Witchlock (23 page)

Evalle snatched her hand away. “I didn’t want to do that to begin with.”
 

“Right.” Adrianna pushed long hair off her shoulders and turned, eyes searching.
 

When Evalle’s eyes focused, she felt like an ant in a giant forest.
 

So this was the realm of Jafnan Mir.
 

Evalle’s gaze climbed a hundred feet in the air to where huge palm-frond-type branches sprouted from smooth gray trunks. Trees? Twisted vines with spines crawled up around the trunks.
 

The entire place appeared to be in sepia tones, like an old, brownish-colored photograph, which added to the ancient feel. The sky was an odd shade of gray.
 

Strange vegetation everywhere reminded her of a leafy plant in Georgia used for poke salad. Or it would have if poke leaves were as long as Evalle’s arm and had a black base as thick as her leg.
 

The ground shifted and made a sighing sound.
 

Evalle pointed down. “What the–”
 

Adrianna said, “Everything here is part of Veronika’s family. Every bush, the trees, any creatures. Our presence will become known to the guardians before long, but let’s try to delay that as much as possible.”
 

“Got it. What do we do next?”
 

“I’m going to cloak you in a spell.”
 

Evalle shook her head. “No, you’re not.”
 

“Why?”
 

“For one thing, I don’t like anyone using majik on me, and for another, I have no idea how my powers will react to anyone’s majik except Storm’s.”
 

“You let the witch doctor cloak you.”
 

“I had no choice, plus I don’t need to be cloaked. It might hamper my powers like the witch doctor’s invisibility cloaking did.”
 

“Why are you always difficult?”
 

Evalle let go of the argument and focused on what Adrianna had been up to before leaving the construction site. “Did Storm tell you to put some kind of protective spell on me?”
 

“No, but I told him I would cloak you and I don’t want to face him if you do something stupid and get hurt.”
 

“Stupid? You mean like using my powers to watch your back?”  Evalle felt something move nearby and wished for the millionth time to have her dagger. She lowered her voice. “Something’s coming. Let’s move out.”
 

Adrianna nodded. “Give me a minute to locate my sister.”
 

“I thought you heard her all the time.”
 

“I do, or I
did
, but she got quiet when I entered the realm. Button it up so I can listen for her.”
 

Evalle wanted to get in and out, so she let that mouthy comment slide and opened up her empathic senses.
 

Lights flashed around her in small bursts of white-blue the size of her hand.
 

“Don’t touch those power pops,” Adrianna warned. “I believe those might be explosions of majik powering the realm.”
 

 “Wonderful,” Evalle groused. She kept searching the area with her empathic ability and felt a tug on her power. That was weird.
 

Adrianna took a step in the same direction Evalle had felt the tug.
 

Evalle started to ask if the witch was being pulled that way when she sensed something moving toward them from behind her. She spun and narrowed her empathic senses in that direction.
 

Whatever stalked them kept coming and was emitting one single emotion. Aggression.
 

A noise crackled seventy feet away, then again at fifty.
 

Evalle told Adrianna, “Something is hunting us. Ask your sister where she is and let’s get moving.”
 

Adrianna turned to her, skin pale and blue eyes wide with shock. “I can’t find her. She’s ...she’s not here.”
 

More lights flashed, popping everywhere at once.
 

The bushes leaned to each side on their own.
 

Evalle did a double take at what stepped through the opening.
 

She tried to categorize the creature, but where did you file something with a body resembling a rhino covered in grayish-green plates that shined like metal and the head of a jackal with blue fur?
 

A massive jackal.
 

The thing roared and it sounded like two terrifying animals in chorus.
 

The magnetic pull tried to draw Evalle to her right. She planted her feet firmly to keep from being dragged to the side.
 

To Adrianna’s credit, she stepped up beside Evalle and faced the creature with a determined glint in her eyes.
 

Lifting her hands, Evalle prepared to use kinetics and hoped like hell that her powers worked in here.
 

Adrianna whispered, “Don’t use your kinetics yet. Every time you use power in here, the realm takes an equal amount for itself. You may only get one or two uses.”
 

That limited her choices, but saving her juice for later wouldn’t matter if that thing ate them.
 

Adrianna pointed a perfect red fingernail at the creature and it snarled.
 

Then wide jaws opened, but this time a human voice came out that sounded as raspy as an old man who had smoked his whole life. “Who are you?”
 

Adrianna said, “I am family.”
 

“Not my family.”
 

“Yes, I am.”
 

“Prove it.”
 

Adrianna tapped her chin as if thinking and said, “I know. I’ll let you taste my blood. If I prove I am family, you will allow us to pass.”
 

Evalle couldn’t decide if she wanted to give Adrianna an award for best bluff ever, or conk her on the head for the stupidest idea she’d heard in a long time. Evalle whispered, “Do I get to cut your head off to feed him for this taste test since you clearly aren’t using it?”
 

Adrianna sent a scathing glare in answer, then her entire body leaned away from Evalle in the direction of that strange pulling sensation.
 

Evalle grabbed Adrianna’s shoulder and brought the witch back vertical again.
 

Murmuring her thanks, Adrianna smiled at the creature. “What will it be?”
 

“Veronika did not tell us of new family.”
 

“She has too much to get done before the eclipse, and the young
woman feeding Veronika power for Witchlock is growing weak. I am the host’s twin. I was sent to keep her strong.”
 

Evalle watched the creature. Did he realize Adrianna was lying through her teeth? Or did he buy that line?
 

“Give me your blood and I will decide.”
 

That would be
no
he didn’t believe her.
 

Adrianna looked around and caught a branch with a leaf the size of a serving platter, but she didn’t break it off. She told Evalle, “Hold the leaf level.”
 

While Evalle did as she asked, Adrianna used a fingernail to slice across her palm and drizzle her blood onto the leaf.
 

Evalle asked, “Shouldn’t we have pulled this leaf off first so it would be easier to feed him?”
 

“Do not harm any plant or it will retaliate. Everything in here was created
by
their ancestors and
of
their ancestors.”
 

“How can a–” Evalle sputtered to a stop when the leaf veins opened up and absorbed the blood.
 

It even made a slurping sound.
 

O-
kay
.
 

Message received. Don’t antagonize the landscape.
 

When Adrianna nodded, Evalle released the plant and waited.
 

The creature lifted its head and angled it to one side as if listening to someone. Then he growled and said, “You may pass, but Veronika will be informed of this.”
 

When would the four-legged grump tattle on them? Now or later?
 

“Where is the host?” Adrianna asked, ignoring his comment.
 

The jackal’s green eyes sharpened with predatory intent. “You would know that if Veronika sent you.
Who. Are. You?”
 

Oh. Crap.
 

Adrianna said in a hushed voice to Evalle, “I can’t hear or feel Ragan. She hasn’t been silent one second in the last seventeen months.”   
 

The ancestor creature shouted, “Veronika did not send you. You are an intruder.”
 

Evalle said, “We need to fight or leave.”
 

“Agreed.” Adrianna reached up and yanked a strand of hair from Evalle’s head.
 

“Ouch. What the hell?”
 

Adrianna whispered words quickly while gripping the strand, then tossed it into the air where silver-blue power poofed at Evalle. She sneezed and swatted an empty space. “I swear I’m going to kill you
myself.”
 

The creature lifted a massive hoof and slammed it down, shaking the ground. He roared, “
Intruder!
”
 

Something shrieked in reply in the distance.  
 

Skin around his mouth pulled back, revealing sharp teeth twice the length of Evalle’s fingers. He snarled and leaped forward.
 

Evalle pushed Adrianna aside and dove in the opposite direction, rolling then coming up on her feet. She spun around, ready to toss a kinetic hit at the creature, but Adrianna had her hands up and was chanting in a language Evalle had never heard.
 

Using kinetics might harm Adrianna, who had stepped between Evalle and the creature.
 

Thrashing plants right and left, the creature dove at Adrianna and red power burst across his head and body. He screamed in agony and backed up, trying to get away from whatever Adrianna had conjured.
 

He stood all that body up on his short and stocky hind legs.
 

Evalle wouldn’t have thought that possible.
 

Then he crashed backwards, shaking the entire area with trees swaying and the ground rippling. Evalle danced around to keep her balance.
 

Adrianna was doing the same then she started sidestepping faster and faster.
 

The plants parted to make a path.
 

Any help from the plants could not be good for either of them.
 

Evalle lunged for her, but Adrianna took off running backwards. The witch yelled, “I can’t stop!”
 

Gaining her feet, Evalle turned to go after her, which was a good thing. That magnetic force gripped Evalle’s chest and yanked her in the same direction as the backpedaling Adrianna.
 

Evalle raced through the strange woods.
 

Leaves and branches swung out of the way then back across the path to swat her face, her arms, her legs ... even when she tried to duck or avoid them. Thwacking noises and Adrianna’s shouts rambled thirty steps ahead of Evalle.
 

Evalle double-timed to catch Adrianna and grabbed one of the witch’s flailing arms. She whipped Adrianna around so they could both run forward.
 

Trees bent, their long branches reaching for Adrianna and Evalle. She had a vision of being the main dish for a forest. Death by vegetation would be so wrong after all the vicious beings she’d fought and survived.
 

All at once, the woods blurred into a gold steam that swirled as if the
air had been whipped into cream, and the magnetic draw began to lessen.
 

Evalle slowed as the creamy air swirled around them. She tried to take a step backwards and got a quick yank forward again.  She waved her hands, fanning the cloudy mist.  Adrianna did the same.
 

When the mist cleared, they found Ragan.
 

Ragan looked identical to Adrianna except for being suspended in a giant, translucent sphere forty feet in diameter. It hung a foot off the ground and turned slowly, smoldering as tendrils of white energy smoked away from the surface.
 

Ragan had the same long, blond hair, but upon closer inspection, her hair had turned white with jagged stripes of black running through it.
 

Hundreds of gossamer threads tied Ragan to the inside of the sphere.
 

Adrianna’s game face gave way to the pain of seeing her twin. “Ragan?”
 

Evalle lost all sense of the magnetic pull. The realm had drawn them here, which might mean this was some sort of trap. “We’ve found her. Now what?”
 

“I can’t hear her inside me. I need to put my hands on the globe and see if that reconnects us.”
 

“What if it kills you?”
 

Adrianna turned a crazed look on Evalle. “My sister is dying. Veronika’s cooking Ragan’s majik. Ragan is powering that sphere, which means I should be able to touch it and not die.”
 

Should
just did not have the same ring as absolutely.
 

Evalle kept looking around. “Another guardian might show up so let’s figure this out quickly.”
 

Adrianna turned to her. “You’re right and we don’t have much time. Listen carefully.”
 

“I hate when phone recordings say
listen carefully
. What? You think that will make me listen better?”
 

Adrianna’s jaw clenched. “Don’t make me regret bringing you. We’ll make one attempt at freeing Ragan and leaving, but if I can’t get her out of that sphere we won’t have much time before the other guardians come for us. When I tell you to get ready that means I’m going to join with my sister and say the words that will ignite the pouch I gave Storm. The minute that happens, Storm’s pulling you out of here.”