The Blood Spell (Ravenspire, #4)(110)
Dinah threw her arms out, and the wraith spun into the air. Its mouth opened wide, and it screamed, an undulating howl that swelled to fill the room, climbing in volume and pitch until Kellan thought he would burst from the power of it. The floor shuddered, sending several people to their knees, and a spider web of cracks spread along the walls. People screamed and sobbed, grabbing on to those around them for support.
“You can’t kill me.” Dinah laughed, cruel and feral. “You tried once before, and I almost wish you’d succeeded. At least I would have been dead instead of condemned to live without my heart.”
Blue moved closer to the wraith, candlelight dancing on the bare skin of her arms as she raised them up like an offering.
“Blue.” Kellan whispered her name, a broken prayer that sounded too much like good-bye.
“Blue.” His father repeated the name, still watching him, though Kellan was sure now that the flicker in his father’s flat expression was truly him.
“Father.” Kellan had to swallow past the grief that was choking him. Grief for the time he’d lost with his father and for what was left of the man he’d loved. For what he had to do to break the wraith’s hold on the king. And for Blue, who was now standing five lengths from the wraith. “Please put down your sword. I don’t want to have to kill you, but I can’t let you get past me, or you’ll kill your wife and daughter.”
“Arrest her!” the queen shouted.
Guards converged on Dinah, and Blue ran for the wraith. Kellan shoved against his father’s sword and felt it drop a fraction.
The wraith screamed, and the guards stumbled, blood leaking from their ears and noses. Dinah laughed. “How does it feel to be helpless now, Adelene? I’m going to take your children. Your kingdom. And your life. And there’s nothing you can do to stop me.”
“Don’t forget about me,” Blue said, and Kellan’s heart ached at the fierce courage on her face as she approached the wraith, her arms still raised. “Don’t forget that my mother is the one who locked the wraith away in the first place.”
Dinah swung to face Blue, her lips peeling away from her teeth in a snarl. She reached up to snap a chain from around her neck. “I couldn’t possibly forget you. You’re the key to fixing everything.” She held up the chain. A small vial dangled from the silver links, and within that vial rested a single drop of blood.
“Father, lower your sword now, or the girl I love is going to die.” Kellan met his father’s gaze and begged him to be there. To fight past the wraith’s magic. Kellan didn’t know what Dinah planned to do with that drop of Blue’s blood, but it wasn’t good. And it wasn’t something Blue had planned for when she’d turned her body into poison.
The king’s sword lowered another notch.
“You’ve already won,” Blue said calmly. “You figured out the spell. You set the wraith free. You don’t need to kill anyone in this room, Dinah. You already got what you wanted.”
The wraith trembled at the sound of Blue’s voice and jerked toward her. Thrusting its face close to her, it opened its mouth, exposing a double circle of tiny sharp fangs.
“You know nothing about what I want.” Dinah uncorked the vial and tilted it until the drop of blood rolled onto her fingertip. “What I want is to hunt down everyone who hunted me. What I want is to drink the blood of my enemies’ children. What I want is to tear my dear, sweet sister in two the way she divided me sixteen years ago. And now, thanks to you, I get to have it all.”
The queen blanched, and Blue froze, her eyes wide as the wraith whirled to face Dinah.
“No!” Blue lunged for the wraith, tearing at its shroud as it lifted its arms to meet Dinah’s outstretched hands. The drop of blood on Dinah’s finger disappeared beneath the wraith’s bony limb, and for an instant, nothing happened. But then Dinah threw back her head, the cords of her neck standing out as she screamed in pain. The wraith shivered, its hand sizzling where it met Dinah’s, and then the two collided against each other with a thunderclap of power that reverberated throughout the ballroom. Dinah and the wraith fell on the floor in a heap, the wraith’s dark shroud settling over them like a tattered blanket.
Blue’s frantic gaze found Kellan’s. Behind her, the shroud shuddered, and then a single creature rose to its feet. It was Dinah, but not. The same dark hair, same sharp bones and pale skin. But her eyes were entirely black. Her fingers were long, skeletal things. And when she smiled, her teeth were double rows of fangs.
Kellan shuddered, horror crawling up the back of his throat like sickness. Dinah and Marielle the witch were one and the same.
“Look out!” he yelled as Dinah turned toward Blue.
Blue pivoted in time for Dinah’s fist to send her crashing to the floor. One of her dancing slippers flew off her foot and sailed under the dais.
Dinah laughed, a powerful swell of sound that grew and grew until it was a creature of teeth and fury battering those around it. Dust fell from the cracks in the walls, and the floor buckled. She threw her arms out, and magic swept the room in a tidal wave of force and fury. The windows shattered, glass exploding out onto the castle grounds. Every person in the room was knocked screaming to the floor, including the king.
Kellan landed beside his father. The king’s sword clattered to the ground, and the prince kicked it out of reach.