Page 85 of The Witch and His Crow

I reached deeper into the belly of this place, until I found an outer limit to my power. A dribble of blood oozed from my nose as sharp agony ruptured my skull. Frustration hissed inside of me, fangs ready to strike. My fingers trembled, my arms tensing until my muscles burned. This felt like punishment. But for what, I wasn’t yet sure.

I was about to hit the wall, my body swaying as more pain assaulted me, when my Gift stumbled on what I was looking for. In my thoughts I could picture the grimoire, laid open, pages face down on the ground at the end of the stairs. I focused on it, lifting the grimoire and calling it to me. My fingers fisted, nails digging into my palm, just to keep my focus locked on my Gift.

‘Come on,’ I hissed, urging it to listen to my command. ‘Come on.’

The second the grimoire reached me, my Gift severed. I dropped to my knees, clutching the book to my chest, breathing heavily. With the back of a hand, I cleared the blood from my nose, feeling the rush of relief unfold across my skull.

I tried to reach for my power, but it had retreated. I couldn’t even conjure enough of a force to shake the dust from around me. The last time I had felt so severed from my Gift was when Jonathan had made me ingest thistlebane.

Was it because so much grew around me? I’d never heard of the weed having effects, as it wasn’t a pollinating plant. Then again, my body was reacting as if I’d ingested it

My eyes snapped open at the realisation. The tea. The taste. I didn’t clock it before, my focus solely on the intent to spell Romy to sleep. But it was poisoned. Someone had poisoned it, even before I had spelled it.

With the Gift-dulling plant.

I got up andran.

There was no time to lock the mausoleum up. There was no time to care whether there were demons at my back. If what I thought was happening, I had far more to worry about than the shadow creatures we’d faced.

There was only the need to get back to our room. I grasped onto the grimoire so tight I likely spoiled the leather-bound cover. I blinked away panic, forced myself not to contemplate what I had done.

‘Romy!’ I screamed as I began racing up the stairs to our room. ‘Romy, wake up!’

The castle was silent. Too quiet. The shadows had eyes, but this time it wasn’t Caym or Arwyn watching from the dark. Because as I got to the floor of our room, rounded the staircase and got view of what stood outside our door, my greatest fears were confirmed.

‘Ah, Hector,’ Jaz said, grinning like the cat who got the cream. Around her stood three witches, faces I had seen before but didn’t recognise. Although, from the way they regarded me, they knew exactly who I was. Part of me searched for Salemamongst the group, but he was nowhere to be seen. ‘I’m glad you’re here.’

Breathless and without my Gift, I stood at a distance, glancing between the still closed door and the coven before it. ‘Can I help you all with something? Because if I’m honest…’ My breathing was rushed and uneven, forcing the words out awkwardly. ‘I’m not in the mood to host a tea party today.’

From Jaz’s widening of her eyes, I could see that my hunch was right. The tea was poisoned, and she was to blame.

‘Yes, actually.’ Jaz paced a few steps towards me. ‘We do want something. But not tea. Never had a taste for it.’

‘Then what do you want?’ I spat.

Jaz pointed behind her, towards my room. ‘The door seems to be jammed. It doesn’t budge. Care to be a darling and open it for me?’

If I wasn’t so focused on the pack of wolves before me, I might’ve felt relief. The spell had worked. One look and I could see the door handle had been torn out the door, and the wood around it marked by burns. They’d tried to get in but failed. Lock or no.

‘No,’ I said, ‘I don’t think I will.’

Jaz cocked her head to the side, eyes narrowing as a ring of emerald flared around her iris. ‘Everything okay, Hector? You look… terrible.’

I feel fucking terrible, I thought but dared not reveal it.

‘Have you eaten something dodgy? Or was it something you…drank?’

There it was. The confirmation I needed. Jaz had poisoned the tea with thistlebane, and I knew where she’d found it. Which meant she had been watching, waiting for the time to act. Jaz had removed our gifts in the hopes of getting into our room and killing us all whilst we were vulnerable. Dread shifted to terror which morphed quickly into desperation. I couldn’t speak,knowing I was facing a coven of Gift-blessed witches with no power to resist them.

But, as if the grimoire had a living presence, it seemed to grow heavier in my hand. The sleeping rune, the incantation to protect the room, it had all worked.

‘Why are you doing this?’ I asked.

‘It’s part of the competition, silly.’ Her answer was clear as day and spoken with the confidence of someone who knew exactly what they wanted. ‘For you to die.’

‘I’m not going to allow that to happen,’ I said, mocking her confidence with my own.

‘And what are you going to do?’ Jaz circled me. ‘Bash me to death with that book?’

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