green and blue sparkles that reflect along the wall.
“Tahoe doesn’t like her,” Bren mutters. “All that is the lake’s magic is fighting hers.”
Merche and Farrah clutch each other, racing away from the water’s edge. Bren’s focus bounces from them to the pool. “Hell, it doesn’t like you either.”
“It’s because the magic they used for Mirror was just as dark as what made Una,” I whisper.
The pool spills over and splashes against our feet, bubbling as if boiling. I barely register what’s happening when Bren drags me behind him. “It’s banging the crap out of Oompa’s magic.”
“Una,” I remind him. I lead him to where the witches are hugging the wall. “Do you think Tahoe can kill her?”
“Yeah, I do, but not quicker than she can get to us,” Bren says. “Tahoe’s packed with enough good magic to suffocate the bad. But it’s like I said, she’s kept a safe distance from it by burrowing underground. It’ll be hours, or maybe days before Tahoe breaks that freak apart, and that’s only if she stays underwater long enough, which she won’t do. She’s too smart.”
He whistles, trying to snag Merche’s attention. “Mickey, hey Mickey. Get us the hell out of here.”
Merche doesn’t take too kindly to the mouse reference. I think she tries to flip Bren off with her paw except it doesn’t quite work due to her lack of fingers.
“Come on, Merche, go,” Farrah urges. “We have to at least try to find our way through the tunnels.”
Merche adjusts her position beside Farrah and they begin their chant. I don’t understand enough Latin to interpret what they’re saying, but I recognize enough words to know they repeat the spell more than once.
The wall beside Gerald starts to split and a section breaks off and lands in the water. “Any day now, ladies,” Bren calls behind him.
“We’re trying,” Merche squeaks. “But it’s like you told us. Tahoe doesn’t like Una or us. It’s blocking our spells.”
“Try harder,” Bren snaps.
The opposite wall cracks. Bren presses his body against me, shielding me from the crumbling rock. Gerald is beside himself, jumping in place and causing the sides of his head to slam repeatedly against his shoulders. “I don’t want to die,” he says. “No way, not like this. Not under the damn water like a punk, and not after I sucked a fish.”
“I can respect that,” Bren agrees. “How we doing, witches?”
“We got it,” Farrah calls.
A crackling noise accompanies a break in the stone. It opens enough to allow Merche through.
Farrah doesn’t stand a chance. Bren lugs me away in the opposite direction as an octopus tentacle thrusts though the water and snatches Farrah by the waist.
Farrah screams.
So does Merche.
So do I.
So does Gerald.
“An octopus,” Bren says, pointing. “I fucking knew it.”
He shoves me in the direction of the fissure as Farrah is forced underwater. The horrible sound of shattering bones precedes Farrah’s reappearance. She floats to the surface of the water, belly up, her lifeless protruding eyes no longer moving.
Bren urges me through the opening. “Go, go.”
The rock edge scrapes my shoulders and rakes at my shirt as I angle my way through. Gerald is a tighter fit and Bren barely makes it through.
I move forward blind, using my force to feel around the tight space. It’s better than using my hands but not efficient enough to run.
“Bren,” I call out. “I can’t see.”
“I’ve got you, Em,” he yells. “Harold, go after the mouse.”
Gerald doesn’t bother to correct his name. “On, it,” he says.
Like a spider, Gerald scrambles up the wall and onto the ceiling, passing over top of me.
The stretch of space we’re in widens enough to allow Bren ahead of me. He clasps my hand, hurrying us ahead.
A collision of rock and magic shake the ground at our feet. “Mother fucker,” Gerald hisses.
He’s somewhere to our far left. But it doesn’t make sense, there’s only wall and stone. He screams, the agony in his tone paining my ears.
And then he’s gone.
I clasp my hand over my mouth. “Oh, Gerald,” I say.
“Yeah,” Bren mutters. “It must’ve been his time. But it’s not ours, Em. This way.”
We dash in the opposite direction we heard Gerald cry out. We’re farther along and pass into another cell. This one is more of a cave. Stalactites in varying length and width hang from the ceiling.
I’m out of breath from running and breathing in the stagnant air from such an enclosed space. “Do you think we’re closer to the surface?”
Bren takes a sniff and curses. “No. These