“Fucking hell.” I brushed away the watery monsters.
Moire had used a spell to make it rain spiders. Spiders made of goddamn water. The more I destroyed, telekinetically waved away, the more that gathered into larger water spiders. Soon, a dozen spiders half my size surrounded me.
I willed myself to relax, ignoring the chittering hisses of these watery monstrosities. Ben’s constant curious comments popped into my head. Ever since his trip to the animal shelter, since getting that damn dog, he’s been obsessed with all thingsanimals. The kid would probably end up a veterinarian or zookeeper or running his own haven for untethered familiars.
Unable to remember the exact origins of the predator, I focused less on specifics and more on sheer force. If Moire wanted to create water spiders, then I’d create a horde of electrical wasps. Ben mentioned they hunted spiders to feed their young. He also mentioned they’re vicious.
My manifested magical attack buzzed through Katherine’s mind, tearing apart the spiders until nothing remained. I directed the horde to strike Moire.
Thousands upon thousands stung the witch, sparks of electricity stunned her, and soon she screamed an anguished defeat, consumed by the wrath of the wasp horde.
“Are you done with the dramatics?” I asked, listening intently to where she might reveal herself.
“I thought you’d enjoy the flair.” She leapt from my shadow, a blade in her hand.
I spun around, catching her arm, but tumbling backward. We crashed onto the ground and rolled around, each fighting desperately to avoid the blade’s edge.
“You do so enjoy murdering my coven.”
I fought against the blade, panicking as the tip pressed to my neck. Dying in the mind wasn’t a true death, but it might as well be. As a manifested extension, if I died here, I wouldn’t be able to help. I wouldn’t be able to protect my students. I wouldn’t be able to end this coven.
“You killed my best friend,” Moire screamed, tracing the blade’s tip along my scar.
How poetic, planning to end me the way I’d damn near died at Theodore’s hands.
“Sorry about your psychic witches,” I groaned, bending Moire’s hand and forcing the blade away. “But they put their hands on Milo; there was no coming back for them after that.”
And while the Global Guild, along with every other government agency, wanted to detain the Celestial Coven witches if possible, I would never go back and change my decision. I stood by it, proudly, knowing those horrid sisters deserved to be sent to their deaths, if only to free the unwilling mind of their host body, and prevent a thousand more to follow in such a cruel fate.
“The Sisters Three?” Moire scoffed. “You think I give a damn about those petty witches.”
I crinkled my brow, perplexed and also exhausted, fighting to keep Moire off me.
“I speak of my sister, my daughter, my creation.” Moire lifted the blade high, snatching it free from my grasp. “You killed her like she meant nothing.”
A flash of my battle at Gemini Academy appeared on the surface of Moire’s mind, completely unguarded. The anguish of losing her loved one struck when I ripped the bone staff magic from Amara. I shattered it, releasing the many souls bound to it.
“One of the fallen members of the coven,” I said, out of breath. “When I released them, you lost your loved one.”
“No, you fool.” Moire laughed lightly. “Those fragments held no memories, only magic.”
“She’s speaking of the staff itself,” Katherine said, standing up again, and holding her hands in a weird position, almost as if she held an invisible object. “The staff was sentient, much like Moire has become over the centuries.”
“What?” I blinked, more confused by every passing word.
“That ends now.” Katherine pulled her hands apart in a ripping motion.
Moire screamed, her body shredding apart before me.
“What the hell?”
“She’s the grimoire,” Katherine explained, continuing her tearing actions. “Now that I have control over my body again, I’m ripping her apart one spell at a time.”
Moire’s bloody and broken body began falling apart like paper sent through the shredder.
She wasn’t a witch with enchantment magic. Moire was the enchantment magic, a sentient spell gone awry. And the skull staff that Amara once wielded was Moire’s creation, an attempt to breathe life into another spell, conjure a living being out of magical energy.
I forced myself up, furious and disgusted by this creature. She reminded me far too much of my doppler, the stray persona that nearly ruined my life.
