EMBRY
Lucianna and the ladies follow me into the great room where I have the shadow books laid out. I sit on the couch in front of them while the ladies take seats next to me and on the smaller sofa beside us. “I wanted to show you this passage,” I tell them, stroking a finger across the small print that’s been preserved for centuries by the witches’ curse.
Lucianna and Raven look to each other. “What was that look?” I ask, sensing that I’m missing something. All of a sudden the bauble on Madria’s necklace begins to glow. I look at Raven and Willow and theirs are glowing too. “Devora is nearby?” I ask.
Raven’s fingers begin snapping with electricity, and her eyes begin changing colors and swirling with the excitement in the room. “Tell her, Lucianna.”
My eyes narrow. “Tell me what?”
Lucianna exhales a breath. “I was hoping to ease into this given some of the passages in the book and help you tie the connections, but there simply is no time.
“Your great, great, great gramma loved the vampires with a passion no one really ever understood. A true psychic that could transcend communication between the vampires, the witches,and through the portals of death and beyond. Her powers were unsurpassed.”
This I knew.
Raven interjects. “The humans thought she was a witch and tried to burn her at the stake, the witches wanted nothing to do with her, and thought she was an evil spirit sent to take away their powers, and of course the vampires, until she proved herself in a bloody battle on their side against us, thought she was just another witch too.”
“But she wasn’t.”
Lucianna takes my hand. “She was simply given powers that I believe were supposed to be used to bring everyone together, but she unfortunately never could. I had a vision earlier that makes me believe you were lured into the Mystic Forest for a reason.”
My blood heats with anger. “The fucking little witches! Meddling where their noses don’t belong, time and time again over the years. You’re telling me they conjured my gramma’s directions and even the conversations I had with her in the cavern, they weren’t real?” Tears of embarrassment and rage heat my cheeks, but I swipe them away. I have no need for emotions right now, I want fucking revenge.
Lucianna’s eyes begin to glow bright green and the witches’ baubles glow brighter and brighter. Lucianna takes both of my hands. “I know you’re mad, Embry. We’re all mad, but you need to listen to me. What I’m going to tell you now is something that Overmaster Descallia doesn’t even know yet. After I told him about the vision I had and he left to meet with the masters and Corvinus, pieces of the vampire bible kept resounding in my mind, things that happened years and years ago.”
My friend and our new queen inhales a deep breath. “I believe that somehow you and I were intended to meet, and that together, our powers are supposed to be enough to do what yourgreat, great gramma and gramma were unable to do because of the witches’ intervention.”
“It would explain why they tried to take us out.”
She nods. “Yes, and there’s more.”
I cross my leg, kicking my shortie boot. “I’m furious, Luce. I seriously don’t know how much more I can take. All I want right now is to grab my sword and go on a hunt for some nasty witches.” I glance around at the ladies surrounding me. “Not you, obviously,” I huff.
They nod, but no one is smiling. They’re all holding onto their baubles. “Raven?” I ask.
“Tell her, Lucianna, we’re running out of time,” she says. “Auntie Devora is on her way. She must know we have the shadow books.” Willow’s finger sends electricity into the air as she disappears the books with a wave of her wand.
“Tell her, Lucianna,” Raven urges, her voice going up an octave as the air in the room begins to swirl and the witches’ eyes begin to spin.
Lucianna nods. “They wanted to start a war; they want the land. I believe Isala’s intervention is what kept your great grandmother and every generation since then from being successful in bringing us together. It’s going to take both of us, using our powers together, because I believe that Isala is back and helping the witches.”
My entire body starts to tremble. “And Lucas?”
