Page 60 of The Coveted
My eyes fluttered open, and I remembered suddenly the voices from the ocean. They said they could help me, and I believed them.
I let Daelon help me into a comfortable white silk nightgown, which was light and cool against my freshly washed skin. It flowed to my ankles and off my shoulders.
“I think someone is—” But before I could tell Daelon about the servant’s message from the ball or the voices in the ocean, a high-pitched frequency pulsated through the air.
Daelon frowned, suddenly falling forward. I raised a palm to catch him with my magick, sending him onto the bed rather than the floor. Blood rushed to my head from the exertion, my power still protesting against me. A man and a woman dressed in servant garb appeared in a rush of wind. I recognized the man as the one who sent me the map at the ball. He was tall and lean, with freckles delicately dotting his fair skin around his nose and lips. His reddish-brown hair was floppy and tousled, hanging to his mid-forehead. He seemed young, maybe in his late teens. The woman appeared closer to my age, with light brown skin, piercing chestnut eyes, and tight black curls that framed her heart-shaped face. She looked so familiar, but I couldn’t quite place why.
“Callum,” the man introduced himself, his eyes wide and bouncing erratically from Daelon’s motionless body to me. I could nearly hear his heart pounding with fear. His energy was a frenzy of determination and courage—wide brushstrokes of orange, summery hues. “And this—this is Amaya.”
“You didn’t need to do that,” I whispered. “He’s… he’s a friend.”
Amaya raised her brows. Her own energy was earthy and grounded, with a solid current of confidence that held it all together. “The Commander of the Guard? The King’sbrother?”
I balanced myself on the bedframe, taking in a deep breath in preparation for another wave of magickal expulsion. “They’re not brothers,” I muttered, but I was too exasperated to explain further, nor did I know if I should yet.
“What have we done?” Callum breathed, rubbing his chest. “I—”
“Stop that,” Amaya hissed. “You’re stronger than this. There is no room for doubt now. We have to help.” She glanced at me. “Wecanhelp.”
Full-body chills erupted across my skin, and soon I was throwing up icy black sludge again. Why wasn’t I getting better?
“Oh god. That’s going to make me sick,” I heard Callum say as I stumbled forward.
“Don’t you dare,” Amaya warned him. Hands clasped mine and in a burst of white light we were traveling through space.
The sound of voices danced all around me, rising and swelling like the ocean’s waves. They spoke in words that felt ancient, resurrected with a care and devotion that brought forth magick from far-away lands.
“Goddess, heal her,”one voice said. Others called upon names I did not recognize and ones I did. They called upon Hecate, goddess of witchcraft and magick. The Universe. Mother Aradia and Mother Earth. They called upon water. On fire. The moon and the stars. Covens and witches across the realms, both alive and intact and dead and destroyed.
I felt my pain ease, a healing, cool breeze spreading from the tips of my toes, through my calves, to my thighs, to my midsection, chest, arms, and throughout my fingertips. I felt it gather between my eyes and on top of my crown. I heard the roar of an ocean, felt my mothers’ love in the taste of brine and the smell of wildflowers.
“We share in her pain so that it may pass through, dissipating into the darkness from whence it came.”
“It is banished,” another voice said, low and strained.
As I lay with my eyes closed, the floor hard and carpeted beneath my motionless body, I could still see them. A group of castle servants gathered in a circle, holding their hands clasped tight as they sang an ancient song, one that had once been carried above mountains, through valleys, across oceans and deserts, sang as an act of resistance against dark forces that were to come. It was a song of hope. It was a song of devotion. And now it was a song of healing.
Some of them were wearing their uniforms and others were wearing casual clothing or nightgowns like I was. One woman sat next to me, holding my hand and tethering me to the earth and to the circle of witches.Amaya.
Chairs and tables were pressed up against the walls to clear a space for them, and candles lined the stone walls and scattered across the wooden floor beyond the circle. I felt their strong, purposed magick rise up and meet my own, and soon the sound of coughing moved through the room. Dark black smoke expelled from the mouths of each witch, evaporating into vapor as it spilled into the air.
They were expelling Lucius’s dark magick. They were taking it on as if it was their burden to bear, and my gratitude welled as the darkness began to lift. They were strangers. They didn’t know me, but they loved me—loved me enough to risk their lives, to practice the old ways under the nose of an oppressive, all-powerful regime, to take on my pain like it was their pain. And I didn’t know how to thank them for delivering me back to myself, piece by piece. All I could do was float back into my body, and my physical eyes fluttered open and spilled out a stream of tears. A space opened up inside of me, the storm clouds rolling off into the horizon, and my magick was safe to return in full force, no longer fouled by Lucius’s unrelenting thirst for shadowed power and domination.
“Welcome back,” Amaya whispered, squeezing my hand. Her eyes widened when the room suddenly filled with light.
A surge of power rippled through my body, floating up from my chest in an apparition of glowing white energy, expanding and contracting as it rose. I sat up, unable to peel my eyes away as the manifestation broke apart into smaller orbs, lurching to the outskirts of the circle to face each witch.
“I think it’s a gift,” I said, leaning into my intuition. “Grab it.”
After a moment of tense silence, the witches unclasped their hands, each tentatively reaching toward the balls of energy. I locked eyes with Amaya as she moved her fingertips into the light, watching as it lit up her aura in pure lavender shades and hues. It moved into her, and I felt an emotion flow through her that flooded through all of us all at once. It felt like unity, like love, like tradition and transcendence and something stronger than any one of us alone, even me. It was community.
“My sister,” she whispered. “She’s alive. In the dungeons.” She turned to me. “We’re from the same coven. She—she saw you.”
Realization finally struck. That was why she looked so familiar. “Seraphina.”
“I wasn’t old enough when I was taken to remember our parents or our origins. I only knew about Seraphina because she cast a spell to reach out to me, even though it put her in danger. She needed me to remember who I was so I could find the others like me, who wanted to practice the ways of our people. Soon we realized our purpose was much greater.”
I looked around the room, watching a great many tears fall as others received similar knowledge of the lands they were taken from.
