Chapter 19
My head pounds relentlessly. It’s so heavy, and I struggle to focus.
The last thing I remember was being outside the pub after the funeral.
Martin’s service had been very nice, Chan had done an amazing job, but I needed to get some air.
With everything that happened with Sam yesterday, the revelation that I might somehow be responsible for the increase in supernatural cases and then being at the funeral with everyone’s emotions crashing in on me had been overwhelming.
Over the months since I’ve been with Sam, it’s been getting easier to manage my empathic abilities. Somehow, he grounds me, makes it easier to focus. Being in such a busy city, I’ve had no choice but to learn how to block out others’ emotions or I’d have been a basket case by now.
But that still doesn’t explain what happened. I was outside and then the next moment?—
Darkness.
I blink at the blurry lights above me. My stomach churns and bile burns at the back of my throat. Then I taste it.
Dark magic.
A high ceiling comes into view as I open my eyes fully. I’m indoors somewhere. Fighting back a brutal wave of nausea, I draw in a slow breath through my nose and force it out through my mouth, then repeat the action a couple of times until I’m certain I’m not going to be sick.
My shoulders scream in agony and my body shivers violently. I’m so cold.
When the room finally stops spinning, I recognise my surroundings with a sinking feeling. I’m in the bookshop.
It’s then I’m aware of the ropes binding my wrists.
I’m strung up over a hook, leaving me suspended a foot above the ground.
Tiny white flowers are woven into the twisted fibres of the ropes, and my skin burns wherever the flowers touch.
I’ve been stripped to the waist, and the same symbols which had marked Vivienne’s corpse now adorn my body.
My feet are also bare, my toes almost numb in the icy air of the room.
Well, fuck.
Did I just get myself kidnapped?
My gaze trails to the wooden floor, and my stomach clenches. A circle has been cast over the demon trap, with lit candles that give off an unpleasant, oily scent placed at intervals around its perimeter.
Footsteps approach from behind me, and I try to twist my body, but it’s no use. From this angle, I can’t see who it is.
“You’re awake, then?”
The voice is deep and male, and has a rasp to it. A moment later, a hooded figure appears. From where I’m dangling, he doesn’t look particularly tall, maybe average height, and is dressed in a very clichéd deeply cowled white robe. He stops a few steps from me and draws his hood back.
I blink in confusion. It looks like Inspector Byrnes, the police detective who showed up out of the blue and took an instant dislike to Danny and Tristan. But at the same time, it’s also not him.
This person is using some sort of spell to change his appearance, but here in this shop supercharged with magic, I can see straight through his disguise to an old man.
He’s in his late seventies, maybe. I’ve never been any good at guessing people’s ages, but his face is heavily lined.
His brows are wiry and almost white, his hair the same.
When I look down at his hands, they’re twisted and gnarled with age.
“You’re not Inspector Byrnes.”
His eyes narrow and his thin lips curl in distaste. “I’m not, and if you’d been a witch worth your salt, you’d have known that from the beginning.” His gaze sweeps over my half-naked and graffitied body. “I must confess, I don’t know why he was so insistent you be kept alive.”
“Who?” I demand.
He ignores my question, instead just continuing to stare at me, his twisted fingers stroking his bony jaw. “I was expecting you to be slightly more impressive.”
“Well, you’re not exactly catching me at my best,” I mutter.
Taking a slow breath, I reach inside myself for my magic, but something is wrong. I can’t seem to access it. Some of my panic must bleed through my expression because the old man chuckles.
“What’s the matter?” he tuts. “Missing something?”
I glare at him. “What did you do?”
He lifts his chin, indicating the bindings at my wrists, which I’m trying to ignore even as my skin blisters beneath them.
“That’s witch rope. Don’t you know anything, boy?” he scoffs. “You’re not fit to bear the Crawshanks name.”
Something in the loathing of his tone and the resentment in his eyes brings a moment of clarity. “But you are?” I reply coolly. “You’re a descendant too, aren’t you?”
“I am Issac, the true descendant of the Crawshanks bloodline,” his says imperiously. “I come from Cordelia. Unlike you, who were spawned from her useless sister.”
“Useless?” I raise a brow. “And yet Constance was powerful enough to stop her sister and trap a demon.”
The man bares his teeth and hisses. “You dare to think you’re more powerful… more deserving than me?”
“More powerful, I have no idea. More deserving?” I hum a little.
“Debatable. Have a more highly evolved moral compass? Definitely.” We stare at each other for a long, silent moment.
“Why did you do it?” I whisper. “Why did you kill Vivienne? We both know unlocking a blood-magic spell only takes a vial’s worth of blood at most. There was no need for her to die. ”
Issac’s grin is filled with sadistic glee. “I’d have thought you’d be glad.”
“Why the hell would I be glad?”
“I did you a favour. She was a whore, getting herself pregnant so young. Then she threw you away like you were nothing.”
I can’t help my flinch as his words hit a little too close, but he notices, and his smile widens.
“That’s right. She didn’t give a fuck about her bastard child.
You were just a dirty little secret she had to get rid of.
She didn’t deserve the Crawshanks legacy,” he growls in disgust. “This place, the fortune tucked away in several accounts. I should have killed her when I killed her parents. Their deaths were so unsatisfying. I really had wanted to make them suffer, just like I finally did with their slut of a daughter, but the timing wasn’t right.
I couldn’t afford to draw too much attention, so I had to make it look like an accident. ”
“You killed her—” I suck in a sharp breath. “Why?”
“Why did I kill your grandparents?” He raises one bushy brow.
“The same reason I killed your drunken whore of a mother, the same reason I’m going to kill you.
Because I hate you. Because I am going to wipe out the whole of Constance’s bloodline.
” His gaze sweeps the room. “Can you feel the power in this place? There is so much more here than you realise. You have no idea of the secrets it hides. You are unworthy of it.”
“I don’t want it,” I admit. “Never did. And neither did Vivienne, she was trapped here.”
“Aww, defending your mummy?” he mocks. “Even after she threw you away like trash. You really are pathetic. I’d have smothered you in your crib if I could.”
“Then why didn’t you?” I hiss.
“I was beyond tempted, but that bitch got rid of you before I could find you. Gave you to those two fucking poofs that have the nerve to call themselves witches.”
Anger sears through me.
“Don’t call them that!” My voice reverberates through the entire room like a sonic boom, making the floorboards tremble beneath him.
Issac’s eyes widen, and he stumbles back a pace. “How did you do that?”
The scent of singed twine drifts around me as I follow his gaze, looking up to find scorch marks on the rope and several of the flowers burned to ashes.
Unfortunately, although the surge of my magic damaged my bonds, it hadn’t quite been enough to free me, leaving me still dangling from the hook.
But at least my wrists aren’t burning anymore.
“Untie me,” I say flatly. “Then we can figure out which one of us is more powerful. My guess is it won’t be you, considering you had to sucker punch me with magic when my back was turned.”
“Shut the fuck up before I sew your mouth shut like I did that bitch of a mother of yours.”
I stare at him calmly. “I’m going to make sure you pay for every moment of pain you caused her. Just so you know.”
“I said, shut the fuck up!”
“Or what?” I tilt my head and study his flashing eyes and ruddy skin. “Why don’t you tell me why you weren’t supposed to kill me? Exactly who wanted me alive?”
His eyes flick to the floor at my feet and I have my answer.
“The demon?” I stare at him, trying to keep the sudden sense of dread from leaching into my expression. I can’t afford to show any weakness right now. “The demon wanted me alive?”
“He’s always retained an awareness, even after Constance tricked him into that trap.”
“Tricked, or kicked his ass with magic?” I can’t help the words that tumble from my lips acerbically.
“Fuck you,” Issac spits.
“No, thank you.”
“I came here looking for Vivienne and her parents thirty years ago. I was going to kill them and take what was rightfully mine, but instead I heard his voice.”
“The demon?” I frowned. “You could hear him?”
Issac gives a callous smile. “I was chosen. Because he could sense my power.”
Sensed your stupidity more like, I think to myself, but choose to keep my mouth shut.
“He wants to be released, to be free, and he needs Constance’s bloodline to open the trap, but he also needs someone powerful enough to wield his magic.
Demon magic.” He looks down at his own outstretched hands.
“He whispered in my ear, taught me his language, his secrets, so that I could free him. He promised to serve me, to bestow upon me powers beyond my wildest imagination.”
“He’s a demon, not a genie,” I snap. “Surely you must know he lies.”
Issac peels back his lips and growls at me again. “Do you think me stupid?”
It is so hard to bite my tongue and not answer that question.
“I know demons lie, but I am of Cordelia’s bloodline. Her control of him extends to me. Only I can command him.”
I don’t believe that for a second, but I’m not going to argue semantics with him. “So you free him and he promises to serve you. Where do I come into this?”
“He wants you.”
“Excuse me?”
“He didn’t say why.” Issac shrugs. “But he knew.”
“Knew what?”
“He knew the moment you came into being. When you were conceived in a dirty fumble upstairs with the musician lodger while her parents slept in the room down the corridor. I wanted to put a knife through her belly and be done with it, but he insisted you had to be born. He wouldn’t share his knowledge with me until I promised.
” Issac’s mouth curved. “An agreement I will shortly no longer be bound to.”
“What do you mean?” my eyes narrow.
“The second I release him and he comes fully under my control, I will have no need to bargain with him. He will serve me whether he wants to or not. Whatever plans he has for you will be null and void. I’ll put a knife through your belly and be done with your whole bloodline.”
“Surely you can’t be this na?ve? You think he’s just going to jump out of the floor and hand himself over to you?
Into slavery to a human? You have no idea if Cordelia’s original spell is powerful enough to extend to her descendant or how extensive her control of him actually was.
Have you ever thought he was playing her?
That he just pretended to be her tame demon, to give her the illusion of control, because he has his own agenda? He’s a fucking demon!”
“I wouldn’t expect you to understand,” he scoffs.
“Issac, I know you think you are, but you’re not strong enough to control a demon. It will turn on you the moment it is free, and the whole world will burn for your avarice.”
“I have Cordelia’s blood burning through my veins. It bowed to her, it will bow to me.”
“If that’s true and she did actually find a way to control the demon, it bowed to her because she had The Book of Lala Khal.
You. Do. Not.” I take a deep breath. “Issac, it is going to kill you and everyone else that stands in its path. Are you willing to unleash that kind of evil on the world? Are you really that deluded? That power-mad?”
“Enough!” he snaps, but before I can say anything else, a familiar sound echoes through the room.
It’s my phone. I look around frantically, not that it would do any good in my current predicament. It rings off and then a second later starts again. I watch as Issac smirks and reaches into the pocket of his robe, then produces my phone and glances at the screen.
“Ah, it seems your PI friend is trying to reach you.” The phone rings off and then starts again. “My, my, he is very insistent. Perhaps I should answer? Oh look, he’s left you a message. Shall we listen to it?”
“Leave him alone, he has nothing to do with this.”
Ignoring me, Issac plays the voice message.
“There’s no point in hiding from us, Prickles.” Sam’s annoyed tone echoes in the stillness of the room. “You’ve got some explaining to do.”
“Prickles?” Issac eyes me with interest. “Hmm, your friend seems very unhappy about something, do you think your secret’s out…Sage?”
My tone is glacial as I stare at him. “If you go near him, I will make you suffer like you’ve never suffered before. It’ll make whatever that demon is planning to do to you look like a Sunday fucking picnic.”
“You do have a temper hidden under all those neatly pressed, tightly buttoned-up clothes of yours, don’t you, cousin?
” He tuts mockingly, but before I can respond, the phone rings again, and this time he hums in pleasure when he looks at the screen.
“Oh, it’s Tristan. What do you think? Should we invite the whole gang along?
After all, my demon will be hungry after rising from such a long confinement.
I for one cannot wait to see him rip the good detective Hayes into tiny little pieces. ”
“I mean it, Issac.” I growl. “It’s me you want, stay away from them!”
But he ignores me. Instead, he connects the call and raises it to his ear, then listens for a long, excruciating moment.
“I’m sorry.” He smiles at me slowly. “Harrison can’t come to the phone right now. My cousin is rather”—his gaze flicks to my wrists—“tied up at the moment.”