The Coven History

by Lily Luchesi

  The front door to the Smiths’ house was blown open, hanging on one hinge. Salem’s gut twisted, but he forced himself to keep moving. That was, until he came upon a gooey, decayed body that vaguely resembled Michael Smith. He grimaced at the close up sight of such a grisly demise, though he couldn’t say he felt sorry for him. The man was rotten to the core, and he deserved to have died slowly, feeling his body decay from the inside out.

  Rushing footsteps could be heard above, and he saw the edge of a silver cloak vanish up the staircase. In the distance, he heard Daphne cast a Concealment Charm, the magic so powerful, it made the house shake. Whatever she was hiding, it was important.

  A child’s cries could be heard: it had to be the boy, Nicolas.

  Daphne was yelling something, and Robert was laughing. Salem raced up the stairs, but his foot had only just hit the landing when he heard one word that filled his heart with dread: “Imputresco!”

  Daphne screamed, “No,” the word already dying in her throat. It was a word, a sound, Salem knew he would never forget, if he lived to survive that night. He fervently hoped he would die. It was better than the lifetime of grief, regret, and nightmares that lay before him.

  Once he made it up the stairs, he saw only Robert’s back to him. The master bedroom door was wide open, and the bedroom with Nick’s name on it was Charmed shut. But it wasn’t Concealed. Salem wondered what Daphne was hiding; what was so precious to her that she used her last attempt at a defensive spell to instead cast that Charm?

  Knowing this was his last chance, he made his presence known.

  “Get away!” Salem shouted. “Leave them alone!”

  Robert laughed some more. “Salem Sinclair. The traitor come to save the woman he defected for. How bloody romantic. You can’t defeat me. Not while you wear my amulet.”

  Rage raced through Salem, the rage he had fervently tried to tamper down since he was a boy. For the first time, he embraced that rage, embraced the Darkness in his heart and veins. “Perhaps I cannot beat you, but I can get rid of you. Ejicio!”

  Magic blasted out from within him. Usually a banishing spell such as that needed to have multiple magicians behind it to work. For Salem, his power was enough. His rage was enough. His Darkness was enough. Robert screamed as the spell sent him flying through space. Salem had no idea where he was going to end up, and he didn’t give a damn. His heart was now solely focused on Daphne.

  He turned, afraid of what he might see. Her body lay on the floor, and aside from advanced rigor, she had not yet truly begun to decay. Her eyes were wide and her hand was reaching out to the bare wall ahead of her. Salem had no idea why.

  Feeling numbness in his hands and finding it hard to breathe, he fell to his knees beside her. His best friend. His true love. His soul mate. Always so vibrant and full of life, even when she was yelling at him, she was now still and cold as marble.

  Gingerly, he reached out to touch her, to be certain she was dead and not merely stunned. It was an idiotic thing: he had heard the fatal curse being cast. But a small, childlike part of him had held onto hope. And now, as he touched her cold skin, that part of him died, joining Daphne in the afterlife.

  He began to cry, unable to hold the grief at bay. “Daphne… Oh, Daphne, no…” His sobs seemed to be torn from his lungs, they were so harsh. She was dead. The woman he loved was dead, and it was all his fault.

  He had no idea how long he was there, but it could not have been long, because the corpse’s decay did not advance when he heard footsteps. He leapt up, ready to kill Robert this time. However, it was Mrs. Donahue.

  “Oh dear. Even Daphne?” she asked, tears coming to her eyes.

  “I will see him destroyed for this,” Salem growled.

  “You might get your chance tonight,” Donahue said. “He was heading for Caelum and Draven. Please, I know you’re in mourning, but please go help them. I will take Nicolas to safety.”

  Salem nodded and turned to go, but Donahue stopped him with a hand on his arm.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said.

  So am I, Salem thought, closing his eyes and allowing a few more tears to slip down his cheeks.

  The Second Clan War was nearly over, but the loss had been insurmountable. And he knew that, as long as he lived, he would never be the same again.

  Epilogue

  Harley was expelled from the memories, finding herself on her hands and knees on the Watchtower floor. Her breath came in gasps and her eyes were wide and unblinking. Slow tears leaked from her eyes and her body was trembling.

  Caelum lay next to her, unconscious as his mind and memories were being returned to him from the spell. Draven and Daphne’s spirits were nowhere to be seen. The fire from the candle had died out in the cold, biting autumn wind that cut through the tower.

  Harley was devastated by everything she had seen, but there was one sliver of light: the poison cure had worked on Salem once before, so that meant it had to work on him again. There had been a flaw somewhere. Perhaps she had used a spoilt ingredient.

  Leaving Caelum where he was — she couldn’t waste time teleporting him — she stepped outside the Watchtower and teleported away. Salem didn’t have that much time to spare.

  Looking at the sky, she guessed it was a little after seven in the evening, which meant four hours had passed. There wasn’t much time left. She mounted the castle steps two at a time, dashing past people and rushing around them when they didn’t move fast enough for her.

  Eventually, she burst into her father’s bedchamber, where he lay motionless in bed, watched by Madam Maysa and Mrs. Donahue.

  “White oleander,” Harley panted. “The white powder was created using dried oleander leaves. The cure should work: it already did when Father was poisoned with it once before when he was fifteen.”

  Madam Maysa clutched at her hijab’s hem, eyes widening. “Oh, dear. Are you sure he was given that exact cure before?”

  Harley nodded. “I’m positive, I saw it. So either I did something wrong or one of the ingredients wasn’t up to its full potency. Allow me to go and brew another batch—”

  “No, wait,” Maysa called to her.

  Harley turned back around to face the Medic. “He doesn’t have much time!”

  “Miss Sinclair…” Maysa sighed. “There is one caveat that applies to both that potion and your father. Since it is, in a sense, an emergency cure, it can only be administered once in a person’s lifetime. And you have just informed me that he was already given the potion as a teenager.”

  The breath left Harley’s lungs and she tried to focus. “Okay, then. What about a cure for oleander poisoning? There must be one!”

  At that, Maysa looked at the ground. “There is. However, it is only effective if administered within the first forty-eight hours after the poisoning occurred. According to your timeline, that window closed seven hours ago.”

  Harley felt dizzy and went for the nearest chair in the room, well aware that she was being observed. “I don’t … I don’t understand. What can we do for him, then?”

  She looked between Maysa and Donahue, and neither woman would look her in the eye. They both had downcast looks on their faces, and Donahue had suspiciously reddening eyes.

  “Damn it, what can we do for him?” Harley cried. Her whole body was beginning to shake and she couldn’t control it.

  “There is nothing left to do but make him comfortable until…” Maysa trailed off, still not looking at Harley. “I am so sorry, Miss Sinclair.”

  “No!” Harley cried. “No, that cannot be true! That can’t be all we can do: sit here and let my father die!” Her magic sparked on the fabric of the armchair she sat in, singeing the fibres and sending tiny plumes of green smoke in the air.

  Her heart didn’t want to believe it, but deep down, she knew it was true. She knew that there was nothing left to help him. All because he had been given the antidote once before.

  All because of Caelum Lynx, and the mysterious ‘deadly prank’ that had been
pulled. She had gone years hearing about it; Salem had told her after Alicia Gordon had poisoned her when she was sixteen. Only now did she realise just how bad that prank really had been. How, decades later, it had finished the job and killed him.

  It was as though she was unable to breathe as thoughts and memories swirled inside of her head. Just as she was about to go into a full blown panic attack, she heard her name.

  “Harley…”

  It made her jump up as she dashed to kneel at her father’s bedside. He was covered in cold sweat, face even paler than normal, with black circles under his eyes. His chest was rising and falling shallowly, and his breaths were rattling like thin pieces of paper in the wind.

  “Father… I’ve tried everything,” she said, her voice a gasp as hot tears fell from her eyes. “There’s nothing left. I don’t know what to do. Tell me what to do.”

  “You have done all you could,” he said, his voice barely audible as he tried to catch his breath long enough to speak. “I should have realised it sooner. I should have recognised the signs.”

  “But I don’t — I can’t…” She reached out and took one of his cold, clammy hands in hers. She was shaking so hard, it was causing him to tremble.

  “My little girl, I wish we had more time.” He turned his head with effort to look at her, giving a small smile.

  “But we will have more time,” Harley said desperately, trying to will his cure into existence just by speaking of it. “We will.”

  “Just like your mother,” he rasped, the smile growing. How could he be smiling when he was dying? “Promise me something.”

  “Anything, Father.”

  “Never lose your Light. Never let the Coven lose that Light.” He then went into a coughing fit, and she could feel his pulse racing far too fast. There was no way his heart would be able to handle it much longer.

  When the fit subsided, it seemed to have taken whatever energy Salem had left. He could barely open his eyes to look at Harley. It killed her to see him this way, her strong and powerful father brought so low by a flower.

  Her breath hitched in her throat as she said, “Father?”

  Heavy lidded eyes shifted toward her. “I love you, little girl.” His eyes closed and his breath rattled in his chest once before it stilled.

  “No … no!” Harley shook him, knowing deep in her heart that he was gone. However, a part of her refused to accept it and she continued to cry, calling for him, begging him to waken.

  “Please, Father, you have to wake up! You can’t die … you can’t leave me like this! Come on, wake up!”

  He did not wake, and Harley’s body felt as though it weighed roughly two tonnes. She trembled everywhere as grief overtook her and she cried out wordlessly, a wail that Madam Maysa and Mrs. Donahue would one day describe as at once heartbreaking and ear shattering.

  Bright green magic escaped her, swirling around the room like ghostly tendrils. The windows and the potion bottles at his bedside all shattered, as did an ornate mirror that sat above the fireplace.

  The two women went to take cover from falling shards as well as the uncontrolled Dark magic pouring out of the Princess. However, not a single spark touched either Coven Elder.

  Exhaustion overcame Harley as quick as the rage had, and her magic faded as quickly as it had appeared. She leaned heavily onto the side of the bed, crying soundlessly as she felt her heart shatter.

  Salem Sinclair was dead.

  And it was all Caelum Lynx’s fault.

  FIN

  Acknowledgments

  Well … that happened. All I can say is I’m sorry. But to be fair, I was going to kill him way back in The Coven Princess, so you at least got 4 books of Salem! I’m going to go hide now from the tearful readers…

  Really, though I have said it before: thank you all so much for loving Harley, Salem, and the others. These characters are very close to my heart, and it pleases me to no end to have you welcome them into your Kindles and bookshelves.

  Now, onto the people who assisted in bringing this book to your hands.

  To God, Who gave me this amazing career and drive.

  To my mother for being my cheerleader, advisor, and so much more.

  To Sarah, who took a chance on Harley, even though I never wrote YA in my life.

  To Rue Volley, for creating another amazing cover.

  To Elizabeth Anne Lance, for editing and giving encouragement with her notes.

  To everyone else in my CHBB/HIP/ENC/VAMP family, for your friendship, support, and advice.

  To those who have supported me: Katie Keller-Nieman, Dr. John Benedict, Sarah Fairbairn, Barbara Gartman, Bailey and Christian of Knightingale Reviews, Kimberly Vanderbloom, Rainne Atkins, Alexis Long, Deberha White Perkins, Stephanie Herman, Terrick Heckstall, Charity Rowell, Danetta Sutton, and of course every single one of my Vamplets and readers.

  If you enjoyed this book, please take a moment to leave a review on Amazon. Every kind word helps!

  xoxo

  LL❤

  About the Author

  Lily Luchesi is the USA Today bestselling and award-winning author of the Paranormal Detectives Series, published by Vamptasy Publishing, as well as various short stories in the horror, paranormal, and erotica genres.

  Her first young adult novel, The Coven Princess, hit #1 on the Amazon hot new releases chart and remained in the top twenty for two weeks.

  She is also the editor and curator of the bestselling Damsels of Distress anthology, which focuses on strong female characters in horror and paranormal fiction.

  Lily is an active and out member of the LGBT+ community, a self-professed nerd, music-lover, and a little obsessed with vampires and comic books. When not writing or reading, she can be found drinking copious amounts of coffee, getting tattooed, going to concerts, or watching too much of the CW.

  She was born and raised in Chicago, but now resides in Arizona. You can find her on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Goodreads, and Pinterest.

  She also writes contemporary books for adults as Samantha Calcott.

  You can also keep up with Lily via her newsletter … and receive a free e-book as well!