Playing With Monsters

by Amelia Hutchins

  “Or maybe because you’re refusing to believe that it happened to you, as Kendra said. She’s worried about you, they all are. You bottle everything inside, and eventually even the strongest walls tumble to the ground.”

  “You think I should talk about it?” I asked, unsure why I felt comfortable talking to him and not my sister.

  “I think you just did,” he murmured against my ear and I turned to look at him.

  “How do you do that?” I asked, and watched as his lips curved into a smile as his eyes searched my face.

  “Do what?” he questioned.

  “Make me so comfortable, as if I’ve known you forever instead of the short time that I actually have.”

  Something dark entered his eyes but when I blinked, it was gone. He shook his head and pulled me tighter against himself, and closed his eyes.

  “Anyone ever told you that you talk too much?” he laughed against my neck. “Go to sleep, little fighter,” he finished, and I felt my eyes finally give in to the weight that had been pulling them down, and slept cradled in his warm embrace.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The assembly had been postponed for a few days to allow me time to heal, as if they thought I’d attend it if I had more time to cope with what had happened. After a week had gone by without me changing my mind, they decided to finally move forward without me. When it came time for the meeting, Kendra agreed to stand in on my behalf, leaving me free from the prying eyes and having to relay my story to the entire coven that would have been in attendance.

  With time on my hands, I’d decided to pull weeds from the garden, knowing it was therapeutic in its own way. I had just managed to clean out five rows of weeds when I felt the shift in the weather; it went from cloudy to beautiful blue skies in less than a minute. I stood up, looking around for the cause of the sudden change.

  “Magdalena, it calms you to garden,” a soft voice said.

  I turned to find her, the high priestess of the coven. Tabitha was beautiful and ageless. She had golden blonde hair that cascaded to her hips in soft curls. Her almond shaped eyes perfectly fit her oval shaped face and were the color of freshly fallen snow.

  “It’s always calmed me,” I replied. My grungy, dirty hands weren’t something I wanted to offer her but she deserved respect. I bowed my head and gave her a quick, awkward curtsy. “I should wash up.”

  “There’s no need for that.”

  “Can I get you something?” I asked as my eyes darted from the cottage to her. She deserved to be given more than I could offer her, but it wasn’t as if I could invite her into the main house, which didn’t even have power restored yet.

  “I’d like to see what happened to you, and know why you asked your sister to beg for Todd to be buried with the honor and approval of the coven.”

  “Tabitha, he gave his life for mine. He could have easily killed me, but he didn’t. I understand that no one wants to believe that he was being controlled by someone else, but I felt it. It was evil, violent and it was absolutely in charge of him. He shot at me, and yet he fought it so that I didn’t end up with a new hole in my stomach. When he raped me, and even before that, he begged me to take his life to stop him from hurting me. He fought whatever it was for me. He didn’t have to, but he did, and that means something. I wasn’t the only victim. He was used as a weapon against me. Todd didn’t have a chance of escaping from them, and he knew it. He watched me pick up the gun while he fought against the spell, and he let me win. He loved me enough to make the sacrifice; you don’t need to see it to understand that.”

  “I need to ‘see’ to argue your case,” she murmured softly as she reached up and pulled a twig from my hair. “Some choose not to honor your wishes because we all know that at one point, you loved and cared for that boy. They believe you’re making excuses for his behavior and if I am to take your side, I wish to see the event through your eyes to understand what really happened.”

  “You don’t believe me?” I asked cautiously.

  “I have not felt the presence of darkness,” she answered softly with no accusation in her tone. “It’s alarming that you have and I have not, Magdalena. If it’s present, then not only are we all in danger; we must consider moving up the Awakening. In the old days, demons would be attracted by the power increase around the time of an Awakening. It’s been a very long time since a coven was attacked by a demon and many have forgotten the evil they bring. When I was little, the old ones spoke of such things. They referred to demons sent by the gods of hell, ones who sought out witches for their powers. Darkness used to be accepted; however, with the dangers that surround us on a daily basis, it was safer to expel those who harbored the darkness in their souls. Demons are attracted to darkness and want to exploit it. Once the darkness was removed from the covens, the demons hunted us less and less until eventually they stopped. That’s why I asked the coven to expel your brother.”

  My pulse ticked with anger at her words but I managed to hide it, or so I thought.

  “You don’t understand,” she stated. “Demons would come again if darkness was allowed to grow inside the coven. We are ill-equipped to fight them, and allowing the past to happen again would be devastating for the coven.”

  “Demons,” I repeated, because we’d all been given a crash course on the coven’s history, or what was left of it. The coven had abandoned pretty much everything each time they moved west.

  “Demons are deadly to witches, Magdalena. We won’t take the chance of encountering them. They covet our powers, and the only way to take a witch’s power, is to take her soul. Without a soul, you can’t be reborn to the coven.”

  “We can be reborn?” I asked, noting the way she’d said it. As in, we could come back.

  “Only the more powerful ones, or those cursed by darkness before death. My grandmother told me the story of one of our ancestors; she was cursed to be reborn. She was a little hazy about most of the details of the story, only that she was a very powerful witch. It was rumored that she was cursed because of something she had done long ago to a very powerful demon.”

  “I heard a little bit about her, that story is part of the catechism.”

  “Yes, I made it part of the catechism; her story is not one that is shared often. My grandmother taught me the story so that I could share it with others before my time on this earth was finished.”

  “You’re dying,” I whispered with wide eyes.

  “Not today, but every priestess can sense her time drawing near. Mine won’t be for a little while longer; however, you should know her story can and does repeat itself because of the one who cursed her.”

  “What does her story have to do with me?” I questioned.

  “Because it used to reoccur every sixty years or so, and with the events happening lately, I think it’s begun again.”

  “You think I’m being targeted by the same monster that killed one of our ancestors?”

  “If I didn’t sense the darkness, it could spell trouble for the coven, Magdalena. It worries me, though, that this is the second attempt on your life, and that of your family’s bloodline.”

  “That’s only an assumption. No disrespect, but you didn’t sense my brother here, either. He has darkness inside of him, and yet he’s somehow learned to hide it,” I divulged.

  “You’re correct about his darkness. I felt the shift in the balance when he arrived, but he carries no malice strong enough to do harm to others.”

  “If you felt him, why didn’t you warn us?” I asked, aghast that she’d known.

  “Because those are your mother’s scars to heal,” she replied with a soft smile. “My job is to protect and teach the coven, not necessarily to meddle in their affairs. I guide, and lead. Only you can choose which path you follow; I can only lead you to the fork in the road, Magdalena.”

  “Oh,�
� was all I could say.

  “If you’d like to change into something more comfortable, I’ll wait,” she announced as I opened the door to the cottage.

  “Please,” I said as a blush stole across my cheeks. “My grandmother would have heart failure if she knew you’d seen me like this.”

  “It matters little to me if you’re covered in dirt, Magdalena. I find gardening comforting as well, and with everything you’ve been through, I was pleased to find you doing something to occupy your mind. I know that he raped you…”

  “He didn’t rape me,” I interrupted. “Todd was a victim as well, and once you see it, you’ll understand. I don’t consider it the same because I don’t feel like I was raped. I feel like I was violated, but it wasn’t by Todd. He loved me, even if we had our differences.”

  “You’re not like most women I’ve known. Witches don’t value chastity, and yet you do. I was told by your grandmother that you had chosen to remain pure until your wedding to the boy.”

  “I wanted it to be special, I guess, to mean something more than just sex. Todd agreed; he thought it was something that we would share on our wedding night.”

  “Many assume he took it by force after you rejected his advances at the opening ceremony celebration,” she mused.

  “I wasn’t a virgin when he…when it happened,” I stammered.

  She smiled and shook her head. “I see; maybe there is hope for you, after all.”

  “Hope?” I asked feeling the blood rush from my face. She thought I was hopeless? Not good.

  “I was joking, Magdalena. Go change, I’ll start some tea. This can take a little while,” she announced.

  I grabbed a camisole of soft pink satin and pair of comfortable black slacks, and moved into the bathroom. I washed up quickly and pulled my hair into a high ponytail before slipping the clothes on and heading to the small, comfortable front room.

  “To do this, you have to let me past those walls you’ve erected,” she announced, surprising me.

  “I have no walls…”

  She smiled and shook her head.

  “I’m fully aware of what you have done to protect yourself from feeling emotions you don’t want. I don’t blame you for doing it, but for me to push through them would prevent you from replacing them anytime soon. I assume you plan to erect them after we’ve finished.”

  “I’m not sure how to take them down,” I admitted.

  “You have to want to take them down,” she replied.

  “I don’t want them down; if they’re down, I have to feel everything.”

  “I’ll keep the pain at bay, if you’ll let me,” she said sadly. “I wish you’d have remained here after your brother’s funeral; I’d have loved to have gotten to know you as I have the others.”

  “I couldn’t, I just needed time…”

  “You needed to heal, but that’s what we’re for; we heal together. It’s how we bond and grow together. I could have helped you through the pain, taught you how to use it for good. Every emotion has a place inside the magical trifecta. The Fae feed from it, but witches, we use it to strengthen spells, to tether bonds and strengthen wards.”

  “I didn’t know that,” I said, watching while the candles ignited around the room as the tea kettle floated by my head and poured tea perfectly into the small mugs on the coffee table. Spoons stirred inside the cup with the flick of her finger and sugar cubes danced in the air and plopped right into the cups.

  “You missed a lot of things while you were off studying herbs,” she smiled mischievously. “I know you have a mother, but I am your mother as well, in a sense. It’s my job to watch over you. That includes my flock that leaves home before they’ve been awoken to the powers that protect them.”

  “Let’s do this,” I said, and then winced at how bitter I sounded. “Do I have to see it again?” I asked.

  “No, I’m just going to look through your mind to find the memory; you won’t see anything, you just have to allow me in.”

  “I don’t understand why I had to endure a blood ritual if you can easily sort through my memories. You could have done this and excluded me as a suspect in the house fire,” I stated, watching as she smiled and nodded gently. Enduring Lucian sorting through my past? It was seriously embarrassing. It was like handing a total stranger your diary and watching as he read through every entry.

  “I could have. I meditated on it for some time before deciding to stay out of it. First off, most of the coven doesn’t know I can do this outside of blood magic.” Her eyes had a mischievous glint in them. “A girl has to have some secrets, you know. The bigger reason is as I said before: my job is to protect and teach the coven, not meddle, and that did fall under the category of meddling. In this situation, I need to see so I can protect the coven and guide them in the best direction. Now sit there and relax.” She lowered herself gracefully on to the carpeting and patted the space in front of herself.

  I sat cross-legged on the floor across from her and accepted her hands as she offered them. She was silent, but I could feel her magic already filling the room as she prepared to use it to enter my memories.

  “You’ll feel me poking around a little, but remember, I’m only looking for what transpired during the attack,” she said with a quick tightening of her hands on mine for comfort. Her hands left mine and carefully touched my cheeks. I felt the shock of her magic as she delved into my mind, but she didn’t get far. “Walls, Magdalena, I need them down. Trust me,” she whispered.

  I imagined them crumbling down, exposing the pain that I’d tried so hard to escape from. Tears filled my eyes as the first ugly slice of pain tore through me and then just like that, it was gone. I opened my eyes to find hers filled with the same tears that I’d just had in my own eyes.

  “I can see why you hide from it,” she whispered sadly, but seemed to be handling it all the same. That was more than I could say for myself.

  I felt her tugging at my mind, pulling and pushing memories until she discovered the freshest wound. I felt her pushing through it, heard her gasp inside my memories as the violence exploded, and the moment I felt her pulling out, I replaced the walls and pushed her from my mind with enough force that the candles extinguished and the room went dark as a single bolt of lightning hit the ground outside, followed by a booming crash of thunder that was too close for comfort.

  “How did you do that?” she demanded.

  “Do what?” I asked as I whirled through the emotions, pushing them away so I wouldn’t feel any of it.

  “You pushed me out,” she said as she lifted her hands and the candles leapt to life again. “You expelled me from your memories. No one has ever done that to me.”

  “I’d have felt them, again,” I said uncomfortably. “I was protecting myself,” I admitted.

  “Todd wasn’t spelled by magic, Magdalena,” she whispered as she got to her feet.

  “Bullshit, I know what I saw!” I argued.

  “It wasn’t magic; it was a possession. He was possessed by a demon,” she replied shakily. “We have to move the Awakening up, and call the other covens to aid us. If they have found us, no one is safe, no one.”

  “Demons, but you said…”

  “I must go; I’m not safe,” she whispered, and with a rush of wind, she vanished. I swallowed and looked around the room.

  Todd had been possessed, which meant I was raped by a demon, but why me? Why him? I felt the blood leaving my face as reality set in. Demons were hunting me, playing with me. I pushed out to feel Kendra, and felt her inner panic. She was with Mom and Grandmother still, and Tabitha had reached them already.

  I heard a chant begin in my mind and before I could stop myself, I started chanting the ancient words to call forth the other covens. Hundreds of voices began chanting, and then thousands. Hell had come to Haven Crest, and no one wa
s safe here, no one.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  I sat on the couch, numb, and unmoving. Netflix was offering suggestions for movies and shows, loading them as I stared blankly at the TV. A partially melted pint of Cherry Garcia waited for me on the coffee table, and Luna slept peacefully in my lap, unaware of the nightmare that was brewing.

  The door opened and I jumped, scaring Luna, who hissed and darted from the couch and out the door. Lucian stood in the doorway, his face angry as he looked around the room. He moved into the room with long strides and stood in front of me, taking in the ice cream and Netflix randomizer, not to mention my disheveled state.

  “You were supposed to be at that meeting, not here at the cottage, and certainly not alone,” he pointed out, and I gave him a blank stare.

  “I told you more than once that I wasn’t going. I didn’t need to be present to be an example of what could happen if they didn’t do the right thing. I also wanted some solitude, so I did some gardening.”

  “There’s a situation,” he said softly. “Some facts have been brought to light, and you shouldn’t be alone right now.”

  “Demons are coming to take me away?” I laughed nervously. His eyes hardened and he pushed aside a pile of clothes I’d placed on the couch to fold. I’d never actually folded any of it, because I’d been too busy imagining a world where demons existed and hunted witches, because my life wasn’t complicated enough.

  “The Awakening is happening tonight,” he said as he sat down and turned to look at me.

  “And?” I asked, my eyes meeting his. I knew exactly what he meant; I’d be off limits to him, at least for longer than either of us wanted. There was a cool-down period after the Harvest, to see if conception had occurred. You could either continue sleeping with the same guy or go without sex until you were sure you weren’t expecting a child. It was a way of marking which bloodlines had successfully bred during the Harvest.