Page 39 of Wallflower Witch
“Any thoughts?” I whisper. “This seems too easy.”
“Slow and steady,” Patrick advises. “See if you can stretch your magic out and reach the door.”
I nod, calling my magic forward with a thought and sending it toward the sealed door before us. It rushes out, pushing into the stone. The second my magic touches it, a line of fire streaks back down the connection, burning my arm. I scream and cut off the flow. The skin on my arm bubbles with angry blisters.
“Mor!” Josh yells, running forward.
The fire jumps from me to him, almost like it can sense when someone comes close. Patrick jumps in front of Josh, calling his own fire up to block the attacking flames.
Josh grabs my good arm and drags me back a few steps until the flames stop tracking our movement. When it seems to have settled, Patrick sets a wall of flame in front of it before coming back to the rest of us.
“Babe,” breathes Matt, “Oh my God! How are you still standing?”
I look down at my arm. The skin is turning an ugly black color around the blisters. I’m worried about why I’m not feeling pain, but then the blisters start to shrink, the skin healing and changing as we watch, until my arm is back to how it was.
“That’s even more impressive than the first time,” Josh says, reaching out to gently poke at my arm.
Patrick’s wall of flame hisses, drawing our attention back to where the cursed fire pushes through the protection and comes toward us.
“I don’t think slow-and-steady is going to work,” I yell, pushing the other three behind me.
Patrick agrees, coming up to stand beside me, reminding he also has magic to help fight back. “We need to attack it at the root,” he says. “I don’t think it is going to let us fight it little by little.”
“At the root?” I ask, pulling a wall of earth in front of us to block the fire. It’s effortless, my magic now responding almost like an extension of myself.
“You’re going to have to break all of them open at once, but we also don’t want to take out any of the houses around us. It’s advanced magic, but I have faith in you.”
“We all do,” Matt says. He runs over, grabbing two limbs about the size of baseball bats, and returns. “But maybe these will help us be of some use.” He passes one over to Josh.
I close my eyes, this time focusing on the world around me. In front of me, I can sense a darkness sucking the life from the area around it. Expanding my senses out, I can feel buildings on one side reaching into the earth, but other than being solid, they don’t seem to be bothering anything. On the other side, I find a combination of buildings and darkness. As I stand there, I can feel tendrils of the darkness stretching out, trying to connect to itself. I don’t know where the knowledge is coming from, but I know that if the darkness forms one solid unit, it will be really bad for me and everyone else in Spells Hollow and out on the main road.
I reach into the earth, pulling hard to create walls above and below the ground to slow the tendrils down.
The curse doesn’t like that, sending the fire bursting through the wall in front of us. Patrick moves forward, fighting fire with fire. I send a tremor through the ground toward the building in front of me. It shakes the crypt. The fire hisses, pulling my attention back to the fight in front of me.
“Keep going,” calls Patrick as the building comes to a halt.
Drawing a deep breath, I send more magic forward and some sideways toward the next spot of darkness. I feel the ground bucking under me, but my feet stay glued to where I am.
Shouts break my concentration as squawks fill the air. Cracking an eye open, I see a mass of black birds descending on us. I block out the noise as Josh and Matt swing their limbs and do their best to keep the birds back.
Patrick’s panting and cursing fills the air in front of me. As much as I want to focus on protecting my men, I know the only way to keep everyone safe will be destroying this curse. I close my eyes and focus on pushing the magic farther out toward more of the spots of darkness. My breathing steadies, the chaos around me settling into a dull roar like I’ve just put my head underwater.
I keep my magic focused on the curse, avoiding anything that doesn’t reek of darkness. Something sliding over my feet draws my attention back to the present. I glance down to see vines snaking over my legs, their bright flowers opening and closing like they want to eat everything in its path.
I shiver, feeling the vines start to climb up my legs. Focusing once again, I draw deep inside, pulling on my magic to push as much of it at the curse as I can. If I stop now, there won’t be another chance. I send my magic even farther out, almost reaching the far edge of the curse.
The vine reaches my waist, curling tight like it could squeeze the air from my body, while wings and beaks beat at my shoulders until I can feel blood dripping down my fingertips.
Shoving all thoughts from my mind, I drag more magic forward. Drawing everything. My arms are heavy, and I’m not sure I can open my eyes if I want to.
“Mor!!!” I hear through the din. I think it’s Patrick. “STOP!!!”
“Just a little more,” I slur, pushing all of me into breaking this curse. I finally find the edge of the darkness and push it farther into the earth until it has no hope of reaching the surface again, burying it under miles upon miles of earth and stone.
A loud pop reaches my ears, like a long-stuck door swinging open, before I give in to the welcoming embrace of oblivion.
“Morrigan! Morrigan, please come back to us!”