Page 5 of Bright Soul

“He’ll be safe here, for now,” she said.

“Is there such a thing as ‘safe’ anymore?” I asked with a sigh. “Did you hear that we’re stuck in this city?”

“Yeah.” She shared what Áine and Hana Graygazer had told her, drawing a muttered string of curses from me.

“But there’s some good news,” Cress added with a hesitant lift of her lips. “Hana says we’re not going to be kept in the dark anymore. We’re invited to meet with the leadership of Ashbough Protective Services, plus the Graygazers and the surviving members of the Crown Coven, tomorrow to decide what to do next. The rest of the day is for us to rest and recover.”

My gaze veered back toward Lucas. I didn’t know how much of either task I would be doing. As a blood witch, I’d already healed all the cuts and bruises I’d sustained in the earlier fight. My body was ready for another round, even if my heart and soul remained wounded and in denial.

“And your aunt is waiting to talk to you, too,” she shared.

She released me so I could open the door out into the hall, and standing there patiently were two people. I should’ve expected as much. Aunt Jordan had yet to see my little brother, and Geo was never too far from Cress if he could help it.

Jordan had escaped any serious harm. She still wore a beautiful formal robe stitched with falling stars, but dust clung stubbornly to it and the limp brown hair around her head. She had a soft face made for kindly smiles and sympathy, which I could barely stand to see on her expression when our eyes met briefly.

“You want to see Lucas,” I said, stepping to the side so she could enter the room.

She pushed off the wall and went straight to me for a big hug. I froze, surprised. “Tell me you’re all right first,” she said.

My aunt released me just to look me over critically, and I wondered if this was what it felt like to have a mom…someonewho would fuss because they liked you whole and healthy, even if it was a little embarrassing. “As good as can be expected.” I felt stiff and awkward. Before we’d met about a month ago, I’d never been fussed over. There had been no mother figures amongst Garroway’s coven of assassins, only blood and pain.

She nodded and gestured over her shoulder. “I made sure to take your staff with us. Unfortunately, the case was left behind…but such a thing can be replaced.”

Propped against the wall were two celestial witch staves. The first was made of golden wood and embellishments, with a single piece of paper hanging from a bar that crossed under a small molded sun resting at the top of it. That paper was a prepared spell, waiting in reserve. Since celestial magic was a long and grueling process, it was typical for spells to be ritually created and then stored on paper slips on a staff.

“My” staff was the impressive creation next to it. Its name was Evening Guidance, and it’d been my father’s before his untimely death. The wood was coated with black varnish and painted with silver trails of stars to match the centerpiece of a silver-plated crescent moon wrapped in the tails of several falling stars. Dozens of prepared spells were still attached to it.

The last time it’d been used was in Cress’s hands, firing a ray of pure power at Lucas to separate him from the Hungering Darkness. Neither of us was a celestial witch, but somehow, she’d called upon the power to use it anyway. I saw Evening Guidance as her weapon now, even if it were sized and balanced for a man’s use.

Her magical book’s spine was perched on it, front and back cover flickering like a strange butterfly. As I ushered my aunt into my brother’s room, I heard it utter, “Hey Cressie-poo, were you worried about me too?” It sounded a lot like a squeaky toy, and Cress loved it to death even though it was a flying, talking, know-it-all nuisance.

“Of course I was,The Librarian Witch’s Handbook,” she cooed.

Oh, and she had to address it by its full name, else it pouted. “Annoying” was part of its charm.

Their voices were muffled as I closed the door behind us, letting my aunt meet Lucas for the first time. She took his hand and prayed to the Goddess while I stood back to give her some privacy. Something told me his condition was not for the divine to heal.

His soul needed Phaeron Sudair’s help, the one thing we didn’t have.

Evening came swiftly, and I’d been dragged from Lucas’s bedside to join my coven and friends in one of the only rooms left unused on the fourth and final floor of the hospital. It had two curtained beds, and we drew straws for who would pile into them versus sleep on the cold floor tonight.

It was like a strange slumber party, all of us huddled under blankets, watching the evening news from a tiny television mounted in the wall, and eating our rationed share of hospital food. Geo, who’d returned to his human form finally, helped me bracket Cress between us in the back of the group.

The supernatural news stations were dominated by grainy footage taken of a glowing white figure sitting on the Crown Coven’s dais as if it were a throne. News anchors warned viewers multiple times before playing a few carefully curated shots of Myuna interacting with the two men still alive with her.

Though the news jumped around to avoid showing the reality of the situation, Myuna’s mouth and chin were streakedwith blood, standing out in shades of gray and black from the grayscale recording.

“She’s eating the bodies left behind,” Cress murmured, the first to acknowledge the gruesome truth.

“And Garroway’s feeding her,” commented Bianca.

The olive-skinned woman was the other person in this room that didn’t bear any injuries. She and I were perhaps the only two blood witches to escape Garroway’s coven and live to tell the tale. We would always bear the runes he’d carved into our skin and the scars from his relentless training. That made us trauma siblings, even if she was about as friendly as a lit fuse most days.

As much as I wanted Garroway to suffer for everything he’d done to us, I hoped Myuna didn’t kill him. I’d vowed to finish him myself and intended to keep that promise.

“But not Phaeron,” Cress said, her voice tinged with hope.

The news only showed the dark gray figure of the dimensional prince standing there, watching. He appeared to be standing in the same place in every shot.

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