Free Secretly Sam by Heather Killough-Walden Page A

would come apart at the seams. What was worse was that he was at a fraction of the strength he could be. What Logan had given him was fuel on a fire that burned and craved more fuel, a catch-22 of epic proportions, and it was driving him rather mad.
    The actual result was that he was getting a fairly bad headache, and he wasn’t sure how much longer he would be able to keep his eyes from glowing. As it was, their true color was barely being masked… and he was growing tired of wearing a mask at all.
    “Yo, Dom?”
    Sam let the words slide over him. They felt like sandpaper on his already raw nerves. Maldovan’s friends were still here. Despite his wishes, Logan had left, and these two boys had remained behind. It was the opposite of what he wanted.
    They lounged in Maldovan’s living room, their faces ashen, their quiet demeanor so typical of the human reaction to traumatic loss. They’d asked him to fill them in on what had transpired, and because he needed the time to figure out what he was going to do next, and also because he couldn’t have cared less what they thought, he’d obliged. He gave them the same story he’d given the cops because it never hurt to be careful.
    But now enough was enough. The inferno raging to life inside of him wanted to be fed. It wanted Logan’s words.
    It wanted Logan .
    First things first. Lehrer had to go. The witches were too dangerous, and Sam wasn’t going to allow anything to stop him this time.
    As for Maldovan, Sam would remain in his body for now. The disguise might yet come in handy, and in order to leave his form, he would have to orchestrate the Maldovan’s death. Experience had shown him such a task was never as simple as it would seem to be. He would stay hidden, build his power, and gain a better footing on this veritable chess board. Then he would move in for the kill and return to his realm with the prize.
    Sam lowered his hand, raised his head, and stood from where he’d been seated at the bar. Maldovan’s band mates looked up at him.
    They had dressed up as vampires at the Halloween dance. Vampires , Sam mused, liking the idea. As he recalled, they’d looked fairly convincing in their costumes, too.
    Vampirism suited them.
    Sam smiled. And this time, he didn’t bother hiding his fangs.
    *****
    Meagan rifled through the leather backpack with a combination of care and restless impatience. She pulled a small bottle out and then wrestled with a larger metal one she had braced between her legs in the passenger seat. It was hard to do while the car was moving, but one after another, she managed to get the ingredients from several different small bottles all mixed up into one big one.
    “I think that’s everything,” she said. “The sand from an equator island, candle made of summer beeswax, melted snow from the last snowfall, and ink from a pen Logan used.” She screwed a metal cap on tight and slipped the flask into the pocket of her leather jacket.
    “At least that’s taken care of,” said Mr. Lehrer as he continued to watch the road ahead. His tone was strained with stress, and every muscle in his erect form seemed to be pulled taut as a bow string.
    It had begun to rain, and the wind was picking up. Road conditions were deteriorating quickly. It didn’t help the situation.
    The ingredients Meagan had just poured together were components for a protection spell she and Mr. Lehrer had cast earlier that night at the library just after Katelyn had headed home for bed. The spell was intended to protect Logan, hence the pen ink, and existed in two chronological parts. Half of each ingredient was used at the casting of the spell; the other half had to be placed together in one safe receptacle. The spell would then last for as long as the components and their container were unharmed.
    That last ingredient, the ink from a pen Logan had used, had been Meagan’s job to procure. Thankfully, they didn’t need very much of it, and Logan could pretty much be counted