The effect was immediate and violent.
29
LOONEY TUNES
Black fur rippledlike water disturbed by a stone. The small body contorted, bones cracking and lengthening with sounds that turned my stomach. The cat’s shape blurred and expanded, limbs stretching, spine arching, until the outline of the animal dissolved into something larger and human.
My heart thumped against my ribs.
Where a cat had been, a woman in a dark dress now crouched on the forest floor. My hand was wrapped around her left ankle. She was breathing hard, her dark hair disheveled and her golden-rimmed pupils incandescent with rage.
It was a grown-up version of the girl from the photograph.
Esmeralda Thornwick looked exactly as Mrs. Chen had described her. Slender. Dark-haired. Sharp-featured. Attractive in the way a blade was attractive, all edges and cold beauty. She didn’t look a day over thirty.
The Thornwick arrogance Barney and Mrs. Chen had spoken of radiated from her like heat off a furnace.
Samuel was at my side in two strides, his alpha powers pressing down on the clearing like a physical weight. Crimson pupils announced Barney’s presence as he materialized from the shadows. Didi and Mrs. Chen arrived seconds later, the witch breathing hard and the old woman somehow not winded at all. Gavin brought up the rear, his horns fully extended and trailing smoke.
Esmeralda’s gaze swept over us with a contempt that went bone deep. It lingered on Didi, slid to Mrs. Chen, and settled on me with an intensity that made my wolf bare her teeth.
“A white wolf.” Her voice was low and smooth, with an accent I couldn’t place. “I heard the rumors. I assumed they were exaggerated.”
“They weren’t,” Samuel said. His tone was the one that made lesser wolves whimper and cower. “Esmeralda Thornwick, you are under arrest by the authority of the Amberford Alliance for the kidnapping of the Lincoln sisters and the use of banned subjugation magic.”
I released her ankle and moved back.
Esmeralda rose to her feet in a single fluid motion. She was taller than I’d imagined and moved like a witch who was used to being the most dangerous person in any room.
Something shifted in her eyes. I frowned.
It wasn’t fear I’d just glimpsed in her gaze. It was amusement.
“Arrest.” She laughed, the sound short and ugly. “You think I’ve spent over a year building this to be undone by a couple of dogs, a pensioner, a dumb witch, a vampire who’s seen better days, and a weak dragon newt?”
I scowled. Gavin’s nostrils puffed in indignation. Didi’s eyes shrank to slits. Barney’s gaze focused on Esmeralda’s jugular vein.
“This pensioner helped exile your grandmother, kid,” Mrs. Chen said coldly.
Esmeralda’s amusement vanished at the mention of Cordelia. Something far darker surfaced in her golden eyes.
“My grandmother was the most powerful witch Amberford has ever produced,” she said, her emotions finally leaking through in her icy words. “The covens feared her. So, they destroyed her and took everything she’d built. Everything she was owed.” Her jaw tightened. “The Lincoln matriarch stole that seat. They stole my family’s legacy. And the covens stood by and applauded.” She jutted her chin out. “This isn’t revenge. This is a restitution of power.”
I could tell the witch believed everything she’d just said.
As Ellie would have said, Esmeralda was definitely in looney tunes territory.
“Cordelia attempted a coup,” Didi said flatly. “She tried to seize control of every coven in Amberford using forbidden magic, with the intention of extending her authority over the entire East Coast. That’s not a legacy. That’s asupernatural crime.”
“It’s just a matter of perspective, isn’t it,witch?” Esmeralda said with a smile that had no warmth in it.
Didi refused to rise to the bait, though I could see it was costing her.
“Where are the Lincoln sisters?” I took a step toward Esmeralda, my voice dropping to a feral growl. “And what the hell did you do to Melody and the Ashgrove witches?!”
I could hear the four women’s racing hearts and smell their terror and pain even from the distance. Alarm tightened my belly. Beneath them, the three pulses I suspected belonged to the Lincoln sisters had slowed down.
They’re getting weaker!
