Anathema (Causal Enchantment, #1) (28 page)

I tried to make sense of what he was saying,
but I couldn’t.
You didn’t misread anything.
So did he
feel something for me? But his next words were so definite, so
uncompromising:
We will never happen.
I didn’t understand.
“Why?” I heard myself croak, not intending to ask that out loud. I
knew the answer already.
Because you’re a plain little
girl.

Caden leaned in, his lips grazing mine, so
lightly that it couldn’t be intentional.
He didn’t mean to do
that
.
It had to be an accident. His eyes were still
closed. He couldn’t see anything.

When his eyes finally fluttered open again, I
saw the distance in them. “We are two different species, living in
two different worlds. It’s impossible,” he said. With a heavy sigh
of resignation, he let go of my wrists and flopped back down beside
me to stare vacantly up at the ceiling.

“
I’ll figure out a way to bring you
back,” I declared.

“
Just me?”

“
No … I’ll figure out a way to bring
you all back. There has to be away.”

“
Yes, but it’ll be too dangerous for
you to stand in the same room with me, let alone … anything
else.”

A strange sensation rippled through me when he
said that. Be
with
him, he meant.

Caden sighed, pressing his hand against his
forehead.

“
Is it Rachel?” I asked quietly,
then bit my lower lip.

He began laughing, then groaned. “How could I
forget about
her
?” he muttered to himself. He groaned
loudly again, running a hand through his hair, sending it into
disarray. His face went disturbingly calm as he fell deep into
thought for a moment. Finally he turned to looked at me. “Yes, it’s
Rachel. As long as she and I are together, you and I can’t
be.”

I nodded slowly, rolling onto my back to stare
up at the cave ceiling, wanting to be anywhere but there so he
wouldn’t see me cry. As if hearing my silent pleas, the constant
burn of the pendant faded. “I’m leaving now,” I announced, my voice
hollow.
Back to a house of devious vampires and a back–stabbing
dog.

My head rolled toward Caden for one more look
into those beautiful jade eyes. I saw anguish. And then I was
gone.

My eyes snapped open. The pain of Caden’s
rejection still burned hot through my body. That pain was quickly
quashed, though, by the sight of my balcony doors hanging
haphazardly from their hinges, the glass shattered. I sat up to
find the corpse of a large black animal, too mutilated to identify
but most certainly dead, lying on the floor, its blood splattering
the walls and floor of my perfect white and silver bedroom. The
creature had obviously gained entry from the balcony, though I had
no idea how, given we were five storeys up and it had no
wings.

A deep growl sounded behind me. I turned to see
Max facing my bedroom door, hackles raised.

Someone—or something—was on the other side of
that door, and it wanted in.

Hide!
a deep male voice
ordered.

I leapt out of bed and whirled, looking for the
source. There was no one in the room but Max and me.

Under the bed!

My eyes darted suspiciously to the curtains,
half expecting a tiny old man to pop out from behind them and
introduce himself as the Wizard of Oz.

Now!
the voice shouted.

It no longer mattered where it was coming from.
The warning shot through my paralyzed legs like a lightning bolt,
forcing them to move of their own accord before my brain could
instruct them. I dove under the bed a split second before the door
exploded, splinters of wood flying in every direction.

Ferocious snarling intermingled with the
ghastly sounds of tearing flesh and bones snapping like twigs. I
heard countless yelps of pain but I couldn’t identify the owners. I
clenched my fists and gritted my teeth, my fear for Max outweighing
that for myself. Even with his betrayal—spying on me for Mortimer—I
didn’t want him hurt in doing his job to guard me.

From my vantage point, I could only see feet.
There were so many of them—gigantic, hairy, black paws with
talon–like claws. Max was outnumbered.

A final yelp, then my room fell to dead
silence. I remained in my hiding spot, gripped by fear, watching as
a set of black paws limped toward me. They stopped at the end of
the bed. A big black nose sniffed under the bed. I recoiled as far
back as possible.

You’re safe now,
that male voice—the
one who had warned me to hide—whispered. He was obviously in great
pain.

The animal by the bed keeled over, its yellow
eyes coming level with mine as its chin settled on the
floor.

“
Max!” I slid out from my hiding
place. Five more heaps of flesh and gore like the one that had
greeted me lay nearby. I gasped as I saw Max’s torn and punctured
body; a pool of blood was rapidly forming underneath him. I
crumpled to the floor, resting my forehead on his, and
wept.

Don’t worry. I just need rest,
the
voice whispered
.

I gasped.

Y
es, it’s me you
hear
.

My eyes bulged. “How?”

Before Max could answer, a commotion erupted in
the atrium. Max lifted his head, struggling to stand.

“
Stay,” I ordered gently as I crept
out onto the balcony, the broken glass from the doors crunching
beneath my sneakers.

Sofie was shouting at someone. “Why would you
do this?”

Leaning over the railing, I spotted the top of
Sofie’s fiery red head as she squared off against another
woman.

“
The perfect revenge requires a fair
amount of risk,” the woman answered coldly. A wave of recognition
hit me. I’d heard that bitterness before. It was the young woman
from the park.
I thought she was dead!

“
Revenge for what?” Sofie’s
bewilderment seemed authentic.

“
For the worst betrayal,” the woman
replied acidly.

There was a long pause as Sofie no doubt worked
hard to recall where their paths had crossed.

“
You’re not the only witch who has
found a form of immortality,” the woman hinted.

Another long pause. Suddenly Sofie gasped in
recognition. “Ursula?”

The woman cackled viciously. “You’d be
surprised what you can do with host bodies. I’ve gone through
dozens now. It’s exhilarating, like shopping for fine furniture.
I’ve tried out every ethnicity … always beautiful, though. And
young. Those are my prerequisites. It’s a lot of work, but worth
it. I’ve been able to remain alive, year after year, studying you,
waiting for the perfect opportunity to punish you. I can’t believe
I missed the connection between you and the girl all these years.
That bloody dog was constantly in the way so I could never get too
close
.”

Old news, Ursula. I knew she was spying on
me. Tell me something I don’t know. Like how Sofie betrayed you
too.

“
All of this because of Nathan? I
think both he and I were sufficiently punished, don’t you?” Grief
filled Sofie’s voice.

“
Nathan was mine and you murdered
him!” Ursula ear–piercing shriek startled me.

A chill ran down my spine. With everything
else, Sofie was capable of murder.

“
He never loved you,” Sofie calmly
answered, pronouncing every word with slow precision.

“
Oh please, save your lies.” Ursula
turned her head slightly, the only indication that she was aware of
Viggo and Mortimer’s presence in the shadows. “Those two imbeciles
of yours hired me to watch over you five years ago. They wanted to
know what kind of magic you were playing with. Of course they
didn’t know who I really was.”

Sofie gasped. “I knew it!” she screeched, her
finger pointing accusingly at Viggo.

“
I think you’ve divulged enough
information, Ursula,” Viggo said, sidestepping to close in on her,
Mortimer on the other side.

“
Did Sofie tell you that the pendant
is a key?” Ursula asked, avoiding Viggo’s outstretched
hand.

Sofie lunged for Ursula’s neck but Mortimer
intercepted, holding her back.

“
What do you mean?” Viggo said, a
sharp undercurrent in his calm voice.

“
It’s a key. Plug it into the right
lock or portal and you’ll get whatever you need with it. It’s
obvious to anyone looking at it, including Sofie.”

Mortimer whirled on Sofie, hurling her back to
smash through a ground–level French door with the power of his
wrath. “What else have you been keeping from us?” he
thundered.

Ursula’s speckled green eyes darted up to lock
with mine for a split second before moving on. The others didn’t
notice. “I did some digging after I met your girl at the park,” she
said to the others. “It was interesting … The police report for her
mother’s death was in your handwriting, Viggo. If you were going to
kill her, why didn’t you just bite her?”

In one fluid motion, Viggo reached up and
snapped Ursula’s neck. Her body dropped to the ground, its life
extinguished, her last words ringing in my ears as I collapsed to
the floor.

M
ax limped out to rub his wet
nose against my cheek. It barely registered. “Is it true, Max?” I
choked out.

Silence.

“
Don’t go mute now. What do you
know?” Max blinked, averting guilty yellow eyes.
He knows
something.
“That woman’s crazy, right? Viggo never would have
killed my mother. There’s no way, right?” I pressed, on the verge
of hysteria.

I tried to stop it,
Max finally
answered.

“
What?”

Max closed his eyes and sighed—an odd reaction
from a dog—and a peculiar thing happened. Images flashed through my
mind. At first they were fuzzy and faint, but the clarity
strengthened until it was like a movie trailer was playing inside
my head.

It was night. Someone walked along a dimly lit
sidewalk on a quiet street in drizzling rain, though the person had
no umbrella, just a jacket hood. The camera angle in my head
shifted to show car lights approaching. There was nothing unusual
about it until the car’s engine revved. The person’s head turned,
the headlights illuminating a female face. The face of my mother,
as young and beautiful as I remembered her.

The driver suddenly gunned it and swerved,
sending the car up onto the sidewalk. I caught the fleeting look of
confusion on my mother’s face a second before the car struck
her.

She didn’t have a chance.

I gasped, my hands flying to my throat. So many
times I had recreated the accident in my head, but this was a
thousand times worse.

And it didn’t end there. The car stopped after
hitting her. The door opened and the driver stepped out. I couldn’t
make out a face in the shadows but I recognized that it was a man.
He took several long, casual strides over to my mother’s motionless
body. When he stooped over her lifeless body to dip his fingers in
her blood and the headlights shone across his face, I saw a blonde
man with piercing blue eyes. And I knew who it was.

Viggo murdered my mother.

I cried out as wounds that had closed but never
healed tore open as surely as if it were happening all over again.
Only this time the wounds gaped wider than ever before.
But
why? Why would they kill my mother? What did Viggo
gain?

The vision blurred, then disappeared
altogether. I scrambled to my feet and swayed, barely able to stand
upright, then bolted into my room, intent on escaping this prison.
Instead I found myself face to face with my mother’s
murderer.

“
Thank goodness you’re okay. You
were gone four days this time. We were beginning to worry,” Viggo
said, stepping forward. I recoiled. He chuckled. “Oh, you heard
that nonsense? She was a delusional witch. Pay no
attention.”