As the words left my mouth, I heard a faint click. I whipped my head up to see two men stepping out from behind a truck fifty yards away; one held a bazooka. It was pointing at me. And its rocket had been launched.
With no opportunity to weigh my options, I sent another bolt of magic out—this one a thousand helixes strong—to block the rocket and send it back to its launching point, trying to contain the blast. The truck rocked with the explosion, bricks, metal, and body parts flying in every direction.
“So much for keeping a low profile,” I muttered, silently berating myself for being too cocky to notice their plan unfolding. I need to get out of here. Now. I wrapped magical threads around both trucks. With a flick of my wrist, they were swept aside like a minor inconvenience, crumpling against the brick walls and taking four more men with them.
I revved the truck engine and threw it into gear again. It jerked forward. The decoy man stepped in front of the truck to stop me. He disappeared under my truck as I drove over him, the back tires jolting over his body. I peeled out of the alley, speeding up as I passed various pedestrians running toward the commotion, some eyeing my truck suspiciously and a few of them jotting down the license plate number. I had no time to stop and do damage control. Looking in my rearview mirror at the fiery, body-peppered scene I had just left, I knew I needed a new blood supplier.
Not until the heavy iron door slammed against the ground behind me and I coasted into the atrium was I able to relax. I watched forty pairs of bloodthirsty eyes immediately lock onto the truck, the scent of this much human blood sending their senses into overdrive. The moment that back door rolled up, they’d turn into wild, blood-crazed demons.
“Take it easy. It won’t come as easily next time,” I called in warning as I hopped out the driver’s side, on my way to Mortimer. Their ocular veins began pulsating in response.
My expression must have been grim because panic flitted across Mortimer’s face. “It’s safe to say they’re onto us,” I said dryly, scanning the crowd—for Mage, I realized. I had an overpowering urge to talk to her. She was the only one who could appreciate the coming disaster.
Mortimer’s jaw tightened. “We managed to hide from them for a hundred and twenty years and yet now, at the most critical time, they decide they’re going to have their little revolution.”
“I’m beginning to think they’ve had some help,” I replied, intent on explaining the link to the witches, but Mortimer’s plea interrupted me.
“Please, Sofie. Just bring Evangeline back so we can be done with this and move on. We can lose the Sentinel.”
I set my jaw stubbornly. “You know I can’t do that.”
“You’d risk everything for one human girl?”
I glared at him. “Yes.” I sounded insane, but I didn’t care.
“Well, that’s just brilliant.” He slammed his fist on the bistro table so hard that the metal legs snapped like twigs.
A shrill scream disrupted his tantrum. I turned to see a petite, mousy blonde girl of no more than fourteen step out from behind the truck. The body of a male Ratheus vampire lay on the ground beside her, chin smeared with blood, jerking in convulsions before it stopped and lay still. Dead.
“What the—” I began, but then I looked at her neck, where blood ran from two puncture wounds. The other Ratheus vampires hissed at the young woman but slinked away, their comrade’s body keeping them at bay.
“Ileana!” Viggo exclaimed, rushing over to her, his arms wide for an embrace. “How lovely of you to come!”
The hairs on the back of my neck rose as Viggo led the young girl, her face full of fear, away from the throng. It wasn’t until she moved away from the truck and the overpowering scent of blood that the wave of recognition hit me.
Magic.
She was a witch.
“How did—” I began, then cut myself short as I answered my own question, eyeing the garage door. Of course! She had hitched a ride on the back of the truck while I waited for the garage to open, and I was too frazzled after the attack to notice. That was why Viggo seemed so concerned with when I’d be back—he was planning her entry. “Are you insane?” I shrieked. “Plotting with another witch? Because the first time didn’t teach you enough, you moron,” I grated through clenched teeth, my hand flying up to my forehead. “You’re inviting the Sentinel in!”
From the corner of my eye, I saw Mage’s eyes—not transformed by blood lust, surprisingly—narrow as she studied the girl. Good. She wasn’t impressed either.
“Oh, that’s preposterous.” Viggo dismissed my concerns with a wave of his hand. “That mess with Ursula was a fluke.”
The frown on Mortimer’s face told me he wasn’t a part of this plan. He leaned in close to Viggo, whispering, “We didn’t discuss this.”
“I don’t need your permission,” Viggo responded arrogantly.
The two of them turned to face off.
“But this . . . after the fiasco with Ursula and that one—” Mortimer jerked his chin in my direction “—I thought we were washing our hands of these treacherous creatures.”
“Oh, I know.” Viggo patted the air soothingly. “However, Ileana is more than willing to remain quiet. For the sake of her dear mother, right?” He looked at the woman. Pain flashed in her cornflower-blue eyes.
Of course. I exhaled in disgust. Viggo had hired thugs everywhere. This was obviously a well thought-out contingency plan on his part. The young woman’s mother was likely chained up in a basement somewhere with a bunch of sweaty, hairy men eyeballing her, appalling intentions running through their illiterate brains.
“I can’t guarantee your witch will be safe here,” Mage began, regarding the woman with disapproval, “among this crowd.”
“Oh, we’ve taken care of that! Show them, Ileana,” Viggo said. Ileana lifted a shaking hand to her neck and pulled a tiny vial on a chain from her collar. “Isn’t it lovely?” Viggo crowed. “She stole it from one of her teachers. It makes her blood toxic. Anyone who bites her will die.”
My attention shifted from the vial—a powerful weapon that the Fates must have played a part in creating—to the girl. Her trembling knees knocked together and she wrung her hands, clenching and unclenching her fingers constantly, clearly terrified. And her young age made her practically useless to Viggo; she would have just learned how to find the magic threads within herself, and she would have few spells in her repertoire—and no idea how to bend the laws of physics to create new spells. There was no hard and fast set of rules around sorceress magic. It took years of experimentation; the more cautious witches never truly figured it out. And this witchling was weak, judging by the tiny glow of magic radiating from her. The smug fool in front of me didn’t know that, though.
“Viggo. She can’t break the Merth’s curse. She can’t get Veronique out. She can’t undo anything I’ve done. So let her mother go,” I pleaded. The child would be lucky to tie her own shoes with her magic.
“Gladly! As soon as you release Evangeline.” Viggo turned to the young witch. “This is Sofie. This is all her fault, you know.”
The young witch turned to regard me, contempt flashing in her eyes. I sighed heavily. Great. Yet another enemy within these walls, thanks to Viggo.
“I hope you’re not planning on having her toy with magic,” Mage called, “considering we have a truce.”
“Yes, I recall Sofie couldn’t use her magic, right?” Viggo answered, smiling. “Sofie,” he repeated. Mage’s lips tightened, his emphasis not lost on her. “Ileana is not Sofie. I have done nothing to break our agreement. And what was that other part? Oh yes, no killing of anyone. That includes Ileana, here.”
“She killed Tanner!” Mage threw back, glancing over at the corpse on the cobblestones.
“In self-defense! You can’t hold that against her!” Viggo was testing her honor, seeing if she would back out of the truce she’d imposed. It was silly, really; she could tear both Viggo and this witchling to shreds in seconds, if she chose. But from what I could read of Mage—which wasn’t a lot—her honor, or the impression of her honor, held sway.
Her mouth twisted and she nodded, and I knew Viggo had won.
“If her magic causes anyone any harm, I will strike her down.” I glared at Ileana. “Dead.”
“Agreed! She’s not here to harm anyone!” Viggo exclaimed, throwing an arm proudly over Ileana’s shoulder. She remained rigid, terror-filled eyes looking everywhere but at me now.
With an angry shake of my head, I turned and stalked off.
The glass panes of the French door rattled as I slammed it. I marched straight over to study Veronique’s portrait, as I did every time I stepped foot inside the grand mahogany-and leather-filled parlor. “I hope you’ll understand, Veronique,” I whispered, anticipating the tales painting me as a wicked sister that those two monsters would spin. And she’d likely believe them. As lovely and sweet as my sister was, no one would ever have described her as clever.
I heaved an exhausted sigh. For over one hundred years, I had waited for the Fates to fix this mess and release my baby sister from her tomb. And then, for the last eighteen years, I had spent my days in a bipolar balance of bliss and dread as I watched Evangeline grow up, knowing what I had brought down on her, what my deal had condemned her to. I was exhausted, tired of the magic, of the unknown, of the constant fighting with Viggo and Mortimer, of the hatred boiling inside of me. I hadn’t always been so angry.
Yes, I had a temper—Nathan had always been quick to point that out. I was his fiery redhead. But that fire had evolved into rot, deep within my core. The only saving grace, the only reason the rot hadn’t fully consumed me, was Evangeline. And I would lose her if I didn’t get that damn pendant off her, something I could not for the life of me figure out how to do. Each day I poked and prodded the boundaries of the spell’s weave inside my head, delivered to me by the Fates in a hard, marble-sized packet of magic. But it was impenetrable.
And if that wasn’t enough, now I had the fate of Earth on my shoulders. How would I manage to keep the end of the human world at bay when I couldn’t even control the mess within these Fifth Avenue walls? For God’s sake, I had just unwittingly helped Viggo bring in the enemy! A useless witch, but an enemy, nonetheless.
I pressed my fingertips against my temples, trying to ease my tension. I needed to focus on the more immediate task, the one I could handle: an update for Leo. He needed to know about the Sentinel and the truth of this parallel world. But more importantly, I needed to know how my Evangeline was coping.
Opening my mind up to the portal into Leo’s mind, one of the simplest yet most useful spells I had designed over all my years, I reached out, following my mind’s eye as it sailed down the long, blue-tinged tunnel to the link in Leo’s head. The link I had planted the night I healed his wife. At the time, I had no specific plans for him; I just recognized an opportunity to call on a favor in the future, if needed. Boy, had I ever taken advantage of my dear friend Leo’s debt to me!
I reached the portal in the old warlock’s head within seconds. Oddly enough, it looked like a solid little wooden door at the end of a tunnel. I prodded at it, and sensed it open. How is Evangeline? I sent in greeting. And then I sensed something slither up behind my message. Like a tiny anchor affixed to my words, something was trailing them there, through the tunnel, to Leo. An invader.
I slammed the portal shut and sailed back into my own head, forcefully breaking off the communication before Leo could send out a probe to reply. Someone had tagged onto my message! Few had the skill to pull that off. There were only two possibilities within these walls: the five thousand-year-old vampire who had powers I couldn’t grasp yet, or the meek witchling who couldn’t meet my gaze. Both seemed impossible. Either way, someone would pay.
With shock and rage driving each step, I crashed through the French doors to the atrium, unwilling to take the time to open them. Shards of glass and wood flew in every direction. I didn’t even flinch.
Only a few Ratheus vampires remained in the atrium. The rest, including Caden and friends, were either chasing the blood to the cellar or hiding out—away from the new witch, no doubt. Mage was nowhere in sight. I marched over to where Viggo and Ileana stood. The little witch-girl slipped behind him, her guilty eyes going wide. I had my answer. Her? Seriously? That tiny wisp of a thing, her magic immature and weak? How?
“Oh! I forgot to mention,” Viggo began, his chest puffing out, “Ileana is something of a genius in her circles—decades ahead of where she should be, and extremely powerful.” He reached over to lift the chain of her necklace. “This thing serves a dual purpose; it masks the power of her magic.” He smiled knowingly at me. “I thought it best. I didn’t want you feeling threatened by a witch more powerful than you in here.”