Regan Hastings - Visions of Magic

Shea’s fingers tightened around the black silver and the element took a stronger grip on her as well. It whispered through her mind of glories to come. Of battles to be won. Of victory and more power than any witch had ever before claimed.

She heard it all and fought anew to retain knowledge of who and what she was.

“Think about it Shea,” Kellyn said, her voice as musical and compelling as a chant. “Think of how the world has changed in eight hundred years. Think how much more we could have now. Think of the dynasty we could build. Together. The black silver craves us as we need it. We are blood-bonded, the coven and the Artifact. Each of the other, we are pieces in a puzzle, incomplete unless joined.”

“She’s lying to you, Shea.”

Shea heard Torin, but her soul listened to Kellyn.

“We can be gods, Shea,” the witch said, moving closer still until they were only an arm’s reach apart. “Danu created the witches. Belen created the Eternals. We can be bigger than either of them. Mortals don’t understand real power. But they will. Don’t you see? We can harvest the darkness for ourselves. We can be what we always were meant to be…”

Shea swayed and locked her knees to keep from toppling beneath the onslaught of images racing through her mind. Dark, terrible, glorious images of witches running the world. Leaders of nations. No longer hunted, but the hunters. No longer held beneath the thumb of humans who couldn’t possibly understand what the witches really were.

“And our souls?” Shea finally managed to ask, fixing her gaze on the witch in front of her.

Kellyn’s eyes glittered with victory, excitement. She felt Shea weakening and was rejoicing in it. “With enough power, we can enchant a spell of immortality and live forever. Who cares about a soul? I’m offering you everything. All you have to do is reach out and take it.”

Shea shifted a look at Torin and read his expression. His complete trust in her. How, she wondered. How did he trust her when she couldn’t trust herself? Couldn’t he hear the irresistible lure of Kellyn’s words? Couldn’t he feel the pull of the dark power? He’d held the Artifact. Didn’t he realize what that black silver was doing to her, even now?

But his pale gray eyes remained steady on her, filled with his unshakeable belief in her.

“Stop thinking about him!” Kellyn shouted, as she clapped her hands together and a man-size cage with white gold bars appeared on the bullet-shredded lawn. The cage bars glinted in the early-morning sunlight.

“What’re you doing?” Shea looked from Kellyn to Torin and back again.

“I’m taking care of your problem as I took care of my own,” Kellyn told her. “The power’s in you, Shea. Force your Eternal into the cage.”

Torin tensed as if ready to flash out. But Shea knew he wouldn’t do it, not without her. And she wasn’t within reach. He wouldn’t leave her, no matter the cost. She glanced at him, but kept her hand tight around the black silver still pumping dark energy into her body. The sweet rush of temptation pooled within her and she took short, shallow breaths, relishing all of the dark sensations.

“Do it, Shea,” Kellyn demanded. “Then we’ll finish our talk.”

Fingers and thumb caressing the smooth, glassy surface of the black silver, Shea whipped her head around, lifted her free hand and aimed her power at Torin.

“Close your mind to her, Shea,” he shouted even as he was swept into the cage. Instantly, the white gold barred door slammed shut on him. His eyes flared with fury, but the anger was directed at Kellyn, not Shea. His hands fisted around the white gold briefly, but he let go a moment later, no doubt feeling the drain of his powers. “Damn it, Shea, let me out before it’s too late!”

His voice sounded far away, muffled, and Shea knew it was because she was losing herself in the dark magics. She felt as if she were trapped in a slow spiral, traveling ever downward, becoming a part of the darkness itself. And a part of her loved it. Craved it.

Her gaze locked with her Eternal, though, and she somehow managed to gain a tenuous grip on her own inner strength. She looked at Torin, but asked Kellyn, “What happens now? What happens to him if I go along with you?”

He became a pillar of fire within the white gold cage, but the flames were a pale echo of what they usually were. And she knew he would never be free of that cage unless she freed him.

“Nothing,” Kellyn said, strolling toward the trapped Eternal with a smile on her face. “Absolutely nothing will happen to him. Ever.” She tapped her fingernail against the white gold bars and made a face at the instant yet tiny drain on her power. “I did the same to my Eternal. Trust me when I say it works like a charm.”

“Where is he?” Shea asked, still fighting the lure of the darkness. “Your Eternal. What did you do with him?”

Kellyn whirled around to face her, a wide grin on her face. “I dropped him into the ocean,” she said and chuckled a little at the memory. “Right now, the oh, so pious Egan is enjoying the view at the bottom of the sea.”

Shea shot a look at Torin and she saw his eyes fill with pain and fury.

“Remember,” Kellyn was saying, “they are of the fire. Water will restrict and dampen their powers and the white gold bars are a continual drain. They can’t drown, because they’re unfortunately immortal”-she looked disappointed-“but they can be contained. Eternally-no pun intended, of course. You are the only one who can dispose of your Eternal, Shea. I’d do it for you, but some things are simply out of my control.”

Shea heard the madness in the witch’s voice and knew that if she continued to listen to the dark magics taking her over, she would soon be no better.

“You’ll see,” Kellyn assured her. “Besides, it’s not as if we’re killing the Eternals. We’re just putting them where they won’t be able to interfere in our business again. And with the mating ritual unfinished, his soul will die and he’ll never be a threat again. It’s all very easy, Shea,” she whispered. “All you have to do is say ‘yes.’ ”

The word echoed in her mind. She tasted it, tasted the aftereffects and looked into her own soul to see if that was who she really was. Her gaze shot to the curve of the stairwell leading to the chapel and Haven beyond. But no one was coming to help them.

This was her test, Shea thought. This was the moment her soul had spent eight hundred years preparing for. The moment when she would discover if she had grown, evolved-or if she was no better than she had been on that long-ago night.

She shifted her gaze to Torin, trapped in a cage, his immense strength and courage locked away by a crazy witch with delusions of grandeur. His eyes shone at her. The emotions he directed at her were clear in his gaze. Faith. Love. Beacons in the darkness where she battled for control of her own destiny.

I love you.

His voice rippled through her mind and she felt the power of him within her. The branding tattoo on her skin burned with a fire that reminded her of who she was. How far she had come and how far she still had to go.

Her fingers played across the glossy black surface of the silver she held and she smiled at the Eternal who had so completed her. With his help, she could resist the call of the darkness.

She would not bow down to greed again. She would not play the puppet to dark powers. Would not give up all that mattered in a quest to find the ephemeral. Would not succumb to temptations of the past that would destroy the future she wanted so badly.

“Catch!” she shouted and tossed the black sliver to him. Instantly, he shoved his arms between the bars of white gold, called the fire and captured the Artifact in the flames.