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“Stand your ground, boy.”

“Give them to us or he dies!”

The wind became ferocious.
 

The clouds lowered and swirled, snaking around bushes and curling around trees.

There was a sudden scrambling behind me.
 
A massive crack of thunder above me.
 
Lightning flashed in front of me.

And then there was Anna, hovering closer.
 
She lifted her hand and was about to throw God knows what at me when I shifted the wind, caught her off guard and swept her hard against one of the pine trees.
 
Her back smashed against it, she fell to the ground, but then she was on her feet and blazing straight toward us.

We had to get out of here.

I turned to grab Jim so we could teleport to someplace safe, but when I did, there was no sign of him.
 
Just before she closed her hands around my neck and started pulling on the amulets, just before my official war with the witches began and our lives changed forever, I swung around and looked for him, but he was nowhere.
 

For a moment, my heart stopped and my stomach sank.

He was nowhere.

They’d taken him.

Jim was gone.

chapter forty-five

book four

WAR

The idea that they’d dare take Jim away from me fueled such a rage within me, I swung around hard and threw Anna off me with a strength I didn’t know I possessed.

But it was good to know that I possessed it.

I watched her fly back hundreds of feet and when she hit the ground, she rolled another forty feet before she got up with surprise stamped on her face.
 
I made a quick check of the amulets and felt all of them burning against my chest.
 
She tried to take them, but she lost.

I looked around for the other witches and saw them closing in on me from the left and the right.
 
They were identical to Anna.
 
And then I wondered if that even was Anna who I just threw off.
 
If she was the leader, wouldn’t she first have sent in a lesser witch in an effort to protect herself and guide the situation from the sidelines?
 
I wasn’t sure.
 
But I needed to be sure.
 
Taking her out would send a strong message to her master.

I looked at them all.
 
“Which one of you is Anna?”

“Take a guess,” they said in unison.

“What did you do to Jim?”

“Jim is dead.”
 

“Jim is screaming your name in hell.”

“Jim died a horrible death because of you.”

“Jim will burn forever in a satanic hellfire.”

“You’re responsible for Jim’s death.”

“You killed Jim.”

“Jim’s lost to this world.”

“Jim’s right here, bitches.”
 

Without warning, the trailer door kicked open behind me, there was the sound of a gunshot and the witch to my right suddenly was without a face.
 
I whirled around and saw Jim coming out of the trailer and down the steps with his shotgun held up to his face and his eye looking down the long end of the barrel.
 
He looked at me sternly and said, “Make yourself a machete and cut off her head.
 
Don’t look at me like that, boy.
 
Hurry before she recovers.”

In waves of shock and relief, I imagined a machete in my hand, I put a shield around each of us so they couldn’t immediately hurt us and then I ran over to the felled witch while another gunshot cracked behind me.
 
I heard what sounded like a shriek mixed with a thick gurgle and then the sound of one of the witches falling.

The witch I was running to was trying to get up.
 
Her broken, meaty face was reassembling itself quickly, but one swipe of the machete put an end to that and to her.
 
The moment I severed her head, she turned to dust.

“Over here.
 
Come quick, now.
 
Boss lady’s coming.”

I swung around, saw what had to be Anna soaring toward him and drilled an electrical bolt straight into her face.
 
It knocked her down, but I knew she’d recover fast, so I hustled.
 
I ran over to the other witch, who was struggling to stand, though her smashed face was quickly mending itself.
 
I leaped into the air, she turned to face me and lifted up her hand in an effort to stop me.
 
A blue globe expanded around her fingertips.
 
Whatever it was, inside it looked as if a firestorm was brewing.

She threw it at me, I dodged it and severed her head before she could throw another.
 
She fell hard and also turned to ash, but not before Anna was hovering over me and glaring down at what I’d just done.
 
Jim took a shot at her but she held out her hand and said a word I didn’t understand.
 
The bullets struck something invisible and fell.

She lowered herself so she was standing opposite me.
 
She’d just lost two of her witches but she looked absolutely calm in the wake of their deaths.
 
“You do know what you’ve just done, don’t you, Seth?”

“I have an idea, but why don’t you tell me, Anna?”

“Who said I’m Anna?”

“You reek of Anna.”

“And you reek of fear.
 
But I don’t blame you.
 
Who would blame you?
 
You’ve just started a war.
 
And it will be a terrible war.
 
It will be a bloody war.
 
People will talk about it where I come from and also in this backwoods shithole where you come from.
 
Witches will come from all over and we will win.
 
We will kill you, we will take those amulets and he shall have them as he wishes.”

“What’s stopping you from taking them now?”

“Because I know the longer you wait for us to come for you, the more unnerved you’ll become.
 
The more paranoid.
 
It’ll weaken you and that makes me happy.”

I took a step toward her.
 
Energy was coming off me like heat from a scorched summer street.
 
“That actually sounds like a load of bullshit.
 
I think you won’t take them because you don’t dare to.”

“I think you need to watch yourself.”

“You won’t take them because I’m as powerful as you.”

“You’ll never be as powerful as me.”

“You don’t think so?”

“You’re a child.
 
I know so.”

And with that, I leaped over her and swung the machete.
 
She was ready for me and turned, her hair fanning out.
 

And that’s what I sliced off.
 

I landed behind her, watched her look down in shock at the amount of hair that was on the ground and I swung again, this time nicking her throat as she reared back.
 

Quickly, she raised her hand and tried to force me away from her.
 
I pushed back hard and became unmovable.
 
I could tell she was furious.
 
Her focus was so intense, it was as if her face was set in stone.
 
She gave one great shake of her head and her hair grew back immediately.
 
It fell around her shoulders, she pulled it away from her face and ran a finger along the wound at her throat.
 
It healed instantly.

“None of this will end well for you, Anna.”

She laughed at me, but woven into that laughter was an edge of something else.
 
Uncertainty?
 
Fear?
 
“Three hundred years ago, when I was turned and invited into the coven, I also thought the powers I was given would make me invincible.
 
Now I know better.
 
You killed Leana and Celina, who were at least as powerful as you.
 
But I’m stronger.
 
I’ve got years on you.”
 
She shrugged.
 
“Still, none of us is invincible, Seth.
 
Either of us could die.
 
I know that.
 
And I’m prepared for it.
 
But are your friends?
 
If you keep resisting me, I will kill them.
 
And then what?”

“Then I’ll kill you.”

I saw her glance fleetingly at Jim and could sense her weighing her options.
 
He was protected by a shield, but if she had enough time, she could cut through it.
 
There was a crack of thunder, which caused her to look up.
 
Then she faced me and took a step back.
 
Was she being called?

“I guess I won’t be going back to your school anytime soon,” she said.
 
“At least not looking like this.
 
How will anyone explain what happened to those three beautiful girls, who just burned up in class like that?
 
How do you even wrap your head around three triplets spontaneously combusting?
 
Too bad it didn’t happen in physics class.
 
That would have played well in the press.
 
Can’t you see the headlines now?”
 

Without so much as a leap, she rose into the air and ripped across the sky.
 
Soon, she was little more than a dot along the horizon.
 
I wanted to go after her but Jim stopped me.
 

“That’s enough,” he said.
 
“We’ve done our share of damage here.
 
She knows it.
 
He knows it.
 
Let her go.”

“But I could get her.”

“Bide your time.
 
You need to slow it down and plan, or she
will
succeed.
 
She will kill your ass.
 
You need to start thinking.
 
You need to cut out this bullshit bravery bender you’re on and settle the fuck down.
 
She was telling you the truth just then.
 
She’s got years on you—hundreds of them.
 
She recognizes you’re powerful.
 
She knows each of you is vulnerable.
 
You need to be as smart about this as she is.
 
She left for a reason.”

“And what’s that?”

“To save her goddamn life.
 
And probably to go wherever she goes to ask for reinforcement.
 
I don’t know how many more he’ll give her, if any.
 
He’s watching and he knows how those amulets affect you, which is greater than anything I’ve seen and maybe more than he’s seen.
 
Still, he’s hungry.
 
I think he’ll try once more to get them.
 
If you take out however many he sends and kill them all—including Anna—that should end it.”
 
He paused.
 
“Unless he comes himself, which is a possibility though I doubt it.
 
He’s letting them do his dirty work so he remains unharmed.”

“He’s known about the amulets for decades.
 
He could have come for yours at any point.
 
Why now?”

“Maybe because he can get four at once.
 
Maybe because he’s aware of your success with them.
 
Maybe a mix of each.
 
Power is power and some people can never have enough of it, Seth.
 
Ask your bullies that.”

“You know,” I said, “I thought they killed you.”

He held out a hand for a beer and I shot a Bud Lite into it.
 
He cracked it open and downed it.
 
“Shit, no,” he said.
 
“I had that gun leaning against the wall inside the door.
 
Just needed to run inside Betsy and grab it.
 
Didn’t mean to scare you.”

“You did.”

“Sorry about that.
 
Crazy fuckin’ day.”

“Did you see them turn to dust?”

He held out his hand again and I made another beer appear in it.
 
And it struck me how happy I was to do so.
 
Jim was coming to mean a great deal to me.
 
He was more than just a mere father figure.
 
He was a friend.
 
I felt ashamed that I’d ever considered him creepy.
 
He was a good man.
 

“I saw what happened,” he said, opening the can.
 
“But don’t worry about it.
 
Dust to dust.
 
Neither of those bitches will be coming back and looking for their heads anytime soon.”