Page 35 of Banishing Regrets

“It will be.”

Jane pulled the book from her bag. Molly gasped. Somehow the puma knew of the charmed ones or at least the book. It didn’t surprise Jane. For someone who’d spent most of her life in a cave, Molly knew everything there was to know about the magical world, near enough.

“Jane.” Molly got to her feet. “Is that what I think it is?”

“Yes.” Jane held the book in front of her.

“Kingsley, Isobel. Move the babies farther back into the cave. Lily, you go with them,” Molly ordered.

“What’s happening?” Isobel asked, grabbing a crib and pulling it with her.

“Heath died for a reason,” Jane replied bluntly, her emotions becoming more subdued every second she held the book in her hands.

Jane flipped the book open, and a powerful shot of magic blasted from the first page and hit her directly in the center of her forehead. She felt the blast of knowledge and power surge into her body. She welcomed it because she knew this was her time.

It was the only way the war could be won. She just hoped Kas could keep fighting long enough for her to get there.

Twenty-Two

Kas and Nukacontinued to trade blows as the Glacial Blood pack fought to stop Nuka’s followers from killing the humans. At the same time, the soldiers fired their weapons at anything that wasn’t human. Most of them were still blind to the fact that the members of the Glacial Blood pack were trying to prevent them from being attacked.

Two men raced toward Nuka, which distracted him from attacking Kas. This allowed Kas to have a rest and take note of what was happening around him. He watched Jessica and Ciaran fighting high in the sky. Magical bolts of lightning were being traded between them. A helicopter hovered nearby, seemingly unsure how to stop the two druids fighting.

Out of the corner of his eye, Kas spotted Ethern at the top of the Glacial Blood mansion. He was standing on the roof, his eyes dark and full of power. Kas was unsure what abilities his friend now had. He knew reapers collected souls for Death, but he didn’t know anything more about them.

Ethern raised his hand, and their surroundings disappeared. The trees and the mansion vanished, and they were now situated in the mountains of the park, except they weren’t. Kas could still feel the pull of his home nearby. Next, they appeared to be fighting on a large open plain with endless swathes of land spread out before them. Kas realized Ethern was alternating the landscape, trying to distract the humans and make them reconsider the fight. Several of the humans did indeed look around in panic before returning to the relative safety of their vehicles, perplexed as to how they’d changed locations when in reality they hadn’t.

Ethern leaped off the top of the building, landing squarely on the ground in front of a dead human. The man’s body was twisted at an awkward angle. Blood pooled around him where he’d been mauled by Nuka’s pack. Ethern placed his hands on the man.

“Breathe again,” Ethern instructed.

A few seconds later, the man was sitting up and the blood had vanished.

Surely reapers took souls. They didn’t give them back, did they? Kas realized he had a lot to learn about reapers. If he got out of this alive, he’d make sure to study Ethern more closely.

The resuscitated human scrambled to his feet. His eyes wide with fear at Ethern’s appearance. If the reaper had been carrying a scythe with him, the scene would have almost been comical. The human ran to a nearby vehicle and drove away. At least Death was still scarier than the wild animals surrounding them.

Ethern winked at Kas before continuing on to the next dead human. However, they both looked up when a loud explosion overhead distracted them. A bolt of dark magic had extended from Ciaran’s hands toward a helicopter that was now flying out of control, spiralling downward. It seemed nothing could be done to prevent the imminent disaster, but then tendrils of white magic wrapped around the aircraft, stopping the spin, as Jessica lowered it to the ground safely.

Kas shifted to human form and ran forward as several men stumbled blindly from the helicopter. Nuka’s shifters instantly descended upon them. Kas raced through the shifters, sending them flying with his powerful intention. He wasn’t going to let anyone hurt these soldiers even if they were raising their weapons to kill him.

“Get away from here,” Kas ordered the humans. They looked at him suspiciously, and he heard several triggers click. “For fuck’s sake. Listen up. Get the hell out of here unless you want to be attacked by the other shifters who are trying to kill you. You’ve just been saved by a witch who stopped your helicopter crashing. You’ve narrowly escaped death once. Don’t risk it again.”

The men didn’t move.

Kas wanted to shake his head in frustration. Instead, he shifted into his polar bear form and roared loudly. The men did indeed run this time.

Stupid bloody humans.

Kas felt the earth shake underneath him. An earthquake?

No, it was Ethern. He was altering their surroundings again. This time, a tall cliff rose up from the ground to where Jessica and Ciaran were trading blows. The white witch had been losing the fight, but the situation quickly changed the moment her foot touched land. Kas knew Jessica had always felt an affinity with the earth. As her foot connected with the cliff, the bolts of energy she fired became stronger and stronger, and she hammered them down on Nuka’s druid.

Ciaran’s magic was no longer powerful enough to counter the good magic coursing through Jessica’s body, and he stumbled backward and teetered on the edge of the cliff they were both now standing on.

Kas watched intently as Jessica fired a round of ten fast and furious bolts of magical energy toward Ciaran. It was enough to send Ciaran over the edge. His body tumbled and twisted before landing with a heavy thud on the ground. Jessica teleported from the top of the cliff to the bottom where Ciaran lay. At the same time, Ethern teleported to her side. He knelt down beside Ciaran and touched the druid’s chest. Kas held his breath. If the druid was dead, then they had a chance.

Ethern stood up and pulled Jessica a few steps backward.

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