“Gabriel!” Zane shouted, hoping the cell would pick up his voice for his boss to hear. “There’s more than one witch!”

The dog’s barking drowned out any reply Gabriel might have had for him.

Zane picked himself up. Closing his eyes for a moment, he focused all his energy on his sense of smell, then turned into the direction where it was strongest. Opening his eyes, his night vision picked up a movement. He reached for his gun, pulling it out of the holster so fast, no human would have even seen the movement.

He aimed at the shadow and squeezed his trigger finger before the weapon fell from his hand. His flesh was hot, and had he been human, third-degree burns would have already formed on his palm. The gun had turned red-hot within a split-second. Fucking witches!

Zane reached for a throwing star in his pocket and, ignoring the now searing-hot metal of the lethal weapon, threw it. A second later, a blast accompanied by a lightning strike hit him in the gut and catapulted him back, slamming him against a door between the book shelves. Wood splintered.

The dog jumped in front of him, barking loudly at the person who’d attacked him. At the same time, Zane heard footsteps from the outside. His colleagues were descending on the warehouse.

“Come here, dog!” he ordered, hoping the beast would obey. He needed the vial around its neck to immobilize the witch who was attacking him—and this witch wasn’t Haven. It was a female; he could smell it. What he would do to eliminate Haven once he’d used the vial on this witch, he wasn’t sure yet. But first things first.

The dog jumped away, clearly frightened by the commotion. “Fuck!” Zane cursed and reached for another throwing star to distract the witch who, despite his night vision, he couldn’t make out clearly.

“Zane?” he heard a faint voice through the door whose wood he’d splintered by crashing against it.

Relief flooded through him. At least she was alive. “Yvette, we’re coming for you.” He pushed his entire weight against the door and broke it, yet he didn’t fall. Some invisible force was denying him entry into the room despite the now open door. He realized that this was the ward Francine had spoken of.

Zane had no time to peer into the room to find out what condition Yvette and her charge were in, because another lightning bolt charged toward him. Alerted by the dog’s bark, Zane lunged to the side and saw it bounce off the ward surrounding the captives’ room.

It appeared not even the witch’s own weapon could penetrate the ward, which told him that at least Yvette and Kimberly were safe for now.

Rolling to the side, he lunged for the dog, trying to grab it by its collar. As he reached it and pulled the beast closer to him, a bolt of energy hit him in the side, slicing through his jacket and shirt, burning through his flesh. He cried out in agony and involuntarily released the dog. It scampered away from him, now clearly frightened of him too.

When he made another attempt at catching the dog, it ran full speed into the other room, right through the ward as if it didn’t exist. Shit!

“The vial!” he yelled. “Yvette, take out the witch with the vial on the dog’s collar.”

It was all the instructions he could shout to her before another attack hit his leg and made him tumble. As he fell, the vibrations on the concrete floor announced the arrival of his brethren, as they rushed through the corridor.

Sliding his hand into his pocket once more, he gripped his knife and aimed.
Twenty-Two

Through the open door, Yvette saw Zane tumble to the floor just as a poodle slammed into her at full-doggie speed and nearly knocked her off balance. Had Haven not been standing behind her and caught her, she would have landed on her ass.

Yvette bent down to the frightened animal and hugged her arms around it. The dog instantly licked her neck and shoulders. “Easy, boy,” she calmed him. “You’re safe in here.”

Her hands searched the dog’s neck, trying to figure out what Zane had been trying to tell her. She felt a small, oblong glass object which hung on a ribbon off the dog’s collar. A colored liquid sloshed inside. Putting two and two together, Yvette realized that Francine must have brewed some sort of potion to help them defeat the witch.

Flashes of light came from the other room, temporarily illuminating her prison as the fighting continued.

Her hand closed over the delicate object, but before she could pull it off the dog’s collar, a large hand wrapped around her wrist and immobilized her hand.

“No!” Haven hissed. “Don’t touch it.”

She twisted her hand out of his grip and tried to push him back, but he locked his other arm around her waist and jerked her back. “We can take out the witch with it!” She reached for the dog again, but this time Haven wrestled her to the ground, making the dog shrink away from them.