Page 39 of Bewitched By the Voodoo King (The Bewitching Hour #7)
“They’re here!” the leader roared, lunging toward me before Rune’s shadows could close the gap.
My pulse spiked. I didn’t see him—didn’t see any witches—just the blur of movement in the trees and the sudden clash of sound. The night erupted in howls and battle cries.
“Wait!” I screamed, but it was useless. The first witches broke from the cypress shadows like a wave, their magic lighting the swamp in violent bursts of color. In seconds, it was carnage.
“Stop! This isn’t what you think!” I fought to make my voice carry, but it was swallowed by the chaos. No one was listening. No one wanted to.
The leader’s grip on my arm tightened like a vice, dragging me backward as two of his people fell in front of us—one collapsing in a cloud of silvery mist, the other shrieking as fire ate at his twisted flesh.
I kicked against the ground, panic knotting in my chest. If Rune was here, if he was watching, he’d see this as proof I’d been taken hostage by monsters and he would kill them all.
There was so much more to the story that he needed to know. How could I tell him?
Screams and growls were louder than my voice, and I still couldn’t find Rune anywhere. What did this mean for my people? Obviously, he was here; his shadows were fighting alongside the witches, trying to get to me. But I couldn’t find him in the wreckage unfolding around me.
It was like being snapped back with a rubber band when my eyes met his. He was a black silhouette against the fire, magic coiled around him like a living storm, with his gaze fixed on the leader’s hand gripping my arm. The fury there was enough to burn the world down.
“Rune!” I screamed, my voice hoarse. “Stop! It’s not?—”
Too late. His magic broke from its leash, a tidal wave of shadow tearing through the circle. Wolves went flying, the ground itself shuddering beneath the force of it. The leader yanked me back, snarling, and the gap between Rune and me stretched wider with every heartbeat.
If I didn’t get to him now—if I didn’t make him listen —there’d be no one left alive to save. Desperation clawed at my insides as I fought with what to do, what to say, and how to get everyone to listen.
It wasn’t until a wolf threw himself at Rune’s back that I realized just how bad all of this was.
He was so focused on getting to me that he didn’t even notice the claws stretching for his throat.
My breath caught, sharp and painful in my chest. This wasn’t just about the curse anymore—this was about losing him all because of one senseless bitch.
Something inside of me built as I watched everything happen in what seemed to be slow motion.
Everything we’d worked so hard for was going to be lost in seconds, all because of Babette.
All because of another curse. I ripped my bound hands out of the leader’s grip and threw myself forward.
The momentum of it was more than I anticipated, and I ended up on my knees before the fire, watching helplessly as the wolf took everything that mattered most to me.
One of his claws sank into Rune’s shoulder, and a scream tore from my throat.
The sound ripped something open inside me.
What surged out wasn’t just fear or rage.
It was everything —every ounce of magic I thought I didn’t have, every piece of myself I’d kept caged for years.
Every single moment of doubt, betrayal, and sadness.
It roared through me like a hurricane.
The firelight bent, shadows stretching toward me as if answering a call I didn’t remember making. The ground trembled beneath my knees, sending ripples through the golden flames until they flickered blue. Everyone froze as blood sprayed from Rune’s shoulder, and I feared I was too late.
But the magic inside of me that had been waiting all of these years knew what to do.
Power spilled from my fingertips, snapping the ropes at my wrists as though they’d never existed.
I didn’t think —I reached for Rune. My magic threaded through the air, curling around the wolf at his back. It didn’t burn or shred. It pulled .
The wolf gasped, a sound halfway between a growl and a sob, as a wisp of shimmering silver light seeped from his chest into my palm.
It was warm and alive. When I let go, he collapsed to his knees.
His face relaxed, and the long snout that had protruded there disappeared to show me a man instead of a beast. The clearing went utterly silent.
I didn’t know what I was doing. All I could do was feel as the magic surged through me again, and the wolves that hadn’t been slain fell to their knees before me.
Everyone stopped, even though I couldn’t. My magic, that I hadn’t ever known, had a mind of its own, and it was tired of being trapped and confined. It had a job to do, and it wanted out .
The magic inside me wasn’t something I commanded—it was something I answered. Each pulse of it leapt from me to the wolves, tugging at the silver threads of whatever curse bound them. One by one, the monstrous features bled away, fur shrinking back into skin, claws retracting into fingers.
Gasps and murmurs rippled through the clearing. Some of the wolves—no, men—stared at their hands in shock while others cried out and rejoiced.
Rune stepped toward me, his gaze locked on mine, his expression unreadable. “Maple…”
My knees buckled under the weight of it all. The magic receded like a tide pulling back from shore, leaving me shaky and hollow but somehow still standing.
The leader, now fully human, patted his chest in disbelief. “ Curse breaker. ”
My lips stretched into a small smile as I swayed on my feet. I opened my mouth to say something, but words wouldn’t come out. Instead, I slumped sideways and everything went black.