Hexbound (The Dark Elite 2)

“Shut it, Fleming,” Scout said, kicking her toe a little, then glancing at me. “That may be our cue to depart.”

“They know something,” I pointed out.

“I know something, too. I know we’re going to attract a lot of unwanted attention if they keep screaming. And then we have to make up some ridiculous explanation about how we heard screaming through the vents in our rooms, and we followed the sound back to the basement, and we found these girls lying on the ground and pretending to be tied up by invisible rope because they’re practicing for the regional mime championships.”

I blinked at her. “Is that explanation more or less believable than we woke up because two girls who are actually evil magicians tripped a magical alarm wired to a door in the basement we aren’t supposed to know about?”

Scout paused for a minute, the nodded. “Point made. Let’s go home. Ladies, have a pleasant evening.”

Not surprisingly, Lauren stopped screaming. But that just meant the curses were a little less loud than they had been before.

We left a flashlight on the ground between them, then slipped through the door again. When we were both on the other side, we used all our weight to push the thing closed again, muffling the sounds of cursing that were coming from the other side. I took a step back while Scout spun the flywheel and slid the security bar into place, metallic cranking and grinding echoing through the corridor.

“They’ve seen the rat things,” I said.

“And if Lauren’s screaming means anything, they’ve done more than just that. They know more than just that, which means the Reapers and the rats are definitely tied together. It wasn’t a coincidence that Detroit and Naya saw the slime outside that sanctuary.” She put her hands on her hips and looked at the closed door. “I also guess I have to try to ward the door again.”

“You can do it!” I said, giving her a chipper thumbs-up.

“Daniel could do it,” she said. “And without a spell. Me? He says, ‘Go for it, Scout,’ and I have to rough out a few lines—hardly have time to pay attention to the meter, to the melody, the rhythm—ugh,” she said, and the irritation in her voice was really the only part of the monologue I understood.

“So, what does that mean? Dumb it down like you’re talking to a girl who’s only had magic for, like, a few weeks.”

She smiled a little, which had been the point. “You’ve seen me work my magic. Putting together an incantation is hard work, and wards are harder than most. There’s no physical charm—like the origami I used on the thingies—to boost the words. Daniel didn’t give me a lot of direction, and he certainly didn’t give me time to do it well. The ward won’t really keep out anyone with any skill, and the hex isn’t going to last much longer.” She glanced down at her watch. “Fifteen minutes or a half an hour, tops?”

Probably not enough time to find Daniel and get him into the basement, even if he was already in the Enclave. A blast of firespell wasn’t going to do much to the door, and opening up the door again to firespell the Reapers into unconsciousness would just be a waste of time. They’d eventually wake up, and we’d still have doors with breach problems.

We needed stronger wards, and we needed them now.

I grinned slowly, an idea blossoming. “Maybe I can do for you what I did for Naya and Temperance.”

Scout tilted her head. “What do you mean?”

“Well, if I could funnel energy through Naya, maybe I could funnel it through you. To strengthen the wards, I mean.”

“Huh,” she said, then looked at the ground, frowning as she considered the possibility. “So you’re thinking the trouble isn’t that the wards didn’t work, but that they weren’t strong enough to keep the Reapers out.”

I nodded. “I mean, you’re the expert on wards so you’d know better than me, but if we pump up the power, wouldn’t it make the ward harder to break through?”

“It might,” she said with a nod. “It definitely might. Do you need to recharge or whatever?”

“It’s two o’clock in the morning.”

“I’ll assume that’s a general yes, so we’ll do this and go back to sleep. What do I need to do?”

“What do you have to do to work your magic?”

“Remember the triple I?”

“Um, intent, incantation, incarnation?”

She nodded and held out a hand. I took it in mind. With her free hand, she pressed her palm to a flat spot on the door. She closed her eyes, and her lips began to move with words I couldn’t hear. The door began to glow, pale green light filling the corridor.

“Now,” she quietly said, her eyes still closed.

I closed my own eyes, and tried to imagine the power around me, the atomic potential in the air. I imagined it flowing through my fingers, then my arm, then across my body. I felt her jump when it reached her, and her fingers tightened on mine.

“You okay?”

“Keep it coming,” she gritted out.

“Try not to flinch,” I said, “and don’t try to fight it. Just let it flow across you and into the door. Let me do the work.”

Scout let out a muffled sound, but she kept her fingers tight on mine. She kept the current intact.

A low hum began to fill the air. I opened my eyes a little. The hum was coming from the rivets as they vibrated in their sockets. The green glow was also deeper now, the light more intense as Scout transmitted the magic into the door.

“How’s it coming?”

“I think we’re . . . almost there. I can feel it filling up. Sealing. Closing up the cracks.”

That was great, but it was late, and I was exhausted, and Scout wasn’t exactly a finicky magic eater. I could feel her capacity power, like a cavern of magical potential.

And that potential liked firespell.

“Okay, I think we’re done, Lily.”

I tried to pull back, to slow down the flood of power to a trickle, but it didn’t want to stop. Scout’s magic kept sucking more power, and I couldn’t close that door.

“Lily, we’re done here.”

“I can’t make it stop, Scout.”

The door began to pulse with green light. Off and on, off and on, like the world’s largest turn signal.

“Lily, I need you to do something. This is starting to hurt.”

I looked over at Scout. Her hair was standing on end, a punky blond-and-brown halo around her head.