Raven Ridge (Witches of Sanctuary Book 2) Read Online Free

okay?
    I must have inadvertently sent Reid some frantic thoughts.
    Yes. I’m in the circle. I’m fine.
    Suddenly the flames turn white. They thicken, shifting into a pale fog that drops around me and spreads through the woods. It drifts and swirls, snaking along the ground, until finally two forms take shape inside the circle in front of me. Two human forms.
    I recognize them. Two young girls whose ghosts I met in the cemetery after performing a spell taught to me by Julien last summer. I know now that those young girls are the very first descendants of the Innocent. Contessa and Elizabeth. Orphans adopted by the widow of Frog Hollow. The figures slowly grow, the fog changing them, transforming them into women. As the fog fades away from their faces, I’m left standing in the circle with two very real, very non-ghost type women.
    I can’t make myself speak.
    “It’s nice to see you again, Wilhelmina,” the woman I’d known as Tessie says. Her once short, curly hair is now as long as my own.
    I reach my hand out, wanting to touch her and make sure she’s real. “You’re not young anymore?”
    The other one, Elizabeth, whose brown hair and mystic blue eyes are still wild as I remember, says, “We didn’t want to scare you at the cemetery that night by appearing in our natural form.”
    “Besides,” Contessa says, reaching up to touch her very real fingertips to my cheek. “You had one of The Haunted with you. We thought it best to keep our true identity a secret.”
    My hand absently touches my heart at the memory. “Julien was with me.”
    “Yes.” Contessa’s smile fades. “I’m sorry about him. There was nothing we could do.”
    My breathing steadies and my voice manages to stay firm. “You were watching?”
    “We are always watching, Wilhelmina. However, there are only so many things we can control.”
    I recall the night the curse consumed Julien, and all the unnatural things that occurred to keep me safe from his wrath. “You sent my mother back to me that night on the rooftop. She healed me after Julien sent that blade through my chest.”
    Contessa smiles weakly. “Yes. You must understand, though. It was only because you were so close to death that we were able to do that. If Julien would have stabbed you in the heart, it would have been too late. We couldn’t have saved you. It was only because he chose to kill you slowly, to torture you, that it gave us enough time to intervene.”
    Tears sting my eyes. “You couldn’t have saved Ezekiel instead?”
    I lost much more than one friend on that rooftop in Charleston. Ezekiel sacrificed himself to save me from Julien.
    “Ezekiel was one of the Haunted.”
    “The curse hadn’t consumed him yet.” My voice is loud as the tears spill over my lashes. Ezekiel shouldn’t have died. Not like he did. On a rooftop with a monster. “He was still good.”
    Contessa steps toward me. “There was nothing we could do for him. Ezekiel chose his fate.”
    I wipe the tears from my eyes. “What do I do now? Julien will come for me. Maybe not tonight, but one day, he will come back.” The tears stream down my cheeks onto my lips. “I promised him that I would end his life if the curse took him. What happens if I can’t fulfill that promise?”
    Elizabeth looks at Contessa, her features very serious. “Tell her, Contessa. It’s time.”
    Contessa continues forward toward me. “As I understand it, you have found your Sun.”
    I take a step back. “What?”
    Contessa stands still, her eyes directed at me, waiting.
    “No one was identified at the Summer Solstice ceremony,” I say, my voice shaking. It was technically true. I wasn’t matched with any known Innocent during the ceremony.
    Contessa very calmly places her hand on my shoulder. “Tell him to come into the circle, Wilhelmina.”
    I choke down a breath. “Who?”
    “Reid. We know you can communicate with him right now. Tell him to come into the circle.”
    I jerk away from her touch in a