Sapphire Nights (Crystal Magic Book 1)(34)

“It feels right,” they agreed simultaneously.

“It’s not too hard to reach,” Amber said, gazing skeptically back up the hill they’d descended.

“It’s flat and wide enough and the walking stick approves,” Sam added, hoping this would draw Val out of the hills.

“I think this is where the old church was.” Mariah turned around to study the trees. “That was back in the day when even the spiritualists still believed in good and evil. They would have blessed this land when they consecrated the church.”

Amber beamed proudly at Sam. “Your cards said you would were the Earth Mother. Let’s bring this meeting to order.”

Earth Mother? Sam felt more like Class Clown, even more so when the Lucys began arriving without any particular command for them to do so. Convenient, when cell phones didn’t work. She needed to learn psychic communication.

Maybe desperation had made her a little nuts.

“Daisy, will you be able to reach Val from here?” Mariah asked as the numbers filled the small clearing.

“Val is already here,” Daisy replied, settling on a rock. “She is watching for Cass. The buzzards are circling. It is almost time to dispel them.”

Sam glanced questioningly at Mariah, who shrugged. “She’s time walking, seeing a different circle in a different time where Val is present. But she can communicate from anywhere, so let her be.”

That was one step past crazy into Twilight Zone. Sam wanted to run back to the lodge and the familiarity of technology, but she feared she was letting down her new friends if she did.

Desperation had apparently given her a ridiculous niggling hope that maybe woo-woo could return her memory if modern science couldn’t. That thought fled when she saw her new friends lighting dry tree branches in a makeshift rock basin they’d created.

“You can’t have fires up here,” she cried. “One spark could set this tinder into disaster!”

“We’re careful. We’ve cleared it down to dirt around the cauldron.” Mariah removed dried leaves from a pouch on her belt and blew them toward the small flame dancing in the rock bowl of dirt. The flames danced higher.

Each woman had her own pouch and her own smoldering branch, but they all chanted the same words. Smoke circled the clearing, smudging the air in the same manner as the fog had earlier.

Visions of soaring flames rushing through the woods, engulfing the timber-clad lodge and its occupants froze her in panic.

The scent of sage and incense swirled. She swayed dizzily, but her feet were rooted to the ground. The ground. . . she let the energy flow upward, clearing her head. The staff in her hand bobbed excitedly.

The owl shrieked again. A swirling wind swept through the clearing, casting flames higher. The chant rose. Mariah flung more ashes on the flames. And a circle of white light nearly blinded the clearing.

Sam screamed, grabbed her head, and dropped to the ground.





Chapter 12





Walker had started downhill the minute he’d seen smoke rising behind the lodge. From his vantage point, he could see the crazy coven in a clearing far below.

He watched as, surrounded by the Lucys, Samantha raised a stick. In the flash of an instant, the circle exploded in an inferno of light.

Save him from the effing crazies! Walker broke into a run. Arson was no laughing matter. Just when he thought—

Sam collapsed, screaming, while smoke rose around her. Her cry escalated his heart rate to terror mode.

He leapt over fallen trunks and skidded through debris, descending the hill at breakneck pace. Lodge personnel ran toward the clearing with buckets and hoses, but he could only see Sam crumpled in the weeds. He barely noticed the women stomping out smoldering branches and chanting what sounded like Blessed Be. It was his own damned fault for letting a mentally impaired female loose with the looneys. Sam’s lack of memory was definitely an impairment if she didn’t know better than to set fires.

He stumbled into the clearing, out of breath and furious.

The women finished stomping on their smoking sticks and throwing dirt on their fire. Lodge security shouted curses and dumped buckets of water on hot rocks, exploding them in steam. Walker could see Carmel Kennedy and her chauffeur marching in this direction, steaming hotter than the rocks.

His duty was to keep the townspeople from killing each other, but right now, the victim he’d sent into this brawl was his primary concern.

He scooped up Samantha and felt her wriggle. Good. She was alive. Now he was damned well taking her down for medical help, as he should have done in the first place.

“I’m fine, put me down,” she sputtered, wriggling to get free. “I was just a little overcome with smoke.”

“Yeah, most people shriek and wave wands when they have smoke inhalation, right.” He marched on, taking the shortest unmarked path to the parking lot. Stones and rubble rolled beneath his boots, but he didn’t release his grip.

“Not a wand,” she muttered, pounding his shoulders. “Just one of Harvey’s walking sticks. I kept the Lucys busy, didn’t I?”

“You let them nearly set the mountain on fire! That is not what I meant about keeping them busy. What the hell did they explode on that fire? The place lit up like a ten-thousand megawatt magnesium flare.”

“For all I know, it was magnesium.” She shoved hard, nearly toppling them both. “I do not need medical assistance.”