Arthur’s ley line chart was hand-drawn in ink, the lines rendered with the fine detail of someone who’d spent a decade inside the magical currents he was mapping. It was beautiful in a way that made my skin crawl.
“He traced the one beneath the warehouse on Porter and Ninth,” Didi said. “It runs northeast.” She placed her finger on the line and followed it across the map. “It intersects with two other major ley lines approximately twelve miles north of the Crossroads.”
Her finger stopped on the exact spot where Gavin’s property parcel sat.
Bo’s ears flattened. Nobody spoke for a moment.
“Three ley lines,” Samuel said quietly. “A convergence point.”
“The same kind of convergence he said the Black Chalice Rite would require,” Didi confirmed. Her voice was steady, but I could feel the controlled fury radiating off her. “Arthur told me a three-line intersection is rare. There are only a handful in the entire county, if you exclude the one beneath his family mansion.” She shot a glance my way. “If Abby is right. If Esmeralda wanted to perform a sustained magical ritual—the kind that would let herdrain another witch’s power over weeks or months—this is exactly the kind of location she’d need.”
My chest tightened. The Lincoln sisters had been moved from the warehouse likely a few days ago. If Esmeralda had taken them to this property, to a convergence point even more powerful than the one beneath the warehouse, then whatever she was doing to them had only intensified.
“We need to move on this,” I said.
“Agreed.” Samuel frowned. “But we need to be smart about it. We’ve seen what this magic can do. The warehouse was a holding location and the residual magic in that cellar nearly overwhelmed us. A convergence point with an active ritual will be significantly worse.”
Didi’s mouth thinned. I could tell she wanted to argue, but she knew he was right.
A heavy silence filled the conference room.
Didi finally broke it. “Then we don’t go in alone.”
We stared at her.
“We’re going to need more witches,” Didi explained grimly.
26
STRENGTH IN NUMBERS
Samuel wrinkled his forehead.“Define more witches.”
Didi straightened, her expression the one she wore when delivering compliance verdicts nobody wanted to hear. “Six. I think six witches combining their powers might be enough to stop Esmeralda.”
“So, five including you?” I asked warily.
Didi nodded. “Mrs. Chen should be one of them. I know she likes to keep to herself, but she’s pretty powerful.”
Surprise jolted me at this. I never realized my old neighbor had that kind of rep in the Amberford witching community.
Didi hesitated. “Melody and the Ashgrove witches have the right kind of magic to help us.”
Barney raised an elegant eyebrow. “You want to recruit people who are already under the enemy’s control?”
“I think there might be a way around that.” Diditapped the ley line map. “Arthur said a three-line convergence amplifies magic exponentially. Esmeralda will be operating at a power level no witch can match individually. Not me. Not Mrs. Chen.” She leveled a hard stare at us. “But coordinated magical firepower over a convergence could work.”
Gavin’s nostrils puffed with alarm.
I chewed my lip. “What about Daria? She’s the Alliance chair and one of the strongest witches in Amberford. Wasn’t she due back imminently?”
“I checked with Cornelius this morning. Daria’s flight back from the West Coast was delayed. Something about a dispute between two covens in Portland that escalated into a weather event.”
“A weather event,” Samuel repeated leadenly.
Didi made a face. “Apparently someone hexed the rain. She won’t be back for a couple of days at the earliest.”
My stomach churned. “We don’t have a couple of days. And if Esmeralda moved the sisters from the warehouse because she knew we were close, she could move them again. Or worse.”
