Lockhart's Legacy (Vespari Lockhart Book 1) Read Free Page B

shirt, ripping it from his chest. This exposed all of his tattooed runes, as well as the wound in his gut. Neither of these were what the beldams sought.
    Alviva licked her lips and held the needle up for him. “We’re going to add a new rune to your collection,” she told him, giggling to herself.
    The beldam dipped the needle into the ink and then pressed it to the flesh of his chest, just above the other tattoos. Lockhart could smell the ink, and though he couldn’t place what all they’d put in it, the black substance had a terrible odor like that of dung. Something they had concocted with their vile magics, certainly. Alviva then plucked the needle out and pushed it back in, staining his skin with the ink over and over.
    Lockhart had felt much worse pain than this, so he took it as another opportunity. The vespari squirmed with each press of the needle. Mabilia held him in place, but his goal wasn’t to escape her. His intent was to cut the rope with the knife still wedged in between his palm and the meat hook. With each movement, he felt the forward section of the knife tear against the rope, but the back section of the blade was slicing his palm open further and further. That was far worse than the needle pricking his flesh, but he kept tugging against it regardless.
    None of the beldams noticed what he was doing, being too preoccupied with the hex Alviva engraved on his chest with their vile ink. That fat beldam was nearly finished though, and he had to hurry. Another strain against the knife. He felt the rope begin to fray. He’d nearly made it through. Blood, however, pooled in his palm, and with nowhere for it to go, it dripped down his arm. A drop splashed against his forehead. This caught the attention of Petronila.
    “What’s this?” she asked.
    The slender beldam raised her long finger to his forehead, scraping the blood off, and she licked it from her finger, while tracing the drop up. Lockhart had to move fast. One more hard tug, and the rope was severed. The vespari dropped, the knife fell with him, and Alviva stumbled backward. Lockhart’s hard leather boots landed on the cave’s rocky floor, but his other hand was still in Mabilia’s clutches. He had a plan to put a stop to that.
    Lockhart grabbed the falling knife in midair with his bloodied but free hand. He swiped it at Petronila, causing her to back up along with Alviva, but neither of them were his target. Lockhart turned the knife toward Mabilia and sliced down against her wrist. The runed blade swept right through her flesh and came to a hard stop at her bone. Mabilia released her grip with a deep and terrible scream, but Lockhart held tight to his knife’s handle, tugging it away from her and peeling some of her flesh off as it dislodged from her bone.
    The vespari lunged for Alviva next, but she moved away from him, her fat flesh jiggling with each step. Mabilia recovered from her wound faster than he would’ve hoped, and with a roar, she began to charge him. Petronila grabbed her from behind though, having circled around to that side of the cave when Lockhart wasn’t looking.
    “No,” she whispered in her ear. “Look!” Petronila pointed to Lockhart’s chest. “The hex is finished. We just have to wait now.”
    Alviva started laughing, her fat jiggling with each outburst. Behind her, Estrild joined in with a high-pitched cackle though she didn’t seem to know why she was laughing. Mabilia looked over at them, pain and anger still flush on her face. Petronila, however, glared with a wicked smile. Lockhart knew that Alviva claimed to lead this coven, but he saw the slender beldam as the most devious and the most to be concerned with.
    “Let’s go,” Alviva told the others. “The hex will do the rest of the work.”
    “But he--” Mabilia started, gripping the wound in her wrist.
    “Silence!” the fat beldam told her. “We leave. Now. I will not repeat myself.”
    Alviva turned around and opened a dark swirling portal