The Trine’s retaliation would be swift and brutal, but knowing Jin, the vampire would be prepared for whatever they threw at him.

  “I saw her in there,” Holly said, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “She was reaching for me.”

  Patrick let go of her hair as she straightened, her entire body still trembling.

  “Was he right?” she asked, turning to face him. “Was there really no hope?”

  “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I’ve never seen anyone come back from a possession like that. The spirits in the diggings aren’t regular spirits, but neither was the light I saw coming from you.”

  “God,” she muttered, her eyes darting around the garden. “God.”

  Afraid she might faint, Patrick held out his arm. “I think you better sit down. You’re in shock.”

  “That’s an understatement.”

  He guided her through the garden and onto the verandah, where she collapsed onto the stairs. Noticing a box of groceries sitting by the front door, he peered inside. It was mostly full of brightly wrapped chocolate and snacks.

  “Oh…” Holly flopped down onto the step. “I was at the supermarket. I must’ve…”

  Patrick sat beside her, the box forgotten. “Have you got your key?”

  Holly leaned her shoulder against his and ran her hands through her hair. Taking a deep breath, she let it out in one long whoosh. “Aunt Hannah did something to me.”

  He nodded, his gaze fixed on the diggings across the creek. “Yes.”

  She was silent for a moment, then she said, “I can’t decide if it was the spirit trying to open me that triggered it or if Sarah unbound me.”

  Patrick didn’t know, either. When Samantha had attacked her the other night, she hadn’t gotten as far as Sarah had. It was possible the witch had fought back against her possession, but there was an equal chance it was simply the opening that’d triggered Holly’s Legacy to manifest. There was no way to know for sure.

  “That light,” she whispered, staring at her hands. “Am I what they… Am I the conduit?”

  “I don’t know.” All that was certain was that her Legacy was more than a mere drop—much more—but she was a Burke witch, after all. They always had a certain knack for magic. “But when your Legacy passed through me, it changed something. It…loosened a thread.”

  Her eyes widened. “The curse?”

  “I hope so.”

  “The Trine,” she rasped. “Sarah.”

  “A problem for tomorrow,” he murmured. “You better go inside. I’ll keep watch. When Jin—”

  Holly recoiled at the mention of the other vampire, her eyes widening. “I don’t want to see him.”

  “Holly—”

  “I can’t.” She stood, using the wisteria-laden pole to steady herself. “When I close my eyes, I can see her heart in his hand. I can see the look in her eyes… Patrick…”

  He stood and held out his arm. “Where are your keys? I’ll unlock the door for you.”

  “She’s dead because I wanted to save him.”

  Patrick shook his head as he took her house keys from her jacket pocket. “No. This wasn’t your fault. Sarah made the choice to take that spirit in on her own. She set her own path.”

  “I woke Jin,” she cried. “If I hadn’t—”

  “No,” he interrupted. “Don’t go down that path, Holly. Jin’s actions are his alone. You did nothing wrong.”

  Holly let out a strangled cry and fell into his arms. She sobbed, her tears soaking into the front of his shirt.

  Her absolute trust in him sent a bolt of something long forgotten coursing through his dead heart. She knew what he was, what he’d done, and still, she clutched onto him like a raft in the middle of a heaving ocean.

  In that moment, as he cradled her exhausted body against his, Patrick knew he’d do whatever it took to free himself from the Trine’s curse. Not only to rid himself of two centuries of control, but to help keep her alive. If Holly was the conduit, they’d stop at nothing to take her Legacy.

  “Shh,” he murmured, rubbing her back. “We’ll figure it out. I promise.”

  Jin lifted Sarah Dunne’s corpse into his arms and carried her across the clearing. The fire flickered as he passed, the scent of blood and magic still thick in the air. His body had healed enough for him to manage the task of disposing the evidence, and he entered the mine, eager to get it over with.

  The whispers began the moment he crossed the threshold. Strange, breathy sounds that were far too faint for him to hear. Not even his enhanced senses could make heads or tails of the murmurings, so he ignored them.

  When he became a vampire, everything good in him had died with his humanity. Hazel had kept the truth at bay—his love for her overshadowing the reality of his nature—but without her, there was nothing stopping it from flooding in. He was death, and that was all he’d ever be.

  But Holly had seen something in him worth saving, and for a brief moment, he felt like he had a chance…until the moment he took Sarah’s life. Now it was all gone. He’d seen it in her eyes; the horror she felt towards him was palpable.

  His boots crunched on dirt and rock as he followed the iron cart tracks deeper into the Union Reef Mine. They snaked along the main tunnel all the way into the back of the quartz vein the miners had dug into in the 1850s, the crude support beams still holding strong after almost two centuries of pressure from above.

  Whatever mining had continued here after his imprisonment had occurred from different angles well beyond the influence of the darkness living amongst the historic Dunloe diggings. That’s what had shut down operations in the twentieth century. Supernatural interference had everything to do with it, not the discovery of toxic minerals.

  At the end of the tunnel, Jin found the shaft where he’d spent the better part of one hundred and seventy years rotting. Without a second thought, he threw Sarah’s body into the hole, listening as it tumbled into the darkness. It landed with a sickening thud, the sound echoing through the abandoned mine.

  A whisper brushed against his ear, and he scowled.

  “You got your soul,” he murmured, staring down into the darkness. “But you’ll never get mine…and especially not hers.”

  The whispers intensified, but Jin wasn’t listening. He’d already turned his back on them.

  The real fight was about to begin, and he had to be ready for it… The moment they found out he’d torn out Sarah Dunne’s heart, the Trine’s retaliation would be brutal.

  But his would be worse.

  They could count on it.

  CHAPTER 21

  Patrick lingered the garden outside Holly’s cottage, watching the night.

  The bush had gone still. The rustling of the usual nocturnal animals was absent and even the wind was flat. The unbinding of Holly’s Legacy had unleashed a change in the air that even nature itself felt—though a change he hoped the Trine were oblivious to.

  Jin materialised out of the shadows, his ghostly form lurking in the darkness.

  “It’s done,” he said, stopping several paces away.

  Patrick nodded, looking the other vampire over. His shirt was torn open by at least a dozen knife slashes from where Sarah had stabbed him, but the blood had dried a while ago.

  “You’ve healed?” he asked.

  “Enough,” Jin replied. “But I need to get someone to eat on the way home.”

  “You know, it’s the modern age where people donate blood to hospitals. You don’t need to—”

  “Don’t patronise me.” The vampire looked towards the cottage.

  “She’s safe,” Patrick said. “In shock, but safe.”

  “She’s far from safe.” Jin turned back to him and narrowed his eyes. “Why haven’t you run off and told the Trine yet? I thought you would’ve squealed about Holly’s Legacy the first chance you got.”

  He shook his head. “When the shock wave hit me…it changed something. Whatever hold the Trine has, it feels different now. Like there’s an opening.”

  Jin snorted. “Lucky you.”

  “Samantha will want to know what happened,” Patrick began. “What should I tell her?”

  “The truth.” Jin reached behind his back and took out something he’d hidden there—Sarah’s anthame. “Tell her that her daughter messed with the wrong vampire and came out second best. If the bitch wants to speak with her spirit, she needs to cross Moonlight Creek.” He thrust the flat of the blade towards Patrick.

  “Why?” He took the anthame. “We’ve got a chance to change the narrative.”

  “Don’t make me vomit.” Jin rolled his eyes. “I’m the bad guy, remember? You all expect me to do the worst possible thing, and I did, so why change the story now? Don’t you know that all the best lies are rooted in truth.”

  “Yes, they certainly are,” Patrick muttered.

  The two vampires stood in silence, barely moving as they listened to the night. If anyone happened by them at that moment, they would mistake them for two marble statues—one macabre and covered in blood, the other…Patrick didn’t know what the other would be. His identity was in question, as were the choices that’d brought him here.

  “The Trine ordered you to kill me,” Jin finally said, staring at the cottage.

  “You believe me now?” Patrick turned towards him. “Why?”

  “I remembered things. The night they took her…” He glared at the vampire, his hatred still as severe as it was in 1852. “This doesn’t mean we’re friends.”

  Patrick nodded.

  “We have the same goal. That’s it.”

  “I understand.” He tensed, sensing a reemergence of their old rivalry. “She’ll never forgive you for what you did to Sarah.”

  “She doesn’t need to,” Jin muttered. “I’ll be whoever I need to be to make sure she lives…but you and me? When this is over, I’ll spend the rest of my eternity making sure yours is a living hell.”

  “Jin—”

  “There’s no changing what you did,” he snapped. “You always had a choice, Patrick, and you chose to turn me against my will, just like you chose to help them murder Hazel.”

  “I was compelled by the Trine’s curse,” he argued.

  Jin snarled and grabbed the front of Patrick’s shirt, wrenching him close. “You didn’t kill me, even after you were ordered to.” He shoved the vampire away. “You’ve always had the power to resist them. You play the part of the good guy well, but I see you for what you really are.” He pointed to the cottage. “I’ll be watching you. If you do anything to endanger Holly’s life, I will live up to my promise and then some.”

  Patrick narrowed his eyes and nodded once.

  The slight acceptance was enough for Jin, and he disappeared into the night, leaving Patrick alone outside Holly’s cottage.

  He held up Sarah’s anthame and turned it over, the silver blade catching the moonlight. The blood of another witch’s death was on his hands, and now he had to tell her mother.

  Holly carried the box of groceries inside, making sure the front door was closed and locked behind her.

  The recycled waxed apple box was full of the stuff she’d left behind in the aisle at the IGA supermarket, and she knew they were from Fiona. It was a nice gesture, but in that moment, Holly’s head was full of nothing but blood and magic.

  She didn’t bother turning on the light. Dumping the groceries on the floor by the coffee table, she sank onto the couch, the keys dropping onto the rug with a loud clatter.

  “Hannah bound my magic.” It was no longer a question in her mind, but a statement. With that burst of power came a weird understanding of things. She didn’t know whether to call it memory or intuition, but it hardly seemed to matter.

  Sarah was dead. Jin had ripped out her heart as easily as puncturing a scrap of tissue paper.

  Sarah was dead.

  Holly closed her eyes in an attempt to stop another flood of tears, but they flew open as she was assaulted with an image of her friend’s hollow chest. The recognition in the witch’s eyes…the shock.

  Then nothing.

  Holly looked around the room, desperate for something, anything to make sense.

  Nothing did.

  Staring at her makeshift spellbook, she ran her hands over her face. She had to pretend she had no magic when it was all she could feel inside her. She had to pretend while Dunloe mourned another death with a sketchy coverup attached—three in as many months.

  Holding up her hands, she scoffed as a warmth spread through her fingers. She had no idea how to use her Legacy, let alone control it. Who could she ask for help? The Trine controlled Dunloe, and it wasn’t like she could look up other witches on Google. She was alone with no way forward.

  Suddenly, she felt a desperate longing for Aunt Hannah, and a burning hatred for the witches who took her away.

  “They’re not going to get me,” she whispered. “Not without a fight.”

  Her head flew up as a light began to glow beside the hearth. Shafts of golden light streamed up through the floorboards, glittering like rays of the sun bursting through a bank of gloomy storm clouds.

  Holly dropped to her knees and ran her fingers around the floorboard, looking for a way in. Thumping her fist on one end of the board, the other flew into the air and almost knocked her out. She caught it at the last second and gasped as she saw what was laying hidden in the cavity underneath.

  Hannah’s grimoire.

  She knew it as certainly as she knew the sun rose in the east and set in the west. There were no doubts, no fear. Only hope.

  Leaning over the hole, Holly reached inside, the shock of the events in the diggings pushed aside. The moment she touched the book, a jolt of static electricity zapped her fingers. She jerked back, rubbing her hand against her chest.

  Trying again, she was able to pick the book up and lift it out of the hole in the floor.

  It was smaller than she’d imagined, only slightly bigger than the A5 notebook she’d been writing in. The brown leather cover felt soft underneath her fingers and the pen tingled as she slipped it out of the clasp.

  It must’ve been hidden with a spell. Maybe her unhindered Legacy had been the key to triggering it.

  Holly opened the cover, wondering what secrets the grimoire held, but she didn’t get far. A folded piece of paper dropped out of the pages and fluttered to the floor. Picking it up, she saw it was a letter…addressed to her.

  Dear Holly,

  If you’re reading this, it means I failed.

  Her hand flew to her mouth as a new round of tears filled her eyes. She recognised Aunt Hannah’s handwriting from all those random birthday and Christmas cards she’d received over the years. They’d always contained impersonal notes and an orange twenty dollar note, but as she looked at the letter, she recognised the distinctive curve of the letter ‘d’ and the twist of the ‘f.’

  Looking around the dark lounge room, she took a deep breath. No one was here, no one was watching. She was alone.

  Holly unfolded the rest of the letter and began reading…

  I’m so sorry it had to come to this. I wish with all my heart I could’ve been there to guide and teach as you come into your Legacy, but it couldn’t have happened any other way. You’re special, Holly, but there are things you need to know. First, and most important: Do not trust Hazel Burke.

  Holly looked up at the dark fireplace and frowned. But Hazel was dead. She’d—

  “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

  Patrick stood on the verandah of Samantha Dunne’s home, his hands shaking.

  Reaching for the doorbell, he hesitated. What would he give away this time? Or was Jin right when he said he’d always had a choice? Whatever path, he knew when Holly’s magic had passed through him, it’d changed something. It opened a hole he might be able to exploit.

  Grimacing, he shook his head and gathered his last scrap of courage. There was only one way to find out.

  He rang the doorbell and waited. Inside the house, he heard movement, then a light came on in the hall, and another popped to life above his head. A moment later, Samantha Dunne opened the door.

  She wore a black silk dressing gown over her nightclothes and her feet were bare. The witch was always the picture of elegance, even in the middle of the night.

  “What kind of hour do you think this is?” she demanded, her scowl deepening. “Not a decent one.”

  “It couldn’t wait.” The words died in his throat, and he hesitated again.

  “You have information, I assume?” she prodded. “Get on with it. My feet are cold.”

  Patrick reached inside his jacket and took out the anthame. Presenting it to her, he said, “Sarah’s dead.”

  Samantha’s expression fell and her skin took on a sickly grey pallor. “What?”

  “Sarah is dead. Jin Xu killed her.”

  Thank you for reading The Power Within!

  The story continues in Book Two, THE THRICE DIVIDED.

  THE THRICE DIVIDED

  Australian Supernatural: Goldfields Book Two

  Trapped ghosts, evil witches, and tormented vampires. With ultimate power at stake, can newly awoken witch Holly keep it together long enough to survive?

  * * *

  Holly Burke has a big problem. Dark spirits are prowling outside her house, witches want to steal her powers, and she keeps spontaneously shooting electric sparks out of her hands.

  With danger lurking around every corner, her only allies are two vampires who have major problems of their own — one may or may not be cursed, and the other is in the middle of an existential crisis. She’s already lost so much, and with her own life on the line, she can’t bear to lose anyone else, but she may not have a choice.

  Things are spiralling out of control, and unless Holly can control her magic, she won’t stand a chance against the sinister rulers of Dunloe’s coven, the Trine.

  As dark powers close in, the unlikely trio must stand together…or remain forever divided.