The sound of scratching echoed through the still graveyard, the six-hundred-year-old church standing tall in the gloom of twilight.
Eleanor’s fingers dug into the earth, feeling for the place where the earth energy leaked to the surface. She was so tired, so hungry for the power that would keep her from slipping back into the otherworld. Four hundred years she’d been clawing at the bottom rungs of life, searching for the ultimate revenge. Resurrection. Not just hers…all of them.
That bitch Gabrielle Cohen had banished her to the far reaches of the spirit realm, stealing her power and casting her sisters back into the void. The witch was so clueless. She didn’t even realize what she’d done! They would all pay—Gabrielle and Nye the most. When the coven was resurrected, they would beg for mercy.
Dirt clung underneath her fingernails, the life her five sisters had given her so she could claw her way back into the world of the living rejoicing as she found it. The ley line.
She smiled, her eyes beginning to glow with white fire as the ley line responded to her, filling her veins with the intoxicating energy of the earth. Her power was slowly being restored, her life force growing stronger with every passing moment, and soon, the generations of ancient Unhallowed witches would join her.
“Eleanor.”
She glanced up at the spirit before her and knelt, her knees pressing into the damp earth.
“Matriarch,” she replied, bowing her head.
“Explain to me why our coven still languishes in the otherworld?”
The spirit was the matriarch of the Unhallowed, the voice that spoke for them all. Eleanor was the matriarch’s heir, and the only one trusted enough to carry out this task, a weapon to be wielded in the war for resurrection. She answered to the higher power of the matriarch…her mother.
“I failed, but I have planted the seed,” Eleanor replied. “It may not be me who bares the fruit of our salvation, but it shall be borne.”
“This is our last chance at survival, child,” the matriarch snarled. “If you fail, you doom us all to oblivion.”
Eleanor smiled, knowing that it was only a matter of time before they got what they wanted. The seed had been planted, and now was the time to be patient and regain her strength. The time was coming when she’d need to strike, and Gabrielle Cohen would not get in her way a second time.
“You have nothing to fear, Mother,” she said, smiling up at the apparition. “Their love will be their undoing…and our salvation.”
Nye, Gabby and Isobel’s story will be continued in book six, The Keeping Place… coming soon.