“No!” Nash roared. “Don’t touch the bonds, Clive! She has them rigged. If you release me, it’ll kill you! Get out—get out now. Go!” he ordered.
Calla’s eyesight might be a hot mess, but her ears were pretty damn good. Hearing Nash panicked—solid, tough as nails Nash—left her panicked.
Someone would end up dead if they tried to release his restraints?
Oh God, this was the eye of madness, the center of a crazy storm. No way was she leaving here without every single person she loved. Nash included.
“Clive!” she hollered. “Get out! Get everyone out!”
But Clive wasn’t listening. “No man left behind!” he bellowed back, reaching for Nash again.
But Nash scooted away from him. “The whole place is going to fall apart, Clive! Everything is rigged. Your magic isn’t strong enough to stop it. Take Calla and the others and get out!”
And that was when Calla went a little crazypants herself. Sheer grit and determination made her push her way across the floor, ignoring the glass breaking all around her. Ignoring the sting of it digging into her flesh as she stayed low to the ground, slithering, reaching.
She was so close—so damn close, the tips of her fingers actually grazed the box, but then she heard Flora scream, “Calla, on your left!”
Her eyes caught the brief glimpse of Kirby just as she waved her hands and lifted Calla off her feet, hurling her into what was left of the barn door.
She hit it with a thud, sliding down and landing in a pile of broken wood. But then Daphne was there, shooting a ball of fire directly at Kirby’s head, making her duck. “Incoming!”
And that’s when opportunity presented itself. Calla lunged across the floor, skidding into the bale of hay Nash sat on, her hand firmly around the box.
She pushed herself off the floor and rose just as Kirby came for her. “Flora! Go long!” she cried out before shooting the box though the air with everything she had in her. But Kirby steamrolled her, slamming her against the floor in a move a wrestler would be proud of.
Dust flew up all around her as her vision became hazy and she fought unconsciousness. Kirby’s face swam in front of hers as she grabbed a handful of Calla’s shirt and screeched, “I loved you!” before slamming her head into the hard floor of the barn.
The blow to her head left her dizzy, but not so dizzy she wasn’t able to rear upward, jutting her hips with as much force as she had left in her, knocking Kirby off her.
Calla rolled away and drove her body upward and onto her feet, just in time to see Flora open the box over Winnie’s prone body and hear a scream of rage fly from Kirby’s mouth.
Winnie popped up like she’d never been down and instantly snapped her fingers and then everything stopped.
Planks of wood peeling from the walls stopped midair. Particles of dust and paint hovered. No one moved except for Calla. She could still move.
Pushing her hand through her hair, she watched Winnie float across the floor and land in front of her. “Honey? Are you okay?”
Calla threw her arms around her friend’s neck and squeezed as hard as she could. “Oh, thank God! Thank God you’re okay.” She fought the press of tears as the fear dissipated and sweet relief replaced it.
“Calla, I want you to listen to me carefully. Take everyone out of here and go back to the house. They’re all fine, and they’ll all know why I have to stay behind. I promise. But I need your help. Even as a witch, I’m only affective in one place at a time, and I need all my strength for these next moments in order to wipe the place clean of her evil magic and cleanse it.”
Her eyes went wide. “But why aren’t you coming with us?” Not a chance in hell she was leaving her here alone with Kirby.
Winnie’s eyes went sad, and filled with a regret Calla didn’t quite understand. “I also have to do something I don’t want to. But it’s for the good of everyone. Kirby is dangerous, not just to others but to herself. Far more dangerous than I think anyone anticipated. She has to be dealt with.”
Suddenly, she understood very clearly. Yet there was a part of her, despite what Kirby had done, that hated this. “What will you do to her?”
“I can’t tell you that. I can only tell you that she’ll be dealt with. Now go, please. Because this is harder than you can imagine, and I have to do it alone.”
Calla licked her dry lips, wanting to ask again what would happen, but too afraid to hear the answer. Instead, she opted to trust Winnie. “Okay. But please be safe.”