Page 64 of Her Dreadful Will
With an apologetic wince, he pulled open the driver’s door of his Honda. “Can’t stay to argue.”
Soleil let go of the leash and pointed to Achan. “Carebear, lock.”
The Doberman shot across the pavement, reared up, and snapped his jaws shut around Achan’s wrist.
“Soleil!” Achan’s voice cracked with urgency. “This is life or death, and I don’t want to hurt your pet. Tell him to let me go.”
Soleil’s heart jerked, but she didn’t think Achan would harm the dog. “Let us come along, and I’ll call him off.”
“Fine. I don’t have time to argue,” he hissed.
“Good.” Soleil hopped into the backseat, leaving the door open. “Carebear, release. And come in here with me.” She patted the upholstery.
The Doberman unclamped his jaws, gave Achan a penitent lick across the fingers, and jumped in beside Soleil.
The next second they were speeding along the exact route Soleil would have taken to get home.
“What’s going on, Achan?” she demanded.
“Someone is being murdered.”
Her skin erupted in goosebumps. “Who? The woman who owned the tooth? Or Zillah Dean?”
“Zillah is the one committing the murder.”
“Should we call the police? 911?”
“They won’t get there any faster than I can, and I can’t involve them, even if it means that Florence—ah, fuck.” He extracted the tooth necklace and tossed it back to her. “Look for the tooth you touched, the one belonging to Florence Fowler. Tell me if she’s still alive. I can’t do anything useful through the tether—see if you can.”
Soleil fumbled along the string of teeth, her heart pounding. She found the tag for Florence Fowler and pinched the tooth between her fingers.
The window opened, but it was blurred, whited out as if a curtain had been dropped over it. A muffled voice echoed along the tether. “Stop struggling, bitch!”
A flash of light appeared as the pillow over Florence’s face was knocked askew. Florence lurched aside, crashing to the floor in a tangle of sheets and blankets. Wrinkled hands clawed feebly as the pillow approached again.
Soleil gritted her teeth so hard they hurt, trying to press her power through the mental window into the space beyond. This tether was made to channel sight and sound, and to relay mind-messages from the witch holding it. It wouldn’t let her affect the will of the tooth’s owner, or the will of Zillah Dean.
Unless—
There were ways to break magical rules. They were usually violent, and carried a high cost.
But there was a life at stake here. The pillow had blocked Soleil’s view again, and the terrified squawks of the woman being smothered ricocheted through her head. Florence had mere moments left before Zillah ended her life.
Gripping the tooth in one hand, Soleil tore the underside of her arm with her nails, opening bloody scratches. She spat on her hematite ring, then smeared it into the beading blood, stirring up a red froth. The ring’s latent ability activated, sending a sharp zing of power along her nerves. A quick dip of her bog oak ring in the blood, and it awakened too, turning her throat dry and painful. When she spoke, her voice wasn’t hers anymore—it was something eldritch and infernal, capable of carrying a single curse through the tether.
“Zillah Dean,” she said. “What you do will come back to you.Ce que tu fait, te reviendra.”
She closed her eyes and focused every ounce of her power on the reciprocation curse, pushing it through the tether.
But the tether was weakening. Florence was fading, her consciousness slipping away.
She was dying.
“Ce que tu fait, te reviendra!” screamed Soleil in the voice of the bog witch. The car jerked so hard she nearly lost her grip on the tooth. Sobbing, she blasted every bit of energy she had left through the tether, cementing the curse onto Zillah Dean.
A terrible choking sound sifted through the tether, but it wasn’t the feeble wheeze of Florence being crushed under the pillow—it was Zillah’s breath, being stifled by the curse. The pillow vanished and light rushed back in as Zillah staggered away from her victim, struggling to drag air through her own throat. Soleil had a tilted sideways view of the thick carpet on which Florence lay gasping. From that vantage point, she saw Zillah regain her own breath and collect a knife from the dresser by the bedroom door.
If Zillah stabbed Florence now, the act would backfire, and Zillah would find herself bleeding instead. Soleil tried to smile in triumph, but her face felt stiff and sticky.
