Water Witch

by Carol Goodman

  “My esteemed colleague, Garnette Davis, has another suggestion. If the captured undine is escorted under the armed guard of the Stewarts to the door, and the door is sealed and warded, the majority of otherworldly creatures will leave this world. It may take some time to clean up the woods entirely, but we may be able to save the town and the college.”

  The IMP board members murmured their approval.

  “That is, if Dr. McFay is willing to close the door for us,” Adelaide added.

  “And what if I don’t?” I asked.

  “That would be regrettable,” Adelaide said severely, “but I assure you we have ways of doing it ourselves. You won’t be able to stop us.”

  “What about the otherworlders living in Fairwick?” I asked. “What will happen to them?”

  “The creatures that have made their homes here are free to choose which world they will live in,” Adelaide replied.

  “That seems eminently fair,” Talbot Greeley said with a relieved sigh. “Don’t you think so, Delbert?”

  Delbert Winters snorted. “Too fair by half, but I suppose it will do.”

  “But if the door is closed forever, many will be forced to choose Faerie,” Liz said.

  “So they’ll have to choose,” Lydia Markham said brusquely. “We’ve all had to make hard choices. Why should the fairies be any different?”

  “And what of those who have used Aelvesgold to lengthen their life spans?” Liz asked. “Or to control illnesses. Lydia, didn’t your mother receive treatment when she was sick last year? And you, Talbot, I know you don’t maintain your physique through going to the gym.” Neither professor met Liz’s gaze.

  “Vanities,” Eleanor Belknap remarked. “We’ll learn to do without them. Are we ready to take a vote? All those in favor of closing the door forever, raise their hands.”

  Five of the six board members raised their hands. Liz kept her hands clasped in front of her, fingers knotted together.

  “Very well, then,” Adelaide said, smiling. “We’re agreed. The door will be closed forever.”

  “When?” Soheila asked, the single word gusting from her mouth with a force that snapped the window blinds and chilled the room.

  Adelaide smiled. “Since tomorrow is the solstice it seems a fitting time. The door will be closed tomorrow morning at dawn.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  RISING AS ONE, the Grove members began to file out. The IMP Board members got up more slowly, but they too left the room, avoiding looking at Liz, who still sat in her seat. Soheila got up and started walking toward Liz and me at the same time as Frank turned around from the slide screen, which had been left on. He started toward her, his arms out as though to grab hold of her.

  “Soheila, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know …”

  Soheila held up her hands. I think she only meant to ward off Frank’s apologies and to keep him from touching her – maybe she was afraid of what effect her touch might have on him in her highly emotional state – but the motion caused a gust of wind that blew him backwards. He hit the wall, his arms splayed out to steady himself, in a pose eerily like the twisted limbs of the murdered fisherman. Soheila made a sound like a wounded bird and fled the room. Frank watched her go with a pained look on his face and then addressed himself to Liz. “I had no idea that the information I was collecting would be used by the Grove. It looks to me like IMP has been compromised by the Grove.”

  Liz nodded. “We’re in agreement there,” she said. “I don’t understand how they can turn their backs on the fey. Even Loomis Pagan and Talbot Greeley have turned on their own kind.”

  I filled Frank in on what I’d learned from Jen Davies about the club in London that the Grove had joined forces with.

  “The Seraphim Club?” he repeated. “I’ve heard something about them …” His voice drifted off. He was staring at me, his eyes narrowed. “What did happen to your face, McFay?”

  “Oh,” I said, embarrassed. “It’s a long story …” Before I could finish he stepped closer and put his hand up against my face, but the wards on my skin sizzled and popped. He kept his hand there, though, even though the wards were beginning to smoke and I smelled singed flesh.

  “Frank, don’t …” I grabbed his hand and pushed it away. He looked at me, then down at his hand. The coils had been seared into his flesh. He nodded once, as if what he saw confirmed something he’d suspected and then he turned and left without another word.

  Liz’s face sagged. She looked like she had aged a decade in the hour we’d been inside this room. I was afraid she was going to cry, but instead she asked me the last question I wanted to answer. “Do you think you can stop them from closing the door?”

  “Yes,” I said with more confidence than I felt. “I read in Wheelock that there’s a way for a doorkeeper to create a bond with the door to keep it open.”

  “I’ve read that footnote in Wheelock,” Liz said, “but only a doorkeeper can open it.” Her face looked troubled. “I’ve also heard though that doorkeepers have died in the attempt to prevent a door from closing. If it comes to that, Callie, you mustn’t sacrifice your own life.”

  “It won’t come to that,” I told Liz.

  She held my gaze for a moment, and then nodded. “Let’s hope not.”

  I walked quickly across the campus, my anger at the Grove pumping in my veins. They had tricked and manipulated us. Clearly they had gotten to some of the IMP board members to influence their votes. The others had been swayed by those awful pictures of undine attacks. They were using fear and prejudice to control us. Well, I wouldn’t be controlled. I was the doorkeeper. There had to be a way I could keep the door open despite the Grove’s intention to close it – and the answer was in Wheelock.

  When I reached my house I opened my briefcase and took out the spell book. Standing on the porch I opened to the marked section, reread the footnote, and then depressed the magical icon. Instead of pages filling with text as had happened before I felt a sharp stabbing pain in my right eye, as if a hot cinder had blown into it. I blinked and a red film covered my vision. It took a moment for me to realize that words were printed on the film and that they were scrolling across my vision.

  “In order for a doorkeeper to gain complete dominion over the door to Faerie and prevent others from closing it she may cast a correlative spell that links her own person to the door. This can be accomplished by spilling a drop of her blood on the threshold of the door. Once the bond is established she only has to repeat the words Quam cor mea aperit, tam ianua aperit (“Just as my heart opens, so the door opens”) in order to cancel out any opposing closing spells. The best time to perform this ritual is at dusk on the eve of the summer solstice.”

  “Eureka!” I said aloud, blinking my eyes three times. The words “There is one caution …” flashed as I blinked but then began to fade. Shoot! Blinking three times was probably the way to end the transmission. Never mind, I thought, I knew enough to make the bond. I could read the caution later. It was nearly dusk now. I had to go to the door right now to establish the bond before tomorrow morning.

  Without bothering to change out of my suit and pumps, I took off into the woods, walking as fast as I could on heels to the clearing in the woods where the door to Faerie stood. As rushed as I was, though, I ground to a halt when I reached the edge of the clearing. I’d stood here before in the middle of winter and thought it looked magical glazed with ice and snow, but I’d never seen it before in full summer, on the eve of the summer solstice. The trees were draped with honeysuckle vines in full bloom, their white and yellow blossoms filling the air with sweet honeyed air. The vines had twisted themselves into an arch directly across from me. Heavy wisteria blooms hung over the arch like a fringed curtain. The air inside the arch shimmered like the skin of a soap bubble. I approached it warily, feeling my resolve waver with the undulating colors. I was going to bond myself to this, I thought, a portal to another world? I was already a mess of conflicting desires. What would it do to me to connect m
yself to an unstable, volatile entity?

  Perhaps I should have read that caution in Wheelock.

  But I’d left the book behind and I didn’t have time to go back for it. It was dusk. The Grove was going to close the door tomorrow. Clearly they thought they could. This might be the only way to stop them.

  I moved closer until I was inches from the door. The transparent film pulsed as if sensing my presence. Weren’t we already connected? I stretched out my hand and held it up to the surface of the door, palm out. The film swirled, forming a pattern like the one I’d seen on Skald’s phone. Yes, this was my fate. Whatever it did to me, I had to forge this bond.

  Still holding one hand up to the door I unpinned the Luckenbooth brooch from my jacket. Its design of two hearts seemed fitting for a spell that linked my heart to the door. I pricked my finger with the pin, squeezed it until a drop of blood welled up, then turned my hand over to let the drop fall on the threshold of the door.

  “Quam cor mea aperit,” I said, “tam ianua aperit.”

  The transparent pattern swirled into a spiral. As it moved I felt a tugging sensation in my chest. Yes, we were connected for better or for worse. Like a marriage, I thought wryly, looking down at my hand. The drop of blood reminded me of Bill drawing out the splinter and I suddenly wished he were here to cradle my hand in his …

  But that was silly. It wasn’t like I was really injured, just bound to an ephemeral ancient gateway. I turned and walked back to my house. It began to rain again, but the trees were so thick that the raindrops barely touched me. I could hear them, though, rustling through the high branches. When I looked up I saw a shadow moving through the branches.

  A shadow? In the pouring rain?

  A branch cracked overhead, the sound loud as gunfire in the pouring rain, and I took off toward my house. Something burst out of the trees above me but I was too frightened to turn around and look up. I sprinted across my lawn, up the porch steps, onto the shelter of my porch. My hands were wet and shaking as I dug in my pocket for my keys. I’d just found them when I felt a hand on my back.

  I whirled around, the point of the house key gripped between my fingers ready to stab the intruder … and looked up into Duncan’s blue eyes.

  “Callie, it’s me. Are you all right? I saw you running from the woods and came to see if you were okay. You looked frightened.”

  I edged past Duncan to the porch railing and looked up into the sky. A large branch had fallen at the edge of the woods.

  “I thought I heard something in the trees,” I said warily. “For all I knew it was you come to finish what you had started and claw out my other eye.”

  Duncan blanched. “Callie, I’m sorry. I can explain …”

  “Really?” I leaned against the porch railing and crossed my arms over my chest. “I’m waiting.”

  “That spell you cast summoned a creature – some kind of imp with bat wings and claws. It flew between us so quickly I couldn’t stop it, but when it struck you I pulled it away from you and then chased it into the woods.”

  I snorted. “I don’t believe that for a minute. I was holding your hand. When I turned …” I faltered. I had turned and the slash of claws had blinded me. I’d assumed it was Duncan – or Duncan turned into a clawed beast – but really I hadn’t seen the thing that had attacked me. “If that were true, why didn’t you come back?”

  “I followed it into the woods. I didn’t want it to come back to hurt you. I chased it all night and finally cornered it, but it lashed out at me just as it had at you. This is what I got for my trouble.” He took a tentative step closer to me and rolled up his shirtsleeve. Five deep gashes ran from elbow to wrist.

  “You could have done that to yourself,” I said.

  “Really?” he asked, lifting an eyebrow. “Could I have done this?” He turned, ripping off his shirt to expose his back. His back was raked with claw marks. I reached out to touch one and he winced.

  “You weren’t at the meeting today,” I said.

  “How could I go with these marks on me?” he asked, turning to face me. He was close, his bare chest radiating heat across the few inches that separated us. I felt a tug, like static electricity or centripetal force, pulling me toward him. My heart, newly bound to the door, beat erratically. Were heart palpitations part of the warning I hadn’t read?

  “Ann Chase told me you asked her to recommend you as my tutor. She thinks you’re the incubus.”

  “Is that who you think I am?” he asked, lifting his hand to my cheek and gently tracing the scratches over my eye with his fingertips. I shivered at his touch, suddenly aware of how cold and wet I was. “Is that who you want me to be?”

  “I … I don’t know,” I said, my voice trembling. “I thought I might love him. I thought if I saw him once more … as he really is … then I’d know.”

  There was a flicker in Duncan azure eyes, a shadow that swam in and out of vision as Duncan lowered his head and pressed his mouth against my mouth. The instant I felt his lips on mine the shadow resolved into the shadow moving through the trees and I felt a jolt of fear course through my body. I tried to pull away but he wrapped his arms around me and held me tight, his lips locked on mine, his tongue probing my mouth, his bare chest pressing me up against the porch railing. But now instead of warmth rising off him, I felt cold. Pure ice-water cold. I wasn’t sure if Duncan was the incubus or not but I was sure of one thing. He felt wrong. I summoned the fizzle of energy I’d felt last night when I released my wards, wriggled my hands between our bodies, and pushed.

  Duncan flew across the porch and hit the front door so hard the doorbell chimed and the glass fanlight shook in its frame and cracked. A sliver of green glass plummeted straight down onto Duncan’s bare chest and lodged there like a miniature dart. Duncan winced and brushed it away, streaking blood across his chest. He wiped the blood on his pants and got to his feet, his eyes locked on mine.

  “I’m getting a little tired,” he said, biting off each word as he moved toward me, “of these mixed signals.”

  “I don’t think there was anything mixed in that last signal the lady sent you.”

  The voice, low and ominous, came from behind me. I turned around and found Bill, hands clenched into fists, glaring at Duncan.

  “This is between Callie and me,” Duncan said, “I don’t think we need the handyman to weigh in.”

  I moved closer to Bill and put my hand on his arm. “Bill’s right. I think you should leave.”

  Duncan narrowed his eyes at Bill, clearly assessing the threat he represented. The muscles in Bill’s forearm clenched under my fingers, turning hard as steel. I could practically smell the testosterone in the air. Any second now the two men would fly at each other. I stepped in between them and felt the hair on the back of my neck rise. “If the two of you are going to fight over me like two dogs fighting over a bone I’m going to talk to you like dogs. Go home, Duncan. You stay here, Bill.”

  Duncan lifted one corner of his mouth in a half smile/half snarl and walked past us, getting close enough to brush against Bill’s arm. I felt Bill tense, but he remained still. We both turned, though, to watch Duncan walk down the stairs. When he got to the bottom he turned around and looked over his shoulder at me. “Remember that this was your choice, Callie.” Then he turned and walked across the street to the Hart Brake Inn.

  It wasn’t until he was halfway across the street that I felt a release of the tension in the air and then I nearly collapsed. If Bill hadn’t steadied me with his arm, I’d have slumped to the floor. “Let’s get you inside,” he said, helping me toward the door.

  “Okay,” I said, leaning against him and letting him practically carry me over the threshold. I felt weak. It wasn’t just the release of tension, it had something to do with the power I’d used pushing Duncan away. “Thank you for coming to my defense.”

  “You looked like you were doing a pretty good job yourself,” he said. “I’d have stepped in sooner, only I wasn’t sure you wanted me to.�
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  “You were watching us?”

  Bill pointed up. At first I thought he was pointing at the fanlight, which I saw to my dismay was indeed cracked. A splinter had come loose from the stained glass eye of the young man, making it look as if a single tear was falling from his eye. “I was on the porch roof,” Bill explained when he saw me staring at the fanlight. “I didn’t mean to listen in, but I couldn’t help but hear … I heard you say you thought you loved someone.”

  “Oh, that,” I said. “I thought Duncan Laird was someone else …” I looked up at Bill. “I’ve been pretty confused lately. I seem to keep making mistakes …”

  “Do you think last night was a mistake?” he asked, his face pained.

  “No! I didn’t mean that. Last night was great … lovely … but …”

  “But what?” he asked, taking his arm away from my shoulder and leaning against the wall. “Do you want to be with that man?”

  “Duncan?” I shuddered. “No, I don’t. But it’s complicated. There’s history between us that I can’t completely ignore.”

  “Oh, I see. Complicated. Too complicated for the likes of me, I guess. It seems pretty simple to me. That man hurt you.” He reached out and touched my face. His blunt calloused fingertips felt like balm on my bruised skin, like a warm breeze. While Duncan’s touch had chilled me, Bill’s warmed me. Where Duncan had felt wrong, Bill just felt right. He started to take his hand away, but I grabbed it and held it to my face.

  “You’re right,” I said. “It is simple. I want you, not Duncan Laird. Would you …? Could you …?”

  Bill didn’t wait for me to figure out the words to ask him for what I wanted. He already knew. He pulled me into his arms and pressed me hard against his chest and bent my head back. He kissed the bruises on my face gently, and then sank his mouth down to mine not so gently. He pressed me up against the door until I felt the hard length of him pushing between my legs. I moaned and went weak in the knees. He scooped me up and started for the stairs, but I wrapped my legs around his waist and bit his ear.