Chapter 23 Aurora
TWENTY-THREE
AURORA
They picked their way through the forest, giving the cemetery a wide berth. Aurora paused. A faint voice carried through the trees, but she couldn’t make out who it was. As she debated detouring to investigate, everything went silent.
A scream cut through the air, then cut off. Seemed Viv worked fast.
“What if that was your uncle?” Gia whispered as they reached the first of the outbuildings.
“He wouldn’t creep around the woods himself.” Aurora ushered Gia past a shed on the edge of the forest, and the main house came into view on the opposite side of the field. “What’s the point of having underlings if you don’t send them to do everything for you?”
“True. Franco would have done the same. It’s creepy how similar they—” Gia gasped, her eyes going wide as she froze in place.
“Gia!” Aurora caught her as she fell, her body a heavy, dead weight in Aurora’s arms.
The crunch of leaves underfoot sent Aurora’s heart thundering. Someone was behind her. Aurora checked Gia’s pulse, finding it slow but strong beneath her fingers. It must have been a stunning spell.
Was there time to cast a counter spell? Aurora turned toward the approaching footsteps, and her mother stepped out from behind the shed.
“Aurora.” Virginia betrayed no hint of surprise. Shouldn’t the sight of her daughter, fresh out of her grave, evoke some emotion other than cold fury, even if she’d been watching and had time to school herself?
Aurora’s throat ran dry. With Gia unconscious, she couldn’t channel her magic.
When Aurora had been a ghost, the usual rules of magic didn’t always apply.
Like being invisible. There was a chance she’d have been able to join with Gia as a ghost and work through her, even if she were out of it.
That wouldn’t work now. Channeling between witches needed continuous consent on both sides.
She was as defenseless as she’d ever been, and worse, she couldn’t protect Gia.
“I don’t know how she got past our wards.” Virginia gestured carelessly at Gia. “But it doesn’t matter now. You won’t be leaving with her, so why not come with me? Stan needs to see you urgently.”
Aurora’s grip on Gia tightened. “That’s all you have to say after I crawled out of a coffin? Stan needs to see me urgently?”
“If you didn’t want to be put to rest, you shouldn’t have abandoned your body in such a lifeless—or should I say soulless?—position. Do you have any idea what you’ve cost us? All Stan’s plans are ruined.”
Damn it, where’s Viv when you need her? Aurora didn’t have the energy for her mother’s bullshit.
“Leave the trespasser where she belongs.” Virginia’s voice rose, and she swept out a commanding arm, sending magic cutting through the air.
Power hit Aurora in the chest, and she staggered to the side, dropping Gia.
“Come with me.” Her mother pointed toward the main house. “Don’t make me force you.”
Aurora bit the inside of her cheek until she tasted blood. She walked as slowly as possible, but didn’t try to resist. The last thing she needed was her mother hurting Gia more than she already had.
What else could Aurora do? She saw no way out of this.
The back door to the house opened, and three familiar men strode across the lawn.
Her uncle’s steps faltered, his pale face losing color at the sight of her.
Had he expected someone else? From what Virginia had said, they’d known she wasn’t dead.
Stan had expected her to suffocate, and here she was.
Sick satisfaction at catching him off guard coiled inside Aurora. She wouldn’t be beaten down easily. But without Gia, Stan’s momentary fear meant little. He still had power over her and seemed to remember as much.
Stan’s surprise smoothed over. By the time he stood in front of Aurora, meeting halfway between the trees and the house, he wore his usual self-important sneer.
“Aurora, I thought we made it clear we no longer need you.”
She flinched as if he’d slapped her, hating that he could still cause her pain. She didn’t care what he thought. Didn’t want anything from him, least of all to be of value to him. But still. He’d buried her in the ground, knowing she was alive and assuming she’d die.
“You expected me to suffocate?” She lifted her chin, pretending his cruelty was nothing to her. “Maybe you should have dug deeper.”
“Perhaps you should have done as you were told and solidified our alliance with the Nightingales. As soon as I asked to postpone the betrothal, they dropped us faster than hot coal. Claimed we were unreliable and not what they’d hoped. All because of you.”
Aurora fumed, even though she was glad to hear the Nightingales weren’t around. “Seems like pinning your alliance on me was a dumb idea. You can try as hard as you want, but you can’t control me.”
“No?” Stan cocked his head. “What are you still doing here then?”
Aurora swallowed a scream, the desire to escape swelling within her.
She glanced over her shoulder. Virginia stood over Gia, who remained slumped on the ground, and Viv was nowhere to be seen. Even if Aurora could escape, she couldn’t run and leave Gia defenseless.
No matter how fiercely Aurora raged inside, she was defenseless too, a caged animal, and her keeper knew it.
Panic threatened the edges of Aurora’s senses. She clenched a shaking fist, trying desperately to come up with a plan. Her next move. Anything. She reached inward, searching for…she didn’t even know what.
Something responded. A tickle of warmth caressed the magic within her. Was it Gia’s?
Hope tore through Aurora, and she reached for Gia’s power. It pulsed stronger, like it was offering itself up, waiting and ready to give her everything it could.
Gia must have woken and had the forethought to remain limp. Satan bless that smart woman. Aurora wanted nothing more than to kiss her until her lips were raw.
Soon. She’d give Gia the world as soon as she got them out of this mess.
Aurora faced her uncle, a smile stretching her lips. “What am I still doing here? I came to find you.”
His brow furrowed in confusion, and Aurora unleashed Gia’s power. Waving her arms, she sent magic barreling into Stan’s advisors, sending them flying.
Stan staggered, horror breaking over his face. “What?”
Aurora didn’t hesitate. She sent a stunning spell straight for his chest.
He got his shit together in time to block it, his beady eyes narrowing. “How?” he snarled.
Aurora wrapped a silencing spell around his throat. She’d heard more than enough from him.
Eyes bulging, Stan struck, hitting Aurora in the shoulder. She cried out at the pain and struck back, taking her uncle out at the knees.
Hands tangled in Aurora’s hair from behind, and she lurched backward, stumbling into her mother’s clutches. Stan got to his feet, his face red with fury.
Virginia muttered a counter-spell, freeing Stan’s voice.
“Kill her,” he rasped, clutching his throat.
Aurora felt her mother stiffen behind her. Was she hesitating? Even after leaving Aurora for dead underground?
The hands gripping Aurora’s hair went slack, and her mother toppled to the side. Aurora managed to pull away and turned to see Gia rising from the ground, power glowing at her fingertips.
It wasn’t hesitation or a change of heart. Virginia had been stunned.
Aurora and Gia’s eyes locked, and the power flowing between them flared. Aurora faced her uncle, his advisors flanking him once more. She stunned the one on the left as blood bloomed across the chest of the one on the right. He screamed, clawing at his shirt in confusion.
That must have been Gia’s doing.
Stan roared, striking Aurora with a blast of power. She was knocked on her ass, but all she did was laugh, hysteria bubbling inside her. She wasn’t the real threat here, and Stan could do nothing to keep her incapacitated for long.
Not with Gia by her side.
Blood bloomed on Stan’s chest, and he screamed. More cuts speared across his cheeks and arms, blood soaking his clothes. Howling, he dropped to his knees.
Gia held out a hand to help Aurora up. “How much of his blood do you need?”
“Not much.” Aurora heaved to her feet.
Gia curled her fingers, and Stan was dragged forward by an invisible force until he slumped, whimpering at her feet. Aurora grabbed his bloody cheeks and covered her palms in his blood.
“That’ll be enough,” she told Gia, stunning Stan and tossing him aside. “Cover me?”
Gia nodded, moving in close, and Aurora knelt on the ground, digging her fingers into the grass.
She searched for the binding linking the Thornfield Coven to this cursed earth, and when she found it, she sent Gia’s considerable power into it, burning the blood binding from the inside out, picking apart each thread of the spell.
The enforced hierarchy. The leader’s control.
The restriction on magic. The intricate knots keeping them prisoner.
Grass crisped beneath her fingers as she worked, checking for every possible link in the magic.
The soil beneath Aurora grew hot. Heat radiated around her, fiercer than the summer sun.
Her palms burned, and she had to fight to keep her hands in place, but she wouldn’t let up until the binding was broken.
There was no stopping now.
Aurora bit her lip, vaguely aware of Gia blasting someone away. The dirt burned even hotter beneath her fingers, but she didn’t let go. With a strangled cry, she sent one last jolt of Gia’s power into the earth. Into the blood binding.
The blood coating her hands—her uncle’s blood—turned to flame, and fire shot from Aurora’s palms out along the grass, flames roaring in the four cardinal directions as something seemed to snap deep within her.
Aurora jolted away from the flames. She cradled her hands, surprised to see them unharmed, clean of her uncle’s blood, and free of burns.
Gia gripped her shoulder, hauling her upright. “Are you okay?”
“Fine.” She gripped Aurora’s elbow for support. “You?”
“All good. You haven’t gotten close to draining my power.” There was a wild look in Gia’s eye, almost a sparkle. “Did it work?”
“I think so. Something snapped when I burned the last of the binding.” Aurora didn’t feel any different, but then the binding had never been something she sensed unless she actively struggled against it.
The flames cutting through the grass went out, but the fire had reached the trees and the shrubbery lining the house. Stan stirred in the grass beside them, recovering from the stunning spell and unharmed by the flames.
Aurora lashed out, this time with her power, not Gia’s, and Stan was thrown into the air, landing near the house with a thud.
“It’s gone.” She stared at him in dazed wonder. “The binding is gone.”
Gia grabbed her hand. “Thank god. We better get out of here. I don’t know where Viv is.”
Damn it. They’d have to find her.
A booming explosion rocked the earth, throwing them to the ground. What the hell was that? Aurora looked wildly around. There was nothing near the trees, but as her attention landed on the house, she froze.
The fire burning the bushes must have spread to the gas canisters stored along the wall. There was nothing but a gaping hole in the building where they’d been.
Fire spread up the wall, and screams came from inside as people spilled out of every exit.
“Shit.” Aurora hoped people hadn’t been in the back of the massive house. Well, there were more than a few coven members that she wouldn’t have cared had they been, but not every one of the Thornfields was like Stan.
There were other witches like her. Trapped and beaten down.
Another of Stan’s top men ran from the building, searching frantically until he spotted his fallen leader. Two other men ran in Aurora’s direction, pointing and shouting, their faces red with anger.
Gia’s grip on her tightened. “We can’t fight them all off. Not this many at once.”
Aurora raised her arms, ready to strike. “We have to try. At least enough to escape.”
Gia nodded, pulling Aurora toward the trees.
Two more men and a woman headed off the lackeys charging toward Aurora, and a fight broke out between the five of them.
Another woman descended upon Stan, flashes of light filling the air as he fought against her attack.
Not too far away, a woman near Aurora’s age attacked one of Stan’s junior advisors.
Other witches ran straight for the borders. More fights broke out, more people joining in the attack on Stan and his closest allies, until every upper member of the coven was outnumbered by the people they’d kept prisoner.
“Holy shit,” Gia muttered.
Aurora felt dazed. No one was paying attention to her any longer. It was chaos. They should run, but Aurora was rooted to the spot.
Her gaze returned to Stan. He was nothing more than a bloody heap, torn apart by the people he’d abused.
She flinched away from the sight.
“Let’s go.” Gia wrapped an arm around Aurora, shielding her vision and pulling her away.
A bellowing scream tore through the air, and it sounded like more people were running out of the house as the fire spread.
Aurora and Gia had almost reached the trees when an unfamiliar voice called out.
“Stop right there!”
Gia stilled, a tremble running through her as her magic raged, sparking along its connection to Aurora. But Gia wasn’t trembling in fear, Aurora realized with sudden clarity. She was seething.
Gia turned slowly, pushing Aurora behind her. “Franco, what the hell are you doing here?”