Hold Me Closer, Necromancer - Lish McBride [102]
Tia unfurled from her crouch, her desire to examine the yard apparently more powerful than her fear of Mrs. W’s driving. Or, Haley thought, it might just be because the car was finally going under eighty miles an hour.
Tia squinted, looking for a sign. She pointed toward the back of the house. “There,” she said.
“You sure?” Mrs. W asked, even though she’d already started driving over grass to get there.
“Yes,” Tia said, eyes going toward the eaves of the house. For the first time, Haley noticed the biggest freaking crow she’d ever seen. How had she missed that?
“What the hell is that?” she said. Her mom mumbled in response. She wasn’t sure if she heard correctly, but it sounded like Tia said, “Sam’s crow.”
“Hold on.” Mrs. W downshifted and hit the gas, tearing huge chunks out of the yard, her face filled with devilish glee. “I hope ol’ Dougie has a good gardener on staff.”
Haley hunkered down in her seat and braced herself for the end of the ride. There was a small thump and a cry as the car hit something. Mrs. W slammed on the brakes, and they all piled out.
Whatever they’d hit had been thrown a few yards and wasn’t moving. Haley immediately ran toward it, ignoring her mother’s protests. The curled-up form of a black-and-white cat was embedded in the ground. Despite the hole it had caused, the actual body of the cat seemed fine. Haley picked it up gently, running her hands over it while looking for any wounds. Nothing.
“Haley.” Her mother came to a stop behind her. “You shouldn’t do that. You don’t know what it is.”
“It’s a cat.”
“You don’t know that for sure.”
“What does it matter?” Haley asked. “What do we need to know besides the fact that it could be hurt?”
“It must be nice to be young,” Mrs. W said wistfully.
“Haley, put it down.” Tia’s voice was firm.
“No.” She brushed some dirt off the cat’s face and it opened its eyes. Haley had never seen a cat with silver eyes before. “It’s beautiful.”
The cat stared at her for a minute before leaping out of her arms. In midair, the cat morphed into a tiny dragon and flew in a wobbly path toward the woods, hiccuping fire the whole time. Haley stood dumbfounded.
“What on earth?” Tia stared off after the creature.
“Well, thank heavens for that,” Mrs. W said. She looked around, taking in the yard. She frowned at the men lounging close to the pretty lady and the guy fighting a berserk hedge. Mrs. W grabbed Haley by the shoulder. “You and your mom go get the boy, okay? I’m going to stay out here and deal with this lot.”
Haley nodded. Tia was already sprinting toward the house, yelling at Haley to stay there.
She stayed put for all of two seconds. Haley couldn’t just sit there and let them have all the fun. She looked back to where the cat had disappeared. “Ingrate,” she mumbled, and snuck off toward the house.
29
Ballroom Blitz
Sweat beaded on my lip as I tried to maintain some measure of control over the situation. But with my blood flowing onto the floor and my energy waning under the strain, I didn’t think I had much more in me.
Douglas continued to mumble and throw my blood around. I couldn’t see everything he was doing, but I didn’t really want to. I didn’t need to see him to know that his spell was coming together. I could feel the power of it pressing on the backs of my eyelids. I shuddered as the spell crawled along my skin. It felt oily and unclean.
The power of the incantation jackknifed up, and I knew Douglas was almost done. If I had any tricks, the time to use them had come.
As he reached across me to draw a symbol on my head, I jerked my right hand out of the cuff and slammed my fist into his eye. My knuckles connected with his cheek and brow, and I felt his surprise. He stumbled back, and I grabbed for the knife. My palm wrapped around the top of the blade, which cut into the soft flesh of my hand. I managed to get a finger