Chapter Nineteen
Melinda
We had converged around the dining table at their home, all five of us too in shock to really speak.
Ambrose was taken by surprise that he hadn’t pieced that together while Erie sat beside me, too concerned with me to say anything.
Isa was concerned about both Lucien and I, her eyes constantly flickering between us.
Lucien was in a rage. He had not stopped pacing since we had all sat down, eyes flickering between their dulled honey brown and their true iridescent gold color.
He was not able to keep his magic under control due to the anger.
His anger only erupted the moment he’d realized that it had been my dad who had cut my brakes and tried to kill me the night of the town dance. That part had also been harder for me to grasp than my dad killing people.
I was his blood and yet he had tried to kill me because of either my witch blood or because he feared I was too close to figuring him out. He had been hunting and fishing a lot more than usual, plus his mood swings had become erratic towards Lucien, me and the people who had tried buying our land.
“What do we do?” I found myself thinking aloud.
With the first words spoken in the past half hour, everyone snapped from their own inner thoughts to dwell on my spoken one.
What could we do? If we acted now, what would happen? What kind of ritual would we interrupt? What consequences would there be for us acting now or not at all?
Ambrose read my thoughts and spoke them aloud, “We need to know the reason and what the blood sacrifices are for. We need to know what will happen if we intervene. The last thing we need is interrupting a ritual that could bring about more chaos than another person killed. It’s harsh, but it’s the reality we have to come to terms with. ”
I knew he was right, but the thought of making that choice didn’t sit well in my heart. How could I choose between sacrificing someone I might know for others?
“How would we get those answers?” Erie questioned. “No one even knows he’s the killer besides us.”
Ambrose looked at me, then down to my necklace.
“We can try to contact the residual magic inside that necklace in hopes your mother knows. You will most likely absorb the magic within, which means your mother’s as well.
If she knows then we can make a plan based on the information she gives.
Are you willing to sacrifice your necklace for these answers? ”
I nodded. The prospect of seeing my mother or communicating with her in any way made me feel an excitement that had seemed impossible to feel given the current circumstances before us. Isadora left the room momentarily before returning with six candles.
“We should do this in the living room. She needs a larger flat surface. This table is not large enough.”
Ambrose nodded in agreement, taking us all into the living room where I watched the two set up the candles and draw runes on the ground that I did not recognize, but looked similar to the ones that were etched into my necklace.
Once the runes were drawn around each candle, I was placed in the center.
The candles ignited once I was laid in the center.
“Take off your necklace and place it above your head, between the candle and you,” Isadora continued to instruct.
One day I would have to delve further into how Isadora knew so much about magic and witches, but for now I listened to her instruction and placed the necklace in its designated spot.
“Place your hands over your heart and take three deep breaths. With each breath, picture yourself untangling a knot. By your third breath, you will cease breathing and wake up inside the necklace. You will not have much time so please try and get the answers.”
Closing my eyes with my hands over my heart, I pictured the thread and took a deep breath.
The thread came undone a little and with the next breath, it was almost undone.
By the third and final, the thread stretched across my mind, untangled.
And when I opened my eyes, I was in a dark forest. Across from me was a woman, sitting on a large log as frogs croaked around us and the moon emitting the only light around us.
I took a small step in her direction, my heart hammering inside my chest. Then I saw the familiar black dahlia tattoo on her back. I took another step in her direction. “Mom?”
The woman turned around, with a smile and a face that looked so similar to my own.
My feet carried me to her, my arms pulling her against me as I embraced my mother for the first time.
Her slender arms enveloped my frame, her scent of lilacs and honey smelled of a home I had not known.
I didn’t care about anything that I had come here for. I was with my mom again.
Sensing my dissolving resolve, she tried to bring me back to the task at hand, “We don’t have much time, Mel. This connection cannot last as long as I would like it to. You need to stop Gene before he kills again.”
“Why? Why can’t I just stay here with you?” I sniffled into her shoulder. Here where she was; where I could finally be with her forever. Her hands ran over my back to comfort me. “I never got to know you. I never got to tell you everything I wanted to.”
She pulled back so I had to face her. Her familiar gray eyes surveyed mine, taking in every feature it could as I did the same with her. She kissed my forehead and pressed hers against my own.
“Mel, I have been with you every step of your journey through life. I was there for every first love and heartbreak with Lance. I was there as you discovered your passions. I was there for every tear and smile. I was with you every day you wore your necklace. My necklace.”
It took every bit of will power to step out of her arms, to wear a serious expression and abandon all the questions I had. Wiping the tears I had shed, I took a deep breath to return to the subject at hand, “Why is my dad doing this?”
She sat me down on the log she had been sitting on before I arrived, her face wary. There was something she wanted to say, but unsure what to do.
Wringing her hands, she finally spoke, “Gene is not your father. He is a man that was kind enough to take me in when I escaped from Shadowhaven. We went with the story that you were his so no one would know of your true origins. Your real father was someone that I knew only briefly. The coven began turning on me, so I fled here and told Gene everything. When he already had an understanding of Shadowhaven from his family, that should have been a warning sign. But I didn’t think anything of it at the time because the town had many with Shadow blood.
It wasn’t until Hugo gave me the necklace that I saw the real change in him.
I saw the darkness in his heart and when I realized he wasn’t the man I thought he was, it was too late. ”
“Why? Why is he doing this?” I asked again.
She shook her head. “Humans are not supposed to perform magical sacrifices. It kills their soul as well as their body with each sacrifice. His family didn’t care about the consequences when they staked their claim to this land.
They were greedy and used a witch to bless the land.
Before they killed her, she told them they would have to make six sacrifices every generation to keep the land from dying.
She cursed them to only carry boys so that no female would carry the burden of the curse.
Gene is the fourth member who chose not to sacrifice animals.
It’s an outlawed practice for a reason.”
This man I had lived with my whole life, who cared for me and raised me, was not my father.
He was a killer. With the information from my mother, I now knew he chose to kill them and continued to do so.
I felt the weight of my guilt disappear from wishing for his death.
He chose to kill Jeremy. And I was now choosing to kill him.
I would hold no regrets when he drew his last breath.
There was nothing he could say or do that would change that.
Taking her hands, I looked at her with a new determination, “How do I stop him?”
“Death. That is the only way.”
“I can do it. Knowing what I do now, I can do it,” I assure her. She squeezed my hands, shaking her head vehemently. “I can. After what he did to Jeremy, I can.”
“Do not worry about that now. He would have already chosen his next target by now. You have to go back to your body, my daughter. I will be with you until it is all over. Save the fae girl before it’s too late,” she told me while her form disappeared in front of me. I could no longer feel her hands.
She was gone in an instant and in the next, I was opening my eyes to stare up at the living room ceiling. Lucien sensed my pain and was by my side in an instant.
“I didn’t get to say goodbye,” I sobbed. He pulled me into his arms, letting me cry into his chest as the others watched. Ambrose looked away, as if too embarrassed to be seen sympathizing with my situation.
“We can mourn later,” he finally spoke up. “You were mumbling about saving a fae girl. We need to do that now. Who is fae in this town?”
I shook my head, unable to answer that. Lucien took over to answer, “There’s four in this town. There’s only four of us that can travel in enough time, but that leaves Melinda unaccounted for.”
“I can go home and see if that bastard is still there. If he is, I could try to stall for enough time for you all to locate the fae girls,” I offered.
Lucien shook his head, but Ambrose approved of my suggestion, “Very well. We will go with that plan. Go now, Melinda. Time is against us to save this last victim.”
I nodded and Lucien handed me the truck keys reluctantly.
Anxiety gripped me as I grabbed onto the keys, remembering the last time I was behind the wheel alone.
I shoved the anxiety down, knowing I couldn’t afford to hesitate for a second.
I ran from the house and into the vehicle, giving the truck no time to adjust as I shifted into drive.
Gravel and dirt flew around me with the speed I took the roads, needing to get home as soon as possible.
When I arrived, I took immediate notice of the lights still being on inside. I left the truck running as I ran inside. Gene was there, filling a bag with some herbs I didn’t recognize. I snatched it from his hands and threw it into the trash.
“Melinda Marie Hardgrave! What in God’s name are you doing?”
“I know. I know everything, Gene. I’m not going to let you hurt another person.”
He searched my face, looking for something I wasn’t sure of.
Whether he found it or not, his paternal mask fell away to expose the dark hatred that twisted his face.
“Well, then let’s not keep pretending, daughter.
You won’t be able to stop me. Since you started accepting that abominable blood of yours, I made sure the house was warded against magic.
Let me finish this last sacrifice without interference and you can ride off into the night with your vampires. ”
“No. This stops now. I will not let you kill another and I’ve already called Dorian. The police know everything and are on their way,” I lied as well as I could manage in the high stress situation I was in. It didn’t appear too convincing, however, as he didn’t bat an eye at my threat.
“I would love to stand and wait for nothing, but I have a fae tied up in the barn and I am on a time crunch. If you try anything, I will put you down just the same.”
He turned to leave, but I rushed in front of him, arms splayed out as I blocked his path, “No.”
Rolling his eyes, he pulled a fist back and delivered a punch to my stomach. All the air left my lungs with a wheeze, my body folding. The next blow was to the back of my neck, knocking me unconscious almost instantly.
I had failed.
I only hoped that the others would come find us before this monster killed the fae girl that would complete his sinister ritual.