“Tonight is the night, Fallon,” he announced.
I glanced over at Fable, who was drawing circles in the sand with a stick, keeping her gaze down. My gaze flicked back to Kane. “The night for what?”
“The start of your initiation. It’s a three-step process for Sacred Sea. I went through it. Cyrus, Mav, and Ivy went through it,” he paused and narrowed his eyes, “Your dad went through it… It’s important you do too. The other girls have been waiting for this, especially your girl, Monday.” He moved his gaze over to the girls dancing at the waterline. “But we’re focused on you right now, Tobias Morgan’s daughter and all.”
“I’m not a witch,” I said, almost laughing at the idea.
“Yes, you are. It’s already inside you, and we’re going to help pull that out during the initiation. By the time you’re fully in, you’ll see it too.” All three guys glared in my direction across the fire. “We can protect you, Fallon, but you have to trust us. You have to drop those walls of yours and submit, or it won’t work.”
I raised a brow. “Can you protect Benny?”
Kane shook his head. “Benny is a castaway, an old Norse Woods witch who happens to live on our soil. We can’t help him.”
“But he’s my grandfather, my family,” I insisted.
“No, Fallon, we’ll be your family.”
I shook my head, swiping the moonshine from the sand and standing. “Then I’m not interested,” I said as I walked away, the sand flying up from my bare feet with every step.
After a few slugs of the spicy amber liquid, I found myself leaning against the cold rocky cliffs, watching the girls in all their beauty, their arms moving effortlessly like a ballet over the water to a remake of Tainted Love. My eyes closed, thinking what my life had become. The only man I wanted wasn’t allowed near me. Witches were here and real, murder was in the air, someone may be after me, and Gramps was dying.
To my left, Kane was walking my way, and I crossed my arms over my chest. “I can try,” he said, dropping a palm onto the rock and leaning over me. I clutched the mason jar and looked down at our bare feet sinking into the sand, thinking try wasn’t going to be enough. “Hey,” Kane clipped out. “I’ll do what I can to help Benny, okay? I’ll talk to my father, figure something out.”
In the distance, Adora’s sing-song voice drifted. “It’s almost midnight. Who’s jumping into the ocean?”
My eyes darted back to Kane’s, an idea sparking. “No, Kane. I’ll figure this out on my own without your coven.” I slipped under his arm and walked back toward the group. “Me!” I shouted, trotting through the sand. “I want to jump.” They all said jumping into the ocean would bring one good fortune, and after my reading with Eleanor, I was desperate. Gramps didn’t have much longer, and I’d do anything, even jump into the ice-cold sea.
“No way,” Fable dismissed, hopping to her feet. “No one other than Maverick has jumped, but he’s a moron.”
“Thanks,” Maverick muttered.
Fable rolled her eyes. “It’s no secret, dude. You’re an idiot.”
“But one lucky sonofabitch.”
I pushed my hair from my face and hugged my body. “So, it’s true? I jump, and good things will come?” An inkling of hope brewed inside my chest. I could turn Gramps fate around.
Fable shrugged when Adora skipped across the sand. “Oh, I gotta see this,” she sang, then grabbed Ivy’s hand and took off to the rocks. The rest of the crowd followed, hollering into the night and leaving the blazing bonfire and alcohol behind.
We climbed up the north end of the beach, where the slope wasn’t as steep. Maverick and Cyrus were the first ones up, pulling the girls up by their arms. Once we were all back on solid ground, we walked along the cliff’s edge to the steep drop off where no rocks gathered at the bottom.
When we stopped, the eight of us peered over the edge as the neglected black mansion sat behind us. The bonfire mimicked a candle’s flame from up here, and my nerves crawled over me like spiders. I turned to my left to look at Maverick when I noticed a large scarecrow looking statue at the highest peak of the cliff. “What is that?”
Maverick turned and hooked his thumb behind him. “Oh, that? That’s the Wicker Man.”
I hadn’t noticed it before, but I also had never been this far down the coastline. “What’s it for?”
“He’s our executioner.” Maverick turned back to face me, and the tips of his toes met the edge at my side. “It’s a straight drop down, no rocks, and the water is deep here. It’s cold, are you sure you want to do this?”
I sucked in a breath, and the cold air shattered inside my lungs like broken glass. “Yeah,” I nodded. “I’m doing this.” I had to try at least.
“If you say so,” Maverick took a step back, as did the rest of them, “Ladies first.”
“She’s not going to do it,” Ivy whispered.
“A hundred bucks says she does,” Adora shot back.
I shook my hands out to shake away the jitters as my bare feet teetered over the cliff.
This was it.
With one last look into the black canvas of constellations, I took a few steps back, then ran…
And I jumped.
What no one had told me was that when flying, time stopped. Air caught inside my lungs. I couldn’t breathe, I couldn’t think. Fear clutched my soul yet set me free, the unknown waiting for me at the bottom, breaking through a dimension between life and death.
Maybe this was the reason Dad had lost himself with his job and hobby. Perhaps here, in this in-between place, he felt closer to my mother. The reason he had always been so fascinated with model airplanes and looked forward to the single phone call that had taken him away from me and put him in the air.
And I wished the ocean disappeared and gravity was non-existent. For a short time, nothing mattered. Everything between the cliff and the sea seemed enchanting, like a peaceful dream, and I wished I could stay in this place forever, pin myself in the sky, make me one with the galaxy.
But then it hurt like a bitch.
My body slammed against the bitter-cold water as if it were concrete, biting and stinging my flesh just as a wave crashed over me. My arms and legs scrambled at my sides as I tried to take back control under the rocky waters, but the waves sent me flying against the cliff, and my head crashed into a rock.
I sank below the surface, face up and staring into the night sky. Deeper and deeper, I focused on the panicked group of people I’d left behind moments ago, pointing down and shoving each other, but I heard nothing inside these waters. I blinked, commanding my limbs to take me back to the surface—begging the hunger for survival to kick in—but they wouldn’t give. My muscles froze as I sank deeper, my body rocking under the surface with the waves.
The icy ocean took me over, spilling into my mouth, up my nose, drinking me and filling me up with its lethal chill. The sea had full possession of me, and though my brain felt as if it were on fire, a frost flowed through my bloodstream. The Atlantic rushed its ice all around me.
I was out of oxygen, and fear raked my spine.
I needed to breathe.
Bubbles exploded from my mouth. My body jerked, and my cry distorted. The sea muted me. All I could do was stare above. I blinked when a figure appeared atop the cliff, diving head-first into the waters with precise and angelic form. My mind was playing tricks on me as I sank deeper and deeper, my white hair billowing around me like clouds.