When I entered the main chamber, I was struck by the sky. The room opened wide to the heavens, like a conservatory. The sky above it was black, the blackest sky I’d ever seen. Like we were in the middle of a terrible storm, yet the room was silent.
Lena lay on a heavy stone table, curled in a fetal position. She was soaking wet, drenched in her own sweat and writhing in pain. They were all standing around her—Macon, Aunt Del, Barclay, Reece, Larkin, even Ryan, and a woman I didn’t recognize, holding hands, forming a circle.
Their eyes were open, but they weren’t seeing. They didn’t even notice I was in the room. I could see their mouths moving, mumbling something. As I stepped closer to Macon, I realized that they weren’t speaking in English. I couldn’t be sure, but I’d spent enough time with Marian to think it was Latin.
“Sanguis sanguinis mei, tutela tua est.
Sanguis sanguinis mei, tutela tua est.
Sanguis sanguinis mei, tutela tua est.
Sanguis sanguinis mei, tutela tua est.”
All I could hear was the quiet mumbling, the chanting. I couldn’t hear Lena anymore. My head was empty. She was gone.
Lena! Answer me!
Nothing. She just lay there, moaning softly, twisting slowly like she was trying to shed her own skin.
Still sweating, sweat mixed with tears.
Del broke the silence, hysterical. “Macon, do something! It’s not working.”
“I’m trying, Delphine.” There was something in his voice I’d never heard before. Fear.
“I don’t understand. We Bound this place together. This house is the one place she was supposed to be safe.” Aunt Del looked at Macon for answers.
“We were wrong. There’s no safe haven for her here.” A beautiful woman about my grandmother’s age with spirals of black hair spoke. She wore strands of beads around her neck, piled one on top of the other, and ornate silver rings on her thumbs. She had the same exotic quality Marian possessed, as if she was from somewhere far from here.
“You don’t know that, Aunt Arelia,” Del snapped, turning to Reece. “Reece, what’s happening? Can you see anything?”
Reece’s eyes were closed, tears streaming down her face. “I can’t see anything, Mamma.”
Lena’s body seized and she screamed—at least she opened her mouth and looked as if she was screaming, but she didn’t make a sound. I couldn’t take it.
“Do something! Help her!” I shouted.
“What are you doin’ here? Get out of here. It’s not safe,” Larkin warned. The family had noticed me for the first time.
“Concentrate!” Macon sounded desperate. His voice rose over the others’, louder and louder, until he was shouting— “Sanguis sanguinis mei, tutela tua est!
Sanguis sanguinis mei, tutela tua est!
Sanguis sanguinis mei, tutela tua est!
Blood of my blood, protection is thine!”
The members of the circle tensed their arms as if to give the circle more strength, but it didn’t work.
Lena was still screaming, silent screams of terror. This was worse than the dreams. This was real. And if they weren’t going to stop it, I would. I ran toward her, ducking under Reece and Larkin’s arms.
“Ethan, NO!”
As I entered the circle, I could hear it. A howl. Sinister, haunting, like the voice of the wind itself. Or was it a voice? I couldn’t be sure. Even though it was only a few feet to the table where she was lying, it felt like it was a million miles away. Something was trying to push me back, something more powerful than anything I’d ever felt before. Even more powerful than when Ridley was freezing the life out of me. I pushed against it with everything I had in me.
I’m coming, Lena! Hold on!
I threw my body forward, reaching, like I reached in the dreams. The black abyss in the sky began to spin.
I closed my eyes and lunged forward. Our fingers touched, barely.
I heard her voice.
Ethan. I…
The air inside the circle whipped around us violently, like a vortex. Swirling up toward the sky, if you could still call it a sky. Into the blackness. There was a surge, like an explosion, slamming Uncle Macon, Aunt Del, everyone onto their backs, into the walls behind them. In the same moment, the spinning air within the broken circle was sucked up into the blackness above.
Then it was over. The castle dissolved into a regular attic, with a regular window, swinging open under the eaves. Lena lay on the floor, in a tangle of hair and limbs and unconsciousness, but she was breathing.
Macon pulled himself up from the floor, staring at me, stunned. Then he walked over to the window and slammed it shut.
Aunt Del looked at me, tears still streaming down her face. “If I hadn’t seen it myself…”
I knelt at Lena’s side. She couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. But she was alive. I could feel her, a tiny throb pulsing in her hand. I lay my head down next to her. It was all I could do not to collapse.
Lena’s family slowly contracted around us, a dark circle talking over my head.
“I told you. The boy has power.”
“It’s not possible. He’s a Mortal. He’s not one of us.”