“Allow me to help.”In moments, I summon roots and branches to bind his hands and gag his mouth, replacing Necia’s spell.
“Thanks,” Necia adds.“But I’ll drag him back myself.”She grabs the branch rings and moves him forward, and the bound cultist stumbles along.
“And I’ll set up a foggy perimeter so that mortals won’t notice,” Max says.He grins at Necia and bumps his shoulder against hers.“Thanks for being a kickass superheroine.”
She titters, and I turn to finish assessing the other potential victims.I don’t walk three steps before I hear Taz’s voice in the distance.
“Guys?”
“What’s up?”I holler.
“Come check this!”
My instincts warn me this can’t be good.I jog over to the torch where Taz is hunched over a limp body.This victim is particularly bloody, and I frown.We didn’t make it in time to save this person.
“Shit,” I say.
“It’s so much worse than the others we’ve seen.”
“Blood magic,” I say dolefully.As Taz inspects the mangled corpse, I notice a small trench in the ground.Huh.
After stepping a few feet away, I use my flashlight to follow the trench.It’s deep red and seems to be flowing in a small circle around this one specific torch.
It’s the blood of the sacrifice.And it’s in the shape of mystical runes, carved into the ground.
The ground my boyfriend is standing at the center of.“Taz!”Just as he looks up, the air above us shifts.The red runes, powered by the blood of a human sacrifice, light up.One rune flies out, narrowly dodging me, and lands square at the perpetrator.The red-eyed man glows white, and he appears pleased as he disappears into thin air, his bindings falling to the ground.
“Shit!”Max curses from afar.The perpetrator is gone.The ritual did that!But that means…
Taz gazes around at the glowing red circle surrounding him.I don’t have time to think, only to act.Rushing up to Taz, I push him aside, out of the circle.With a sound like the crack of thunder, the sky above me opens into a rift of purple haze.
And the gravity of it pulls me in.The last thing I see before flying upward is Taz’s hands trying to grab me.I reach for him, but my body is flung upward.Even as I fall into the sky, I have the clarity to know I’m headed into the Other Side.
CHAPTER 18- TAZ
A PANIC I’VEnever felt seizes my chest, like thorns piercing into my very heart.I’m hyperventilating, cursing up a storm as I feel around the air in the darkness, but to no avail.The portal above me closed as fast as it opened.I’m reliving the worst moment of my youth all over again after seeing Luther get sucked up into the Other Side.
No rift.No cultist.No Luther.Only darkness.
“No…nonono…no,” I rasp.My hands pull at my hair as I gaze around, and the dark forest spins around me.Luther can’t be gone.
“Shit,” Necia says.She and Max share looks of shock as they rush up to me.“That portal…”
“It took Luther,” Max says.
“No!”I howl, falling to my knees.As my hands dig into the dirt, I try to even out the panic in my chest.
This isn’t happening.
Still taking rapid breaths, I stand up and retrieve the gauntlet piece from my pocket.This infernal thing?resembling a gilded, bejeweled bracelet?is the reason the cultists were able to do any ritual.With fury in my soul, I’m going to make sure this relic gets him back.
“Taz, what are you doing?”Necia asks in a chastising tone.
“I’m getting Luther.”
“You need a blood sacrifice to use that, I thought,” Max remarks.
“No,” I reply, still studying the object.“We have geo arcanum.Those cultists were weak, so they set about it the best way they could, by using blood.”I step forward and raise my hands.“There are still cracks in the ley lines, weak spots where rifts can be opened.”
