Free Original Sin by Allison Brennan

were …
    … leading Fiona right to them . It was the magic that revealed Moira’s location, the magic that led Fiona to St. Michael’s, and no amount of protection could shield Moira from her own arrogance.
    Fiona found her, sent a demon to possess her, and with her own hands Moira had killed the one man she loved.

SIX
Oh mama, I’m in fear for my life from the long arm of the law
Lawman has put an end to my running
and I’m so far from my home .
—STYX, “Renegade”
    Moira had to steer well clear of any self-pity, especially now when Anthony had the opportunity to chip away at her carefully constructed shields. Glancing over her shoulder, she saw Skye McPherson approaching Anthony, who was standing near the edge of the cliffs. Skye and Anthony talked, and Moira knew damn well what Anthony would say about her.
    Moira turned on her flashlight and shined it on the ground, looking for more clues.
    It was obvious—at least to her—that there had been a full, protective circle here. Anthony knew how to read the signs and symbols, how to trace their magical supplies. As a demonologist, he might even know which demons had been summoned. But most of the symbols were obscured. Some attempt had been made at collecting the supplies—she saw only two candles, yet the wax in the dirt indicated many more. Something violent had wreaked havoc here. Maybe she could piece it all together and somehow discover Fiona’s weak spot.
    If only it weren’t just about her, Moira wouldn’t hesitate to use magic to find and destroy her mother, even knowing that she herself would likely die and her soul would be lost. What did Moira have to live for but regret?
    But she couldn’t risk innocents. Lily, or Jared, or even that bastard Anthony Zaccardi. She’d told Father Philip she couldn’t bring Anthony in because she didn’t want to risk his life, and while on the surface it sounded altruistic, it was purely selfish. She didn’t care if Anthony was dead or alive, as long as he was dead through natural means. Then his eternal fate was between him and the Big Guy. But witches? Possession? Hell? She couldn’t suffer through that again.
    You’re pathetic. Get over it already .
    Good going, Mo. Practice that tough love on yourself; maybe you’ll believe it one of these days.
    Moira walked along the perimeter of what had been the outer circle and suddenly spotted something. She stopped, squatted, and inspected the earth.
    There had been a double circle, and the remnants of a hexagram. But this hexagram had crossed the inner circle and touched the outer circle. Generally, the hexagram was constrained by the inner circle. She hadn’t seen one of these before, but she knew the triangles at the tips of the hexagram within the double circle were for specific, ancient rituals. They were not well known, not practiced by most covens because most covens were novices working basic spells that did nothing but add to the fissure between the underworld and humans.
    For Moira’s entire life, her mother had been obsessed with finding the Conoscenza . Everything that she and Peter had uncovered years ago told them that the Conoscenza , the Book of Knowledge, the key to finding the Tree of Life, was gone forever. What if they’d been wrong? What if Fiona had found it? How in the world had her mother even read and understood it? It wasn’t written in a known language; it was so foreign, so old, that it was rumored to have first been written in the generation after the fall of man, by fallen angels and the humans they seduced into rebellion.
    The two types of demons—fallen angels and lost souls—had one thing in common: they wanted out of Hell. Lost souls were dangerous, but they needed a body to possess. They were weaker than fallen angels, more susceptible to traditional exorcism rites, vulnerable to certain weapons such as iron.
    Fallen angels, they were spirits. They were a whole other breed of demon—deadly, dangerous, and wholly evil. They