Read Online creepy hollow 05.5 - scarlett by rachel morgan - Free Book Online

up the wooden spoon balancing across the handle and stirred the liquid. Should she count to one minute now? Had Malena meant exactly one minute, or was that simply an estimation? She was about to ask when Madame Lucia loudly instructed her son to stop kicking his feet against the furniture.
    “Also add a drop of midnight spider venom,” Malena added in a low voice, nodding to a vial containing a dark blue liquid. Beth’s eyes flicked toward Madame Lucia, but the woman hadn’t noticed Malena’s instruction. Beth opened the vial and allowed a single drop to fall into the pot. It sizzled as it hit the potion’s boiling surface. She stirred the concoction once more, and Malena, who was busy swirling a flask of liquid as black as soot, said, “You can strain it now.”
    Beth’s eyes darted across the workbench surface and found a sieve. And there was the cup Malena had mentioned. Wrapping a cloth around the handle to keep from burning her hand—her glove surely wouldn’t be thick enough to protect her—Beth lifted the pot and poured the contents over the sieve and into the cup. Bark, herbs and leaves gathered in the wire mesh, leaving a smooth blue-grey potion in the cup.
    “We’re ready,” Malena announced, and Madame Lucia turned her attention back to the witch. “Bring the potion,” Malena said to Beth as she carried her flask and a quill across the room. She sat on a low table across from the boy while Beth stood awkwardly beside her.
    The boy took in the sharp tip of the quill with wide eyes and asked, “Will it hurt?”
    “Not at all,” Malena said. She nodded for Beth to hand him the cup and added, “Drink this.”
    With shaking fingers, the boy took the cup and sipped the contents. His face twisted as he swallowed, but he finished the remaining liquid and returned the cup to Beth’s hand. Barely a second passed before he slumped back against the cushions, his eyes sliding shut and his head drooping to the side. Madame Lucia turned her accusing gaze on Malena. “What is the meaning of—”
    “I lied, I’m afraid,” Malena said. “The mark will hurt a great deal, which is why I put him to sleep. He won’t feel a thing, and the pain will be gone by the time he wakes.”
    Madame Lucia hesitated, but her eyes remained narrowed as they looked Malena up and down. “You could have warned me.”
    “My apologies,” Malena said, but as she caught Beth’s eye she smiled discreetly, and Beth knew she didn’t feel sorry at all for startling the woman. “Where would you like the mark to be placed?”
    “Does it make any difference to the effectiveness of the spell?”
    “No.”
    “Then … on the side of his torso, beneath his arm. I obviously don’t want anyone to know it’s there.”
    “Of course. Please lift his clothing.”
    As Madame Lucia moved the boy onto his side and pulled his shirt out of the way, Malena dipped her sharpened quill into the flask. Then, with movements slow and precise, she drew an eye onto the boy’s side. As her quill pressed into his skin, black ink tinged with red dripped down his side, looking eerily as though the eye were crying.
    “A cloth, Scarlett,” Malena instructed as she finished the eye and sat back. Beth hurried to the bench and returned with the same cloth she’d used to pick up the pot. Without sterilizing the cloth in any way, Malena wiped it across the boy’s skin, cleaning away the excess ink and leaving the perfect dark outline of an eye. Germs and infection clearly weren’t a concern when magic was involved.
    Malena then pressed her hand flat against the tattooed shape, closed her eyes, and began reciting words Beth didn’t understand. She assumed at first that it was the same language she’d heard the witches speak before, but it sounded different. Hard edges and guttural sounds. As she spoke the final word, her hand tensed, her nails dug into the boy’s skin, and a flash of light blazed briefly from beneath her palm.
    Then she stood, wiped