Chapter Nine #2
Her lips pressed together, and her head jerked from side to side. Clearly, the spell was doing its level best to stop her from talking to us. It needed to be taken care of.
As Margaux questioned her, I flipped through my memories, trying to recall a chant, incantation, or something innate in my elemental magic that might unravel the spell’s bonds on her.
I needed to think. To retake control of myself.
The voice inside my head whispered, “She’ll get Ida killed if you let your guard down. Even if you dismantle the spell, she won’t tell you anything. The best thing to do is kill her.”
“No,” I yelled, and the apathy receded slightly. All sensation intensified. My blood trickled down my fingers and hit the floor with a splash, not a hiss. Sounds momentarily returned to their normal tones.
Margaux gave me a curious glance, but she didn’t miss a step questioning Bronwyn. “What are you doing in La Paloma? Why did you come here?”
“I was assigned to integrate with the paranormals in town. Particularly the witches.”
“Why?”
“The organization believed Betty was dangerous.” She tried to calm her voice, but the spell had too strong a hold on her. “My instructions were … observe and report back.”
Margaux looked as pissed as I’d ever seen her. “For what? What’s the purpose of this organization?”
“We track demons,” she choked out, as the spell she was under took full effect.
Demons? The word was a quick, sharp jab to the ribs, but the pain was fleeting, instantly replaced by the apathetic numbness as icy darkness seeped in again.
“You were sent to observe me,” I said.
“Yes.”
“Good goddess, were you ever on the wrong track when you joined the coven,” Margaux muttered. “Betty despised the La Paloma coven.”
“Uh huh.” She snapped her head to the side as if physically breaking free of the spell’s hold.
Her voice was less forced, less thready when she spoke again.
“I realized that the first time I invited Betty to a meeting, and she told me she’d rather scrub down with a sandpaper loofah and jump into a pool of rubbing alcohol. ”
I didn’t recall saying that, but it sounded like me. “What were you and your people going to do if you decided I was a demon? What was the big plan?”
“Banish you back to Hell.”
The apathy lessened, and I squeezed my hands into fists.
This time, my nails didn’t cut into my palms. My gray skin and pointed nails had gone fuzzy, the way my face had changed on the way to Floyd’s with Cecil.
My demon side was like a poorly executed overlay atop my human self.
It hadn’t gone away completely, but my skin returned to its usual color.
The numbness retreated, and I was left with confusion, hurt, and an empty sort of rage.
“I don’t understand. I didn’t even know about my demon side when you came to town.”
“My orders indicated otherwise,” she said with a grunt.
Had someone known what I was before I even did?
The obvious answer was yes. My mom, Sexton, my murderous cousin, and the father I never knew. Anyone they’d told. Definitely Bloody Mary. Probably Belial.
Hell.
“Really pisses me off that I considered you a friend,” I said.
“I am, though.” Her gaze was sad, her tone regretful. “It’s probably because of my choice to be your friend that Mason is in trouble.”
“Explain yourself,” Margaux said.
“I stopped reporting about Betty to my superiors. Mason disagreed with me, but he didn’t do anything about it. That put him on the wrong side of the Org. Me, too.”
“Why’d you stop?” I asked.
“I got to know you. You aren’t a danger to anyone.” She shrugged. “Maybe yourself, but I was convinced the Org was wrong about you.”
“Why would they accuse Betty of kidnapping him?” Margaux asked.
“I don’t know. Everything depends on who has him. There’s a structure to the Org, but there are also independent operators—like bounty hunters.”
Margaux cursed in Spanish.
“Once the Org realizes I don’t have him what will they do?”
“Kill you,” she said simply.
“So, one way or another, they intend to get me off this plane of existence. Even if I have nothing to do with Mason’s disappearance, they’ll kill me. Even if I’m not from Hell, they’ll try to send me there.”
“Yes,” Bronwyn said.
“Will they kill me with human weapons if they can’t banish me?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never seen them fail.”
A chill went through me.
“Evidently, they don’t view you as human,” Margaux said, grinding her heel into my pain. “Paranormal, either. To them, you’re not worthy of consideration.”
The numbness threatened, lapping at me like waves on a beach.
Once more, my fingernails sharpened, skin grayed.
I was so angry at everything—the threat to Ida, Bronwyn, this organization, my mother and father, and Sexton.
I ground my teeth, fisted my hands, stared daggers at the witch in front of me.
“Uh, Betty?” Margaux watched me with the vigilance she would’ve shown a snarling dog she’d come across in a dark alley. “It’s happening again.”
As if I didn’t know that.
The deadening of my emotions spread until I had only the slightest sliver of annoyance left. I directed it at the thing taking me over.
Go away. I’m not angry. I don’t need you.
Earth magic pushed against demon magic. Both were determined, and the fight was intense. My body felt like my mouth after a bad dental appointment. Deadened and bleeding.
“Get back,” I said, aloud. “I don’t need you.”
I gave up my hold on Bronwyn, and she sank to the floor at Margaux’s feet. It was taking everything I had to fight the urge to burn this store to the ground with her in it.
“Go.” This time I directed my words to the witches. “I can’t hold this back.”
Bronwyn shook her head. “We can’t just leave you here.”
“Let me try something.” Margaux held her phone up like she was taking a picture of me.
Great. I’m sure I looked like Medusa’s way less beautiful cousin. Couldn’t wait to see myself become a hangover meme on social media.
The opening beat of Redbone’s “Come and Get Your Love” played from the phone’s tinny speaker. She turned up the volume.
“Margaux, what in the world are you doing?” Bronwyn stroked the sore spots on her throat.
“There’s a reason she plays seventies music all the time. Lila loved it, and this was her favorite song. I’m thinking it’s Betty’s, too.”
My hands were shaking, so I fisted them at my sides. The music reached for me like Mom’s hands, melodic fingers stroking the planes of my face. I fought against it like a nightmare fights the dawn.
“Let your earth magic do some fighting,” Margaux said. “You don’t have to do it alone, Betty. You aren’t alone.”
She thought I could fight this thing possessing me with platitudes and old songs? The woman had no idea what I was battling.
“I’m trying.” I strained against the darkness—eyes pinched shut, jaw clenched, sweat dribbling down the side of my face. At this point, I couldn’t feel anything. Not even my earth magic.
“I don’t think it’s working,” Bronwyn said.
Margaux upped the volume to full blast, which wasn’t all that loud since it was through her phone’s speaker. “We aren’t even at the good part yet.”
“Look at her. Is that what I think it is? Is she sweating blood?”
The chorus hit then, entering my body with an endorphin rush of sound, and Mom was with me. I was a child, being led into the soil for the very first time.
“This is where we’re our strongest, Betty.”
I replied in my own voice, “But I’m not on the soil, Mom.”
Bronwyn made an approving sound. Margaux shushed her.
Memories, good and bad, flooded into my head. “You carry our soil within you. It lives in your blood.”
“I’m a demon,” I said.
“You are something neither the elemental world nor the demon world has ever seen.” The words, and the voice that spoke them, made me shiver.
Sexton.
I didn’t dare say it aloud. He’d once told me I could summon him by speaking his name, and that was the last thing I needed now. I couldn’t deal with another complication.
The music had provided the distraction I’d needed to battle back my demon side. As the song faded to silence, the numbness and chill receded entirely, and I was myself again.
“You have so much to explain.” I glared at Bronwyn.
“Everything.” Margaux helped the other witch to her feet. “We need it all.”
“I’ll tell you what I know.” Bronwyn touched her face, her mouth, her throat. “Whoa. I can speak. The secrecy spell broke. I must’ve truly believed you were going to kill me.”
“I would have,” I said. “I wanted to.”
“You’re upset.” She swallowed audibly. “I don’t blame you. And Maya. Damn. How am I going to explain this to her?”
I liked Maya, but I gave zero damns about her feelings right now. Ida was in danger. The whole county was in danger. And Bronwyn had answers I needed.
“Who are you really, Rachel Hill? And who is Mason Hartman? But most importantly, who the hell was that on the phone threatening my best friend?”