Suddenly, a burst of movement came from behind Balthazar. Emerging from the grave—or at least appearing as if they did—came a volcanic eruption of people.
All dressed in black. All with hands raised and spells at the ready.
They filled in around Balthazar, pulsing with their own magic. The power they exuded washed over Embry, warming her skin and stinking of heavy enchantment. She recalled that very first time she saw Balthazar. Before she knew what he was, she’d known he was more than magically gifted—he seemed to be built of the stuff. These people were no different.
Sorcerers.
Most of them shared the same Superman/Clark Kent coloring Balthazar wielded like a knife—pale skin, dark hair, eyes so blue they seem to glow.
His family wasn’t abroad. They were right here. On his team. Ready to fight.
Embry had been right about this, too—she’d truly believed he wasn’t in this alone.
Instead of rejoicing, a wave of nausea washed over her frozen form. Balthazar was a cog in a very large, magic-stealing machine. And if they were as powerful as he was, drawing from a well newly replenished with the blood of all those Riddle vampires? Not good.
“Woodcross Coven of Ravenwood,” he announced, stage-ready grin in place, “please meet the Hale Clan of Everywhere and Anywhere We Desire.”
Balthazar spread his arms magnanimously, exchanging looks with several members of the group, all displaying varying shades of his smug braggadocio. “I know we simply look like pretty faces, but I can tell you right now not a single trick in your witchy book will allow you to defeat us.” His grin became a smirk. “Not that any of you can do anything at the moment.”
The rest of the sorcerers laughed. Embry yearned for her magic to burst forth from where she was suspended, but just like her body, her power couldn’t move. Balthazar picked that moment to show off how free he was. Stepping atop the tomb lid, walking over it as if it weren’t ajar, and hoisting himself onto the platform holding the statue of Hiram Woodcross.
He backed up to the statue, a menacing figure to a curious one, looking down upon them.
“Wecouldjust kill each of you while you’re suspended in time,” he announced, positively gleeful. “But honestly, that’s too much like cheating.”
He shrugged, and a few of the sorcerers laughed again.
Embry’s anger burned. In the corner of her eye, she could see a smudge of Rye, mussed hair falling away from his face with the force of his movement as he lunged toward where Balthazar had been. The anger in her belly was the same kind etched in his profile. Though she couldn’t get a bead on Daddy, she hoped his reaction was the same. She hoped every member of the coven flamed with fury.
“We could also simply walk away,” Balthazar continued, making a slow circle around Hiram’s form now, checking his handiwork from all sides, “and leave you grasping for yet another not-quite-easy-to-believe explanation for the Table. But, honestly, we’ve gotten so good at killing vampires that we never get to enjoy a good, old-fashioned brawl anymore. Just a precise prick of a magical micro needle is all it takes.” He mimicked clicking a pen—in, out, in again. “Not to mention it is oh-so-much fun to fight an inferior being who is feelingdesperate.”
He’d just admitted to killing vampires. Illegally hunting them.
Oakley. Her family. Very likely others.
Embry feverishly hoped Rye’s cameras had microphones. She honestly couldn’t remember from the video at the police station if they did.
Balthazar finished his revolution of the statue and came to a stop aligned with Hiram’s back once again. Facing Embry. “So, perhaps we’ll let you play with us just long enough to give you something to think about while you wait out your years in the Table’s fine prisons.”
Around him, his family nodded. Grins flashed, fingertips filled with magic pulsed and reset. Knees bent, fighting stances at the ready.
Balthazar’s gaze drilled into Embry. His smile dropped.
Then, with a snap of his fingers, time began again.
CHAPTER 42
AS IT WAS DIVINED
NOW THIS WAS THE SCENE FROM THE VISION.
Balthazar, his hands raised and pulsing with power against the backdrop of Hiram’s disturbed tomb, while all around, the graveyard whirled in chaos.
Alistair didn’t know how it ended, but he knew this would happen. Embry gritted her teeth. The witches had to win—because this was most definitely a battle to be won or lost, no longer a mission to extract Balthazar, but to survive their second all-out brawl in so many days.
Their ambush had turned into a counterambush, and now spells were flying this way and that. The sorcerers dodged and rolled, gleefully attacking and parrying from their advantageous upper ground with power that was, indeed, twenty-times stronger than the witches’ own. Worse, the longer this went on, the more exhausted and literally drained the coven would get. Embry didn’t have any kind of metric for how much juice a vampire’s life could give the well the two dozen of them were drawing from, but she knew that if her plan didn’t work, there’d be no outlasting the Hale clan. There’d just be losing, surrounded by their ancestors’ disappointment.
Embry immediately fired another stun spell from one hand and the immobilization enchantment that wasn’t entirely legal from the other, aiming at the bigger target of Balthazar’s torso, hoping the double-up would help her land a blow.
