Chapter 36
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
A ll I could think, when I laid eyes on the man who betrayed my family and those he’d sworn to protect, was what Arwyn had told me. Jonathan was the cause of my mother’s death. The letters in Romy’s diary proved it. He had sold her out to the Witch Hunters. There wasn’t room to care why, or wonder about his reasonings.
All my hate, all my anger and disdain came crashing out of me. The viper may not have been sated during the Rewarding, but it would now.
The demon inside of me, the shard Bahmet embedded into me as I grew beside him in my mother’s stomach, was free. The darkness had never felt so prominent.
Knowledge was the greatest power, and I’d come out of the Witch Trials brimming with it.
I jolted forwards, nails outstretched, my Gift striking out like a viper. One witch closest to me slammed into the stone archway, their skull cracking upon impact. I didn’t care for the life lost, not when these people had sent us into the trials knowing what was behind it.
Jonathan didn’t step back. He didn’t even bother to move out the way. His confidence stirred something violent deep in my gut. It was the type of behaviour exposed by someone who already believed they’d won.
And he had. For now.
Jonathan smiled at me as my body was taken over by the witches around him. In seconds I was back on my knees, arms pinned behind my back, a needle buried deep into my neck as a strong dose of thistlebane was emptied into my blood stream.
‘Ah, ah, ah,’ Jonathan tsked, arms behind his back, his entire demeanour one of calm control. ‘That isn’t the way to act now, is it?’
I gathered phlegm in my mouth and spat it at Jonathan. Without breaking our eye contact, I said the very thing he likely expected. ‘I know what you did. I know who you truly are, Jonathan.’
He titled his head, smiling harder. If it wasn’t for the witches physically restraining me, I would’ve clawed his fucking mouth from his face.
‘I don’t doubt it. Even your mother was far too inquisitive for her own good, and look where that led her. Six feet under the ground. All that power at her disposal and she choose to squander it, bury it. Maybe if she kept Bahmet free, she would’ve been able to save herself.’
A symbol painted behind my eyes. It was as clear as day, so powerful the lines of the symbol were solid and demanding. Although the thistlebane had rendered me powerless, I knew this feeling suggested otherwise.
Old magic. A spark of it still lingered in my bones, just in reach.
There wasn’t a moment to wonder why. Without thinking about the repercussions, before Jonathan could say another word or the twenty-or-so witches around him could hurt me, I grasped onto it, sinking the claws of my mind deep into the heart of the power.
It was like peeling back the skin of a ripe, sweet fruit. Except, Jonathan’s demise would be sweeter.
When I opened my mouth, it wasn’t to reply with words. Fire spilled out of my throat, a wall of boiling of flame. Heat rippled across my skin, a warm kiss of summer. The blast sent the hair off my face, giving me the perfect view of the destruction. I caught the shock in Jonathan’s eyes, the disbelief as the wave of fire met him. It swept out, devouring him whole.
Flesh melted, bones charred, and blood hissed.
Silence reigned around me as everyone witnessed what I did.
By the time the fire dwindled to natural tongues, the room was empty of Jonathan’s presence. Dead, like my parents, like Salem’s parents, like every witch he’d knowingly sent into the Witch Trials as a sacrifice to a dark demon. He deserved this.
It was justice, I told myself.
I stood, looking around at the ruined remains of my true enemy, the old magic dwindling, but close enough if I needed it. Jonathan’s corpse was frozen in his last act, a burned husk oozing grey snakes of smoke as he fell to the ground and shattered.
All the witches around me paused, eyeing me with suspicion. Then, without word, they bowed.
The hands holding me down released me, the witches putting space between us. Out of trepidation and fear as to what I’d do next. What I’d just achieved was impossible with the thistlebane dampening my Gift.
It proved one thing, or at least suggested that I’d come out of the Witch Trials a victor. A perfectly crafted lie, given to me by the master of deceits.
I heard Arwyn’s last words to me.
‘Tell them you won.’
From the way the room bowed at me, it proved I didn’t need to tell them anything of the sort. They made their mind up in that moment. And if it kept me alive long enough to leave this place, I would make Arwyn proud. This would be my illusion to cast.
In place of the fissure across my heart, it was the dark promise of revenge that held the parts together. The need to finish my mother’s mission.
‘Grand High, we are sorry.’ It was an elderly witch who spoke, stepping forwards whereas the rest kept their distance. He was old, balding at the top of his head as he bowed dramatically. ‘We were simply following Jonathan’s order?—’
I lifted a hand, silencing the man who spoke. Jonathan’s bones shattered to shards beneath my boots as I carelessly stepped over him. ‘Take me to Romy Baily.’
‘Certainly, she is in the infirmary. Please, follow me.’
That was the excuse the witches required to step out of the way and let me follow the male witch out of the cellar. I didn’t look back, not once. Only forwards.
As I was guided through the corridors of the White Tower, passing witches who stopped and stared at me, noticing the blood on my body and the scent of burned flesh following behind me, I kept my focus ahead.
Let them fear me. Let them all cower.
No one dared step in my way. Many just stood aside, whereas others bowed their heads, showing signs of respect to the witch they believed to be the victor. Even if that was far from the truth.
‘Tell them you won.’
I couldn’t rid myself of Arwyn’s voice. He infected my mind, a parasite that required cleansing.
With the taste of destruction on my tongue, and the desire for more in my heart, I knew what was to follow. I would find Romy, get far away from here as I could, and finish the task my mother attempted.
The destruction of Bahmet.
No matter the cost.