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“We would have to discuss this at length,” John said sternly.
A relieved smile broke out over my face. “Agreed.”
John eyed Jed carefully. “You seem fairly accepting of the fact that we lied to you.”
“Well, there’s no cure for what I am,” Jed said. “It’s not a disease or a curse. I can’t change it. That doesn’t mean you’re not an asshole.”
“I am sorry,” John told him, sounding very nearly sincere. “But in our defense, you did betray us and help our rivals locate the items first.”
“What are you going to do about your mother?” Melinda asked me. “A number of us have matters to discuss with her.”
I looked down at my mother. I had no idea what the Kerrigans had planned for her. I did know that whatever it was, she probably deserved it. Anna hurt, stole, or defiled almost everything she touched. She’d all but admitted to murdering some unfortunate because she needed a body to throw her “associates” off her scent. I was finished with her.
“I don’t know who that woman is,” I told them blithely. “She’s not bound to me or mine through magic or blood.”
Melinda’s eyes widened at my wording as she recognized its significance. I understood her surprise. Binding was one thing, but she’d probably never heard someone magically disown her own mother before, abjuring her from family and coven. From that moment on, Anna really would be dead to us, even if she showed up on our doorsteps. We wouldn’t see her or hear her or even smell her. It was one of the coldest, cruelest things a witch could do to her own kin. And I’d done it to my own mother.
In terms of negotiating tactics, it was a heck of a way to establish one’s position.
“That’s settled, then. We’ll take her home with us. You’ll not hear from her again. And I’d like the use of my hands, if you please,” John added, a little prim. “This is demoralizing.”
I nodded to Dick, who snapped the plastic tie on John’s hands.
“And Melinda’s?” John asked, rubbing his purpling wrists.
“No, just you,” I insisted. “I said I was open to negotiations, not that I was stupid.”>John moved toward us, but Jed picked him up by the shoulders and tossed him into the trees like a rag doll.
Melinda Kerrigan shrieked and lunged for me. I cranked my fist back and swung for her face, just as Dick had instructed. My knuckles connected with her jaw. She yelped, flailing back toward the fire.
I heard a loud whooping at the edge of the clearing, and dark shapes emerged from the trees. Suddenly, the clearing was filled with vampires. Jane and Gabriel, Andrea and Dick, even Jamie. But there were others, more dark-clad Kerrigans, waiting to get their licks in on a McGavock. Jane was engaged in a hair-pulling contest with Melinda. Andrea and Gabriel were chasing the nameless Kerrigan men into the trees. Jamie and Cameron were slugging it out. Jed had shifted into what looked like a Minotaur and was charging a Kerrigan henchman alongside Dick. And from nowhere, a weight crashed against my ribs, throwing me to the ground.
“You little bitch!” my mother howled, her face white and skeletal, hovering over mine as she clawed at me. “You think you can use magic against me? I made you! You’re nothing without me. You’re nothing!”
I yanked my hand loose and swung at her chin. She shouted, covering her face with her hands. I swung again, letting the heel of my hand collide with her sternum. I took both hands and popped them against her ears. She howled, falling to her side. I shoved her off of me, jumping to my feet and kicking her in the ribs.
With my mother on her knees, wheezing, the woods seemed incredibly quiet. I turned to see that the Kerrigans were subdued, their hands secured behind their backs with zip ties that Andrea had pulled from her purse. Suddenly, Jed appeared at the edge of the clearing, tossing two more strange men into the firelit circle.
My mother used this moment of distraction to punch me in the face. I stumbled back and punched her in the stomach.
“Keep your guard up!” Dick yelled.
“Let her do it on her own,” Gabriel admonished. “She’s never going to learn if you’re hovering all the time.”
My mother and I grappled, wrestling back and forth, her hands wrapped around my wrists. My muscles were starting to burn from the extended use of magic and the effort of fighting her. She had to be getting tired. I shoved her against the large oak, Uncle Jack’s cabinet bumping against my shins. I felt sparks at her fingertips. She was actually trying to use magic against me. She barely had enough power to sting me. Even with her study of dark spells, she was weak. She was a weak woman, a weaker witch, and a shameful mother. I’d spent years being afraid of this woman, and she couldn’t even sting me.
Ouch. She had a hell of a right hook, though.
Rather than stumbling, I threw my momentum forward, knocking her to the ground. Gasping for air, wiping at the blood dripping from her mouth, she glared up at me. “You think I’m afraid of you? Little Miss Perfect? The Half-Assed Witch?”
“You should be. I’m done letting you walk all over me. I’m done with your games. I’m done with forgiving you and giving in to you because you’re the only mother I’ve got. Give me that cabinet, and get the hell out of my face.” I nodded toward Jane, giving her a mental picture of what was about to happen. I placed my hands on my mother’s shoulders and used every bit of the authority I had to say, “I bind you, Anna. I bind you in the name of your mother, in the name of our ancestors. I bind you from doing harm, from doing magic. You spent every day of your life abusing the magic in your blood. You will live the rest of your life without it.”
I felt it leave her body before I spoke the last syllable. The spark of my mother’s energy fizzled out like a doused candle. She was dead space, cold and empty—which wasn’t much of a change, really.
My mother stared at her hands as if she were suddenly missing a few fingertips. She flicked them as if trying to spark a lighter. Nothing.
“No,” she spat. “No!”
Jane gasped, but before she could move, my mother had grabbed the athame from the ground. She lurched to her feet, swinging the blade directly at my stomach. A force from my left knocked me out of the way like a wrecking ball, throwing me into the ground so hard that I left a trench in the dirt. I removed my face from the forest floor, looking up to see a giant armadillo creature standing over me, a black enamel handle sticking out of its chest.
