by Faith Hunter
“This is witch magic. Go away, skinwalker. Go away, Onorio. And take your foolish human with you.”
I had no intention of leaving, but I did back away to our SUV, where I handed out bottles of water to the guys before taking one and draining it myself. I kept my eyes on the witches, especially Sabina, who wore fresh, starched, habit-like whites, all the way to the wimple covering her hair. She had been burned at our last meeting, dangerously so, and now she wore white gloves of soft leather on both hands, hiding her wounds. Her fingers seemed to move more stiffly than usual, and I had to wonder how much pain she was in and how well she would handle confrontation with Joses Bar-Judas if he came to them.
As the witches walked into the central open space, I felt the tingle of magic through the ground as a circle was raised, but . . . nothing happened in the grassy area. “Did you feel that?” I asked Bruiser.
“Feel what?”
Whatever I had felt had happened elsewhere, not just there, in front of me. The sensation had been like ants running across my feet, little feathery touches, there and then gone. The sensation hadn’t come from a regular witch circle, but from something else, something more finessed and subtle, more practiced.
I tossed my empty into the back of the SUV and drew on my Beast. She peered out of my eyes, lending me her night vision and pulling up a hint of the Gray Between, which turned the world into sharp focus, grays and silvers and deep sylvan greens. I turned in a circle, questing with my/our senses, and spotted something different just beyond the tree line. A soft greenish glow of power ran through the trees on the far side of the chapel, crossed the drive, just short of the road, and circled back into the trees, enclosing the mausoleums. It wasn’t a ward, exactly; it was more of an early-warning system, like a magical burglar alarm, and a very sophisticated one too.
Sabina’s territory had once been used by the Damours in a black-magic, blood-magic ceremony trying to raise vampires into the undead without the devoveo—without the insanity that vamps go through when they’re changed. Everything in this gig came back to the vamps I’d killed my first few months in New Orleans. I’d missed the chance to gather intel back then—too busy killing things. Too sure that my way was the best and only one. Too dependent on Reach for intel, and not careful enough to gather my own. I’d learned that lesson the hard way.
Since then, Sabina had instituted modifications to her territory that I hadn’t noticed the last time I was there, probably because I was in danger of losing my head last time and had other things on my mind. I explained Sabina’s spell and added, “We don’t have to worry about Joses/Joseph walking up to us unannounced. I have a feeling that if he tried it, we’d see fireworks.”
Eli rolled his head on his shoulders and I heard a faint pop as his spine relaxed into place. “Good. I’m taking a shooter position up there.” He pointed with his weapon to the top of the Rousseau mausoleum. It had a small, flat roof ridge, not quite wide enough for a normal human to lie down on, but enough for a former active-duty Ranger to get comfy and get his weapon ready. And the sword held by the vampire angel was canted at a nice angle to tie off a rappel line for a quick dismount. I shooed him with my fingers and he trotted off; I turned my attention to the witches and asked Bruiser, “What’d I miss?”
“They’re drawing a double circle. No, make that a triple circle.”
I snorted in disgust. “This is looking like a whole lotta hurry up and wait.”
Bruiser lifted a single eyebrow in that Leo-like gesture and said, “We could play blackjack. Or strip poker. I’m very, very good at poker, so it would prove interesting.”
From out of the dark I heard Eli snort, this time sounding much like my own. I just shook my head and levered myself up onto the SUV hood to lean against the windshield for a little catnap. But I found myself watching the witches, Molly in particular, as they discussed the working they were going to try and shared the carefully spoken syllables of the easiest wyrd spell.
“Vo. Co. . . . E. X. Cie. O.” They spoke the syllables with no inflection and with irregular pauses between to avoid releasing the spell. Testing a new spell was dangerous. Testing someone else’s spell was triply dangerous. I hoped they had done their investigation properly, that the mathematics were correct and the wyrd wouldn’t blow them all to tiny, bloody, messy pieces.
The witches used string and a stick to mark three circles, then went to work with small shovels, digging the circles out. It should have been backbreaking work, but I realized that they weren’t creating new circles, but simply cleaning out preexisting furrows, removing the loam and grass to reveal channels made with concrete mixed with white shells. From the condition of the grass, they hadn’t been used in decades, but clearly Sabina had left her territory ready to take up her witchery at any point. The string had been used to measure out and find the circles, not to create circles.
Four witches stepped back against the mausoleum walls, Molly among them, as five witches stepped inside the middle circle. The five sat in the traditional pentagram positions—which was one of the best circles for a combined working. Sabina was sitting at the position for north and clapped her hands once, to call them to . . . I didn’t know what. Attention maybe. Or to announce it was time to get started. A circle opened around them, and the middle, white, concrete furrow glowed with a reddish light, flickered, and stabilized.
Sabina said a version of what I’d heard Molly say before. “We ward our space with the power of the wind and rain, the moon, the earth and all that lives upon it, the stone of the heart of the mountains, and the energy of fire. All power is gifted by the Creator, and to her we offer homage . . .”
Her? Interesting. But I didn’t dispute the gender of the Creator God. He—she—whatever—had no gender, so any pronoun would do as well as any other. And calling God it seemed disrespectful.
The middle circle flared, merging with the energies of the far warning circle. The powers paled from reddish to pink and then to a deep purple before the circle evened out again, looking as smooth and unbreakable as plasticized glass. As they murmured, getting the rhythm right, they initiated the first steps of an inverted hedge of thorns in the center circle, turning a proactive shield spell into a trap spell, but this spell felt different from the ones I’d seen before, smelled sharper on the air. Yeah. This was a different trap from the one they’d used before.
The hedge spell smelled the way the world did in the middle of a major thunderstorm—stronger, creating a tingle of static electricity in the air—as opposed to the way the Everhart sisters’ spell felt, which was more like the air when a storm is brewing but still far off. This hedge also felt different from the same spell that had been opened on the grounds of the Louis Armstrong Park. They had used five witches then too, but only three had been strong practitioners; two had been weakly gifted. That night, I didn’t see Butterfly Lily and her mother, Feather Storm. There were five strong witches in the working, a well-balanced blend of talents. The power signature was stronger.
So far, it was pretty much what I was used to, but with enough differences to make me wary. The witches were chanting something too softly to hear, the words not in English or Gaelic or Latin, not in any Romance tongue I recognized, all of which were languages I had heard witches and shamans use before. But it was something different, maybe tribal American. Not Cherokee—the consonants were too hard and sharp for that. But maybe something else tribal, a language that I didn’t know.
Molly’s mouth turned down in a frown. She didn’t know the language either, but the local witches did, even Sabina. Interesting-er and interesting-er. How would Sabina know a local witch language unless she had been working with them? In secret or something. Yeah. That. More vamp games. I wondered how long that had been going on. It couldn’t have started until after I’d gotten to NOLA, so probably less than a year. Maybe. Or maybe not.
They stopped speaking and the circles fell. Or they went inactive; I could see over and around the circles, but there was still a faint
glow. Sabina stepped to the center of the inner circle and gestured for all the women to join her. They all came close, even Molly, who was looking more and more like a fish out of water. Sabina talked to them, her voice soothing and peaceful, but with the nine witches it was still a lot like a huddle of football players discussing the next play.
I could have listened if I’d strained, but the days of lack of rest caught up with me. I fell sound asleep. I dreamed about my soul home, but it was a confusing dream, and a different place, the walls blackened as if by fire, the smell of sour smoke hanging on the damp air. It smelled unused. It sounded silent. It felt cold and empty.
I woke when Bruiser’s scent changed, my eyes opening wide. A heartbeat later, his hand landed on my ankle and I sat upright.
“No,” he said. “I won’t allow that.”
Sabina said, “We dare not utilize the same sequence of spells and incantations and wyrds that we used last. We are stronger now, with time to prepare and with five full practitioners on the regnum circle and four on the outer protego circle. We have more options, but we must be prepared for the unforeseen and the unexpected. In return, we must attempt that which is untried and unanticipated.”
“And what is that?” I asked, knowing I wasn’t going to like it.
“We will once again place you in the center of the hedge with the item that will attract Santana. You will hold the sliver of the Blood Cross and the blood diamond in one hand, so that they touch. And you will drop your blood upon them.”
“Which could get me and everyone in the circle with me killed if it explodes and sends wild magic everywhere.”
“No. That will not happen. You have used the sliver before. Your blood has been upon it before. The diamond has touched your blood before. There will be no change except you will be able to call Santana to you with the power of your blood.”
I knew instantly that they had been talking to Molly about me and that she had shared the story of the first time I wielded the sliver of the Blood Cross. She had told them one of my greatest secrets. Until now, the number of people who knew exactly what had happened the night I killed a coven of blood-magic practitioners to save her children had been extremely limited. I turned wounded eyes to my best friend, and she lifted her chin, a gesture that looked defiant. I didn’t know what was happening to Molly. She was changing, and I couldn’t see where the changes would take her except someplace dark and empty and alone.
“It’s untried magic,” Bruiser growled, sounding a lot like he had the first time I ever saw him, in the doorway of Katie’s Ladies, defending Leo. Now he was defending me. Life was so weird. “That makes it dangerous.”
“Worst-case scenario?” I asked.
“You burn to death,” Molly said.
“That’s what I always liked about you, Mol. Honest to a fault. Except when you aren’t.”
She flinched, a minuscule recoil at my words. Yeah. Molly wasn’t so honest anymore. That hurt. And it made me mad. And it made me sad.
“Hey, Molly,” I said, feeling mean. “Where’s KitKit?”
“In the van in her travel carrier, from where I picked her up at the vet’s,” Molly said, lying through her teeth. “She’ll be fine. The windows are cracked and I left her water.” Her bright eyes stared at me across the darkness, defying me to share her secret, even though she had shared mine.
It was a dare. A challenge. Like a line in the sand, one that Molly wondered whether I’d cross. Would I really tell the witches of New Orleans that my best friend in the whole world had gone to the dark side? That she was drawn to the practice of death magic? My breath caught as I realized that—yes. I’d give away my best friend in my entire life, turning her over to her own people, if it meant saving her life and the lives of my godchildren. “I’ll get the cage out,” I said, my words slow and stiff, telling her I accepted her challenge. “A little night air will do her good.”
Molly narrowed her eyes. Her hair blew out in a wind that wasn’t there, a wind that instantly died. Staring at me, walking slowly backward, placing her feet with care, she stepped to the outermost of the three circles. I turned my back on her, a Beast-move that said she wasn’t a threat, wasn’t worth remaining watchful over. It was a dominance ploy and an insult that Molly surely recognized.
I opened the van’s hatch and saw the cat cage, the tiny cat staring at me through the mesh, much like Molly stared at me across the cemetery grounds. I lifted the carrier by its handle to carry the cage to the edge of the grassy area where the witches had activated their circles.
Sabina was watching me, her expression shrewd and knowing. I had to wonder how many times in her own long life she had been tempted to take the easy way out, to try blood magic, to kill something, or someone, for an end that appeared worth the murder and the smut on her soul—assuming she had a soul. Most Christians said no vamps had souls, but as with most things religious, there was no proof. And then I wondered, what if Molly had already been there, done that, and was getting ready to betray us all? Crap. Too much could go wrong, including the people I needed to be able to trust.
I set the carrier down on the grass and looked up at Clan Rousseau’s mausoleum, seeing the slightly darker outline of Eli Younger, stretched across the roof’s ridge. Instantly I felt better. I had stopped next to Bruiser, KitKit’s cage at his feet, his warm eyes on me, telling me that he knew something about Molly and the other witches was off-kilter but that he trusted me to handle it. Yeah. I blew out a tight breath, chest muscles relaxing. Two people here that I can trust with my life, Eli and Bruiser. I can work with that.
* * *
Deep night had fallen when the witches were finally ready, dark night, with a whipping wind and clouds building overhead, anvil shaped, moving in from the southwest. But, low to the ground, it was still and heated, the wet hanging on the air and slicking our skin, the humidity so high that our own sweat wouldn’t evaporate. Lightning flickered uncertainly between the clouds, making a low, rumbling thunder, not striking down to earth, not yet, but dancing from cloud to cloud with lambent light that brightened the mausoleums and the marble vampires who stood atop each, statues of the clan founders depicted as angels going to battle. Campy just on their own. A little eerie, considering the origination story of the vamps.
The witches had planned and arranged and rearranged the alignment of the circles, setting up the two outer rings for eight practitioners instead of nine, four in each circle, with candles on the outer ring at the cardinal points of the compass, and candles on the middle ring at the intermediate points of the compass. At the north compass point on the inner circle was the new trap, stronger than snare of thorns, where Santana would be captured if all went as planned. Molly found her place on the innermost circle and sat—the circle called the inretio circle, which was Latin for trap. And she smiled, shifting candlelight reflected in her eyes.
“Eli,” I said, loudly. “If Molly starts doing something dangerous and Bruiser doesn’t stop her, shoot her.”
“What is the problem?” Sabina asked.
“Chick fight,” I said, “one with lethal consequences. Not something that concerns you or the others. As long as Molly is a good little girl.”
“Angle of shot is acceptable,” Eli said from the roofline. “Placement of shot preference?”
“Not someplace lethal,” I said ruminatively, as if I was thinking about my options. “Maybe a lower-leg wound. She might limp for the rest of her life, but I’d be alive to see her all gimpy.”
“Roger that. Leg wound it is.”
Bruiser looked from Eli to me to Molly and lifted one eyebrow, just the one, and smiled. “Capital idea. And what is my job?”
More softly I said, “Throw the cat at her.”
“I’ll try that right away,” he said, his tone wry, “the moment I see a demon or something, hoping to avoid a shooting. Less mess, all that blood getting all over the grass and inciting vampire hunger.”
“Yeah. Okay. Whatever,” I said, taking in the circle
s and the location and the weird storms on the horizon. No. It wasn’t okay; it was scary and dangerous and probably stupid. It looked all wrong. Lightning flashed between thunderheads, brightening the sky. I did not like it at all.
“You in a Latin triple circle with witches and a priestess of the Mithrans, objects of black magic, the creation wood of all the vampires, and a death witch at the trap to the door? What could go wrong?” Bruiser asked softly, reading my mind.
“I know. Right? Easy-peasy.”
“I have a bad feeling about this, Jane. Make them find another away.”
I glanced at him, his body tense, leaning against the SUV, the grill at his back. He was dressed in Enforcer garb and loaded with weapons, his strong, slightly Roman nose proud and beautiful, his jaw almost square, upper-class British lips thin with disquiet. “Questions, Onorio. One: Does this look like it might work?”
His mouth turned down with an unwilling, “Yes. Perhaps. If it doesn’t blow up everyone in the rings.”
“Two: What kind of honor would I have if I ran away?”
He shook his head, refusing to answer.
“Three: I know you can enter the Gray Between and fight beside me. What would happen if you crossed over an active witch circle or three in the middle of a working?”
Bruiser tilted his head down and smiled at me from beneath his brows. His tone speculative and intrigued, he said, “I have no idea.”
“Well, if it looks like it’s going to hell in a handbasket, and throwing Molly’s familiar at her doesn’t work, and Eli shooting her doesn’t work, pull a couple blades and try it.”
He leaned over to me and pressed his lips to my forehead, his mouth fevered and dry and smooth, like a blessing more than a kiss. I closed my eyes, holding him close with one hand on the back of his head. “Be safe,” he murmured against my face. I felt small tingles of magic flutter over my skin, cool and sparkling, like the tingles of sparklers from a Fourth of July celebration. “Please.”