The Witch's Consorts: The Complete Series, page 86
“Stop right there! Stop this, all of you!”
The middle seat, where two more guards were sitting, blocked my view of the windshield. Who was he shouting at like that? I braced myself in my seat. I couldn’t do much with the guards on either side of me, but they’d get up as soon as the car stopped, right? Then I might have a chance, if there was anything at all I could do.
The SUV jolted to a halt. Frankford was throwing open his door before the engine had even fallen silent. He motioned for the guards with a jerking motion of his arm. The women on either side of me did get up—but not before the one at my right had clamped her well-muscled hand around my forearm. She yanked me up with her.
I scrambled after her, the metallic taste of adrenaline sharp in my mouth. What the hell was going on? The guards up front heaved open the back door and spilled out ahead of us. My guard dragged me out into the hot mid-day sun to face a cluster of startled-looking figures.
My gaze went straight to Rose. God, it wasn’t much more than a week since I’d last been in her presence, but every part of me ached at the sight of her, as if I’d been deprived of a substance as vital as water that was now in reach. Her dark hair lifted in the breeze as her head jerked around. When our eyes met, pain flashed across her face. An echo of it jabbed into me like a knife.
I’d been afraid from the first moment I’d come back into town that I’d cause her pain like that, but I’d never thought I’d end up doing it purposely.
I opened my mouth—and the guard who’d dragged me out shoved her hand against my throat. She wasn’t carrying a weapon, but she didn’t need to. I’d watched witches call forth incredible forces with just a twitch of their fingers. The threat couldn’t be more clear.
This was why Frankford had brought me. I wasn’t a resource to him anymore. I was a hostage. My life for Rose’s compliance.
Rose’s mouth tightened further as she caught the gesture and the guard’s glower. I tried to move, and the woman’s hand clamped down harder. She might crush my windpipe without any help from her magic at all.
“What by the Spark is going on here, Charles?” a woman I’d met briefly at the Den of Spades—Gwen Remington—was saying. “This young woman is saying—”
“I’m sure she’s making up all kinds of stories,” Frankford said. His voice came out smooth, only a hint of a tremor in it. I hoped the others would hear it. “Clearly Lady Hallowell’s animosity has carried even farther than I imagined.”
“I haven’t made up anything,” Rose said. “They can see for their own eyes what I saw here a month ago. If there’s nothing there, you shouldn’t care if they take a look.”
Another woman stepped forward, the middle-aged witch I’d met briefly when she’d arrived at Rose’s estate just before I’d left it. Frankford’s stance tensed at the sight of her. “Lady Ainsworth,” he said quickly, before she could speak. “Has she roped you into her delusions too? My colleagues, you really must—”
“You can’t dismiss me just like that,” the older witch said in a taut voice. “Don’t you dare stop this. Your time is up. Maybe I can’t talk, but I can fight.”
“Now, then, this doesn’t need to come to blows,” one of the other Assembly officials—Justin Brimsey—said, holding up his hands.
“It won’t if these criminal intruders are removed from my home.” Frankford turned to Rose and shook his head with a disbelieving laugh. “You threaten my grandson, break onto my property, and you’re still making demands? You belong tied up in a cell where you can’t hurt anyone else. Keep in mind what’s at stake here for you too.”
He made a subtle gesture, and the guard holding me shifted her other hand in what must have been a threatening gesture, the beginnings of a spell. Rose’s whole body stiffened. He was counting on her still caring about me, regardless of how I’d betrayed her, and she did. Fucking hell, I didn’t deserve all the anguish that was etched on her face.
She’d fought so hard to get this far. Given so much of herself. I’d thrown myself into the fray to save her, not to be the one who brought her down.
“Do whatever you have to do,” I said. “I don’t matter.”
The guard’s hand jammed on my throat. But even as I choked, I caught a glimpse of the only thing I needed to see if I was going to die. Rose’s eyes held pain and fear, but a shimmer of understanding had crept into them.
She knew. She knew even though I’d hurt her that I’d been doing this for her all along.
She whipped out her arm so fast I wasn’t prepared. The guard wasn’t either. A spell slammed into the woman’s head from the side, and her grip loosened. One of the other guards leapt in to grab me, but Ky was already lunging at her with a stick he brandished like a club. I didn’t have time to wonder what he figured he’d accomplish with that. I hurled myself forward.
A magical grip caught my legs. Another spell smacked against the first. I stumbled as the strands of magic wrestled with each other.
“That’s enough!” one of the Assembly witches shouted, just as Rose made a slicing motion with her hand.
The pressure around my ankles shattered. I staggered toward her, and Jin tugged me into their midst between him and Rose.
My throat was still throbbing, but I had to use this moment of freedom, however short it might be.
I spun toward the Assembly officials. “I lied to you before. Frankford is the one who’s the real threat. You need to see what’s down the cliff.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Rose
The other Assembly members looked bewildered, but Frankford’s face twisted into a mask of anger. “You,” he snarled. His gaze jerked from Gabriel to me, his eyes blazing. He smacked one hand against his chest and thrust both upward in a stiff mockery of a witching form. Three guttural syllables I didn’t understand burst from his lips, and then, “I forsake the oath I took.”
The air shivered between us. I had only a split-second to register what that declaration might mean, that he’d somehow been able to make it on his own without my agreement to dissolve the oath, when he was thrusting his arms toward me, sending a bolt of searing energy straight at my heart.
My hands leapt up to cast a shielding spell, but I couldn’t have spun it out fast enough. I would have died if Gabriel hadn’t realized what was happening. Even as Frankford sputtered out his words, my consort was reaching for me. The heat of that spear of magic singed my skin, and I was stumbling out of the way at my consort’s yank as he threw himself in front of me.
Gabriel buckled an instant later, a pained breath hissing through his teeth. His side was blackened and seeping blood where Frankford’s spell had hit him. Frankford growled and lifted his arms again—and Investigator Ruiz charged up to him, snatching his wrists and hauling them behind his back.
I dropped to the ground as Gabriel sank to his knees. My fingers fluttered over his wound, summoning the energy to seal it, to dull the pain, anything I could do. From the raggedness of his breath, I wasn’t sure it hadn’t hurt internal organs I didn’t have the slightest idea how to start mending.
“He needs a medic,” I shouted to anyone who’d listen, clutching my consort’s shoulder. “Fast! Please.”
“Don’t worry about me,” Gabriel mumbled. He managed to raise his head. Pain had tensed his features, but his gaze found mine and held it. “I’m so sorry, Rose. I love you. I always loved you. I always will.”
My eyes welled up. Around me, the meeting I’d set up had erupted into chaos. Voices clashed and hands waved. Kyler knelt next to me. He’d torn off his shirt and pressed it to the wound on Gabriel’s side.
“What do you need me to do?” he said. “Who should I call?”
I didn’t know who the nearest medic was. There were a couple names I knew from Portland, but they wouldn’t come at some unsparked man’s request. I didn’t even know if they’d come at mine.
“Let me go,” Frankford was snapping at Ruiz.
She glared at him. “I witnessed an unauthorized use of hostile magic against an unprepared victim. This is my job.”
“How did you even do that?” Gwen Remington broke in. Her gaze twitched between us. This was the first time I’d ever seen a witching man cast magic of his own, so I’d bet it was a first for her too.
Not magic of his own. Magic he’d borrowed from those demons. My heart skipped a beat. He’d broken the oath. I could say anything I wanted about him now.
“He’s made a deal with the things in the cave down the cliff,” I said. “Him and a bunch of the other families—my father and the Almeidas and—I have a whole list of them, I have their records. They summoned monsters and they force them to give over power. They trick witches into unbalanced consortings and then force them to control the things.”
Frankford let out a scoffing laugh. “Listen to her. She’s completely delusional. An unprepared victim? I was defending my property and myself from this witch who’s determined to tear me down. I have a right to do that.”
“How many people have you torn down?” Damon retorted from where he was standing over me, his enchanted stick still gripped in his fist. “I’ve seen the files. I saw the creature down there. You’re as much a monster as it is.”
Frankford rolled his eyes toward the other Assembly officials. “And this is who she brings into her side. Unsparked men she’s dallying with. Impressionable young witches who don’t have the experience to know better. Jilted wives out for vengeance.” He nodded to Thalia.
Whatever spell he’d cast on her wasn’t broken. Her lips curled back as she tried to find words she could speak. “He’s lying,” she said. “He’s had a lot of practice at it, so he does it well. You can’t listen to him.”
“Oh, and they should listen to you? The Justice Division will definitely hear about this. High ranking Assembly members tramping around one of their colleagues’ homes searching for monsters on the word of a known degenerate? How long do you think your careers will last after this gets out?”
“If there’s nothing to see, what does it matter to you if we look?” Remington asked. The question would have reassured me if her stance hadn’t been so hesitant. She wanted him to convince her there was nothing to see. It’d be easier for her to believe I was a lunatic than that he was the head of some crazy conspiracy. Of course it would be. That was why his faction had been able to operate for so long.
“The principle matters,” Frankford said. He stood there, managing to look haughty even with his arms still restrained behind his back. “The fact that you’d take this witch’s word over mine matters. What kind of justice is this if any maniac can send the Assembly scrambling across the countryside? By the Spark, don’t you have better things to do?”
Justin Brimsey shifted his weight from one foot to the other. He didn’t want to be here anymore.
“You can’t listen to him,” Naomi said. “He’s trying to cover it up, still. You have no idea how many people he’s hurt.”
“How?” Miriam Travers said. “With these ‘monsters’ you’re going to claim are lurking around this property? Have you seen them too?”
My cousin hesitated. “No, but I know Rose wouldn’t make something like that up.”
“I’ve seen them,” I said. “So has he.” I squeezed Gabriel’s shoulder where I was still holding him.
“And me,” Damon said grimly. “And believe me, you won’t get it until you’ve seen that thing for yourself. Why the hell do you think we went to all this trouble to get you out here?”
Remington stiffened at his brash tone. A gleam of triumph lit in Frankford’s eyes. “You see,” he said. “This is what I tried to tell you about. The lengths her little group will go to. The disrespect they have for anyone who’s earned their authority. I know you’re smart enough not to be manipulated by ploys like that.”
They weren’t smart enough not to be manipulated by him. The Assembly members exchanged a glance, and I could read their thoughts on their faces. This whole situation was ridiculous. They’d been dragged out here for some sort of petty grudge-match. They might not have any great love for Frankford, but asking them to believe in a conspiracy of this size was a whole different ballpark.
They didn’t have any love for me either. He’d already poisoned them against me as well as he could.
I’d faced off against Frankford once and taken a deal to save myself and my consorts. But I hadn’t really saved anyone that way. I’d only given him the opportunity to hurt more people. This time I wouldn’t make that mistake.
If I had to go down to take him down too, then so be it. I hadn’t come this far for nothing. His demonic reign ended now.
I brushed my hand over Gabriel’s forehead and kissed him there. “I love you,” I murmured, needing to say it one more time so he’d know he hadn’t lost me anymore than I’d lost him. His breath stuttered as I stood up. Ky gripped him, helping to keep him steady.
“Sprout,” Gabriel croaked. The nickname wrenched at me, but I’d already committed to my final plan.
I’d never cast a spell this finely complex before, and I had to work it fast. But I couldn’t say I really cared if I hurt Frankford a little in the process. My fingers interlocked and broke apart. I called up all the energy of my spark, sending it to my hands as they darted and spun to draw the spell I needed.
Ruiz caught the movement. “Lady Hallowell!” she said, starting to move.
Not fast enough. With a tearing sensation in my chest, I threw the illegal spell into Frankford’s face.
“You’ll tell us the truth,” I said. “What’s in the cave down the cliff here? All of it!”
The other investigator grabbed me, but Frankford was already under the truth-spell’s effect and the compulsion of my question. His mouth twisted as he fought it, but only for a second.
“There’s a portal,” he said in a strangled voice. “To another plane of existence, where creatures live with powers unheard of here. We call them demons.”
His face flushed red. He yanked at his arms, but Ruiz clamped them in place. “Lady Hallowell told us the truth about what she saw?” she demanded. I guessed there was nothing illegal about taking advantage of an unsanctioned truth spell once it’d already been cast.
“She did,” Frankford grated out.
Brimsey’s face had paled. “What in the world do you do with these ‘demons’?” he said.
“We siphon power from them for our own ends,” Frankford said. “We—damn it—we let them drink magic from our witches in return.”
A chill ran through me. The files I’d read hadn’t been that clear about exactly how the witches his faction had used intervened. It wasn’t just about controlling the demons. It was about feeding them.
“I’ve heard enough,” Remington said. “I need to see what in the name of the Spark is going on.”
She turned on her heel and stalked toward the trees that hid the cliffside. The other two Assembly officials and their assistants hurried after her. Ruiz shoved Frankford toward her car.
“You stay with them,” she said to her colleague with a jerk of her head toward the people heading cliff-side. “Lady Hallowell isn’t going anywhere, are you?” Her gaze settled on me.
I shook my head. When the enforcer released me, I sank down with Gabriel again. Something in Ruiz’s eyes softened. “I’ll call for a medic as soon as Frankford is secure,” she said.
At those words, a desperation Frankford hadn’t quite reached before crossed his face. As if he’d only just realized how fully he’d lost, how far he was about to fall.
“Stop them!” he cried out to the guards he’d brought with him. “Don’t let them near that—”
Ruiz cut off his voice with a hand smacked across his mouth, but the guards were already charging after the other Assembly officials. The enforcer with them whipped out a spell, but the nearest guard deflected it and sent her stumbling backward. Frankford’s forces were well-trained.
I sprang up and dashed after them, but Thalia was even faster. Her breath rasped as we chased after the guards.
The enforcer tossed out another spell, managing to tangle one guard’s legs so she crashed to the ground. Remington whirled around at the sound of pounding feet as we reached the trees. She swept aside the spell another guard cast with a snap of her hand. The third guard hurled herself straight at the International Relations head.
“No!” Thalia cried. Her arms flung out. The magic she sent with them was more an instinctive parry than a consciously constructed spell.
The force of it smacked into the guard, shoving the woman to the side. Toward the edge of the cliff. Her arms wheeled, but she was already tipping. She plummeted over the edge.
Her body hit the rocks below with a sickening thump that made me wince.
The enforcer had just caught up with us. “We need another medic,” she muttered to herself, striding up to the cliff. “We…”
She glanced down. Her jaw set. She closed her eyes and turned away. She didn’t need to say anything for me to know there was no saving that witch.
“Go back to the house,” she ordered me and Thalia. “Keep away from the cliff.”
“We were just trying to protect—” I started.
“Go.”
Remington hesitated and then walked on toward the cliff’s path. I wavered, torn between wanting to confirm that they’d witnessed the horror below and not wanting to witness it again myself. The enforcer glowered at us. Thalia gripped my arm, and I turned back toward the trees.
The rest of my group and Ruiz was clustered around Gabriel, who was lying on the ground now. My heart stopped for a second before I saw him blink. Naomi looked up at me from where she’d crouched by my side.
“I think he’ll be all right as long as he’s seen to soon,” she said.
“The medic should be here in twenty minutes,” Ruiz said.
I caught her eye and gave her an apologetic bob of my head. “I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you everything earlier.”
“It’s quite the story,” she said with a ragged chuckle. “I think I’m going to have to see it for myself when my partner gets back.”
