Chapter 27
“Alex.”
Darkness swirled around me.
“Alex, wake up.”
Beyond the darkness was pain. Thundering, searing pain. I clung to the cool darkness, but the voice dragged me forward, into the pain.
“Alex, now would be a good time to wake up.”
I pried my eyes open. Roy’s face slowly emerged from the red haze.
“Go away.”
“Shhhh,” the ghost hissed, clapping a hand over my mouth.
He woke me to tell me to shut up? I groaned and rolled over. Why do I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck?
The van. The wreck. I had been hit by a truck.
I jolted upright. “Falin?”
The world spun, black dots filling my vision, and my stomach flipped. Roy caught my shoulders before I collapsed.
“Maybe not quite so fast,” he said. “And keep quiet. They are fifteen feet away.”
They? I blinked, pressing the heel of my hand against my forehead. “What happened?”
“Well, you abandoned me in a stranger’s house. I caught up just as a big van full of nasty fae plowed into you. They dragged you out of the wreckage, spelled you, and then brought you here. I followed, and I’ve been trying to wake you for the past hour. I finally figured out I had to take that damn disk off your neck.”
But where is here? I looked around.
A thin barrier of red stretched beyond my feet, surrounding me on all sides. I reached out, feeling the tingle of magic. I pushed through the feeling and met solid resistance in the translucent light. I’ve been circled.
The world beyond the circle was hard to make out. I thought I saw the edge of a bed, and I was sure I could see a large candlestick. Another barrier flashed beyond that. I’m in a circle inside a circle? I rolled to my knees and leaned into the barrier, ignoring the biting tingle of magic that crawled over my skin as I cupped my hands over my eyes and peered through the magic.
Definitely a bed. I was in a bedroom? Something moved on top of the mattress. A loud moan trembled through the air, making the skin along my spine itch.
“Hey!” I yelled, slamming my fists against the barrier.
“What was that?” a female voice asked. She sounded familiar.
“Nothing,” a man answered. “I have a surprise for you.”
An arm appeared over the edge of the mattress, followed by a man’s sweat-soaked bare back. He twisted, his gaze cutting into me, and I found myself staring into the face of the late Governor Coleman.
I reeled back, landing on my ass. Roy’s body was dead. Coleman’s face had to be glamour. I knew that. But the man looked like Coleman. He reached down, grabbing at nothing on the floor, and white silk cords appeared in his hand.
Oh crap.
Bed. Silk cords. Woman. He’s going to kill again.
“Stop.” I beat my fists on the barrier. I focused on the only part of the woman I could see, a bare leg. “Run, dammit!”
“Are you crazy?” Roy pulled me back from the edge of the circle. “The bad guy is out there, and you can barely sit up straight.”
“He’ll kill her.”
“I heard something.” The woman pushed up to her elbows. Blond hair fell over her shoulders.
Casey.
“I’m sure it’s nothing,” Coleman said, crawling over her. His hand moved to her face, turned her away from me.
My stomach twisted, and I ripped free of Roy’s grasp.
Pushing up to my feet, I rammed into the barrier. Pain exploded through my body as every ache from the car wreck intensified. Casey didn’t even look up. She can’t hear me.
Coleman wrapped the cord around her wrist and guided her back down on the mattress. Dammit.
“Casey. Get out of there.”
She didn’t react. Coleman moved to tie her feet.
Okay, Alex, think. I looked around. I was in a nearly soundproof circle with a ghost. I was clearly glamoured to be invisible, because Casey didn’t know I was there.
Coleman did; he’d looked directly at me. Why did he bring me here? I had to get out. I had to reach Coleman before he began his ritual.
“Help me overload this circle,” I said to Roy as I tapped the magic in my ring. I couldn’t draw outside magic through someone else’s circle, but no one had taken my charms.
“I don’t think—”
“That’s my sister with that killer.”
Roy frowned, but he joined me at the edge of the barrier.
He pressed against the red haze separating us from the rest of the room, and sparks ignited in the barrier.
His face contoured—ghosts were pure energy held together by will and personality. I’d asked something dangerous from him, but I had to reach Casey before it was too late.
I channeled the raw magic from my ring into the barrier.
More sparks appeared. I drained the ring. The haze wavered. It didn’t break. Damn. Sliding off my charm bracelet, I pressed the sliver charms into the barrier. If I can hit it with enough magic …
It didn’t fall. What else can I hit it with? I glanced down. A small circular disk was on the floor—the spell the fae had used to knock me unconscious. I pushed it with the edge of my boot, shoving it into the barrier.
Still not enough.
Roy pulled back, more translucent than normal. My ring was empty. The charms in my bracelet had overloaded.
What else do I have?
The dagger.
I could still feel the enchantment tingling at my ankle—Coleman hadn’t taken it. Bending made my ribs protest, and my vision spun as I crouched, but my fingers found the hilt. Drawing my hand back, I jabbed the enchanted steel into the circle.
The blade sank in up to the hilt. Streaks of lightning shot through the barrier. The dagger began to glow, searing the skin on my palm. I jerked back. The dagger hung in the barrier, angry flashes of light cutting through the air around it.
“Get back,” I yelled to Roy—not that either of us had much room to go anywhere.
I crouched as close to the center of the small circle as possible and covered my head with my arms. Magic zinged through the air, making my hair stand on end.
Then the circle imploded.
The magical backlash tore around us, knocking me to the ground. A woman screamed. Coleman cursed. The dagger hit the carpet.
I grabbed it. The hilt burned in my grasp, but no magical resonance emanated from the blade. The enchantment overloaded. At least it was still a weapon.
I crawled to my feet, my body protesting. I ignored it.
I forced my legs under me.
“Alex?” Casey tried to sit up, but she had only one hand left free.
“Damn you,” Coleman said. He grabbed Casey’s wrist and strapped it down. Then he turned to me.“Obey me.”
Fear clutched at my throat as his voice crashed through my consciousness. No. The dagger slipped from my fingers. I couldn’t see the slave chain, but I could feel Coleman’s will battering mine. I fell to my knees, my arms wrapping around my bruised ribs—maybe if I could only hold on tight enough, I could keep myself inside me and Coleman’s commands out. It didn’t help.
I gasped and embraced the pain in my body, letting it remind me I was alive and I was me. I needed to focus.
Casey yelled something, alarm tainting her voice. I had to get Coleman’s attention off her until …
Until what? There was no guarantee help was on the way. Falin—A new ache, one that had nothing to do with my body, ripped into me. I didn’t know what had happened to Falin. I didn’t know if he was alive or dead.
The back of my throat burned. No help was coming. No one knew Casey was in danger. No one knew where I was. Still, stalling was my only option. At least until I had the strength to sit up straight.
“What do you want?” I whispered, my voice shaking as I fought to keep my thoughts my own.
Footsteps scrunched in the carpet, and a large hand wrapped itself in my hair, jerked my head back. I blinked at Coleman, his face only a foot from mine.
“What do I want?” he repeated. He laughed, but the sound was rough, and his thin lips curled back in rage.
“What do I want? I want the fear and respect I deserve. That the fae deserve. The King of Faerie is an old fool.
His stand of equality and harmony with humans is preposterous.
It is time for his rule to end, and you, my dear, are going to help me.”
I shook my head, my hair pulling with the movement.
“I won’t. Even if I could.” I’d die first.
“Oh, you can,” he said. Dark light reflected in his pupils, and his mouth twisted into a cruel smile. Nothing sane looked out at me from those eyes. He leaned closer.
“You can. And you will.”
Coleman released my hair, shoving me back to the ground. Then he held up a hand and ripped a hole in space. A gray-cloaked shadow stepped through the opening. “Don’t let her interfere,” he told the cloaked figure.
“It’s her,” Roy whispered.
I looked up as the specter of a woman approached.
She held up a dull hand, and I could feel the static of magic crackling around her skin. I swallowed. The Shadow Girl.
“Teddy, what’s going on?” Casey jerked against her restraints. “Let me up. Let me go.”
Coleman ignored her. He pulled a curved blade from a bag beside the bed. No! I struggled to my feet. The Shadow Girl stepped forward. She pressed two fingers against my forehead, and pain laced through my body.
My muscles turned to jelly. I collapsed. The air rushed out of me. Drawing in more air was hard, requiring more strength than I possessed.
Coleman looked up. “It’s time. Open the gate.”
The Shadow Girl nodded. She lifted her hands, and magic leaked over my skin, wrapped around me. Sinister strings slithered across my throat, my chest, threatening to crush me. I couldn’t imagine anyone channeling so much magic, but it poured out of her, through her.
Darkness crawled over the ceiling above us. Then the darkness split like a rift. The night sky appeared. The moon, full and closer than I’d ever seen, hung directly over the room. The shadow of the eclipse bled over one side. The Blood Moon.
But it was more than that. I was looking at stars I’d never seen. At a sky close enough to reach. The sky of Faerie.
Coleman returned to the edge of the bed. He chanted, lifting the wickedly curved knife, and Casey screamed. I squeezed my eyes closed and pushed up to my hands and knees. The Shadow Girl surged forward. I rolled, trying to get out of reach. It didn’t work. Her hand still caught me, and pain ripped through my body.
I found myself panting into the carpet. Warm moisture dripped onto my hand. I blinked at it.
Water? No. Tears.
The Shadow Girl was crying silent tears. A ghost girl of blood is worth treasure in silver chains, and if she is a fool, by commands she’ll know my pains. Her verse wasn’t a threat. It was both warning and explanation.
She was a slave.
Casey screamed. Blood trickled down her ribs. I had to do something, and I had to do it now.
“Help me,” I whispered.
The Shadow Girl’s cloaked head dropped. Her hand lifted. Magic sparked around her fingers. The message was clear. She couldn’t help me. Whatever was left of her, of whom she’d been once, was buried, and she couldn’t disobey Coleman. Which meant, slave or not, as long as she was between me and Casey, she was my enemy.
I opened my senses. The dark magic in the air clawed at me, trying to worm into my mind. I ignored it. Let it do its worst. I could fight only so many battles. I would either win or die in this circle.
I was out of magic, cut off from the source, but I reached with my senses. There had to be something I could use trapped in the circle with me. I opened my shields. There was grave essence in the air. Bodies. Bodies hidden from sight by glamour, but I could feel them.
I let the power sweep into me. Let it fill me with the chill. My vision changed. The world decayed, magic became a physical substance swirling in the air around me, and the glamour vanished. The dead bodies that had been invisible snapped into focus. Rodger I knew, but the other two I’d seen only from a distance. Father’s guards.
I didn’t have time to focus on those already dead.
My gaze snapped to Coleman. Without the glamour, his body was Graham again. Lines of glyphs covered the stolen skin. He turned, a smile cutting his face.
“Yes, Alex Craft,” he said, his manic eyes glittering.
“Yes, grab your power. Merge realities. I will transcend all planes. They will be mine to rule.”