The night around me was still, but I froze the moment I stepped back into the moonlight, brow furrowed.
Someone was calling me.
Not physically. No, this was magic curling around my hands, leading me deeper into the cemetery.
It wasn’t hypnotizing or forceful. If I wanted to ignore it, I could. I should, even. I should go back to my allies and get the hell out of here.
But I didn’t. I couldn’t.
You’re the one she kidnapped and put into a messy little dream loop, right? Have we forgotten that already?
Merric’s words echoed forcefully in my ears and I was half-sure that if I looked around, he’d be here taunting me.
“We haven’t forgotten that,” I whispered, tail curling at my back and ears flattening.
I followed the beckoning, magical whisper.
It led me on a straight path, past tombs and crypts and too many names to count.
I let it.
No one stopped me. I didn’t see or sense anyone else as I walked, and I was sure it was deliberate.
Finally, the magic stopped. I blinked in the near darkness, my eyes traveling around the open area in front of me.
Torches flickered to life, casting blue, eerie light on the stone and wrought iron of the tombs and fences around us. The air was crisp and clear, not thick with magic like the tomb had been. This far in, I could hear nothing over the sound of my own heart, even with the enhanced senses of my half shifted form.
Colette Villere, leader of the New Orleans Coven, stood less than twenty feet from me.
Her head was bowed and she faced away from me, hands holding herself up on an altar that dripped something dark and thick to the stone below.
Judging by the way she sagged, the coven leader looked tired.
“All I’ve ever wanted is prosperity for my witches,” the woman murmured, voice barely above a whisper. “A place for us in this city. Over the years I’ve protected us from shifters, vampires, and everything else.” She laughed humorlessly. “Never did I think a witch would cause me this much trouble.”
“You brought this on yourself,” I said tiredly. “When you kidnapped Aveline. When you tried to take away my freedom.”
She shook her head. “I wanted to protect you. Don’t you get that? You’re a Levasseur summoner. The first in how many generations? Do you understand how few summoners exist in this world? How many fewer still have cards of the Arcana?” Her shoulder slumped. “You could’ve joined us. You could’ve made us so powerful.”
“That was my choice to make. I had no intention of joining you, but neither did I want to harm any of you.You forced me into this by taking away my choices.” I spoke with a defiance I felt, and confidence I did not.
She let out a long suffering, exhausted sigh. “Perhaps I have become soft in my old age,” the woman went on. “Time was, I would’ve snuffed out your life the moment you became a threat to me. I gave you the opportunity to be someone important. To be loved. But you could only spit in my face.”
Before I could reply she turned on me, and I was able to catch sight of her rune-painted face and bloodstained hands a second before her fingers were reaching towards me, knuckles bent.
I gasped, clawing at my neck as an invisible hand closed over it. What was it with Colette’s witches and going straight for the throat?
She stepped forward, lifting her hand, and my feet left the ground. I was thrown back into one of the mausoleums, the air whooshing from my lungs as I still fought to breathe.
“Was it worth it?” she asked, her eyes sharp. The blue torchlight painted her in an otherworldly glow, the unsteady light making the runes seem to shimmer on her face.
Never give a ritualist a chance to prepare, Aveline had told me once. Caught off guard, they’re no better than a hedge witch. If you give them enough time, they’ll figure out how to move heaven and earth to take you down. Don’t let them.
I’d let her. I’d given her ample time and hadn’t tried to surprise her. I’d walked here when she called and let her have the advantage.
Now I was going to pay for it with my life.
My two cards couldn’t be called back so soon, and I couldn’t force myself to shift with her magic gripping me, cutting me off from my wolf.
And she knew it.
“Was it worth it?” The old woman’s words were laced with hatred and scorn. “To save the monsters you’ve only met? They aren’t even your kind. They were always going to leave you to die.” She laughed, then, and the sound was high pitched and wild. “They aren’t here to save you, but you’ll die for them.”
I gasped around her magic, fighting to speak. “They–“ I choked on my own words. “They don’t need to save me!”
Willing my magic to answer me, I called out in desperation for the one card I hadn’t summoned in well over a year. I couldn’t call The Devil and The Chariot again so soon; my magic with them was spent for the time being.
I didn’t know if The Moon had an Aspect. The Form itself was too much for me; how did I know the Aspect would be any better?
Now I called the Form of the Moon to me, letting magic spill from the card in my hands as glowing runes encircled both my palms. It was only one card, but it took everything I had in me to summon it.
A wolf howled close by. Then another. Instead of pushing my magic into The Moon, the Arcana Form–or Forms–seemed to pull it out of me like a rope. They barely needed a magical command, unlike my other two cards.
A white, spectral wolf sprang from the roof of the tomb, transparent and with a long, flag-like tail that streamed in an invisible wind.
Colette’s face fell in surprise and her magic on me loosened, though she
