The Witches of the Glass Castle (The Witches of the Glass Castle Series Book 1) (21 page)

‘You realise,’ Mia went on, ‘that I’m going to haunt you for ever. I’m going to haunt you until it drives you insane, like in that movie,
Ghost Fever
.’

Dino paused. ‘I haven’t seen it.’

‘It’s quite good. But that’s not the point! The point is, I’m going to dedicate my life – or my afterlife, or whatever – to making your life hell. You thought I was annoying before? Well, get ready to meet me as a ghost.’

Dino snorted
and Tol glared at him.

‘Stop talking,’ Dino snarled, his sharp breath prickling against Mia’s ear.

‘I most certainly will not!’ she exclaimed. ‘If anyone should stop what they’re doing, it should be you!’

‘I can’t stop. I have
to rid myself of my humanity.’

Mia wailed in frustration. ‘Cassandra and Madeline are never going to forgive yo
u for this.’

Cassandra and Madeline
.

Dino stiffened. It had been weeks since he had thought about his mother and aunt. It was strange to hear their names.

Unbeknownst to Dino, Tol had invaded his mind. He had suffocated all of Dino’s own thoughts until only Tol’s influence remained.

But now, a new influence crept into Dino’s subconscious. And it wasn’t Tol’s, or even his own. It was Mia’s. His Sententia
power detected the sound of Mia’s emotion. She had always been louder to him than anyone else – evidently Tol included.

‘You love me,’ he uttered in disbelief.

‘No, I do
not
!’ Mia objected. ‘You’re evil!’

‘How can you still love me?’ Dino stammered. ‘I’m about to kill you.’

‘Yes, I do realise that, thank you, Dino! And, for your information, I
hate
you!’

‘No…you don’t,’ he told her. ‘You love me. I can hear it.’

Mia kicked him.

The Hunter chanting grew louder and faster.

All of a sudden Dino’s head started to throb. There were so many conflicting emotions all battling to be heard. His mind told him that he wanted Mia dead, but simultaneously his heart told him otherwise.

Then Tol spoke to Dino in a deep, guttural voice. ‘Make your sacrifice,’ he commanded, his beady eyes blazing.

Dino gulped. He placed his hands on Mia’s head.

‘No, Dino! Don’t!’ she cried.

You can do it!
Tol planted the affirmation in Dino’s mind.
You are a Hunter.

Dino’s fingers twined into Mia’s hair.
He breathed steadily. It would be over in seconds. She would feel no pain.

Suddenly they were not alone. A warm breeze tousled Mia’s hair, coiling around it and sweeping the strands from her face.

Colt.

Tol tensed. ‘K
ill the girl!’ he roared. Something almost undetectable shot past him.

In a cyclone of wind, Colt appeared. He stood staunchly just outside of the ceremonial border, his eyes fixed on Tol.

‘So, you’re the big bad wolf who murdered my brothers,’ Colt remarked brazenly. ‘You don’t look all that intimidating.’ He sized him up with arrogant disdain.

‘And you must be the fourth Hunter of the Glass Castle,’ Tol sneered back. ‘The only one left.’

‘Still standing,’ Colt provoked him.

‘Not for long.’ Tol raised his hand and shot a blast of yellow light in Colt’s direction.

With impeccable speed, Colt dodged the spear of light. ‘Nice try.’ He grinned.

‘Colt, run!’ Mia screamed. Dino’s hands remained clasped to her h
ead, holding her in place.

‘I’m not going anywhere witho
ut you,’ Colt assured her. His eyes stayed fixed on Tol.

‘They’ll kill you!’ Mia cried. ‘Just go!’

‘No,’ he replied in an even voice. ‘I’m not leaving you.’

‘Funny you should
say that,’ Tol remarked with a cackle. ‘Because that’s precisely how we captured her in the first place! Who knew it would be so easy to take you away from her?’ His laughter pierced the night air like the screeching caws of a crow.

‘That’s why you killed my coven?’ Colt deduced. ‘To take me away from Mia?’

Tol sneered. ‘The simple plans are often the best.’

Colt swallowed.
‘Well, guess what? There’s none of them left for you to kill. I suppose that means I’m staying this time.’

‘Of little use it’ll be! You’re not at the Glass Castle any more. You’re on
my
ground now.’

‘Ha!’ Colt scoffed
. ‘There is no such thing. All ground is my ground. And I’ll kill every single one of you before I let you harm the girl.’

Dino dipped his head to Mia’s ear. ‘What is this? Are you in some sort of relationship with a Hunter? Mia, what are you thinking? He’s too dangerous for you!’

Mia spluttered in shock. ‘Are you serious? Now is not the time to play the protective brother! You’re about to kill me, remember? It doesn’t get much more dangerous than that!’

Grop
ing for time, Colt distracted Tol from the ritual. ‘You went to great effort to get me out of the way,’ he goaded in a risky jeer. ‘Sounds like you might be afraid me.’

‘Afraid of you?’ Tol bellowed
. ‘You are nothing!’

‘Then take your best shot.’ Colt extended his arms, inviting a challenge.

Tol raised his hand and shot a second bolt of light at his opponent – faster and more forceful this time. But again, Colt ducked aside, using his Tempestus agility to his advantage.

In terms of strength, Colt was no match for Tol, but nevertheless he was a distraction.
And an effective one at that.

‘Leave now,’ Tol warned him. ‘You have no business here.’

‘Actually, you’re wrong.’ Colt laced in and out of the trees, trying not to stay in one place for too long. ‘I
do
have business here.’ He disappeared behind a pine tree and resurfaced somewhere else entirely. ‘And I’d go so far as to say that my business takes precedence over yours.’ His voice echoed, its origins indistinct.

‘Pah!’ Tol thundered
. ‘I beg to differ.’

‘No,
I
beg to differ.’ Colt paused and looked intently at Mia. ‘I have to kiss that girl,’ he announced.

Even in the midst of warfare, M
ia couldn’t help but smile.

‘Because I love her,
’ Colt elaborated, ‘and I believe that was the deal.’ He grinned.

‘You have got to be kidding me,’ Dino muttered under his breath.

‘And I love him!’ Mia returned fervently.

To
l let out a rippling laugh. ‘Falling in love with a Hunter?’ he ridiculed, addressing Mia for the first time. ‘Just like your mother. Pitiful little girl!’

Colt frowned. ‘Where are your manners?’ he mocked scornfully. ‘That’s no way to speak to a lady.’

Tol glared at Mia, bitterness colouring his sallow face. ‘I shall speak to her any way I choose,’ he hissed. ‘She
is
my daughter, after all.’

Mia felt Dino’s grip instantly slacken. Her stomach flipped.

‘Liar!’ she screamed at Tol, her grey eyes smouldering with resentment.

Tol guffawed spitefully
. ‘You are just as I imagined. Pure. Nothing like my son.’

‘You’re my father,’ Dino murmured.

‘Surprised?’ Tol asked lightly.

‘Don’t listen to him!’ Mia cried. ‘He’s lying! Our father could never be a monster like that!’ Looking into Tol’s loathsome face, she saw only evil – not the wholesome man that she had always pictured to be her father.

The man whom she had dreamed of had gone away on a covert mission, which kept him from returning to the family home. This wonderful, imaginary man would one day return wearing a tweed suit and carrying a leather briefcase. He was worlds apart from the creature she saw before her now, his face so warped with malice that he was barely human, let alone a father.

‘Mia,’ Dino whispered, ‘he’s not lying.’

Everything started to make sense. Of course Tol had wanted Dino for his coven. What greater asset was there than the direct descendant of Tol’s very own blood – Tol’s heir?

‘I’m shocked that your mother nev
er spoke of me,’ Tol taunted them. ‘I wonder why she chose not to?’ He laughed wildly.

Mia gawped at Tol in revulsion. ‘You make me sick!’

‘Mia, calm down,’ Dino implored her. His arms remained sealed around her, although now it was more for comfort than containment.

Colt watched the scene in wide-eyed
bewilderment while Tol’s two minions stood motionless, hidden beneath their dark robes.

Mia grimaced. ‘You know, I always wondered why you never tried to contact us, or why you never sent me a birthday card. Now I know it was because you were too busy plotting my death!’

‘You’re of no interest to me,’ Tol said icily. ‘It’s the boy whose powers I seek.’ He cast his eyes upon Dino. ‘My son, join me.’

‘No!’ Colt shouted. ‘He’s got into your mind somehow! He’s tricking you into thinking you want to become a Hunter…’

Tol threw a spear of light at his antagonist. Colt dived out of the way, but it was a near miss.

‘Has he taken your b
lood?’ Colt asked Dino quickly. ‘Think!’

‘Quiet!’ Tol roared.

Dino tentatively ran his fingers over the raised scar across his jaw line.

‘You see?’ Colt responded to Dino’s unspoken thoughts. ‘You don’t want to kill your sister. You’re being possessed. He’s probably working all sorts of magic on you…’ His sentence was cut short. A powerful burst of light exploded into him, lifting him from the ground and hurtling him through the air like a rag doll.

‘No!’ Mia cried as Colt’s body collided with a tree trunk and plummeted down to the ground.

‘Dead,’ Tol sneered in satisfaction. ‘Now we can proceed.’

‘No!’ Mia screamed again. She pushed away from Dino and ran to where Colt lay unmoving on the forest floor. She dropped to the ground, shaking him, but his head hung limply in her hands.

‘Now!’ Tol barked. ‘It is time.’ He scowled at Dino. ‘Bring her back,’ he ordered.

Dino froze. ‘Why don’t you bring her back?’ he tested with caution. It had suddenly occurred to him that, even with all of his power, Tol had never directly approached Mia. Tol was keeping his distance from her, just as he had done with Dino – until Dino had inadvertently accepted Tol’s offer, that was.

‘It must be you,’ Tol spat.

‘Because you can’t touch her,’ Dino guessed. ‘She’s magically protected from you. And so was I until I invited you in. You’re in my mind, aren’t you? The Hunter was right – you’re controlling me.’

‘You belong to me,’ Tol snarled.

Dino glanced at his sister, who now lay buckled over Colt, crying breathless, heart-breaking tears.

‘Mia,’ Dino murmured
. He heard the screech of her pain like no sound he’d ever experienced – or would ever wish to experience. 

‘This i
sn’t real,’ Mia choked. She repeated the words over and over again until they distorted into nothing more than earth-shattering sobs.

Dino didn’t know if it was her words, her tears, or his own consciousness breaki
ng through, but something changed within him. He was guided by a new energy now. It was as though his mind was reborn to him at long last. He focused his concentration on blocking Tol’s power, just as he had done with Wendolyn so many times before.

In a counterattack, Tol’s determination hardened as he desperately fought to retain his influence over Dino.

With a strained breath, Dino stepped out of the ceremonial diamond and raced to Mia’s side. For once, he ignored every reflection and emotion that crossed his mind and only thought of her. He dropped to his knees and grabbed her shoulders.

‘Please forgive me,’ he begged her urgently. He pulled her into him roughly, rent by his own ragged sorrow.

‘Let me go,’ she wept. Even when enveloped in Dino’s hug, Mia’s fingers remained coiled around the collar of Colt’s shirt. Her fingertips touched his skin as though their connection gave him a link to a life force.

Tol and his incomplete coven watched this display of human passion with heartless curiosity.

‘Come on,’ Dino said in a gentle yet imperative voice. ‘We need to get out of here.’ He took her elbow, urging her to leave, but she shook herself free of him, clinging to Colt’s lifeless body.

‘No!’ she cried

Dino bit his lip. ‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered. ‘I’m so sorry.’

Grief-stricken tears were her only response.

Tol let out a deafening bellow. ‘I may not be able to touch her, but you, on the other hand, are fair game.’ His eyes bore into Dino vengefully.

‘Mia, please,’ Dino rasped. ‘We have to go.’

‘I can’t leave him here alone,’ she whimpered. ‘I don’t want him to be alone.’ With one of her hands, she protectively shielded Colt’s serene face. ‘You go,’ she said to Dino briefly, looking up at him through her blinding tears.

Dino crouched ov
er her. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I won’t leave you.’

With his coven looking on impatiently, Tol stepped away from his post and lunged towards his victim. But his opening assault was not on Dino. Instead he grabbed Colt by the scruff of the neck and hoisted him upright. Colt slumped forward, his eyes shut and his body limp.

‘No!’ Mia screamed, as Colt was ripped away from her.

With astonishing ease Tol tossed Colt aside, hurling him into the thick of trees.

Mia fell back, dismayed.

Next, Tol moved on to Dino. Backed against a tree, Dino had nowhere to run. Tol gripped his throat and lifted him to his feet.

Dino wheezed as Tol’s knife-like fingernails pierced his skin. Their eyes met, and slits of ruby-red blood began to appear on Dino’s throat as his attacker’s nails penetrated his flesh.

Mia retched at the sight. With tracks of tears staining her face, she staggered to her feet. As Tol wrung the life from Dino, Mia turned her palms down
to the ground. The earth beneath her feet began to rumble, shuddering in an underground eruption. Mia’s earthquake.

The shaking ground jolted Tol off balance. He stumbled backwards and dropped Dino to the ground.

Mia looked at her brother, whose blood was trickling down his throat and on to the lapel of his T-shirt. In a profound moment, the siblings locked eyes intently, communicating by instinct rather than words.

Without missing a beat, Dino sprung to his feet. Taking Mia’s hand, he began to run. They darted through the maze of trees, racing at full pelt through the forest, driven by the knowledge that Tol would be upon them at any moment.

A rusty blue station wagon pulled up to the dark courtyard. The purring engine let out a final splutter before cutting out entirely. Now only a ghostly silence engaged the courtyard.

‘Cassie,’ Madeline said from the front passenger seat of the car, ‘before we go inside, I want to promise you that, whatever happens, we’ll get through this – just like last time.’

‘It can be nothing like last time, Maddie!’ Cassandra exclaimed, her slender hands still resting on the steering wheel. ‘Last time we lost our brothers to Tol. I will not lose my children, too,’ she said adamantly.

Madelin
e held up her hands in submission. ‘That’s what I’m saying – we’ll find a way. We’ve stopped Tol before…eventually.’ She scraped her mane of red hair into a high ponytail, letting it bob at the crown of her head.

‘Yes, we stopped him,’ Cassandra agreed, fixating on the positive, ‘and we will do it again.’

‘Sure,’ Madeline flipped down the vanity mirror and inspected her appearance. ‘And look how well that worked out,’ she added dryly.

Cassandra glared at her. ‘It worked for sixteen years, didn’t it? I’d say that’s a pretty successful spell.’

‘He must have found a loophole,’ Madeline muttered, twisting her head from left to right to get a thorough look at her attractive profile.

Irritably, Cassandra pushed the vanity mirror back into its place, regaining her sister’s focus. ‘I imagine he’s searched many years to find a way around our curse.’

Without her reflection to distract her, Madeline was suddenly re-energised. ‘And now he’s taken baby Dino!’ she shouted, outraged.

Cassandra chuckled in spite of the sombre mood. ‘How much longer are you going to call him
baby Dino? He’s seventeen years old. That’s practically a grown man!’

Madeline pouted. ‘He’ll always be a baby to me. I liked him as a baby – he was cute. As a man he’s sul
len and petulant. Just like his–’

‘Madeline! Don’t you dare say, just like his father, or so help me God…’

‘Easy, mama bear,’ Madeline gave her an aloof sideways glance. ‘I was going to say, just like his mother.’

‘Oh!’ Cassandra retracted her claws. ‘I’m not sullen,’ she slipped in as an afterthought.

Before another word could be exchanged, the castle door lurched open and Wendolyn bustled into the courtyard, followed by Kizzy and Blue. The rain had stopped, but the ground was still damp and puddled in places.

Cassandra and Madeline unfastened their seatbelts and hurried out of the car to greet the newcomers.

Wendolyn, still in her nightwear, hugged and kissed the two women.

‘How can I show my face to you?’ she sighed remorsefully. ‘You trusted me with your children and I have failed you.’

‘Oh, nonsense!’ Cassandra exonerated her immediately. ‘You are most certainly not to blame for any of this.’

‘That’s absolutely right,’ Madeline chimed in. ‘Besides, I think we all half expected Tol to return sometime.’

Blue peered at the women fearfully. ‘So, you knew that T-Tol would come f-for Dino?’ he asked meekly.

Cassandra and Madeline looked at Kizzy and Blue as though they had only just noticed them standing there.

‘Well,’ Madeline shrugged, ‘it was always at the back of our minds. I suppose it was only a matter of time.’

‘What does he want with Dino?’ Blue asked her. He fidgeted tensely, shifting his weight from left foot to right.

Madeline took the floor to explain. ‘I’m a Seer,’ she pointed to herself, causing her array of colourful bracelets to clang against each other noisily, ‘and when Cassandra was pregnant with Dino, I foresaw a powerful heir. Of course I told Cassandra and Tol about their unborn child…’

Kizzy and Blue gasped in unison.

‘Tol’s child?’ Kizzy repeated, her blue eyes as wide as saucers.

Cassandra and Madeline shared a private glance.

‘Tol is Dino’s father,’ Cassandra confirmed with a tight expression. ‘Mia’s, too.’

‘Anyway,’ Madeline went on, skipping over the stunned silence, ‘Tol became obsessed with Dino’s imminent power. He wanted to raise the child in the dark arts, but we didn’t know it at the time. You see, Tol wasn’t always evil. I mean
, personally, I never liked him–’

‘He was a Hunter,’ Cassandra interjected, ‘but he was noble and I fell in love with him. I was young, and so was Tol. But the idea of having such power within his grasp turned him for the worse. I
t drove him insane.’

‘Of course, he hid it well,’ Madeline jumped in. ‘It was almost two years before we began to notice how sinister he was becoming – by which time Dino was a toddler and Mia was a newborn.’

‘Everything about him changed,’ Cassandra said, speaking directly to Wendolyn now, finally able to unload the burden that she had been carrying for years. ‘His voice, his appearance, his manner.
Everything.
I loved him so dearly, and it broke my heart to watch. But Tol – my Tol – was gone, and what was left was a shell, driven only by greed.’

‘So, we did what we had to do,’ Madeline spoke softly. ‘We performed a binding spell, banishing Tol from our land and protecting the children from him.’

Cassandra smiled sadly. ‘And the irony of it all is that Dino isn’t the powerful heir that Maddie saw – Mia is. Of course, Tol doesn’t know that.’