Grim Lovelies (Grim Lovelies 1)

Rennar, however, remained quiet.

“I haven’t trained at one of the witch academies, no,” Anouk said. “I wasn’t born into magic, like the Royals. All I’ve learned are spells overheard from Mada Vittora and a few Goblin tricks. But this spell is simple. It requires nothing but a tremendous amount of life-essence.”

Now Mada Zola really wa

sn’t smiling. “You would have to take a human life to acquire that much blood. You wouldn’t do that. You’re too tenderhearted.”

Anouk thought of Viggo and said softly, “Not all life-magic has to be taken by force.”

A commotion came from the stairs. Anouk whipped around. Someone was coming. For a second her confidence faltered. Countess Quine appeared with Luc in tow, her hair mussed as though they’d been in a struggle. Luc’s hands were bound with twine. A bruise marred his dark cheek.

Anouk sucked in a breath. “Luc, are you all right?”

But he wasn’t. Anyone could see.

Mada Zola smirked again, her confidence restored. “Good, he can be a witness to this. Quine, our little dust mop says she’s going to turn us into animals if we don’t obey her. Go ahead, dust mop. Show us how you’d do that.”

Anouk loathed the smirk on the witch’s face. It itched at her with blade-sharp claws, just like the sounds of the battle outside.

Rennar grabbed Luc and jerked his head at Quine. “Go. Handle the driver. He’s the only one left.”

Beau.

Anouk turned and gripped the window ledge, searching the battle. She caught sight of Tenpenny’s top hat—?he was crouched behind a garden wall near the Goblins’ potting-shed stronghold. A dozen or so more Goblins huddled with him, trying to break the spell that locked the shed door. And then a sandy-haired boy in a white chauffeur shirt and black trousers sprinted toward the Goblins, jumped over a fallen wooden soldier, and joined them behind the wall.

A streak of magic tore across the garden, turning the kilted Goblin that Cricket had danced with to stone. Anouk whipped her head around. It was Quine—?she was below now, in the shelter of the porte-cochère, eating powder and casting spells.

“Beau, watch out!” Anouk yelled.

He couldn’t hear her. He was so far away. He was slamming his umbrella against the lock, unaware that his back was exposed and that Countess Quine was swallowing more powder . . .

“Beau!” Her cry was hoarse. But just as Countess Quine’s next bolt hurtled across the garden, Tenpenny heard Anouk’s call and spun around to see what was happening. In a few long strides, he got to the shed and shoved Beau out of the way. Beau landed against the stone wall, his shoulder connecting hard enough to make Anouk bristle.

The bolt of magic clipped Tenpenny in the hip. Anouk cried out. It spread from his hip with alarming speed, immobilizing his legs and his chest, swallowing his neck and head, finally reaching the hand that was still outstretched to protect Beau. In only seconds, he was transformed from the leader of the exiled Goblins into a mass of colorless granite.

Anouk gasped.

One of the wooden soldiers wrapped its rootlike fingers around Tenpenny’s stone body and, with one swift motion, lifted the statue off the ground and slammed it against the wall.

It shattered into dust and pieces.

Anouk had to steady herself on the windowsill. Her lungs felt robbed of air, like she’d forgotten how to breathe. A statue could be whispered back to life, but there was no returning from rubble and dust. Tenpenny was gone. She clutched the ledge hard enough to leave imprints.

“No!”

Below, Countess Quine aimed at Beau again. He was leaning against the stone wall, looking dazed from the fall. He could never get up and run in time.

She’s going to turn him to stone too.

In that moment, reason disappeared. She’d never let Beau become a pile of rubble.

She raised her hands toward the window. Luc called out a warning before Rennar could silence him, but she barely heard him. Hot anger was slick between her ears. It deafened her. Controlled her. She channeled every ounce of Viggo’s blood, every bit of her love for Beau, no longer needing Rennar’s belief in her because she believed in herself.

“Bomba ak ignis bleu,” she whispered grimly.

It was quiet. That was the thing about magic. It was best done with whispers, not shouts. And her one whisper, bolstered with the strength of six pints of life-blood, sent a shock wave over the gardens. The lavender in the fields rippled as though a hurricane had passed through; buds, stripped from the plants, rose in the air like a dusky purple cloud. The Goblins fell to their knees from the tremor.

Each of the wooden soldiers, one by one, burst into blue flames. The smell of wood smoke mixed with the lavender as hot flames turned their wooden bones to ash. A hideous scream pierced the air as Countess Quine sizzled along with them.