Page 23 of Coven

Kana immediately tensed, but so did George and Emily so he didn’t feel bad about giving away their plot. Ember didn’t move, although his lips might have compressed slightly.

“You think this is my first coup attempt?” Octavius continued. “You are not the first pack of werewolves I’ll enjoy putting down like the rabid dogs you are. Now, let’s talk about your surrender.” He reached behind him to grip the doorknob and pushed the door open. “Come out,” he snapped, although he didn’t take his eyes off Ember as he spoke.

Shuffling noises sounded from inside the closet, and a second later three kids stepped into view. They couldn’t have been more than ten, and all of them were covered in brilliant violet bruises and dried blood. Silver shackles encircled their wrists, which were burnt and meant the shackles were real silver. Werewolves were deathly allergic, so the kids must have been born as wolves. If what Ember had said was right, they were either really strong wolves, or more likely, really weak ones who needed protection.

Ember, George, and Emily’s faces were pale white and Emily was vibrating in place as if she weren’t sure whether to start screaming or crying.

“You have kidnapped our innocents,” Ember said, his voice flat.

“And if you don’t want them to die, you’ll offer your own neck in sacrifice.” Octavius smiled widely, his fangs visible in a blatant threat.

Ember looked at the kids for a long moment, and Kana looked too. One of them was crying softly, but trying to stifle it in his shoulder as if afraid to draw attention to himself. The other two were standing bravely, their chins set and their spines straight, but Kana could see defeat in the way their eyes downcast. They still had some spirit left, but it had been beaten as severely as their bodies.

Ember next moved his eyes to look at Kana, and Kana saw a fire burning behind them. Fury, not just that Octavius would stoop so low, but also at himself for allowing the children to become a target. Kana also read Ember’s plan, even though he didn’t use more than his jaw flexing as he ground his teeth to convey it. He would draw Octavius away from the children, so Kana could throw a protection circle around them.

Kana dipped his chin in the barest of nods. Ember returned his attention to Octavius and slowly raised his head until his neck was exposed.

“How lovely,” Octavius said. His voice was jovial, as if they were all engaged in a mutual pastime, yet he somehow still sounded dark and ominous. “After I’m through with you, I expect whomever replaces you will deliver the delightful morsel of magic you used to entice Lucas to his death. I will take that as payment for having to rebuild my coven.”

He walked forward, but stopped with still a few feet between himself and Ember. He reached out with one finger and tapped the pulse point on Ember’s neck, right where Kana had drawn a pentagram in his homemade Hunter’s Bane.

“Up to your nasty tricks again, I see,” Octavius said, and he grinned his threatening smirk again. He pressed his fingertip against that spot, holding it in place. “Perhaps had I not seen it kill poor Penelope, I might have fallen for such a crude trick, but to try it on me again shows your lack of imagination.”

A scent of burnt meat filled the air. Was Octavius willingly burning his finger just to prove he wouldn’t be felled by Kana’s spell? Except Octavius’s smile only grew as the smell increased, and Ember’s jaw flexed as if he was clenching it. Octavius was burning the symbol off Ember’s neck! And Ember was letting him.

Octavius was definitely distracted. Kana luckily didn’t have to move to set his spell circle. He would be stronger if he could take the time to draw the circle in chalk, but as a short-term preventative, a quick-set circle would suffice. He widened the channels between himself and Mika and Sora.

Sora’s massive paw swatted Sophia like he was swatting a gnat. She flew across the room and hit the wall with a bone-cracking thud. Looks like you’re in trouble, Sora said, sharing Kana’s eyes for a moment. We’ll finish here and head your way. Ralph stepped up next to Sora and two more wolves joined him, but by then enough magic had flooded from Sora, so Kana narrowed the channels and lost sight of their battle.

The circle bloomed to life underneath the kids, the pentagram crossing below their feet. Kana wrote in runes for protection and added the symbols for garlic and mistletoe. He also tossed in the rune for healing, although spell circles weren’t capable of mending the level of injuries the kids had sustained.

“I can see you’ll be a powerful asset once I’ve broken you to my will, witch,” Octavius said. He had turned away from Ember to watch Kana’s spell form, although his finger was still pressed to Ember’s neck.

Quick as a flash, Ember’s hands darted forward and clamped down on Octavius’s neck. Octavius let out a little gasp, and his body shuddered as Ember’s hands seemed to glow. Ember had a bottle of Kana’s Hunter’s Bane, Kana remembered. He must have coated his hands with it. George and Emily leaped, and they each grabbed one of Octavius’s arms. Their hands immediately started to glow too. Together the three of them pushed Octavius forward, and when his foot brushed one of the chalk lines Kana had hidden underneath the ostentatious purple carpet, Octavius convulsed as the spell flared to life.

Octavius shouted something unintelligible. He raked his claws across George’s chest, who howled in pain but grimly hung on.

“Kana!” Ember yelled just before a weight slammed into Kana’s back.

Kana hit the ground with a thud that left his lungs aching and him gasping for air. Someone landed on his back and hands pressed on his shoulders to hold him down. A warm, wet breath touched his neck. Kana threw open all his magic channels, drawing power recklessly, and felt it explode out of his body. The weight holding him down vanished. Kana rolled over, then struggled to his feet.

One vampire was leaning against one of the far walls, half his body starting to flake away in gray ash. More were rushing out of the closet.

Kana threw magic outwards and every single chalk circle he had drawn flared to life. Vampires screamed. One was fully caught in a circle and dissolved to ash on the spot, others had parts of their bodies flaking away until the air was gray with floating ash dust.

And still more vampires emerged from what must be a large walk-in closet. Kana pointed to the floor directly in front of the closet and drew a circle in the air with his pointed finger. A large circle appeared on the floor. He drew the pentagram next, and a glowing pentagram emerged as well. Every anti-vampire rune Kana could think of went into the spaces between the lines in the circle. Some vampires stumbled across the circle and immediately flared into ash, but more were coming, and they learned. The next few vampires went around the circle.

He had to stop them. Ember and his wolves were doing absolutely everything they could to battle Octavius; more vampires coming to Octavius’s aid would turn the tide against them. Kana was the only person available until the other group finished defeating Sophia and arrived to help.

Kana drew another circle, this one hovering in the air about a foot above the first. When that also wasn’t enough, he drew a third and then a fourth, until he had a tower of circles. Magic pulsed in the air, filling the room until Kana felt as if the walls were vibrating with it. More vampires were caught in the new circles, but not enough. The circles wanted—needed—something more.

Not more magic, Kana thought as he closed his eyes so he could listen to the circles better. Kana saw the pattern of magic comprising the circles behind his closed eyelids and heard the dissonant tone associated with the current array. The circles wanted to fulfil their full potential, that tone insisted, and they weren’t doing that by staying in their current configuration.

If Kana offset the second circle just a bit, then turned the third and the fourth each a little more… Kana opened his eyes.

All four circles were shining with a brilliant golden light. The vampires who had been able to evade it were shrieking, their arms held up to cover their eyes.

“You can’t!” Octavius screamed. There were scuffling noises behind Kana, but he couldn’t turn to look; the magic had his full attention.

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