Page 26 of Hellfire to Come
“Look who joined us,” Frederic said brightly while bile rose in my throat. “I left him alive. I simply found a better use for him.” Sounding disappointed, he started shaking his head and the blade dug deeper into my skin. “He was a horrible witch anyway.”
Brooklyn took a half step forward, eyes wide, shaking her head. “Rowan? Rowan answer me.” My friend used that tone in her voice which forced anyone to obey her but not a muscle moved on Rowan’s face.
“He can’t hear you,” Frederic interrupted. “He’s quite… borrowed, shall we say? A rather exquisite blend of witchbinding and possession. Nasty business, really. Messes with the soul, I’ve heard. But, on the bright side, he’s terribly obedient.”
The old vampire removed his hand from my shoulder, and his fingers twitched once in a graceful motion at the dazed witch next to us.
Rowan moved.
Fast.
Straight toward Brooklyn.
A scream lodged itself behind my teeth, but I didn’t dare move. Thankfully, she dodged just in time, sliding back as Rowan’s hands lifted in front of him and lit up with intense visible energy, blue-white sigils sparking like lightning around his fingers. He threw a wave of that energy at her, and it cracked the stone floor where she’d been standing a second ago.
“No!” I screamed, struggling in Frederic’s grip. Damn him and that knife he held on my throat. “Let me go, you piece of shit!” I slammed my elbow back into his ribs, felt the impact, but he didn’t even flinch. I was about to slam the pipe I still clutched in my other hand but I immediately froze. Magic shivered down his arm and tightened like a vice around my neck and shoulders. I was paralyzed from neck to waist.
Brooklyn didn’t strike back, I realized in horror.
She couldn’t.
Her expression was carved from agony and restraint, but all she did was dodge every attack from Rowan.
“Fight back!” Chester roared, trying to rush forward, but Echo slammed a hand across his chest, preventing him from coming between Brooklyn and Frederic. Her eyes blazed.
“She can’t fight, you idiot!” Echo hissed. “Not until Alice is clear!”
Brooklyn ducked another blast, then rolled, narrowly dodging a rune sigil meant to turn her insides into wall decorations.
Rowan advanced like a whirlwind built for destruction. Precision in every movement, methodical, calculated. He launched another spell, this one a narrow beam of scorching light that sliced clean through a support column beside Brooklyn’s head.
She dropped into a crouch, rolling through a plume of shattered stone and heat, her body a blur. Sweat gleamed on her brow as she rose behind the debris, breath ragged, gaze finding mine for the briefest, electric second.
The anguish there nearly undid me.
She wanted to end this. She wanted to kill Frederic. She wanted to protect me, as she always had, more.
But she couldn’t. Not without sentencing me to death.
And Frederic knew that all too well.
“Oh, the poetry of it all,” he murmured, his voice a velvet blade curling against my ear. “Your lethal little guardian, reduced to inaction by sentiment. How tragic.”
“You’ll regret this,” I said, jaw clenched so tightly my teeth ached, vision blurring under the weight of whatever power he used to squeeze my ribcage.
“Possibly,” he replied with a languid shrug. “But regret is a game for mortals, darling. And I’m rather immortal, I’m afraid.”
Rowan struck again, this time summoning a corkscrewing vortex of fire and electrical charge that shrieked through the air. Brooklyn dodged by inches, landing hard against a jagged outcrop of wall. Blood trickled from a gash along her temple, yet she pushed up again without hesitation, without fear.
She never paused.
Behind her, Chester strained against Echo’s restraining hand, his expression a storm of wrath and desperation. The wolf prowled in tense arcs, jaws frothing, a low growl reverberating through the stone like a bad omen.
“Brooklyn,” Dominic was as still as a statue as he growled, his voice roughened with urgency. “We need to go. We can return another day for Alice.”
“No,” she bit out, ducking as another arc of sigil-fire seared past her cheek, singeing the ends of her hair.
“Anytime you want to start fighting works for me, female!” Chester bellowed, eyes darting between Rowan and the blade still pressed to my throat. Something had freaked out the demon but I had no clue what.
