in the city. Sitting up, I meet Dawn’s startled gaze. She is sitting at the end of the bed, crossed-legged, watching me in confusion.
“Where did you go?” She shivers. “I couldn’t feel you.”
I open my arms to her and sigh when she clambers into my lap, all is right again.
“I am sorry, Little Monster, someone trespassed on my land. Someone with great power. I must return to my land and find out who and what they want. I fear we are not safe there any more than we are here.”
I’m not sleeping, but my eyes are closed to deter the questions from the nosey flight attendant, so when the lights flicker and the bing sounds, I crack them open. Leaning out into the aisle, I see the pilots panicking slightly just as the air masks drop from above. Groaning, I get to my feet and make my way to the cockpit—what now?
Bracing myself with hands on either side of the door, I huff, “What?”
The co-pilot glances back at me before concentrating on the sky in front of him again. “Sir, please take your seat,” he grits out, while flicking switches.
“What the fuck is going on?” I growl, impatient now.
He doesn’t glance over at me again, but he does force out the next sentence between clenched teeth. “A storm, sir, a bad fucking storm. We have no chance but to land if we can find ground.”
“What do you mean?” I ask, because that doesn’t seem normal.
He looks over at me then, letting me see the fear and confusion in his face as it pales. “This isn’t a normal storm, we—our equipment is malfunctioning, like it can’t find its way out of the storm, like something is blocking it and it came out of nowhere. One minute clear night sky, the next, one of the biggest, most aggressive storms I’ve ever seen!” he yells, before turning back around. I tune him and his pilot’s conversation out as I peer through the front window to the sky.
Clouds are rolling with lightning and thunder is humming through the plane. I watch the storm, unblinking, and if I look close enough I can almost see outside of it to the clear night sky. It is only surrounding the plane. This isn’t a normal storm, it’s fucking magic.
Witches. “Take us down, take us down now!” I yell.
They look over at me, confused.
“If you don’t, they are going to rip this plane apart and fry us all. Down. Now,” I order.
The pilot nods as they both turn back to the controls in front of them, flicking switches and talking into their headsets as I turn back into the aisle. The flight attendant is sitting in the first seat, clutching his seat belt for dear life.
Moving to the seat on the other side, I grab my bag and hold it on my lap as I buckle in. I turn my head and stare out of the window as the clouds boil over. The plane dips and beeps come from the cockpit. Holding on to the seat, I slow my breathing, watching until I see the shimmer of magic.
Above the shouts and beeping in the plane—I hear it.
The chanting of the coven doing this, their voices rising like they are here. Their words are not in any tongue I know while they chant and scream. It all blurs together until I hear an explosion. Turning my head toward the sound, I groan when the door to the plane rips open. The flight attendant screams, looking over at me for help before he is sucked from his seat.
He is suspended there for a moment, his fingers clutching desperately at his chair, his face pale as his eyes meet mine, and then he is gone. Out through the gap where the door once was and flying backwards. I hear the moment he hits the engine of the plane and wince, then we tilt dangerously.
Watching the hole, I know we are fucked. The wall is cracking and ripping away with the pressure, and if we don’t land soon, we are all going to be airborne. I don’t think even I could survive that sort of drop.
The air masks are down but I don’t need it. I just sit and wait, hoping I get to hold my mate once, just once, before I die.
We are dropping steadily now, I can feel it, but the hole the plane is getting wider and wider.
“We are landing now!” screams the pilot over the sound of the