Page 66 of Blood Sacrifice

I stumbled, lost in the dim light, and crushed by all the emotions churning inside me. I tried to remember what had happened, but everything was so hazy, only fragments of memories taunting me.

“Salvator,” I whispered, crouching low to the ground when another wave of pain crested over me.

That pain transported me to memories of me being tortured, and my magic experimented on. I had screamed for Salvator, my hands raw from grasping the iron bars and fingernails fractured from my fingers almost breaking under the strain to remain still. At the beginning, I had tried to count the days, but in the constant world of darkness and pain you lost track of where days ended and began again. To keep me sane, I had held onto the memories Salvator and I had created, the touch of his fingertips across my skin, his lips on mine.

Those memories were replaced with new ones, his touch the same yet different, coloured by a lifetime of experiences that had changed both of us. I leaned my head back against the wall, a wave of dizziness weakening me.

The death curse.

I had been hit by one of the forbidden curses, one that had been directed at my mate. He had saved me all those years ago when I was young and terrified, and now it was my turn to save him. The Chimaera Foundation would survive and thrive in my absence, the witches who founded it with me all powerful and talented. They would ensure the next generation was safe from persecution. Salvator was the beating heart of his pack, and they needed him for what was coming.

All the fragments of my thoughts pieced together again, and I sat on the filthy floor too tired to move. I had known Aisha was a dark witch from the moment Salvator told me she workedwith his organisation. It was the only explanation to why I felt her death. She had not died physically, but spiritually. However, there was a vast expanse between knowing your sister was a dark witch and realising that she worked with the person who had hunted you for four centuries.

I looked around me at the scenery, my hand moving to cover the wound in my abdomen that had brought me here. If I was in Hell, some hellspawn would be dragging my essence to their master to fetch the bounty for a witch’s soul. This must be Purgatory, the place that emerged for the souls too pure for Hell but not good enough for Heaven.

I was dead.

“Well, shit,” I said, leaning my head back. “You’d think if I was dead at least I could stop leaking.” I touched my wound again, feeling the sticky residue there.

In the past, I had hated people who were weak, and expected others to fight or save them. Tonight, I decided there was no shame in sitting here and resting my weary soul. There was no one to save me, no one to fight for me because death was the end of my journey.

I had lived a long time, watched the world evolve and grow through several ages, and had experienced love in its rawest form. It would have to be enough. Time meant nothing in this midnight realm, screams and other noises echoing in the darkness. There was eternity to explore this place, so instead, I curled myself up in a ball and closed my eyes.

There was no hope left, nothing left for me to achieve, and the one overriding memory was when I took my vows as a priestess, the words of the prayer that joined my life with the others. Mother priestess had made me say the words over and over again in training until they were forever engrained in my soul.

Those same words flowed from my lips as I lay here in Purgatory. They had brought me comfort in the past, and for years I had recited them like a nighttime prayer. Here, in a different realm, those same words took on a different energy. They seemed to solidify and take form, a presence taking shape, shadows moving toward me.

It wasn’t bad enough that I had died today. Could I not have some time to lick my wounds?

I pulled what was left of me together and slowly stood to face whatever had come to drag me off to wherever I belonged in this strange realm. Magic was contained in the soul, but I had no idea if it stayed with you when you died. I raised my head, bringing my hands up in front of me ready to defend myself.

“I told you it was Luna,” a familiar voice from the past said to my right. “I would recognise her energy anywhere.”

From the shadows a figure emerged, and every thought in my head silenced. Mother priestess had taken me under her tutelage, and created a family for me when I had been taken from my biological one.

“You sacrificed yourself for us,” I said, involuntarily moving forward. The thought of her being set upon by Balor and his jackal priests had haunted me for years.

A half smile curved her lips. “Life is just a season, and we all have a role to play. Mine was to protect the key players in the upcoming magical war.” She reached her hand to touch me. “And that moment is now here.”

“I’m dead,” I replied, slowly looking behind her and seeing other familiar faces. Some of them from the temple all those years ago, others that were lost when humans had hunted us into near extinction.

“The soul lives on,” she replied, taking my arm and leading me away from the place I had found to hide. “That is what Balor and his men never understood. He thought he consumedour souls and took our powers when all he truly did was borrow them. Come.”

I had no idea where they were taking me but anywhere was better than being alone. Two red moons hung low in the sky, casting a dull light across the barren landscape. Red rivers ran in crooked lines in the distance, and a faint smell of sulphur hung in the air.

I felt the pressure against me as we walked through a spell. A large black structure had been cloaked, but magic emanated from every brick it had been created from.

“No one will find you here,” Mother priestess said. “This place was started long before I arrived by one of the ancestors of the greatest magical line. She knew we would need somewhere safe in this midnight realm. We have healing potions here that tend to the wounds left on our souls.”

My hand automatically covered the area on my abdomen that still oozed a black liquid. “Aisha hit me with a death curse,” I replied. “She was aiming at my mate.”

Mother priestess merely nodded, and I had the feeling that she already knew the details of how I ended up here. “She was a talented witch, but she never understood that to cast light magic you had to be selfless. That ego had no place in our magic.”

I slowed and she glanced back at me. “She is my sister.”

“Sometimes family members are put into our lives to teach us a lesson that only they can because they are given a level of trust that no one receives during our lifetimes.” Her gaze dropped to the injury on my side. “And she will realise that those spells were forbidden for a reason, and not just because someone ends up dead.”

She started walking again and I followed her, crossing the threshold, and sensing another layer of protection. I never expected to find a place for lost witches in Purgatory, and in allthe years I had studied magic, I had never heard any whispers from those who had travelled here.

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