Page 10 of Samhain Savior

“We were there,” I insisted, the memory rising in my mind. “We were in Salem, there at the end. We didn’t hear about the trials in time to save them all but we saved who we could. The Everwood witch was not among them.”

The memory of Salem still haunted me. We'd arrived too late to save them all—women and men who'd trusted us toprotect them, hanging lifeless from those cursed gallows. The accusation in their vacant eyes had burned itself into my soul. We'd failed them then, and the guilt of that failure had shaped everything we'd done since.

“I know that,” Modi replied, the sorrow in his voice echoing my own.

The devastation we had all felt, standing at the bottom of Gallows Hill on that cold September day, staring at the swaying corpses of eight faithful servants, our failure evident in their vacant, accusing eyes.

“And yet, what other reason could there be for the Order of the Broken Veil to be hunting the pieces of the Fallen Key if they didn’t have the blood of an Everwood witch to bind it with?”

The idea was impossible; if a bloodline that powerful was still in existence, there was no way I wouldn’t have known about it.

Was there?

“How did they even discover that the Key was there?” I asked, changing the subject. Modi turned to me, a familiar look in his unfamiliar eyes, and I feared that I already knew the answer.

“We have a leak,” Modi replied simply, as though a member of theUmbra Fratrumbreaking their vowswas a simple matter.

“Are you telling me that a member of the Shadow Brotherhood is the reason Phips is dead?” Vine asked, a dangerous glint in his eyes as he pulled his blade out of his Rip, almost unconsciously.

“It would appear that way, yes.”

“Who?” Mal snarled, the word coming out with a little hint of a squawk. “Who would fuckingdare?”

“That is something I am not certain of. Not yet, anyway.”

The thought of betrayal within our ranks made my stomach turn. TheUmbra Fratrumwasn't just an organization—we were blood brothers, our bond forged by centuries of shared battles and sacrifice. For one of us to sell out a Guardian of the Brotherhood, to get Phips killed...it went against everything we stood for. When we found the bastard, death would be too kind.

“What are you going to do?” I asked, needing to know what he had planned.

Modi sat back, his youthful face breaking out in a smirk. “I’mnot going to do anything.”

“You can’t mean to allow this to go unpunished.” If Asmodeus failed to retaliate, swiftly and with an inordinate amount of force, he’d paint the entire Brotherhood as weak. A great portion of our control came from the factthat people were simply too scared to risk our wrath by stepping out of line.

“I’m sure you’ll come up with something creative when you catch the bastard who’s doing this,” he replied casually.

“Me?” I asked, my eyebrows rising in surprise.

“Are you not my chosen representative here on earth?”

“I—yes.”

“And have you not been running things on your own for the last twenty or so years?”

Reluctantly, I nodded, feeling Corson and Mal approach the back of the couch, taking up positions on my flank as Modi took us in. Even Vine, the perpetual slacker, sat up straighter, his knife spinning between his twitchy fingers as he stared at Modi, rapt.

“Then I have full faith that you’ll find the source of the leak and stem it in your very impressive way.” He looked to Vine as he said it, and I watched as Vine’s shoulders straightened, appreciating the praise. “A good soul eater is hard to find these days.”

“Asmodeus,” I said, exasperated. “Be serious. This isn’t some back-alley conjurer or traveling hag we’re talking about. If they’re taking down Guardians then the Order is a real threat.”

“Of course, they’re a real threat,” he snarled, standing. In his rage, his handsome face morphed into something else entirely. There and gone, the crack in his mask revealed his true form beneath, and it both terrified me and comforted me.

Perhaps the Asmodeus I knew was still there, buried under whatever the hell he was now, waiting to be released once more.

“But you are a threat too, brother,” he continued, pacing the room. “You are more than capable of facing whoever this is head on. Do not, for one second, forget who you are. Who theUmbra Fratrumare.”

“Born of Grace, forged in Darkness,” Mal intoned, the first line of theCreed of Shadowssending a shiver up my spine.

“We alone stand between chaos and corruption,” Corson continued, picking up the next line.