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“Do you have what you need for your spell?” I ask her, shouting so that she can hear me

“Yes,” she answers, “everything except for your blood”

“Okay That’s good Get down underneath the platforet off this ride and I’ll meet you down there” I hadn’t noticed until now, but Gabriel is right behind Rita and a look of confusion passes over his face I knohat he’s wondering He’s wondering why Rita needs my blood to perform her spell Nonetheless he follows her as she crawls under the shallow space beneath the platforone I panic, because I know that the only way I a off this wheel is if I juets to the closest possible position to the ground before I leap

I suck in a deep breath for courage, as I rise up to the top of the wheel and then slowly lower to the ground I pullready to leap over the safety bar But as it gets close to the ground ins to hammer and my hands shake, I start forward but I just don’t have the courage to make the jump Okay, I tell myself, the next time I really will do it Unfortunately one around another three times and I still haven’t moved from my position on the seat

On the fourth try I finally let go, but my fear makes my jump sloppy as hell and my knee whacks off the safety bar as I fall onto the darass below Most definitely I’ve broken a bone soure out where yet Although the fact that I landed on ed them in some way My knee screah that this the second tiot to get away from the vampires, as soon as is reasonably possible

I decide there’s no point in trying to stand up since I have to go to Rita and Gabriel, so I simply crawl forward on my injured wrists When I join them I find they have set out a wooden board on which they have placed all sorts of intricate looking spell ingredients, and not just the herbal kind Rita had used before The light of a torch shines on us as it leans against one of the support bea the space, and on the board I notice a s sliarden when it’s dale in the bowl, still alive

“I know,” says Rita, gauging s required to open up a portal into a hell diear”

“You can say that again,” I reply, eyeing another bowl that holds a ots and dead cockroaches Coh are the chopped up lemons, I wonder what they’re for Perhaps they’re used drown out the sredients

Rita hands me a blade that looks exactly like the one my mother had used to cut herself when she cast the spell to protectmy mind “But it needs to be silver for the spell to work, so it’s sort of similar to the one she used” I turn it over in lints off it and shines in my eyes

“Are you okay Tegan?” Gabriel asks gently, speaking for the first time

“Yes, I’h nervously “It’s only to be expected”

“Yeah,” says Rita “But do you ?”

“Don’t Let’s just say that Theodore is even ht He put these clothes on me while I was passed out”

“E, creepy,” Rita replies, while crushing ginger over the dead spiders I don’t bother to ask about it I assu

Then she gives lass vial “Here,” she says “I need you to fill this with your blood Cutting down the centre of your palm will probably be easiest” I nod and brace myself for more pain