What are we going to do? I asked him with a desperate look.
There was despair in Avery’s blue eyes and I could almost hear him saying, I don’t know!
70
The Hallowed Glade was a small clearing in the woods not far from the orange grove which hid the Academy. It was, as Avery had said, ringed around the perimeter with a wild tangle of thorny green vines. There was only one opening in the briars and Winifred Rattcliff and her daughter and henchmen shoved me roughly through it.
In the center of the Glade were two ancient trees, both with gnarled roots and leafless, brown-black branches reaching towards the sky.
They were dead oaks, I saw, and it was easy to see what had killed them. Long tufts of grayish Spanish Moss hung like limp party streamers from their branches. Aunt Dellie had explained to me how the parasitic plant grew on trees, smothering them and covering their leaves so that photosynthesis could not take place, killing them slowly but surely until they were nothing but dry, lifeless husks.
The trees made a grim sight but my attention was caught more by what was hung between them. It was a kind of hammock, I thought—that was easy enough to see in the bright moonlight—though there was something strange about the long, trailing edges of it. But why would a coven of witches put a hammock in the middle of their most sacred spot? It didn’t make sense.
“Put her in it,” Winifred Rattcliff commanded, pointing to the hammock. “And make sure she’s tied down tightly. We wouldn’t want her to squirm away while we go get the other one.”
My heart began to beat a mile a minute. Other one? Other one what? Who or what was the senior witch intending to put into the strange hammock with me?
Whoever or whatever it was, I was completely helpless to stop anything they or it might do to me. I was still securely gagged and I had my hands tied behind my back—just far enough apart that there was no way I could pinch or cut myself with my nails to get even a tiny bit of blood to flow.
Nancy and her two goons pushed me into the hammock and strapped me down securely with my hands tied above my head to one end of it and my feet tied to the other. I heard Winifred giving orders for Avery and Emma and Kaitlyn to be tied to trees around the outside of the Glade, “So they can watch,” she said and then their voices faded away.
I lay completely still, my heart pounding. Had they gone? Was there any way I could escape?
I began struggling but then someone leaned over the hammock and hit me, hard in the face.
I flinched back as Nancy’s nasty sneer came into view.
“None of that you little wanna-be,” she snapped at me. “Mother told me to watch you and your pathetic excuse for a coven and I’m not going to tolerate any trouble. You move so much as an inch and I’ll make you sorry!”
I wanted to struggle some more—wanted to shout and scream with rage and fear. But of course I couldn’t—I was trapped and there was nothing I could do but wait as the endless minutes ticked by and the moon slowly set, waiting to meet whatever fate Winifred Rattcliff had planned for me.
I was sure it was going to be nasty.
71
Maybe a little less than an hour before dawn, Winifred Rattcliff and several other witches came back into the clearing. I had been almost drifting off—you can only be terrified for so long, even when you’re waiting for your own awful demise. At least, I couldn’t. I had almost started dreaming as I lay tied to the hammock between the two dead trees, when the scuffling sound of a struggle woke me up.
“Hold him!” I heard Winifred say to someone. “He’s a strong one—a direct descendant of the line. Keep the spell in place—don’t let him go!”
I craned my neck, trying to see who they were talking about and what was happening but though the sky was growing a tiny bit lighter, I couldn’t see a thing except for shadows—a lot of shadows—heading towards the hammock.
Then, suddenly a familiar scent filled the air around me—the smell of winter and dark spice.
Griffin? My eyes opened wider and I struggled with my bonds, trying to get to him, trying to see if he was all right.
“Be still, you little idiot,” Winifred Rattcliff said sharply and slapped me across the face. “Don’t worry,” she added, “You’ll be with your Nocturne lover soon enough.”
“You bitch! Don’t touch her!” Griffin growled at her angrily and lunged, obviously upset that she’d hurt me. The senior witch hurriedly said some words I didn’t understand and made a few motions with her fingers, apparently shoring-up her spell.