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Reese and I exchange a tense look before we take our places at the back next to Savannah and file out of the battle room.
“Is this what I think it is?” she asks, the question barely audible over the incessant beeping.
“Unfortunately,” Reese confirms grimly. “The black dog is coming our way.”
“Dammit.” She rubs her hand over her closely cropped black hair. “Is the big tree ready for this?”
“To the best of our ability.” A surge of gratitude fills me for the long hours Reese and Xander had put into creating a safe room just for this kind of thing.
The day after they warded the cabin, they added the same protections here, ringing the room in a new trench dug out and filled with salt and lead.
The front of our line of students merges with another group coming out of a classroom, and they zipper together just like they’ve been drilling to do since we took over the Conservatory from the previous high priestess.
We reach the meditation room at the heart of the Conservatory, where grass covers the ground and an ancient tree rises at the center, punching through the glass dome roof. Sunlight floods the room, the sky cloudless and blue.
Despite the fall of the Conservatory, this space survived, and we kept it true to its original function when we rebuilt the school, engraving protections into the stones that will ensure that it can withstand another battle in the halls.
Xander and another teacher stand at the entrance, checking off student names as they pass. As our group files in, I let my magic sweep outward, searching for anyone who ignored the drill, and a blazing star of energy near the front demands my attention.
I turn toward the double-doors just as they burst open, spilling Pen and Marc into the Conservatory.
Marc spots me right away and jogs forward, the shotgun that pokes up over his shoulder bouncing. Pen peers backward as she follows, her hand at her side, where her weapons ride on her belt.
With a gesture for Savannah to stay with the kids, Reese and I move to meet them. “What’s going on?”
“It’s Lynch.” Pen’s ash-blond hair lies in a disheveled halo around her face. “He transformed into a black dog, and he’s heading this way.”
“Wait, what?” The blood drains from my face, and I sway. “What about Bailey?”
“He started to transform, too, but Darius killed him before it was completed.” Marc’s expression turns grim. “Darius and Sharpe are on their way now.”
“But…why?” Everything we had assumed is tossed on its head with this development. “Bailey and Lynch were marked for sacrifice.”
“And now they’re dead.” Reese fiddles with his device, quieting the beeping as it quickens. “Transforming men into beasts is also a fae myth. When Sharpe and Marc took out the Wild Hunt’s first black dog, the spell must have jumped to Bailey and Lynch, since they were part of the ritual. The spell doesn’t care how they die, as long as they end up dead.”
Before I can respond, the light dims in the meditation room, and a worried murmur ripples through the people gathered. The students huddle closer under the tree, their whispers turning fearful as they stare up at the glass dome.
I tilt my head back to see the sky darkening without a single cloud in sight.
“Reese, stay with Xander to guard the kids,” I order, my voice as steady as I can manage. “Marc, Pen, come with me. We need to find out what’s happening.”
We sprint outside, leaving the safety of the wards behind us. My pulse races with every step, my mind a whirlwind of questions and fears.
As we reach the outer steps, horror quakes through me to see the moon moving in front of the sun, the darkness deepening. The solar eclipse, which wasn’t due for another day, casts the world in an eerie twilight, and brings with it power that crackles in the air.
Marc pulls the shotgun from the holster on his back. “What the hell?”
“I don’t know.” I shake my head in confusion. “This shouldn’t be possible.”
A black SUV barrels out of the tree-lined driveway, speeding into the parking lot, and its tires screech as it comes to a halt at the base of the stairs.
Sharpe and Darius spill out, their gazes locked on the sky.
“What’s happening?” Sharpe’s hazel eyes dart to us. “We thought we had more time.”
At a loss for how to explain, I say, “Magic?”
Full darkness descends as the moon fully covers the sun and a fiery ring forms, bathing the world in blood-red light, like a promise for the coming slaughter.
