boats proved to be trickier than we’d planned. Rafe and I had managed to create a solid illusion of a dock, a much more manageable task than calling down the spirit of a long-dead woman whose ghost lingered in the moonlight. Or so we thought.
Since this brand of magic didn’t require us to rouse the dead, Rafe and I were able to handle it on our own. Now that we’d combined powers, not only could I levitate objects, but my illusions were stronger as well. It didn’t take as much from me to create a dock strong enough to allow the residents safe passage to the boats—only a few shards of bone, some intestinal lining, and a few teeth. All temporary losses. And it didn’t require the touch of all twelve. So long as we were working together in some capacity.
We let Violet and Donovan take the first walk across the dock to test its durability. They made it halfway before a ten-foot-tall wave washed them over the side. The eels were back, hiding under the dock. They instantly attacked, but Donovan only suffered a few minor electrical burns protecting Violet before Wes and Audrey zapped them and Galen burned the lingering smoke to ash.
Donovan hopped back on the dock, soaking wet, and pulled Violet up with him. He flopped on his back, the gills on his neck fanning in and out. “Now what?”
Galen nodded at me and Rafe. “You could levitate everyone onto the boat.”
Rafe shook his head. “That will take too long, and it’s risky. We have better control, but our magic is mostly meant for objects, and there’s still the possibility of us breaking someone’s neck if we fling them too hard.”
“I’ve got this one,” Audrey said.
She grabbed Wes’s hand and pulled him out to the dock. When the wave came up to wash them overboard, she was ready. Lifting her hand, she shot a sizzling spark of golden-green light at the wall of water and froze it into a solid block of ice.
For good measure, she froze the surrounding area as well, in case any sharp-toothed swimmers were readying themselves to leap out from under the dock. Angry, pounding waves beat against Audrey’s ice wall, but they couldn’t break through. She’d eliminated the threat.
Wes swept her up and kissed her hard. “Isn’t she amazing?” She gave him a dazed, lust-drunk smile, and he tucked her close to his side. “Mine.”
We didn’t waste any time ushering the residents onto the boats. There was only so long we could hold the curse back before it discovered another, more horrifying, way to attack.
Violet and Donovan stood with Finn and Thora at the end of the dock, ready to grab and heal anyone that got tossed into the water if the curse found a way through Audrey’s ice. Paige Newcomb must’ve said something nasty to Violet as she passed by, because Donovan looked very close to shoving her off the dock.
Wes and Audrey patrolled the length of the dock. Selene clasped Audrey’s hands, giving her a proud watery smile before she boarded the ferry. Cole and Brooke kept an eye on things from the land side of the dock. And Galen and Kenna patrolled the retaining wall, both on fire and ready to grab any smoke that snuck out of the woods.
The mayor positioned himself with the first ferry group, and all of us watched him with narrowed eyes as he and his wife took a spot on a boat that wouldn’t have even been necessary if he’d worked with Wes from the start. Instead, he’d set his petty feud with Thora above the safety of the townspeople, and none of them would forget the horrors they’d been forced to endure as a result.
Rafe and I remained at the front of the dock, using every ounce of our energy toward keeping the wood we’d conjured solid.
When Maybell Ketner passed us, she flicked her gaze to our joined hands. Sadness leaked from her like a faucet that would never stop dripping. It would eat away at her and rust her out until the end of her days. My heart hurt for Rafe and for Maybell. She wasn’t a bad person, just a grieving mother who could never forgive me.
And I’d never give her reason to. Her memories of Kyle were far more precious than whatever tolerance she’d had for me when she thought I was going to be her daughter-in-law.
I just hoped one day she’d find a way to welcome Rafe back into her life. He cared a great deal for her and her daughters. And from the way she looked at him, I believed she still cared for him too, despite her anger and misplaced feelings of betrayal.
Once we had one ferry full of residents, Brooke melted the anchor holding it to the metal post she’d created, and Hank Wilder pulled away from the dock. He followed Finn’s instructions to take everyone to the east side of the island, as far from the Well of Rebirth as possible. Things were about to get ugly on this side of the island.
We loaded up another five ferries and ten fishing boats, all piloted by experienced fishermen and women who had weathered more than their fair share of storms. If things got choppy, they’d know how to keep everyone safe.
That left the twelve of us with a single fishing boat. The smallest of the lot.
Galen had gone sheet-white as we crossed the dock, but Kenna held him tight as they stepped onto the boat, pushing all of her magic into him. Once they were on board she pulled him to the side. Cupping his face, she murmured soft words that were only for his ears until the color returned to his face. He rested his forehead against hers, wrapping his arms tightly around her.
My heart filled at the sight of them, so perfect for each other. I couldn’t have picked a better match for my cousin if I’d been given dossiers on every man on the planet. And Galen had only ever had eyes for Kenna. Even when we were kids.
Finn had the most experience handling boats, so he took the wheel while the rest of us positioned ourselves near the railing. Rafe and I let our dock go, and all the pieces of ourselves it took to create it came rushing back. Judging by the way the sea battered against Audrey’s ice wall, the curse wasn’t going to let us have a nice little sail out to the cave.
Finn kept a careful eye on Galen, refusing to start the boat until Kenna gave him the okay. The ropes of light glowing from Kenna’s hands were more neon green than purple, signifying that she was currently feeding him a larger share of her power. Their magic worked a little different than everyone else’s. Instead of sharing a single color, they supported and lifted each other. The dominant color belonged to whoever had more to give at the time.
“You good?” Finn asked Galen.
He swallowed hard and kept his gaze locked on Kenna as he nodded. She’d be the rock in his storm and take care of him. And he trusted her enough to let her.
“All right.” Finn fired up the boat. The motor roared to life, giving off the scent of grinding gears and burning oil. “Let’s get this shit done with.”
Wes and Audrey stood at the stern and lifted their hands. Golden-green light glowed between them as they shot out a burst of lightning. The ice shifted, crackling as huge chunks broke off. Audrey’s protective wall melted and joined the churning black waters of the sea.
Once the path was clear, the curse wasted no time hitting us. Rafe grabbed me, sheltering my body with his as he pulled us both against the deck. A twenty-foot swell loomed over us, blocking out the night sky, before it crashed down, coating us all in brine and seaweed. I popped my head up long enough to make sure everyone was still on board.
Finn moved full steam ahead toward the cave, taking us far from land, in the opposite direction of the line of ferries headed for the east side of the island. The total population of Zodiac Cove looked like tiny white ants bobbing on the water. They continued to get smaller until they rounded the cliffs and disappeared altogether.
Another wave aimed for us, and Finn turned the boat at a sharp angle that had my stomach rolling. “Hang the fuck on,” he hollered. “Things are about to get messy.”
Another swell slammed against the side of the boat that had tilted to accommodate Finn’s sharp turn. Someone behind me screamed as we dipped dangerously close to the swirling black water. Cold, salty spray soaked my face and temporarily blinded me. As another wave rose over the deck, Brooke flung out a sheet of metal, blocking it from soaking us again. Which allowed Finn a second to get control of the boat again.
Two more waves formed on opposite sides, but Audrey froze them with a flick of her wrist. Rafe stood and helped me to my feet. The waters were still choppy, but we weren’t in as much danger of going overboard. Clinging to the rail to stay steady, I weaved an illusion of Violet and Donovan jumping into the water and swimming toward the cave. Rafe covered the real Violet and Donovan in a wooden wrap to look like poles on the boat.
As we became more accustomed to the motion, it was easier to stay on our feet and wield our magic. The curse gave us a small break when it turned its attention to the illusion I’d used to taunt it, and a giant shark launched out of the water. Propelled by blood-lust and whatever black magick the curse had used to engineer it, it gnashed its teeth and tried to take a bite out of my illusions. When it met only air, it thrashed its tail in frustration.
Rafe dropped the wooden illusion, and Donovan grimaced as he rubbed the back of his neck. “So, it looks like Vi and I should probably stay out of the water.”
“Not a bad idea,” I said.
Cole shook his head. “Fucking sharks. What’s next?”
“Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to,” Rafe said. The timbre of his steady voice was a balm; the warmth of him seeped into me, a life preserver on the rocking waters.
Another swell began to build energy to our left, but this time, both Brooke and Audrey were ready for it. Audrey hit it with ice, and Brooke wrapped a strand of seaweed around the wave, which pulled the berg of ice away from us while keeping the smoke trapped.
Overhead, large swathes of smoke rolled like storm clouds. Electric blue lightning zapped the air, leaving behind the metallic tang of burnt copper. Kenna sucked up the vapors that tried to worm into people’s minds, burning them to ash, but she had to work alone.
Galen was using all his energy just trying to survive the boat trip. He fought his own battle, inside his mind, and had nothing left to give to his magic. But Kenna had him covered. Their magic worked best when they were supporting each other like this.
“We’re making another tight turn,” Finn yelled. “Hang on.”
He twisted the wheel sharply to the right, likely doing a zigzag pattern to burn more of the curse’s energy as it tried to keep up with us. Which was fine. We could handle it. As long as it was focused on us, it wasn’t tearing apart the island.
The boat once again tilted on its side, skimming the choppy water. My stomach rose to my throat and I swallowed the acidic saliva that pooled on my tongue. Audrey careened backward and Wes caught her hard against his chest. Galen threw up over the side. Still blazing with internal fire, Kenna rubbed his back, keeping her voice low as she tried to pull him back from nightmares I couldn’t begin to imagine.
The boat righted itself and hit the water with a loud slap, sending a spray arching over the deck. Finn gave us a sheepish wave. “Sorry. Turned a little too tight.”
Thora stepped out of the cabin, her eyes widening at the horizon. “What the hell is that?”
At a quick glance, it looked like another wave. But it was too dark, even for cursed sea water, and it… wiggled? There was no other way to explain it. Hundreds of little black feelers wiggled in a watery funnel headed right for us.
I narrowed my eyes, trying to get a better look. “Are those snakes?”
“Oh, fuck.” Cole paled as he grabbed Brooke away from the rail. “Not snakes.”
I opened my mouth to scream, but fear stole the remaining air from my lungs. Black spiders with strange red markings on their backs rained down on us. Some were the size of basketballs and small dogs. A few of them landed hard enough to splat across the deck in a puddle of smoking black goo. The ones that survived the fall scuttled toward us on spindly, hairy legs with needle-like pincers clicking.
Metal mouths that had been created with the magic the curse had taken from Cole in exchange for Brooke’s life.
Brooke, recognizing her own magic, skewered them on iron stakes while Audrey and Wes hit them with lightning. Kenna burned a handful of them and killed the smoke, while Rafe and I created illusions of webs with fat flies on the side of the ship to lure them off the edge. Cole stood behind Brooke, steadily holding her and feeding her the magic that only she could use now, looking like he was very close to joining Galen in puking over the side.
“We need a stronger illusion,” Rafe yelled over the roaring wind. The spiders weren’t taking our bait and the four fighting with offensive magic could barely keep up.
One of the spiders got ahold of Violet and tried dragging her foot into its razor-sharp, jagged maw. She was so small, it could’ve devoured half her leg. Donovan kicked the spider away, taking out two of its spindly legs, and Wes hit it with ice. But within seconds, Violet’s ankle turned a sickly shade of purple.
Violet’s eyelids fluttered shut and her lips turned blue. Before Donovan’s panic could turn into a full-blown meltdown, Thora dropped down beside Violet and lifted her ankle. Her hands glowed with a soft, warm healing light that had a way of comforting, even in the most serious of circumstances.
Her lips pinched with pain. “It’s not the poison Finn and I dealt with, this is something different. It’s plant based and attacks the nervous system. Be careful with those spiders.”
Finn and Thora had taken the curse’s poison, so it had used Brooke’s magic, the part of her that lived inside Cole, to make something else. I could only image the horrors we’d be facing if it had gotten ahold of Wes and Audrey or Kenna and Galen’s magic.
I clamped my hand over Rafe’s. “A net. We can scoop the rest of them up that way.”
He nodded, keeping a close eye on Thora as her lips turned blue and her eyes rolled to the back of her head before she snapped out of it. I didn’t want to test whatever those spiders had in their pincers. We needed them gone. Another spider snipped at Brooke’s ankle, and Cole put his fist through its soft head. Though he nearly passed out when he drew his hand up to find it covered in a sticky black substance.
Rafe and I charged our power and aimed a net at the next wave of spiders, catching them before they could hit the deck. It only required a few fingernails and a chunk of muscle from my inner thigh. As soon as the spiders hit the water, they hissed and turned to smoke.
Wes, Audrey, and Kenna killed the remaining danglers. I let go of the net and got back my nails and leg muscle. Not a terrible trade, all things considered. It could’ve been worse. I could’ve been forced to endure what Finn and Thora had to in order to use their magic.
The boat continued to lean and pitch over the rolling waves. I held the railing in a grip tight enough to numb my fingers. Flecks of white paint peeled away from the cool metal as we swayed from side to side.
Dorsal fins, so black they almost blended with the sky, circled our boat.
Finn gritted his teeth as he fought to keep the wheel steady. “Something under the boat is trying to flip us. What the fuck is down there?”
The rail I held buzzed and sparked with jet blue light that zipped along the metal rods like a bug zapper. The quick shock had me letting go and stumbling into Rafe, who barely kept his balance on the slick deck. I shook out my palm, stinging from the electric burn.
“Eels,” Donovan swore. “I thought we got rid of them.”
“We got rid of a lot of shit that keeps coming back,” Wes said. He took a quick charge from Audrey, then the two of them split apart, taking opposite sides of the boat.
As one, they aimed their glowing palms at the water and froze everything beneath the boat, which stopped rocking at once. I lurched against the rail that no longer hissed and sizzled. The sharks tried to chew through the ice, but once they were in range, Audrey hit them with lightning and motioned Kenna forward to grab the smoke.
After the sharks were cleared away, Wes melted the ice and took in the calm waves lapping at the hull. Concerned creased his brow. This wasn’t right. The curse should’ve given us more of a fight. We weren’t close enough to the cave for it to give up now.
But the smoke that had been roiling overhead cleared and the moon’s light illuminated our tiny boat in the middle of a now vast ocean of calm, clear water.
I pressed a hand to my chest as I tried to get my racing heart under control. “What now?”
Rafe glanced at the still waters that surrounded us, wrapping both his arms around me to keep me close to his chest. “I don’t know, but I don’t like this.”
With the temporary lull in attacks, Finn abandoned the cabin to recharge with Thora. One by one, the earth and air signs pulled their water and fire signs close. Our kaleidoscope of magic lit up the quiet, dark night with a rainbow of sparkling light.
“I don’t like this either.” Violet snuggled closer against Donovan’s chest. “It barely took a swing at us. Why is it leaving us alone now?”
Violet got her answer in the form of a resounding boom erupting from the island. A mushroom cloud, thicker than tar, rose over the land. All of us ducked as a spray of smoking rocks and shale pelted the deck of our boat. We were half a mile from shore, yet the blast had been so powerful, it managed to blow pieces of the island all the way out here.
We stood on shaky legs, checking each other over for injuries before turning our attention to the shore. We now understood why the curse had ceased its attack on us.
Because it needed every bit of its energy for the island.
Which was now buried under a blanket of black water, far past the retaining wall that separated the town from the forest.
