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“I forgot,” I mutter as I reach into my pocket and wrap my hand around the piece of black tourmaline I brought with me today before glancing at Jonas. “Do you have protection with you?”
“Always,” he says with a nod, and we walk to the door.
I turn the knob, and it opens, but when I push it in, something forces me back and slams it shut.
“Something doesn’t want us in there,” Lucy says.
“Too fucking bad.” I push my shoulder against it as Jonas murmurs words of a spell I can’t fully understand, and then the door gives, and we shove our way inside.
The floor creaks. Dust floats through the air, and the smell of something that’s been dead for a few days permeates the space. It’s enough to make my eyes water.
“Please tell me that smell isn’t Xander,” Breena whispers, clearly terrified that it’s exactly that.
“No,” Jonas assures her. “It would be far worse than this.”
“Look.” Lorelei points to the second floor, where we see lights flashing as if a TV is on in the dark. “He’s up there.”
“We should spread out,” I say before she can climb the stairs. “Those steps don’t look particularly steady, and we don’t need them coming down on us.”
We gingerly walk upstairs, single file. The closer we get to the top, the more my stomach roils. I feel sick, and I know we’re not going to like what we find up here.
“Oh, my goddess. Xander!” Jonas holds Lorelei back from running to the man.
“Stop,” Jonas says into her ear. “You will only hurt yourself right now.”
The scene before us is just…horrifying. Xander is sitting on the floor, cross-legged, staring into a mirror. The reflection is not of the room we’re in but rather a dimension I don’t recognize. Lights swirl, but not beautifully. They’re dark, pulsing, and hypnotizing.
“Don’t look into that mirror,” I instruct the others. And then, very slowly, Xander turns his head to look at us.
He’s sweating profusely as if he’s trying with everything in him to fight. But his eyes… His eyes swirl with the same colors as in the mirror.
“Go.” His voice is guttural, and I know that even just that one word costs him energy in his fight. “Run.”
“Xander,” Lorelei says again, crying in earnest now. “You son of a bitch, you won’t leave me like this. You won’t give in to this piece of shit. You fight, do you hear me?”
“He’s fighting,” Breena says and rubs her hand over Lorelei’s back. “What do we do?”
“He tried to do the mirror spell without us,” Lucy says, misery in every word. “Damn it, he promised he wouldn’t do that.”
I glance around the room, trying to gather my wits about me, and then freeze. “You’ve got to be kidding me. That can’t be real.”
“What? What is it?” Breena follows my gaze, and then what’s left of the color in her face drains out. “That’s impossible. We destroyed that thing.”
The labradorite flashes in the corner of the room, as perfect as ever.
“Xander’s dirty,” Lucy says. “It looks as if he was digging holes all night.”
“He followed us?” Breena demands.
“It has him,” Lorelei says, her voice frantic now. “That thing you unleashed last night has Xander and made him dig up the pieces.”
“Impossible,” Jonas mutters.
Xander lets out a whimper and then throws back his head as if he’s being tortured. The anger is swift and fierce as it rolls through me.
“We’re going to stop this, right here and now.”
“Go,” Xander manages to say with another guttural groan.
Instead of running, Jonas raises his hands and begins a spell. The rest of us listen carefully and then join him when he starts it all over again, raising our voices in unison and using all our magic and might to protect Xander.
He yells, sounding in utter agony. And then, before our eyes, he shifts into his crow form. The bird’s eyes still swirl with color as he caws and then flies out the window.
The room stills, and the mirror shatters. The crystal loses its flash and then falls into a million pieces on the floor.
“It took him,” Lucy says. “Holy shit, it took him.”
“We need to leave this place,” Jonas says. “It’s not safe for us here.”
“I need to find Xander.” Lorelei leads us down the stairs. When we’re all outside by the car, I hear a loud rumble.
We all turn in time to see the house collapsing behind us.
“Let’s go.” I circle my finger in the air, gesturing for everyone to get the hell inside the car. When we’re all safely inside, I peel away from the house and head down the street. “This is absolutely fucking insane.”
“Where would Xander go?” Lucy asks Lorelei.
“Xander, or the son of a bitch who has him?” Lorelei counters. “Because as far as that goes, your guess is as good as mine.”
