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"Not actual blood Well, not these days, not with modern spellcraft Blood of an Evil Man is a type of spell, an intensifier that adds power to whateverwith"

"So you don’t really use blood?"

"Well, you can Some old-school witches and sorcerers probably still do But we’ve got better methods now to achieve the sahed, showing her white teeth, and Daniel smiled back "People are often reluctant to part with it"

"Especially evil ain "True And how , ‘Oooh, I’m evil’? Makes it hard to advertise for blood donors"

Daniel looked right into her eyes as they laughed together Pretty rotten of et back to the shield, please?" They both turned to me with the faces of scolded children who didn’t feel one bit guilty It was annoying "So, Roxana," I said, "what you’re tellingThe shield could have been breached any day of the year"

"Not by a Hellion Not that, ever But we never expected a ht in a sense After the thirtieth--huh, that’s today, isn’t it--the shield would have been e" She flipped a strand of hair back over her shoulder "It’s back to full strength now, though Daniel told you we repaired it, right?"

"You what?" A hot, sick feeling possessedaround Boston? Are you crazy? You’ve sealed it inside!"

Those stupid witches They’d trapped Difethwr inside the very city it promised to destroy Which meant it was only ahundreds or even thousands of people It didn’t need a legion It could do that all by itself

What if I couldn’t stop it in time? Those witches had sentenced half of Boston to death

The sick feeling ept aside by an electric jolt My fist clenched, and along ht forear at Daniel as the de face into his desk over and over and over, until not even his danize him

Whoa Not that I closed ht e of Daniel out ofmy hand If I could do that, I’d be in control Me, not the deht, focus on the real enemy Face up to what you’re really afraid of Difethwr Sealed inside the city Your city

The thought was terrifying And rage felt way better than fear, so I let it flow The es oflikeheartbeat Instead, so alive in e toward that, toward the Destroyer itself The demon that had killed my father andto use its essence to controlThat had been the plan all along, hadn’t it?

My fingers flew open

I inhaled deeply, then exhaled I openednervous "We had to repair the shield, Victory," she said "We’ve sensed a spike in Hellion activity; the Destroyer is asseion If we don’t keep the Boston, not just one"

It made sense I didn’t like it, but it was the less terrible of two really bad choices And it was true that if Difethwr couldn’t get out of Boston, it couldn’t escapeaway from me so far

"We need to find out who breached the shield in the first place," I said, surprised that my voice sounded normal "Who kneas due for renewal?"

Roxana frowned "That’s what bothers me Only the Witches of the Shield knew We’re all sworn to secrecy, and we take that vow seriously The only reason I’m able to tell you and Daniel all this is because we had an e and voted to cooperate with the authorities"

"It doesn’tto clue her in after all "About the date, the ti Those spirits are always around Halloween is just the day humans decide to notice"

Roxana’s face clouded, and then she smiled "Of course," she said "So we can renew the shield whenever ant" She was quick; I liked that

"And you can keep the new date a secret, or even change the date each year"

"Excellent" She bea us stay one step ahead of the dele" style="display:block" data-ad-client="ca-pub-7451196230453695" data-ad-slot="9930101810" data-ad-format="auto" data-full-width-responsive="true"></ins>