Crown of Magic Read online

  “It is, but I’d rather admire it in the day,” she admitted, before turning to Alex. “Have you got the map of the cemetery?”

  He patted his pocket. “Right here. Yvonne’s grave is on the higher section, to the rear.”

  “How did you get a map?” Reuben asked, baffled.

  “Off the council’s website, you twit. The site’s so big they keep a list of who’s buried where.”

  Reuben looked mock-offended. “That’s a bit harsh. It was a simple question!”

  Alex led the way up the lane that was edged by high hedges, bantering with Reuben, until they reached the main entrance where a large and currently empty car park was set before two enormous iron gates. A small brick building was located just beyond them. Alex quickly spelled the gates unlocked, and the hinges creaked as they pushed the gate open and edged inside, shutting it quietly behind them.

  It was odd, Avery reflected, that they should keep their voices down and be so quiet. The cemetery was well away from houses, so it wasn’t like anyone could hear them. But she guessed it was natural to be quiet in such places. It felt more respectful—which was ironic, considering what they were about to do.

  Alex led them onto the main path, and after a short distance turned left, leading them up the hillside. “It’s this way.”

  Hunter was close behind him, and he said, “Kit must be buried here too, Alex.”

  Alex turned to look at him, his eyes glinting silver under the night sky. “He is, further along to the right. I checked earlier.”

  “Do you want me to piss on it?”

  Briar gave a tiny shriek and smacked his arm. “Hunter!”

  Alex laughed unexpectedly. “Thanks for the offer, but not right now. It’s his spirit that’s worrying me, not his grave.”

  Hunter shrugged. “If you change your mind, just say the word.”

  Briar stepped around him and glared. “I cannot believe you just said that.”

  “I’m being supportive!”

  “I expect that of Reuben, but not you!”

  “Oh, thanks!” Reuben grumbled from behind Hunter. “It’s fine that I’m offensive?”

  “No, but you just do it all the time,” Briar told him.

  El smirked. “Both of you, shut up and move on. And I don’t mean you, Briar,” she added as Briar looked at her, startled.

  Avery sniggered as they continued to toil up the hill towards the plot where Yvonne was buried. She’d rather this banter than stony silence. It was creepy enough with the sound of the wind whistling through the trees, and the faint glow of the headstones in the dark.

  Finally Alex slowed down, checking the names as he walked, until he came to a stop in front of a grave marked with a plain, pale headstone. He threw a witch-light over the stone, and silence fell for a moment as they read the simple engraving.

  Briar shook her head. “She was only twenty-five! How tragic.”

  “Avoidably tragic!” Alex added harshly. “Bewitched by my vindictive grandfather.”

  “Is Charles Ball’s grave here somewhere?” El asked.

  “A few rows up from here,” Alex told her. “I’m presuming his spirit is resting somewhere peacefully, and therefore we don’t need to disturb his grave.”

  “Let’s hope so,” she said as she pulled her backpack to the ground and extracted the Empusa’s sword from it.

  “Expecting trouble?” Avery asked.

  El gave her a wry smile. “I’m hoping not, but I want to be prepared.”

  Briar slipped her shoes off and wriggled her feet in the grass. “Let’s hope we don’t experience what the Nephilim did in Old Haven’s churchyard.”

  “Thanks for reminding us of that, Briar,” Reuben said sarcastically. “Hundreds of bodies rising from their graves isn’t exactly what I want to think about right now!”

  “Nothing like that will happen here,” Alex said decisively. “Briar can raise the coffin, then we’ll get the ring and go. This will be short and not quite so sweet.” He looked at Hunter and Reuben. “Can you two check the approaching paths, just to make sure no one else is here?”

  “Sure,” Reuben nodded, and after a brief discussion between the two of them, Hunter headed one way and Reuben the other.

  “You all need to move back,” Briar told El, Avery, and Alex. “I’m going to try to keep this as tightly controlled as possible, but it will still dislodge the ground around the grave for a few feet.”

  They nodded, and Avery stepped back several paces, watching Alex as he moved his pack and retreated to the next grave. There wasn’t a lot of space between the plots, Avery noted, and she hoped they wouldn’t disturb them.

  When they were out of the way, Briar stood a short distance from the foot of the grave and raised her hands as she started to intone the spell. For a few moments, nothing happened, and then Avery felt a rumble deep beneath her feet. Startled, she stepped back again, catching Alex’s eye, and he smiled reassuringly at her before turning his attention to the grave.

  The earth churned and the rumble grew in strength until waves of soil thrust the coffin to the surface, and with a loud crack, the headstone tipped back.

  Avery gasped, her hand to her mouth, and stepped back with a grimace.

  The force of the coffin’s expulsion from the ground had caused the already rotten wood to disintegrate, revealing a glimpse of the skeleton within. Alex leapt into action, wasting no time, and Avery gathered herself together and stepped forward to help.

  Briar shook her head as she knelt in the earth. “I hate doing this.”

  Alex glanced up at her. “I’m sorry, Briar. We could have dug it up and saved you the trouble.”

  “No, it would have taken hours. It’s for the best.”

  Alex gently pulled the coffin lid away, but it virtually collapsed in his hands, and beneath the earth that had seeped into the coffin they saw the pale, skeletal remains of Yvonne. Mummified skin still clung to her bones, and remnants of clothing too, but Avery pushed it to the back of her mind, focussing on clearing the earth gently away from her body. She summoned air beneath her fingers and moved her hands lightly over the remains, blowing the earth away from the bones where she could. Unfortunately, most of the earth was damp and heavy, and they had no choice but to move it with their hands.

  “We need more light,” El said, pulling a torch from her pack and shining it across the grave. “This will be better than witch-light.”

  With Alex on one side and Avery on the other they moved quickly, working from the shoulders down the arm to her fingers. But the bones were displaced, and the small hand bones were scattered through the soil.

  “Shit!” Alex exclaimed. “This isn’t like in the films.”

  A startling crack made them stop and look around, and in the silence that followed they surveyed the surroundings warily.

  “Did I imagine that?” Avery asked.

  El panned her torch around, the Empusa’s sword clutched tightly in her other hand. “No. It sounded like a pop of energy.” She handed the torch to Briar, and summoning a ball of magic into her other hand, said, “I’ll keep watch, carry on!”

  Avery concentrated on finding the ring, and was vaguely aware that Briar had stood, too. She felt a prickle of discomfort that suggested something else was there with them, but trying to ignore it, she kept filtering through the soil, finally finding some finger bones. “Alex, I’ve found a hand, but there’s no ring!”

  He grunted. “Me, too. It must be in the soil somewhere.”

  “If it’s here at all!” she reasoned.

  Alex looked up at her sharply. “It has to be. She said it is. Keep looking.”

  A crackle of magic and a flare of bright white light fizzed around them, and El yelled, “Keep your head down! It’s Kit.”

  Within seconds, flashes of energy were erupting around them, and Avery heard Reuben and Hunter arrive. Avery focussed only on the grave, filtering through debris as quickly as she could, and trying not to gag as she came upon bits of skin an
d tangles of rotten clothing. Half the time she couldn’t even work out what was what. “Why the hell didn’t we bring gloves?” she muttered to Alex.

  “Because we don’t rob graves very often,” he grumbled back.

  An energy ball whizzed past Avery’s ears, and as the rattling report from a shotgun resounded through the night, she flattened herself against the ground. When she finally lifted her head, her mouth fell open in shock.

  Kit’s spectral form was prowling a few feet away, and his dark eyes glowed with an unearthly light. If anything, his spirit seemed more corporeal than it had only the night before. Energy surrounded him in a nimbus of light and flickered from his fingertips. Reuben and Briar were hurling balls of fire at him, and Hunter pointed Reuben’s shotgun loaded with salt shells. Circling as closely as he could, Hunter fired at Kit while El tried to get near enough to attack him with her sword, but he fended them both off.

  Avery turned back to the grave, trying to ignore the activity around her. A glint of metal appeared beneath her fingers. “I’ve found it,” she said, relieved, and then had to backtrack. “No, it’s a bracelet, sorry.”

  “It’s okay, keep going,” Alex muttered.

  “Why don’t you try to banish him?” Avery suggested as she worked. “I’ll do this.”

  “No. He’s too strong now, and it would take too long,” Alex said, barely looking at her as he frantically searched through the earth. “And besides, when I finally do it, I want to make sure that everything else is in place.”

  A shudder ran through the ground beneath them and the earth shifted, and then Avery, Alex, and the coffin began to sink back into the ground. “Briar!” she yelled, trying not to panic.

  “Sorry!” Briar shouted back, and with another rumble, they shot back up again.

  With a nervous glance at each other, Alex and Avery continued to search with increasing haste until Alex shouted. “Here! I’ve got it.” He held a small ring up to her, crusted with earth and with a bone still in it, and with a grimace he shook the bone free and pocketed the ring.

  “Would there be any other rings?” Avery asked.

  “No. She said this was it.”

  They leapt to their feet, and Alex shouted, “I’ve got it! Briar, sink the coffin again.”

  His shout attracted Kit’s attention, and he rasped, “I can’t let you have that, Alex.”

  They were all spread out now in a loose semicircle around Kit, trying to hold off his attack as best they could. It was obvious he didn’t like the salt from the shotgun, because with every blast that hit him, he staggered further back.

  “Too late,” Alex yelled back, and sent a well-timed burst of searing, jagged energy at Kit’s chest, jolting him backwards so far that he flew right through a tree trunk.

  Briar, meanwhile, was focussing on burying Yvonne’s coffin again, the earth folding around it and drawing it downwards until it completely vanished. The others kept buying her time to smooth the ground over and lift the gravestone back into position. Unfortunately, other graves weren’t faring as well. A couple had been hit with magic, pockmarking them with cracks and shards of stone that had dislodged with the fury of their attack.

  But Kit kept coming, and Avery knew that unless they could banish him somewhere, he would follow them all the way home—and looking at the worried expression on everyone else’s faces, they all knew it.

  Alex headed to Avery’s side and lowered his voice while the others continued to distract Kit. “There’s a bag of salt in my pack—I need your help!”

  She nodded, spotting the bag behind the next grave. “What do you want me to do?”

  “Find his grave and pour salt around all but a small section. Leave the rest to me—you’ll know when to complete the circle.”

  “Just give me a few minutes!”

  Alex nodded and thrust the plan of the graves into her hand, and without saying another word, resumed his attack on Kit, who was proving very resilient.

  Avery scrambled to Alex’s backpack and pulled the large bag of salt out. Summoning air, she used witch-flight to fly a short distance away and quickly consulted the map. For a few seconds she had trouble placing herself, and then she realised where she was. She ran through the graves, zigzagging along the paths, until she virtually stumbled on it. Like Yvonne’s, it was a plain headstone with a simple epitaph. She quickly circled the grave, pouring a thick white line of salt around all but a few inches, and then looked across the cemetery to where the others continued to battle Kit.

  White light flashed, illuminating trees and bushes. A scorched smell filled the air, and the silence of the night was disturbed by shouts, thumping, and the regular boom of the shotgun. Avery looked towards White Haven, and realised that if anyone were looking up at the hills, they would see the lights. If they weren’t quick, the police may arrive.

  Avery threw a handful of witch-lights into the air, firing them up like fireworks, in the hope that Alex would see them and know she was ready, but seconds stretched into minutes, and the frenzy of magical energy continued. Just as she was wondering whether to join the others, Kit’s spirit streaked past her and plunged into the ground. She leapt forward and completed the salt circle. Summoning her power, she uttered a spell to seal it, and within seconds a bright blue light flashed across the grave.

  Silence fell along with the darkness, which seemed more intense than it had been only moments before. But she didn’t move. She stood with raised hands watching Kit’s grave, until she heard the thundering of footsteps and voices as the others arrived next to her.

  Alex sounded breathless as he skidded to a halt at her side. “Is he in there?”

  Avery grinned at him as relief swept through her. “Yes, he’s there, and I’ve sealed the circle, too.”

  “Great,” he said with a sigh.

  He looked like he’d just battled a hurricane. His hair was wild and dirt was smeared across his face, and when she looked around at the others, she noted they all looked similarly dishevelled. “Wow. Look at you guys. Do I look as shit as you do?”

  “Yep—although, you probably smell better than I do,” Reuben said, pulling her to him for quick hug. The he grimaced and pushed her away. “Wrong. You stink of dead people.”

  “Thanks, Reuben. I guess that’s what happens when you scrabble about in someone’s grave.” She looked at the others. “Is Yvonne’s grave back to normal?”

  Briar shrugged. “I’ll smooth it over before we leave. What are we doing with the ring?”

  Alex pulled it gingerly out of his pocket, still wrapped in a cloth, and unfolding it gently, he let the others see it.

  “It’s very pretty,” El said, as she pointed the torch on it. Then she shuddered. “I remember the feeling of that cursed necklace, though. That was the worst thing I’ve ever experienced.”

  Reuben squeezed her shoulder. “Let’s get this over with, Alex.”

  “Are we sure we want to do this here?” Hunter asked. He still had the shotgun cocked, and he looked as if he was ready to spring into action.

  “Yes,” Alex answered, looking determined. “I want this ring gone by the time Kit breaks out of this.”

  El looked at him, puzzled. “What spell did you use?”

  “It’s a type of binding spell. I’ve bound Kit’s spirit to his bones. It won’t last long, because technically his spirit is already free of his body and it was a simple spell, but it will last long enough for us to get this done, at least. Besides,” he said, glancing at El, “your knife that can destroy anything should work.”

  “It didn’t work for the Empusa’s ring,” Briar reminded them.

  El pulled the knife free from the scabbard on her waistband. “I’m confident it will for this. Put it on the ground, Alex.”

  Alex walked away from Kit’s grave and placed the ring on the bare earth, and El crouched next to it. She held the knife at arms’ length, leaning her head back, too. It was always wise to be careful with cursed objects, Avery reflected. El pressed the knife ag
ainst the ring, and with a puff of black smoke, the ring split into two and then ignited. The flames burned green and black, until only a dirty black reside of metal remained.

  Immediately Yvonne’s spirit appeared before them, and they all jumped back with surprise. Her ghost was faint, the cemetery clearly visible through her, but Avery’s attention was drawn to her face. A broad smile was spread across it, and she saw her lips move soundlessly before she vanished.

  “What did she say?” Avery asked Alex, who was grinning and looking very pleased with himself.

  “She said ‘thank you.’ Job done! We freed her spirit!”

  “Just like that?” Reuben asked, looking surprised.

  Alex nodded. “Just like that. Destroying the ring did it. One spirit down, one to go. Let’s get out of here.”

  22

  Avery and Alex stood in the empty lounge area of The Wayward Son and looked around, perplexed.

  “Any idea of where we should start?” Avery asked.

  “Not really,” Alex said, shaking his head. His arms were folded across his chest and he turned slowly. “The walls and floor are the most obvious places, and the fireplace. The structure of the place hasn’t changed that much since Kit ran it. I think there may have been a couple of smaller rooms, but they’ve been knocked out—hence the pillars.” He pointed to a couple of large brick columns that supported the ceiling.

  “Come on, let’s get on with that finding spell we talked about yesterday.” Avery headed to the back room where they couldn’t be overlooked by anyone who might peer through the windows from the street. “It’s worth trying,” she said in answer to Alex’s sceptical expression as he followed her.

  “I wondered what you were running around collecting this morning.” Alex nodded. “All right. Did you bring a map so that we can check the locations across White Haven, too?”

  She patted her bag. “I’m well prepared.”