My jaw dropped. “He lied to me, but why?”
“Well, it would make sense if he was up to something dastardly and wanted us distracted and fighting each other.” Hilda threw up her hands. “I just can’t believe it’s him who’s causing all of this to happen. He’s a simpleton. His wife was the one with the magical prowess. There’s no way he could have the power to perform such an advanced spell. There must be another explanation.”
“Would a simpleton have an altar under his store? I’m new at all this, but it looked like he was performing some powerful magic to me. And he has the book. The one we got from Vermilda.”
Hilda stared daggers at me. “If that’s true, then we must investigate.”
“When we went there, he looked as scared as we all were,” Katie said. “If he’s the one responsible for all of this, why would he be frightened?”
“I don’t know,” Hilda said. “I wrote off Frank as the culprit because I knew him to be completely devoid of magical power.”
“I don’t think so,” I said. “He melted your golem and made a locator spell.”
Hilda gritted her teeth. “It seems like I have underestimated him. Come along. We must see what Frank knows about this whole situation.”
“What about Samantha?” Katie said.
“I’ll summon our best healer to help her, but we must go now. Who knows what Frank is planning?” Hilda snapped her fingers and a witch, dressed in orange with a big, purple hat, appeared out of thin air. “See to the hurt one in the bus and make sure she is all right.”
The witch nodded. “Yes, ma’am.”
“And be quick about it. When you’re done, bring her to help you.” Hilda turned to me. “Shall we?”
I turned to Katie. “Stay here and make sure they take care of Samantha.”
“No way,” she replied. “I’m going with you.”
“There’s nothing you can do, ghost,” Hilda said.
“So, I’m just supposed to trust you to watch out for Anna?” Katie asked, throwing her hands up.
“No,” I said, taking a step closer and looking into Katie’s face. “Trust me.”
She teared up and looked away. “Fine, but be careful.”
“I will,” I turned back to Hilda. “Let’s go.”
Hilda nodded and snapped her fingers, and just like that we vanished from sight.
Chapter 54
We rematerialized in front of the Witch’s Brew. The sky was still dark, but the light from the rift was approaching the strip mall quickly and seemed to increase with each passing second.
“The rift will be over the store in a couple of minutes. Then, we won’t be able to stop whatever Frank has planned.”
“How do we stop him?”
Hilda walked to the door. “I don’t know. That depends on what he’s planning. But if we don’t stop him, who knows what he will unleash on this planet.”
“Should we really be going in there with just the two of us?”
“No,” Hilda said. “But aside from the one helping your friend, Samantha, it’s taking every ounce of mana we have just to keep this darkness from spreading.”
Hilda placed her hand on the door and an explosion pushed her backwards toward the street. She pushed herself up and brushed herself off. “This is old magic. Nothing that a simpleton like Frank could command. Hexious Revil.”
She waved her hand across the building, and a giant orange orb revealed itself. Letters and symbols floated around the translucent orb encasing the door.
“It is as I feared. These wards are almost ancient in their construction. These spells are buried deep in the central branch of the library. There’s no way he could have known about them without help.”
“Can you break them?” I asked.
“Well, of course. Even old magic is not immune to blunt force. Tilforcian Blazian Ugmendo.”
Hilda held out her arms in front of her, and a giant beam of blue light shot out and blasted into the orange orb. It seemed to be able to take the force of the blast without being destroyed, but then Hilda’s eyes glowed white, and the beam intensified. The orb bent and cracked, until it exploded and shattered into a million pieces. The shards vanished.
“There,” Hilda said, straightening her blue coat. She walked forward, grabbed the handle, and whispered something I couldn’t understand. The knob glowed red before it fell off entirely, and the door swung open. “In we go.”
Inside, barbed wire still lined the floor, glowing in many different colors. Hilda held me back as I walked inside. She closed her eyes and muttered something under her breath. Then, she snapped her fingers and wisps of purple smoke came out of her mouth. As the wisps snaked around the room, the barbed wires exploded, leaving nothing but singe marks where the wires had been.
Hilda pushed her arms apart and the purple wisps became blue lights that led the way through the room. She stepped forward confidently and pushed open the door to the back room with the slightest nudge of her fingers.
“We mustn’t dawdle, Anna,” she said. “Time is of the essence.”
“You just moved through those barbs like it was nothing.”
“Of course I did, dear. Those spells I have seen before, and when you have seen everything, nothing scares you. You could learn it too someday, if you weren’t so headstrong. I can see your magical aura now, where it was lost to me before.”
“Who says I want to learn it?”
“I suppose nobody, actually, except for everybody in the world. I’ve never met somebody who didn’t want to be a witch or a warlock.” Hilda pressed on the back wall, but nothing happened. “How does this all work to get down to the subbasement?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “He closed the door and we just fell.”
“Ah,” she said, walking back across the room and closing the door. “Of course. Belonius.”
The room started to shake and began to shoot downward more quickly than it had the last time. My stomach moved into my mouth, and I wanted to vomit. Luckily, the room stopped right before I was
