Broken Spell (14 page)

Boulder is leaving us. I know it. I can feel it.

The way the accident happened weighs on me. I keep replaying the night in my head. If Priscilla hadn’t heard Boulder’s comments. If Sean hadn’t asked her—or if she had refused, or if Boulder hadn’t seen them.

And all the things I could have done—or not done. Not forcing him to open up. Not telling him to talk to Pri right away. Not leaving his side to get a towel. Making sure he didn’t have his car keys.

I once read that for a catastrophic event to happen, many things have to go wrong at the same time. The book said that in a particular nuclear plant incident, twenty-two different systems and safety measures failed in succession.

It’s cruel that Boulder had such bad luck—on top of his ongoing bad luck streak: being hated by two schools and losing everything he truly wanted—football, college, Priscilla.

Seeing him like this is the worst. I wish I could do something. I wish I were a doctor. A great doctor. A doctor with super powers.

Dumb.

Dumb, stupid Drake. I don’t have super powers, but Mona does. She may even have that Healing Charm that Skye mentioned. I mean, she helped Brianna and me after the fire.

I need to know how she would feel about it. I go upstairs and knock on her door.

“What?”

I open the door. “I think you mean, ‘come in’.”

“You think wrong.” Mona is seated on her bed, a couple of upturned books around her, a highlighter pen in her hand.

“What’s this annoying music?”

“It’s Thursday.”

“No, it’s Wednesday.”

“Thursday, the band, you geek. And they’re great.”

“Mona, have you thought about what you’re doing with your magic?”

Her face loses its color. “What?”

“You’re this super-girl now. What are you doing with your powers?”

“Damn, Drake. That’s a hell of a thing to spring on me.”

“Come on, you must have thought about that.”

She scratches her head. “I did. I don’t think it’s an accident.”

I walk up to her and sit on the bed. “What do you mean?”

Mona props herself up on the bed so her spine is straighter. “If I have this, I should use it, right? Not for me. For people. What? You’re smiling like an idiot.”

“That’s good to know.”

“What did you expect of me, Drake? That I would use it for make money or something?”

“No, no. What you said is
exactly
what I expected to hear from you.”

“Oh.” She looks embarrassed. “Then it’s okay, I guess. But it’s
pointless, right? I can’t use the magic without trigging a witch tornado warning. If we don’t solve that, all this power will be for nothing.”

“We’ll figure it out, Mona. Don’t worry.”

“Is that it? That’s all you came here to ask me?”

“Yep.”

She rolls her eyes. “You’re so weird! Get out of my room.”

After I leave her bedroom, I walk down the stairs, beaming. I need a plan. We might be able to help Boulder.

Liam hesitates to kill me. “I prefer not to do that. I see no point in hiring a witch assassin if we will end up doing the killing ourselves. Maybe we should have Scythe go after Jane instead.”

Miranda ponders that. “Jane is not important. The Singularity is.”

“Anyway, I think we should spare this one.” He points at me. “You told me that when the Truth potion wears off, she won’t remember it anyway.”

“It doesn’t work like that,” Miranda says. “The person doesn’t remember what she said, but the other memories will be there. She’ll know that
something
happened. She will have a bad feeling about you and might remember you’re not her friend. But the main reason is that there’s a slight chance she’ll remember my face and this place. We can’t afford that.”

“We should’ve thought of that before bringing her here.”

“Oh, I did. But I needed to question her myself. Look at me.” She caresses Liam’s face. “This is on me, Liam. My coven trusted me with the Search. I tracked down Jane and put her to it. If we don’t get the Singularity back, Kendall will have my head. Literally.”

“I’m kind of attached to your head,” he says.

She stares at him, perplexed. Then she smiles and kisses him. “Me too.”

My mind spins everywhere. Even with my brain still muddled by the potion, I need to think. I had a couple of vials in my back pocket, but I can’t feel them in my pants anymore. They have taken them. The plastic handcuffs are fastened tight, but they’ll have to
uncuff me to kill me.

Will they kill me here and dump my body? Maybe they’ll take me somewhere else and then kill me there. Grim thoughts or not, I need to consider all possibilities: the cell in the jacket’s pocket, their strength versus mine, running through the door.

“Okay, one last thing,” Liam says. “She’s pretty high profile. She is a heroine to them. Wouldn’t that stir things up? They might increase the security around the Brianna girl.”

“Well, I also want to kill her because she beat me to the Singularity,” Miranda says with venom. “But you’re right. Kendall might not like it.”

Miranda looks dejected. The prospect of not killing me is hard for her. She paces the room while Liam sips his coffee.

They’re discussing my death in a relaxed way, as if they have an unshakeable confidence that nobody is looking for me and that nobody will catch them. I wish they were yelling at me. Their calm is terrifying.

“Damn it!” Miranda snaps. “Let’s give her a Forget potion. Then she’ll have absolutely no memory.”

Liam gets a syringe and approaches me. He sticks the needle into my arm and the potion enters my bloodstream. After he leaves the syringe on the table, he says, “You’ll have your revenge, Miranda. Just be patient.”

She smiles with malevolence. “No, I don’t need to be patient.” She approaches and stands in front of me. Miranda raises her foot and kicks me in the face.

I yelp. The back of my head bangs on the metal pole, and the sharp sting under my eye adds to the throbbing pain in the back of my head. I need to lie down. My body slides down to the concrete floor. My arms, still cuffed, twist.

“Let’s test the limits of the Allure Charm,” Miranda says. Then she stomps on my face.

A cut above my eye starts to bleed. I see Liam rising.

“I’ll leave you girls to it.” He goes out of the basement and closes the door behind him.

Miranda doesn’t turn, doesn’t say anything back to him. She just kicks me in the nose.

After a few kicks, I faint.

***

When I regain my bearings, I’m down on the floor of something bumpy. It moves. It’s disorienting. I open and shut my eyes quickly. A van. I keep faking I am out.

It isn’t easy. I want to
moan, to yell, to cry.

My entire head
hurts like hell. My face is on fire, covered with something liquid, viscous—it must be a mixture of tears, dirt, and blood. She didn’t just break my nose; she destroyed it. I’m using all my strength not to yell. The excruciating pain is like a hot iron poking my brain.

They gave me an injection with Forget potion, but the Dispel took care of it. So far. I hope it holds. Under any other circumstances, I’d want to forget what had happened. But I need to remember. I need to remember all they said. And I need to know who did this to me, so I can get back at them.

A small part of me is actually grateful she only battered my face. I was afraid they would break me, scar me for life, violate me. The Allure might heal that—in time.

And I’m still alive. It’s the worst of feelings: being grateful to somebody because they didn’t kill you.

Since I don’t dare to open my eyes, I can’t tell where they’ve brought me. They think I’m still out while they drag me out of the van. Miranda’s energy this close is overwhelming, but I keep my control and don’t let my body shake.

The freezing night air doesn’t even bother me. It’s nothing compared to the pain.

Liam catches me under my arms and carries me, my feet scraping on the ground. It sounds like a gravel path.

Then I feel it. Another signature. Far away, but distinct. Another Sister is nearby, but not close enough to alert Miranda.

“Just leave her behind the bushes. Remember to get all her valuables,” Miranda instructs.

Liam proceeds to search my pockets. He also takes his time feeling me up. The bastard.

“Where’s her phone?” he asks.

“I got it,” Miranda says from a distance. Then I hear a splashing sound. “I mean, the lake’s got it now.”

He cups his hands over my breasts. I almost give in and punch him.

Liam leaves me and walks away. “A waste of time. We should be worried about Jane,” he says to Miranda.

Her voice comes from somewhere close to the van. “I know. Trust me, I’d love to get my hands on Jane. Don’t worry, she will come to us. Are you done, sugar? We need to go.”

My two captors enter the van and leave in a flash. It’s almost as if they weren’t here.

I open my eyes but don’t move. The energy source is closing fast. It seems I’m in a park. The faint moonlight lets me see the bushes around me. Soft waves are hitting a beach not far away.

Getting to my knees, I try to regain my balance. I look in the direction the energy is coming from, but I can’t see her.
The low growl of an engine approaching freezes my blood.

Jane has never collected her motorcycle from the impound lot, as far as I know. But she’s the only biker Sister I can think of right now.

My muscles ache from the beating and the hours in awkward positions. I’m in no condition to flee. I hope she won’t see me, but I know she’s coming for me. I need to hide.

I crawl to a line of bushes nearby. The pain in my face makes me dizzy. I try to steady myself, grasping on a branch, only it’s too thin to hold my weight, and I almost tumble over.

But I keep going. I can’t let her find me.

Stumbling through the vegetation, I reach a clearing. She’s close enough to sense me now.

It’s over. I stop and turn. My potions are gone; Miranda took them all. My only defense is the Dispel. If it’s still active.

The engine stops rumbling nearby. She must be near where the van was. I can hear footsteps on the gravel.

“Skye?” she calls. “It’s okay.”

I’ve defeated her before. I can fake that I’m even weaker than I really am, and, when she’s close, I’ll strike her and make a run for it. It’s my only hope: my cell is gone and no one is going to hear me scream. But it’s not going to be enough. Jane is stronger and way more athletic than I am, even if I weren’t beaten up. She’ll catch me.

Now twigs crunch under her boots. She’s close. She appears from behind a tree, most of her face hidden by a hoodie. She stays in the shadow.

“You’re alive, thank Goddess,” she says.

Who does she think she’s kidding? Despite my exhaustion, I get up. I make fists and wait for her to get close.

“Did you see a boy in the house?”

“What?” My mind is still addled. “You mean, Liam?”

“No. Younger. Fifteen. Did you?”

“No!” Why am I humoring her? She’s trying to distract me.

“Did you hear anything about him? Or the name Jason?”

“Why?”

“Just tell me! Is he still alive?” she asks in an anxious voice.

“Yes. They plan to kill him. I don’t know where or who he is.”

My answer makes her go quiet. Her hands shake, but she closes them in fists, and the trembling stops. She takes a step toward me. “You look like hell,” she says.

I can’t help but answer her. “Satisfied?”

“Not really. It’s not fun. I should know. Remember these?” She removes the
hoodie.

I let out a gasp.

She points to a series of small scars on her cheek. “This is where you broke the glass vial and cut me.” Her hand goes to the other side. “And this is what the fire did to the rest of my face.”

That side of her face has a depressed lesion. It looks like part of her flesh melted and vanished. The remaining skin is thin, stretched.

A twinge of guilt and a speck of sympathy almost make me forget who she is. That she’s here for revenge.

“You tried to kill me. And Mona,” I say.

“I was left to die in the gym. You saved Brianna, but not me.”

“You were gone!”

She snorts. “Yeah, yeah. Always an excuse. You’re so worked up I broke into your house, but you did the same to mine.” She points to the cut scars again.

“You’ve been following me. Here, and at Aurora Park!”

“No, just here. And I wasn’t after you, just keeping an eye on Miranda.”

I don’t know what to say. I just wait for her next move, but she’s doing the same. We’re at a standoff.

She narrows her eyes and asks, “How did you know I was here? You started to run before you could sense me.”

“The bike—”

“Bullshit. I saw you. You looked right at me. What is it? You have a long-range sense? Is that it? That’s how you tricked me the other times, isn’t it?”

I’m not that strong. In my mind, I have a vision of Jane killing me and stealing my True Sight, then killing Mona and getting all her power. My body trembles. I wish I were tougher.

“You do! That’s why they chose you to find the Singularity.” She scrutinizes me with even more intensity. “That’s perfect, actually. I need your help.”

I may have brain damage from the kicks. “What?”

“We’re both…scarred. Let’s call it even. Look,” she says while getting something from her back pocket. Her knife.

“Jane…”

“No, it’s okay. See?” She throws it away. “I’m not here to hurt you.”

My nerves are frazzled. “Are you insane? Am I supposed to be grateful because you won’t kill me?”

She’s taken aback. “Neither you nor Mona.”

“Wow, thank you for letting me live. What’s this sick game you and Miranda are playing? Do you expect me to believe she didn’t know about Mona?”

“She didn’t. Why would she get you—”

“Yeah, how come you’re here just in time to ‘help me’, huh?” I’m out of it, shouting, crying. The blood and tears make my vision blur.

“Goddess, calm down. I was following them. I’m trying to—”

But I don’t listen. I try to go after her. “Go away. Just go! Leave me alone. Get out of my life.”

Jane swats my weak slaps away easily, more stunned than afraid. “Okay, okay.” She pushes me away. “Get a grip.”

I take two steps back, panting.

She walks to her left, picks up her knife, and puts it back in her pocket. Then she gets a small cell from another pocket. “Here,” she says. “We’ll need to talk, sooner or later. This is a prepaid phone, so the Night covens can’t trace it. You can use it to call for help too.” She throws it at my feet. It lands with a soft thud on the dirt.

After she leaves, her motorcycle’s roar just a faint purr in the distance, I fall to my knees, shaking. I hate myself for some reason. My nails dig deep into my arms, but I don’t feel anything.

I could take Miranda’s beating; I could take Jane’s return from the dead. But not both on the same night. I’m crying angrily—at them, at me. At their cruelty, at my weakness.

I don’t know what I’m doing anymore. Worse, I don’t understand what’s going on.

The tears ebb. The blood on my face is drying. I look at my fingernails and see pieces of skin stuck under them.

Pull yourself together, Skye. You’re better than that.
Show them.