Page 99 of Witch Unbound
I pulled myself to my feet. “Yes. I saw everything. Anna, let her go. Now.”
Anna’s shoulders slumped and she released Meredith but didn’t face us.
“What’s going on?” Sloane asked me.
“We should ask Anna that.” My voice shook with indignant rage. “After all, she’s the one responsible for the east wing fire centuries ago.”
“What?” Sloane looked confused. “Anna, what is she talking about?”
Anna turned to us, her expression perfectly composed. “Yes. I did it,” she admitted.
Meredith let out a sob of relief, then misted into nothing.
Okay, I was not expecting her to admit it so readily, and my mind was still processing everything I’d seen, including one huge factor that made no sense. “How are you still alive? That fire was centuries ago.”
Anna lifted her chin and looked down her nose at me. “If I’m to explain what happened, then I’d prefer to do it in the comfort of my quarters.”
Did she think I was stupid? “Like hell are we going into your den. Right now, I wouldn’t trust you as far as I can throw you. Sloane, we need a neutral spot.”
Sloane was staring at Anna in shocked horror.
“Sloane?” I nudged her.
“The atrium.” She took my hand. “Can you jump us there?”
I nodded and reached for Anna. She offered me her hand with a reined-in sigh, and I made the jump.
* * *
Anna perchedon the ledge of the broken fountain inside the atrium while Sloane and I stood a little way from her, both on the defensive, because this bitch had burned a roomful of people without blinking an eye.
Anna looked from Sloane to me, noting our expressions, and then sighed. “What you saw isn’t the full truth.”
Yeah, right. “So, youdidn’t kill all those people?”
She closed her eyes briefly, as if it pained her to hear me say it. “There was no other way to protect the coven.”
“Killing the elders, the anchor, and her mates was necessary to protect the coven?” I stared at her incredulously. “Bullshit.” I’d worked it out. “You were pissed at the amount of power the anchor had. The whole no-penetrative-sex and no-kids rule is bullshit, isn’t it? You made it up to stop the anchor from accessing full cosmos power.”
Her mouth pursed. “We did what we had to.”
Sloane’s curse was an explosion of breath.
My lip curled in disgust. “Youhadto kill people?”
“The power of the cosmos is a precious thing,” Anna said. “One we were given access to at great sacrifice, and the only witch who was able to provide us access to it was born of the very bloodline we hoped to end.”
What did she mean, bloodline…Oh…Wait a minute. The Anna in my vision had mentioned Croatoan…No fucking way!
Anna watched me with a grim smile. “I see you’ve made the connection.”
“What connection?” Sloane asked.
I kept my attention on Anna, wanting to see if I had it right. “Evelyn, the first anchor, was of Croatoan’s bloodline.”
“What the fuck?” Sloane looked at Anna too. “Is that true?”
“Yes. The first anchor was Croatoan’s blood,” Anna said. “His daughter.”
