Chapter 27
Chapter
Twenty-Seven
I t was closing in on midnight. By then, Stryker and Dylan had arrived in Salem and they had their plan: weaken the Collector with the poppet, then wait for him to arrive at Medfield Hospital.
As soon as he did, Stella would call up as much fire as she could summon. Ethan would bolster it with their paired magic, and Abby would add whatever she could to increase the vibration of their energies to— hopefully —overwhelm the Collector and end him for good.
If they needed extra power, they had Jade and the shifters.
Beyond that, Stella could only trust that—one—her mother led them to this moment on purpose and—two—she knew something that was yet to be revealed.
While they waited for Jade to come back, Abby called Jun several times, hoping he’d join them and lend his magical magnification gifts. All her calls went to voicemail.
Jade finally returned to Broomstix, bringing Izzy, as well as an old red and black Harley Quinn costume she’d crumpled into a ball and tucked under her arm.
“This is what I wore to Bethany’s Halloween party,” she explained, grinning from ear to ear. “We can use it as an anchor when we open the portal.”
“Uh…Jade,” Stella said. Had her little sister totally forgotten how an anchor worked?
“It took us forever to find it,” Jade continued, seemingly ignoring Stella’s lack of enthusiasm.
“ I found it, actually,” Izzy said. “It was buried in a bin in Marietta’s cellar.”
“It won’t work as an anchor,” Stella explained. “Not if it’s here. An anchor has to be partially here and partially at Medfield Hospital, specifically on Halloween 2015.”
“Ah,” Jade said, wagging her finger. “But see, that’s just it. Only most of it is here.” She shook out the costume. “See? I caught the hem on a nail, and a chunk of it ripped off when I was inside Building R.”
“That’ll work!” Ethan said. “You can do the honors, Jade. Open the portal.”
“Remember how the runes go?” Stella asked.
“ Pfff . Of course,” Jade said. “I got it.”
They huddled together, except for Goody Joan, who held back.
“You’re not coming?” Stella asked.
“I am an old woman. I would be a liability.”
Stella looked to the shifters to get their read on the situation. They knew Goody Joan best and might know if this was a bad omen.
After all, Goody Joan prided herself on being a survivor. After four hundred years, she’d learned to avoid situations that jeopardized her life.
Hawk shrugged, which wasn’t helpful.
Before Stella could think better of the plan, Jade quipped, “Suit yourself!” and—still clutching her torn costume—drew the runes in the air.
Each stroke created a line of fire and when she was done, a shimmering circle of air wobbled in front of them before cracking open like a pair of eyelids.
It was nearly pitch black on the other side of the portal, but sure enough, when Stella, Ethan, Jade, Izzy, Hawk, Stryker, Dylan, and Abby stepped through the opening, they entered the grounds of the Medfield State Hospital.
Up ahead of them, the massive complex loomed, including the hint of a church steeple that was illuminated by the moon. To her right, a glowing white-painted sign read:
PASS AT YOUR OWN RISK.
UNSAFE CONDITIONS.
“Y’ think? ” she asked Ethan, lifting her chin toward the sign while clutching the poppet to her chest. She could feel her father’s monogrammed ring just there, inside the poppet and under her thumb.
Ethan grunted. “I wish rotting floor joists and crumbling mortar were the only things we had to worry about.”
“This way,” Jade whispered, and since she and Izzy were the only ones who’d been there before, they led the group along the edges of the paths that skirted the first few buildings.
The entire campus seemed to be built of the same red brick. Most of the windows were either boarded or bricked over and only a few had surviving bits of white trim. Brambles grew over many of the buildings’ doors, fending off any thoughts of entrance.
Eventually, they made it to the rear of the complex and the infamous Building R. It was surrounded by a fifteen-foot chainlink fence with its openings padlocked and previously attempted breaches patched with plywood, more chains, and wire. Another sign read in large block letters:
ENTRY TO BUILDINGS PROHIBITED
“Well, Stella?” Stryker asked. “Sensing the presence of any magic yet?”
“I don’t know,” Stella said.
“What do you mean, you don’t know?” Ethan asked. “You always know.”
“There’s definitely something nearby, but it doesn’t smell like the Collector. His magic is blended with everything he’s stolen. There are no distinct notes.”
“So, it worked,” Ethan concluded. “We’ve beat him here. We’ve got the advantage.”
“Yeah, I don’t think he’s here yet. Whoever this magic belongs to… I don’t know. It feels young. Maybe he’s holding other witches in one of these buildings?”
“Then this won’t be a wasted trip,” Dylan said, “even if he never shows. It’ll be another rescue mission.”
“Should we split up and see where the magic is coming from?” Jade asked.
“Maybe we should stick together,” Izzy said.
“Stick together,” Stella said, focusing her attention on Building R. “Ethan? Give me a leg up?”
Ethan looked up at the top of the chainlink fence, pressed his lips together, then bent over and laced his fingers to make a stirrup.
Stella passed the poppet off to Jade and set her foot in Ethan’s hands.
“One…two…three!” Ethan heaved Stella into the air toward top of the fence.
She’d just got her hands around the top crossbar when, quite suddenly, she was blown backward. Her arms windmilled as she flew through the air away from the building.
Abby rushed to the spot where Stella landed and bent over her friend’s body. Stella’s eyes were wide open, but unblinking. She didn’t seem to be breathing.
“Oh god. She’s not…?” Abby couldn’t make herself say the word.
Ethan dropped to his knees beside Stella. “Breathe. You just got the wind knocked out of you.”
“Is she okay?” Jade asked, a cry in her voice. She hugged the poppet to her chest.
Stella dragged in a gasping breath.
“There she is,” Hawk said, and he brushed the loose curls off his face.
“Shit,” Jade said. “You scared me.”
Stella groaned. “What happened?”
Ethan helped her sit up.
“You got to the top of the fence,” Abby said, replaying the scene as if it were a movie in her head. “Then it was like a cannon blast hit right in front of you. It threw you thirty feet.”
“That’s what it felt like,” Stella said, and she grabbed the back of her head. “Do we know why?”
“I didn’t detect any kind of ward,” Izzy said.
“Well, if you didn’t…” Abby said, knowing that she could stop there and her meaning would be clear. Izzy was a whiz at creating and destroying wards. If she didn’t detect one, then that was that.
“Is it an electric fence?” Stryker asked, glancing over his shoulder at it.
“I think I’d notice if it was,” said Izzy—who, in addition to wards, had an uncanny way with currents. Even now, her long frizzy brown hair seemed to lift off her scalp.
“Maybe it was just a fluke,” Hawk said, though it didn’t sound like he had a lot of faith in the theory.
“ I’ll try it,” Abby said, and she ran for the barricade.
“Wait!” Dylan cried.
But she was already scaling the fence—the irony not lost on her that four months after breaking out of a facility she was now trying to break in.
As soon as her hand hit the top rail, she too was blown backward.
Hawk, fortunately, was prepared and caught her in his arms before she could hit the ground.
“Thanks,” she whispered.
“Not a problem,” Hawk said, and he gave her a quick kiss on the lips.
A high-pitched scream split the night, and they all turned toward Building R.
A second later, the doors burst open and six shrieking high-school girls—all of them dressed in Halloween costumes, one of them in a torn Harley Quinn costume—poured out of the building.
“Shit,” Izzy said. “Jade, that’s us!”
The shifters immediately pushed their group behind some shrubbery as the girls screamed bloody murder while deftly climbing the fence and jumping down to the other side.
Abby didn’t know what would happen if Jade and Izzy’s younger selves ran into them, but she had to believe it wouldn’t be good. She watched in wide-eyed fascination as the last girl made it over, and the party ran away into the night.
“Uh…” Jade said. “Did that really happen?”
“Why the hell did you let me cut my bangs so short?” Izzy asked.
“I think the better question,” Hawk said, “is how they got in there.”
“We went in that night the same way they just came out,” Jade said. “Over the fence.”
“There must not have been a ward back then,” Abby said.
“But…” Izzy said. “This is back then. We’re in 2015. If there wasn’t a ward back then, then there shouldn’t be a ward right now.”
“Something kept Stella and Abby out,” Hawk said.
Jade got a determined look on her face, handed the poppet back to Stella, and stepped out from behind the shrub. She balled her hands into fists and approached the fence.
Abby braced in anticipation as Jade fit the toe of her right shoe into one of the holes in the chainlink.
Seconds later, she was up, over, and dropping gracefully to the ground on the other side. She put her hands on her hips and looked up at the top of the fence in confusion. “Huh.”
“How did you do that?” Abby asked, emerging from behind the shrub with everyone else. Jade had made it look so effortless.
Jade shrugged.
“My turn,” Izzy said.
She went up and over just as easily.
“Maybe we’ve got a window of opportunity,” Ethan said, and he wedged the tip of his shoe into the chain link.
That’s as far as he got, though. He was immediately blasted backward and landed in the dirt.
Ethan grunted and pushed up on his elbows. “What the hell?”
“Do we dare try?” Stryker asked.
“I think you’ve got to,” Stella said, “because I don’t like the theory that’s coming together.”
“What theory?” Abby asked because none of this made any sense to her. In fact, she had half a mind to try again.
Stella kept her gaze on Stryker and Dylan. “Give it a go.”
The two shifters tipped their heads back to look at the top of the rail, then they took several steps backward, dropped into their crouches, and took a running leap at the fence.
Abby had to say it, even among shifters, her mates were the shit. In one leap, they had their hands wrapped around the top bar and were swinging their legs to the side, vaulting over the fence like it was nothing. They landed silently on the other side.
“Shit,” Stella said. “I was right.”
“Now, tell us the theory,” Ethan demanded.
“There’s a ward all right,” Stella said, “but it’s designed just for the three of us.” She wagged her finger between herself, Ethan, and Abby.
“Why would that be?” Abby asked. “The Collector doesn’t even know we’re here. A few hours ago, we didn’t even know we’d be here.”
“Maybe he’s just ultra prepared,” Ethan said. “Maybe he was afraid we’d someday discover what he’s been doing here.”
Ethan reached out and touched the chainlink. His hand shot back as if he’d been burned.
“So, now what?” Jade asked. “Do we come back over? Do we try and take the ward down?”
“No,” Hawk said. “We split up. You four on that side. The four of us on this side.”
Abby’s heart squeezed when she saw the crestfallen looks on Stryker and Dylan’s faces. They hadn’t immediately realized that leaping the fence would mean being separated from her.
“Hawk?” Stryker asked.
“It’ll be okay,” he said. “This evens out our numbers. We can cover twice as much ground if we split up.”
Abby’s witch half wasn’t so sure this was a good idea, though her wolf half would never contradict her alpha.
“Go inside,” Stella said. “Jade, try to remember where you were when you felt someone watching you.” She glanced in the direction the teenage girls had run. “But don’t get too close. Just find out what we’re up against, so we can modify our plan if necessary.”
“And you?” Jade asked. “What are you guys gonna do?”
“We’ll look for another way in,” Abby said, her eyes locking with Stryker’s, then with Dylan’s. The divide between herself and them felt foreign and wrong. “And we’ll find you.”
Jade tugged on Stryker’s elbow, and he took two steps backward, his eyes never leaving Abby’s, before he finally turned and ran with Jade, Izzy, and Dylan into the building.
The creaky door scraped against the concrete as they muscled it open, then they disappeared inside and it fell shut.
A tingling sensation rippled down Abby’s arms. She thought it was the effects of being separated from two of her mates. But then she heard Stella mutter a curse in an odd-sounding voice.
Abby whirled, expecting the Collector. Instead, three semi-transparent women stood right in front of them. They were dressed in thick, gray dresses with heavy quilted bodices. Ghost inmates .
The first two specters—standing on the left and center—had bobbed and matted hair. The third ghost had her hair twisted into buns on either side of her head, and they appeared to have been sewn in place if the red thread was any indication. Their eyes were sunken and dark.
“Come with us,” said the middle ghost. “Now, before he arrives.”
“My mates—” Abby said, twisting her neck to look back at Building R.
“Are fine,” said the third ghost on the right. “Claire sent us to warn you.”
“Claire?” Stella asked. “My mother?”
“It’s the pair and the beetle we must protect,” said the first ghost. “Now, hurry.”
As soon as the door to Building R closed behind them, Stryker felt quite sure Hawk had made a mistake about splitting up. In fact, he turned and stared at the door for a full five seconds before Jade, Izzy, and Dylan, who were now twenty paces ahead, whisper-yelled for him to keep up.
He switched on his flashlight app and aimed it at the floor, adding his beam to the witches’ two streams of light that were slicing through the hallway ahead of them.
Debris littered the hall, and paint peeled like birch bark off the walls, which were otherwise pock-marked with giant holes, exposing sections of laths.
One room they passed contained several broken commodes, though there was no plumbing to suggest it had ever been a bathroom.
Another room was strewn with stained, striped mattresses, now homes for rats. Many doors were off their hinges and leaning against walls.
“How big is this building?” Stryker asked.
“I don’t know,” Jade said. “We explored a lot of it last time we were here, but not all. There are supposed to be tunnels underneath it that connect to other buildings.”
“If the Collector is using this place for one of his surgeries, I bet he’d be doing it in one of the tunnels,” Izzy said. “Back in the 30s, all of these rooms would’ve had patients, or staff buzzing around.”
They passed a large tiled room, marked Cafeteria . It was mostly empty, save for the stack of stainless-steel food trays and several folded tables.
“He could’ve done it up here too,” Dylan said. “He could’ve put up an invisibility ward like he did at Trask’s Mill.”
Izzy turned and aimed her flashlight at Dylan. “Sure. But it would be easier to maintain an invisibility ward if there were fewer people bumping into it all the time.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Stryker said. “I doubt we’re going to find a sign that says this way to the tunnels.”
“Wanna bet?” Jade said, and she pointed toward the end of the hall, which came to a T. The wall was tagged—graffiti style—with the word TUNNEL and an arrow to the left.
“Helpful,” Stryker said, taking one last glance back at the exit before they rounded the corner.
The hallway led down a short flight of stairs before bending to the right. Hawk couldn’t help noticing that the hallway was narrowing. His broad shoulders occasionally brushed the walls as he navigated more debris.
“Can you imagine if we found some witches being held down here?” Jade asked. “I wouldn’t mind being the hero for once.”
“I’d definitely prefer finding them alive and not those cylindrical tanks,” Stryker said, remembering the hoard of corpses he and his pack had discovered in a Connecticut barn.
“How do you feel about the third option?” Izzy asked, slowing her pace.
Jade bumped into the back of her. “The third option being?—”
“Zombies,” Izzy said.
“Shit.” Dylan let out a low, rumbling growl.
Stryker directed his flashlight into the dark ahead of them.
Several gray swampy figures filled the narrow space.
Stryker’s strategic instincts kicked in. There was no way they could fight in a space this tight. They were sitting ducks. They needed more room to move.
“Back to the cafeteria!” He turned to run, but his retreat was cut off. More zombies descended the stairs behind him.