by Cate Tiernan
Together we shifted everything away from the wall by at least a foot or two. When we were done, Charlie pulled his athame out of his messenger bag. It was entirely made of highly polished silver, with a Celtic engraving around the handle and a round piece of black onyx set at the very top. Slowly, working right under the ceiling, he ran the athame around the walls, moving a bit every time he made a complete pass. He had to go around about two dozen times to cover the whole area.
When that revealed nothing, he started on the floor, passing the athame carefully over every inch. He had to stop every few minutes so that we could rearrange the furniture. Again nothing, the straightened up and stared down at the floor, puzzled. The he slouched against the wall and squinted around with an intent expression, tapping his athame in his palm.
"I have an idea," he finally said. "But it involves the both of us. It's possible that because you're a blood relative, the door will be revealed to you more easily. So together we're going to do a nochd."
"Should I close my eyes?" I said, keeping a very straight face.
"I expected that," he replied with a wry grin. "Here." He held out the athame to me, handle first.
I pointed to the athame. "Can I… hold that? I mean, is it sacred or something?"
"Well," he said, "it's a magickal tool—so, yes. It's sacred. But it belongs to me, and I have no problem with you using it. Whether or not it works pretty much on you. Magickal tools function when the user brings their magick to them."
"You mean, like the toaster only works when you plug it in? Then it can use its bread-charring powers."
"Exactly." He nodded with a smile. "The tool is the toaster. You're the socket."
I accepted the athame, and he fished through his bag and removed a white candle and a piece of chalk.
"I'll cast the spell," he said. "We're going to see of your energy can guise us. I'll lead you as we go, so don't worry."
"Okay," I agreed, feeling weird with the heavy athame in my hand. "How do I hold it up? Up, or down, or out…"
"Just let your arm fall naturally by your side," he said, expertly drawing a circle around us. Then he placed the candle in the middle, between us, and drew a series of runes around it in chalk. Standing, he lightly took hold of my right wrist, gripping just below the handle of the athame. He flashed me a look to see if I was ready, and I nodded.
"Aingeal," he intoned.
The candle snapped to life. I guess I shouldn't have been so startled. I'd seen both Morgan and Evelyn do that. Still, to see Charlie do it surprised me.
"Sinn sir ni keillit," he continued. The metal of the athame grew warm. He tightened his grip on my wrist—not enough to hurt me, but enough to have a firm grasp. "Tar er ahs, seòl heen."
I saw now why he had tightened his hold. My arm began to quake, and for a moment I thought I might drop the athame. He locked his hand around mine and looked down at me. Magick was flowing through us, between us. I could feel his strength as he controlled its flow. I’m not sure if it was the magick or simply being so close it him, but my heart started beating like crazy. It seemed so loud that I actually thought he would be able to hear it.
In one movement our arms rose together—mine started to come forward, pushing his back. It was pointing the athame to a spot on the floor. He couldn’t see it because it was behind him, but a square appeared in that spot. It was made of symbols, very finely drawn in a bluish light. I wanted to say something, but I thought it might ruin the spell. As it was, he seemed aware that something was happening, even though he couldn’t see what I saw.
Giving thanks to the Goddess and the God, he ended the spell, but he held on to my hand for a moment. We said nothing—just stood there, looking at each other. I felt the warmth of his body and could smell the faint smell of laundry detergent, some kind of spicy men’s deodorant, and faint traces of sage smoke. Charlie smell. So nice. As he gazed down at me, I realized that he was the only person who could really stare at me like that without my wanting to turn away or hide my face. I could actually look him right in the eye and not flinch. Even though his expression was serious and intent, his mouth still retained its wide, happy curve. It was as if he was born to smile and make others smile. Such a nice mouth.
Such a what? What was I thinking?
Unintentionally I pulled away. He backed up, as though I startled him. His face was flushed, and he didn’t seem to know where to look for a moment.
“There’s a… thing on the floor,” I mumbled, pointing.
“Good!” he said, quickly kneeling down and snapping out the candle flame with his fingers. “That’s what was supposed to happen. We did it. Good work.”
I brushed the chalk circle away as Charlie sprawled flat on the floor to examine the symbols up close. I saw him working his way all around the square. By now my mind was everywhere it shouldn’t be. I could only see the length of his body, the way the sleeves of his T-shirt tightened around his upper arms, the speed of his movements.
Cousin’s boyfriend, I kept saying to myself over and over and over.
“Okay,” he said, getting up to his knees. “This shouldn’t be too bad. Finding it was the hard part. The seal itself isn’t a tremendous piece of work.” He reached back for his bag and started rooting through it again, producing a handful of runes.
“Have you got a whole magick shop in there?” I asked.
“No ma’am,” he said. “Just the basics. Some candles, chalk, athame, runes. All the things a witch should never travel without, especially when they’re trying to break into other witches’ private library.”
I gulped, feeling a pang of guilt as he set a rune in each corner of the box, then put the white candle in the center. He muttered a spell quietly to himself. The candle winked to life again, and over the next few minutes, as he spelled and tapped his athame around its perimeter, the dusty patch of floor revealed itself to be a wooden door with a round handle.
“Voilà,” he said, looking up in satisfaction. “One trapdoor.”
“That was amazing,” I told him, completely awed. “You’re like a safecracker.” He didn’t reply, just gave a nervous little laugh.
When we opened the wooden door, we found a switch that turned on a set of overhead lights. They revealed a set of tiny steps that dropped almost straight down into a darker room. Charlie went down first, then offered up his hand to help me down. He had to bend down, as the low ceiling didn’t give him much clearance.
You’d think a room under a house like this would be musty and dirty, but it was spotlessly clean. The walls and floor where made of smooth stone. There was an air filter and dehumidifier. Every inch of space was carefully utilized. The walls were completely set with shelves, and several freestanding floor-to-ceiling bookcases sat back-to-back in in eight rows, the pathways between the rows of books were narrow, just large enough for one person to pass through with a step stool. In one corner there was a small antique reading table with a lamp and two chairs.
“This place is great,” he said, his expression melting into one of amazement at the sight of all the books. It was like watching a little kid at an amusement park, so deliriously excited that they don’t know where to head first. In his enthusiasm he stumbled but caught himself on one of the bookcases.
“It’s my ballet training coming through,” he said with a smile as his face turned charmingly pink. The he bounded off into the stacks.
As Charlie devoured the titles on the shelves, I walked around quietly, taking in the magnitude and splendor of the collection. Many of the books, though ancient, weren’t particularly frail. They’d been so well taken care of that age had only affected them slightly. There were books in strange blocky print, dating well back into the 1600s. There were books in all kinds of languages, in mysterious prints and symbols. Some sections were full of dry, academic-sounding titles. Others were filled with books so exotic looking that I was actually frightened to touch them.
As I turned down one aisle, it was as if the books were whispering
to me. I glanced over their titles. I couldn’t read any of them. They looked like German to me, lots of huge words starting with das or der. Still, even though I couldn’t understand them, I wanted to touch them. I wanted to pull them from the shelves. I wanted—this one—Edelsteine und Metalle, whatever that meant. I needed this book. Gently I slipped it from the shelf. It seemed warm to the touch, as if I’d been holding it for a long time. Surprisingly there was nothing on the front cover. It was plain green book, covered in cloth, obviously very old. I flipped it back and looked at the spine again, but I now saw nothing written there.
I almost dropped the book in shock.
“Charlie!” I called, my voice husky.
He came right around from the row behind. I explained what I had seen and offered the book to him. He took it, examined it all over.
“Edelsteine und Metalle,” he said, holding the spine out for me too see. “Something and metals.”
I looked at the spine again. There was the title, in gold letter in the greenish black cloth. It hadn’t been there a second ago. I was shaking a bit now, and he put his hand on my shoulder to steady me.
“It must have been spelled with some kind of glamour or concealment spell,” he said. “That’s all. You’re not going crazy. Let’s have a look at it and find out why it was being hidden. This is a private family library, so it’s kind of strange for a Rowanwand to hide a book from a relative.”
We took it over to the reading table and switched on the light. Charlie began to page through the book. In the first moment we could see it was definitely not a German textbook on something and metals. It was handwritten, in English. It looked like a Book of Shadows, with dates at the tops of the pages. Charlie’s eyes grew wider with every page.
“This is Máirin’s book,” he said, looking up, his eyes full of awe. “Oona’s daughter. No one’s seen this book in years. How the hell…”
Máirin’s book. That was what I had found. The story of the family witch, down here, in the secret Curtis family library. This was where my mother had experienced a frightening telekinetic episode. There was too much magick, too many feelings tied into this house. I chose this moment to become completely overwhelmed. Even though I tried to will them back, I felt tears well up behind my eyes. Charlie looked up in alarm and saw my eyes glistening.
“What is it?” he said, setting his hand back on my shoulder.
“All these weird feelings,” I answered, rubbing my eyes. “All of these strange things I don’t understand.”
As much as I knew he was dying to look in that book, he slid it aside and turned all his attention to me.
“It must be really hard to have to deal with so much magick at once,” he said. “Just try to relax. I’m right here. Nothing that’s happened is too out of the ordinary.”
“Everything is out of my ordinary,” I moaned.
Instead of reading, we sat there for a while, talking. I found myself telling him about the dark wave and how frightened I had been. I told him about Hilary and all the things that had led up to my running away—all of the really personal things that I’d left out of my first explanation. I finally explained that I had a problem with telekinesis and that that what I was trying to find out more about.
“The newest thing,” I explained, feeling my defenses collapse under the calming weight of his hand on my shoulder, “is that I can feel other witches around me. I can sense their feelings. I can sense my mother here, even though she’s gone. I like the feeling of connection, but it also scares me. Everything comes so fast now. I’m never expecting any of it.”
Then he leaned in, and his look took on a new level of seriousness.
“Can you feel my senses right now?” he said.
My body seemed to freeze in time. My heart stopped. I didn’t breathe, didn’t move. Everything was anticipation. I could feel him. He was going to… what?
He came in close, took my face in one of his soft hands, and kissed me.
I’d never been kissed before, and I’d been kind of worried that I wouldn’t know what to do when and if it ever happened. Luckily I didn’t freak out or accidentally bit him or anything. I pressed to his mouth and responded naturally. He slipped his hands behind my neck and pulled me closer. Warmth…so much warmth. A universe of warmth. As he pulled away, he looked at me in happy surprise.
“I…” He seemed to catch himself speaking bit didn’t know what to say. “I’ve been wanting to do that since I saw you yesterday.”
Could I speak? Did my mouth still work? Was my voice going to come out all funny? Only one way to find out.
“Me too,” I said. “I mean, not kissing myself. You know. You.”
Smooth, Soto. Smooth.
Fleeting concern zapped through my brain. What about Brigid? What did this mean? Those feelings were numbed when I felt the sensation again. He wanted to pull me into him, and I wanted him to wrap his arms around me. But the flow cooled quickly, like we’d blown a fuse, and all the power went down. We must have become aware of it at the same moment. We sat very still and listened.
Someone was upstairs.
13. Attack
September 24, 1952
Goddess, goddess, where have I been? I'm only just now getting the strenght to get out of bed and resume my daily activities.
We opened the lith dearc two nights ago. Claire Findgoll and I, down on the shore below the house. It is a terrible yet fascinating thing, this small hole that rips through the fabric of the universe and seems to go on eternally. I maintained the dearc while Clair comducted the spell to try and draw Oona from the house into the opening. I am glad that Claire stood away from it, as it possesses a devastating force. It actually drains you of life energy. I feel as though I've been poisoned.
We haven't had any visitations since we performed the spell, but only time will tell if we've been successful.
Oh, I must go to sleep again. There is nothing left in me. No energy at all.
— Aoibheann
"Hello?" called a female voice. "Mom?"
"It's Brigid," Charlie whispered, all color draining from his face. "She's home early.”
"Should I… hide down here while you go up?" I offered. Good one, Alisa. The sitcom situation always works so well in real life.
"No," he answered, shaking his head. "She knows we're here."
Brigid, I had figured, wasn't a powerful witch—but she was still a witch. Feeling another's presence in the house seemed like something she would very well be able to do. We head her walking through the kitchen and then opening the basement door.
"Okay," Charlie admitted, "this is kind of bad."
"What do we do?" I asked.
He squeezed my hand quickly, as a kind of apology for what was probably going to happen next. "I have no idea," he said.
"Hello?" Brigid called again. She approached the door to the library, which was still open behind us. "Aunt Evelyn?" Brigid said. She came down the steps and looked at the two of us, first in confusion and then with a growing flurry of emotion.
"Charlie? Alisa?" she said, her voice wavering. "What are you two doing here?"
"Researching," Charlie said simply.
"Researching?" she said. "You came in here when we weren't here… both of you?"
Whether through magick or regular female intuition (which might also be magick, I don't know), Brigid seemed to know at once that there was a problem. She sat down on the bottom step, blocking our way out. Did kissing a witch leave a mark on your mouth? Did my lips glow? Could she see some kind of imprint?
"Alisa needed help." Chalrie said. "She's trying to find out about her ancestors, and Evelyn was definitely wasn't going to give her a hand. Sorry. We had to come in when Evelyn wasn't here."
"You could have told me," she said. "I would have helped you."
Oh. If we didn't feel bad before…
"So," she said, staring hard at me, "did you find anything?"
"A book," I said immediately realizing how stupid that answer was.
I went to a library and found… a book. Not for the first time in my life, I wished the floor would open under me and swallow me whole.
After a few moments of silence it finally dawned on my that I should leave them alone. I didn't want to leave Charlie to the wolves or anything, but had no place here. They needed to talk. And I had a feeling Charlie was going to come clean about what had just occurred.
"I should probably go," I said, "before Evelyn gets home, like you said. She'd be furious to find me here."
"That might be a good idea." Charlie nodded. We probably realized at the same moment that he had driven me here.
"I'll walk back," I added. "I could use some fresh air." I tucked the book into my messenger bag. "I'll return this to Sam," I said to Brigid. "He'll put it back in the library." Then I did my walk of shame, crossing the room and headed to where she was perched.
Brigid slid aside to let me pass. She said nothing. She wouldn't—or couldn't—even look at me. As I stepped past, my leg brushed against her. I almost jumped as a surge went through that whole half of my body. I felt a wave of pure raw emotion coming off her. She might look furious, but inside, everything in her was weeping.
It was a long walk home through the mist and the wet, with my brain clanging between elation and guilt.
I mean, he kissed me. What was I supposed to do? Slap him, like they do in old movies. Call him a cad. I hadn't done anything wrong…it wasn't my fault…
But then I examined my motives. Did I want Charlie to kiss me? Yes. Was he my cousin's boyfriend? Yes.
Guilty.
I sucked. I sucked, I sucked, I sucked.
But still it had been the best moment of my life. I had touched his face and felt the tiny, soft curls at the back of his head, down near his neck. It had been good, so good, too good. I still felt like I was walking through an incredible dream.