by K E O'Connor
“Um... I know we’re real good friends, but even this is a bit intimate for my liking.”
A relieved laugh blasted out of me. “I’m so happy to hear you say that.”
Storm was the next to go. She juddered around, her head jerking back and forth and repeatedly smashing into me.
“Where are we?” Odessa whispered. “I can’t see much, but I have a feeling we’re not alone. And what the heck is squashed in between us?”
“We’re in the cemetery, the entire village is here, the living and the dead, and it’s a cursed skull nestled between our bosoms.”
Storm stopped head-butting me and slumped forward. She’d have fallen if my binding spell hadn’t kept her upright.
Odessa moved her head a fraction. “Did... did I just try to kill you? I feel like I really wanted to kill you a few seconds ago.”
“You did. And you probably would have done if I hadn’t stopped you,” I said. “Everyone here wants to kill me.”
“Oh! I don’t want to hurt you now. But I got so angry. I was at the farm and got this waft of something rotten. Then I was running as fast as I could. I knew where you were and had to stop you.”
“That would be the skull magic making you think like that. And I need your help to destroy it. I’ve tried everything, but nothing works. My magic isn’t strong enough to blast it apart.”
“We need Storm’s help.” Odessa shifted her head. “She’s always handy to have around when it comes to destroying things.”
“She must have passed out.”
“I’ll sort that.” Odessa licked the side of Storm’s face. “Hey! We’ve got no time to nap. Everyone wants to kill Indigo. Again.”
Storm groaned and wriggled. “Get that disgusting tongue away from me.”
“Hey, Storm. I just need to check something before I drop this binding spell. Do you want to kill me?”
“No more than usual. What’s going on?”
“We have two not so amazing options in front of us. We’re about to be attacked by the village mob, or eaten by angry corpses.”
Storm’s eyes were unfocused as she lifted her head. “More corpses?”
“Yes! And Indigo has a skull wedged between our busts. We have to destroy it,” Odessa said.
Storm frowned. “How will we do that? Crush it with our mighty cleavages?”
“I’ll explain everything later. Do you both trust me?” I said.
They nodded as best they could.
“Then let’s do this. You need to open your magic to me. We have to do this together.”
“We’re always better together,” Odessa said. “Take everything you need from me.”
“One question before we do this. Did I just try to freeze you to death?” Storm said.
“Yep, and I have the numb toes to prove it,” I said.
“Same here,” Odessa said. “I won’t be happy if I get chilblains.”
“You’re lucky your head is still on your shoulders,” Storm said. “Uh... sorry about that.”
“Don’t worry about it. Think about the skull. Once it’s gone, I’m hoping the corpses will go back in their coffins and the villagers won’t want to destroy me.”
“I feel like I’ve missed a few things,” Storm said.
“I promise, I’ll tell you everything. Are you both ready?”
They nodded again.
I loosened the binding spell a fraction so our hands and arms were free. We linked hands and formed a circle. The skull dropped to the ground and rested between our feet.
“How about using a destruction spell?” Odessa said.
“We’re too close. It could rebound onto us.” I glanced at the glaring villagers and groaning corpses. “We need fire, ice, and strength. I can conjure a stream of fire.”
“I’ve got the ice,” Storm said.
Odessa reached into her pocket and pulled out a black velvet pouch. “And I’ve got my powdered pumpkin to make everything go with a sucker-punch bang.”
I blocked out the distractions, hoped no one would jump me from behind, and we evoked our individual streams of magic.
My fire heated the air, but I kept tight control over the jet of flames so we wouldn’t get singed. Storm snaked a ring of ice around the jet and hovered it over the skull, while Odessa held a full hand of glowing pumpkin powder over our magic streams.
She dropped the powder just as the ice and fire met. Power blasted out of us and smashed into the skull.
It wobbled from side to side and let out an ear-splitting shriek.
I gritted my teeth, my ears ringing from the sound, but kept on going. The skull glowed red and vibrated.
“Give it more magic!” I yelled. “It’s working.”
A quick glance at Storm and Odessa showed they weren’t holding back. Odessa was shaking and panting, and Storm had her teeth bared as sweat trickled down her face.
“It’s about to blow,” Storm said. “Look out!”
I let out a final blast of my magic and turned my head as the skull shattered into tiny bone fragments. I pulled back my power and looked around the cemetery. The corpses were dropping to the ground, and all the villagers stood still, looking shocked, as if they weren’t sure how they found themselves to be in the cemetery.
“We did it!” Odessa grabbed me in a tight hug.
I dropped the binding magic around us and hugged her back. “Thanks to your help.” I grabbed Storm and included her in the hug, even though she grumbled.
“I’m still not sure what happened,” Storm said. “Why is everyone here? And what’s with this skull?”
“I’ll tell you everything back at the house. I’ve had more than enough of this cemetery.”
Russell swooped down and landed on my shoulder. He tapped the top of my head several times.
“Are we friends again?” I reached up to stroke him. “And do you remember what an amazing familiar you are?”
He cawed, nuzzled my face, and flew around my head.
“What trouble have you been getting into this time?” Nugget trotted over with Hilda riding on his back.
I scooped them up and gave them a hug. “Am I glad to see you two. And you’re both yourselves.”
“Who else would we be?” Nugget said. “Although I do have a question. Why is Olympus sleeping on our couch?”
I grinned. “That’s another story. Come on, let’s get out of here.”
“Um... before we do that, you should take a look at what’s left of the skull.” Odessa stood by the remains of the skull, tugging on her bottom lip.
I turned to see a red mist rising out of the fragments, and my happy mood instantly died. I settled Nugget and Hilda back on the ground and watched as the red mist swirled up into a spiral.
“That’s not good,” Storm said. “The skull’s magic should have been destroyed when we blasted it into pieces.”
“Did we get it wrong? We didn’t destroy it, but we let something out?” Odessa said.
“I’ve seen this mist before,” I said. “It’s been following me around Witch Haven. And it’s time to find out what it wants.”
“What shall we do about the villagers?” Odessa said.
Several people were wandering away, looking bemused, but most of them just stood around scratching their heads or mumbling to their neighbor.
“Let’s keep them out of the way, in case this turns nasty. Check they have their memories back and don’t want to kill me, though. We don’t want any surprise attacks while we’re dealing with whatever this is.” I gestured at the red mist.
“I’ll do crowd control,” Odessa said.
I nodded, my attention on the mist as it swirled around. It was forming a vaguely human shape.
“We should just blast it again,” Storm said. “If it forms a solid shape, it could cause more trouble.”
“I want to know what this is. I’m certain this mist is connected to the coven that ruined Magda’s life and messed with me when I was a teenager. I have to know who’s behind it.
”
Storm nodded and flexed her fingers. “You just say the word, and I’m happy to blast away. I’ve still got some magic left.”
My smile was grateful as I patted her arm. Storm was back to her old self, and I could always count on her to thump anything that needed thumping.
Odessa hurried back to join us. “Everyone is fine, although they’re all confused. But they have no murderous intentions toward you. I put out the word that a toxic fog from the river floated across the village and has been making people hallucinate.”
“Smart idea. I had no clue how to explain all of this,” I said.
“Most of them aren’t moving, though. And they want to know what we’re doing.”
“That’s a great question,” I said. “We’re... investigating.”
“More like, we’re about to get ourselves killed,” Storm said.
I bit my lip. “We might. If you want to leave—”
“Oh, hush up. What’s a little mortal danger among friends?” Storm smirked at me.
“That mist looks human,” Odessa said. “Is something trying to come through?”
I kept watching the mist. It was definitely forming the shape of a slender female, wearing a long, floor-length dress.
“So, we meet again,” a voice said from the mist as the figure continued to form.
I recognized that voice. It was the ghost from Luna’s apartment. “I thought I’d gotten rid of you.”
“No, you didn’t. You knew I was still around. And you knew I wouldn’t go without seeing you first.”
“Why does she want to see you?” Odessa whispered.
I shrugged. “No idea. Did you take Luna?”
“I did. I find her fascinating. I’ve been keeping her in a little place called limbo.”
Odessa jabbed a finger in my side. “I knew it. I said that’s where we’d find her.”
I nodded, my focus still on the shape.
“I watched you while you attempted to find her,” the misty figure said. “You have power. You haven’t let down the Ash witch legacy.”
“Give her back to us,” I said. “She’s of no use to you.”
“I wouldn’t say that. And Luna called to me. I was certain I could convince her to join my coven.”
“What do you mean, she called to you?” Storm said.
The mist continued to form a female shape, although the facial features were still indistinct. “Your friend’s particular thirst attracted my attention.”
“Thirst? You mean, the amount of herbal tea she drinks?” I said.
The mysterious woman laughed. “I couldn’t convince her to come over to my side. Luna’s strong. She makes a good friend for you. I’m pleased you found her.”
“Why do you care who my friends are?” I had that same faint niggle in the back of my head that I knew this magic user.
“I’m done with this getting to know you rubbish,” Storm said. “We’ve destroyed your skull, we’ve ruined your plans, now give us our friend back.”
“I intend to keep her,” the woman said. “Unless you give me something I need.”
“What’s that?” I said.
“My lost love.”
Storm snorted a laugh. “You want us to find you a date?”
Flickers of jagged, dark energy shot through the mist. “You’re carrying the only thing that will bring me back my paramour. You took him from me, and I insist you bring him back.”
“You mean the ghost jar?” I said. “Did we trap your boyfriend in Luna’s apartment?”
A soft breeze swirled around us. It carried that same tang of rot I’d smelt in the cemetery when fighting the corpses.
“Killion let himself down. I thought he was stronger than that, but you somehow managed to capture him.”
“You really want to date a guy who can’t take care of himself?” Storm said.
The dark flickers in the mist grew hectic. “We weren’t expecting such resistance. We didn’t anticipate you could control your powers. You’ve had so little education.”
“She’s talking like she knows you,” Odessa said.
Uneasiness curled around my spine. “We don’t know each other.”
“I know you, Indigo. Which is why you’re still alive. And I’m prepared to offer you a trade.”
“A trade?” I tilted my head.
“I’ll return Luna if you summon Killion to me.”
No one spoke for several seconds.
“Is that a good idea?” Odessa whispered.
“We have to get Luna back,” Storm said.
“But the ghosts in Luna’s apartment weren’t fun to tangle with. If these two get back together, they’ll cause chaos.”
I narrowed my eyes at the mysterious woman. I still couldn’t make out her face. “We don’t have Killion. The ghost jar was destroyed. He’s escaped.”
“I know that. I took the ghost jar and tried to extract him, but something went wrong. His energy was weak from being trapped, and he slipped through my fingers.”
“That was careless,” I said. “You can’t have thought much of him if you dropped him.”
Storm smirked. “Maybe don’t rile the evil mist too much. I doubt she plays nice.”
I shrugged. “If Killion is so weak, how do you expect us to get him back? He could be anywhere.”
“You must return him to me. I am lost without him.” A hint of desperation colored the woman’s voice. “And if you fail, you’ll never see Luna again.”
I turned to Storm and Odessa. “We have to do this.”
“We can’t trust that man-obsessed thing,” Storm said. “What if we give her that creepy ghost lover and she vanishes?”
“I won’t disappear,” she said. “I have no wish to double-cross those I care about.”
My stomach flipped, and I turned back to the misty woman. “We’ll summon him back in exchange for Luna, but you need to answer a question before we do anything to help you.”
She spread out her arms. “Ask me anything. Much like Magda’s journals, my life is an open book.”
That was it. It confirmed she knew a lot more about me than I did her. “How do you know me?”
Her face shimmered into view.
My heart dropped to my boots, my throat tightened, and my vision blurred.
Odessa squeaked. “Indigo, she looks just like you.”
I stared at the floating image before me, my lungs burning because I’d forgotten how to breathe. “That’s because she’s my mom.”
Chapter 19
I’d have hit the ground if Odessa and Storm weren’t holding onto me. I stared at the image again, my heart thudding so fast I grew dizzy. This had to be a trick. My mom couldn’t be behind the darkness in Witch Haven.
“That’s not the welcome I’d hoped for. Aren’t you going to come kiss your mother?” The fully formed, misty woman smiled, but it held no kindness.
I shook my head. “You’re... you’re not her. She’s dead. She died giving birth to me.”
“Not true. I was close to death when I gave birth to you, but I lived for a short time afterward.”
I tried to get my thoughts in order, but they refused to obey. I had a hundred questions tumbling through my head and no clue where to start.
“Is that really your mom?” Odessa whispered.
“No, this is the dark magic messing with us,” I croaked out.
“Again, false. I loved you and your father greatly. I couldn’t bear the thought of letting you go, and I wasn’t ready to give up on the life we’d made. We were so looking forward to welcoming our first child into the world.” There was a glimmer of sadness in her eyes.
“She looks just like the pictures I’ve seen of her,” Odessa said.
I nodded, too stunned to form a sentence.
My mom sighed. “There were complications during the labor, and I lost a lot of blood. Your father and I performed healing magic, but I kept on getting weaker. Nothing we did could reverse the damage. And as you know, magic should
never interfere with the natural order of life and death.”
I shook my head. “You died. We had a funeral for you.” I didn’t remember it, but as I’d grown up, I sometimes visited my mom’s grave. She’d died to give me life, so I’d always felt a connection to her.
“You did. And I witnessed all of that. And for a short time, I was dead. But then I saw the light. Or rather, I was introduced to the wonderful darkness. Killion came to me when I was laid out in the mortuary.”
“And what, he offered to bring you back as some kind of twisted spirit in exchange for joining him?” I said.
“I’m alive, not a ghost. I’m just not fully in this world.” She smiled. “He’s a wonderful man. He taught me the true power of magic. And it doesn’t lie on the path you follow.”
Anger pulsed through me. “He’s not a man. No man would bring back a dead woman.”
“He could be a demon,” Odessa said.
“Or an ancient ghost,” Storm said. “They get powerful when they’ve been around a few thousand years.”
“Whatever he is, he seduced you with darkness.” I scowled at my mom. “How could you go from loving Dad to a monster?”
She arched an eyebrow. “You’re lecturing me on bad choices when it comes to men?”
“I have to. Most people don’t get their heads turned by evil.”
My mom laughed. “It seems we’re both drawn to inappropriate men.”
“I... you mean Olympus? I’m not drawn to him.”
“A mother knows. And I see the attachment growing between you. You can’t help who you fall in love with. I love Killion passionately, and I’ll do anything to get him back.”
“You’ve failed so far,” Storm said.
“Which is why I need my daughter’s help. Indigo captured him. She can bring him back. She has the pieces of the ghost jar that connect to him. Her magic will reunite us.”
“And create a crazy duo who’ll go on a killing spree,” I said.
“No, I’ll leave the killing sprees to the woman who stole my husband and my wonderful daughter.” My mom’s eyes glowed with an unnatural intensity. “You did such an incredible job. I only wish you’d fulfilled the prophecy and emptied the entire village of its inhabitants. Then the way would have been clear for me and Killion to take our place in Witch Haven. We could have ruled together with darkness. We’d have been a complete family.”
