Like spoiled meat and something… darker.
“No,” I moaned, knowing what it meant.
I’d smelled that carrion scent twice before. And both times it had come from an otherworldly creature chasing me down.
I pushed on, harder and faster. I could see a clearing just ahead. That had to be the tiny meadow where Luke’s cottage was. If I could just make it to Luke, he would save me, I was sure of it. I was so close.
Branches tangled in my gown and I ripped myself free of them and stumbled into the open.
But I was wrong. Luke’s cottage was nowhere to be seen. This was the wrong meadow. And it wasn’t empty.
A man in dark leather stood in the center of the clearing. He had to be one of the warlocks from the brotherhood Luke told me about - the ones who would love to get their hands on the magic we were supposed to be protecting, or worse, on me.
Beside the man was a huge, slavering canine. It looked like it had been sewn together from strips of meat, some hairy, some pale, some bruised and half-bleeding. The scent pouring off it was so loathsome that I nearly choked on it.
“Give me the book,” the man said.
I gazed at him in horror. He was tall and thin with long tangled hair hanging down over his dark leathers. He looked like he needed a bath.
“Never,” I said, standing my ground. I might die in this meadow, but I would do it like a hero, not a coward. I had already come so far. I wasn’t going to stop now.
His eyes fixed on the book in my hand and he glanced back up to my face.
I saw a flash of something like fear in his eyes. But that didn’t make any sense. I was a first-year witch, tapped out and tired. And he had a hellhound. Why would anyone be afraid of me?
But he wasn’t looking at me, he was looking at the book.
Of course. The book was filled with powerful magic. I could feel the energy surging in my hands from the moment I picked it up.
And he didn’t know I didn’t know how to use it.
That was probably the only reason he hadn’t already attacked. Maybe I could use his hesitation.
Praying that I had a little more magic in me, I gritted my teeth and tried to create another smoke screen. If I could distract him and run to Luke, all wouldn’t be lost.
But the smoke merely sputtered from my fingers and went out.
Shit.
I looked around desperately. There was a blanket of English ivy on the ground. I closed my eyes and called on it. Maybe my own special magic would still work for me.
I opened my eyes again to see the vines crawling over his feet.
But he laughed and made a striking motion in the air.
Instantly the vines retreated from his feet and began to crawl up mine, twisting around my ankles.
“You don’t even know how to use that book, do you, sweetheart?” he asked with an ugly smirk. “Might as well give a machine gun to a bunny rabbit.”
The vines had reached my arms, pushing them upward so that they were holding the book out to him.
He strode closer, the foul dog by his side, the air thick with their combined stink.
I wanted to scream as he plucked the book effortlessly from my grasp and began to page through it right there, just inches from my helpless hands.
My whole world was in shades of gray, I felt like a two-dimensional photograph in a newspaper.
The warlock found what he was looking for and began to murmur out the words of a spell at me.
Something crashed through the trees behind me, I couldn’t turn to see what it was, but I assumed it was something awful.
The dark man glanced up from the book, distracted from whatever he had hoped to do to me.
The stump beside him exploded and the hellhound yelped.
Nina appeared out of thin air on his other side.
“Nina?” I gasped.
Quick as a thought, he took one hand off the book and used it to punch her in the side of the head, hard.
I screamed as my friend fell to the ground like a bag of rocks.
Something was pulling at the vines around my feet and I strained for a better view, eyes landing on Cori, tugging fruitlessly at the thick foliage.
My friends had come to save me. I couldn’t let anything happen to them. Even if it killed me.
I drew on my magic until the world went pale and I felt my soul almost tug out of my body.
The vines let go of me with a strange popping sound, and I lunged and grabbed the book from the man’s hands as my vision blurred.
There was a tearing sound as he held onto a single page, but the book itself was safe in my hands again. I could almost feel its protest at losing that small part of itself.
“That’s enough,” the warlock screamed to the hellhound. “Kill them.”
I tumbled to the ground, too exhausted to even stand, curling my body protectively around the book as the shadows closed in from all sides.
The hellhound growled, a sickly, rasping sound that made the blood freeze in my veins.
It was all over.
The last thing I saw before the whole world went dark was the shape of something huge and furry leaping at us through the trees.
30
Luke
Luke, please. I need you…
Bella’s call set my blood on fire and I raced out the door, not bothering to close it behind me.
I slammed through the trees, crashing in the underbrush, but even my fastest wasn’t fast enough.
I paused, closed my eyes and invited my other self
