11. Elder Witch

eleven

“He’s going to kill me when he sees you.”

Something snapped over Milla’s skin. She lurched forward, hauled off of her bed and onto her knees by a sharp pull at the center of her belly. She threw her arms out, catching herself on hands and knees to keep from crashing to the floor.

Each breath came too quick, too shallow, her heartbeat one continuous thrum, buzzing in her chest like the drone of hummingbird wings and prickling in her hands and feet. Spots bloomed at the corners of her vision. She fought to fill her lungs, and then a breath caught. And another, pants slowing to gasps. Her heartbeat tripped into quick pulses, longer now, dropping into a steady thub-dub. Her vision cleared—or slowed? until the veins in the marble were no longer smudges but fine and separate details.

“I-I’m in the cell,” she panted.

Millapet?

“I’m in Jacksonville.”

“What are you going on about?” Heels clacked against the floor, stopping just out of MIlla’s line of sight.

“I’m in the cells, in Jacksonville. I’m a Death Witch, my demesne is St. Augustine, and” —she raised her head, scowling at the pointed shiny-leather toe of an expensive high heel—“those are the stupidest shoes to wear in a prison.”

“Charming,” Lou drawled. Milla followed the stitched line on her Ponte pants up to a tailored blouse and blazer combo. A Dara Knot hung low against Lou’s breastbone from a thin gold chain, the twisted metal gleaming in the orange-yellow light.

For all the care put into her outfit, Lou’s expression was strained. A tightness pulled at her mouth, and her makeup barely hid the faint shadows beneath her eyes. Hair that had been meticulously styled every time Milla saw the witch was pulled now into a bun at the nape of her neck, the fly-aways and uneven coil suggesting she’d tied it back while rushing out the door.

Lou glanced back at the door, eyeing the empty hallway for a moment before returning her blue-green gaze to Milla.

“You look tired,” Milla stated, still on her hands and knees. Lou frowned, nudged her fingertips with the toe of one heel, and stepped back. A long moment passed before she tossed a tan folder on the bed and crossed her arms.

“You look wretched,” she replied. “I know regular showers are out of the question, but would it kill you to eat?”

Who is that, Milla?

“No one.” She rose slowly, closing her eyes as a wave of dizziness surged in her head.

“What was that?”

“No.” Milla faced Lou, fists clenched at her sides. “No, it wouldn’t kill me to eat. Any chance I’ll ever get more than thirty seconds to do so?”

Lou narrowed her eyes. She swept the folder from the bed and tossed it at Milla’s feet. “We need your expertise.”

“My expertise?” Her entire body twitched in shock. “With what?”

“An affair for which you are uniquely qualified to offer insight.” Lou gestured to the folder, waiting as Milla stooped and took it from the floor.

It was unlabeled, the edges crisp, suggesting whatever was inside had been assembled moments before Lou headed to the cells. She perched on the edge of the mattress, her crisp appearance at odds with the dingy, worn bedding, waiting as Milla opened the folder and immediately wished she had not.

The first page was a graph of multi-colored wavy lines, some arcing high, others a warble of tight curves. Reds, blues, purples, and yellows woven together almost in synchrony, while an anomalous line arced and fell so tightly, it was almost a blur.

The next page was the same, so Milla flipped back, frowning at the location listed in tiny point font beneath the graph. “Daytona?”

“From the day of your arrest,” Lou said. “We’ve pulled the E.R.I.E. records to use as a baseline.”

“For what?” She scrunched her brows together and turned to the second page, frowning as she read the exact words she expected to see.

St. Augustine.

“With this, the readings from Daytona, and help from my brother, we isolated the signature of a Death Witch.” Paper crinkled between Milla’s fingers, and she forced herself to remain still. “At first, this report could be explained away as coming from your demesne. The residual echoes of your magick are imbued into every tree and stone.”

“If you know all that, why do you need my expertise?” Lou’s face was just visible out of the corner of her eye, watching her closely. “Why tell me any of this?”

Lou plucked the St. Augustine paper from her hand and held it beside a third printout of an identical graph. Milla bit the inside of her cheek, scanning the graph and squinting at the tiny font.

“This signature surge is from an unsanctioned ritual in Savannah three days ago.” Lou pointed to the yellow line. “Hippocromantic, chronomantic, vinefica.” And traced the different warbles and arcs before finally flicking the topmost peak of the black line. “And this blur here is a Death Witch.”

“That’s impossible.” Milla flipped the page over and back again, glancing between it, the St. Augustine graph, and Daytona. “I’ve been in here for …”

How long, Millapet?

“Which is precisely why we require your expertise.” Lou took the folder, replaced the sheets, and tucked it under her arm. “We identified a commonality between the instances. A member of my team is running the data on a third recorded instance in Hattiesburg.”

Milla sank to the floor, leaning against the wall and propping her forearms on her knees. Waiting. Lou stared back at her as calmly as if waiting for a bus. When she offered nothing else, Milla drawled, “Please, the anticipation is killing me.”

“Missing witches,” she said. “In each of these events, a witch has been reported missing by their home coven. Your arrest is the outlier, and I want to know why.”

“Why what?”

“Why your signature appears in unsanctioned rituals resulting in the disappearance of witches.”

A harsh bark of a laugh shoved out of Milla’s throat, rushing past her lips before she could stop it. “How in the nine rings would I know? I’ve been here .” She threw her arm out, gesturing to the cell.

“You have, yes.” Lou stepped closer, looming over Milla, serene and tall. “But what of another Death Witch?”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Then tell me what you know.”

Milla dropped her head back against the marble, closing her eyes and relishing the dull pop of pain. “I don’t know anything. I’m not even supposed to exist; isn’t that why you put me down here?”

“I did not put you down here, Ludmilla,” Lou answered. “You put yourself here.”

Maybe it was the cool, calm way she delivered the words. Or maybe it was the way she looked down at Milla—perfect, put-together Luminescence Simmons, with her tailored Ponte pants, flawless bone structure, and tilt to her mouth that was all too much like Darkly’s. Whatever it was, it snapped the last of Milla’s restraint.

She popped to her feet, rising on her tiptoes and still falling short of being anything close to threatening to the tall witch. “Your brother is the reason I’m down here. He used me as bait for that raw-head. You used me as bait. All I did was defend my demesne from a desecrant and a Horned God-damned Voodoo spirit. All I did was my job, and then your brother gave C.R.O.W. my location.”

“Is that what you think happened?”

“It’s what I know happened!” She ducked around Lou, putting space between herself and the witch before she did something truly stupid. “Goddess, if you need to talk to missing witches so badly, why don’t you ask him? Maybe they’re dead. Isn’t talking to ghosts, like, his whole deal?”

She lobbed that last bit over her shoulder, which was the only reason she saw it—the crack in Lou’s veneer. Her upper lip twitched, and she blinked. It was tiny. Subtle and so brief anyone who wasn’t looking never would have noticed.

But Milla did. She had spent weeks learning Darkly’s tics and tells. Running beside and behind the witch, sitting across from him at tables, and studying him from that asinine bean bag.

And it had only taken a week for Milla to recognize when she managed to land an insult.

She faced Lou and crossed her arms, biding her time with this tiny triumph. Something had earned that reaction, and if she could determine what it was, she could—what, exactly? Insulting Lou was not going to get her out of the cells.

She exhaled, stuck between wanting to stay silent and feeling a weirdly displaced need to apologize, when Lou sighed and swept a hand over her hair.

“You need to work with us,” she said. “I have seen the evidence, Ludmilla. I have read the case C.R.O.W. has built against you—”

“No fucking shit, you were there for most of it.”

Lou’s eyes flashed a brilliant teal. “This does not have to be so hard on you, Ludmilla. Work with us. Explain away this supposed Death Witch. Help us so I can help you.”

“Help me with what , Luminescence?”

Wait. Is that Lou?

Milla swatted the empty air, brushing away that voice as one would brush away a fly. Lou tracked the movement. Her mouth softened, and, dare it be suggested, she smiled.

“The Third Head is a dear family friend,” she said.

“I—” Milla blinked and backed away. “What?”

“It will take some finessing, but it is within the realm of possibility.” She raised one finger, eyes gleaming. “If you agree, that is.”

“Agree to what?”

Don’t listen to her, Milla , the voice in her head urged. Louder, now, and more frantic than ever. You can’t trust a thing that witch says.

“Work with us.” Lou’s voice was calm, her posture easy and confident. “The team of Enforcers I lead is unique, but for all my witches bring to the cauldron, we’re operating at a loss.” She tossed the folder onto the mattress and crossed her arms, but Milla was not fooled. A tendon stood out tight against her neck, and her shoulders were held tight, their line too straight. It was all too staged, too perfect. Goddess, even the glowing light from the hallway caught perfectly along Lou’s cheekbones, making her look like some otherworldly fae creature. “We need you, and you need out of this cell.”

What is she saying, Millapet?

“Are you implying that you can get me out of here?”

It was ludicrous. Deranged and unfathomable. Milla was a Death Witch accused of the Forbidden and Foule, and the very witch who witnessed her dust a raw-head was offering her freedom?

Not freedom.

What had Darkly said? He had been benched for something. He had needed Milla to—no. He wanted out, and the price of his freedom was delivering her to C.R.O.W. Darkly had traded Milla for himself, and now Lou wanted to get her out of the cells.

Think! For once in your life, think, that voice hissed.

Milla pressed her fists against her temples when Lou did not answer and turned her back to escape that piercing, needling gaze. She wanted to sit, curl into a tiny ball on her awful mattress, and block out the world so she could think.

What else did she know? What else had Darkly let slip that could not be discounted as a lie?

Lou was his handler. A Light Witch for a Dark Witch, two sides of the same coin. She had been his guardian and his jezibaba , caring for a Dark Witch just stumbling into his Ways. A Dark Witch who had been allowed to become an Enforcer while Milla was hidden away in the Keys, kept under C.R.O.W.’s nose by one of their own. Forced to ignore her Way while Darkly was allowed to thrive.

Something noxious churned in her chest, tightening as a pressure around her lungs. He had been allowed to live , but at what cost?

Natje’s offhand comment crept along the edges of Milla’s mind, slipping in under the anger and stretching tall.

C.R.O.W.’s darling Light Witch and her pet.

Yes, he had been allowed to live, but Lou—his guardian, his jezibaba —clearly held a tight leash.

Milla had been handled before. She’d been kept on a similar leash by Morgen and again by Ezra, only tasting a semblance of freedom for the year and a half she was back in St. Augustine before that Horned God-damned Loa and Darkly arrived.

But what sort of freedom was that? Drowning her Way, ducking her head, and keeping out of notice, out of sight. If she said yes—if she agreed to work with Lou, agreed to be handled by her; if any witch could convince C.R.O.W. that Milla was worth using rather than cleaving, it had to be Lou, the Light Witch who had raised a witch forbidden and foul.

“There will be training with the core team,” Lou stated. “As Keir explains it, your tolerance for your Way is abysmal—”

“Lovely,” Milla bit out, crossing her arms. Ezra’s voice sang in her head, the tone soft and patient as it always was in those early days. Test the scene , he would advise, guiding Milla by the hand through the grand illusions he had cast just for her. Prod the edges, and seek out the inconsistencies.

“—and I cannot have you endangering the rest of my coven,” Lou finished and narrowed her eyes. “You’ll have to get over whatever that is.” One finger flicked in Milla’s direction. “You don’t have to like everyone on the team, but trust among us is necessary.”

Apply pressure and see what gives.

“Trust?” She barked a harsh laugh. “How can I trust the witch who turned me in?”

“Is that what you think happened?”

“He said it himself.” Milla leaned against the wall, assuming as casual a pose as she could while her attention never strayed from Lou’s face. If there were going to be a tell or a tic, it would be now. Another twitch of the lip. The flicker of an eyelid. “He needed a win to get unbenched.”

Lou’s stupidly perfect face remained serene. “I suppose he did.”

Okay, not that, then.

“What’s in it for me?” Milla tried.

“Beyond living?” One heel tocked against the floor as Lou took a step. And another, the sharp sound bouncing off the walls. The light within Lou, the force of her Way that made her skin glow, brightened, the blue-green of her eyes heating to a painfully bright teal. Milla pressed against the wall. Every cell in her body screamed for her to drop her gaze, close her eyes, look away, but Milla had stared down worse and survived. “What else could a Death Witch want?”

“I want …” The words died on her tongue, even as she screamed them in her mind.

Out of these cells. My demesne and Diego. My store and Julie, and the occult boards. Freedom. A life .

If she could just get her mouth to work, get her tongue to form the words, she could answer the question and Lou would relent. Instead, her fingers and toes tingled. Searing pain cut into the inside of her wrist, scraping up her arm. Milla ripped her gaze away from Lou, down to where her nails dug into the crook of her right elbow. Angry, jagged lines crawled up her inner arm, trailing the stretch of her scar, and beads of crimson red welled in a dotted line.

When did I do that?

“One last chance, Ludmilla.” Lou backed away, her bright gaze still on Milla but absent the caustic gleam. “Work with us.”

In the end, the decision was easy. Milla supposed it always had been, and why wouldn’t it?

Hadn’t she made the same choice time and time again? Hadn’t she sacrificed bits of her Shade and Soul for years? Chaining herself to Ezra, agreeing to perform the ritual on Lake Pontchartrain, dusting the raw-head, and sending Anaisa back to the Gates—hadn’t she done all of that for a chance to live?

Millapet, no.

“Yes.”

Lou’s shoulders hitched, her eyes widening momentarily in surprise before her entire posture relaxed. “Oh, thank the Goddess.” She spun and knocked on the door. The tumblers groaned, gears clacking, and the door opened to reveal Agent Sterne on the other side. Lou nodded to the Enforcer and crossed the threshold without looking back.

“Wait.” Milla rushed across the cell and skidded to a halt as Agent Sterne held his palm out in warning. She popped onto her toes, barely able to see Lou over his shoulder. “How are you going to convince C.R.O.W. not to cleave me?”

Lou slowed and spun, regarding Milla with the same cold calm she had during her arrest. After a long beat, she nodded, and something like a smile curled her lips. “Same as I did last time.”