Page 117 of Bewitching Her Monsters

“Is this close to where Rob and the witch person went after he attacked me?”I ask.

“Close, only a few blocks.”Osen walks down an alleyway and circles a spot, studying the ground.

“There’s a dead zone here. Forgive the pun.”We don’t sense any magic in this spot.

The sound of cars in the distance reminds me we are still on Earth, but for some reason, it feels otherworldly here.

“I agree.”Osen rubs our chin, thinking.

* * *

He allows his thoughts to drift to the night he died…

I see a moon above and a man in silhouette walking toward us.

“You shouldn’t have pushed,” the male says. The voice… it sounds so much like Rob, but this is only a memory, and can’t be trusted completely. Perhaps it’s only my fears in play. “I warned you to walk away.”

“You expect me to heed your message from the lips of my dying ally? You truly didn’t expect I’d seek justice for what you’ve done to my kind?” Osen remembers himself asking the mystery man.

“I was hoping you might be smarter than the rest since you have gotten closer than the others to discovering what’s truly going on.”

“I know the witches are behind the ASO. And it’s the Witch Council members.”

The man laughs—genuinely amused.

I sense Osen’s doubt.

Could he be wrong?

Suddenly, Osen is hit with a blast of energy—magic—from behind. Someone has used the man’s distraction to sneak up on him. This energy doesn’t feel like anything Osen has experienced before. It’s a new magic filled with dark intent.

Osen wonders how there can be new magic.

But he realizes that magic has been dwindling in the realms… and if that’s so, then maybe, like most things in the Universe, when one thing dies off, something else slightly different replaces it, filling a void.

Osen’s body trembles. Someone is stealing his magic, and his soul feels as if it has detached from his body.

Is this his death?

Osen’s spirit floats above the scene.

“I told you he’d come, my liege.”

And a woman, who looks very much like me, appears from the shadows. A wicked grin spreads over her face.

What in the Freaky Friday?

“Why are you in my memories, Jade?”Osen snarls.

“I don’t know. But that can’t be me.”I feel the pressure of Osen’s anger, as if he’s attempting to crush my actual soul.“Wait! Didn’t you say Rob hypnotized me?”

“You don’t look brainwashed to me now,”Osen argues.

He’s not wrong. This woman appears to be incompletecontrol.

“Why would I come here if I was behind your death?”

“Maybe you didn’t think I’d remember?”

---