Callan
“Time to get up.”
I kick the body slumped against the dirt wall, and the dark witch groans, cracking open his eyelids to reveal putrid yellow irises. He yanks on his shackles, forgetting for the millionth time that they’re nailed to the wall behind him.
He’s been like this for a week, and still, he won’t talk, but we’re running out of time. They’ve sent a search party out for him, and they’re closing in.
I look around the cramped space. Easton is keeping watch at the hatch in the ceiling, his long, dark hair pulled back in a messy bun.
Devon lingers in the corner, his massive build towering to the ceiling, and Phoenix is picking the dirt out of his nails with his switchblade, his mismatched eyes flicking up to me now and again.
The last two in my coven are outside, staying hidden, but close enough to warn Easton should someone get too close to the bunker.
They’re all tired and ready to get back, but we have nothing to take with us.
No information, no answers, and no survivors.
“Boss,” Devon mutters, snagging my attention. He nods towards the Rogue as his yellow eyes slip shut again.
I stalk forward, crouching before him. “I said, get up.”
He lifts his head, those foul yellow eyes dull and lifeless as they crack back open. His features are sharp, his cheeks hollow and pale. “Filthy Sol blood,” he snarls, his crooked teeth snapping together as he lunges forward. “You don’t deserve your people back.”
I kick his legs out from under him, and he screams as the joints in his shoulders crack, all his weight yanking against the chains.
“We don’t have to keep doing this,” I say calmly. “Tell me where you’re keeping them, tell me anything, and I’ll offer you a quick and easy death.” He knows he isn’t making it out of here alive. The only choice he has in his death is how brutal it will be.
“I’d rather bleed out,” he spits, saliva spraying my boots.
“Oh, you won’t bleed out.” I nod to the freshest of his wounds. “Not with all that Orris root.”
The Rogue’s face turns white as a sheet.
“I packed it into your wounds while you were sleeping, then I shoved it down your throat for good measure.” His eyes widen, and he begins to squirm in his chains, more desperate than I’d seen him all week.
“Bleeding out would be a euphoric death compared to the one you will face, but I’ll make it quick if you talk. ”
Blood dribbles from the holes in his palms. Drip, drip, drip, against the stone.
I look down at my imaginary watch. “I’d say you have about two minutes before you feel it.
The agony. The rapid firing of all your neurons at once until you are a burning ball of fire, begging to die.
Begging for me to rip out your shriveled, callous heart, and send you straight into Pyra’s arms.” My head tilts as he squirms, curses flying from his mouth in a flurry of hatred.
“But maybe if you offer me something worthwhile, I’ll snap your neck before it starts. You’d better hurry and choose.”
Orris root is hard to find, but I paid a Flora to grow it for me.
It’s one of only three poisons without an antidote.
Once you’re exposed, there is no reversing it, which is why I used three pairs of gloves to handle it.
When it kicks in, it triggers every pain receptor in your body as if you’re being stabbed; everywhere and all at once.
It’s a torture worse than death.
And it’s my last resort.
A dark spot spreads across the front of the Rogue’s pants, and Phoenix chuckles, a sinister stare in his mismatched eyes when I look back.
“I don’t know anything!” the Rogue screams, pulling my attention.
“Sixty seconds,” I warn.
“HELP!” he roars, spit flying from his gaping mouth. “HELP!”
I’ve already told him that screaming was useless. “You’re running out of time.”
His yellow eyes bulge, and his veins protrude from his forehead as he fights to bite his tongue. I pull out a sharpened dagger and press the blade into the pale skin along his neck, grimacing at the lasting smell of urine.
“Talk,” I tell him, then I watch it begin—the agony.
He sucks in a sharp breath, a deafening bellow shaking the loose rocks scattered around the small space as his body falls victim to the poison. His pulse hammers at the base of his neck, and he pales until he’s nearly translucent, thrashing in his restraints.
“Hey!” I dig the blade in until blood beads along the edge, just enough to get him to look at me. “All it would take is two swipes on either side of your throat and you’d bleed out in seconds.”
He lets out another wail, his arms and legs flailing helplessly, but his rotten mouth stays shut.
“Cal, we gotta go,” Easton calls from his watch post. “Now.”
“Fuck.” I let the knife hang loosely between my thighs.
“You—” The Rogue stutters, and I snap the dagger right back up, all the blood draining from his face as he begins to sway against the chains. “Y-you…”
“Go on, then.” I press the blade in, ignoring Easton’s pleas as they get more frantic. “What about me?”
“Y-you,” he stutters again, a deep bellow of pain ripping from his chest, then his lips curl back in a snarl. “You look just like your daddy—”
My wrist flicks. Blood spews. And his body falls with a deafening thud.
We walk in silence as dawn breaks over the horizon, casting the near cloudless sky in warm shades of orange and red. My boots are getting harder to lift, the sand clinging to them like thick cement.
“There’s a storm coming,” I tell my coven, who trudges with heavy steps behind me.
Throwing words through the previous silence feels like throwing a boulder into still water, but dad taught me a red sky at sunrise was a bad omen from the sea, and that felt worth sharing with the group.
The group that hates my guts right now, seeing as none of them reply.
This is our third failed attempt at finding our people. We all managed to survive, and none of us lost any limbs, but our hands are empty. Again.
“Boss,” Devon calls from behind me, “Where are you going?”
I whip my head up, stopping dead in my tracks. Where am I going?
I’d walked this path plenty of times before, yet I’ve veered off somehow, leading my coven along the coast instead of following our usual path through the center of Griseo. I half turn in the sand, spinning to get my surroundings.
I turn again, disoriented, and then I feel a tug. Strong enough that I whip back around, facing the large dune closest to the swelling tide.
I take off walking around it without explanation, following that tug, and five sets of footsteps skeptically follow. Maybe I’ve finally lost my mind, I’m sure that’s what they’re all thinking.
The rope around my chest pulls taught, and as soon as I catch a glimpse of the waves that lap the shore, I freeze, and the rest of my coven halts beside me.
“Chiaros, what is that?” Hunter asks, blonde brows furrowed at what looks like a tangled mass of seaweed.
My boots sink into the sand as I approach. No, it’s a mass of dark waves and curls; long tendrils strewn across the sand. Tangled within it is a pale face; closed eyes with dark lashes, full colorless lips parted slightly, and lifeless freckles splattered across high cheekbones.
“Is she dead?” Pax steps up beside me, and I shrug, sinking my knees into the sand and pressing two fingers against the cold skin at her neck—
Her eyes open like fireworks, honeyed, burning, and bloodshot.
Instantly, she’s up, as if she wasn’t half dead a second ago, blood spreading back through her colorless lips, turning them a deep shade of pink.
Her wild curls fall in a tangled web around her shoulders, and every inch of skin that her bathing suit doesn’t cover is smothered in sand.
Her frantic eyes search my face, then the faces of the five men behind me, widening at each weapon we have strapped to our bodies.
“Who are you?” she asks, eyes flitting back to me. Her voice is hoarse and shaky, her arms trembling as she wraps them around herself.
“Who are you?” Phoenix drawls, prowling a step closer, and I jut my hand out over his chest to stop him.
“I’m Callan. And this is Phoenix.” Her eyes widen when I nod to the four behind me. “Pax, Devon, Hunter, Easton.” I take a step towards her, and she takes a step back, fear flitting across her face. “Do you…remember your name?” I ask, and Pax snickers behind me.
Her brows pinch. “Of course I do, I’m not stupid.”
I can’t tell who laughs behind me then, but someone does.
“Well, if you’re not stupid,” I pull on the arms of my jacket, walking it over to her, “then what do you go by?” This time, when I approach, she doesn’t take a step back; she stands a bit straighter. I can’t tell if that’s a defense mechanism or not; her face seems innocent enough.
She takes it from me before I can slide it over her shoulders. “Lucina,” she says, teeth chattering as she wraps herself in the material, enough to cover most of her thighs. “Where am I?”
“You’re on the coast of Streatham.”
Her face pales. Ambered eyes widening on us.
“Where did you come from—fuck.” Her eyes roll back, and I jolt forward, catching her by the waist before she can hit the sand.
She’s out completely, but there’s a pulse still, flickering violently beneath the two fingers I press there.
I hand my bag to Pax and gather her to my chest, trudging back up the sloped sand while my coven spectates wordlessly.
“Um, Boss,” Devon says as I pass, but I don’t answer, I already know what he’s going to say. He’s going to tell me that I can’t bring her back, because if I bring her back, she won’t be allowed to leave. But I’d rather she wake up pissed than die out here.
“Callan,” Easton says this time, and when I turn around to face them, the girl—Lucina— tightens her arm around me as if I’d moved too fast.
“What?” I snap. “I’m not just going to let her die out here, and we don’t know where she came from—”
“She’s Sol,” Devon says, pointing a burly finger to Lucina’s chest, and my eyes fall to the silver pendant there, the image of a burning sun engraved in the oath-bound metal. We all wear one; it’s the mark of a witch.
Lucina’s hardly moved, still sound asleep in my arms, when we make it to the Banyan tree.
It towers amongst the dense foliage, its falling branches sinking into the earth.
The coarse bark wraps every branch, the arms of the ancient giant like long, gangly fingers reaching for the surrounding soil.
Spring has fully given way to summer, and the leaves are a vibrant green, soaking up every ounce of the burning sun.
Devon presses his palm against the rough bark, and with a trembling groan, the trunk cracks and splits, revealing an archway that swirls with liquid gold.
Lucina jerks awake, all but scrambling out of my arms. I catch her shoulders to keep her steady, but she yanks herself out of my grasp. “You kidnapped me!” She backs up, hand raised as if there’s a weapon in it, but it’s only her pointed finger.
“Kidnapping?” I rear back. “How old are you?”
She pauses. Sitting with the question. Then her anger flares anew. “You adult-napped me!”
“Gods,” I curse, nodding to Devon. They all take turns stepping through the velvet gold archway, and her face goes deathly pale as she watches them.
“Okay,” I sigh. “Look at me, please.” Lucina does, instantly, and there’s a fight in her eyes like she’s mad at how fast she listened.
But that doesn’t matter, I only needed her attention.
“I have more things to tell you, but they might be shocking.” Her brows pinch.
“And the last time I did that, you fainted. Do you think you’re going to faint again, Lucina? ”
She folds her arms across her chest, her hands swimming in the fabric of my jacket. “Do you think I knew I was going to faint the first time?”
I don’t have the patience for this. “Look, I’m not the enemy here,” I tell her.
“You’re…” Lucina’s stare trails down my body, “covered in blood.” There’s no trace of fear in her voice, just pure observation.
I don’t bother looking down, I know how bad it is. I’ve been hunting Rogues for seven days; I am covered in it. “It’s not mine.”
“Whose is it, then?”
“I’m trying to help you, Lucina.” I change the subject, nodding to the Banyan.
“Through that tree is a safe place. We have plenty of space, food, and anything you might need, and if the Dame approves, you can stay as long as you like. But here’s the thing,” I step into her, just in case that sway in her stance gets too severe.
“Where I’m offering to take you can never be found, so if you want to leave, I’ll have to make you forget that it exists.
I’ll have to pull those memories right out of your head. Do you understand?”
“Not even a little bit.”
“Okay,” I tug on the silver chain around my neck and lift it out of my shirt. Her eyes follow it as it swings, then steadies itself in front of her face. “Look. Friendship necklaces. Do you have any idea what they mean?”
She frowns, dipping her chin and holding her silver pendant out to the light as if she’s just now seeing it for the first time. “No…I don’t.” She drops the charm, letting it fall back down her chest. “But I have a feeling you’re going to tell me.”
“You’re one of us.” She blinks up at me with a blank look on her face.
“Over twenty years ago, Streatham was attacked, and my people were forced to flee. Those that escaped fled to where I’m offering to take you, and we’ve been living there ever since.
” I grab onto her elbow. Just in case. “That necklace you’re wearing is the mark of a witch.
Congratulations, Lucina, you’re Solian.”