Page 58 of The Witch and The Blood Oath

She drew closer. “I’m tired of being denied my dreams.”

Rage tunneled my vision. Ihatedthis witch spirit. I hated what she had done to innocents, and I hated that in a twisted way, she had been right.

Onecouldbe turned into a witch.

I hated that any part of what I had done would validate her cruelty.

“Did my mother help hunt you down and crush yourdreams?” I asked and sneered. “Did she ensure you were locked out of Summerland for all eternity?”

Madame LaLaurie cackled. “No. No, your mother came to me many years after my death because she wanted to learn from me.”

My world screeched to a halt. “You’re lying.”

She flashed those ugly teeth again.

“I harbored information Sybil sought,” Madame LaLaurie. “Ironically, she needed my advice to help her accomplish something for the High Witch.”

I balked in confusion. Mom had never told me about any mission for the High Witch, nor had she confessed she went to Madame LaLaurie to aid her on it.

My mother had been against everything Madame LaLaurie stood for.

“What knowledge?” I asked. “I know it has nothing to do with your demented projects.”

Madame LaLaurie’s thin lips curled. “Maybe you didn’t know her as well as you’d like to believe.”

Though I worried the ghostly witch’s words held some truth, Mom never would have supported the abuse of innocent people in the name of experimentation, but what other projects had Madame LaLaurie endeavored in? Mom had never told me anything about the witch except that she was a cautionary tale about the consequences of overstretching one’s power.

“Would she be proud of how you’ve overstretched your power?” the tall, leering sister asked and arched an eyebrow.

"Get out of my head," I threatened.

“Would she be proud of how your coven has lost all faith in you?" the ghostly witch continued, "how you’ve risked their lives to save a human man?”

“Or would she have you put down the same way your dear goddessmother was ended?” the shortest sister taunted.

“Enough, children,” Madame LaLauire chided.

The sisters quieted like well-trained dogs, and I laughed at them.

“Still on your mother’s leash after all these years, huh?” I spat.

The tallest sister’s leer transformed into a snarl, and she tried to push past her mother, but Madame LaLaurie stopped her with a glare. The other sisters hissed but didn’t attempt to disobey their terrible mother.

“Focus,” Madame LaLaurie commanded. “Tell me, Freya Redfern, what mission might your mother have been assigned by the High Witch? What might she have wanted to learn from me?”

The magical vice that held me in place squeezed even tighter, and I searched my memory for the answers to Madame LaLaurie’s questions.

“Entrapment,” I realized. Dread and disgust turned my stomach. “Aside from your sick projects, you specialized in entrapment.”

It was undoubtedly why she had been able to entrap her own magic within her spirit. I was certain the High Witch never would’ve intentionally left it in possession of the crazed witch.

Madame LaLaurie preened. “You’re not as foolish as you look, but, child, what might your mother have wanted to entrap? What would theHigh Witchwant brought to her?”

I gasped.

It couldn’t be…

“The chimera?” I asked. “Has Cordelia been searching for it for all this time?”

---