Captivating the Witch

by Michele Hauf

  “The warlock is strong,” Vika said as she inspected her sister’s wounds. “We’ll need stronger magic if we’re going to stop that bitch, Tamatha.”

  “Yes,” she said absently, because her focus was on the demon who marched toward her. He did not look happy. “Ed?”

  “Witch!”

  He gripped her by the wrist. Verity cast a sputtering flame at him, but the demon merely shrugged it off.

  “I’m sorry—we tried!” Tamatha said, resisting his strong hold, and she was able to pull free, though in doing so she twisted her wrist painfully and something cut her skin. “Calm down, Ed!”

  “They would have ripped me limb from limb,” he snarled at her in that hollow demonic tone that was far from sexy now. The horns at his temples cut the air with a tilt of his head. “Not so powerful after all,” he assessed of her.

  “Leave her alone!” Libby grabbed Tamatha by the shoulders and pulled her away from Ed. “Shift back, asshole. You’re doing no one any good in that form and someone could see you.”

  “Witches!” the demon growled. And with a roar that echoed over the cemetery, he then shifted into a conspiracy of ravens and soared up into the sky.

  “That was freakin’ cool,” Libby commented. “Didn’t know the guy could do that.”

  Tamatha shot her a glare.

  “Hey, it was. Is he flying away, then? Nice guy. Not.”

  “Libby,” Verity chastised as she checked Tamatha’s injuries. She held a palm over the cut on her wrist and closed her eyes.

  “Sorry,” Libby said. “Ah, the ravens are circling around and swooping back down. So maybe he’s not going to abandon you. But maybe he should. No man has a right to grab a woman like he did you.”

  “He was frightened,” Tamatha defended him. “You would be, too, if a dozen zombie witches came after you.”

  “Point taken. But I only counted ten. Either they’ve lost two or a couple were hiding.” Libby turned to check on her sister.

  The ravens flocked close to the ground, but before talons could touch the cold cemetery pathway, they transformed and coalesced into the dark figure of Edamite Thrash. He shivered, as if a bird shaking out its wings, then let out a moan as the final remnants of the shift left him.

  * * *

  He’d shifted to demon form without volition, and when that happened, it was because he was angry. Angry that he’d been so ineffectual facing a coven of dead witches. They were zombies. Bags of bones and rotting meat. They should have been easy to defeat. Instead, they’d nearly torn him apart.

  And the quartet of live witches who had attempted to stave off the zombie-witch attack had served much less than he’d expected from “combined magic.” Which had made him even angrier. Not directly at Tamatha, but again, simply because—what the hell? They. Were. Zombies. They shouldn’t be that hard to put down.

  And once shifted, with the anger racing through his system, he’d gone after the first person he’d seen—Tamatha.

  Ed swiped a hand over his head, reactively checking that his horns had completely receded. He touched his knuckles. No gloves to cover the thorn nubs. He hadn’t time to put them on at his home before the witches had whisked him away to Montparnasse. What was that? A trace of red blood on the back of his hand? Wasn’t his. And the zombies bled weird metallic stuff.

  Had he cut someone?

  “No, that’s impossible. That would poison—”

  He rushed for Tamatha but the witch Vika put up a palm, repulsing him as if with an invisible shield. He stumbled backward against a tombstone, catching an arm across the top to keep from going down.

  “No, it’s okay,” Tamatha said as she pushed away from her friends. “He was out of it. Didn’t know what he was doing. Are you okay, Ed? They didn’t hurt you?”

  That she was more worried about him than herself killed him. She had talon marks across her cheek. Ed nodded but didn’t try to approach her again. He could have hurt her with his thorns.

  “Let me take care of you, sweetie.” Verity pressed her palms against Tamatha’s cheek and closed her eyes.

  Meanwhile, Libby eyed Ed with an admonishing glare.

  “Your bait worked,” he spit at the curvaceous witch.

  “Yeah, but the warlock’s magic was too strong. We’re going to have to go at this another way. If we don’t have guns big enough to blow her away, we’ll have to combine our powers.”

  “I thought that’s what you just did,” Ed protested.

  “So did I. Back to the drawing board, as they say. We should all head home and search our grimoires for effective magic. I sensed something beyond malefic.”

  “It was demonic,” Vika said, joining her sister’s side and smoothing at the torn dress fabric at her hip. “I recognize the feel of it from when CJ was infested with demons.”

  “Demonic?” Ed asked. “That doesn’t make sense. They are killing demons. You think a demon is controlling Les Douze?”

  Vika shrugged. “I honestly don’t know. It was witch magic, for sure. Mixed in with the demonic. Weird. Maybe CJ will have some answers. Verity, you want to take Tamatha home with you tonight?”

  “No,” Tamatha said, though Verity still worked her healing magic on her cheek. “I’m good. I’ll go home with Ed.”

  All three of her friends glanced to Ed. More admonishing witch vibes. He felt them as a cold shiver in his veins. Duly taken. He should have never gone after Tamatha. She did not deserve his anger.

  “Your friends don’t trust me,” he said. “I don’t blame them.”

  “I’ll be fine,” she said and gasped as her friend pulled her hands from her cheek to reveal smooth, healed skin. “Thanks, Verity. I need to rest. This night has taken a lot out of all of us. Not to mention you, Ed.” She tucked a hand against her stomach and wandered toward him. “Will you take me home?”

  “Yes.” He kissed her forehead and stroked the hair from her cheek. Verity’s magic had healed her completely; not a sign of damage on her pale skin. As were the others healed. “We’ll be in touch,” he said, and then he lifted Tamatha into his arms and walked past the witches.

  “Dude, we will be keeping an eye on you,” Libby called after him.

  “I don’t doubt that!” he returned.

  And then thinking he had had enough of witches for the evening, and that he only wanted to be home as quickly as possible, he considered flying out of the cemetery with Tamatha in his arms. She would be carried aloft by his conspiracy, but even considering another shift gave him a headache. He was too drained. And he shouldn’t risk anyone spying a witch flying through the air on the back of ravens’ wings.

  He landed the sidewalk outside the cemetery and set Tamatha down. Pulling out his phone, he called for a ride. Twenty minutes later, Inego dropped them both off before his building. He scooped his tired witch into his arms and carried her inside.

  He laid Tamatha on the couch and only then did he notice her wrist when her hand fell away from her stomach. “You’re cut here. The purple witch didn’t heal it?”

  “Oh, it’s nothing.” She grasped her wrist and winced. “Must have gotten it when I...”

  She hadn’t been involved in hand-to-hand combat with the zombie witches. The only wound she had taken from the warlock had been across the cheek.

  Ah hell. No.

  Ed slapped a palm over the back of his hand. His thorns were retracted, but the cool, hard thorn nubs were always sharp. He had struggled with her in his demonic form. Had he accidentally cut her?

  “Tamatha, is that cut from my thorns?”

  She shook her head and closed her eyes, suddenly seeming as if she could drop into the sleep of the dead. The poison from his thorn would infect her and not stop until she was dead.

  He shook her by the shoulders. “Tamatha? Tell me!”

 
; “Maybe,” she said softly.

  “No!”

  If his poison were coursing through her system— He hadn’t time to consider the horrible reality. He had to act. Fast.

  “The antidote. I’ve got to make it.”

  “No,” she said lazily, and her head dropped to the side. “I’ll be...”

  He remembered the antidote she had explained to him. Some of it. It involved crushing the demon’s thorn and mixing it with salt and...something.

  “How much salt?” he asked, shaking her again. She shrugged out of his grasp and he grabbed her by the chin. “Tamatha, listen to me. We don’t have much time. The poison will kill you. I need to do this now.”

  “Will hurt you,” she whispered.

  “Hurt?” Yes, removing his thorn could have a dire effect. Much worse than a simple hurt. “Fuck that. I’m not going to watch you die.”

  “But my mother’s intuition—”

  About him dying? “Is not going to be accurate today. Now help me. How much salt?”

  She sighed. Her hand flopped lifelessly over the edge of the couch. “Equal parts.”

  “Salt. Ground thorn. And...?”

  “Whiskey.”

  “Whiskey?” That sounded random, but he wasn’t going to doubt. Not when time was crucial.

  He didn’t own a single crystal of salt. He had plenty of whiskey. And the thorn. That was going to hurt like a mother, and had irreversible consequences, but that mattered little.

  “I knew from the get-go when a demon gets involved with a witch he never survives to the end of the story.” Good ole Mom and her faery tales.

  Ed dashed into the kitchen and picked up his phone. He called the building concierge and told him he had an urgent need for salt. Any kind. Borrow some from a resident and bring it up. The concierge promised he’d be up in ten minutes.

  “Make it five,” Ed said and then dashed to the liquor cabinet. He yanked out a bottle of twenty-year-old whiskey and unscrewed the cap. Pulling down a stainless steel mixing bowl from the cupboard, he almost dumped all the whiskey into it, then remembered, “Equal parts.”

  He’d start with the most precious ingredient. Opening a drawer by the stone, he pulled out a bowie knife.

  He called out, “How you doing, Tamatha?”

  No reply. Shit. He dashed into the living room and found her lifeless, her hair spilling to the floor like a Sleeping Beauty in wait of the prince’s kiss.

  Ed rubbed his lips. He was the furthest thing from a prince. Why was this happening? She wasn’t supposed to be the one hurt. He was. A shake of her shoulder forced her to mutter drowsily.

  “I love you, Tamatha. I’m going to save you.” Fuck. He was the one who may very well kill her. “I’m so sorry.”

  The door buzzer rang. He retrieved the glass jar of salt and shoved a ten-euro bill into the concierge’s hand. Door slammed behind him, he knelt and partially shifted so his horns grew out on his skull and his thorns popped up on his knuckles.

  Placing the knife blade to the hard base of the thorn behind his forefinger, he dug into flesh and thorn.

  Chapter 19

  Ed blinked through the pain. Black blood gushed from the wound on the back of his hand. He’d cut through cartilage and what had seemed like bone for the tremendous effort it required to remove a thorn from his knuckle. The thorn landed on the marble floor. He bent forward, clenching his jaw and pressing his fist to his gut. Tears formed in his eyes. He felt sure he’d never experienced anything so painful. And he had taken battle wounds from demons, werewolves, vampires and even zombie witches.

  No time to lament the agony. He’d suffer his skin flailed from his body if it would save Tamatha. Even more? He’d give his life for hers.

  Grasping the thorn, he dashed into the kitchen, grabbed the mortar and pestle—no idea why or how he owned one, but he was glad he did—and began to grind the ingredient.

  Blood spilled from his knuckle, so he switched hands and used his right to crush. No sound from the couch, but he could see the top of Tamatha’s head, her goddess hair spilling to the floor. Not moving. He crushed harder, finding it a difficult task, but soon enough, he had reduced the thorn to a black powder.

  Grabbing the jar of salt, he cautiously removed the screw-on lid. He could touch salt, but the instant it hit his bloodstream he’d be a goner. He should wrap his hand to cover the wound but he hadn’t time. So with his good hand, he carefully sifted into the mortar an equal amount of salt over the crushed thorn.

  Whiskey to hand, he tilted back a swallow. It scoured down his throat, but it distracted from the pulsing burn at his knuckles. He poured what he thought was an equal amount into the mortar then mixed it together with a spoon from the drawer. The instant the silver spoon hit the mix it began to steam. He whipped it into the sink.

  “Can’t use metal, apparently.” A burn on the back of his wrist began to sizzle into his skin. “Shit!” He thrust his bloodied hand under the faucet and turned on the water. Must have got a drop of the mixture on his skin when he flicked away the spoon.

  Finally, skin cleaned, but his knuckle still bleeding, Ed slammed his palms to the marble counter. A new sigil veined its way about his wrist where he’d been burned by the salt, forming a black, thorned chain. That meant only one thing in the demonic realm: death.

  Well, wasn’t as if that surprised him.

  “I can do this. I have to save her. Then it doesn’t matter what happens to me.”

  But how to administer the antidote?

  Clasping the heavy stone mortar to his gut, he dashed over to the couch and knelt. “Tamatha?” She was unresponsive, yet when he laid his fingers against her neck, he felt a strong pulse. “I’ll have to wing it for this part.”

  Turning over her wrist, he saw the cuts made by his thorns, which had not healed. And would not, he guessed, for he had seen the purple-haired witch place a healing touch there. The cuts were thin. If he laid the antidote on them, it wasn’t as though they would suck it in. Maybe?

  “I don’t know what to do next,” he muttered. “Shit! What do I do? I need those witches back here.”

  Maybe there was a way to reach them. Pulling out Tamatha’s cell phone from her purse, he was thankful the Contacts listed Libby Saint-Charles. When the witch answered she sounded frantic. “It’s Tamatha?”

  “She’s been poisoned by my thorns,” he said. “I’ve got the antidote mixed up. How do I administer it?”

  “Injection.”

  “I...don’t know how to do that. I don’t have a syringe.” Why was he so damned ineffectual? He could keep the demons in Paris under thumb but he couldn’t save one witch? “Libby, she can’t die. She means too much to me. She’s the only— I love her.”

  “Chill out, demon boy. Close your eyes and concentrate on me.”

  “What?”

  “Just do what I tell you, or I will hunt you down.”

  “Yes, I’m listening.” Ed closed his eyes and pictured the sassy redheaded witch. An angel lover? Wonders never ceased. Something clattered onto the floor near his knee. He opened his eyes and saw the plastic syringe lying there.

  “You get it?” she asked.

  “Witch, you do good magic. Okay, I gotta go. I have to do this.”

  “Listen to me, lover boy. Inject it into her heart. It’s the best way to initiate the antidote through her system fast.”

  “Her heart? But—?”

  “Do as I say.”

  “Yes. Okay. Thanks, Libby.”

  He tossed the phone aside and picked up the syringe. He tried to grab the mortar with his other hand, but his bloodied fingers slipped over the marble bowl. His hand had gone numb. And a black streak ran up the back of his hand from the severed thorn to his wrist. It felt icy and at the same time burned as if he’d stuck hi
s hand into a bee skep.

  Managing the syringe with his right hand, he suctioned up the antidote into the device then leaned over Tamatha. She looked too peaceful, her pale pink lips parted and her skin like milk. Her hair even looked softer, like silk. He kissed her eyebrow and inhaled her lemon skin. Fresh and bright. A witch like no other.

  A woman like no other.

  He didn’t deserve her. But he wanted to be worthy of her.

  Positioning the syringe over her heart, he shook his head. What if he didn’t do this right? His ineptitude could kill her faster than the poison might. Then her witch friends would come after him and—if that happened he deserved whatever they served him.

  “I love you,” he said and pierced her chest with the needle. He squeezed in the antidote, then tossed the syringe aside and lay across her stomach, hugging her. “Please don’t die. We are good together. My world is brighter when you’re in it. Tamatha...”

  Her body remained cold and immobile, yet he could hear her heart beating beneath his ear. He grabbed her wrist. The wounds had blackened much like the wound on his knuckles. Something was wrong. Shouldn’t she jolt back to life? At the very least, gasp in a healing breath?

  A knock at his door startled him. If the concierge had returned he could just leave. “Busy!”

  The knock came again, fierce and insistent.

  “Go away!”

  A mist of red smoke sifted under the doorway and floated into the living room at the end of the couch. It swirled like a tornado contained within a human-sized space, and then a woman formed, sitting on the couch arm near Tamatha’s shoes.

  “Who are you?” Had to be a shifter. Or a witch. Or— He didn’t have time to make friends right now. “Get the hell out of here!”

  The woman, with bloodred hair and blue eyes, crossed her arms and closed her eyes. Intent on staying put. She wore a deep green frock coat over a revealing black bustier, tight black leather leggings and laced-up combat boots. A white triangle was etched onto her forehead, and on her chin, vertical white lines flowed down her neck. The symbols looked demonic to Ed.

  Who was she? She had broached the wards Tamatha had put on this place, so...