“No. No, no, no.” I pat Gwen’s cheek, my head flooding with all the things I could have done wrong. They are totally limp, not breathing, and I can’t see anymore because my eyes are filled with tears. They can’t be dead. Please don’t be dead. “Gwen, sweetie, I can’t do this without you or Kat. I can’t live without you guys.”
Prudence kneels next to Kat. “They shouldn’t have died. The spell may not have worked, but you paid more than enough. This could not be the consequence.”
I’m still crying. I did this to them—I should have never been so reckless. “What do we do?”
Prudence gives me a sad look. “All we can do is wait.”
“Wait? For what? For him to bust the door down?” I lay down next to Gwen, hugging her. I can’t look into her dead eyes, so I close them. This can’t be happening, but I can’t hear her heart.
They both look dead.
Dead.
“This can’t be right,” Prudence says again. Her disbelief is surprising, what with her initial assumption that I was crazy to even try. “Your composition was well conceived, and we poured everything into it.”
“I must have missed something,” I whisper.
“I don’t think so.” She puts her hand on Kat’s stomach, presses as if it’ll wake her up.
“But we are missing something now, perhaps,” Nana croaks, and then goes into a coughing fit.
I force myself to look at Gwen again, searching my mind for anything that might fix this. We can’t raise the dead—or rather, the sacrifice is too heinous to even consider it. And there isn’t time anyway. I can feel his magic pressing in all around us, hungry and excited for the pain he’ll soon inflict.
“I’m so sorry, Gwen.” I take her hand, trying to pretend that she’s still here. “I don’t know what to do. I just wanted to give you magic. I never thought . . .”
I gasp when I feel it. Magic is leaving my body, being drained like when Levi sucked it out of me. I jump up, scared that he found a way to Curse me, but the feeling disappears as quickly as it came. I search the room for the threat, but I see nothing. No Shadows.
“Josephine?” Tessa says, as if I’m on the doorstep to insanity. “Are you okay?”
“I thought I felt—”
Gwen’s finger twitches.
I put my hand over my mouth. Of course! Rushing back to her, I grasp her hand and push my magic into her. If I feel bad without magic for even a few minutes, how awful would it be for a body to suddenly need it and not know what to do? They’re empty. New.
Her hand tightens around mine, and I let out a joyful squeak. “Pru, take Kat’s hand and give her some magic.”
Her eyebrow raises. “What?”
“They’re not dead! They’re empty.”
“Ohhh.” She grabs Kat’s hand and gets to work. “C’mon, sweetheart, time to wake up.”
Gwen moans. Her eyes flutter open and fix on mine. “Did I die? I have a feeling I died.”
“You did.” I can barely breathe as I look at her, a strange and unreal recognition rushing through me. My blood . . . it’s in her now. I can feel her power. She is definitely a witch, and more than that, she is a Hemlock. Not just in name, but in blood.
She’s my sister.
Gwen pulls herself up, rubbing her eyes. “And now I’m back?”
“I think you were . . . reborn.”
Kat groans as she comes to, and I feel it again. Sisterhood. True, perfect sisterhood. “You said we wouldn’t die, liar.”
“I didn’t know!”
“Whoa.” Kat puts her hand to her head. “Is this magic? That tingling in the air?”
“Yeah. Can you breathe it in? Hold it inside you?” I’m terrified waiting for their answer. What if I made them like Levi? What if they have to feed off us for magic? That would be worse than death, to have turned them into monsters.
They both close their eyes, and after a few deep breaths they smile.
“That’s . . . fantastic,” Gwen says. “I feel like I can conquer the world if I wanted to.”
I let out a relieved sigh. They’re real witches. There are more Hemlocks in the world, and having four in one room makes me realize why the Blacks want us gone. We are powerful, and we can stop this. I tackle them both into a hug, relishing all the family surrounding me.
“We don’t do that whole world-domination thing, Gwen.” Maggie bounces over to us. “But maybe we should tell you the rules after we kick the shit out of that Shadow.”
“Margaret!” Tessa says.
She rolls her eyes. “C’mon, Mom, I know you want to. And now it’s six on one! We just have to go out and get him.”
“No,” I say, the happy moment already gone. “We’re not going out there—he has the advantage.”
Maggie tilts her head. “Huh?”
“He has a massive amount of magic. Hundreds of times what we can store.” I stand, pacing the room as I think. “If we leave our property, we only have what we can hold. That’s not enough. We have to do this on our turf. Here, on this land. We have an infinite well of magic if we stay here. All he has is what he’s stolen.”
“He won’t get any more from me. I refuse to take it in,” Nana says, her voice so weak it hurts my soul.
I offer a sad smile. “Strong to the bitter end, aren’t you?”
“Of course, dear. I will do what I can.”
Prudence makes a disapproving face. “But take down the barrier? Let him on this land? He would taint it with all that perverse magic.”
“No, he can use up his magic trying to get it down. It’ll give us a little time to—”
A deafening crack shudders through the house, and we cover our heads as the jars and bottles rattle against the cabinet doors. Once everything is still, I rush to the window.
At the gate stands an older version of Levi, his eyes as wild as his smile. And yet his suit is crisp, as if he’s here to talk realty. Which, in a sick way, he kind of is.
When his eyes find me, my entire body goes cold under his cruel gaze. I can’t help but feel terror—Jeff is so much worse than I expected. A million times worse than Levi. I’m not even sure one could call him by his human name—he is that Consumed by the darkness. I recognize the feeling immediately—it’s exactly what I felt when I cleansed my dad.
He wants to take everything I have.
He will enjoy slowly destroying me.
He puts his finger to the gate’s latch, and even though no one uninvited can enter, it opens.