Beautiful Darkness (Caster Chronicles 2)

We made our way down the side of the cavern, keeping to the shadows until we reached the wet, sandy cave floor. I realized the chanting had stopped. The Casters were silently transfixed, watching Sarafine and the pyre, as if they were all under the same mind-numbing spell.

“Now what?” Link looked pale.

A figure stepped into the center of the circle. I didn’t have to guess who it was, because he was wearing the same Sunday suit and string tie from the visions. His white summer suit made him look even more out of place among the Dark Casters and the helix of Vexes.

It was Abraham, the only Incubus powerful enough to summon this many Vexes from belo

w. Larkin and Hunting stood behind him, and every Incubus in the cavern fell to one knee. Abraham raised his hands up toward the vortex. “It’s time.”

Lena! Wake up!

The flames surrounding the pyre surged higher. In front of the pyre, John Breed gently lifted Lena to wake her up.

L! Run!

Lena looked around, disoriented. She didn’t react to my voice. I wasn’t sure if she could hear anything. Her movements were unsteady, as if she didn’t know where she was.

Abraham reached out toward John and lifted his hand slowly. John jerked, then picked Lena up in his arms, rising as if being pulled by a string.

Lena!

Lena’s head fell to the side, her eyes closing again. John carried her up the stairs. The cocky attitude was gone. He looked like a zombie.

Ridley pushed her way closer. “Lena’s totally disoriented. She doesn’t even know what’s happening. It’s an effect of the fire.”

“Why would they want her to be passed out? Doesn’t Lena have to be conscious to Claim herself?” I thought that was a given.

Ridley stared at the fire. Her voice was uncharacteristically serious, and she was avoiding my eyes. “The Claiming requires volition. She’ll have to make the Choice.” Ridley sounded strange. “Unless…”

“Unless what?” I didn’t have time to try to interpret Ridley.

“Unless she already has.” By leaving us behind. By taking off the necklace. By running off with John Breed.

“She hasn’t,” I said automatically. I knew Lena. There was a reason for all of it, everything. “She hasn’t.”

Ridley looked at me. “I hope you’re right.”

John reached the top of the altar, Larkin following behind him. Larkin bound Sarafine and Lena together under the light of the Seventeenth Moon.

I felt my heart pounding. “I have to get Lena. Can you help me?”

Link grabbed two chunks of rock, big enough to do some damage if he could get close enough to use them. Liv flipped through her notebook. Even Ridley unwrapped a lollipop and shrugged. “You never know.”

I heard another voice behind me. “You aren’t gonna be able to get up there unless you’re fixin’ to take care a all those Vexes on your own. And I don’t remember teachin’ you how to do that.” I smiled before I turned around.

It was Amma, and this time she had brought some of the living with her. Arelia and Twyla stood nearby, and together the three old women looked like the Three Fates. Relief washed over me, and I realized part of me had thought I’d never see Amma again. I crushed her in a hug, which she returned, straightening her hat. That’s when I saw Gramma’s old-fashioned lace-up boots, as she stepped out from behind Arelia.

Make that Four Fates.

“Ma’am.” I nodded to Gramma. She nodded back, as if she was about to offer me tea on the veranda at Ravenwood. Then I panicked, because we weren’t at Ravenwood. And Amma and Arelia and Twyla weren’t the Three Fates. They were three ancient, brittle-boned Southern ladies who were probably about two hundred and fifty years old between them—wearing support hose. And Gramma wasn’t much younger. These Four Fates, in particular, had no business being on a battlefield.

Come to think of it, neither did this one Wate.

I slipped free from Amma’s grip. “What are you doing here? How did you find us?”

“What am I doin’ here?” Amma sniffed. “My family came to the Sea Islands from Barbados before you were a thought in the Good Lord’s mind. I know these islands like my kitchen.”

“This is a Caster island, Amma. Not one of the Sea Islands.”