Crap. Dracula knew magic.
Instantly, I jumped back, slipping my dagger back into its sheath. The stake might work, but I’d never get close enough to him to use it and I knew it. Instead, I quickly unzipped the fanny pack and pulled out a vial of my blood. There was only one way to take care of Dracula, at least as far as I was concerned. My confidence shaken, I forced myself to stand my ground.
I pulled the cork out of the vial with my teeth and, before I could actually stop to think about what I was doing, I raced directly toward him, splashing the blood in his face. Some of it missed but a few ounces managed to spray his cheek. His face sizzled as smoke wafted up into the air.
Dracula hissed, narrowing his eyes as he reached toward the burning spot on his face. It looked like he had an acid burn, and I realized that Essie was right—witches’ blood was an incredible weapon against the ancient vampire. If we could get enough on him, we might be able to put him out of commission for a while. At this point I wasn’t convinced anybody could kill him, the energy of his aura was so incredibly strong. If he was like this when he was weak, I dreaded thinking what he’d be like at full strength.
Dracula waved his fingers to my right, and a blinding flash behind me startled me enough into turning around. Max was in his weretiger shape, crouching on the ground, letting out a pitiful yell as he rubbed his face with his paw. I wasn’t sure what had happened, but he had obviously shifted quickly enough to rip his clothes off him.
At that moment, Aegis came flying across the room, tackling Dracula and taking him to the ground. They scuffled, rolling on the ground. Dracula might be strong, but Aegis was as well, and it looked as though they were almost evenly matched.
I turned to Sandy, who was kneeling by Max in tiger form, frantic. “How is he?”
“I think he’s injured,” she said, trying to convince him to let her touch him.
But Max swatted at her, growling deep in his throat, and then he slinked away, low to the ground, trying to hide from her.
“Your pack—the vials. Quick!” I grabbed two more of the vials out of my own pack.
Cautiously approaching the fighting vampires, I was terrified at the display of strength and fury that I was witnessing. Aegis’s eyes had turned thoroughly crimson, which meant he was completely caught up in his predator self.
Dracula, too, was fighting fang to fang. This was a fight to the death and only one of them could walk away. I pulled open the stoppers on the two vials, and waited for my chance. As Dracula straddled Aegis, his hands around Aegis’s throat, I managed to sidle in at an angle where I could see his face. Before he could look away, I threw the blood directly into his eyes.
Dracula screamed as I threw the other vial on his face as well.
Sandy came running in with hers, but she tripped and fell, the vials slipping out of her hands to land on Aegis. The blood trickled down to Dracula’s fingers, and he let go, staggering back, clutching at his eyes.
There were no flames, but it looked like acid was eating away at the flesh. I grabbed up my stake and started pursuit. As I was racing toward him, Dracula whirled, raising his hand.
A wave of energy slammed into me so hard that it knocked me off my feet and I went flying back through the air, crashing against the wall. My stake went skittering across the floor as the room began to spin. I gasped for air, trying to catch my breath.
Inside, I could feel my fire began to grow. I tried to contain it, but it was as if gasoline had just been thrown on my inner flame. As I stood, my only focus and thought was to burn the vampire who had done this to me. Aegis, Sandy, and Max vanished from my thoughts as my sole focus turned to Dracula.
Memories of the village in Romania swept over me, and the passion I had felt as the flames raced down the mountainside returned in full force. I held up my hands, conjuring two balls of fire to flicker in my fingers. Somewhere in the distance, I heard Sandy shouting something, but I couldn’t be bothered to listen.
The only thing I wanted was to destroy Dracula in fire and flame, to rid the world of his evil. I stoked the fire, feeding it as it grew stronger. It sprang from a ball of fire in my hand to flames shooting from my fingertips and I held my hands out, aiming at Dracula, and sent the full force of my anger and fury out like a whip of flames in the dim light of the basement.
I caught him in my flames just as he turned into a bat and flew quickly away, wobbling from side to side. He vanished out of sight. In vain I looked for dust, something to tell me that I had killed him, but the next moment, Aegis slapped me hard, bringing me out of my haze.
Sandy was screaming for Max, and I realized that the basement was on fire, blazing so bright and so hot that I couldn’t even see the exit. As the manic anger vanished, I realized that we were in danger of burning to death if we couldn’t find our way out. If we couldn’t escape, it would be my fault, and we would all be dead.
Chapter 17
I DESPERATELY TRIED to gather my wits as the flames raged around us. All I could see were the crackling tongues of fire as it licked at the ceiling and walls. They were blocking the trapdoor so we couldn’t escape that way. Elementals danced through the flames. Somehow I had summoned them when I had lost control. I shook off my confusion, and looked around for Aegis but couldn’t see him. Somewhere, I heard Sandy screaming and I heard the growl of the tiger, roaring in fear.
I stumbled to the left, against Dracula’s coffin, and tipped it off the sawhorses. It fell to the ground with a crash and splintered, spilling dirt everywhere. The elementals were dancing around me now as if I were their queen, and I closed my eyes, trying to focus enough to withdraw the flames, to pull them back within me. I held out my hands, persuading the fires to return to my fingers, to summon them back. But there was no putting the genie back in the bottle. They were too hot and too violent for me to retract.
I tried to part them like I had when I first found Bubba, and managed to create a path through the fire. In the corner, I saw Sandy, crouching against Max, trying to stay away from the nearest flames. If she used her wind magic to try and protect herself, it would blow the flames directly onto Aegis and me. Aegis had climbed atop the remains of the workbench, and was looking around frantically for a way out.
“Turn into a bat,” I screamed at him. “You can fly out of here.”
“I’m not leaving here without you,” he said, shaking his head.
“Go get help!” I realized I still had my phone. I dug it out, dialing 911. When the operator came on the line, I gave her the address of the house, that it was on fire, and we were trapped in the basement. And then, once again, I went back to trying to create a path between Sandy and Max, and the door. If I could push back the flames enough for them to get out, they could escape.
The fire raged against me, not wanting to be controlled. I had summoned it in anger, and it was imbued with my feelings. I fought with it, focusing all my energy on wrestling it into submission. Slowly, it began to yield to my will, but it was taking every ounce of my energy to do so and I wasn’t sure how long I could keep it up.
“She’s trying to create a path for you,” Aegis yelled at Sandy. “The moment it appears, get the hell out of here.”
I held up my hands, aiming them at the fire, using them to will it to part as I slowly spread my arms to the side. A tiny opening in the inferno appeared, and then grew as I drove my will forward like a wedge through the flames, through the conflagration.
Sandy and Max were ready, Max’s tiger looking terrified. I wondered if he was hurt, but quickly narrowed my attention back to controlling the out-of-control blaze. The next moment, the path widened through to the door, and Sandy and Max went racing through it, managing to get outside before the flames roared back together, trapping me behind them.
“Fly out of here,” I yelled at Aegis. “You won’t help me if you get burnt to a crisp.”
Looking desperate, but with the flames licking at his boots, Aegis turned into a bat and flew toward the
door, zigzagging to avoid the sparks. As he disappeared out into the night, I was left alone with fire.
I fell to my knees, clasping my hands. “Great Arianrhod, if I’ve ever needed you, I need you now. Please, help me. I’ve tried to be a good priestess, and if it is your will, please help me escape. If not, then lift me up to your side in Caer Sidi, at the center of the Silver Wheel.”
As the flames began to gather around me again, I shivered, wondering if this was going to be my end. Would Dracula manage to inadvertently cause my death? I had done everything I could to push back the fire, but now I was drained of energy, and I crouched down on one knee, bowing my head so I wouldn’t see the flames as they overtook me. My lungs were clouded with smoke, and I could barely breathe.
“No!”
The voice rang out loud and clear, like an echo ricocheting from cliff to cliff. A terrible scream, like that of a banshee, rolled through the room on a gust of wind and rain. The next moment the flames began to sizzle and hiss as a wave of water rolled into the basement, pouring down the stairs, flooding the room.
It swept around my knees and I jumped up, trying to keep my balance as everywhere the flames let out shrieks of protest as they sizzled and hissed, the water extinguishing them. The room filled to my knees, and then to my waist, the water splashing on my face. A drop landed on my lip and I tasted it—salty with ocean brine.
I looked up at the steps as the smoke began to dissipate. There, standing on the edge of the flood, was Fata Morgana. She was dressed in a long white gown with a blue cape gusting behind her. Shining with an inner light, she held out her hands to me, her hair blowing as bright as my flames.
“Maddy,” she called. “I heard you scream for help. I’m here.”
It was then that I realize that Sandy and I had not broken the pact. Nothing could. We three had given our word to each other, and it would stand as long as we lived. Forever we were bound, the Witches Wild, and at this moment, nothing in the world could make me as happy as that knowledge.
BY THE TIME the fire department got there, there was nothing left of the fire. Delia wisely stood back, giving Sandy, Fata, and me our space. We sat outside in the driving rain, on the stone wall that surrounded the house. I looked up at the sky as the rain pounded on us, streaking down my face. I opened my mouth to catch it on my tongue, the cool water soothing my throat that was raw from screaming and from the smoke. Tears raced down my face, I was so worn out from the events of the night.
Sandy took my hand in hers, and then reached for Fata Morgana’s, to complete the circle. We sat there in silence, watching the firefighters rush around. To one side, Aegis stood by Max, who was back in his human form. He was wearing a blanket that one of the firefighters had pulled out of the medic unit. His clothes were inside, now most likely a pile of ashes. While Max was dazed and a little singed, he hadn’t been seriously hurt. The confusion had driven him into a dark place, though, and I suspected it would take him some time to recover.
Finally, I looked into Fata’s eyes, holding her gaze. “You saved my life.”
“You would have saved me, if it had been the other way around.” A luminous light filled her eyes. It was the light of the Ocean Mother, the light of the phosphorescence found in the sea and on the shore at midnight. It was the light of sunset on the horizon, over the ocean on a still night.
I nodded. “Always.”
“And Dracula?” Sandy asked. “Is he still alive?”
“Yes,” I said. “We hurt him, but we didn’t kill him. He’ll heal up and I imagine he’ll be back. But we destroyed his coffin, so he’s going to have to find some other place to recuperate. Now that he knows we’re on to his weakness, he’ll probably be cautious. He’s a vengeful and cunning creature, so we’ll have to be on our guard.”
More and more, it seemed we were having to watch out for enemies. It was beginning to feel a little too much like it had so many years ago, when we had been running across the countryside, slaying vampires and dodging the witch hunters.
“Do you think the Arcānus Nocturni will send someone else after you?” Fata asked.
“I don’t know. I don’t know what they’ll do when they discover we drove Dracula away. I have an odd feeling that he may not return to them. He doesn’t want them knowing about his allergy, and he’s got an ego to match his legend. Yet we managed to hurt him.”
“So you think he may not tell the Arcānus Nocturni what happened?”
“Maybe. I don’t expect him to take this lying down, though. He was hit hard by the flames and the blood, and probably won’t be at his full power for some time. My guess is that he’ll find someplace else to hide and recover, where his kills won’t be noticed as easily.”
The truth was, I didn’t know much of anything. I wasn’t sure whether Dracula would be back, or whether he was still hiding on the island, or whether he would leave for good. The only thing I knew was that my fight with the Arcānus Nocturni wasn’t over. We had opened a can of worms when we had killed Lucifer.
Delia slowly approached, looking at me to see if it was all right. I nodded her over.
“Well, the basement is thoroughly scorched, and a number of things were destroyed, but the house will be all right. I’ve called Bjorn and he’s on his way over. Are you all right?” She looked at me, and then at Sandy.
I gave her a nod. “Yeah, just exhausted and frightened. I can usually control the fire but Dracula managed to fan the flames, so to speak, and I lost control. My own element would’ve killed me if it hadn’t been for Fata Morgana.”
“I’m all right,” Sandy said. “And Max… Well, Max is going to take some time. Dracula forced him into his tiger shape, and that sort of control is humiliating. And then the fire, well, all wild animals fear the fire. I think he’s mired in a mixture of embarrassment mingled with an adrenaline rush.”
Delia turned to Fata. “I want to thank you for what you did. Maddy and Sandy are extremely important to this community, and they’re special to me. Thank you for saving my friends.” She held out her hand.
Fata looked at it, almost curiously, and then slowly extended her own, grasping the sheriff’s hand and shaking it. “I’ve forgotten so many customs. There’s so much to remember, it confuses me.”
“Are you going to be staying in Bedlam?” Delia’s question was cautious, and she gave me a nervous glance as she asked it.
Fata Morgana shivered, quietly shrugging. “I don’t know. I don’t know if I can.” She fell silent, and Delia turned and walked away.
When she was gone, Fata looked at us. Her eyes reflected the shifting clouds overhead, and in the dull glow of the streetlight, she looked as alien as I had ever seen her look. She looked lonely, and afraid, and yet so overwhelmingly regal that I almost went down on my knees. She truly was a queen, the queen of her realm, and yet I had the feeling she didn’t realize it.
“I can’t stay, Maddy. I want to stay, I want to be here with you and Cassandra. I want my old life back, but even now I feel the pull of the water, the siren song of the ocean. The Ocean Mother calls to me, she misses me. I’m bound by chains stronger than any tangible bonds. Silver, platinum, titanium—all the metals of the world couldn’t chain me as much as the ocean has. She owns me, and as much as my heart belongs to you, Maddy, the ocean has laid claim to it.” Tears trickled down her face, and I wasn’t sure whether they were tears of joy or sorrow. Or perhaps, a mingling of both.
“How long can you stay?”
“Another day perhaps, possibly two. But the pull is getting stronger, and I’ll become too dangerous for your town. I can feel myself slipping away again. I don’t want to sleep for another hundred years. Please, don’t let me sleep for another hundred years in the depths.”
She began to cry in earnest then, and I wrapped my arms around her and held her as her shoulders quivered. We sat into the night until all the firefighters were gone. I noticed Aegis had vanished too, but shortly he came driving up in my CR-V. He h
ad returned down to Beachcomber Spit and driven it back. Together with Max, they bundled the three of us into the back of the car, and we drove back to the Bewitching Bedlam. All the way there, Fata cried, and Sandy and I stared out the windows, each of us locked within our thoughts.
AUNTIE TAUTAU WAS waiting at our house. An old beater of a station wagon was parked in the driveway. I hadn’t realized that any of the Aunties knew how to drive, but apparently they did, although they had lousy tastes in cars. As we clambered out of the CR-V, Fata seemed locked within herself, mute. Auntie Tautau scurried up, Merriweather holding onto the brim of her hat for dear life.
“I’ll take her home with me,” Auntie Tautau said. “It wouldn’t be a good idea to let her sleep here tonight.” And with that, she took Fata Morgana’s hands, and led her to the station wagon. As they drove out of sight, I let out a shuddering breath.
“I have no clue of what to do about Fata. She’s so lonely and she so much wants to be part of our lives again. But it’s so dangerous having her around. And I feel absolutely horrible saying that, given she saved my life tonight.”
“Let it be for now. Auntie Tautau will know what’s best,” Aegis said, unlocking the door. He turned to Sandy and Max. “Do you to want to spend the night here, given how late it is?”
Sandy shook her head. “I just want a hot bath, and my own bed. I’ll call you tomorrow morning, Maddy. We’ll go over to Auntie Tautau’s together and talk to her about Fata and what to do.” And with that, she and Max made their way back to their car and headed off into the darkness.
It was four a.m., and I was feeling every single moment in my body. The flames had singed me from the inside out, leaving me feeling crisped and dry. Aegis pushed me toward the table, motioning to a chair. “Sit down. I’m going to get you something to eat and drink. You need energy.”