Page 77 of Wicked Witch of the Wolf

Magic blasted through my pores, and I hurled it at Aldrich’s face. “Cover.”

The soil wrapped around his entire head, looking a bit like a brown ski mask with no slits for mouth or eyes. He went to his knees, and muted mewling sounds leaked out of the bottom of the “mask.”

“You’re going to suffocate him,” Carolina shrieked.

“That’s the point. What part of ‘if either of you cast against me again, I’ll consider it a death challenge,’ did you not understand?”

“Please,” she clasped her hands together like she was praying, “don’t kill him. He’s an old man.”

“Old enough to know exactly what he was doing. Did you think I was kidding?”

“Stop. This is serious.”

“Do you not think what you did was serious? You agreed to assassinate Ronan Pallás.”

“No, I— That’s coven business,” she said lamely.

I looked her in the eye. “Bajar.”

The soil beneath her feet cracked, flinging fissures outward, like the rays of the sun. There was a hollowboom, a crater opened, and she dropped down to her neck.

“You can’t do this?—”

“Silencio.”

Her lips kept moving, but no words came out. Meanwhile, Aldrich was lying prone on the ground, one sandal on, the hem of his robe revealing far too much thigh.

He wasn’t dead. Although it looked as if he was getting no air, he was getting plenty. His brain just wasn’t yet registering it. I’d found the creepy spell in one of Beau’s books a couple weeks ago, and this was the first time I’d gotten it to work. Cecil had been super pissed the three times I’d practiced it on him.

Speaking of, I swiveled around to look for my partners. They must’ve still been hiding, because I didn’t see as much as the tip of a purple hat.

I left the witches and walked cautiously to the front door, feeling for magic. Nothing. I reached for the knob, and the door flew open. I jumped backward out of the way of a swiping dagger.

“You’re trespassing in coven business, Betty Lennox. Get back.”

Gordon Lu lunged at me again, the blade coming within inches of my belly. He wasn’t as strong a witch as Aldrich nor was he aknowledgeable taught witch like Carolina and Bronwyn. He was an elemental. A weak one, but his element was air, and we were usually surrounded by the stuff.

Fortunately, the minute he kicked up his element, we’d be surrounded by mine, too.

Unfortunately, he seemed to have figured that out ahead of time. Hence, the knife.

I cast the same spell on him that I’d used on Carolina. “Bajar.”

Crack,boom, down.

In what must’ve been his profound shock at finding himself neck deep in the ground, he’d dropped the dagger. I scooped it up and tapped him on the head with it. “You shouldn’t bring a knife to a magic fight. It’s bad form.”

He spat out a series of what I could only assume were curses, since I didn’t speak Mandarin.

“I’m telling your brother what you did. Your family isn’t going to be happy with you, Gordon. They’re good people. Pretty sure they don’t condone murder—even coven-sanctioned murder.”

He spat at my feet. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. You aren’t one of us.”

I peered down at him. “You really should stop with this outsider nonsense. Learn to work with the paranormals around you, and you’ll be a happier person.” I tucked the blade into my back pocket. “Gotta go now. Things to do, witches to save. You know how it?—”

“Betty Lennox,” a man called out in a voice so deep it sounded like it had come from the bowels of the planet. It was Desmond Mace, but it also … wasn’t.

The earth rumbled beneath me. Cracks spidered under the soles of my feet.

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