Abby smiled and touched Sydney's grinning face in the photo. Her blue eyes shone and her smile stretched so wide that her cheeks probably ached the next day.
"I hope so," Abby said. She took a deep breath and turned away from the wall of pictures. It would have been easy to get lost wandering down memory lane.
"Bookshelf," Sebastian said, hunching over a long shelf beneath a window that faced downtown Trager. "Mostly steamy romance and murder mysteries."
Abby went to Sydney and Rod's room. She glanced at the bed and felt a little nudge of guilt in the pit of her belly. The last time she had been at the apartment, she had slept in that bed with Oliver. Nothing had happened, of course, but she had not told Sebastian. She wanted to believe he would think nothing of it, but she doubted he would be so understanding. Not that he'd be outright angry. Sebastian hid his feelings well, but it was the kind of information that caused more questions than answers.
Abby scanned the shelf. Sydney had travel books for Greece, Australia, and South America. She passed over books on pool cleaning and maintenance, wine tasting and herbal health. The name Trager caught her eye and she read the title: How to Survive Trager City in the Winter. The cover depicted a man wearing long johns and a cowboy hat, holding two huge cans of beer as he attempted to navigate a snowy hill. She smiled and shook her head. The author was likely one of Sydney's friends. The title next to it looked more promising: Trager City: Past, Present, and Future.
"Any luck?" Sebastian asked.
"Yeah, maybe."
She flipped to the section about the past and scanned the headings.
"Here we go," she said, stopping at a section called Myth and Lore of Trager City. She read aloud:
"Trager City may seem like an ordinary northern Michigan town to the tourists who pop in for a campfire and a swim in the lake. However, the old-timers in the area boast a much more sordid past. From witches to vampires, the city has been housing supernatural creatures for centuries-or so the legends say. One source tells us that once upon a time, our picturesque town was overrun with witches. Fortunately, they kept to themselves on a little-known island approximately five miles off shore. Locals call it Snake Island and perhaps that name was born from its ancient inhabitants: a coven of witches who referred to their home as Serpent House. These days, the island lives up to its name-overrun with snakes of all kinds. Few travelers venture beyond its shores."
"The next paragraph talks about BigFoot," Abby said, scanning to see if she crossed anything else of value.
"So it's true, then," Sebastian murmured, reading over Abby's shoulder. "I'm amazed that we've never heard of it."
"I love that you said it's true despite being nestled between a paragraph about BigFoot and another about the Wolfman.
Sebastian laughed.
"Yeah, but there's a reason people say there's a kernel of truth in every myth."
"What people say that?"
He grinned and tugged a strand of her hair.
"Me," he laughed.
"Well, I'll accept that so long as it doesn't apply to the Wolfman."
****
Lydie passed the library and paused. She heard Faustine and Julian talking about Australia. Helena had given her a brief overview of what had transpired there, and Oliver promised to fill her in on the whole tale, but he left for Chicago before he had the chance. The witches had finally returned from Australia, but she felt as alone as she had before they left. In fact, meeting her aunt had amplified her feelings of loneliness. At Ula, who did she have to remember her mother with? The witches barely spoke of Max and Dafne, two of their own who had died within the last several months.
"The Lourdes is truly dead, then?" Julian asked.
Elda had confided to Lydie that the Lourdes had died, but again, withheld the details.
"Yes. We have her trunk in the oratory, but I haven't had the heart to go through it," Faustine replied.
"But you discovered the book that Dafne received from the L'Obscurite?"
"Yes, and I've read it in its entirety. Disturbing-if I had to sum it up in a word."
Lydie heard a door open and hurried down the hall. She didn't want to be found eavesdropping. She slipped to the stairway and descended quickly, listening for any voices below. She passed Dafne's door and touched the handle, feeling her breath get stuck beneath her ribs and hover there, on the verge of explosion. She wanted to go inside, but didn't. Instead, she continued to the oratory.
"Knock, knock," she said, pushing the door in cautiously.
Elda spent a great deal of time in the space, poring over books of shadows, and Lydie didn't want to startle her. She also wanted the space to herself.
When no one answered, she opened the door wide and darted inside, closing it firmly behind her. She saw the trunk immediately and strode to it, undoing the clasp and flipping up the lid. The inside smelled musty and sour. Lydie wrinkled her nose and stared at the contents. Letters wrapped in twine sat on the top of the stack and she snatched them out and tucked them into her cloak. Lydie closed the trunk and retreated to her room. She knew that Faustine and Elda would be upset that she took the letters, but she was sick of feeling left out. Now she would be the one with information.
****
That evening, Ezra promised to take Oliver to the best sushi restaurant in the city. As they prepared to leave, Kendra walked in the door holding an unwieldy box that she carried effortlessly.
"Where are you guys off to?" she asked, sliding the box on the counter.
"Sushi Om," Ezra told her, buckling the high black boots that she wore over yellow fishnet tights. Above that, she had chosen a pair of paint-smeared terrycloth shorts and a tight black tank top. Oliver had decided that her fashion sense was truly one of a kind.
"Ooh, sounds good. Is Victor here?" Kendra looked around the loft, but the answer was written on her face. "Out again?"
Oliver could see that Kendra was disappointed and trying to hide it.
"Come with us," Oliver insisted. "Ezra said that Dante and Marcus might meet us too."
"Yeah, I think I will," Kendra replied, darting a last glance at Victor's empty bedroom.
She changed quickly and they left the loft on foot. The walk took a little less than fifteen minutes and they settled into a small booth at the back of the crowded restaurant.
When Ezra excused herself to the bathroom, Oliver took his chance with Kendra.
"Any idea what Victor has been working on? Ezra said he's been really busy with some secret project."
Kendra froze and her eyes shifted quickly toward the door. A human would never have noticed, but Oliver was not a human and he had been watching. Whatever Victor was up to, it had Kendra spooked.
She shrugged and ran her fingers through her long blond hair.
"Beats me. He likes to fly under the radar when he's working on something new."
Oliver nodded. He was not telepathic, but before he left Ula, Faustine had given him instructions and sent him with the Crystal of Sight. He slipped the crystal into his palm and leaned his head into his hand, resting the crystal near his third eye. He closed his eyes as if his head ached.
A blast of images cascaded through his mind and he tried to scan them.
He saw one, so briefly that he barely caught it. Victor stood at his dresser holding a black velvet box. He turned a guilty and then angry gaze on Kendra when she walked into his room uninvited, but then the image was gone.
"Headache?" Kendra asked.
Keeping the crystal concealed, Oliver slid his hand beneath the table.
"Yeah, getting better though."
"Here," she dug in her purse and pulled out a roll-on oil. "Rub a bit on your temples. Your headache will be a thing of the past."
He grinned and took the bottle, swiping his temples and holding it to his nose.
"Spearmint?"
"Among other things. So how are the wedding arrangements going?" Kendra asked. "I chatted with Abby to see if we could do anything, but apparently
Bridget and Helena are quite the little wedding planners."
Oliver laughed.
"Yeah, don't dare take away their beloved wedding. They're like cackling hens right now, constantly changing the color of the candles and the arrangement of flowers."
"Sounds miserable." Ezra laughed, returning to the table. "Now I understand why you escaped to Chicago."
"Oh, come one." Kendra smiled, wistfully. "Weddings are beautiful. I've always loved them, the ceremonies especially. I'm not sure that two people are ever more committed to a higher love than on that day."
"Are you a hopeless romantic, Kendra?" Oliver teased.
"I prefer to think that I'm just a romantic, not a hopeless one."
"Hopeless if your partner is Victor," Ezra told her, winking.
Kendra smiled, but Oliver saw a sadness in her eyes at Ezra's words.
****
Elda moved in her astral body to the Cave of Elders. Though the cave was empty, she could send a message through the smoke in hopes of making contact with a coven that knew of the Serpent House. She did not have to build a fire. As she stood in the space and made her intention known, the fire sparked and grew.
"Earth, Air, Fire, and Water
Sisters and Brothers Hear My Call
It is Air that I Seek
Knowledge of a Time Now Passed
Souls of the Serpent House
Can You Hear My Call
Souls of the Serpent House
Can You Hear My Call
Souls of the Serpent House, reach out to me
Mote it be
Mote it be."
She could have returned to Ula. If a witch responded to her request, she would feel the tug in her astral body and return to the cave, but she chose instead to wait. The cave soothed her. She drifted in the smoke and firelight, the burden of her physical life slipped to the periphery of her consciousness. In her astral body, she touched the world of formlessness. It was a sweet, easy space, and sometimes it made her long for the end of life in her physical body.
Several hours passed before another witch joined her in the cave. The woman wore a flowing black cloak. Her white hair stood in stark contrast to the black hood.
Elda moved toward her and extended her hands. They did not touch, but their energies collided and then broke apart.
"You seek a soul of the Serpent House?" the witch asked, watching Elda with curious gray eyes.
"I do."
"She is not well. Astral travel is unavailable to her."
Elda nodded.
"I understand. She is of your coven?"
"Yes, though we are more a family than a coven. You can find us in Montana. Our farm is called the Winds of Change, near Butte."
"Can we come to you? And speak with this witch?"
"She would like that, yes. She is not long for this world and wants to be of service to you. She remembers the Serpent House in great detail. It was her first coven. She still harbors pain from its destruction."
"It was destroyed?" Elda asked.
"I am Ellen. The witch you seek is Nora. She will be expecting you."
When Elda returned to her physical body, she was alone in the dungeons. The stone slab in the underground room aided in astral travel, but Elda rarely went there. It reminded her too much of Max. As she sat in the velvet chair on the raised slab, she could hear his voice echoing through the chamber as he lectured Lydie in that gentle way of his. Max and Dafne, two integral members of Ula, had passed. She wondered how many more might die before the curse would be broken.
Chapter 22
Oliver volunteered to help Ezra at the medical clinic that the guerrilla witches ran in Chicago. In truth, he felt out of his element. Witches, like people, had specific skills and abilities. Oliver hunted Vepars. Healing had never come easily to him.
Ezra lifted a small girl onto an examination table.
"How ya doing sweetie? Eye still hurt?"
"Nope," the little girl told her. "See?"
The little girl held her eye open really wide and pushed her face close to Ezra's.
Ezra laughed.
"Looks like somebody gave you a whole new set of peepers," Ezra exclaimed. "But just to be safe, take this tincture home. Have your momma put one drop in every night for the next two weeks."
The little girl took the tiny blue bottle.
"Can I have a sucker?"
Ezra shook her head.
"You know I don't pedal those drugs in here, but I can do one better." Ezra pulled a huge bowl of fruit from beneath the table. "Take as much as you want."
The little girl snatched two apples and an orange and hopped down from the table.
"Bye, Rachel," Ezra called as the girl ran for the door.
Oliver had been carefully unpacking boxes of sterile gloves and arranging them in a cupboard. He could have unpacked them in about two minutes, but the clinic was bustling with people, none of them witches, so he had to keep things conventional. Plus, he got to watch Ezra out of the corner of his eye while he worked, which he rather enjoyed. He found himself thinking of Ezra more and more. When he was at the loft, he looked up hopefully each time the door opened and felt a little sigh of disappointment if Dante or Marcus walked through instead.
"What happened to her eye?" Oliver asked when Ezra glanced at him.
"Pink eye, pretty common. She has five siblings, and a whole gaggle of neighbor kids who get dropped in her little apartment as a pseudo less-than-legal-daycare. I treat her for all manner of ailments, her whole family too." Ezra shrugged as if to say, "such is life."
The double glass doors at the front of the building flew open and a tall wiry man shoved a gurney into the room.
"It's an O.D.," a short Indian woman, with wild dark hair shouted.
She ran across the room and began to assemble an IV.
Ezra dropped the cloth she'd been using to wipe the bed in front of her and sprinted to the stretcher.
"Room One," she told the man pushing the gurney.
The clinic didn't have rooms, but a series of stalls separated by hanging white curtains. Each space held a hospital bed, a small table, and a swivel chair. Ezra kicked the chair and sent it wheeling across the room.
"He's in cardiac arrest," Ezra told the small Indian women who'd arrived with the IV. "We need to intubate. Where's Jules?"
Oliver had met Jules that morning. Dr. Andrea Jules, a tall, stick thin woman with ebony skin and giant cat eyes glasses, had given him a firm handshake and a quick once over before returning to setting a man's broken arm.
"I'm here," Jules yelled, running toward them and fumbling with a cup of coffee.
"Ouch, shit," she yelped as it scalded her hand.
Oliver flicked his fingers toward her and the cup steadied. He slipped across the room and took it quickly from her grasp.
Ezra pulled the sheet around the patient and Oliver watched the clinic, chaos a moment earlier, return to its pre-emergency calm.
After the doctor and nurses emerged from the room, Ezra stayed behind. Oliver slipped behind the curtain.
Ezra glanced at him.
A man with cropped black hair lay on the bed. Tattoos covered both his arms and most of his neck. Ezra leaned over him, pressing her hands against his torso.
"Just giving his lungs a little extra help," Ezra told him.
"Did you give him anything?" Oliver whispered, referring to a potion or tincture that contained a bit more than herbs.
Ezra shook her head. "I rarely need to. The staff here are miracle workers in their own right. If he starts to slip, I'll help out, but I prefer not to use magic unless necessary."
"Why?"
Ezra cocked her head as if she hadn't ever really thought about it.
"I guess I don't want to take it for granted. Before I became a witch, I watched a lot of people die. It's part of life after all, but now, I rarely have to watch anyone die. I can save most of them. It's such an amazing gift, but it also feels like a huge responsibility. There are d
ays that I am not here. Usually, those are the days that we lose patients. I can't save everyone and it would be naive and arrogant of me to pretend that I can. Humans die, witches die. None of us are getting out of here alive. I treat magic with reverence and respect."
"I definitely see your point. Makes me feel like a jerk for using magic to wash my clothes."
Ezra grinned.
"Always the joker. Believe me, I use magic for all manner of trivial things, but when it comes to bringing magic to non-witches, I tread carefully."
****
Jack opened the door into his small, musty apartment. The air hung thick with cigarette smoke. Sebastian grimaced, but Julian waved a hand near Sebastian's face and the air cleared.
Sebastian had flown to Texas with Julian that morning, reluctant to leave Abby behind, but slightly reassured by her insistence that she intended to take naps for most of the day and catch up on laundry.
Jack leaned heavily on a walker. Two bright blue eyes shone from his tanned, wrinkled face. He smiled and gestured them inside.
"Don't mind the mess, boys. My daughter comes by on Sunday to clean up after her old man."
"No worries," Sebastian told him. Despite Jack's disclaimer, the apartment was neat and clean. A single ashtray contained a pile of cigarette butts, otherwise, the surfaces were empty of dishes and debris. Sebastian and Julian took a seat on a long brown couch, draped with a blue and red afghan.
"Thank you for meeting us," Julian told him, holding out a small package wrapped in brown paper.
Jack took it.
"What's this, then?"
"Cookies, courtesy of our dear friend Bridget," Julian shrugged. "Apparently it's not polite to make house calls without dessert of some kind."
"My kind of woman," Jack laughed, ripping off the paper. "Oatmeal, chocolate chip, and molasses. Well, your friend has outdone herself. You'll offer my kind regards."
"Of course," Julian agreed.
"I must tell you, after I dug up that amulet, I became a bit obsessed. Back in those days, I was a workin' man with money on my mind. Then I went on that little dig and came back different, haunted."
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