Page 100 of Witch Unbound
Daughter? They’d used his daughter against him?
“And she wasn’t the only one,” Anna continued. “He sired a few over the years. We believe he was attempting to make more warlocks like himself, but he kept siring witches.”
“I thought a warlock’s daughters were born without magic.”
“Croatoan is no ordinary warlock. He’s something else. The rules didn’t apply to him. Our coven has fought the Order for centuries, but it was only when we discovered the existence of these witches, all born a year apart, all under the thirteenth sign, that we were able to stop him. The Order kept them locked away, using them to sire warlocks, because although Croatoan couldn’t directly produce male heirs, his female offspring could. We liberated them.” She smiled smugly. “We took them in, and we identified the most powerful of them. Through her, we gained access to the cosmos, and with the help of the dire wolf shifters and otherworld vampire power, we were able to create a prison and lock him away.”
“Then you killed her and her mates.” Sloane looked at Anna with disgust.
“No.” She shook her head vehemently. “That wasn’t how it happened. When the anchor was first bound to the shifters, the whole coven benefited from cosmos. It filtered down to the elder council and through them to the rest of us. It worked until she consummated her relationship with her mates.”
“Penetrative sex,” Sloane said.
“Yes. The way nature intended for procreation purposes. Our access to the power ceased, and at first, we weren’t sure what had happened, but we soon made the connection. The power belonged solely to her now, and we had access to it onlythroughher and only if she allowed it.”
“And that wasn’t enough?” Sloane asked.
“No. It wasn’t right. She was Croatoan’s blood. She was tainted by chaos. It was too much of a risk to allow her to keep that power. I begged Meredith to do something. To work with me to find a way to alter the outcome. She refused. She believed this was what Hecate wanted.”
I exchanged glances with Sloane. “And you didn’t?”
“No. Becausewedid this.Wecreated this spell and begged Hecate for access. She granted it, yes, but I don’t believe she’d want her power in the hands of a daughter of chaos. When Evelyn fell pregnant, I knew that something had to be done. The baby could be the most powerful witch ever born, and no single witch should have that much power. No single being ever should.” She looked at us earnestly, as if begging us to understand. “We’d fought so hard to bring Croatoan down, to reset the balance, and now we were upsetting it in our own coven by encouraging the birth of an entity so powerful she could have become the next Croatoan.”
Was she listening to herself with all thecould haves? “You killed them because you were scared. You didn’t know anything for sure, but you were afraid of something that might never be.”
“But itcouldhave.” She desperately wanted us to understand her point of view and agree with it.
Yeah, not happening. “If Evelyn was going to betray you, then surely Meredith would haveseenit.”
Anna balked and pressed her lips together.
Ha, I’d hit a nerve because my summation of what I’d seen and heard was correct. “Meredith saw flashes of the future, didn’t she?”
Anna’s expression smoothed out. “The future is mutable.”
“Maybe, but Meredith didn’t see a problem with Evelyn or her baby.”
“When it came to Evelyn, Meredith always said the future was murky.”
“Probably because you were going to kill her,” Sloane sneered. “You did a bad thing, Anna.”
She lifted her chin in defiance. “I did what I had to in order to protect the power and our coven. A new anchor was chosen and the new alphas of the packs, the next in line by blood, took their siblings’ places. We changed the rules by changing memories and—”
“You somehow got to live forever?” I finished for her.
She snorted. “You think I wanted this? This eternal life, trapped in a cycle of lies? It was the price I paid along with my sisters, the new council. We gave up our place in Tarrifel, our chance at peace, to watch over this coven for eternity. No one questions our longevity. The spell we cast ensures it.”
If she expected me to feel sorry for her, she was out of luck. “You killed a bunch of people on a hunch, because you were scared. Because of ‘what ifs,’ and you want me to feel sorry for you?”
Her expression hardened. “I won’t apologize for a decision that has maintained the balance for generations.”
“And what about Cora?” Sloane asked. “She’s a tulpa, so she can’t be Croatoan’s bloodline. How is she able to be the anchor?”
Fuck, good point.
“I don’t know. I was fully expecting the ceremony to fail, but it didn’t. Hecate chose you and we were blessed.” She smiled tentatively at me. “She saved us through you.”
The woman had to be slightly unhinged. “Anna, you do realize you did a bad thing, right?” I mean, if she couldn’t see that, then she was a total psycho.
