Page 70 of Spring L.A.W.
“It’slonely.” Her voice cracked. “It doesn't want to fight. It just doesn't know how tobeanymore. It doesn’twant to beanymore.”
The mimic slowly moved closer, gently, until its formless smoke hovered over Joell like a shadow of something that used to be real.
Rayna swallowed. “If we let it go, will it bring others?”
“There are no others,” Joell said. “Not anymore.”
A long silence followed. Then Joell’s hand clenched. She looked at Rayna and whispered, “It wants to consume me. It can fight, but you have to cauterize me.”
“What?”
“Do it. Now. While I still have control.”
“No. There has to be another?—”
“She invited it in,” Victoria said quietly. “She’s the doorway. The only way to close it is from both sides.”
Joell smiled, soft and full of light. “I trust you, Rayna.”
“But do you trustitto doitspart?”
“Yes.”
Then Rayna, shaking, furious, already grieving, pressed a hand to Joell’s chest and released the most beautiful, terrible heat she had ever drawn into her body.
The mimic groaned. Not in pain or rage. Inrelief.Its shape burst into threads of light, each strand carrying a sound: laughter, music, names in languages no one remembered. The firelight crackled and rose from Joell’s eyes like embers into the sky, then vanished.
Joell collapsed. Rayna caught her just before she hit the ground. The glow faded from her eyes. Her body was too warm, but she was breathing.
“She’s alive,” Rayna said, barely above a whisper. “She’s going to beokay. Right, Magda? Right?”
Brianna let out a sob. Magda dropped to her knees. Katie sat down hard and cried, hugging her fish bubble.
Payne limped over and crouched beside Rayna, his arm slung around her back. “Is it over?”
Rayna nodded. “It was the last of its kind.”
He glanced at the empty sky. “That almost makes me feel sorry for it.”
“Me too,” Rayna said. “But not enough to let it take her. Or any of us.”
They sat in the settling dark as the sky healed overhead. There would be scars. There always were. But the battle was over. And the doorway was shut.
“Sheesh!Why do we always have to respond to these supernatural emergencies during our vacation week?” Lioness asked as they returned to the mansion.
“Only witches would consider PMS week to be a vacation,” Payne said.
“Why not? We’re not just witches, we’re women!” Rayna snapped. “It’s not like we’re incapacitated.”
“I—I know that.” Payne said sheepishly.
“Besides, that’s when we get our best writing done,” Lioness added. “We have a nice, quiet place with plenty of privacy in the mountains and don’t even have to pack.”
Payne ran a finger under his collar to loosen it. “Well, I just thought… Um…”
“We know what you thought,” Joell said. “And you’re not wrong. That’s why we lock up our weapons and take the week off.”
“Whew,” he muttered under his breath.
