Without Foresight

by P. D. Workman

  But a diamondback rattler in the yard? Wasn’t it more important for Reg to protect her health and safety than it was to guard her privacy and what someone else might think about her? Sarah had always been friendly and supportive. Or mostly, anyway. It had been a little different when she was sick, but a person couldn’t be expected to expend all her energy on her friends when she is sick.

  Reg went to the back door even though she had been standing outside the front while trying to decide. She knocked and then opened the door, as Sarah had repeatedly encouraged her to just “come right in.”

  “Sarah? Are you home?”

  She could feel Sarah’s presence there. And someone else’s too. Reg closed her eyes for an instant to clarify the feeling. Detective Marta Jessup. That was who was there visiting with Sarah.

  “Come in, Reg,” Sarah called back.

  Reg considered. She was hesitant about talking to Sarah about what had been going on. But she was even more reluctant to talk about it in front of Jessup.

  “Reg?” Sarah called again.

  Reg sighed and followed their voices into the sitting room. “Hi,” she greeted, poking her head in. “I didn’t realize you had company. We can talk later.” A clue to Sarah that she had something they needed to discuss in confidence.

  “No, no,” Sarah said. “Come in. This affects you too. You weren’t home when Marta got here, so I said we would just go ahead, but I would much rather you were part of this.”

  Reg hovered in the doorway. “I don’t know, I just wanted to talk to you about…”

  “Come on, Reg,” Jessup encouraged, smiling at her. But she was in her full cop uniform, which not only triggered Reg’s desire to flee, but also meant that it was official police business, and Reg didn’t want anything to do with a police investigation.

  Beside Jessup sat another cop. A man, balding, barely taller than Detective Jessup, with a round face and a belly that extended past his duty belt. Senior to Jessup; a babysitter. A partner who was supposed to keep her in line, since she’d gone over a few too many lines in previous months. Reg hadn’t seen Jessup with a partner since they had first met, when Jessup had been warning Reg off and poking around to see if she was really a psychic or just trying to bilk people out of their money.

  The cop’s name bar said Devaughn. His presence made Reg doubly anxious.

  “Come in,” Sarah encouraged again, patting the seat of the easy chair next to her. “I want you to be a part of this.”

  Reg eventually caved. She tried not to slink like a cowardly dog as she approached the chair next to Sarah’s and sat down, hoping that if she stayed quiet, she would be invisible to the two cops.

  “We were just talking about some of the things that have been going on around here,” Sarah explained. “The vandalism and such. The police ought to know about it, be on the lookout in case they see anyone around who doesn’t belong here.”

  But they weren’t going to know who belonged and who didn’t, which meant that there were likely to be random stops of suspicious-looking characters, which might just include Reg herself. Jessup wouldn’t arrest her just for hanging out around her own home, but she could still be targeted by other cops who didn’t know her. And so could Forst and anyone else who came over to visit Reg or consult with her. Forst’s twin, Fir, had previously been arrested by cops for vandalism of some industrial equipment.

  “I think we can take care of it ourselves,” she told Sarah and Jessup. “I don’t think we need to involve the police.”

  “After a rock through the window?” Jessup demanded. “What if that had hit you in the head instead of just sailing over it? What if they decide to start throwing rocks at you when they see you out on the street? You were out there walking just now… you’re lucky that no one bothered you. How would you protect yourself if you were attacked?”

  “I can take care of myself,” Reg insisted. “I have… skills.” She looked at Jessup’s partner, not knowing whether he was someone who knew about the magical practitioners in Black Sands or not. Some of the police knew or were practitioners themselves. Others just turned a blind eye to anything they could not explain and continued to operate as if the magical world did not exist.

  “I know you do,” Jessup acknowledged. “There aren’t many people around here who are… more skilled. But that doesn’t mean you would be able to withstand any number of attackers. What if there are more than one or two? What if it’s a whole group of people intent on hurting you?”

  “We’ve already put… systems in place to deal with that,” Reg said carefully. Let Devaughn think that they were talking about burglar alarms or a night guard.

  “I’d like to read this to you,” Jessup said, pulling up the statement that she or Sarah had written out in longhand on a clipboard holding carbonless triplicate forms. Reg was glad that Jessup offered to read it, rather than forcing Reg to read the cursive writing. Bad enough when it was regular cursive writing. Reg would have trouble reading more than a few short words. But even worse was the archaic flavor of writing that witches in the area seemed to all use. Spiky, with longer tails and stems than Reg was used to, often written with a fountain pen or a quill.

  Jessup proceeded to read the statement. It was short, but accurately described the eggs and the rock through the window. It didn’t say anything about the candles and symbols of the protection spell. Reg supposed that was too inflammatory for the official report. They didn’t want anything in writing about witches practicing magic there.

  Reg nodded when Jessup was done. “Yeah, that all sounds right.”

  “And you haven’t seen anyone hanging around? Don’t have any idea who might have done this? If you do, I should bring them in for questioning. And make sure that they understand they will be prosecuted if they come back.”

  “No. I don’t know who it is.” Reg glanced over at Sarah. Had she figured out who was behind the attacks when she spoke to her coven?

  Sarah’s pleasant smile didn’t waver. She gave nothing away. Reg admired her poker face.

  “Okay.” Jessup closed a cover over the clipboard to keep everything neat and tidy. “Thank you for reporting this. It’s important for us to stay on top of social disorder, so that we can curb it before it turns into something dangerous. It may seem like a minor thing, but we know from experience that they can escalate. I want people in our community to feel safe.” Jessup smiled encouragingly.

  Sarah and Reg nodded.

  Devaughn took his cue from Jessup that it was time to go and hefted himself to his feet with a grunt. “You take care, folks,” he said with a nod.

  They saw themselves out. Reg didn’t know whether that new cop might have psychic abilities and be waiting to see what they had to say after he left the house. Or whether they might turn around and pop back in to see if they overheard anything interesting. So she waited until they were some distance from the house before turning to Sarah.

  “I thought that you figured it was going to be okay after talking to your coven.”

  “It will be fine,” Sarah agreed, giving a nod. “I’m just covering all of my bases.”

  “You don’t think that they’ll ‘escalate’?”

  “I don’t imagine so. After having spoken to them, word should get around that we’re not going to just sit here and take it. And that you’re not going anywhere. Eventually, things will settle down and go back to normal.”

  “You don’t think that they would do something like… a spell that would call poisonous snakes, do you?”

  “No, certainly not.” Sarah’s smile disappeared, and she stared at Reg. “Poisonous snakes?”

  Reg shrugged. “I know there are a lot of poisonous snakes in Florida.”

  “Certainly. But not a lot in town. And they won’t go after a person; they will flee in the other direction.”

  “Yeah. That’s what I thought.”

  Neither of them said anything for a while. Sarah’s gaze remained steady on Reg. “What kind of snake?”

>   Reg chewed on her thumbnail, a habit she had broken years ago which still reappeared every now and then in times of stress. “Diamondback.”

  “A diamondback rattler. In my yard. Are you quite sure?”

  “I, um… to tell the truth, I don’t remember anything clearly. But Forst was there, and he says it was a diamondback. I think… he probably knows his snakes.”

  “Yes. I would trust his identification. When did this happen?”

  “Today. Earlier.”

  “Where did it come from? What did it do?”

  “I don’t know. Forst chased it away. With a shovel. But I don’t have any idea where it came from or whether it was related to this other business. Forst suggested that it might have something to do with whatever spell they cast the other night. He said I should ask you. You looked at the symbols and everything that they left behind after their ritual.”

  “So untidy,” Sarah said with a grim shake of her head.

  Reg giggled about Sarah being concerned about the witches not cleaning up after themselves properly. “But it’s good for us because you can read what they left behind, right? You can tell me what it was all about?”

  Sarah tapped her fingers on the arms of her chair. “I don’t know. There was a siren image. There were some other lines and symbols that I couldn’t be sure of. Crude drawings. A couple of squiggly lines could be the waves of the ocean or they could be snakes. It would make more sense if they were waves of the ocean, because of your nature, but I can’t be sure.”

  “If they were clumsy about their drawings, maybe they were trying to draw waves and accidentally summoned snakes.”

  “Uh, no, dear. That’s not how it works. It is the intention of the practitioner, not his artistic ability, that guides the spell. Despite what you may have seen on TV or the silver screen, mispronouncing a word in a spell or chant will not cause something completely unexpected to happen. The practitioner’s will guides it.”

  “But you don’t think they were calling snakes.”

  “No. I don’t. But I would like to hear more about this. I will have to talk to Forst.” Sarah sighed. “But you know that he doesn’t speak to me like he does to you. Would you mind… relaying for him?”

  Reg nodded slowly. “Sure.” She pondered what Forst was going to tell Sarah. Unlike if she were translating for someone who spoke a different language, Forst would know if she misrepresented his answers to Sarah. And he would want Sarah to know everything that was going on that was weird. Not just the unexpected appearance of the snake. “There are… other things I should probably tell you before you talk to Forst.”

  “Okay. What should you probably tell me?”

  “I have… there are some… blanks in my memory.”

  “Blanks. How big are these blanks?”

  “Uh… I don’t remember much of what happened from the time I got up this morning until I got up from a nap in the afternoon. So… pretty big.”

  “Have you been hit on the head?”

  Reg couldn’t repress a laugh at Sarah’s matter-of-fact question. “No. Uh… not that I remember.”

  “Have you been sick? Maybe… something to do with your recent… changes?”

  “No. I’ve been feeling okay. Other than the other night, after I got back from a… date. I sort of… didn’t seem to be able to use any of my powers.”

  Sarah noted her hesitance. “What happened on this date? Could he have put something in your drink? Did he give you a gift or do something else to ensorcell you?”

  “No. Nothing like that. I just… I maybe indulged a little too much. I felt pretty wrecked going to bed. But I was fine when I got up in the morning. Not a sign of a hangover, physical or magical. Everything was back to normal.”

  “But that wasn’t last night. Or this morning. It doesn’t explain your memory blanks.”

  “No. It doesn’t.”

  “So we have had these attacks or warnings, a spell was cast, and you have had a loss of your powers and memory blanks. And the appearance of a diamondback rattler where there really shouldn’t have been one. Is that everything?”

  “Forst said… that he tried to talk to me. To warn me about the rattler and to talk to me about it afterward, and when he did, I couldn’t hear him. Telepathically. He had to speak out loud for me to understand him.”

  Sarah nodded slowly. “That is strange. Another loss of your powers. Something is going on here, but I don’t think this is just the protection spell. Why would that stop you from being able to communicate telepathically or to use other powers?”

  “And I can now… it was just then, before my nap. Now… it seems to be okay again. I talked to him a few minutes ago and everything was normal again.”

  She should probably tell Sarah about not being able to kindle fire with Davyn either.

  “Have you tried… meditating? Or using your powers to find out what has been going on? If you’re able to use them right now, you could ask the spirits about yourself and what has been happening with your gifts. Or you could look in your crystal ball and see what you can see.”

  “I didn’t think of that. I guess I can try. It’s just been so strange the last few days. Switching between normal and these… hiccups.”

  ”You should try it. See if you can determine the source of these changes in your energy field. If we know what it is being caused by, we have a better chance of being able to do something about it.”

  Reg pushed herself to her feet, thinking about it. “And you don’t think…”

  Sarah waited for her to finish, and when she didn’t, prompted her. “I don’t think what, Reg?”

  “You don’t think this is… because of being part siren? That my siren part is somehow… taking over and erasing everything else?”

  “I don’t know. It is not something I have any experience with. Sirens are very rare in this world, and interactions between sirens and humans are practically nonexistent. We know of each other, but we generally try to have nothing to do with each other.”

  “Positive interactions,” Reg amended.

  “Hmm?”

  “There aren’t very many positive interactions between sirens and humans. But sirens still hunt. And so do humans, for that matter.”

  Reg knew that sirens had been hunted in the past when they had gotten too close to human civilization. Maybe that was one of the reasons they were so rare. Other than the fact that they tended to kill each other over territorial rights. Even their own children.

  “Well, yes. I meant that… we don’t talk. We’re not friendly with each other.”

  “Yeah. And you don’t think I have some siren disease? When she was here, Norma Jean seemed like she had periods when she was unaware of what she was doing. I thought it was the drugs. How much of her brain she had killed with her addiction? But what if…”

  “We really don’t know what is normal and what is not for a siren. I wish I could help you more. Maybe Corvin knows something about it. He’s always been interested in deep studies of other magical species.”

  “And he has particular reasons to be interested in sirens now,” Reg agreed.

  Sarah raised her brows.

  “Because of Norma Jean,” Reg clarified quickly. “Not because of me. She could have killed him. He was lucky.”

  It was just one example of Norma Jean’s odd, un-siren-like lapses. They had speculated that it might be because her siren blood was too thin and she didn’t have more than the initial instincts to seduce but not to drown. Reg thought that it might be something more.

  “I’ll think about it all,” Reg said. “Maybe, like you say, I can see something in my crystal. There must be a reason that all of this is happening.”

  Sarah nodded. “I hope you will be able to sort it out. Let me know if you think of any other clues. I’ll try to help you out if I can.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Reg went back to the cottage, dissatisfied with the way things had gone. She’d wanted answers but had gotten nowhere. Sarah didn�
�t know anything else about the protection spell the other witches had worked in the garden and what effects it might have had. Could they have called the snake? And if they had, then why? How did it help them? Did they mean to kill Reg off to get her out of the neighborhood? That seemed quite a bit more extreme than the vandalism. She would have thought it would take more steps to get from throwing eggs at a building to trying to kill someone.

  And Sarah had insisted that witches tried to stay in harmony with nature, each other, and the community. That was in direct opposition to something like calling venomous snakes to attack someone. They were many kinds of magic, and Sarah assured her that there was no bad magic or black magic, just magic that could be used myriad different ways, depending on the practitioner.

  But Reg didn’t believe the line that there were no bad witches. She had met practitioners who used their powers to harm others, no matter what the old witch had said.

  She discovered she had left the cottage door unlocked. She needed to be more careful about that. She didn’t want someone breaking in and lying in wait for her.

  Starlight was lying in the middle of the floor waiting for her. Reg grinned at the juxtaposition of her thought and Starlight’s behavior.

  “I don’t mind you lying in wait for me,” she told Starlight. “Just everyone else.” She picked him up and cuddled him to her face for a few minutes, until he started squirming to get away. She let him jump back to the floor.

  “I’m going to try looking in the crystal,” she told him. “Do you want to help?”

  He sat watching Reg as she moved the crystal ball off her shelf onto the coffee table where she usually put it during a client session. Starlight looked at the door as if checking to see if anyone else were coming in to join them.

  “Just you and me, Star.”

  When Reg sat down with the crystal, Starlight jumped up into her lap and started kneading her legs.

  “Not too much there. Watch the claws,” Reg warned.

  After a few minutes, he settled. Reg stroked him a few times, feeling his comforting aura and the focusing of her powers.