Arrest, Search and Séance : Book 1 of the Fringe Society R.D. Hunter (pride and prejudice read .TXT) 📖

the outside, it looked quiet, dark and empty, but I knew that was just a muffling spell. Inside, there was a rager going on that would make most teen raves look like a nun convention.

I parked some distance away and scanned my surroundings. No sign of Hawkins, by which I meant there were no blood curdling screams, bodies being thrown through the air or the sound of explosions. I was in time.

I started walking towards the entrance, preparing what I was going to say to convince the most powerful coven in Atlanta to run for the hills before a monster showed up and gutted them. Understand this; all the witches inside were extremely talented and powerful in their own right, but they weren’t fighters. They were regular people who happened to practice a magical art, usually for personal gain, removal of obstacles and that sort of thing. Occasionally, they would use their talents for revenge, but there was a blow-back effect from casting directly harmful spells, and sometimes they could be quite dangerous.

When Hawkins showed up, they might be able to slow him down or impede his progress (if enough of them were sober, that is), and as a fully functional coven united in a single task, they could probably even take him down. But caught off guard, without any of their magical artifacts or personal crystals, chaos and panic would ensue as soon as the blood started spilling. Maybe I could warn them in time.

I increased my pace, then came to a sudden halt as my legs and ankles locked together and my arms snapped down to my side. I would have fallen over, stiff as a board, but the same invisible force that had stopped me cold also kept me upright. Shit, I’d walked right into a binding circle, and I didn’t have to look far to see who had set it up.

Trisha and the Thing sisters appeared out of the shadow of a nearby cargo container. Each of them still carried the markings of our first little run-in, but now there was a triumphant gleam in their eyes that told me I was well and truly screwed.

“We figured you’d show up here,” Trisha said, a cruel smile ghosting the corners of her mouth. “All we had to do was set up our little trap and wait. You really are pathetic, you know that?”

“I’m not the one skulking around in a cold, dark parking lot while there’s a party going on inside,” I wanted to say, but invisible bands of sheer energy wrapped themselves around my mouth and jaw, forcing me into silence.

Binding circles weren’t terribly complicated, but they were hellishly hard to break. Two crystals, one to restrain the physical and one to restrain the spiritual, imbued with a spell of restraint and placed in a holding pattern. When your target comes along, you activate the spell, usually by funneling a little energy through the crystal and reciting a keyword and phrase, and PRESTO; instant prison. I was in trouble.

Trisha casually sauntered up to me, waved a hand, and the bands around my mouth vanished.

“Listen to me,” I said urgently. “You have to let me go, then get yourselves to safety. There’s…”

My explanation cut off as a sharp slap connected with the side of my face. Pain flared for an instant, then melted away under the warm energy from my grandpa’s rapidly weakening amulet. I spit out a thin wad of blood and glared at my antagonist, who frowned deeply at my lack of reaction to her assault.

“Well, that won’t do,” she said, scanning me up and down. Her eyes alighted on the small chain around my neck, and she viciously yanked it off with a victorious snarl.

Fresh agony flooded through my body and, unable to collapse or move, all I could do was let out a little groan as my nerve endings caught fire. The Thing sisters gave a little giggle at the sound. I was hurting too bad to tell them to go screw themselves.

“Well, this is lovely, isn’t it?” Trisha said, holding the amulet up to examine it in the moonlight. “Explains how you’re up and about after looking like something the cat played with. One of your little friends make this for you?” She laughed then, a cruel, mocking sound. “What am I saying? You only have colleagues and contacts, don’t you? You don’t have any friends.”

“You’d be surprised,” a new voice said from the darkness.

All three women whirled in surprise to face the newcomer, but that she wasn’t there. Instead, a raven-haired beauty with a lithe figure that looked like she spent hours in the gym every day, appeared from behind, catching one of the Thing Sisters with a hard elbow that knocked her flat to the ground. Her eyes were tightly shut and she made no effort to get up.

Even through the haze of pain that tore at me from every angle, I wanted to cheer. Lacey Shade, Vampire Private Eye, had arrived on the scene. The second call I’d made on my way here had borne fruit.

Trisha and the remaining Thing turned in surprise, already raising their power for some kind of attack, but they were far too late. Lacey moved with a speed and grace that most Olympic athletes would kill to acquire, and there wasn’t an ounce of hesitation in her body.

She moved forward almost too fast to follow, catching Trisha around the throat with the crook of one arm and holding her tight, while planting a foot square in the stomach of the Thing. She went down hard, gasping for breath and making little choking sounds. Trisha was making similar noises as she scraped and wriggled to try and free herself. Lacey didn’t even seem to notice her efforts.

She turned to me with a grin that showed brilliant white teeth, but faltered when she noticed me pale