We landed at a private airport that looked more like a paved backyard than an actual runway and were greeted by at least ten cars. One driver looked miserable, with his hands permanently balled into fists, so I assumed he was Rosenberg.
I spotted Ingrid, looking like her grown-up illusion, and was rushing over to make sure she was okay when I saw, “Sam!”
“Don’t sound so happy to see me,” he reproached, taking me into his arms.
“This is the dangerous stuff you’re not supposed to be a part of,” I explained.
“You’re not either,” he kissed the top of my head, then let me take Ingrid in for a hug. I tried to give him a look like we would talk about this after, but he didn’t seem the least bit concerned.
“It’s good to see you,” she told me once we pulled apart. There was a sense of excitement and fear in the air. It was what I imagined sports teams felt before they went out on the field, but then again, most athletes didn’t die if they lost their games.
Watching them come up with our strategy, I realized it was much more like troops preparing for a battle. Gabriel, Embry, Kate, Delia and Rosenberg all huddled together around a map they made on the ground from rocks and sticks, saying things like, “The witches will hang back as long as they can,” and “We can use the muscle for that.” The only mystery element was me. “What do we do with her?” Rosenberg moved his head to the side in my general direction.
“She’ll come with us,” Embry decided.
“It’ll be game over before half of us show up,” Rosenberg argued.
“With Sam?” Delia asked Gabriel. I wasn’t thrilled by how in sync they seemed to be, but she was a lot like me. She sat back and listened to everyone, but when she spoke, it was usually whatever I was thinking, right before I could cut in to say it.
“Embry and I will drive together while Sam hides Lucy. I need everyone to stay back as far as possible until we’re at the door. Once the fighting starts and everyone is outside, Sam and Lucy will go inside and find the missing ingredients. As soon as they have them, Sam will send up a flare and we get the hell out of there,” Gabriel looked around and got nods of agreement from everyone.
“Let’s get the party started,” Rosenberg clapped his hands, making more than a few of us jump, before everyone headed for a car and we left.
By the time Embry finally pulled into a driveway, I knew we were in the right place. Even without the garden that I recognized from Annabelle’s memories… there was just something dark and ominous about the house. It looked just like all the other ones from the outside, but I could feel it.
I could see the gazebo in the distance, but it was in a state of disrepair, like no one had bothered with it since Annabelle left. The fields surrounding it looked like they were left to their own devices except for a tiny patch right beside the house that was in full bloom.
“It’s not too late to change your mind,” Embry tried, looking to me and Sam in the back seat. The only part of the plan I wanted to change was me hiding inside while everyone else engaged in battle outside.
“I made up my mind months ago,” I assured him.
I was even more sure Henry knew we were here. He was always a million steps ahead of us, and even I could sense all the magic back at the airport. We were hoping mine would be lost in the sea of other powers. Or maybe our magic didn’t come anywhere near to even comparing to him, and we were thus less than blips on his radar.
Gabriel opened the back door to take his weapon, but his eyes rested on me. I bit my bottom lip and looked up at him, trying to convey everything I knew I couldn’t say to him, especially before a fight. That he needed to be careful, that I loved him, that I didn’t think we were a mistake and I couldn’t lose him. His eyes tried to be cold and professional, like when he was trying to run from his feelings at the beginning of the summer, but I could tell he also wanted to reach out and pull me close, so I could be safe in his arms. He lifted his hand, but Sam took my arm before he could do anything. We both needed to be invisible to get out of the SUV unnoticed.
Henry opened the door as the guys stepped onto the porch, wearing dress pants and a button-down shirt. This normalcy somehow made him even scarier. He took his time to walk out and join them, while his men stayed huddled behind him. I counted five, but there were probably more waiting inside.
“Can I help you?” Henry asked with that twisted smile, looking behind them, searching for me. I trusted Sam’s Gift, but I still pulled him behind the SUV. It was bad enough that everyone in a ten-mile radius could hear my heart racing.
“We came for the spell,” Embry said. “The one that keeps her alive.”
“You did?” Henry looked amused. “And what gave you the impression that I would give you the spell?” he asked. “Or do you plan on making a trade?”
“No, we plan on taking the spell and keeping her alive,” Gabriel said.
Henry tried to read their faces, knowing they wouldn’t have shown up blind and unprepared, hoping for a miracle after centuries of running from him at all costs. He started laughing as if Gabriel had just told him the most hilarious joke he’d ever heard, before he stopped, as suddenly as he had started.
I knew he’d already sensed them, like I had, but our reinforcements were coming into Henry’s view. He looked more annoyed than worried, but I knew we had a sizeable enough group to at least give him pause. He snapped his fingers and without a word, the men who had been waiting behind him filed past him to fight Gabriel and Embry, who were closest.
Henry had a few more lackeys who materialized out of nowhere, but they were incredibly outnumbered. Not that it mattered much when we had Terrence, whose Gift was taking confessions, fighting against a woman whose arms turned into tentacles that allowed her to choke four people at once.
Most of the Gifts on our side were rather harmless, or at least defensive, while Henry’s men were groomed to kill. Still, those with the most passive powers seemed to have trained harder to compensate. Sure, the way Rosenberg made his arms turn into swords, spiked balls and carving knives at will was terrifying, but Etta wielding her whip looked deadly. Everyone was holding their own, except for Ingrid, Kate, Lara, Gigi and the man with the dreadlocks, who were fighting Henry, hands clasped together to pool their powers. Even from where I stood behind the car, I could feel how strong their combined powers were, but it was nothing compared to Henry’s. Even with the metal spikes Mallory kept shooting at Henry whenever she had the chance weren’t doing much damage. Unless I got the missing ingredients soon, they would not last long. I could only imagine what would happen to everyone else if Henry was no longer distracted.
I couldn’t see myself, or Sam, but he followed without question when I brought us towards the house. Henry looked like he was distracted enough to not notice, but a part of me was convinced he could still see us, or at least sense me.
The house looked like it belonged in a photoshoot for a magazine, not like anyone lived in it. Everything was meticulously laid out to achieve the perfect look, except for the dining room that had leftover coffee cups and fast food bags all over it. I wondered if Henry had a rotating group of guards at all times, or if he brought his army here around the time he started actively hunting me.
“What are we looking for exactly?” Sam asked in a whisper once we were in what I assumed was Henry’s office.
“Splinter’s from the cross Jesus Christ was crucified on, vervain, a wooden cup and my heart,” I shared, looking for a safe rather than items lying around.
“I found the last one,” I could hear the smile in his voice, but he was keeping a hand on me to keep me invisible, even while everyone else was outside.
“This will take forever if you hold on to me,” I warned.
“It’ll take even longer if you’re dead.”
“We closed the door and I can sense when his magic is close,” I pointed out.
We had a mini staring competition before he decided it was better to get me out of there faster than to keep me invisible while in a locked room, riffling through Henry’s things.
Sam took the left side of the room while I scoured the right, which included a mahogany desk and three towering bookshelves. I gently pulled out each book, half-expecting the walls to shift and reveal a hidden passage to his secret lair.
“I found a safe,” Sam whispered, pulling me from my menial task.
“Try 0108,” I suggested.
“What’s that?” he asked.
“The day he married Annabelle,” I shrugged. If that didn’t work, I would suggest Margaret’s birthday, but my hopes weren’t high on that one.
I didn’t get to find out if I was right. I had barely touched the wooden chalice to move it aside, not even thinking of the cup of Yggdrasil, when I was gone…
“You’re not supposed to see the bride on the wedding day.” I was Talina, talking to the guy from the crowd of her coronation. His guilty smile immediately mollified her reproach.
“I asked to spend the rest of my life with you, not to spend twenty-four hours without being able to see you,” he argued, standing up to wrap his arms around her.
“You make an excellent point,” she agreed, burying her head into his chest. “Is everything ready?”
“My mother woke this morning with a fear that there won’t be enough food,” he shared.
“My father is helping her,” Talina agreed.
“Are you sure that this is what you want?” He brought up the real reason he came. His concern made others doubt him, Talina knew that, but it was one of the main reasons she decided on the full ceremony, rather than the partial one the women in her family usually performed.
“If something matters to you, go all in,” she repeated her mother’s words to him.
“All I can offer is my love,” he reminded her, like he was worried it wasn’t enough.
“And the purest of hearts. The warmest of smiles. The smoothest tongue to calm the voices inside my head, the strongest arms to hold me when I need to feel safe... you are more than worthy my love,” Talina said before giving Zeke a kiss, letting it go further than she’d intended before the ceremony, but she didn’t want him to doubt himself.
“There are enough traditions being broken, I’ll not let you break another,” Talina’s mother warned, coming in with a basket that held what looked like a wedding dress.
“And the first rule is to make sure I never upset you, Xiomara,” he gave her a warm smile.
“Empty words, Zeke,” she pretended to be stern, but her eyes smiled throughout.
“I shall see you both at dusk,” he bowed before retreating, leaving Xiomara to give her daughter a look.
“He worries he is not worthy,” Talina explained his presence to her mother.
“It won’t work if he isn’t,” Xiomara said simply.
“You told me to marry for love,” she was confused.
“You wouldn’t love someone who wasn’t worthy,” Xiomara waved her daughter’s comment away.
“Mama,” she reproached.
“You can marry whoever you choose. The bonds of the flesh need only the vows, and even then...” Xiomara shrugged like vows were not entirely necessary for that kind of bond.
“Mama!” Talina reproached once more.
“The Coalescence will not happen if Zeke is not worthy. You choose with your heart, but being worthy of love, and being worthy of your burden are not the same thing.”
“How will we know if it worked?”
“There will be no doubt in anyone’s mind. The legend is that the Coalescence is so miraculous to behold that it bathes the world in light.”
“Have you seen it before?”
“My grandfather used to say he chose not to steal my grandmother’s glory, but we both knew it was because he would fall short,” was her way of letting Talina know it had been generations since anyone saw it.
“Zeke is the best man I know. If he is not worthy, no man is,” Talina shared. “I’ve always resented the idea that love makes you blind. I think it gives you a perfect understanding of another human being. I see every fault and every good deed, so I know what kind of man he is.”
“Then I look forward to the brightest night in memory,” Xiomara hugged her daughter before carefully removing items from her basket. “Are you ready to begin?”
“Yes mama,” Talina smiled, taking a deep breath.
The memory continued with the Mother’s Love ceremony I saw at the airport, before Talina followed Zeke’s mother outside and went to stand at the front of the crowd, where Zeke was waiting. He took my hands in his and brought me to an altar. The smile on my face unable to express all the happiness Talina was feeling.
“You are the beat of my heart and the air in my lungs. You are the light in my life and the song in my soul,” he started, the nerves seeming to calm when he looked into Talina’s eyes, mirroring her tears.
“I take you for the love you hold in your heart, and the goodness in your soul.”
“I vow to spend my life caring for you and being true.”
“You are my priority, giving me strength through hard times and sharing my joy in good times.”
“I promise you honesty and patience, to spend each day becoming a better version of myself, and helping you to do the same.”
They took turns reciting the vows, before Zeke walked over to a table I hadn’t noticed before. There was a wooden cup in the middle of it, and he took a candle to light it on fire. “From the kindling of Emmanuel’s Betrayal burns the soul of his untouched child,” he said the familiar words with his hands hovering above the flames.
“Let the tears of Isis fuel the flames in the arms of Yggdrasil,” he added a handful of vervain, then took a ceremonial dagger and sliced into his own hand, “As the blood of the incumbent quells the fire, may the heart of the Bearer of the Crescent Moon originate the Coalescence.”
Talina took the dagger and sliced into her own palm, so by the time Zeke said Coalescence, he pressed his cut hand into hers, locking their fingers together, before a light, brighter than any I have ever seen, burst from my heart and surrounded us all. Everyone except Zeke, who completely disappeared into the light…
I was breathing fast when I came back to myself, trying to process what I just saw. So many thoughts were going through my mind. Mostly the fact that those words weren’t actually for a ritual to summon power through nefarious means, but also how my heart wasn’t so much an ingredient as where the ‘coalescence’ bursts out from. Then again, the Coalescence looked more like a wedding than anything else.
I turned and excitedly told Sam what I saw, grateful this was one of the times where I acted out the memory rather than passing out. I saw Sam’s face light up, but before he could reply, I got a sinking feeling in my stomach and turned to find Henry standing in the doorway.
“Do I even bother offering you the chance to join me, one last time?” he asked, stepping closer to me. I stepped back, but there was nothing but wall behind me. I could no longer see Sam and hoped he was gone to get help rather than doing something reckless.
“I would still rather die,” I told him.
Sam chose that moment to rush at Henry with a letter opener. He was invisible, so I saw the weapon disappear from the table a second before the flick of Henry’s hand sent Sam flying into the wall.
“It seems a pity to knock out the last of my line, but if you leave me no other choice…” Henry said as if Sam was nothing more than a fly he swatted away.
“Go to hell,” I said, resigned to not let him see my fear. The fact that no one followed him inside the house did not bode well for the men and women who came with me.
“Been there, done that,” he said, his smile making my skin crawl before he put up his hand and I suddenly felt paralyzed, unable to move or even scream. It was just like Cassie’s dreams, and it turned out my magic was useless too. “Now I promised you I would cut your heart out of your still beating chest, and I am sure you have figured out that I am a man who keeps his promises,” Henry said with a gleam before pulling a knife out of nowhere and planting it in the top of my chest, far enough from my heart or any major arteries so he wouldn’t damage the coveted ingredient, but also ensuring that I would be alive to feel the pain for as long as possible.
Inside, I was screaming. In agony and for Gabriel and Embry, but I knew I wasn’t making a sound, just like my arms and legs were refusing to move as I willed them to. I had just decided to do like Beth had done, to close my eyes and let death take me, but Henry wasn’t done with me yet. He stood and stared at me for a moment that felt like an eternity before saying, “It wasn’t really you I made that promise to. Your misfortune lies in that you look so incredibly like her. The birthmark is your actual curse, but my Annie, she broke a lot of hearts.” The knife was in my chest, but he was taking his absolute time killing me. “You may not believe it, but I loved her once. More than life itself, I thought. I saw her crescent moon on our wedding night. Having it be on her neck nearly took all the joy out of it. I found the last piece of my puzzle, that I had spent over a century trying to complete, yet I couldn’t bear to use it. I spent years searching for a way to achieve my life’s purpose without losing her. There was a time I hoped that her loving me would be enough. My heart was hers, so if she loved me the same, I might have…” he stopped cutting, and looked away from me. When he came back to me, he was no longer nostalgic. If I didn’t know any better, I would think he was hurt. “Unfortunately, she had taken my heart, but given hers to another. I should have killed her then, but still, she was the mother of my child, and I was convinced I could make her love me. I thought the spell in her grimoire solved all of our problems, but she broke my heart all over.” The anger in his voice was reflected in his movements, as the knife went farther than it had previously, catching my breath.