Page 101 of Soul of a Witch

The plants rustled. Even the great tree creaked and groaned. A breeze whispered through my hair, and Darragh said softly, “Say the word, and I’ll strangle her, my lady. You don’t need to lift a finger.”

“Please don’t be violent.” My hands shook as I grasped my teacup, but I couldn’t make myself drink. My stomach was churning. My skin was on fire.

Juniper yelled, “Don’t be violent?Don’t be violent?You listened to me scream for help and did nothing! Was itfunfor you, Everly? Did it make you happy to see some innocent girl suffer for your God? Did you —”

“I don’t serve that God!”

Magic exploded from me in a wave as I raised my voice. One of the greenhouse’s glass panes shattered, shards raining down like glittering rain.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I attempted to regulate my breathing. Somehow, I needed to convince Juniper that I wasn’t her enemy, and losing control wasn’t going to accomplish that. If only she would stop talking, stop blaming me, stop blaming my mother…

But she was right.

I couldn’t change the past, I couldn’t undo the evil my family had inflicted on her. But I also couldn’t give her the justice she wanted.

My voice sounded so far away as I said, “I can’t make it right. I was supposed to be inspired, that’s what they told me. I was supposed to witness something beautiful and be left in awe of God’s power.”

I’d been petrified as I watched, all my horrified emotions locked up tight. That was the day I lost faith, the day blasphemy took root in my heart.

“All I saw was torture.” I was still unable to meet her eyes, although I could feel her glaring at me. “There wasn’t a day I could look at my mother after that and not see it. But she’s dead. And I am not my mother.”

“But you are your father’s daughter.”

Part of me wanted to laugh. Another wanted to weep. My vision was tunneling, my head throbbing. The magic pent up within me was making my skin itch as my emotions grew more erratic.

“He didn’t raise me like them. He raised me, but notlike them.” Not like Victoria and Jeremiah. Not like the children hewanted. I was the extra child, the leftover, the mistake.

When I spoke, my voice didn’t shake. “He was clear, always, that I was not the daughter hewanted; I was only the one heneeded. I wish I could change it. I wish I hadn’t been afraid. I wish I hadn’t spent so many yearsafraid.”

The teacup exploded. The noise startled me, and even Juniper flinched in surprise. We both stared in silence at the broken porcelain until, finally, I lifted my head and met her eyes.

She was looking at me differently now. As if she finally saw something she could understand. Something to connect us.

“What are you going to do, Everly?” she said. “Turn your demon on me? Or kill me yourself?”

I didn’t have the right words to say. An apology wasn’t enough. Excuses were a waste of breath, and she deserved better than that anyway.

Slowly, desperately, I said, “I don’t want you dead, Juniper. I need you alive. I need you to finish what you set out to do.”

35

Callum

My patience was hanging by the thinnest of threads as I waited, listening intently to the conversation going on in the greenhouse.

The words wouldn’t have been difficult to hear if this damn demon would stop talking. One would think being bound in chains and kicked in the face would inspire some silence, but this hellion didn’t know when to shut up.

“You got a name?” he said, still talking even with my foot crushing his head against the stone floor. “I mean, since we’re just going to sit here and get to know each other...I figured...introduction might be nice. So...uh...I’m Zane.”

My irritation rose. At least the voices in the greenhouse had grown calm; the raised tones I’d heard several minutes ago were gone.

Begrudging as I was to admit it, perhaps my witch had been right to spare them. If these two could handle some of the dirty work for us — namely, killing Kent Hadleigh — we’d be better off.

Still, the demon babbled on, “Have you been here long? Odd place, Abelaum. A little Hellish, isn’t it? Where’s that witch of yours? I mean, I’m assuming she’s yours. I don’t think a witchling could have summoned a lovely being like you. You two have made a deal, eh? Lucky you, getting a witch’s soul. I’ve heard they’re sweet as Heaven.”

If Everly hadn’t ordered me not to, I would have ripped out his tongue for a moment of silence.

“You know nothing of witches, hellion,” I said dryly. “You talk too much.”

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