Cursed Bones

chapter 6



The guard took off her blindfold.

“We’re here,” he said, pulling open a large oak door.

She’d been led through a confusing maze of passages, up stairs and then down, until she was thoroughly lost under the stone of the hidden underground fortress. Trajan had told her that the Sin’Rath were very security-conscious, so she wouldn’t be allowed to know how to find them within the mountain … that he didn’t even know. A fact that didn’t seem to bother him, but one that did bother Isabel.

In the short time she’d known Trajan, he’d shown himself to be cautious and inquisitive, prone to gathering information before making decisions. Since his meeting with the witches, he’d come to trust them implicitly, laughing off any questions about their intent and accepting their guidance without hesitation.

Isabel looked into a roughly circular room, carved out of a cave. The walls rose at a steep angle until they fell away into shadow. Around the edge of the room, a magic circle was carved into the floor. Each of the magic symbols etched into the stone appeared to be filled with dried blood. Sunlight streamed into the room from a hole in the cave ceiling far above, filling the well of the room with light while shrouding the balcony above in impenetrable shadows.

Isabel stepped into the room, her eyes adjusting to the sudden brightness. As she surveyed her surroundings, the door closed behind her and the bar was dropped into place. Scattered about the floor were the remnants of people … a scrap of clothing here, a piece of bone there. Fear started to build within her. She thought about the draught given to her by Ayela but rejected the idea … at least for now.

A rustling noise came from above in the shadows—it sounded like a dozen or so people filing into the balcony. She waited.

“You are from the Reishi Coven,” a raspy voice said.

“Yes,” Isabel said.

What followed made her blood run cold. The balcony erupted into a chorus of barking, snarling, mewling, and howling. It was almost animal in nature, but darker. When the cacophony of beastly noises subsided, another voice spoke, this one cloying and sweet.

“We have an agreement,” she cooed, “your coven is not welcome here.”

“I was unaware of any such agreement,” Isabel said, a bit confused. She wondered what Magda might know about the Sin’Rath.

“We should eats her,” a guttural voice barked.

“Yes, we should eats her,” a mewling voice agreed.

“No!” the raspy voice said. “She may prove useful.”

“But I’m hungry,” the mewling voice said.

A snarl from one side of the chamber followed by a menacing growl from the other silenced the mewling voice.

“Why are you here?” the raspy voice asked.

“I’ve come to kill Phane,” Isabel said.

Again the balcony erupted into chaos—howling madness filling the air.

“Silence!” shouted the raspy voice. The howling turned to mewling and then grudging silence.

“We hates him,” the mewling voice whimpered.

“What makes you think you can kill Phane?” the raspy voiced asked.

“Yes, he is most powerful,” the cloying voice said.

“He thinks he’s turned me into his puppet,” Isabel said, struggling to keep the trembling out of her voice.

“Puppet?” the mewling voice asked with rising alarm. “What if she’s been sent to bait a trap for us?” her question trailed off into a petulant whine.

The raspy voice ignored her. “Why would you be his puppet?”

“He’s summoned Azugorath,” Isabel said. “Through her magic, he’s trying to subvert my free will.” She decided the truth was in order. From the sounds of things, she didn’t want to risk being caught in a lie.

The chamber erupted again, but this time the majority of the noises were more whining and whimpering than barking and howling.

“Mother’s sister is in the world?” the mewling voice whined.

Several other voices growled at her viciously.

“Silence, you fool,” the raspy voice said.

“She can’t be trusted,” the cloying voice said.

“No, not with Azugorath’s tendril in her,” the guttural voice said.

“We should eats her,” the mewling voice said.

“Not yet,” the raspy voice barked.

Isabel didn’t like where this conversation was going. “We both have the same enemy … Phane,” she said.

“We hates him,” the mewling voice said.

“We should eats him,” the guttural voice barked.

“We will,” the raspy voice said.

“I can get close to him,” Isabel said.

“Then what?” the guttural voice barked.

“I drive my dagger into his heart.”

“No!” the mewling voice wailed. She was immediately silenced by several snarls and growls.

“What about the Goiri?” a very reasonable voice asked.

“No!” the guttural voice barked.

“Too dangerous,” the raspy voice said.

“We could sends her,” the mewling voice said.

“How much do you want to kill Phane?” the reasonable voice asked.

“He’s driven a wedge between me and my husband and cut me off from everyone I love. I would rather die than become the thing he wants me to be.”

“She sounds committed,” the reasonable voice said.

“I am,” Isabel said.

“The Goiri may be the only way,” the reasonable voice said.

“No,” the cloying voice said, “there’s another way—a doppelganger spell.”

“Yes,” the guttural voice said.

“It could work,” the raspy voice said.

“But who would go?” the mewling voice asked. “Not me.”

“I will,” the cloying voice said.

“If you fail, he will kill you,” the reasonable voice said.

“If I succeed, then Mother will be free,” the cloying voice said.

“You fool,” the guttural voice said.

“You reveal too much,” the raspy voice said.

“No matter,” the reasonable voice said, “we need only keep her alive until the task is complete.”

“Then we can eats her,” the mewling voice said.

“Yes, Sister,” the reasonable voice said.

“We are agreed then?” the raspy voice said.

A chorus of barks and snarls followed. As the Sin’Rath filed out of the balcony and left her alone in the room, Isabel stood stock-still, trying to make sense of what had just happened.

Nearly an hour passed before she heard the bar being lifted.

The door opened and a creature that should not exist entered, smiling wickedly. She had dark grey skin … one eye a smoldering red, the other a sickening yellow, both with the irises of a cat … pointed teeth, the left canine extending past her lower lip, leaving a festering welt where it rubbed. Her long dark grey hair was patchy and stringy, coated in grime. Two-inch horns protruded from her forehead, curving toward one another. She was hunched over, her right shoulder and arm grotesquely larger than the left, both hands ending in long fingers tipped with razor-sharp black talons. She walked with a limp, each step revealing a barbed tail whipping back and forth behind her. Despite her contorted features, her face was perfectly formed, with high cheek bones and perfect bone structure. The contrast between the beauty of her facial structure and the grotesqueness of her body only served to heighten the sense of wrongness that radiated from her in undulating waves.

As Isabel stared in revulsion at the creature that stood before her, the balcony filled up with the rest of the coven and the door was closed once again.

“I’m called Clotus,” she said in a cloying voice. “They won’t believe you. They don’t see me as you do, and besides, they belong to us.”

Isabel swallowed hard, facing the monster. “What do you intend to do?” she asked.

“We will cast a spell to make me look like you,” Clotus said sweetly. “Then I will go to Phane and take his magic and his life.”

The balcony erupted in a fit of barking madness.

“It would be unwise to answer any more of her questions,” the reasonable voice said.

“Yes, begin the spell,” the raspy voice said.

The voices cloaked in shadow above began to chant—guttural, dark and animalistic noise reverberating around the cave. Isabel waited, wondering what to expect. She didn’t have to wait long. A blob of spinning darkness, illuminated by flecks of sparkling purple, began to form in the air between her and Clotus. It grew in size as it spun faster and faster until it split in two with only a thread of darkness between the two halves. Very quickly the thread elongated as it spun, until a blob of darkness engulfed Isabel and Clotus at the same time, surrounding each of them with dark magic.

Isabel couldn’t breathe, coldness seeped into her very soul as the black magic worked within her. She watched in horror as Clotus transformed into a perfect likeness of her, right down to the color of her eyes and the shade of her chestnut-brown hair.

The magic abruptly faded and Clotus smiled.

“You see, I am now you,” she said in Isabel’s voice. “Phane will welcome me into his fortress and then he will fall to me.”

Her smile widened and she looked up to the rest of the coven. “This one is special,” she said. “I can feel the darkness within her. With the proper preparation and motivation, I believe she could summon Mother.”

Madness erupted from the shadows above.

“How can this be?” asked the reasonable voice.

“Yes, how?” said the raspy voice.

“She has a connection to the darkness within her,” Clotus said. “I can feel it through the link.” Her eyes narrowed and fear ghosted across her face before she snarled, “She also has a connection to the light, though Azugorath has blocked it.”

“She may be more valuable than we first thought,” the reasonable voice said.

“Yes,” the raspy voice said. “We will think on how best to use her. For now, Severine will keep her prisoner here until we decide how she can serve us.”

There was a barking agreement from the rest of the coven.

Clotus knocked at the door and a guard opened it.

“Yes, Mistress,” he said, seeming to know she was one of the witches, even though her appearance had changed.

“Take this one back to your King. See to it that she remains here as our guest until we call for her again.”