The Wanda look-a-like glanced up when I approached the counter. Her smile lifted the corners of her lips, a genuine expression that looked nothing like Wanda’s all-knowing, creepy grin. She tapped a button on her cash register and slid the drawer shut. Everything was clean and tidy. No dirt, no cobwebs, no musty books advertising Dark Magicks. If it weren’t for the hair, I might never had made the connection to Wanda’s dust-painted store.

  “How can I help you girls?” she asked, taking Laura and me in with one long sweeping gaze.

  Like Wanda, this woman wasn’t a shaman, but she quickly adopted that ‘I know something’ look that Wanda always wore.

  “Some chicken bones, perhaps?” she asked in a chirpy voice. “I believe I have a few left in stock.”

  Laura stiffened beside me, but I decided to freeze my face in a mask of indifference.

  “No, we’re actually looking for the reverse of a particular spell,” I said, keeping my voice smooth. “We need to undo something that was cast by a…witch?”

  The lighthearted expression fell away. “I see. I’m not sure I can help you with that. As you can see, my shop specializes in demon deterrents.”

  She gestured toward the tidy shelves of herbal candles, parchment paper, and, strangely enough, bones.

  “This is really important.” Laura stepped closer to the counter. “This witch has trapped someone we care about behind a powerful invisible wall thing, and we need to get him out of there before she does something terrible to him.”

  The woman cocked her head and pursed her lips. “You don’t know anything about the olde magicks, do you girls?”

  Laura and I locked gazes while I tried to decide how much I would share with this stranger. The truth, as hard as it was to part with, might be the only way to gain the information we needed to break Nathan free.

  “We know about shamanism,” I finally said, Laura nodding along with my words. “Which I think you’re aware of if you were offering us chicken bones. We don’t know about any other magic though. It’s only been in the past couple of days that we’ve found out there might be more of it than we thought.”

  “Your eyes are beginning to open to the world around you,” the woman said with a slight nod. “This is a good thing.”

  “There’s a new girl at school who used to live here in Salem,” Laura said. “We saw her cast some kind of spell in the woods last night at the same time we found out she’s trapped our friend behind this invisible wall. We just need some information to help us fight back.”

  The woman sighed. “Your parents are the ones who should be explaining all of this to you girls.”

  “Please.” I reached out and put one hand over hers. She flinched, but she didn’t pull away. “My boyfriend’s life is at stake.”

  “Okay.” She pulled free of my grasp, sinking her elbows onto the counter and lowering her voice. “As I hope you know, shamanism developed in South America as a way to protect humanity from what you call spirits and what we call demons. Your magic enables you to communicate and control them. Am I correct in saying you know all of this?”

  “Yep, we’ve got that covered,” Laura said.

  “Good.” Her shoulders released some of their tension. “Unfortunately, your magic can sometimes cause an imbalance between our worlds, and the olde magicks were developed as a direct response to this.”

  “What do you mean?” I frowned. Here was that balancing the universe nonsense again, something Mom had only mentioned to me in passing. Not that she’d explained much of anything of the shaman world.

  “Nature needs balance. Those of us who use the olde magicks are able to control the elements in order to ensure balance. This sometimes means restoring it when shaman magic has caused a rift.” She paused and met our eyes to make sure we were still following. “Now, just as in shamanism, some sorcerers and sorceresses turn to the dark ways. It sounds to me like you’ve encountered one such sorceress.”

  “But why would someone turn to the dark ways?” Laura asked. “What’s the whole point of it?”

  The woman shrugged. “I can’t tell you this without knowing more. It’s different for every person. Most likely she’s after power and life. We’ve seen it hundreds of time. The allure of an infinite lifetime and all-consuming power is too much for some to resist. It’s intoxicating to those who find it.”

  My mind immediately flicked to mental snapshots of Anthony Lombardi’s face. “We’ve seen the same thing with a shaman before.”

  “Shamans and sorcerers aren’t so different.” She pushed off the counter and smiled. “We just have different ways of channeling magic and different purposes for existing.”

  “So, then this wall spell we told you about,” Laura said, getting right back down to business. “Could a shaman break it somehow or does a witch have to do it?”

  “Sorcerer.” The woman showed her teeth when she smiled, impossibly straight and pure white. “Or sorceress. And yes, I’m sorry to say that a shaman won’t be able to negate any spell that a sorceress has cast. Just as we’re unable negate a spell of yours. It’s something we’ve both long sought to change, but I suppose that’s nature’s way of ensuring neither of us has too much power over the other.”

  Nathan, my heart squeezed. I leaned forward and placed my hands flat on the counter. The woman didn’t pull away like I’d expected her to do. Instead, she brought her face only inches from mine and met my fierce gaze, her eyes unblinking.

  “I know what you’re going to ask,” she said before I could open my mouth. “And the answer is no. I’m not going to get involved in a war between a sorceress and a shaman. That way leads to nothing but chaos.”

  “This won’t become a war if we can get Nathan out of there,” I said. “Unharmed.”

  “And it may become a war if you do,” she said. “Whatever reason this sorceress has behind keeping your friend captive, I’m certain she won’t be happy if you take that away from her. She’ll turn her wrath onto whoever had a part in destroying her plan, and that would include me if I helped.”

  “Fine.” I pulled back and narrowed my eyes. “Are there any sorceresses in this town who aren’t massive cowards?”

  Something low came from her throat, a noise like a snake that had been poked by a stick. “I think most of us won’t respond well to threats from shamans who speak against one of our own.”

  “Okay, let’s all calm down and be civil.” Laura gave me a sharp look and turned to the woman. “The girl we’ve having problems with used to live here. Maybe you have some info on her. I have a photo of her on my phone if that helps.”

  “A girl from here? Your age?” The woman’s face turned to stone.

  “She’s seventeen.” Laura stabbed her finger against her phone. “George Proctor. Caused a massive fire at the school and got expelled awhile back. This is her.”

  Laura flicked her screen toward the woman, who sucked in a sharp breath at the sight of George at the beach. In the photo from what felt like years ago, she stood next to me and Laura. We smiled into the camera, though George’s expression seemed glowering in comparison. I hadn’t noticed it until now, the dark storm cloud that seemed to hang over her head.

  “That girl is bad news,” the woman said.

  “So, you know her?” Laura asked, swiping her phone back into her pocket.

  “She leaves a path of destruction in her wake.” A frown carved deep into the woman’s face. “She’s in Seaport? This can’t be happening. The police said there was nothing suspicious about…”

  She trailed off as if she suddenly remembered that Laura and I were still in the room. A sliver of ice ran down my spine.

  “Do you mean Wanda?” I asked, the words popping out of my mouth before I could swallow them back.

  “Wanda was my aunt.” She swallowed hard. “I never really knew her well, but our family is stunned by her death.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I said.

  “They said she had a heart attack.” She shook her head slowly, eyes flickering through rapid fire emotions, too quickly for me to follow. “I thought that sounded strange, but my mother just brushed it aside. There was more to it than that, wasn’t there?”

  Laura reached out and took the woman’s hand into hers. “It was a spirit, or a demon, whatever you want to call it. Someone had lured it into Wanda’s shop somehow.”

  “Lured it?” Her eyes turned dark, and she ripped her hand out of Laura’s grasp. “Then it was a shaman who did this to her.”

  “We’re not so sure,” Laura and I locked eyes. “Earlier in the day, we’d gone to see Wanda for a tarot card reading, and she had a really weird interaction with George. George got the Death card, and she refused to let Wanda do the rest of the reading.

  “And then after Wanda died,” I said, “George went back and stole the deck.”

  The woman gripped the counter, her knuckles turning white. “She stole my aunt’s deck?”

  “Yeah.” Frowning, I took a step back. I hadn’t expected this kind of reaction. “The spell we saw her cast in the woods had something to do with it. She killed a rat and burned the cards.”

  “That bitch,” the woman hissed. “George Proctor will pay for this.”

  “Do you think she killed her?” Laura asked in a whisper.

  “Oh, I think she did whatever she could do in order to undo Aunt Wanda’s reading.” She flicked her dark eyes between me and Laura. “When a sorceress destroys another’s sorceress’s deck, it can change the destroyer’s fate. But there are consequences to those actions. Just as there always are.”

  My mouth went dry as Laura asked the question that I was too scared to voice. I had a feeling it would reveal the truth of why George had Nathan trapped inside her house. A truth I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear.

  “What kind of consequences?”

  The woman’s smile turned bitter. “Blood will be spilled.”

  CHAPTER 17

  “So, she has my boyfriend to spill his blood.” My forehead twitched with every painful beat of my heart. “How can we stop her?”

  “Wait a minute,” Laura said. “She only got ahold of the tarot card deck last night. What does that have to do with everything else she’s been doing in Seaport, like the spirit summoning, or whatever it is?”

  “George Proctor leaves destruction in her wake everywhere she goes.” The woman reached under her counter and brought out a stack of newspapers. “Most especially for my family.”

  There were about thirty newspapers in the pile, dozens of crinkles giving evidence of the many times the articles had been read. I slid the top story into my hands, my eyes skipping down the page. Laura leaned over my shoulder to read, a gasp bursting from her throat.

  It seemed George had been found in the woods with another girl from her school. The girl in the photo had dark hair, but it was the same texture as the bushy strands Wanda and this woman also wore. The girl was sprawled on a dirt path, bruised and bloody, while George scowled in the background, surrounded by cops on every side.

  The woman stabbed the page with a fingernail. “This was the most recent incident, and she left the next day. Alice is my cousin’s daughter. She said she’d gone into the woods to practice spells with George, and the next thing she knew, she woke up with these nasty wounds all over her body. George swore she had nothing to do with it, and the police refused to charge her because there wasn’t enough evidence. But I know she hurt poor Alice. And so does everyone else in this town.”

  “How did she do this?” Laura pressed shaking fingers to the photo. “And why?”

  “The wounds were strange. No one knows.” The woman blinked, shaking her head, and took a step back. “Anyway, I’ve said enough. I’d be careful going up against that girl if I were you.”

  “Can’t you give us anything?” I asked. “If she’s been attacking your family for years, don’t you want to stop her now?”

  “I want nothing to do with this.” She pointed at the stack of newspapers. “If she’s involved in summoning spirits, then she’s not working alone. She’s dangerous enough by herself, but George Proctor plus a powerful shaman should be left to someone with more skill than either of you could ever have.”

  Her words set fire to my veins. Leaning closer, I lowered my voice and stared hard into her eyes. “We are far more dangerous than you could ever know. Stop being a coward and help us fight back. Help us take her down.”

  “I think you should go now.” Her face flushed as she pointed at the door. “If you don’t, I’ll call the police.”

  Blinking, I shook my head and took a step back. I couldn’t believe this woman could just sit here in her stupid shop and refuse to help save a boy’s life, refuse to help save a whole town. There had to be something I could say to change her mind, some way I could make her see just how important this was. No one was this selfish.

  Laura grabbed my arm and pulled me toward the door. “Come on, Holly. Let’s get out of here. We can find something else to help us out.”

  Laura and I spent the next two hours combing the streets of Salem, but we were met with even more resistance than we had at the woman’s demon-repelling shop. Doors wouldn’t open, and shops were mysteriously closed for the day, even though it was barely lunchtime. I had a sneaking suspicion the woman had alerted the rest of the outwardly magical members of the community of our arrival, and no one wanted to step up to the plate and grow some balls.

  There had to be way more to the story than the woman had let on if this was the reaction George caused.

  But finally, Laura and I had to admit defeat, and we climbed back into the truck, turning the wheels toward home. The sky overhead had darkened once again, the afternoon sun blotted out by churning clouds. The mood up above matched the one in my heart. We were no closer to saving Nathan than we had been before.

  “Well, that did us a fat lot of good.” I scowled at the darkening sky and shrugged deeper into my hoodie.

  “Don’t look at it that way.” Laura twisted the steering wheel as she pulled off the main drag of Salem and turned onto the highway that would lead us home. “We got some information.”

  “All it did was confirm our suspicions. It didn’t actually give us anything on how to save Nathan.”

  “We know George is dangerous now, and we know that we need a witch to cancel out her spell.” Laura frowned out the front windshield, flicking on the wipers as the snow began to fall down. “Someone who doesn’t want to hide behind their doors instead of help save a guy’s life. Not everyone will be like that.”

  “And how are we going to find a witch when we didn’t even know they existed like four hours ago?”

  “I haven’t figured that part out yet,” Laura said.

  Sighing, I scanned the clouds, as if they held the answers to all the questions I had bottled up inside of me. I couldn’t shake the words the woman had said about the consequences of George’s actions. Blood would be spilled, and all because she didn’t like a tarot card reading. If kidnapping Nathan was any indication, I had a horrible feeling I knew exactly who she planned on using.

  But there was no reason it had to be him. Blood would be spilled, but it wouldn’t be his if I had anything to do with it.

  “Don’t go to my house,” I said suddenly, my heart pounding within me so hard, it beat against my eyeballs.

  Laura glanced sideways at me, eyebrows raised. “What do you have in mind?”

  “If no one wants to help us, then we have to take care of this my way,” I said, my resolution solidifying with every spin of the tires. “Go to George’s house. I know what I can say to her to get Nathan out of there.”

  Laura shook her head, but she didn’t argue. When we finally made our way back to Seaport, she turned the truck down the dirt gravel drive when we passed by George’s house. Every cell of my body felt electric, every muscle in my body tense with hope and fear.

  “I don’t think this is a good idea, Holly.”

  “We need to do this now. Maybe eventually we could have found a sorcerer willing to help us, but how long would that take?” My spine stiffened as we rolled to a stop outside of the cabin, tires churning the snow into slush. “It’s time to take matter into our own hands.”

  “And ruin the element of surprise.”

  “There’s no reason to dance around the subject and pretend we don’t know what George is up to. Besides, she probably already knows we were here last night.”

  “Okay.” Laura turned off the truck and let out a heavy sigh. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”

  When we approached the house this time, we didn’t bother with invisibility. I wanted George to know we were here, and I wanted her to come outside. My blood boiled with a heat I had never felt before. It was one thing to go after me, but it was a hell of another thing to go after the boy I was pretty sure I loved.

  I tipped back my head and raised my voice to a bellow. “George!”

  Silence followed, Laura and I both waiting on the porch with crossed arms. After several moments passed, I tried again. “George! We need to talk to you. I know you have Nathan in there.”

  A moment later, the door opened. George let the hinges swing wide as she puffed out her chest, filling the whole doorframe with her presence and making herself appear twice as big as she actually was. She wore patchy jeans, a dark-sleeved tank, and a pair of purple bags under her eyes. Her fingers found the cross on her chest as she stared at us with an expression that gave nothing away.

  “So, it was you guys who set off the alarm last night,” she finally said, breaking the tense silence.

  “I’m surprised your sorceress magic isn’t up to the task of telling you that kind of thing,” Laura replied with a sharp edge to her voice.

  “It usually does. Something you guys did must have blocked it.” She leaned against the doorframe and crossed her arms. “Well, looks like you caught me. I’m a sorceress, and you two are shamans. Sorry I didn’t tell you, but there was never a good time to bring it up.”

  “I think it might have been a good time to bring it up when you went after Wanda.” I stepped forward. “We know you stole her tarot cards.”

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22