creepy hollow 05.5 - scarlett Page 11

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Scarlett pictured steep slopes and snow-capped mountains, but her thoughts were vague and scattered, and when she arrived at the edge of a forest where the freezing wind whipped at her hair, she had no idea where the witch candle had sent her. She pulled the cloak tighter around her body, squinting through the darkness at the rushing, tumbling river on one side and the dense trees on the other. She closed her eyes and tried to hear nothing but the swish of leaves, the screaming wind, the roar of water. Anything to drown out—

  I doubt there’s anyone left in this world who will ever want you.

  A shuddering sob ripped through her at the memory of her father’s words. Not true, not true, not true, she told herself as she swiped furiously at the single tear trickling down her cheek. “I am independent,” she uttered in stilted, shivering tones. “I am strong. I am powerful.” But the words she wished so desperately to believe were torn away by the wind.

  As she stood in the blistering cold, clutching her cloak and the candle, thoughts of the witches’ mountain teased and tempted her. The crackling fires, the thick blankets and warm furs, the comfort and safety. She had sworn to herself she’d never return to them, but what if they were her only option now? They had lied to her, but did that really matter if their home was the only place left where she might belong? And perhaps, as Tilda had said, it was all somehow a misunderstanding. They had clothed her and fed her and taught her about magic, so she knew they cared about her, even if they hadn’t been entirely honest.

  And there was Thoren. He wanted her. If she went back to him now, she could give him her whole heart without having to feel guilty about it. Jack saw her as a monster, but Thoren understood her terrible power. Perhaps he was the one she was meant to be with.

  She uncurled her fist and looked down at the candle in her shaking palm. To go back, or not to go back. That was—

  A deafening roar pierced the night as something heavy struck her back. She went flying to the ground, losing her grip on the candle. Snarling, ripping fabric, hot, putrid breath on her neck. She rolled over, found gleaming red eyes above her, and threw a hand up. A pulse of light and energy released itself and sent the creature spinning into the air. It landed on the river bank with a grunt and a howl as Scarlett scrambled backward, feeling for the candle. Her fingers wrapped around it as the creature—a hairy wolf-like beast—rose onto its hind legs.

  Scarlett climbed to her feet and ran. With the river on one side, she had no choice but to go for the trees. She yanked her dress up as she weaved this way and that. The beast crashed into the forest behind her, and a scream threatened to tear loose from her throat as she imagined its claws ripping into her at any second. Then came a roar and a whining whimper, the cracking splinter of branches, and then—nothing. Scarlett ducked behind a tree and dropped to the ground. She pressed a hand over her mouth as a deathly hush fell across the forest. Slowly—so painfully slowly—she lifted the candle. At the edge of her vision, a dark shape slithered across the leaves.

  She snapped her fingers.

  The shape pounced.

  And her scream tore through the night as white light engulfed her.

  * * *

  The echo of her scream bounced across the darkened ice cave. She swung around, almost slipping, but found nothing behind her. As her galloping heart gradually slowed its pace, she patted her arms and body. No blood, no wounds. Nothing except the gashes in her cloak. She pressed a hand to her chest and closed her eyes. “I am not afraid,” she whispered. “I am independent, strong, powerful. I am not afraid.”

  She opened her eyes and looked for the circle of light that indicated the entrance to the tunnels. She walked slowly toward it, giving herself time to think. She wanted to present a front of strength, to show the witches she was not to be messed with. But at the same time, she had attacked them and they had every right to be angry. Should she apologize first? Demand answers first? Would they even let her stay after what she’d done to Tilda and Malena?

  She stopped at the tunnel entrance and pressed a fist against her forehead. She squeezed her eyes shut. She hated this powerlessness, hated that she was once again at the mercy of other people. But she couldn’t face this world on her own. The thought scared her more than she wanted to admit.

  She found Malena, Sorena and Tilda huddled around the fireplace in the kitchen, mugs of steaming tea in their hands. It must be late by now, but perhaps this was normal for them. Perhaps they sat here every night, and Scarlett simply didn’t know. Sitting there, chattering quietly to each other, they didn’t seem as terrifying as the black-eyed, sharp-toothed women she’d woken up to on her first night here. She stood in the doorway and said, “I’m sorry I attacked you.”

  Sorena’s hand rose to her chest in fright, and Tilda jumped to her feet so quickly she sloshed tea out of her mug and down the front of her dress. Malena simply sat back in her chair, eyeing Scarlett with wariness.

  “You came back,” Tilda said. She left her mug on the table and rushed across the room, but Scarlett took a step back, shaking her head.

  “Tell me the truth first. You said I had misunderstood you, but I heard what Malena said. That you lied to me. That you’ve never been able to help me control my power.”

  Tilda halted. She clasped her hands together and began picking at her nails. “It’s true. I can’t help you. But not because it’s impossible,” she rushed to add. “I can’t help you because I don’t know how.”

  “Then why,” Scarlett demanded, throwing her hands up, “did you pretend you could?”

  “Because I believed I would be able to! I’d never encountered a power I couldn’t tame. None of us had. But it turned out that we couldn’t find a record of anyone else with this power. Aside from the sirens, of course, but they can all switch their magic on and off. We thought perhaps it wasn’t possible after all, but I didn’t know how to tell you. I didn’t want to break your heart.”

  “You didn’t think that perhaps continually lying might end up breaking my heart?”

  “Listen, Scar, I’m not finished.” Tilda took a step closer. “On the days Thoren helped you with your magic lessons, I wasn’t only training for the Change. I was also traveling. I went further north and spoke with witches at various covens, and eventually I found someone.”

  “Someone who can help me?”

  “Someone like you.” Tilda beamed. “This witch said that she herself possesses this power, the power to draw out life energy by simply touching another being. She told me that after she went through the Change, she felt completely different. She was able to turn the ability on and off at will.”

  Scarlett narrowed her eyes and looked sidelong at Tilda. “So suddenly my only option is to become a witch?”

  “Well … you had chosen to become one anyway, hadn’t you?” Tilda said tentatively.

  Scarlett folded her arms over her chest. “Doesn’t feel like much of a choice anymore.”

  “I know.” Tilda’s voice was quiet. “But I suppose you could still choose not to. No one is forcing the Change on you.”

  Scarlett watched Tilda, wondering if this was finally the truth. “Can I meet with this other witch? The one who has power like mine?”

  Tilda looked over her shoulder at Malena, who nodded. “Yes, we can definitely arrange that,” Tilda said, turning back to Scarlett. Her eyes moved down, and she gestured toward Scarlett’s wrist. “I, uh, guess that’s how you understood what we were shouting about earlier.”

  Scarlett looked down at the leather charm bracelet. She had to fight the urge to cover it. Had to remind herself that she’d done nothing wrong in creating that charm spell. Hiding in Malena’s workshop, however … Malena had demanded to know why, and the question was there now, barely hidden beneath Tilda’s words. “Yes, that’s how I understood you,” Scarlett said. “And I’m sorry for eavesdropping. I was fetching something for Thoren when I saw the glass window to the bell jar with the flower was open. When I heard you and Malena c
oming toward the workshop and arguing, I was afraid Malena might think I was the one who opened it, so I hid.”

  Tilda laughed her gentle laugh. “Silly Scarlett. It was Malena who left the window open. She wouldn’t have been angry with you.”

  Wouldn’t she? Malena’s grim stare said the complete opposite, but then the witch sipped her tea and looked toward the fireplace, and Scarlett supposed she might have imagined Malena’s glare.

  “So is everything all right now,” Tilda asked, “or do you have other questions?”

  “I—yes, I suppose everything’s all right.” Malena hadn’t kicked her out, so that was good.

  “We should get to bed,” Tilda said, urging Scarlett toward the door. “It’s been such a long day, and before we know it, it will be breakfast time.”

  Scarlett nodded and turned to go with her, but then she looked back. It was none of her business, but if she was living here now, she had the right to know. “What happened to the flower?”

  Malena lowered her mug and looked around at her. “What do you know about it?”

  Scarlett swallowed. “Just that it holds the spells that keep your home here intact.”

  Malena paused before answering. “We thought it might be dying, which would have been catastrophic for us. Fortunately, I managed to heal it while you were gone.”

  “Oh, that’s … that’s good.”

  “Yes. We wouldn’t want the mountain falling to pieces around us as we sleep, now would we.”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Though Scarlett’s eyelids were heavy and both her mind and body ached with exhaustion, she couldn’t fall asleep. Malena’s words played over and over in her head, but it wasn’t fear of the mountain falling apart that kept Scarlett awake; it was the underlying threat in Malena’s voice. She told herself that Malena would never kill her in her sleep. What would be the point in that? But the thought, the possibility, kept her awake nonetheless.

  Sand passed through the hourglass as time slipped by. She had just turned over yet again when she imagined she heard a tap at her door. She stilled, listening carefully. The tap came again, a little louder this time, and definitely not a figment of her imagination. “Yes?” she said as she sat up, hating the quiver in her voice. The door opened slowly. Scarlett’s fingers clenched in the sheets as she wished she had a weapon other than her own hands. But the shape that loomed in the doorway was larger than Malena. “Thoren?” Scarlett asked, sitting up a little straighter.

  “I’m sorry, I know it’s late,” he said from the doorway. “But I couldn’t sleep and I wanted you to know how happy I am that you came back. So I thought I’d check if—if you might also be awake, but now that I’m here, I realize how inappropriate it—”

  “It’s okay,” she said. “I can’t sleep either. And I don’t want to be one of those people who cares about what’s considered appropriate and what isn’t. We should do whatever we want and not be bothered by silly rules.”

  Thoren chuckled. “Tilda has taught you well. You’ll make an excellent witch one day.” He stepped inside the room and leaned against the wall. In the dim light of the hourglass, she saw his expression sobering. “I heard what happened earlier after you went to fetch me a charm bracelet. I’m sorry about that. I had no idea Tilda hadn’t been telling you the truth.”

  Scarlett shrugged as if Tilda’s lies didn’t matter. As if her deception didn’t still sting. “We’ve spoken. It’s in the past.”

  “So you’re happy to stay now?”

  She nodded. Not completely happy, but this was a better option than attempting to face the fae world on her own.

  “And how would you feel if … I also stayed?” he asked carefully.

  Tingling warmth heated her insides, and this time there was no guilt to accompany her attraction to Thoren. Sadness, yes, because she’d loved Jack and had hoped to love him for many years to come. But in truth, the months that had passed since she first fled Holtyn had dimmed her feelings for Jack, and the thought of a future without him didn’t hurt as much as it might once have. “I would like that,” she said to Thoren, tilting her head slightly and smiling at him. Feeling daring, she lifted her blankets and patted the mattress. “What about staying … tonight?”

  She could just make out his widening eyes. “You’ve definitely changed since you first arrived here, Miss Scarlett.”

  She laughed. “Don’t get excited. I don’t want to actually do anything. I just …” Her smile slipped slightly as the truth rose to her lips. “I don’t want to be alone.”

  He nodded as he moved to close the door. He padded across the room and eased himself into the bed. He pulled the blankets over the two of them. Gently, he pushed a lock of hair behind her ear. “You don’t ever have to be alone.”

  * * *

  As if nothing had changed between them, Tilda took Scarlett onto the frozen lake the next day and taught her how to conjure different kinds of flames. A flame that was cool to the touch, a flame she could roll into a ball and throw like a weapon, one so translucent it was almost invisible, and several others. As the afternoon stretched on, their lesson became a snowball fight, which then turned into a fireball fight. Tilda was complaining about the amount of hair Scarlett had singed off the bottom of her braid when Scarlett noticed a figure coming toward them.

  “That looks dangerously fun,” Thoren called to them.

  “I think Scarlett’s trying to burn off all my hair,” Tilda shouted back.

  Thoren’s laugh brought a smile to Scarlett’s face. She remembered him tucking her body against his last night and wrapping his arm around her. Her face warmed, and she looked down to hide her blush.

  “Bad news, Tilda,” Thoren said when he reached them. “The High Tester wants to see you now instead of tomorrow. Double-booked or something.”

  Tilda frowned. “Now?”

  “Yes, well, in about twenty minutes.”

  Her frown deepened. “Fine. Annoying old woman. Keep practicing, Scar. I’ll see you later.”

  As Tilda headed for the cave, Scarlett reached for Thoren’s hand and laced her fingers between his. “I think I now know about every kind of flame in existence.” She lifted his hand and kissed his callused palm.

  “I see.” He stepped closer to her. “Do you have a favorite?”

  She considered telling him that her favorite kind of fire was the fire he ignited inside her, but that was so corny she almost laughed out loud at the thought. “The one that’s almost invisible, I think.”

  “Do you know,” he said as his lips grazed her jaw, “that adding just two words to that spell turns the flame into one that can devour magic?”

  She tilted her head back and let him kiss her neck. “I didn’t know magic talk could sound so sexy.” He put his lips beside her ear and whispered two words. “And when the magic talk is in a foreign language,” she added, “it sounds even sexier.” She stepped back and raised one hand. She said the words of the translucent fire spell and added the extra two words, but the resulting flame that floated above her hand didn’t look any different than before. “How do I know if it’s working?” she asked.

  “I guess you don’t until you try to burn something protected by magic.” He shrugged. “It isn’t a spell we use often. Real fires are far more useful when living in a frozen world.”

  “True.” She closed her hand and snuffed the flame out. She stepped closer once again and asked, “Will you stay out here and practice magic with me?”

  “I wish I could.” He kissed her nose. “But I have to do a quick delivery.”

  “Oh. Where are you going?”

  “Uh, somewhere in the non-magic world.”

  “Not very exciting then.” She bit her lip and added, “Can you do me a favor? It’s very important.”

  “Anything.”

  “Bring me back some chocolate?”

  He laughed. “I guess I can do that.”

  “And then … meet me in my room in an hour?” She gave him a flirtatious smile. “I�
��ll be expecting more than just a kiss on the nose.”

  She left him choking on his response and walked back to the cave, trying to hold in her laughter as she swayed her hips and hoped he was watching her. Once inside the tunnels, she fetched a towel from her bedroom before heading for the lava room. She would soak in one of the steaming pools while she waited for Thoren to return. Malena and Sorena had gone into the workshop that morning and asked not to be disturbed for the day as they mixed up a complicated brew, so Scarlett knew she wouldn’t have to share a pool with either of them.

  She rounded the corner and walked down the steps toward the lava room—but stopped short at the sound of voices. Tilda? Wasn’t she supposed to be with the High Tester right now? Scarlett leaned closer and heard Malena and Sorena. So all three of them were—

  “My goodness,” a fourth voice announced. A voice that seemed familiar, but Scarlett couldn’t place it. “This room is even steamier than the last time I was here. Don’t you get sweaty under all those layers of fur?”

  “Don’t you know anything about punctuality?” Malena snapped. “We’ve been waiting.”

  “I couldn’t get away until now,” the girl said. “What’s the problem?”

  Scarlett tiptoed down the last few steps, peeked around the edge of the doorway, and saw—Delphine. Her childhood friend. The siren she’d accidentally hurt before realizing she couldn’t turn off her own magic.

  “The problem is the last girl you sent us,” Malena said. “Scarlett. It isn’t going to work out with her.”

  “Scarlett? I sent you a girl named Bessie—uh, Beth.”

  “Oh, yes,” Tilda said. She was sitting on the stone bench, swinging her legs back and forth. “I found a necklace in her wardrobe with the word ‘Beth’ hanging from it. She gave us the name Scarlett, though, so we went with that.”