I shook my head. This couldn’t be right. Harper was supposed to be here. I flew down the steps and across the street, not stopping until I’d reached the fence. A plaque welded to the front gate read Evers Institute for Troubled Girls. This had to be it. I didn’t understand.
Harper was being kept in that asylum. I’d seen it in my dreams. Everything I’d learned had led me here to this place. She should be here.
It’s not where you find her. It’s when you find her.
The words of the Alpine Prima echoed in my mind, and goose bumps broke out on my arms. She’d known more than she had let on.
I shifted and flew through the iron bars toward the building. I pulled on the front doors, but a heavy rope of chains was looped around the handles, locked with a heavy metal lock. A weathered NO TRESPASSING sign was taped to the door. I cupped my hands around my face and peered inside.
The walls were charred and debris littered the floor. It looked as though no one had even set foot inside this place in years.
The priestess had to be keeping the girls in the basement somewhere. I refused to believe she wasn’t here. I needed her to be here.
I searched the yard for a stick or something I could use to break the glass, but when I bent down, something blowing in the breeze caught my attention, and my heart tightened in my chest.
A single white rose grew among the thick ivy. I took a deep breath and crouched near the flower. A rose had no business growing in a place like this.
I touched its silky leaves and pulled back the veil of ivy, my heart sinking the moment I saw the large wooden box hidden behind it.
I pulled it from the ground and sat on the bottom steps of the ruined building. I set the box beside me and wiped away the thick layer of dirt that covered the top. A large ornate H was carved into the wood.
I didn’t want to open it. I wanted to believe that she was locked somewhere downstairs and that all I had to do was go down and find her.
But a part of me knew the journey back to each other wasn’t over yet.
With trembling hands, I lifted the lid of the box.
On the very top was a yellowed newspaper clipping that had been folded in half. I prayed this was just some nightmare, and not the truth. I unfolded the article, and the headline split my heart into a million pieces.
“EVERS INSTITUTE CONDEMNED DUE TO FIRE”
At the top of the page was a date: April 2, 1951.
I clutched the newspaper in my hand and fought back fresh rage and confusion. I had lost her all over again.
Across the street, Mary Anne walked out of the weathered Victorian house, and when she saw me, I think she knew. She held a hand out to tell the others to stay put and shifted to her crow form. She landed beside me and sat down, not saying a word.
I took a deep breath to still my heart, and I handed her the newspaper clipping. “She’s not here,” I said.
“No,” she whispered, tears forming in her blue eyes. She read the article several times, and then placed a hand on my shoulder. “What else is in the box? Did she explain what happened?"
I ran my hand across a layer of bright green silk. Underneath were the five items needed to close the emerald gates:
A dagger.
A chalice.
A ring.
A necklace.
And finally, a large round stone. The master stone. The life-support of the emerald priestess herself.
Mary Anne gasped, and I pressed the back of my palm to my lips, understanding what she had done. Harper had killed the priestess. She’d ended the life of another witch who had terrorized so many for so long.
At the bottom of the box was a faded note, the page covered in Harper’s handwriting. I ran my fingers across it, wanting more than anything to feel closer to her. To be with her. To tell her how much I loved her.
I wiped tears from my eyes and read her message to me.
My dearest Jackson,
As I write this letter, I’m sitting on the same steps you are likely sitting on now. It isn’t distance that separates us. It’s decades.
The emerald priestess is dead, but I didn’t realize at the time that killing her would keep me from you for a little while longer. We’re alive and another priestess of the Order is dead. That’s what matters.
I hope you know how much I love you. How much I miss you. I long for you every moment we’re apart.
Through this entire ordeal, you were my anchor. My savior. My sanity in a place of lies. She tried to break my mind but never understood that you are a part of my heart and soul. We share a love that transcends magic and distance and yes, even time.
We have to be stronger now than ever. We have important work to do.
Set them free, my love.
And then come find me.
Yours through eternity,
Harper
I folded the letter and placed it inside the box, my heart aching for her. I missed her more than any words could describe. I missed our whole family.
But she was right. We couldn’t let this destroy us. We had to be strong now. We still had work to do.
I watched as the group of demons and witches who had followed me into battle gathered on the porch of the old Victorian, and I realized that we would survive this. I’d spent months mourning her loss and distancing myself from everyone else.
But we were in this together. All of us. There was enormous power in that.
When you truly loved someone—when they became a part of you—nothing could ever take that away.
Not even time.
I closed the box and gathered it in my arms, lingering for just a moment longer in the place where she had once been.
Someday, we would find our way back to each other.
Someday, we would be free to live the life we’d dreamed of.
But for now, there was work to do.
“What’s going on?” Rend asked as we climbed the steps to the priestess’s old house. “Where’s Harper?”
“She’s not here,” I said. I glanced at the asylum and wondered what horrors had been laid to rest as this place burned to the ground. “Not anymore.”
“I don’t understand,” he said. “Is she okay?”
“She is. And she left us a present,” I said.
I ran my hand across the letter carved into the wood.
“Come on,” I said, throwing one arm around Mary Anne’s shoulder. “Let’s go free some demons.”
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Complete Book List
Books marked with an * are currently free
The Shadow Demons Saga Beautiful Demons Box Set, Books 1-3*
Beautiful Demons*
Inner Demons*
Bitter Demons*
Shadow Demons
Rival Demons
Demons Forever
Emerald Darkness
Forgotten Darkness
A Demon's Wrath
After Midnight
Sacrifice Me Season One Box Set
Episode 1: The Demon*
Episode 2: The Dream
Episode 3: The Darkness
Episode 4: The Dying
Episode 5: The Devil
Episode 6: The Doorway
Eternal Sorrows Death's Awakening
Sorrow's Gift
Fairhope
The Trouble With Goodbye*
The Moment We Began
A Season For Hope
The Fear of Letting Go
A Life With No Regrets
Forgotten Darkness Page 28
