by Catie Rhodes
I was the next Gregorius Witch. It was my destiny and had been since the day I was born.
The only thing left was to let go so I could take the next step on this journey.
So I did.
17
Water lapped nearby. Its fishy, humid smell filled my senses. Something splashed, and wood creaked beneath me. I snapped awake.
A dusky sky hung above me. I stared at it as the memory of how I’d gotten here flashed. The Wanderer had stolen my breath.
I sucked in a deep breath just to prove I could and whipped my head side to side. I wiggled my foot. At least I could move again.
My hands lay clasped on my chest the way funeral directors arranged corpses in coffins. I moved one of them, and something rolled down my side and bounced on a hard surface.
The coins the Wanderer put in my hand after he stole my breath. My breath caught. He’d said I’d need them both. So had Black Silas. Two warnings about the same thing. That was serious business.
My body jerked into action. Gripping the coin I still held, I and rolled over on my side. My other arm snaked out to snatch the escaping coin. It rolled across damp wood planks and teetered on the edge of one of the cracks.
Blood pounding in my ears, my free hand slapped the boards. But my motor skills were still sluggish. I couldn’t quite catch it. Panic rocked my brain. Underneath was water. If it fell, I’d never get it back.
It paused on the edge of the board, rocking back and forth. I forced myself to sit up. My head swam, and my still sore stomach muscles let out a pained screech.
Magic tingled on my skin, reminding me of something important. I was a witch. Without me telling it to, something reached out of my mind and tapped the coin. It tipped backward onto the plank and lay still. I snatched it and closed my trembling fingers over it.
How had that happened? I closed my eyes and turned inward, looking for the shining light of magic. It was there, no different than usual. Then how had my mind reached out like an extra finger and kept the coin from rolling into the water?
You’re almost ready to become. That voice again, the one that didn’t sound like me at first. But this place made me hear it a new way. The voice sounded a lot like my voice when I whispered. Chill bumps formed on my arms. I shivered.
The splash came again. I searched the dark water. A shadowy figure standing on a boat floated toward me. The coins twitched in my hand.
I opened my fingers and studied the coins. Shiny gold, blank except for the raised image of a bee or a wasp. I ran my finger over the metal and found an indention in the coin’s back. Some poor bug had been covered in molten gold to make these.
Why were they so important? In fact, what was this place? My mind shied away from the answers. It didn’t matter now. All that mattered was taking care of the business I had here.
The boat bumped against the pier. The coins twitched again. I rolled onto my knees and stood on shaky legs. Steps unsure, I walked to the end of the pier, footsteps ringing hollowly on the boards.
The figure standing in the boat held a long pole half submerged in water. A dark hooded robe hung to its ankles, swaying with the breeze. The mist coming off the water and the hood hid any telling details of his appearance. We stared at each other.
“I’m Peri Jean Mace.” My voice echoed over the water. “Are you here for me?”
Instead of answering, the figure held out a hand, wrapped in dirty strips of fabric, palm up. One skeletal finger poked out of the fabric. The fingernail on the end had been filed to a sharp point.
Fear jumped in my chest, tried to run. But I didn’t have time for its nonsense right now. Carefully, so as not to drop it, I placed one coin in the outstretched palm. The fingers closed over it.
A hand pressed to my back, and Priscilla Herrera’s voice spoke up inside my head. Get in.
I climbed into the boat. It rocked back and forth, sloshing in the water. I dropped into a crouch and grabbed the edge, fear unspooling in my stomach.
The figure, who I suspected was an animated skeleton similar to Pappy of the Shark Teeth Rednecks, dug the pole into the water and gave it a shove. The boat began to move.
Black water lapped at the sides. We passed a set of huge eyes staring out of the darkness. The eyes sat above the long flat snout I associated with an alligator or other modern-day dinosaur. It ducked under the water.
Humidity rising off the water settled on my face in a cold dew. The damp air filled my senses, reminding me of days I’d spent on the open water, fishing or watching someone else fish.
The tall figure stood at the bow of the boat, digging the pole into the water and pushing on it to propel us.
“Where are we going?” I asked its back.
The figure gave no sign it had heard.
I opened my second sight and searched for Priscilla Herrera. She’d been with me before I got on the boat, but now her dark, cold presence was nowhere near.
Orev. Maybe he could come to me. I reached out to him. The rustle of flapping wings came across the water. Orev landed on the boat’s edge.
He cawed at me. The meaning came. Be careful here. This is the land of the dead.
My stomach lurched and plummeted. The land of the dead. Of course. No Samhain was complete without a trip to the land of dead. Especially when it was my Samhain.
Was this my new home? I glanced at the other coin the Wanderer had given me. No. This coin would pay my way back to the land of the living. But first I had to withstand whatever waited at the other end of this boat ride.
Back in the cavern, the Wanderer had mentioned finding the root of the scar tissue spell. The thing that held it together. How would I find that here?
Fear stretched out the seconds of the trip. Orev had warned me to be careful. Of what? I sent out the question to Orev. A picture came back of a bottle on a chain. Before I could ask for more information, we bumped against something.
The ferryman stepped aside for me to get off the boat. I scrambled past him and used a post to pull myself onto a pier exactly like the one where he’d picked me up. I turned back to ask him what to do now. The water in front of the pier was empty, as though he’d never been there.
Pulled by a force I couldn’t have named, I crossed the pier. It ended on a sandy beach bordered by thick woods.
Orev appeared in front of me, cawed at me, and flew into the woods.
Mouth sour with worry, I followed my familiar. Closer to the woods, a wide path led into the brush. Orev called from a tree near the mouth. I stepped into the woods and breathed deep the scent of cool, damp pine.
A young man wearing a calf-length black fur cloak stepped out of the shadows. A huge dog’s head rested on top of the young man’s head. The rest of the dog’s pelt covered his back, tail dragging the ground. The smell from the hide hit me. Bile filled my mouth. What a gross getup.
I took a step back, grabbing for my magic. The air around me crackled as it came to life.
The young man held up both hands. “I’m not going to attack. I just wanted to tell you that’s the forest of the dead. Sure you want to go?”
“I have to.” I kept a hold on my magic in case I had to blast this freak.
But he stepped back into the shadows without another word and disappeared before my eyes.
Orev squawked at me. Come on.
I gathered my resolve and stepped into the forest. Brush hugged the bases of the trees like an unkempt beard. It made seeing more than a few feet ahead impossible. I crept along with my shoulders hunched. How would I find anything in this thicket? A few yards along the path, the undergrowth thinned. Someone—or something—had cleared it away so it seemed the trees went on forever. The shape of a structure winked in the distance. I didn’t need Orev to tell me this was the right way to go.
I trudged along the path, still tense, imagining everything that could possibly go wrong. Any journey that required a boat ride with a skeleton through the land of the dead would host more horrors than good times.
&
nbsp; Orev cawed at me from a tree. A message came with the caw. Just go forward.
He was right. There was nothing to do but follow the road I was on and do the best I could.
The house, which had seemed a distance away, now appeared right through the trees. Apprehension and the need to see what awaited convinced me to take the first step off the path.
The world darkened, the trees crowding closer. Whispers and giggles reached my ears. A nude figure with skin so white it seemed to shine in the darkness darted behind a tree and disappeared. Death radiated from the creature. Cold hands squeezed my heart.
A branch snapped behind me. I spun, hands up to fight, but saw only another milky white figure darting just out of sight. Another branch popped. I turned on my heel as fast as I could. This time, the figure brushed against me. The contact sent a shock of cold through my body.
Get your ass to that house, girl. My inner self had a damn good idea. I raced toward the structure, fairy tales about errant children who strayed from the path filling my mind. Something—a hand, oh fucking shit, it’s a hand, one of those dead white hands—grabbed at my shirt. I yanked out of its grasp and ran harder.
Footsteps crashed behind me. The creature’s breath rasped in and out, not in exertion but chuckles.
Fear tripping my senses, flashing lights behind my eyes, I sprinted for the cabin. The front door cracked open.
A woman about my age with a baby propped on her hip appeared. “Come on before they catch you. We won’t be able to help you then.”
I reeled toward her. My ankle twisted on a branch. The whispering chuckles behind me grew to a full-blown giggle. Fingers snatched at my back again. I leapt for the door.
The woman stepped aside so I could gain entry and slammed the door, but not before I saw the face of the thing that had been after me. Nose-less with a round hole of mouth, lined with a corona of teeth. Long, skinny white body. Hands with long fingers, tipped in sharp points.
Shuddering, I twisted to see if it had scratched my back, pulling at my shirt.
“You’re okay.” The woman bounced her baby on her hip and kissed its downy hair. The baby, eyes closed as though sleeping, didn’t react.
I put my hands on my knees and gasped. Even in the land of the dead, my lungs still felt like two charred pieces of meat.
I dragged breath after breath into my lungs. My heart slowed enough for me to take in my surroundings.
From the outside, the cabin had seemed tiny. Inside was a different story. Shelves full of bottles and jars lined the walls nearest me. A black cat peered at me from atop a table, tail swishing back and forth.
“So you’re the next Gregorius Witch?” the woman with the baby asked.
I stood straight before I answered, “I am.”
The woman with the baby nodded. “Are you ready to go forward now?”
I wasn’t sure. The way forward could be worse than what lay behind me. I stood frozen at the precipice of my future, whatever it held.
“Come forth,” hissed a voice from deeper inside the cabin.
Wood smoke from a roaring fire obscured the back wall of the cabin, which seemed way farther away than it should have been. Whoever had called to me hid behind that smoke. I didn’t want to go back there.
“Come now.” The voice sharpened with impatience.
I glanced at the woman with the baby. She nodded her head, dark curls bouncing on her shoulders, and shifted the baby. “You must. Or this trip was all for nothing.”
I didn’t want that. Cecil had died for me to be here. I had let the Wanderer steal my breath and had come to the land of the dead. What’s more, if I didn’t do this, I’d never beat Oscar. He’d kill me and use my magic to bring about some cataclysmic event.
I ducked into the smoke. My eyes stung and teared up. A few seconds later, my sinuses throbbed.
The cabin took many steps to cross. I walked with my hands out, stumbling over furniture I could barely see in the smoky haze. I followed the dancing light of the fire until I stood before its wavering warmth.
Fingers closed over my arm and turned me. I stared into the face of an ancient woman. Wrinkles obscured both homeliness and beauty, her lips a dark, shapeless pucker. Gray hair hung past her shoulders in thick waves. Around her neck hung a small bottle on a chain.
I groaned. Almost exactly the image Orev had shown me. I’d led myself to danger.
“We’re no danger.” The gray-haired woman’s lips stretched into a kind smile. It transformed her into a person, rather than a visage of extreme age. In her face, I saw the woman who’d answered the door. The two must have been related—grandmother and granddaughter. Or maybe even more generations separated them.
“The danger you face is in what we’ll sell you.” A clear voice came from my other side.
I jumped and gasped. The woman on my other side couldn’t have been more than eighteen, if that. Her dark hair hung to her waist, twisting into curls.
Her smooth, unlined eyes crinkled, and she let out a dainty, crystalline giggle. The older woman laughed too, her laugh hoarse and uninhibited. The woman with the baby stepped through the smoke, her confident laugh joining the other two. The three women laughed as one, making the same gestures, bending their knees and throwing back their heads the same way.
The ball of fear I carried everywhere uncoiled and slithered smoothly through me. Orev cawed from outside, warning me to stay calm. These creatures could turn ugly if things didn’t go their way. Unable to calm myself, I tightened my control. It would have to be enough.
“The Wanderer sent me here. I have this spell that blocks me from accessing my true…” I trailed off, feeling more foolish than ever.
The women cut off their laughter at once. They all spoke together. “We know who sent you and why you’re here.”
The older woman broke away from the other two. She went to the hearth and stirred something in a big pot. The woman with the baby leaned over a wooden crib and laid her baby carefully inside. The older woman rose from the hearth and nodded at the other two women.
Before I had a chance to think about what the nod could mean, the two younger women leapt on me. I struggled, throwing punches, but quickly realized I was no match for them.
The younger woman grabbed my hair in a hand stronger than most men and forced me off balance. They dragged me toward the hearth. I locked my legs, but they lifted me as though I weighed no more than a pile of laundry.
The old woman smiled as the other two set me down next to her. I tried to run, and she hooked a finger over the waist of my jeans, holding me in place with no effort whatsoever. The three women closed their eyes and began to chant in another language. To my surprise, I picked out a few words.
“Elixir of life
Elixir of death
Born by fire
Death by the same…”
It was enough to make me wish I’d heard nothing.
The chant ended as abruptly as it began. The mother lifted a dagger with a jeweled handle. The young girl gripped one of my fingers, pulled it over the steaming pot, and held it fast while the other woman stabbed her dagger into the tip. She milked out three drops of blood. At once, all three women let go of me.
I backed away, heart filling my throat, wounded hand held to my chest. The wild desire to run beat at me. I stilled my feet. The mother had been right when I first got here. If I ran, this horror of a trip would be wasted.
The women hunched over the hearth, all three chanting that language. Now I couldn’t understand a word of it. They had to be making a potion for me. If they’d wanted to cook some part of my body, I’d be in the pot right now. A sulfuric odor filled the room. I put my hand over my nose.
The older woman tapped the pot three times with a crooked, nubby wand. Light flashed from the boiling brew. The fire dampened beneath the pot. She turned and crooked one finger at me. “Come.”
I did as told, resigned to whatever fate had in store for me. With the fire now little more than glowing coal
s, the steam issuing from the pot had died down. Whatever was inside stank to high heaven.
The youngest woman slipped a sparkling glass vial into my hand. “You must draw your own draught.”
I nodded and reached over the pot. The heat from the liquid inside moved the fine hairs on my arm.
A voice, one I recognized as Priscilla’s, tickled against my ear. “If you don’t want it to burn you, don’t let it.”
A deeper than deep part of me understood she was right. I turned my mind inward and found the mantle straining behind the scar tissue. Sensing me, its efforts became frantic. I drew on a little of its vast power and whispered, “Fire don’t reach me.”
I stuck my hand in the pot. The liquid felt no hotter than good bathwater. I held the dram underneath and let it fill. I drew it out dripping. The older woman popped a cork in the tiny bottle. She fitted a metal cap over the dram’s top and threaded a chain of the brightest silver through it.
“The matter of our payment is at hand.” The mother retrieved her baby from the crib and rocked the still-sleeping child.
“What do you want?” I assessed what I had of value and came up with nothing.
The three women crowded around, studying me. They touched my hands, ran their thumbs over my fingernails. My body tightened at the thought of what it might feel like to let them remove one. They fingered the raven tattoo.
Orev cawed from outside the cabin. He’d come, even though the closed door kept us from each other. The women quit touching me.
“We’ll take the necklace.” The youngest women lifted my black opal pendant and studied the setting.
Panic surged. No. They couldn’t have that. The black opal had been with me since right after my life had started changing. It helped me, made me stronger. I might not be able to beat Oscar without it.
The women tinkled laughter as one.
The eldest one stopped first and fixed me with kind eyes. “If this bit of magic works, you’ll be able to beat anything lower than us. And this creature you fight? Even with the power of the dead, he’s barely your master.”