never known otherwise, right?”
“Yes, I told you at dinner last night. Where is this going?”
Astix stared at the sky. “The closer we get, the more terror I feel. I need to know. Did they tell you who the Harbinger was?”
Nasira paused. “They did,” she answered slowly.
“Wait.” Astix reached out then let her hand fall. “Please. Tell me.”
“I’m not supposed to say. I was told the Harbinger needs to come into their rightful power on their own.”
“We don’t have much time. If we’re going to win this, you need to tell me. Please.”
Nasira weighed the options. A shadow passed across the moon. The wind howled.
What could it hurt?
“The Harbinger…is you. Astix, it’s always been you.”
**
“Kelsi, I said come!” Orestes snapped his fingers and expected her to follow through.
It was time for them to go. He felt the rising magic coursing through him. Alighting his bones and flesh and soul. Oh, if he’d thought the leaking magic was intense before, this was another story. This was pure power.
Cecilia was no longer with him. He expected it. This leg of the journey was his to complete alone. They’d done what they could for each other up until now, a mutually beneficial relationship where both parties would—hopefully—come out on the winning end.
Orestes stood and shook out the arms of his long-sleeved shirt. Staring at the mess on his desk and knowing none of it would matter once the veil tore. The rest of his coworkers were out on the streets. Handling the riotous crowds of people who had no clue what to expect.
For witches, most of his community were on the right side of dumb.
He grabbed his coat from a hook near the door, slipping it on and striding down the hallway. Each step felt right. Felt purposeful.
This was it, he thought, drawing in a breath. It all came down to this night. This hour. His years of work and preparation for this moment, a tiny speck on the great calendar of time. Small it may be, but it was his.
Orestes was nearly to the elevator and prepared to walk to the waterfront area where they would all make their final stand when he realized his assistant had not followed him.
He set her with a look. One she should know quite well. “Kelsi.” His voice held a hint of exaspe
ration. “Come. I will not ask you again.”
His surprise came as an afterthought when she continued to stand in the empty hallway, her feet growing roots. Her face a twisted mess of shame, fear, and something entirely unexpected. Stubbornness.
“No.” Her tone was soft at first. A whisper of sound amidst the howling chaos of the tearing veil.
“What did you say to me?”
“I said no.” Firmer this time. She pushed her hair away from her eyes and stared at him. Stared through him. “I don’t want to do this anymore.”
“You will come with me or so help me god—”
“What?” she interrupted. “You’ll fire me? It doesn’t scare me anymore, sir. Mr. Voltaire.” Once she opened the spout, the words tumbled out over each other in a jumbled flow. She laughed under the force. A crazy, disbelieving laugh. “This isn’t what I signed up for. I might be new, but I don’t have to worry about a job. I don’t have to care what you say to me or how it might impact a future position with the Claddium. What you’re doing is wrong and you know it. I refuse to help you hurt innocent people anymore.”
His eyes narrowed, face heating. The little girl was trying to bait him with negative innuendo. He forced his hands into his pant pockets, appearing unmoved. Unaffected. “I can make you, you know. I don’t need your agreement.”
Orestes found himself reaching for Kelsi. His fingers stretching before folding back into a fist. No, he refused to retaliate. He needed to focus on the tearing veil. This little chit wasn’t worth it.
“Fine. Go,” he spit out. “I don’t need you anymore.”
She didn’t need any further prompting. Head ducked down, she bolted in the opposite direction. Orestes forced himself to focus his attention on the water. On the witches there waiting for him.
“Ladies.” His mouth stretched in a wide grin. “It’s show time.”
Kelsi hurried toward the lowest levels of the Claddium building with the weight of the keys in her pocket hanging heavy. Her fingertips slipped along the bulge and she forced her legs to move faster. She had a lot to atone for, she thought miserably. A lot to do to erase the months of servitude and the deeds she’d enacted because her boss told her to do them.
She disgusted herself.
With the Vault keys secure in her possession, she summoned a gust of wind to push her body. It resulted in a gale that sent her ass over head. She stumbled to a stop against the front desk. It was stupid to use magic with the veil tearing, she knew. She hadn’t thought her own gifts would betray her.
This was penance.
She pushed herself up. The moment she tuned into the low hum in the air, she recognized the frenzy in her blood. Her magic reacting to the seepage coming through from the world of ancient magicks.
This was it, she thought. This was the end. And she finally had enough courage to stand up to the man who helped usher it in.
She slipped in the lobby, unaccustomed to the hush. The rest of her fellow witches and wizards would be out dealing with the consequences of the rogue magick. Trying to do their best for the people under their protection. Damage control, she thought with a sigh. But there was only one way to fix this. Only one person who could.
The elevator doors opened and Kelsi slipped inside, pressing the button for the bottom floor. The Vault.
Oh yes, there was too much to atone for, she knew. She was complicit in the imprisonment of four innocent people. More, if Orestes had had his way.
She reached the landing with a ding and immediately stepped into darkness. There was no magic allowed in the Vault. The runes on the walls allowed nothing to get through, which meant fire and any other mechanics used to light the hallways were absent from the space. She felt her way along the wall. A hundred steps and her fingers brushed against a wood-like material Orestes had conjured. Which should have been impossible, she knew, within the confines of the prison. Except he had help.
Kelsi recognized it now, the dark influence urging him forward, coloring his actions for the last few months. Years, maybe. She didn’t know the full scope of the being attached to him, but she saw the devastation it left in its wake.
Her fingers fell on a strange circular shape made of wood. The cocoon held the head of the Fire Elementals for the Great Lakes Claddium. Once a trusted colleague of Orestes, now imprisoned like the rest of the rabble.
“Zelda,” Kelsi whispered. “I’m here.”
There was no sound from the inside of the prison. It was ridiculous to dive in head first without help, Kelsi knew. What did she have on her that was strong enough to slice through wood? Yeah, she hadn’t thought this out.
She glanced down at the keys in her pocket.
“I’m here.” She only hoped she wasn’t too late.
CHAPTER 22
Fifteen minutes to the eclipse…
Astix opened her eyes, sparks of magic flashing and lightning hitting the sand. The roar of sound made her flinch. Then she hardened her gaze.
“Okay,” she breathed out. “Okay, so I really am the Harbinger.” Her gut twisted.
“It’s time to accept your gifts,” Nasira said, sounding eerily reminiscent of Bast. The thought brought a rueful smile to her face. “And use them.”
“What if I don’t know how?” Astix asked. Panic filled her. The frantic screams from the city streets urged her to be strong. What if she couldn’t be strong? What if she crumbled under the pressure, and when the time came…oh God, when the time came. Cecilia could be right. A new era of darkness because Astix didn’t have what it took to win.
“I think you know exactly what to do.”
Before, when Astix had faced Darkness, she felt it. She knew what to do and it hadn’t worked, had it? She’d given her all to calling up the earth’s magma, using every bit of the magic in her blood and sending everything emptying outward. For what?
For Aisanna to be targeted.
For Karsia to be possessed.
For Nasira to be attacked.
Astix had used whatever sadness and bitterness and defeatism she possessed, layers and layers of it. None of it was enough. Darkness had told her a storm was coming.
She spared another glance at the sky. The storm was here. And it was so much worse than she’d imagined.
“I can’t do this alone,” she whispered.
She was the accident. She was the one who shouldn’t have been born with her magic. How could she restore the balance?
“Astix.” Nasira placed her hand on the other woman’s shoulder. “Trust yourself. And if you can’t do that, then trust me. I believe you can do this. The others are waiting for us.” She jerked her head toward the shore. “Let’s go.”
How much longer did they have? Astix wondered. A minute? Five minutes? The blood moon was nearly complete, only a hint of white showing. Hours had gone by, somehow.
“We need to move,” Nasira stated, pulling her forward.
Knowing she needed to gather herself, to come to terms with her status, Astix nodded. Her eyes turned grim. She scanned the beach, passed over where Aisanna and Karsia were still running. Running, running down a never-ending strip of land with their destination always out of reach.
“Okay,” she said again. She shifted until her fingers were laced through Nasira’s, energy passing between their palms.
This time, Astix didn’t need to use bitterness or anger or sadness. This time she would use love.
**
Orestes was fuming. He stalked forward with hands fisted at his side and his mind like an agitated hornet’s nest. They’d deserted him. Every person he’d thought was on his side, and now? Traitors. Blood traitors. More concerned with those wretched Cavaldi’s than the good of the world.
Even Kelsi. Not for a moment did he think she had it in her to fight him. Him!
No matter. He stopped a moment to smooth a hand over his forehead. What was the old adage? If you wanted something done right, then you had to do it yourself. It was only him in the beginning. Him and his dark lady. It was fit
ting it should be the two of them in the end.
They do not matter.
Her sly retort was welcome. It urged his footsteps faster. The eclipse would not wait for him. He had to move if he wanted to stop Astix and her sisters from ruining his perfect plan. His perfect vision.
He walked the few city blocks over to the 31st street beach. It took the entire time to get his head in the right place. He dammed his assistant. Dammed women in general, actually, for the foes standing in his way were four of them.
It was laughable. Four witches, one with magic she wasn’t entitled to have, thought they could stand in front of him? Orestes was one of the strongest earth elementals in the region. Which was how he came to acquire his position within the Claddium.
This would be over in minutes.
Instead of alarming him, as the sight should have, seeing the boiling clouds and reddened sky caused his heart to beat faster. It was anticipation. It was the culmination of years of subterfuge and playing the game.
“Cecilia, I’m coming,” he muttered under his breath.
Muffled shouts and roars in the distant made him grit his teeth. Worms, he thought of his peers. Unable to handle the rush and pulse from the world of ancient magicks. He was hyperaware of the city behind him, the crowds spilling onto the sidewalks in terror. There was sure to be carnage to clean. Not just on his own streets, but across the country. Blood spilled on the ground.
Instead of horror or disgust, confidence filled him. Confidence with enough oomph to fill a building and blot everyone else out. It showed as he walked, in every line of his body.
He wondered if it was coincidence or fate that brought the four Cavaldi women into his line of vision. There they were, racing toward the water.
He was in the right spot.
It took some work to move his feet quicker. He wasn’t as young as he used to be. Anticipation electrified his insides.
Ah, there she was. The last daughter. Long hair blew behind her in a ribbon of black. He held his hand up and the ground rippled. The resulting shockwave brought both Astix and Nasira to their knees.
