Chapter 10
Istared at the magical gateway. “A portal? But I can’t open portals?” Could I? No, because that was insane. Wasn’t it? Witches didn’t open portals. That was crazy stuff. Yes, demons could… well, for interdimensional travel. But portals? That was different.
Still, part of me was seriously impressed that I could.
If that had actually been me.
“You just did,” said Iris.
I stared at the shifting red-like doorway. It hovered there in front of us, twisting slowly in the cold prison chamber air. Red and black curled through it like smoke under water. The edges rippled strangely, not smooth like a ley line jump. Not familiar.
The air around it felt heavier somehow, like the prison itself didn’t like it.
“A Nexari portal.” I was going to have words with my father after this. If he knew I could create portals and hadn’t told me, that was some serious intel I had been missing. Seriously. Important parenting information felt like something that should have come up at some point.
Hello, daughter. You’re half ancient magical chaos entity. You can accidentally rip holes through reality. Pass the potatoes.
“Where do you think it leads?” asked Iris, lifting her hand close to the edge of the portal but not touching it.
“Hell if I know.”
Iris was nodding to herself. “Could be another dimension.”
I looked at her. “Could be an abyss too. Or the Netherworld.”
The portal shifted again. And through it I could see… nothing. Just distance, space, like looking through a doorway that didn’t belong somewhere physical. Warm wind rolled softly out of it.
I took one cautious step closer. The warmth hit me first—not hot, not dangerous.
And somehow I felt it.
Recognition.
“It recognizes me.” The Nexari magic inside me stirred softly.
“Of course,” said the Dark witch, not sounding as surprised as I was. “You made it.”
“I made it,” I repeated.
“Hey! How the fuck d’you get in here!” said a voice behind us.
I whipped my head around in time to see our guard buddies, the werebear and the werewolf, running toward us, their faces ugly and brutal.
I knew there was just one way out of here—a way I’d never tested. I didn’t know if it would kill me and my friend or save us.
But it wasn’t like I had a choice.
I grabbed Iris’s hand and said, “Let’s go.”
Holding my breath, I pulled her with me, and we leaped into the waiting portal.
Everything around us vanished.
I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t hoping it was like ley line traveling.
Ley lines were aggressive, fast, like getting hit in the soul with magical turbulence.
But at least they were familiar and predictable.
You grabbed on, you got flung across existence, and you landed badly—usually on dirt, sometimes snow, occasionally dignity.
But no. Not even close.
I screamed.
Iris screamed.
We both screamed some more.
A lot.
“What is happening!?” I yelled.
“I don’t know!” Iris yelled back.
Darkness swathed me completely. It didn’t matter if I had my eyes open or not.
It was all the same. I saw nothing but deep, endless blackness stretching forever around us while something twisted strangely beneath my feet.
Or maybe I didn’t have feet anymore. Maybe I was floating. Flying. Falling. Existing aggressively.
Hard to say.
My stomach rolled. My brain rolled.
I was reasonably certain at one point my left arm existed somewhere three feet away from the rest of me.
Still, I had some experience with otherworldly travel from ley lines and having jumped dimensions with Jack, the demon soul collector. So, my freak-out only lasted a few moments, but it was full-blown either way.
Darkness continued swallowing everything. No up. No down. No cold prison stone. No Grimway. No glowing wards. Just endless nothing wrapped around me while ancient Nexari magic thrummed beneath my skin.
Trust me, I would have howled like the banshee of the universe if it had been painful. It occurred to me I should have felt pain, lots and lots of it, but something or someone had made sure I didn’t feel it.
Was that my Nexari magic? No idea.
I drifted through darkness to wherever I was supposed to go while my brain continued to go into deeply unhelpful places.
Darian. Addison. Family secrets. Portal.
My father was absolutely getting interrogated after this.
Aggressively.
“If we survive this,” I yelled into the darkness, “I am having a very serious conversation with my father!”
“Good plan!” yelled Iris.
“He left out important things!”
“Like portals!”
“Yes!”
“And possibly other things!”
“Yes!”
“You should make a list!”
“I am making a list!”
Yes, this was an incredible way of traveling, and I wasn’t even sure how I managed to create the portal or whether I could create another one. Right now, though, all I could think about was my son. My kid. Maybe poisoned. Maybe cursed.
I just wanted to be with him.
And then, the constant pulling sensation stopped just as my feet hit solid ground.
Hard.
My knees buckled instantly, and I felt Iris crash into me.
Breathing hard with my gaze unfocused, I felt vertigo take over. Thank the cauldron I didn’t have much food in me. Otherwise, I would have been sick right about now.
The darkness around me slowly lifted. Shapes came into focus. Walls. Furniture. Familiar furniture. My furniture. I was at my cottage.
And then…
“Tessa! Iris! What is the meaning of this?” yelled Dolores. I hadn’t even seen her yet, but I could “feel” her frown. Apparently, she was back from the festival.
With effort, I hauled myself up, my eyes scanning the room for my kid.
Darian was still sleeping peacefully on the couch where I’d left him. Thank the cauldron. Something tight inside my chest loosened a little, enough that I could breathe properly again. Only this time it wasn’t Ruth next to him, it was Marcus. Who was looking at me with a strange expression.
Iris slowly pushed herself up beside me. “You portaled us home.”
“I know,” I said, not understanding at all how I did it. But apparently I did.
“Tessa Davenport,” said Dolores as she appeared in my line of sight. “Explain yourself.” She was pointing to something behind me.
I spun around. Yup. The portal was still there.
Oops.
“I don’t know how to close it,” I said, staring at the circular doorway. I had no idea how I even created it, so how the hell was I supposed to close it?
Ronin, who hadn’t left, was next to Iris in a blink of an eye, holding her and checking her over to see if she was injured. “My sexy nerdy witch. I missed you.”
Iris leaned in and gave him a kiss. “I know.”
“What do you mean you don’t know?” Dolores marched right up to me. “And how about you tell me how you can create portals?”
“Give her a break, Dolores,” said Beverly, who I just noticed was sitting at the table with a glass of red wine. “She literally just popped in.”
“She did. She really did.” Ruth sneaked up to the portal and reached out to touch it…
Dolores slapped her hand away. “Are you insane?”
Ruth made a face. “You hurt me.”
“I told you. She has man hands,” said Beverly, lifting her wine glass.
Marcus slowly stood from beside the couch and crossed the room. I hadn’t realized until that second how badly I needed him standing next to me. His hand settled against the small of my back, warm through my shirt.
“You okay?” he asked quietly.
No. “Yes.”
His gray eyes stayed on me, sharp and seeing entirely too much. “You’re lying.”
Damn those wereape senses. “I know.”
“What happened?”
The room shifted around us. Beverly slowly lowered her wine. Dolores stopped glaring at the portal long enough to focus fully on me. Even Ronin had gone quiet.
I sighed. “We found Allison’s cell.”
Marcus’s hand tightened slightly against my back.
“We talked to the guards.” My stomach pulled tight all over again thinking about it. Grimway. Allison’s empty cell. The spotless stone. The missing pieces. “Addison lied.”
“How?” asked Dolores.
“There wasn’t a riot. She wasn’t killed by inmates.” I folded my arms tighter across my chest. “She got sick.”
Marcus went very still beside me.
“After Addison visited,” I added quietly.
“What kind of sickness?” Marcus finally asked.
“Poison, I think? Maybe a curse?” I glanced toward Iris. “We found a strand of Allison’s hair.”
Iris lifted Doris slightly under one arm.
“We’re hoping we can figure out what Addison used,” I said. “Maybe Ruth. You can help?”
“Yes,” said Ruth as she suddenly walked back into the living room carrying three potatoes.
We all looked at her.
“Why do you have potatoes?” asked Dolores.
“For magical science,” said Ruth, practically bouncing on the balls of her feet.
Dolores narrowed her eyes at her sister. “No.”
Ruth beamed. “One potato.”
“Have you lost your damn mind?” hissed Dolores.
Ruth shrugged. “Half potato?”
“No.”
“A potato peel?”
“No.”
Ruth let out a sigh. “This reminds me of my friend Pauline,” she began.
“Here we go,” mumbled Beverly.
“She accidentally opened a doorway to another realm using fermented turnips and gnome poop,” informed Ruth.
Beverly slowly lowered her wine another inch. “I should have gone with Antonio. He promised orgasms. This is just stupid.”
“She threw a shoe through first,” Ruth continued.
“What happened?” I asked because, of course, once she started her story, I had to know the ending.
“She lost the shoe,” answered my tiny aunt.
“That’s not terrible,” I told her.
Ruth’s eyes rounded. “She also lost her husband.”
Ronin snorted. “That escalated quickly.”
“Yes,” agreed Ruth. “He came back three years later with another family.”
Yup. Good old Ruthy.
“Tessa,” barked Dolores. “Close the portal. Now.”
The room collectively shifted back toward the glowing red opening sitting in the middle of my cottage like ripping holes through reality had somehow become a perfectly normal activity.
Which, admittedly, was saying something in Hollow Cove, where most people considered surprise magical disasters a minor scheduling inconvenience rather than a cause for concern.
“Right,” I said slowly.
“Right?” Dolores repeated. “That’s your plan?”