I don’t care. I can’t watch Riley die, and I can’t watch Julia lose herself to her hunger the way she did with Charlotte.
And between both those things hides the bitter truth: I can’t watch Julia touch someone else this way.
She’s mine.
The thought blazes through me with absolute certainty as I grab Julia’s wrists and try to wrench her hands away.
The moment I touch her, her magic slams into me.
If I thought the feeding in the forest was rough, it had nothing on this. A tidal wave of power and hunger crashes through me, right into my core, flooding my system with dark, intoxicating energy.
My back arches. My vision distorts. Pleasure and pain become indistinguishable as Julia’s magic pours into me, amplified by the broken ritual into something catastrophic.
I’m burning. Freezing. Falling apart.
“Hannah!” Elizabeth is shouting, her voice far away.
I convulse, sinking lower on my knees, but I refuse to let go of Julia.
Through the haze, Julia’s eyes snap to mine. She’s still holding onto Riley, but she’s frozen, breathing hard. The shadows around her eyes are creeping further out like dark veins, as if the power is consuming her from the inside out.
“Julia,” I whisper. “Please stop.”
21
Julia
AsHannah’sfingersclosearound my wrists, Riley’s essence dissolves in my veins. In its place rushes Hannah’s familiar sweetness, flooding my system and filling the hollow spaces in my soul I didn’t know existed until she carved them out. The difference makes me suck in a sharp breath.
My magic roars, changing focus, demanding that I keep taking what’s mine until there’s nothing left.
I gulp down her essence, desperate for it.
“Julia,” she whispers, her voice distant and distorted through the haze. “Please stop.”
The magic pouring through me is far from controlled. The pentagram has turned it into a torrent. Hannah’s heartbeat stutters, her breath coming in short gasps, her life force draining much too fast.
A tiny, feeble thought forms at the back of my mind:I’m killing her.
With a gasp that feels like surfacing from drowning, I wrench backward to break contact from both her and Riley.
The loss is agonizing. My magic screams in protest, clawing at my insides, demanding I reach for her again. Dark tendrils creep up my arms, alive and writhing under my skin, and I clench my fists to smother it.
Riley crumples to the floor like a puppet with cut strings. The sound of her body hitting stone makes me flinch.
The pentagram scatters as if caught in a violent wind. The candles extinguish, plunging the sanctum back into the eerie green glow from the ceiling.
Someone is breathing in harsh, desperate gasps. It takes me a moment to realize it’s me.
“Dammit,” Elizabeth hisses, already at Riley’s side. Her composure has cracked, and there’s fear in her eyes as she drops to her knees and rolls Riley onto her back.
And through it all, the binding spell pulses as strong as ever. Still intact. Still unbreakable.
Another failed attempt.
Hannah scrambles across the floor to Riley, her hands shaking so badly she can barely check for a pulse. “Oh, God… Riley, can you hear me?”
My throat constricts. I turn away, sucking in deep breaths, trying to understand what I’m feeling.
