Bitter Demons (14 page)

Up ahead, the clearing came into view. She
darted toward it. As I stepped onto the circle, I felt the power of
the place fill me. Out of breath, I laid down on the flat
grass.

"You win," I said, laughing. "I need a
break."

A flash of movement out of the corner of my
eye told me Zara had taken on her human form again. I stared up at
the canopy of trees above and wondered if all that fluttering
around tired her out. My body relaxed into the ground, and I let
myself become a part of it.

So much of my family's history was tied to
this very spot. I wondered if my mother had ever laid like this,
back flat against the grass. I pictured what it would have been
like if she could have brought me here as a child. Would she have
taught me how to do magic? Would she have trained me up for a life
in the Order?

Why did she let me go in the first place? And
how did she die? Those were the questions I always came back to. I
would have given anything to have had her guidance growing up.

A blood-curdling scream broke through my
thoughts. I snapped up and turned toward Zara. At first, I couldn't
see what she was screaming about. I stood and rushed toward
her.

"Are you okay?" I asked.

Then, as I came around beside her, I saw for
myself what she'd been screaming about.

It was Caroline.

Just beyond the circle, in a shaded corner of
the woods, Caroline lay in a circle of black roses. A long white
dress covered her from head to toe. Her body was completely
still.

Tears sprang to my eyes. I rushed forward,
wanting to hold her. To see if she was still alive.

"No!" Zara shouted. "Don't!"

I didn't listen. I crossed the distance in
seconds. As I reached for her, a piercing agony struck me. Pain
sliced through my hand like a hot knife. I fell to the ground and
scrambled backward, holding my injured hand close to my body.

Zara came up behind me and pulled me farther
back. "The roses," she said. "They're like poison."

"Is she dead?" I asked. The pain in my hand
turned to a dull throbbing. Tears flowed freely down my cheeks.
This was my fault.

"No," she said. "Look."

I swiped at my eyes and looked at Caroline.
Her body trembled slightly, as if she were being electrocuted. I
crawled toward the circle, careful not to get too close to the
roses.

"Caroline," I said. "Caroline, can you hear
me?"

A whimper escaped her lips. Her eyes
fluttered open but didn't seem to focus on anything. New pain
seemed to strike her and her face crumpled in agony. The world
around us seemed to spin. I felt like I couldn't catch my breath.
Every muscle in my body tensed with the need to get her out of
those roses.

"We've got to help her," I said to Zara.
"You're powerful. You've got to do something."

She shook her head, fear plastered all over
her pale face. "I can't," she said. "It's too dangerous. The roses
may look innocent enough, but they are not entirely of this world.
They only grow in the shadow world."

"Who gives a shit?" I shouted, angry beyond
reason. I grasped a clump of grass and ripped it from the ground.
"She's dying, can't you see that?"

"I'm sorry," she said. "There's nothing we
can do. The spell that's holding her is unbreakable. We need to get
more help."

"There's no time," I said. "There's no
telling how long she's been here like this. We can't just leave
her."

Caroline shouted. Her body convulsed and she
curled into a fetal position.

I couldn't take it. There had to be a way to
get her out of there.

"What if I just reach in and grab her really
fast?" I said. "It'll hurt, but it won't kill me right?"

"You can't," Zara said, putting her hand on
my shoulder to hold me back. "These roses are a very dark kind of
magic."

Darker than the Order's use of demons to
gain power?
I wanted to shout at her. But it wouldn't do
Caroline any good for us to start shouting at each other. Besides,
I needed Zara to be on my side.

"Please," I said, begging. "You have to know
of something we can do to get her out of there."

"Harper, you have to listen to me," she said.
Her icy blue eyes met mine and held my gaze. "All we can do now is
get help. My mother may know what to do. If you try to save her,
you'll only get hurt."

I took a deep breath and tried to still the
raging waters of panic crashing through me. "I'll stay with her," I
said. "Get help as fast as you can."

Zara thought this over, probably worried
about what I might do if she left me here alone.

"I won't do anything crazy," I said. "You're
wasting time worrying about it."

She nodded. "I just need to get close enough
to my mother for her to feel my panic and be able to locate me. I
can feel her in town, but if I can get closer, it will be easier
for her to find me."

"Go," I said.

Zara ran into the woods. I turned my
attention back to Caroline. I had to figure out a way to help her.
I owed her that much.

It should have been me.

"I'm so sorry," I whispered, crawling as
close to Caroline as I could get before I felt a dull pain sneak
across my flesh. "I didn't mean for anything to happen to you. If
I'd known someone was after me, I never would have let you walk
around looking like me."

Maybe it was the sound of my voice that made
her open her eyes. She looked at me and opened her mouth, as if to
tell me something. Then, pain sent her into spasms again and she
was lost to me.

I screamed and beat my fist against the
ground. I lifted my eyes to the sky, as if to beg help from heaven.
Something dark moved in the corner of my vision. I snapped my head
to the left, searching through the dense trees.

Fear gripped me. What if whoever had done
this to Caroline was still here? They would have me completely
vulnerable and alone. My lips trembled, and I let out a choked sob.
I clapped my hand across my mouth.

Time stood still as I waited to see if some
dark foe would descend on me. A shadow slipped behind a nearby tree
and my breath stopped. I wanted to disappear, but fear held me
prisoner. Magic was no help to me in this state. I could either
face my enemy head-on or wait like a scared mouse.

"Who's there?" I called out. My voice
trembled.

The shadow darted between dark spaces. I
stood, fighting the dizzy weakness that threatened to overcome
me.

"Let Caroline go," I said, sounding braver
than I felt. "If it's me you want, then let her go."

I expected a giant crow to come flying from
the woods, followed by some horrible witch more powerful than I
could ever dream to be. But what emerged from the woods was not a
bird at all. It was a shadow demon.

The darkness swirled and changed shapes, but
I knew the instant the demon showed himself that he wasn't here to
hurt me. Or Caroline.

The demon crossed over to the row of black
roses. Its eyes were onyx circles deep-set inside the smoky black.
The way it looked at Caroline, I knew. This was her family's demon.
How had he found her? How was he here without the Prima? Could they
be separate from one another?

I couldn't put a voice to any of my
questions. All I could do was watch as the demon sank to the ground
beside Caroline's trembling body.

"Can you help her?"

The demon didn't take his eyes off Caroline.
The swirling shadow of him was light and weak. Instead of a deep
black like the demon who'd come to my rescue, this demon was more
like grayish smoke. I could see through him, as if he were only a
ghost.

I stood and took a step toward it.

"Can't you do something?" I said. "Or do the
flowers hurt you too?"

The demon still didn't answer me. Couldn't he
hear me? Weren't Prima demons supposed to be these amazingly
powerful beings? Surely he was stronger than me and could handle
the pain. The way he just sat there staring at her made me want to
scream.

I glanced back toward where Zara had
disappeared into the woods. What was taking her so long?

Caroline groaned. Her back arched high and
for the first time, I noticed a black stone hovering just above her
chest. I stepped closer. The stone was roughly cut with sharp
edges. It was black, but also transparent enough that I could see
light shining through it. As far as I could see, the stone wasn't
actually attached to anything. It hovered in the air just above her
heart. When she moved, the stone moved with her.

Studying her, I now saw that there was a
bluish sort of vapor coming off of her body. The smoke-like vapors
traveled like tiny clouds up to the stone, then were absorbed into
it. Was it the stone that was hurting her?

I rushed to the edge of the woods, looking
for a fallen branch or a long stick. I found a broken limb and
stepped on it to break it in half. I took the longer half and ran
up toward Caroline. Carefully, I edged the stick toward the circle
of black roses. If I could just knock the stone away, I though
maybe I could break whatever spell she was under.

Of course, it might also kill her.

I was dealing with magic way beyond my
knowledge. Dark magic. I knew I should wait for the others to
arrive, but I could see from Caroline's pale face that she didn't
have much time left. I had to trust my own instincts.

I gripped the end of the stick with both
hands and pushed it into the circle. I aimed for the black stone,
hoping to knock it loose, but the second the wood hit the area just
above the roses, it burst into flames. It was like watching a
meteor try to make its way through the earth's outer atmosphere.
The stick disintegrated into ash.

I fell to the ground, my chest tight. Only
the very end of the limb survived. I gripped the wood tight in my
hand, then hurled it toward the roses as hard as I could.

The stick hit the barrier, flared up, and was
gone.

I wanted to destroy those things. To reach in
and rip each one from the ground.

The limb might have burned in the flame, but
my hand didn't disintegrate. Sure, it hurt like hell, but maybe I
could handle the pain long enough to pull Caroline free.

My breath came fast and hard as I tried to
psych myself up for the pain. It was probably nothing compared to
what Caroline was feeling.

I moved toward the circle, still on my knees,
positioning myself as close to Caroline as possible. I held my hand
up and started to reach toward Caroline, but the demon by my side
turned and startled me. I pulled back.

"What?" I shouted. I felt my grasp on sanity
slipping away. Fear and desperation filled me. "You got a better
idea?"

The demon only stared at me.

"I didn't think so," I said.

My heart pumped in anticipation. I tried to
take a deep breath, but I felt like my airways were blocked. In
front of me, Caroline whimpered, then went limp. Terror gripped me.
It was now or never.

I pushed my hand through the smoky barrier.
Pain ripped through my hand and arm and I screamed. Every part of
my brain was screaming for me to pull my hand back, but I forced
myself to keep moving forward. Tears ran down my cheeks. I gritted
my teeth and pushed on.

My fingers touched flesh and blinked through
the tears. Caroline! I'd reached her! I tried to tug on her arm,
but she was way too heavy. There was no way I was going to pull her
through the flowers. I didn't have the strength.

The black stone glowed above her chest. I
closed my fist tight around the rough stone and felt it burn the
skin from my palm. I yelled out and tried to yank my hand back
through the roses. But I was frozen. I tried to release the stone,
but I had lost control of my body. Slowly, I felt myself being
sucked into the circle. My knees scraped against the ground and I
reached out with my left hand, desperate to find something to hold
onto. I pulled up fistfuls of grass and tried to dig my feet into
the ground, but nothing worked.

I was being pulled in with Caroline.

The entire right side of my body screamed in
agony as I slid toward the black roses.

"No!" I yelled. I closed my eyes tight and
pulled with all my strength. I couldn't let myself get sucked in
along with her. The burning spread up my right arm and shoulder. It
hurt so bad, there were no longer words to describe it. I put every
ounce of my strength into resisting the force that was pulling me
toward Caroline, but it was no use.

In that moment, I knew that I was going to
die.

A strong hand grasped mine and hope flooded
my chest. I opened my eyes and tried to see through the tears.

Jackson!

I had no idea how he'd been able to find me
all the way out here, but there he was. He was shouting something
at me, but I couldn't hear him. All I could hear was an awful
hissing sound as my skin continued to burn.

He pointed to my neck, and at first, I didn't
know what he was talking about. The pain was too intense. I
couldn't think clearly. Then, I understood. Against my body's
screams of protests, I leaned into the circle, allowing the burning
barrier to touch my sapphire pendant.

A dark shadow swirled around the marble
statue in the clearing. I blinked hard, but my vision wouldn't
clear. Aerden? The demon moved over to where Jackson stood, then
seemed to step into his body. I felt Jackson's grip tighten. A wave
of cold rushed up my left arm, through the middle of my body, and
finally, mercifully, down my burning arm. My breath became puffs of
white smoke in the air.

The hissing near my ear stopped. Something
snapped. Like a crack moving through ice. Jackson pulled on my arm,
and I slid out of the circle of roses, the black stone still
clutched in my fist. Below me, the roses shattered into thousands
of pieces. I turned my head to shield my eyes and found Jackson's
welcoming arms.