Chapter Nineteen
Charlotte
Halloween—or Samhain—was one of the best parties of the year at Merlin College, along with being a sacred day. It was a mashup of the Halloween I knew and a pagan holiday, and most of the warlocks, no matter whether they followed other religions or not, joined in. Around here, the idea of the veil between the living and the dead being thin on Halloween wasn’t legend, but fact.
Everyone wore costumes, some of them very elaborate, including masks, which were required. Many of them were glamours, of course. I knew for a fact that Alec’s costume, which was some sort of dark horned creature in black leather, was seriously enhanced from a Party City costume called “Demon Beast”. Montague went with an 18th century nobleman with a tricorn hat and black mask.
“You look terrifying,” I told Alec.
“If we don’t look terrifying, the faeries will kidnap us,” Alec said. “At least, that’s what I was told. And if you aren’t careful, we might kidnap you. I know you’re still into it.” He brushed a claw over my face.
“I’m still into it,” I admitted.
Harris wore the same thing every year, a black mask and a costume that he said his great-great-great uncle used to wear in Samhain balls in Austria, that was basically a Disney prince outfit with gold buttons, a sash and some kind of brimmed Germanic hat.
As usual, I didn’t have money to spend on a Halloween costume so I went with Kiki’s Delivery Service with the black dress I already had and a big red bow in my hair, carrying a stuffed black cat under my arm. I put on my basic black mask to conform to the rules.
“It’s time to guess what Charlotte is supposed to be,” Montague said.
“It looks like she’s a witch,” Harris said. “Black dress. Cat.”
“I’m a particular witch,” I said.
“A swamp witch.”
“Why would I be a swamp witch!?”
“Because they’re poor.”
I cast a spell that blew all the buttons off his jacket.
“What was that for?” he snapped, bending over to grab them off the floor.
“For wearing a dumb hat.”
“I think you look adorable,” Alec said. “Not you, Harris. Charlotte.”
“Alec, do you know what my costume is?” I asked.
Alec looked me over. “You’re not supposed to be Minnie Mouse, are you?”
“I think it’s a character from Adventure Time,” Montague said.
I let out a breath. “Wow. Just—wow.”
Daisy burst into our dorm’s main room. She was dressed as a Queen of Hearts wearing a red, white and black dress with a low cut neckline that showed off her boobs, and a full flouncing skirt. Harris was right. I did look poor, and was, indeed, poor.
“I am gluing myself to you and sharing your bonfire,” she declared, looking over her shoulder. “Twenty-four hours with Piers is already too much. He had a private dinner for us and he wanted to make offerings to the dead ancestors. I just got to hear about every Nicolescu who ever killed a vampire for the last three hours.”
“Yes, he’s very proud of that,” Harris said.
“Of course you can hang out with us,” I said. “But he didn’t try anything, right?” I couldn’t help looking at her breasts. They were really getting shown off the maximum advantage.
“I wish it was just that,” Daisy said. “I can handle that.”
“So…he’s just boring? At least it could be worse.”
“Boring…,” she repeated. “That’s enough of a sin. But I swear, you’re looking at my boobs more than he did.”
“They’re impressive, what can I say.”
“You want him to look at your boobs?” Harris asked sharply.
“I sure as hell don’t want him to touch,” she said. “But I wanted to know that he has weaknesses. If he thinks I’m hot, I can manipulate him.” As Harris looked like he was about to argue this more, she put a hand around my shoulder and showed me out the door with her.
The campus was lit with small fires, like the night when we summoned the dead, and it was hopping. Everyone was out walking around, talking to friends, putting our pumpkins carved earlier, and sacrificing snacks and desserts to their fires to appease the spirits.
“Piers wants to have his name written in history like those other Nicolescus,” Daisy said. “He went on and on about slaying demons and vampires for the whole dinner. A dude with a holy mission…ugh. So if I were you, I would really watch out for him with your boys.”
“Oh, I already know that,” I said. “Is that really all he talked about for three hours?”
“Well, he told me the entire plot of the novel he’s reading.”
“Oh no.”
“Right?” She shuddered. “Well, let’s not think about him. I don’t need him. All the men in the family have tiny dicks.”
“Oh—really?”
She burst out laughing. “Look at your face! You were so scared Harris has a microdick. Like you don’t get enough d, girl. Sometimes less is more when you already have so much more.”
My blush must have been maxed out. “I don’t care.”
She patted my back. “Nah, Harris’ bad attitude can’t be explained off that way,” she said.
“Whatever.” I shrugged.
“Honestly?” she said. “I am rooting for Harris to get into a bond brother situation with you, because he needs it. Like, there’s good in him yet. I see Piers and that’s what it’s like to have everything beaten out of you except ambition. He’s already on the council. You’d think that’s enough, but it never is. He wants more, so he’s thinking the only way to go up from here is to take out some Sinistrals. And he’ll use me to do it. My grandmother doesn’t mind because she’s just thinking about her reputation too.” Sighing, Daisy veered toward the fire where Harris and Montague were putting brush down. Alec lit the fire with a flick of his wand.
“As for me and Harris, well… I don’t honestly know if I can handle more guys,” I said, chewing my lip.
“You can,” Daisy said. “I believe in you.”
“Montague has been a little distant lately,” I said.
“I heard Firian is stuck as a fox.”
“Yeah.”
She looked at me more seriously. I had never told Daisy, or anyone outside of Montague, Alec, and my dad, that I had that kind of relationship with Firian. “Am I wrong?” Daisy asked.
“About what?”
“You know.” She continued, more soberly, “You have to be super careful.”
“Stuart said the first familiars were lovers to their witches and warlocks.”
“I don’t know that story,” Daisy said. “But I know about the witch in St. Augustine.”
“Everyone keeps mentioning it,” I said. “All I know are…my feelings… I don’t why it’s so wrong.”
“Cash is like a brother to me,” Daisy said. “He was there when I was a baby and taught me things.”
“Firian wasn’t like that for me…” Was she implying it really was like dating my brother? I just couldn’t see Firian that way. He didn’t look like me or anyone in my family. He had a home in Etherium. He knew things I didn’t know. And even if he had been watching over me since I was a kid, he didn’t seem to think of me that way either. “Daisy…do you think it’s wrong?”
“I think you should love whoever you want,” she said.
“But you do think it’s weird.”
She looked troubled. “One time, Cash asked me if we could go to a human club, so he could pretend to be a human. And I said—no fucking way. And the look on his face—it made me wonder if he was really my friend, brother, and helper, or if he was my slave. They don’t even know anymore, what they are, or where they come from…and neither do we.”
“Are you ladies going to join us?” Montague asked, walking over and offering me a soda. “Or…am I interrupting?”
“Interrupting,” I said, smiling despite a tickle of deep concern inside me. “Nah, we shoul
d hang out.”
“The dead are close tonight,” Harris said. “Be sure to spill a little of your drink on the fire.”
I poured out a sip of Cheerwine. “To Grandpa. Sorry it’s not root beer.”
Harris tossed a few nuts on the fire. “To Montague, our favorite dead person.”
“I don’t count! I’m not dead.”
“Undead.”
“I was never dead,” Montague said. “Call it what you want.”
Daisy quietly took a little sachet from the pocket of her dress and nested it in the smoldering embers. She looked at me with a tight, weird smile.
“To your parents?” I asked gently.
“Yeah, it’s my annual letter. They say if you send a letter on Samhain it’ll reach, so…I have a lot to talk about.” She hugged herself like she was cold. “They never would have sent me to marry Piers.”
“Do you remember them pretty well?” I asked.
“I hope so.” She brushed her hair back behind her ears, then adjusted the tiara with heart cut-outs she was wearing. “I was so little. But I remember things, little things. My dad was tall and my mom was short. He was elegant and quiet, but really nice. He had some job at the Chicago guild but he also loved plants and collected coins. Kind of a nerd, huh, but I thought he was like a prince.” She pinched her lips together. “And my mom was his princess. She would have made a wonderful diviner and maybe that’s why she got killed. She didn’t take shit though, and I know they would have hated this for me, but try telling that to Ermahgerd.”
It was obvious Daisy’s relationship with Ermengarde Pendleton was strained.
“So your mom is your grandmother’s daughter? You don’t have your dad’s name?”
“That’s a tradition with the diviner,” she said. “It’s always a woman and the name carries.”
“That’s cool,” I said. “Is that like the one tradition that isn’t sexist in the whole deal?”
She snorted. “Sexist? It goes both ways. My older cousin Mitchell would like to be the diviner, and his mom is like, Mitchell, you’re a man, get off your ass and go suck magic out of volcanoes! I would totally take his job.”
“Magic volcanoes?”
“Yeah, you know,” she said. “Obviously volcanoes bring up all this magic, so he travels all around and collects it.”
“Right, yeah, I read about that,” I lied.
Still, Daisy looked a little cheered up. I bet no one asked her about her parents much. I knew how that was. Once kids found out my mom was gone, they went out of their way not to mention moms around me. “Do you remember your mom, Charlotte?” she asked. “You were too little…”
“Yeah. Dad’s been giving me some of her things, though.” I showed her the engraved ring.
“It’s not too late,” she said. “We’ll get her back.”
She sounded awfully confident, but I think that was Daisy’s default setting.
“Yeah,” I said, but my stomach flipped over.
I wanted to save her, of course. I wanted to know her. But I kept thinking about Dad. When you love someone, you don’t really care. I just want to know my Emily is safe even if it messes up my life.
He knew, though. We both knew. When someone has spent the last twenty years in a dark realm working for a high demon, you can’t just bring them home for a happily ever after, can you?
Montague, Alec and Harris were talking on the other side of the fire, and Firian had shown up. Alec was giving him a grilled hot dog. They suddenly looked up at someone approaching behind me. Oh, crap. Maybe Piers was here to grab Daisy and ruin the night.
Whoever it was wore a black cloak and a mask so they were completely unrecognizable. Who thought this mask thing was a good idea anyway?
“Shh—it’s just me,” Professor McGuinness whispered. “I just thought I’d check in on you and see how you’re doing.” He glanced behind him. “The veils are thin tonight, and with the masks…well.”
“You just walked in?” Harris said.
“Stuart is more than capable of getting past the wards,” he said. “Piers Nicolescu is no match for a faery lord, I can say that with confidence. I came with Stuart. He is…looking around, trying to see if there is any word of Ignatius.”
“Have y’all seen Professor Adams?” I asked. “He got fired the other day and he was so mad.”
“Yes, yes indeed, we are in contact with him. He has a house in Savannah. I might end up staying there this summer. I didn’t have a home outside of Merlin…” Professor McGuinness, it seemed, had devoted his life to this place. “I must say, the good thing about this experience is that it’s gotten us all on the same page.”
“Do you want to sit down and have a soda?” I asked.
Professor McGuinness, removed from his position of authority, looked like some lost, wandering soul, all bony arms and legs clad in black and fingers that seemed made for some anxious hand-wringing, as he was doing now. I didn’t always like him when he was my teacher, especially after his own sexist lecture about how men were better at necromancy because they weren’t as emotional. Gag. But now I wanted to give the poor guy a break.
“A soda? I haven’t had a soda since I was in school myself.”
“Yeah, school is wild that way,” I said, suppressing an eye roll as Montague offered up a Coke.
He popped the tab and tried it. “That does take me back.” He drew a folded square of paper out of his pocket and tossed it at the fire. I stared at him because, I don’t know, I’m shameless.
“I—I wrote Samuel,” he said. “I thought about what you were saying back there. I thought it wouldn’t matter if he never knew how I felt about him, now that he’s onto the spirit realm, but…”
“Well, we know he’s still watching over us,” I said.
“Yes.” He looked at the stars, and I just knew he was still thinking that tossing a letter onto the fire didn’t feel like enough. Samuel was dead, but like…he was still around. He got in my head a few times. He was certainly capable of talking to Professor McGuinness so he could have some real closure.
“I don’t understand why we can’t summon him just once,” I said.
“Didn’t you listen in class at all?” Professor McGuinness said softly. “It’s against the rules.”
“The rules of Etherium? Or like…all rules?”
“Er…”
“The rules of Wyrd?” I pressed. “Why is it so bad to talk to a dead person just one time to ask them the questions you want to know?”
“Charlotte,” he said warningly. “A wyrd wand does not yet make you a wyrd witch. I don’t want either of us to be banished to Sinistral.”
“Would we be banished just for summoning an old friend?”
“Well…it could put him in danger. I’m sure you remember your lessons!”
“Danger,” I repeated, in a neutral tone. “I mean, I get why it’s a bad idea to talk to loved ones as if they’re still alive. I do. I know when someone dies you have to let them go…”
“Yes,” he said, looking at the flames and finishing the soda. “You must. You really must.”
“But neither of us were super close to him,” I said. “We just want some closure.”
“Charlotte,” he said, his tone sharpening. “Drop it. I don’t want to hear about this again.” He handed me the can. I guess I was the trash lady now. “I should go.”
“Oh…okay…”
Alec looked at me and waved me toward him with a hand. I shrugged like, guess I pushed him too far.
I wasn’t supposed to be too open about my relationship with Alec in public, but I sat between him and Monty, my legs touching theirs. Firian was talking to Daisy so I could have a moment with them. I mean, Harris was there, but if I made him jealous, so what?
“I didn’t expect him to be so pissed off,” I said. “I just want to talk to Samuel once.”
“So does he,” Alec said. “I can sense his desire.”
“Desire? Ergh. Spare me the details.”
&n
bsp; “Seriously, Alec, he’s like a sixty year old coat with the afterthought of a man inside,” Montague said. “Desire seems like a strong word.”
“I have to break something to all of you,” Alec said in a serious tone, leaning close to us.
“What is that?” I asked.
“People who are not super hot feel desire too.”
“I’m not super hot,” I said.
He brushed his claw-glove over my chin. “Oh, sweet Char. Fishing for compliments. Also, people who are sixty years old feel desire too. Montague, you don’t have to worry about it, but someday, Harris will look like a senior villain from a Star Wars movie, and he will still think Charlotte is hot.”
Harris, not quite out of earshot, just lifted his eyebrows. “Samuel Caruthers was fairly ‘hot’,” he said, sarcastically. “Maybe McGuinness’ affections weren’t returned.”
“I don’t know…,” I said, as Alec’s hand crept across my lower back and to my bottom in a very distracting fashion. “If they were never returned, would he really keep thinking about him decades later? I think it would do him some—good!” I caught my breath, as Alec’s hand slipped under the bench and gave me a quick stroke between the legs.
If I was being honest with myself, I just wanted to talk to Samuel myself. Just once. How wrong was it to summon him just once? He had already whispered in my head (unless I was just crazy), so what would one little summoning do? Especially if I summoned him on behalf of Professor McGuinness, like how I summoned Alec’s mom? I know. That didn’t go well. But Samuel also wasn’t a mean succubus… with a very naughty son. Heavens. I tried to get up and Montague put a hand on my thigh and pinned me down.
“I’m dressed as a full-on demon beast tonight,” Alec whispered in my ear. “And it’s Samhain night. Wicked things are afoot, Charlotte.”
My eyes widened and darted frantically between them. Harris is right there!
“Don’t you wonder what he’s thinking?” Alec asked.
Harris’ ears were red. He looked a little pissed off, still trying to ignore us.
A Witch Among Warlocks: The Complete Series Box Set Page 62