Page 104 of Blood Sacrifice

Shouts echoed from somewhere to my left, and for a moment the world stopped, and I was transported back in time to another era when I had heard the screams of the dying as Balor tried to access the void magic trapped here. Maia had never been a priestess, but her potion had brought us to where the original temple had been, its energy pulsing under our feet.

“Why are we here?” I whispered, looking at the volcano in the distance, dread unfurling in my stomach.

“The potion was designed to take us to where we needed to be,” Maia replied. “I have no idea why, but this is where we should be.”

Owen’s head snapped to the right. “We have company,” he hissed, eyes glowing red. His energy washed over us, and I knew he was cloaking us to ensure whoever was approaching couldn’t determine our powers.

“You were supposed to die.” My eyes closed for a moment and I slowly spun to come face-to-face with my sister as she spoke. “I’ve had a long time to collect relics of those around me since I always knew they couldn’t remain spellbound forever.”

I glanced beyond her to see Salvator and many of his pack floating in mid-air, their bodies bound by powerful magic.

“One snap of my fingers and all their necks will break,” Aisha said in a singsong tone. “All those years, and he never stopped loving you. All those years, and he never once noticed that I was a woman. Now he will do everything I command.”

Her smile bordered on maniacal, her eyes bright with madness. The sister I had looked up to had lost her way, and in the process had surrendered her soul to the darkness.

“What is it you want?” I asked in a low tone.

She had captured dire wolves that she had pieces of hair and nails from. Dominic had been with Salvator, and he was too old and too wise to be captured, and wouldn’t allow the others tobe taken without a plan in mind. I had to believe help was on the way.

“I want what I always wanted.” Aisha paused, her lips pursing together. “Power. Mother priestess treated you like a star pupil because she saw what the rest of us felt. You were different, containing raw power that connected to magic. I looked for you after we scattered, but Salvator had hidden you, and only he knew where he had sent you.”

My mind flashed back to that night, his strong hands lifting me when I had fallen, carrying me when I ran out of energy, loving me when I lost hope.

“I’m not prepared to negotiate with you, Aisha,” I replied, straightening my back to stare at her with contempt. “You are nothing more than a pawn on this chessboard of power and death. A queen will only negotiate with her equal, which is a king. Where is Balor?”

A figure in a black cloak emerged from behind the suspended men. He tugged the hood back to reveal the man who had haunted my nightmares for centuries. His face was the same, but there was a blankness to his eyes that made me hesitate. Owen’s magic tightened around us in a protective embrace.

“Balor,” I said slowly, nodding once. “I would say it is a pleasure, but you’ve spent four hundred years trying to kill me.”

He smiled, but it looked more as if he was baring his teeth. “You’re one of the few who escaped me.” His gaze moved for a moment to Salvator. “Now I understand why. He protected you with a selfless sacrifice of his love. Four hundred years is a long time for a wolf to be celibate to maintain a magical bond.”

I refused to enter into a debate with him about Salvator, since fear gnawed in my chest at seeing him helpless.

“I’ve returned home,” I replied, looking him dead in the eye. “I refuse to keep running.”

He shrugged one shoulder. “There is a shallow grave with your name on it in a forest beside your sisters. I have no problem burying you there.”

I had seen Salvator’s memories, and knew that forest where he had lain my sister priestesses to rest. “You placed them in sacred ground, which is not the actions of a monster.”

A foreign emotion flickered in his eyes for a moment before it was suppressed again, his expression impassive. “Take her,” he commanded.

I held one hand up. “I wouldn’t advise that.”

Balor heralded his soldiers forward, the first one stopping abruptly, his mouth opening in shock as his head slid from where it had been connected to his neck. Owen placed the point of his sword on the ground casually, while lifting one shoulder in a half shrug.

“Luna did advise against trying to restrain her,” Owen said.

All eyes cut to the hybrid vampire, tension gathering in the air as the warlocks re-evaluated what was happening.

“I am not like the other priestesses who you hunted down and slaughtered,” I said. “Many went into hiding and avoided using their magic. I didn’t have that luxury.”

I felt the loss of the witches I had journeyed with in my life like a stab to my heart. Powerful women had died because others were intimidated by them. It had been the overriding factor in the witch trials, and still held true today.

Balor blinked, his head canting slightly as if listening to someone. “Enough of this nonsense. Kill them, I can recover her energy later,” he commanded, making a slicing motion with his hand.

The soldier closest to me tried to grab my arm, but every magical symbol carved into my body had been activated before we started our mission, every chakra energised and ready to cast spells. The fingers of my left hand touched his chest andI uttered an ancient incantation. He screamed, jumping back from me as he flayed the flesh from his bones as he fought an invisible swarm of beetles infesting him. The mind was a powerful tool that could be manipulated by magical suggestion.

Owen slammed his hands together in a clap that echoed around us, the energy of his magic changing from cloaking to radiating out to force those closest to us back several paces. I rubbed my own hands together to activate my hand chakras and uttered the words to an incantation connected to the emotions of our enemies. My magic felt more potent here so close to the void, as if I could draw energy from it. A mist rose up into the air and began to weave its way around those assembled. Fear was a powerful emotion, and every single person on this planet had a fear they hid inside them.

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