Magick (Book 3 in the Coven Series) (5 page)

With that directive, the women vacate the room, leaving Egan and me to play generals.

After a few minutes of frustrated pacing, I tell Egan we might as well do as Sarah suggested. At least it might prove more productive than cursing our current helpless situation.

About the time my stomach starts growling, the door unlocks, and Amanda and a woman I’ve never seen before appear in the doorway. “Time to eat,” Amanda says, still not sounding like our biggest fan.

Egan and I give each other a quick glance before following the Bane down the hallway. After a couple of turns, she leads us into a dining room with a twelve-person oak table.

A gasp draws my attention to the far side of the table. Toni stares back at us with wide eyes that reflect no small amount of fear. It breaks my heart to see the girl I consider my best friend frightened of me.

In the next moment, my eyes find Keller’s. I’m so happy to see him tears of joy pool in my eyes, and I smile at him.

He doesn’t smile back.

I lift my arm with the bracelet. “The Bane used these to harness our magic. At the moment, I have no more power than you do.”

That gets Keller’s attention, and the inevitable questions about stopping the covens using this method follow. While Sarah explains to Toni and Keller what Egan and I already know, I can’t pull my eyes away from Keller’s profile. My heart breaks at the same time I grow more determined to redeem myself enough to win him back.

“I’m going to learn to control the magic.”

“You tried that before,” he says without looking at me.

“That’s enough,” Egan says beside me as his fists clench atop the table.

I place my hand on Egan’s forearm. “It’s okay. He’s right.”

“No, it’s not okay. This is not all Jax’s fault. Yes, she’s the one who killed Barrow, but not a one of us is without fault.” He gestures toward Sarah, Amanda and a few other women I don’t recognize. “You all kept secrets, ones that might have kept her from going that far.” He jabs his finger toward Keller. “You left her side when she could have used your support most, when you could have calmed her.”

I know this isn’t fair because the plan had called for Egan and Keller to approach Barrow from the sides while I occupied him head-on, but I don’t interrupt him. I can’t lie and say that having someone stand up for me doesn’t feel good.

“I should have tried harder to stop her, fighting magic with magic.” Egan shifts his focus to Toni, though I can tell it pains him to do so. I don’t need our witch connection to sense that. “And when she’s at her lowest point, her friends turn away and blame her for possessing a power she didn’t ask for.”

Silence settles on the room in the wake of Egan’s accusations.

I take a deep, shaky breath. “I’m sorry I lost control.” I need to say it out loud, even if it makes no difference to anyone but me. “I’m sorry that I let you all down.”

I can’t force myself to look at Keller, so my gaze connects with Toni’s instead.

“I really thought you could control it.” Toni sounds more sad than disappointed. “I’ve never seen anything more frightening.”

The image of Barrow’s charred face staring at me as we lie face-to-face in the snow causes me to shiver. “Me neither.” Another deep breath. “As much as I wish I could, I can’t undo what happened. I have to live with the fact that I didn’t have to kill Barrow but I did it anyway, that I tortured him and enjoyed it.” Bile rises in my throat at that admission. “All I can do at this point is move forward, try to atone by making sure no one else suffers because of a coven witch. I swear to you that I will do everything I can, no matter how hard it is, to protect you. All of you.”

I look around the table at all the faces. Some I know well, some are more recently familiar, and some I’ve never seen before. A dark-haired girl who appears to be about my age sits to Sarah’s left, and two blond women who look enough alike to be sisters sit across from each other.

“Which will be a big task,” Sarah says. “But hopefully possible. And we’re going to start by clearing the air. I know we all have questions, so let’s get those taken care of as we eat so that the real work can commence.”

“Where are we?” Keller asks. “I get the sense it’s underground.”

“It is, but you’ll understand if I don’t elaborate. You don’t stay hidden from dark covens without being very, very careful.” Sarah points toward the bowls of food placed down the middle of the table. “I know you all have to be hungry. Eat. No one works well on an empty stomach, and we all need to be alert and at peak condition.” Sarah dips mashed potatoes onto her plate then passes the bowl to Amanda.

When the plates and bowls reach me, I mechanically place helpings onto my plate but can’t imagine being able to eat them despite my grumbling stomach. How can I do something as mundane as eat when the guy I love hates me? When my best friend is scared of me? When I’m filled with huge, freaking doubts that I’ll be able to accomplish everything I want to despite my current determination? Will my resolve still be there when the Bane take off my bracelet?

“Are all of you descendants of those original four girls who ran away?” Toni asks, breaking into my careening thoughts.

Sarah nods then points to her right. “Amanda is a direct descendant of Elizabeth Woodley.” Next she indicates the two blond women. “Caren and Hope are descended from Jane Burkes. Vera Dewey’s line died out a couple of generations ago.” She points to the pretty brunette girl, the youngest of the Bane. “Piper is my niece. I don’t have my own children.”

I meet Piper’s dark eyes.

“My mother died when I was three,” she says.

“I’m sorry.” I know what it’s like to miss a mother taken too soon.

“For various reasons, there are fewer of us than there used to be,” Sarah says. “Only direct descendants of those first four Bane have any power whatsoever, and some throughout history have chosen not to embrace it. We’ve wanted to end the coven menace for ages, but there are way too many dark witches walking this earth and too few of us.”

“But maybe that changes now,” Caren says, looking at me with more hope than I’ve seen from anyone at this table today. Of course, she wasn’t there at the cemetery. She didn’t see me at my worst.

“Can we put ourselves at that much risk?” Hope asks, looking at things from a different angle than her sister.

“We can’t very well stay down here and hide forever,” Piper says. “Jax isn’t facing a threat down here. None of us knows how we would react if our dearest friends’ lives were in danger.” Piper looks at her aunt. “Can you honestly say you wouldn’t kill to protect me?” She shifts her gaze to Hope. “What about you? If a gunman was shooting at Caren, would you do nothing?”

“She can do it.”

My heart thuds hard against my ribs at Keller’s words. I try to temper my hope, but it proves useless. Those four words make it explode beyond the confines of my heart. I shift my gaze to him, praying I haven’t imagined what he said. And there in his eyes I see an ember of understanding and maybe the possibility of eventual forgiveness.

“I’ve spent my entire life being told that human life is sacred and anything unnatural that kills humans is evil and should be put down,” he says while I almost forget how to breathe. “But I’ve learned that everything isn’t always so black and white.”

“You condone her killing the hunter?” Amanda asks.

“No, but
 . . .
” He looks toward me, and for a long moment our gazes meet and hold. “I think we all sometimes reach a breaking point. We’re pushed beyond it by stress and grief. Jax was fighting hard against her nature, barely holding it together but still winning until Barrow pointed his gun at me. I think that’s what sent her over the edge.”

He understands. Tears spill over and run down my cheeks until he grows blurry. I look down and quickly wipe them away. If these people are giving me a second chance, if whether they live or die is in my hands, I have to be strong. And I have no time for tears.

I want to touch Keller, to have him hold me, but now is not the time. I force myself to look away from him, and when I do a question hits me. One that should have been front and center long before now.

“What happened to Barrow’s body?”

“We took care of it,” Amanda says.

“Took care of it?” I scan the faces of the Bane. “You got rid of a body?”

“We couldn’t leave him there to be found, leading to unwanted questions by the local authorities, his fellow hunters or the covens,” Sarah says. “Now, back to the more important topic, your status as a white witch. It’s time you know the full extent of your history. Maybe, somehow, it will help us in the days ahead.”

Though I’m still very aware of Keller watching me from across the table, I focus all of my attention on Sarah and the other members of the Bane.

“There was one in the first generation of dark witches.” Sarah says. “You know about the four original members of the Bane, but what you don’t know is that there should have been a fifth. Anne Reedy was the original white witch, but she was killed before she could come fully into her power. She was friends with Penelope, Elizabeth, Jane and Vera, so they knew they had to flee or risk death, too.”

“They were all white witches?” I ask.

Sarah shakes her head. “No. Though they tried to find a way to be. Penelope risked her life to sneak back into Salem after she’d fled. She’d heard about two books that appeared magically when the first of the dark witches made their conversion.”

My gaze shoots to Keller’s then Toni’s, and Egan shifts in his seat beside me.

“I see you also know about the Beginning and Ending books,” Sarah says. “These books hold the tale of the covens’ births and tell how to bring about their demise. Penelope was able to steal them both, but she was nearly caught. The only thing that saved her was her friendship with a boy from one of the witch families that hadn’t yet made the conversion, one that would end up not doing so. Benjamin Latimer hid her in his family’s barn for several days.”

“Latimer,” I say. “Rule’s family?”

Sarah nods. “During that time, she read the entirety of the Beginning Book but she couldn’t read the Ending Book. It was in a language she didn’t recognize.”

I do my best not to react to this part of the story. I’m not ready to reveal that I have seen this book and can read it. Even with everything Sarah is telling us, I sense she’s holding something back. Just in case I need something in reserve too, I’m keeping mum about the books—at least until I feel like sharing that information will help us all in our eventual goal.

“Even without being able to read the second book, Penelope got a feeling that they were too dangerous to let fall into the wrong hands and should never be kept in the same place.”

Sarah stops moving food around on her plate and places her hands atop the arms of her chair. “Benjamin came to tell her that his family was fleeing. She gave him the Ending Book for safekeeping.”