Page 2 of Thistle Thorns

Marten. My arrogant, insufferable brother. But he hadn’t always been that way. And… he had taken a vow—willingly—to sacrifice and feed his magic to that demonic half-heart in order to protect me. From what, I still didn’t know, but none of that mattered anyway if we couldn’t get free of this portal dragging us towards that hellish maw far below.

Groaning, I fought to regain my senses above the roaring wind and the strain in my shoulders and the pain that now ignited in my hand; Arcadis was stabbing me with his talon-like fingernails, the ring on his finger twinkling madly with each strike.

Marten’s head snapped back, the wind stealing away his scream as the demon used the hellhound claw as a handle to steady himself as he pawed at my hand, trying to peel my fingers back. But I wouldn’t let my brother go. At least, I wouldn’t have if the blood from all the claw marks hadn’t oozed between my fingers and soaked my palm.

“No,” Marten cried as my hand slipped, half the tendrils bursting into glittering green light and dissipating into the churning brown around us.

Arcadis bared his sharp white teeth into a feral sneer as he seized hold of two of my weakening fingers and wrenched.

I yelped, and there was a frantic scrabbling of my hand and its magic vines. I had to catch hold of something—anything—before Arcadis and Marten plummeted below and my family yanked me back to the moonflower grove.

The demon snarled as my vines lashed around his wrist, retethering him to me and the chain of witches and once again halting his decent with his captive. Battling against the increasing pressure that seemed wholly intent on snuffing out my magic, I strained towards the demon.

My bloody hand latched on to his, and I squeezed hard, frantic not to let go. A new wound wept from where that twinkling gold ring on his finger bit into my palm, red soaking our skin.

“Troublesome witch,” Arcadis spat, rearing back.

His booted foot lodged in the cleft between my neck and outstretched hand, and stomped down.

The magic vines snapped, my hand sloughing off his… and taking his twinkling golden ring with me.

Arcadis’s crimson eyes exploded into red flames as he lunged after me with a roar. “No!”

But the churning brown shadows of the portal plucked him and Marten away just as my family hauled me back towards the gray light of the mortal realm.

I landed hard on my backside, but I only mourned my bruised tailbone for a second before I lurched onto my hands and knees and scurried after the edges of the rapidly closing portal. The swirling earth stilled with a tiny exhale that jettisoned the dry leaves into the air and nothing else. Trembling, I just stared at the earth as the leaves fluttered back down to the ground, covering the location my brother had disappeared like flowers at a grave site.

The quiet tension of the forest snapped as my mother howled, dropping to her knees. Her sobs brought tears to my own eyes, finally overflowing and dripping off my cheeks to splatter in the dirt.

Marten. I’d lost him.

Overhead, the sky finally opened, the rain surprisingly gentle.

It was cold, though, and I shivered. A bone-chilling cold entered me, but it had nothing to do with the rain.

I’d let my brother go.

I started when a furry head butted against my elbow—Sawyer. He looked up at me with wide amber eyes, his wounded mouth crusted with blood at each corner, his striped fur singed and missing in places. The parasite bracelet he’d torn from my wrist had not been kind to him. Stifling a sob, I hauled the little tomcat into my arms. I had my face buried in his fur when a warm hand melded over my shoulder. It didn’t attempt to pull me upright or away from my cat, only sought to fill me with comfort. And I did feel it; it was warmer and more nourishing than the springtime sun finally breaking through winter’s chill.

“Get away from her, bear,” a witch snapped. Which witch, I couldn’t be sure. My hearing was still overwhelmed with the phantom rush of the portal’s winds. Of my own heartbeat that was crashing like storm-churned waves upon the shore. Of Sawyer’s soothing purr.

Arthur didn’t move. Didn’t even acknowledge he’d heard.

“Why you—”

“He was the one who brought you all back,” Lewellyn snarled, “or have you so easily forgotten you would be lost without him? And someone give him another robe before the women faint!”

“Be quiet, you yapping dog, before I—”

“That is enough,” Grandmother’s voice lashed. “I… I need to think.”

Dimly, I was aware that my family was recovering and regrouping, all nine—eight—voices filling the air simultaneously as they frantically tried to figure out what to do next. The cacophony of their panic and desperation bludgeoned me back to the present.

The Circle of Nine was broken.

CHAPTER ONE

As I stared at the swirl of earth where Marten and the demon Arcadis had disappeared into a portal to the Unseelie Court, only one thought crossed my mind.

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