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“What the hell!?” James shouted. He shook his hands, like he couldn’t understand why his spell wasn’t working on her.

Terrible pain continued to course through my veins, but I understood now what the blast had been. It was James’s spell backfiring. Talia had broken through it, though the rest of us were still trapped.

Leroy ran toward Talia. If he got her hands on her, he could kill her in a second. But Grant kicked his leg out to trip Leroy. The fucker landed flat on his face.

James hesitated, shooting a glance between Talia and the rest of us. For a beat, his pain spell faltered, but it came back full-force a second later. He’d lost control of Talia and couldn’t focus on her without losing his grip on us.

Talia aimed the Seer Wand straight at Cody. “I get it now, why you had to convince me I was nothing and that my feelings didn’t matter. You couldn’t handle that my magic was stronger than yours. You’re a Seer with empathic abilities, but I never saw you use them. It’s because you can’t, isn’t it? Not because your magic doesn’t work, but because you don’t know how to feel for someone else. Instead of caring for people, you break them down until they feel as shitty as you do. You take people’s voices away because you can’t handle what they’d say about you if they spoke up. You played with my head for too long, but now I’m the one in charge. I know what you did to me, and I’ve seen what you’ve done to other girls. Now you’re going to see it from my perspective.”

The end of the Seer Wand glowed. Cody clutched his head and scrambled back until he stumbled into a tree. Talia must’ve been projecting a vision into his mind, because he squeezed his eyes together and shook his head violently, like he could rid his mind from everything she showed him.

“You bitch!” he screamed.

“I’m not showing you anything you didn’t do yourself!” Talia shot back. “You know what you did, and now you’re going to know the pain it caused.”

Cody dropped to his knees as veins bulged in his face. He stared blankly into the forest with a look of horror permanently etched onto his face. Whatever she showed him next caused him to sag forward and spew vomit across the forest floor.

Cody couldn’t handle it. He scrambled to his feet and took off down the mountain, running and screaming like a maniac.

Leroy pushed himself to his feet and turned on Talia. “You’re going to pay for that.”

Black tendrils of magic danced out of Leroy’s fingers. I’d seen his magic at play before and knew that if he got close enough to her, his spell would kill her instantly. He could’ve achieved the same effect with a battle spell, but it was clear he liked to show off.

“Leroy, the priestesses wanted us to—” James started.

“Shut up!” Leroy spat. “The priestesses aren’t here. I’m going to handle this my way. And when the priestesses put me on the council, this is the way we’re going to deal with people like her who step out of line. She thinks she’s so powerful, but I’ll show her what power looks like.”

Fuck that. It didn’t matter if the pain tearing my body to shreds right now was real or not. I could be burning in hellfire and still wouldn’t let him touch my friend. I squeezed Nadine’s and Grant’s hands tighter, then something within me snapped.

James recoiled as his spell broke its hold on me, blasting outward like it had with Talia. I lifted my hand, and the Mortana Wand flew into it. Leroy reached Talia, but his killing spell had died on his fingers.

“You won’t touch her!” I growled as I got to my feet.

Mortana magic pulsed through me, so powerful that I didn’t even have to think about cutting off Leroy’s magic. The Wand merely responded to my will.

I felt his connection to Alora snap as the Mortana Wand overpowered him completely. The tendrils of black magic swirling out of his fingers drifted away in the wind as I severed his control of power.

Leroy’s eyes went wide. He touched Talia again, but nothing happened.

“You’re right, Leroy,” I said. “You are powerful. But it’s not your power that matters—it’s how you use it. You could’ve used your power for good, but you didn’t even try. Instead, to prove to everyone how strong you were, you chose to use it in the most horrific of ways. You tortured us and tried to drown me at my trial. I’ve watched you use your power to kill innocent people. You were a bully because you couldn’t figure out how to be great without harming others. Your streak is over. I have all the magic of the Mortana Cast now, and I’m going to take your power so you can’t keep hurting people.”

“No!” he panicked.

“I don’t want to do this,” I said honestly. “I’m not in the business of taking people’s power. But if I can prevent you from stealing one more innocent life, it’s worth it. I’m not doing this to punish you. I’m doing it to protect all your future victims, because you’ve made it damn clear you won’t stop hurting people unless someone stops you first. You won’t hurt my friend, or anyone else ever again.”

He backpedaled a few steps, though he kept his arms lifted like he was trying to overpower me. But the Wand had already damned him, for the spell was so strong that even if I wanted to give his magic back, I couldn’t. Death was a transformation, and I had transformed his magic entirely. Leroy’s connection to his magic had been severed, and his power to kill was forever gone.

“You can’t do this!” Leroy protested.

Energy rippled through my entire form as I conjured powerful reaper magic. The chill on my skin disappeared as my magic turned me into something otherworldly. I appeared as nothing but a skeleton—my full reaper form. My scythe appeared in my hand, and I crossed the distance between us in a split second. The empty sockets of my skeletal face stopped mere inches from his nose.

“You want to bet?” I threatened.

Sheer terror crossed his features, then Leroy whirled around and took off running the way Cody went. I didn’t know where he would go, but it was sure as hell somewhere far away from Octavia Falls. Leroy would never show his face around here again, that was for certain.

“Nobody move!” James warned. He still had a hold on Nadine, Grant, and Chloe, but his arms shook, like he was struggling to hold the spell. “Try anything, and I’ll hurt your little Curse Maker girlfriend.”

“No… you won’t!” Nadine snarled.

Her proclamation was enough to break the last of his spell. His power ricocheted in his direction, sending him flying off his feet. Grant and Chloe sagged to the ground, letting out a collective sigh of relief as the pain ebbed away.

Nadine grabbed the Curse Breaker Wand from beside her and got to her feet. James trembled as he scrambled back on his elbows.

Nadine aimed her Wand at his face. “It’s over, James. You called me a Curse Maker because you were afraid of people who were different than you. It’s our differences that make us a coven, but you were so intent on causing pain to everyone else around you so you never had to feel it yourself. You wanted me to make curses—fine. I’ll give you a curse. I want you to walk in the shoes of your victims. Get on your feet, turn around, and start walking. Walk until your feet bleed. Don’t stop until you know what it’s like to suffer like all the people you’ve hurt.”

James whimpered as he got to his feet. Then he did exactly as Nadine ordered. He started walking, disappearing into the trees with the gait of a man who would never be seen or heard from again.

I breathed a sigh of relief, and my magic subsided to bring the flesh back to my bones. I rushed over to Nadine and swept her into my arms. Grant hugged Talia so hard he picked her nearly a foot off the ground.

Chloe bent down to grab the Mentalist Wand from the ground. “You guys, that was totally badass!”

“Scared me there for a bit,” Grant said as he set Talia down. “I thought we were going to break the spell together, but when you guys started breaking it on your own, I worried I was going to have to do it by myself.”

“We did break the spell together,” Nadine said. “Maybe not at the same time, but we gave each other the courage to do it.”

Chloe walked over to Talia and placed her palms on her shoulders. “Tal, I am so, so proud of you.”

Then she wrapped her in a tight hug, and Talia squeezed her back. “Thank you. I never thought I could do it, but now I know I can—and nobody will ever silence me again. Certainly not some asshat like him.”

Chloe pulled away beaming proudly. “How’d it feel?”

Talia couldn’t help but smile. “Really fucking good. Now let’s go kick some priestess ass.”

“We’ve got to get a vantage point,” I said.

Chloe lifted her hands, and her powers raised us into the air once again. We quickly flew upward, until Chloe deposited us all gently onto the outcropping of rock I’d seen the priestesses standing on before. There were no signs of them now.

We stood at the top of a steep cliff that towered over the treetops below. It gave us a clear view of the battlefield that had been carved out in the forest at the base of the mountain. So many trees had toppled over that the clearing was bigger than ever before—at least twenty acres now. Shadowed figures ran from one end of the battlefield to the other, and screams could be heard over the storm. Explosions sounded in the distance, and flashes of magic lit up the clouds. It was impossible to tell who was winning the fight, because we couldn’t see much else through the rain. I figured our side must be holding up well, because I hadn’t heard a single dying thought since we arrived.

Then it occurred to me that James’s spell very well could’ve distracted me long enough to not hear a thing. We had no way of knowing what was going on down there.

Chloe spread her arms to the sky. “All right, we’re here! Come and get us!”

No answer came except the rumbling of thunder overhead.

“I don’t get it,” Grant said. “Don’t the priestesses want to kill us? Why aren’t they coming for us?”

“Because they don’t know where we are,” Talia realized. “Cody, Leroy, and James took power from people because they didn’t feel they had it themselves, and the priestesses are no different. That’s why they’re blocking me from seeing them—because they don’t know how to use their visions effectively. The priestesses don’t know how this is going to end any more than we do.”

I wiped rainwater from my eyes. “Good. We can use that to our advantage.”

Nadine tore her gaze from the battlefield. “Tal, you said the Master Wand was blocking your visions of the priestesses. Can we get around that somehow? If we use the Seer Wand to target other people on the battlefield, maybe they have eyes on them.”

“Good idea,” Talia said. “Let’s work the spell together.”

We ducked into the cover of the trees. The five of us formed a circle and created a powerful shield around ourselves. As we joined hands, magic began to pulse around us like a spinning wheel. Talia’s visions invaded my mind, and we seemed to be transported down the mountain, looking over the scene.

The vision gave us a clearer view of the battlefield. All across the clearing, mounds of mud were piled high from the remains of hundreds of golems. The golems still fighting hid behind the mounds, aiming powerful spells at our allies who came too close. Our people hid in the trees, blasting magic and cannonballs over the clearing.

Bodies lay sprawled across the battlefield. Some were corpses of the undead, who had been beaten down so hard their magic couldn't sustain them any longer. Others were coven members who had come to support our cause.

The vision zoomed in on the battlefield. A line of blood left a trail to an injured man at the edge of the trees. Three people dragged him to the tree line and laid him down gently. The Seer Wand took us closer, until we could see him reaching out with a shaky hand.

“Tell my wife and son I love them,” he choked out.

I saw his face in my mind’s eye a second before his hand went limp. Jude Bennett had a hole ripped through his stomach so wide his intestines were spilling out. Samantha was beside him, her hands bloody as she tried to shove his guts back into his abdomen. But it was too late. His features went pale as life drained out of him. My Mortana magic fused with Talia’s Seer powers, and together, we all felt the void of death permeate the battlefield.

Jude’s voice entered my mind. I did this for them. Protect my family like you protected them before, Lucas .

Jude had used his last thought to send me a message—a plea from beyond the grave to do everything in my power to help.

The vision lingered on Jude a few moments longer, until Nadine said, “We have to keep going.”

Talia cleared her throat. “Right.”

The vision flew us over toward the other end of the battlefield. We witnessed the golems gathering a spell together, forming it in the blink of an eye. Instinctually, I went to throw up a shield, before realizing I wasn’t actually on the battlefield and my shield wouldn’t reach that far.

The spell exploded toward our allies, and they scrambled out of the way to dodge the attack. But one person wasn’t so lucky. Professor Loren was an old, frail woman, and she couldn’t get out of the way in time. She lifted her hand to cast a shield, but the golems’ spell blasted straight through it. She was hit in the shoulder and fell to the ground, panting.

“Nina!” Professor Richards screamed. He’d been among those who dodged the spell, and he’d landed on his hands and knees. He crawled over to her. Richards reached into this pocket and pulled out a tiny vial of white liquid. “I brought this just in case. It’s the only one I have left. Take it.”

Professor Loren pushed his hand away. “Save your healing potion, Anthony,” she rasped. “I’m prepared to go. I’ve been ready for a long time.”

Tears welled in Professor Richards’s eyes. “Nina, no. Fight with me. We promised to fight together.”

Professor Loren took his hand in hers. “We did, and we fought well . I’m ready to be with my Autumn again.”

“You were the best colleague I could ask for,” Richards told her.

Then her hand went limp in his.

The fight has been worth it , her voice echoed through my mind.

A shiver traveled down my spine.

“Tal, keep going,” Chloe pressed.

Our vision took us into the trees, where we caught sight of Cody tearing through the battle, trying to escape the horror of the visions Talia had given him. From out of nowhere, a crackling spell whizzed through the trees and hit Cody in the back. His form went rigid, and black veins spiderwebbed up his neck.

Mother Miriam, forgive me. His voice echoed through my mind as he collapsed to the ground.

The power of the killing curse seemed to shudder through the trees. This wasn’t just any rogue spell. Whoever had cast it had done so with a vengeance.

The vision shifted its angle, and we saw Tyler standing several feet away from Cody, his chest heaving. “That’ll teach you to mess with my sister,” he sneered. Then he spat on Cody’s corpse and walked away.

“I—I can’t believe he did that for me,” Talia whispered.

“I didn’t see anything,” Chloe said innocently. “Keep going. We need to find the priestesses.”

The vision shifted again, flashing from face to face on the battlefield to hunt the priestesses down. The Seer Wand settled upon Professor Lewis. She didn’t look as angry as the others engaged in battle. Instead, she appeared desperate.

“Priestesses,” Professor Lewis groveled.

Footsteps sounded in the background of the vision, but the spell resisted changing angles. I witnessed the flash of a black cloak, but nothing more.

“I saw the traitors heading up the mountain,” Professor Lewis said.

The vision turned hazy as a muffled voice responded, but we couldn’t hear what they said.

Professor Lewis stumbled to the side, like someone had shoved her. “Wait! Don’t I get a reward for helping you?”

Another muffled voice came, and then a sinister flash of light. I didn’t comprehend what happened until Professor Lewis’s voice came into my mind.

I was loyal . Her final thought was melancholy, almost regretful, but it all occurred so fast I wasn’t sure she fully understood what had happened to her.

Talia yanked her hands away, and the vision ended. “I’m sorry… that was too much.”

“Why would the priestesses kill their own follower?” Grant asked hollowly.

Chloe shifted uncomfortably. “Because she outlived her usefulness. She was only going to slow them down.”

“That means they’re on their way to us.” Nadine turned her gaze skyward. “We obtain the Master Wand at all costs, agreed? Everyone get ready. We do this together.”

I nodded firmly and placed my left hand on her right shoulder. “Together.”

Grant did the same to me, and Talia and Chloe joined us on either side. We formed a line and lifted the Oaken Wands to the sky. I could feel our magic pulsing as one. The Wands’ power spoke to us, and we didn’t even have to speak aloud to know which spell we wanted to cast. I could feel the intention of my friends, and I knew the desires of each Wand as if it were my own. The Wands weren’t just one—but we were one.

I didn’t shrink down to become something else. I was still a whole and complete human being on my own. But together, by standing united with each other and the Oaken Wands, we each became something bigger than ourselves. We were no longer five individuals working toward a common goal. We were one people made of five different parts.

Two ominous silhouettes appeared through the treetops above us, their cloaks billowing against the backdrop of flashing storm clouds. Margaret lifted the Master Wand above her, while Lilian kept her hands outward to control her levitation powers.

Before they could spot us, my friends and I blasted our magic outward simultaneously. Beams of light burst from the ends of the Oaken Wands, becoming one as the massive spell enveloped the priestesses entirely. It was a spell unlike I’d ever seen before—the kind so strong it made the earth shake. Above us, our spell was so bright it lit the dark sky like the sun. The forest quieted as the thunder halted at our command. My ears rang as I urged my Wand to push harder. Rocks tumbled down the mountainside, and trees fell over as our spell intensified. It felt as if we were pulling magic from the core of the Earth itself. All the magic of the coven flowed through us, and it was enough to drain the priestesses of their power for good. They should never be able to cast another spell again, for our magic was so strong it would forever refuse their desires.

The massive ball of light in the sky became brighter and brighter, expanding outward as if it were a star about to go supernova.

Then it stopped. From out of nowhere, the magic simply halted. There was no explosion, no backfire… the magic just vanished, like it was never there to begin with. The sky turned dark again, and thunder returned with a vengeance. Lightning cracked three times in a second. Around us, the wind picked up heavier than before, whipping through the trees at least sixty miles per hour. Now the earth wasn’t rumbling in response to our spell, but because of the storm. A funnel cloud began to form overhead, and I realized we’d made the storm even worse.

“Did it work?” Grant shouted.

A loud, wicked cackle rang through the sky. I shielded my eyes from the rain and looked up to see the priestesses descending upon us. They landed in the forest with ease, like our spell hadn’t even shaken them.

“What a sad attempt at exhibiting your power!” Lilian mocked. “Too bad all that determination will go to waste.”

We didn’t let her finish. Together, my friends and I blasted out another spell, but Margaret had already flicked the Master Wand. The two spells rushed through the forest like tidal waves speeding toward each other. They slammed into one another, creating an echoing crack louder than any thunder. It must’ve been audible a hundred miles away. I threw up a shield to protect us from the deafening noise.

The magic from our spell shot upward toward the sky, sending light beams into the clouds. Margaret’s spell had stopped ours, and its power had nowhere else to go.

My friends and I held our ground, pushing with all our might to overpower her magic. I could feel her spell resisting ours, and as we touched it, her intent was clear. She wanted to strip us of our magic, the same way we intended to do to her. The only way to win this was for one of us to weaken the other, and it was obvious the Master Wand and the Oaken Wands were equally matched.

“We’ve got to try something else!” Nadine shouted over the roaring wind. She flicked the Curse Breaker Wand, and her magic rippled through us all. We could feel her intent and instantly agreed to help her.

Basic magic alone wasn’t working. We had to try something darker, something sinister. If we wanted to win this, we had to put our morals aside, because we weren’t playing by our rules anymore—we were playing by theirs . It wasn’t a route we wanted to take, but if we didn’t stop the priestesses now, they would continue their rampage across Octavia Falls and stop at nothing to bring every last coven member under their tyrannical control.