His hand, warm and solid, cupped the back of her head, fingers tangling in her hair. The kiss was a collision, a desperate, passionate act that spoke of love and loss and a raw, final defiance. Goldie tilted her head just so, her body instinctively shielding the intimacy of their mouths from Tamsin's cool, detached gaze.
For a moment, it was simply a maelstrom of feeling and unspoken promises. Then, she felt the sharp pressure of his teeth against her lower lip. Goldie forced herself not to wince, her nails digging into his shoulders as the skin parted. A hot, coppery tang flooded her mouth.
Giving a dramatic sob, Goldie tore herself from Splice’s embrace and threw herself face-down onto the grass of the Grove Core. Splice, understanding her cue, released her instantly, his face a mask of stoic concern for their audience of one.
"I don't want to die!" Goldie wailed into the earth, her voice muffled by soil and genuine terror. As she cried out, one hand clawed at the ground, fingers digging deep into the soft dirt, creating a small, hidden trench. "My cats! Who will take care of my cats?"
Without hesitation, she opened her mouth and bit down into the dirt, pressing her bleeding lip firmly into the soil she had disturbed as she made sounds of theatrical grief.
Help us,she thought frantically, pushing her will, her very essence, down through the point of contact.Please,she begged the soil, the roots, the Grove Core, Mycor, and any other power that might be listening.Please, help us.
“Oh, for goddesses sake, Goldie, give it a rest,” Tamsin snapped, her voice sharp with impatience. Goldie heard a heavy, dragging sound through the grass and damp earth.
“Really, that’s one thing I always disliked about you. That penchant for melodrama. Doesn’t it get exhausting?”
Goldie let out another sob, digging her fingers deeper into the soil.Maybe I can find a rock.Something sharp. Something heavy enough to?—
WE ANSWER.
Goldie’s head snapped up, her sob cutting off.
Tamsin had finished dragging Jonah’s body into the circle. As she bent to close the broken salt line, a faint shimmer rose from the boundary
Goldie’s eyes darted to Splice, wide with a silent, frantic question. He met her gaze for a single heartbeat before his attention snapped back to the glow.
The shimmer thickened, motes of light weaving themselves into the shape of a young man with pale hair, sorrowful blue eyes, and a stubborn jaw. The earth gave a deep, resonant pulse, and the spirit’s light answered in perfect rhythm, a luminous echo of grief and power.
The intrusion shattered Tamsin’s focus. She froze, her hand hovering mid-gesture, then straightened slowly. Her head whipped around, eyes narrowing as she locked on the translucent figure hovering above Jonah’s body.
An ugly sneer twisted her lips. “Oh. Hello, Elijah. Come to take your brother to the otherworld? A little late for that, don’t you think?”
The flickering form stayed silent, its gaze fixed not on her, but on the spot where Jonah had fallen.
Tamsin rolled her eyes. “Don’t be dramatic, Elijah,” she muttered, striding toward Goldie. In one swift, brutal motion, she fisted a handful of Goldie’s hair and yanked her head back. The silver bonds snapped tight again, pinning Goldie’s arms to her sides.
Splice let out a strangled, furious roar and lunged. Tamsin gestured negligently with the hand holding the knife, slamming him flat onto his face.
Tamsin leaned in close, the obsidian blade cold against Goldie’s skin. She began to chant, the words a low, guttural litany in a language Goldie didn’t recognize, but whose intent she felt in her very bones.
Goldie’s eyes darted wildly around, her mind screaming.Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, this is it, this is where I die, all I did was summon Casper, gods above?—
And then, a sound tore through the clearing, ripping the world apart. The unearthly sound cut through Tamsin’s chanting. Her voice broke, and the knife at Goldie’s throat jerked, wrenched backward by an invisible force.
“ENOUGH!”
A wave of incandescent power erupted from the ground. The obsidian knife was ripped from Tamsin’s grasp, sent flying into the dark underbrush to be swallowed by the night.
The silver bonds holding Goldie captive dissolved into smoke. She collapsed, gasping, and immediately scuttled backward like a frightened crab.
Tamsin was frozen, her arm still raised from her broken spell, fingers splayed uselessly in the air. Her entire body was held rigid, every muscle locked in place as if an invisible fist had clenched around her. Her eyes were blown wide with shock, fury, and something perilously close to fear as her mouth hung open in a soundless scream.
For the first time since Goldie had known her, Tamsin Donover looked utterly, horrifyingly helpless.
With a slow, inexorable purpose, the glowing figure of Elijah Pell drifted from the center of the circle, moving toward the witch who had orchestrated his death.
But as Goldie watched, her senses still alight and buzzing, she felt something else. A new pulse answered, thrumming through the ground and the air, shaking the marrow in her bones.
Mycor.
