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Nadine nodded, then addressed the others. “Lend me your power and repeat the incantation. I’ll do the rest.”
We began to recite the incantation. Magic surged through me, and it was so powerful I nearly lost my grip on Nadine’s hand. I held on tighter. My friends’ magic pulsed throughout our circle as we combined our power into a single spell. Above us, the lights flickered, and then went out.
Onyx gasped, and Grant gave a start. Talia shot nervous glances around the room, and Miles looked a bit shaken. Helena didn’t take her eyes off Nadine. Chloe, Hattie, and Professor Warren remained relatively calm.
I watched Nadine as I continued speaking the incantation with the others. She had her eyes closed, looking deep in concentration. Slowly, the magic pulsing through me evened out, and it flowed effortlessly.
Nadine opened her eyes and stared into the crystal ball. Smoke swirled within the glass, and all gazes turned to watch the images taking shape. It was like watching a movie. We saw a cloaked figure with bones for hands and a skull for a head appear. A bright light shone behind him—so bright I had to squint to see anything. I couldn’t make out any shapes except for the reaper. I assumed this to be a depiction of Alora.
Then the scene shifted, and it showed him stepping through a portal. His surroundings turned dark, though I could make out the shadows of gravestones in front of him. He approached a figure in the cemetery and spoke with them for a moment, before the scene shifted again and he appeared inside a home. I recognized Helena’s living room, and I saw Nadine as the reaper took her soul from her body.
The incantation had asked us to show us where he’d been, and it was playing out the night we’d encountered him—the night of Nadine’s Evoking Ceremony when I’d sent him to the Abyss so that he couldn’t take Nadine there.
The scene sped up, until it depicted three figures in the woods—Edgar, Nadine, and me. Edgar and I fought, until I kicked his skull off his body and sent it sailing through the portal. Edgar’s headless form approached me, and he blasted off another spell that ricocheted off my shield. The spell hit him, shooting him through the portal. Thunder cracked, like it had that night when the portal slammed closed.
Nadine and I disappeared from view as the scene followed Edgar’s perspective. He tumbled downward into a dark, fiery landscape. He landed on black, crusted ground that looked like the remnants of cooled lava. His bony fingers felt around until he found his skull and positioned it back on his head. Though his eye sockets were empty, Edgar shifted his head from side to side, taking in the fires of hell. His jaw hung slack, and he quickly lifted his hands like he was going to create another portal.
Nothing happened. Edgar drew a wand from his cloak. The end glowed a bright red, and sparks flew out of the end of it…
But the portal never came. Edgar was stuck in the Abyss.
The smoke inside the crystal ball faded, until the glass became clear again. The lights overhead turned on, and our magic dissipated. The whole room remained silent for several beats.
Nadine was the first to speak. “Edgar is in the Abyss, and he has been since Lucas sent him there. Lucas, you said that reaping is different from portal magic. Even though reaping uses portals, it also affects the soul. Edgar was in the middle of reaping me, but he fell through the portal and reaped himself. Your powers could’ve amplified the reaping, too. It must’ve damaged his soul, so he can’t escape. Edgar’s been stuck there all this time.”
“I never meant to hurt him like that,” I admitted. “I only wanted to protect you.”
“You couldn’t have known,” Nadine insisted.
I furrowed my brow thoughtfully. “This actually makes a lot of sense. This must be why he hasn’t come to mentor me. Maybe he wants to contact me but can’t because of something I did that night.”
“At least we know where to find him, and he isn’t going anywhere,” Professor Warren said. “We know we need to get to the Abyss to get the Mentalist Wand. Now we know the Mortana Wand is there, too. We can get them both in one journey and bring them back together.”
Verla stepped forward. “We have to go to Malovia as soon as possible, so we can find a portal to the Abyss and get those Wands.”
“This is dangerous,” Helena insisted.
“But necessary,” Nadine argued.
Helena placed her hands on her hips. “And once you get to the Abyss, how are you getting out?”
“The same way we got in,” Nadine stated. “Monsters slip through portals to Malovia all the time. If they can get out of the Abyss, so can we.”
We’d gone over this before, and Helena never liked the answer. Helena sighed. “I’m merely stating that you must be prepared.”
“We’ve been infusing crystals with magic all summer, so we’ll have extra power to make our spells stronger,” I reminded her. “The crystals will give us an edge if the Waning affects us while we’re down there, but I don’t believe that’ll be a problem. The Waning has barely touched us all summer. It’s like the further we are from Octavia Falls, the better our magic performs.”
Talia looked thoughtful. “Maybe it’s not about distance, but about uniting. The divide in the coven is causing the Waning. Perhaps our magic is working because our group is united.”
“I think you’re on to something,” I mused. “But there has to be a connection to town, too. Verla said her magic has been affected since she approached town earlier, when she met up with Hattie.”
“Either way, if division is causing the Waning, then uniting is the solution,” Miles said. “If we can convince everyone else to unite, the Waning will go away, right? If that’s the answer, then why aren’t we focusing on uniting the coven instead of finding these Wands?”
“If we don’t get them, the priestesses will, and then we’ll be powerless to stop them,” I explained. “They’ve already summoned a demon. They can do it again and use it to locate the Wands in the Abyss. All it takes is for them to make a deal with a demon to give them the Wands, and if they offer a demon the right bargain, he’ll get the Wands for them. We need to get them first.”
“Who cares if the priestesses have the Wands?” Miles argued. “If the coven unites, everyone can defeat them together. Besides, even if they get the two Wands in the Abyss, they still don’t have the Curse Breaker Wand. The priestesses are powerless without Nadine.”
“That’s not true,” Nadine cut in. “With four Wands, they would have the power of four Casts at their fingertips. They could take magic from everyone except me, and then they could kill me in an instant. The only reason they didn’t kill me earlier is to prevent an uprising, but we’re past that now. We have enough wards that the priestesses can’t curse us or track us down right now, but if they have the power of all four Casts, they can overpower all the coven. No one is going to be able to revolt if the priestesses are controlling their magic. Even if we unite the coven and bring an end to the Waning, none of it will matter if the priestesses have the Wands. They’ll create a Waning of their own to control people. Then the priestesses will use the Oaken Wands to divide us further.”
