The Witch with No Name

“If you’re going to be a demon, you should be a demon,” Landon said softly, and I twitched, my back arching as I fell, looking at the ceiling, trying to get a clean breath. Landon’s hands were glowing, a haze of purple hanging between them. Slowly his hands came together. Struggling, he pulled them apart to show a spiderweb spool of glittering gold hanging in the air. And then he blew it at me.

I could do nothing as it settled over me, seeping in past my aura, winding its way to my core. My heart pounded as it begin to search, little darts of magic moving through me like a parasite. Groaning, I rolled over, but it clung, soaked in. Tendrils wafted out past my skin and then fell back as if the curse was looking for something to use to invoke. A soft, insidious chanting came from Landon, along with the sounds of Ivy’s frustrated struggle and Jenks’s swearing.

My eyes closed as the chant spun into the humming of my blood, settling into me like water, expanding my mind until it was unable to string two thoughts together. I recognized the spiderweb pattern. It was the curse that tied the demons to the ever-after, ages old and unbreakable—and Landon was trying to fix it on me.

It glittered in my thoughts like a living spell, and as I struggled to keep it from invoking, the sound of the drums quickened until it was as if I had been there at the beginning, watching ancient elves craft in the hollows of a primeval forest, calling upon their Goddess to give it the strength to last forever. And now it was seeking to bind itself to me.

Power slipped around my mental grasp like sunbeams, and abruptly I realized the curse was connecting me to Landon. Until the elven curse fixed upon me for good, we were bound together. There, in the background of his thoughts, was the curse to break the lines. I can take control of this, I thought, but not when I was fighting to get this damned binding curse off me.

“Let go,” Landon whispered, and I felt his breath on my cheek as he knelt over me while I curled into a ball and fought it. “Submit. End the pain,” he taunted.

But to submit would bind me to the ever-after. How long, I wondered, how long had Al fought? Newt? My breath came in a ragged gasp as the winding wisps of the binding curse seemed to find my soul. “No,” I groaned, even as it wove deeper.

The stinging slap of his hand meeting my cheek pulled my eyes open. Landon hung over me, sweat beading on him. “Let go!” he demanded. “Be a demon. Die with them.”

My eyes searched until they found Jenks and Ivy, held at bay by my torture.

“No,” I forced out between clenched teeth, then screamed when he leaned on my shot leg. Agony arched through me. “Get off!” I shouted, flooding him with a jolt of power.

Landon fell back with a cry of outrage, but the second of inattention cost me, and I gasped again, scrambling to catch the binding curse before it settled in any deeper. It didn’t have me yet, but the feel of it was familiar, and with a shock, I realized that it drew its strength from the Goddess’s will. Can I use this?

“Son of a whore!” Jenks shouted, and Landon laughed as Ivy began to struggle as well, held down by Landon’s last man, bloodied but still intact.

Jenks was free, darting madly and scoring on the incensed man. “Jenks, no,” I tried to shout, my voice failing. Ivy was down. We were losing, losing badly, and my heart leapt into my throat when, with an ugly snarl, Landon got a lucky strike in and Jenks was flung into the wall.

“Jenks!” I staggered to a kneel, and the binding curse dug deeper. It was the Goddess’s magic, but Jenks was in danger, and I didn’t have time for it. Lurching to Jenks, I sent a wave of force through me, driving the binding curse to my chi where I bubbled it, the hateful thing hissing and black like living tar. I might not be able to get rid of it, but I sure as hell could capture it—hold it in limbo.

I fell before Jenks, hands reaching. He was breathing, and fingers shaking, I lifted him, wanting him to be okay. His wings sparkled, and his eyes were closed.

“You don’t know when to stay down, do you,” Landon snarled, and something hit the back of my head.

I reeled, clutching Jenks to me as I fell. Landon hit me again, and I let him, curled into a ball to protect Jenks.

“Get your hands off Ivy, you sons of bitches!” Nina screamed.

“Nina!” Ivy called out in panic. “Help Rachel!”

But it was Trent who pried Landon off me, his smooth unworked hands glowing with a power I could feel. A great boom of sound pulled my head up, and Nina dove at the man holding Ivy, wrenching her free and snapping the man’s neck.

“Jenks,” I whispered, then cowered, one hand holding him to my middle when a second boom of sound shook the room. Dust shifted down, and a wall fell, showing a bedroom.

“Rachel!” Ivy was shouting. “Go help Rachel!”