“Yep,” she said. “These last two are almost done. With any luck, they’ll all work and you can give her some whoop-ass in a bag. Sorry, I didn’t bring any fancy vials, so plastic baggies will have to do. Once these cool, I’ll dump them in and we can go.”
Ray arrived five feet from us in a rush of air, his feet landing cleanly and without impact on the walkway. “I located Danny’s boat. It’s parked in the same spot you guys were in yesterday, but he’s nowhere to be found. We need to leave right now.” Ray’s voice was hard. Even though he likely wouldn’t admit it, he loved Danny and Naomi as much as the rest of us.
“The bokor let him in just like that?” I asked.
“That’s my guess. I didn’t see any of those snakes you talked about before, and this time the black magic around the area didn’t fuck with me as much. Maybe because I was just there. But I flew over the top to check it out and remember more details. The trees all look dead from above, gnarled and black. The memory is fading quickly, but that place is rotten from the inside out.”
“We’re almost done here,” I said. “Marcy just has to put the spells in bags.”
My father stood from his place at the table where he’d watched Marcy work. “When we go, we take all the airboats. The channel where you crossed over into her land has two entrances. There’s another channel farther west. We’ll split up and meet where Daniel parked his boat.”
It was the only viable option we had. The bokor would be expecting us, and she wasn’t about to let an angry army of werewolves invade her land. We all knew it but had no choice but to move forward and hope we could breach her wards.
I stood and Rourke laid a hand on my back and leaned around to my ear, rubbing his stubble along my neck. “She’s not going to play nice. If we get separated, remember the power inside you. Call on it individually if you need to. Each supernatural has a different strength.”
Marcy poured the spells into the bags, tying the ends with a makeshift closure made of wire, so they looked like little water balloons. “He’s right,” she said. “If you can find a way to concentrate anything Selene gave you and push it into the words attached to these spells”—she shook the bags—“like uttering a power word, the spell will become even stronger. Each of these spells has a keyword attached. I’ll give them to you on the boat.”
I nodded. I’d managed to separate the demon essence inside me in the Underworld and use it to my advantage. Since receiving the power of five, it’d been stored away in my body and I hadn’t focused on it. I’d left it to my wolf. Can we easily pull magic individually when needed? I asked my wolf. She snapped her jaw, showing us taking what we wanted. How do I pull just one kind? Magic erupted inside my mind, a kaleidoscope of colors—my wolf’s way of showing me that each magic had a different signature. Mine was gold. Eudoxia’s was white—and now pale orange, which must be her fae magic. Demon essence was black. Selene’s was pink. Rourke’s was slate green. It was the first time I realized I had my mate’s magic signature inside me.
“I have a piece of your magic,” I said to Rourke, a little surprised to find it there, even though I knew it was there.
He chuckled as he began to lead me toward the waiting boats. “That you do.”
“Do you think I can turn into a cat now?” I joked. “Because that would be awesome.”
“No.” He grinned. “That’s hardwired into my DNA. But I do think you’ll be able to run faster now, especially in your animal form. Did you feel different when we ran after the crash?”
“I wasn’t paying attention,” I admitted. “I was too worried about dodging hungry alligators and getting out of there with both my legs intact. But I kept up with you, no problem, so I’d say that’s a yes.”
Four airboats pulled alongside Danny’s boat, two from one end and two from another. There were nineteen of us total. The short trip over had been uneventful, even though once we crossed into her territory, the air was denser than it had been before, heavy with intent.
She knew we were coming and she was preparing herself.
Ray dropped out of the sky onto the cypress roots next to our boat. “Storm clouds are gathering directly above us. I can’t believe this bokor can mess with the weather, but something is definitely brewing up there.” He pointed to the sky and my eyes tracked upward. Sure enough, big, dark clouds were pulling together, forming a huge front right above our heads.
“She’s going to do everything she can to protect her realm from attack,” I said. “I’m not surprised. She only has two choices. She either has to bide her time or launch a preemptive attack. We have to prepare ourselves for her to pick the latter.”
My father sat in the boat directly across from me. “We all go in at once and scour the area. Naomi’s and Daniel’s scent are all over this area. I know we can find them, but we’ll have to be tenacious about it.”
Behind me, in our boat, James was quietly arguing with Marcy to stay put, but she was loudly having none of it. “You can’t be serious,” she addressed her mate. “There’s no part of me that’s going to sit on the sidelines and watch the people I love get hurt while I can help.” She stood, and James raised his head up to the sky in defeat, reluctantly standing to help her out of the boat. Once she was out, I followed. She handed me the baggies and a pouch with a long strip of fabric to tie around my waist. “Here you go,” she said. “They’re all ready to use. They’re as airtight as I could make them. The important thing to remember is to split the bag open while uttering the words. You can either toss it to the ground or explode it in your fist.” The words she’d given me were in Latin and corresponded to the colors of the spells. “I made a little pouch for them out of an old shirt, and once you wrap the ties around you, I spelled them to stay put. Again, not ideal, but it should work.”