War Witch

by Layla Nash

  “I can’t—”

  “You said,” I interrupted. “You would be the first to follow, if I started a coven. So let’s do it. I’ll lead, if you want me to, or we’ll make you a Morrigan to terrify the world.”

  Seconds ticked by as she considered, the darkness weighing on me as the chanting overhead grew louder and the magic spiraled up in heady waves. Her expression cleared just as I wanted to scream to break the tension. “We have to eliminate some competition.”

  I forced a smile as I held out my right hand. My conscience flared, but the War Witch knew Tracy was too far gone to save. Madness stained her magic. Red circled her irises. She was a rabid dog, and one with the power to not only summon demons, but the willingness to use them. She would be a pebble in the city’s magical pond, sending ripples of insanity into every nook and cranny.

  I managed a more genuine smile. “I already have a list.”

  The opal ring on her hand glimmered as she reached for mine. “Welcome back.”

  “Guess I’ll need a new ring,” I said, and reached out, decision made. The hex trembled in my hand. It would be enough.

  “Not so fast,” a deep voice said, and Tracy went rigid as magic zinged.

  I swayed back with the weight of the collar. Sam.

  Chapter 52

  He walked around the corner and into view, and still looked almost like the man I’d loved. Only his eyes gave him away, with the red ring glowing around the irises. Sam’s eyebrows rose as he looked from Tracy to Anne Marie and me. “Having a good time, are we?”

  Tracy cleared her throat, remarkably calm for being caught in the middle of her newest treason. “Lilith was just telling me about the fire demon spell.”

  “I find that hard to believe,” Sam said. He didn’t remove the hex that froze her. His attention drifted back to me, and my skin crawled with the sense of pure evil staring at me from behind his eerie eyes. “But I have been looking forward to this, Lilith.”

  “So you enjoyed me killing you the first time around?”

  “Even that was exhilarating,” he said. He inhaled deeply and stole all the oxygen from the room, wild-eyed. “To feel death take over my body and soul, and then to—burn—feeling it all but knowing that immortality awaited. I would give that freedom to you, Lilith. We could remake the world.”

  “I like the world the way it is.” It was one of the biggest lies I’d ever told. He knew it, too.

  Sam moved closer, murmuring, “I miss exchanging power with you, Lilith. I miss the rush. We can have that again, you know.” The corner of his mouth curled as he eyed me. “The sex wasn’t bad, either.”

  Heat rose in my cheeks, more from rage than embarrassment. “I’ve had better.”

  Anne Marie laughed.

  But Sam only smiled and shook a finger at me. “So I heard. The Warder, that animal—really? He’s a little…proletarian for you, isn’t he? Although I suppose you spent enough time lusting after him while we were together. Don’t think I didn’t notice, dear.”

  “I meant power,” I said, and my cheeks burned still more. Sam wouldn’t have to kill me—rage and spontaneous combustion might get the job done first. “I’ve had power that dwarfs yours.”

  “Forgive me if I don’t believe you,” he said. Sam wandered closer and examined the edges of the ward that contained the three of us, peering at where Tracy remained motionless as if he didn’t know the cause. “I’ve been watching you, and you haven’t gotten close to any male witches, other than that weakling who follows the animals around.”

  Poor Kyle. I wondered whether he looked for us. I wouldn’t want him to challenge Rook or Sam, not when it meant torture and death. But I had to knock Sam off balance and distract him from the magic that still tangled around my fingers. “Did I say he was a witch, Sumo?”

  “You can’t take power from humans,” Sam said. “And you certainly can’t mean—”

  “Soren,” I said, releasing his name like a talisman on a thread of the stolen magic. I Called the Peacemaker and summoned him like a wandering puppy. Our nascent connection had to work a second time—our lives depended on it. “That’s right. Guess who learned to control and manipulate pack magic?”

  Another set of lies, sort of.

  His ghastly face went whiter still, and I eased another step closer to Tracy. Sam shook his head. “That’s not possible.”

  “You always underestimated me,” I said, taking one long last look at his serene face.

  Before he could speak, the spell above us built in a dangerous crescendo as they attempted to summon the fire demons. The kettle’s chanting hiccupped, paused—then the cursing started. Magic flared out, seeking, and sulfur curled through the house until everything reeked. Sam glanced up, his concentration broken, as the kettle’s spell faltered and the crackle of flames grew louder.

  I lunged to reach Tracy, using her magic to rip away the iron around my throat and wrists, and grabbed her shoulder with my left hand. I pulled her back as Sam shouted and the wards climbed around us, Anne Marie trying to hex him before we were sealed off even more.

  Power sparked as the fire built and I dragged Sam’s hex off Tracy. She smiled in relief and tried to embrace me, demon-mad eyes blazing with excitement. “Thanks, Lil. We should—”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, and I meant it. I really did.

  Her face went blank as her power rushed out, and she stared at me in confusion as I stole everything she had.

  Chapter 53

  Sam leapt back instead of attacking as I lowered Tracy’s limp body to the floor. She still lived, but she would never cast magic again. I’d done my part. Anne Marie could do the rest.

  Wards flared up and shouts built upstairs as a garbled regression spell failed, then the clatter of feet on the stairs alerted us to the kettle’s approach. Why they’d run into the basement of a burning house escaped me until they skidded behind Sam and started chanting, trying to redirect the mess from upstairs to our little piece of heaven in the dark.

  “Shit,” Anne Marie said, and I spun Tracy’s magic out into a ward around us, inside the kettle’s ward. Just in time, too, as smoke and sulfur coalesced too close.

  My lip curled as I looked at Sam, letting the cold magic seep through me. Even with the tinge of demon madness that Tracy carried, the magic was strong enough to lift me up and protect me. I tried to remember the good times, before she changed, and concentrated on the heroics she performed during the war. She’d saved my life. That memory cleansed some of the hate and evil from the magic, until I knew I could do some good on her behalf by killing the dark witches. A small repayment for her role in so much damage. But Sam—hiding behind the black-cloaked witches, had always been a coward. Unwilling to risk himself when survival was not assured and others would take the chance instead of him. Fool.

  The dark witches kept up their chant until a sunspot appeared just outside my wards, but I didn’t take my eyes off Sam. I’d raised him; he was my responsibility. I rotated my head to the right, then left, my vertebrae cracking. Then I’d get Brandr the hell out of that house, and we could even more scores. It felt like a dream as smoke drifted into the basement and ash and cinders dropped all around us.

  Anne Marie tried to keep an eye on all the kettle members as they started to spread out, trying to surround us in the large room. I pulled her collar and chains off, dropping them as they burned my hands, and she muttered curses and hexes that should have fucked up those dark witches as well as three generations of their ancestors. It was just a beat, and then she drew her own power, lighting up like a beacon, and we stood shoulder to shoulder to face death and the small demon that popped to life and started attacking my wards.

  The temperature in the basement climbed, and it was another degree of cruelty that sweat dripped into the open wounds and reignited the fire that even magic couldn’t dampen. My pinkie throbbed in time with my heartbeat, a distraction from the business of saving ourselves. Anne Marie’s breath hissed in her teeth, and I wondered if
she experienced the same.

  “We can save you. You just have to cooperate,” one of the dark witches said, and I took a moment to count them—a full nine. Without Tracy. So Rook always had a spare. Disloyal bastards, all of them.

  Most of them hid in deep hoods, but I memorized the strands of their magic and knew I would be able to find them. As they continued to feed magic to the demon rampaging against my shields to reach Anne Marie and me, I leaned to pull the opal ring off Tracy’s finger. I studied it closely, searching for whatever side panel crests they decided to corrupt with their damn dark magic, then held it up for Sam and Rook to see. “You want this back, stud? Give it to your next girlfriend?”

  “Keep it,” Sam said. He pulled my jade ring out of his pocket and held it up to kiss, closing his eyes as if he could sense me on the silver. His mouth twisted as he played with it, and it might have been my imagination, but his teeth looked black with blood as he smiled. “I’ve got this, and so many happy memories to go with it. I don’t think I can trust you enough to keep you, Lilith. After all this... How could I sleep next to you again?”

  “Listen while my heart breaks,” I said. “What are you going to do about it? Kill us? Go ahead and try.”

  “Maybe don’t antagonize them just yet,” Anne Marie said. “What with the demon right there.”

  I turned my back to the kettle, though the back of my neck itched in paranoia even with the wards, and faced her. They didn’t need to see me winking at her or trying to make her understand. At least none of them managed to get all the way around our ward. “Maybe if you weren’t such a coward and a bagwitch, we wouldn’t be in this position.”

  Her eyebrows arched and I winked hard, though having both eyes nearly swollen shut may have precluded the message being passed. They’d used me to trick her, and her to trick me, and it was our turn to completely fuck them over. No more games. No sleight of hand or fancy charms. Just war witches destroying everything around them.

  She took a deep breath and folded her arms over her chest. “And if you weren’t a complete psychopath, we wouldn’t be in this position. So I guess that makes us equal.”

  “Not by a long shot.” I really hoped she kept an eye on that damn demon. I willed her to understand what I intended. If she could hold off the demon, I could break the kettle’s circle, the same as I broke the wards on her store. It might kill me, but at least I’d have a chance to get rid of Sam once and for all. Rook could slaughter us, or the house would collapse on top of us, but I needed to know that Sam no longer haunted the world. I wanted him in hell. Forever.

  “I’ve wanted to say this since that day at your store, Anne Marie. Now we’re stuck here and it’s your fault, and I’m going to walk out of here and make sure the Alliance knows just how badly you failed.”

  Her eyes narrowed as she watched me. “How dare you—”

  “This shit is as low budget as your wards,” I said, waving my hand back at the kettle. My wards shot through with lightning as the demon redoubled its attacks, growing larger and hungrier with each moment it was denied blood. I widened my eyes and hoped my concentration alone would make her psychic. “And just as useful at keeping me contained. This is it, Anne Marie. I’m done.”

  The knowledge broke across her face like clear dawn, but she immediately shook her head. “Lilith, you can’t—”

  A larger crack appeared in my wards, and it took longer to seal up. The kettle fed the demon more and more power, and mine began to fade. I clenched my hands at my sides. “I will not die here, Annette. Je vais pas.”

  She dropped into a defensive crouch, like we were about to fight, and her voice shook though her hands held steady. She drew up power, expression resolute, and prepared to go down fighting. I was almost proud of her. “Like hell I will either, Lilith. Prepare yourself.”

  But something in her eyes pleaded with me, and she shook her head a little as she whispered, “Not like this, Lil.”

  “You said it yourself—I have much to atone for.” I slapped my hands together and walked to the edge of my wards, placing my hands against the magic to reinforce and control the shield, so I would know exactly how to drop it. “This makes up for at least three of the seven plagues, no?”

  Some of the kettle retreated as the fire roared overhead and a beam in the ceiling began to smoke. I took a deep breath and braced myself. It was now or never. Remaining frozen would only get us killed faster.

  Before Anne Marie could argue with me or try to convince me not to take a run at their wards, I glanced over and nodded to her. “I’ll make sure you get a nice pyre.”

  “Ditto,” she said through gritted teeth, and pursed her lips.

  As Sam preened and offered us safety if we only cooperated, I centered myself and dropped the wards.

  The demon lunged forward and the kettle yelled, some in triumph and some in fear. The snake-like being got close enough to my leg that its sulfur breath singed what remained of my pants, and I wondered if I would die before I even got to the wards. I hexed it and Anne Marie snarled something, then her magic shot out and trapped the thing with only a few millimeters to spare.

  I dragged myself past the hungry demon and leaned into the kettle’s wards as Rook raised his hands and summoned more power. With as cowardly as he was, the fact he stayed in the basement as the house burned struck me as strange. Maybe it was all an illusion, an effort to make Anne Marie and me act hastily.

  It would have been a hell of a glamour.

  The power of their wards crackled through my hands, a punch in the chest like grabbing an electrified fence. I braced myself and gritted my teeth, forcing my hands through. I just had to break it. Just had to crack it a bit and the backlash would disable the kettle, we could escape, and I’d save Brandr. Saints protect and keep me. It had to work.

  The dome around us cracked, from my hands to the ground and back in a spiderweb of potential. The kettle shored it up, reinforcing and patching as fast as it weakened, though more than one looked around at the smoke and ash with flares of concern in their magic. Anne Marie muttered behind me and the kettle faltered, distracted by her spell, and I bit back irritation at the noise they all made.

  Sam smiled as he mirrored Rook’s raised-arm gesture. “You will not win, Lilith. I’ve learned many things since I’ve been gone.”

  I leaned into the wards more, my brain rattling in my skull with the force of it, and blinked as smoke stung my eyes and blurred my vision. It had to work. The wards had to fail.

  But Anne Marie still hadn’t killed the demon. I looked back, hesitating, and she snapped, “Don’t you dare interfere. I can handle this demon.”

  “You have to unbalance the elemental connection,” I said. I shoved my foot into the wards to create another source of fracture. Almost there. The dark witches’ hands shook and their chanting fell out of rhythm.

  “I know what I’m doing, witch.”

  I found the weakest link in the kettle’s spell, the witch who struggled to maintain his part of the spell. That one. That one was the key to undoing. I clenched Tracy’s opal ring in my hand and shouldered my way into the ward. Magic burst through me like lightning and I felt myself coming apart, being consumed by the magic, and the wards flexed around me.

  Sam started to sweat. “If you wanted to share power, lover, you should have just asked.”

  “I’d rather die than let you touch me.” My voice shook and I swallowed a cry as pain ripped through me.

  “That’s not a problem for me,” he said, smooth as silk and just as pretty. He slid closer to the wards, magic flaring around him in a greasy black halo as his fingers drifted over the kettle’s efforts. “My tastes have... expanded since we parted.”

  Anne Marie’s strangled yell made me tense. “Stop playing around, witch—end it already.”

  “This isn’t easy, you stupid cow,” I muttered, as the power raged through me and melted my bones into nothingness.

  I forced myself to smile at Sam. One last chance. My hands vibr
ated in the wards and I focused. One last shove. One push. That was all I needed. I leaned into it and hurled myself into the magic, praying the saints would protect me, and then...

  My fingers broke through just enough, and I threw the opal ring in his face.

  His head snapped back and he fell, tripping over his own feet. Without Sam as the anchor, the young one faltered. I pushed harder. Right there. The dome of magic bowed out, expanding under the pressure of my power.

  Someone cried out, fell. A beam broke and crashed to the ground behind them, and everything shattered.

  Some of the magical backlash exploded out, searing into the standing kettle members, and Sam flew back in a clap of thunder. But some of it rolled inward, and I staggered back to Anne Marie. “Shield yourse—”

  It was too late—I turned in time to see the demon vaporize in a wave of power and Anne Marie collapse in silence. I went to my knees in pain as my whole brain melted and everything blackened around the edges. It was a thousand times worse than when Leif broke the wards on my apartment.

  I braced my hands on the floor, unwilling to simply collapse as the fire licked closer, and found myself staring at where Tracy lay, motionless, on the ground. Not even a faint spark of life or magic remained.

  My eyes burned, too dry from heat and magic to cry, but my heart ached.

  Maybe I’d been her executioner after all.

  Chapter 54

  Nothing moved except the smoke.

  I concentrated on breathing, telling myself to get up. Get up. Fight. Don’t just lie here and wait for something to happen. Didn’t want to die in the dark, in the fire.

  Get up.

  I crawled to Anne Marie but stopped, staring as Tracy’s opal ring spun across the floor with the sweet chime of silver. Sam rolled and tried to stand, and I reached for Anne Marie. We’d only survive if we worked together. I shoved Tracy’s ring in my pocket. “Anne Marie. We have to go.”