“I don’t care,” Dad said. “Just tell us.”
“We’ll find Evangeline. I don’t know how or when, but I know she’s not going to die now. Because I’ve seen a vision of her in the future. So, I know I’m going to see her again.”
“What is the vision of her?” Dad pressed.
“A vision of her alive in the future. That’s all you need to know right now. Somehow or another, she makes it out of this.”
“And your mother?” Dad asked.
He could lie and say she’d survive too, but he feared he wouldn’t get away with it. What he said about Evangeline was true, and he didn’t want them to doubt that by lying now.
“I have no information about Mom.”
“You don’t have any visions of her in the future?” Emmy asked, breathless.
“Yeah, but it doesn’t mean anything. I can’t see the future like I’m looking through a window. It’s just certain things. It could be a good thing I don’t have a vision. If Mom gets better and lives a normal, happy life, I wouldn’t see visions of that. I just see the things that…I don’t know, leave a mark. On time, or fate, or whatever. So, I think that means Mom is not going to die, at least if she does, it’s not soon. I’m not close enough to see it yet.”
“Okay, thank you,” Dad said.
Patrick could hear a difference in his voice. Patrick’s vague pronouncements actually did change something in him. At least they gave him a reason to keep going.
“And Julie,” Dad continued. “If there is anything else you’ve seen about her you’re holding back, now is the time. Everything is different now. Whatever has happened to her has probably happened to Evangeline. It’s personal now.”
Patrick tasted bile in the back of his throat. He had only shared the details of the vision with Evangeline. He had told the others he had seen a vision of her and that’s why he reacted. But he didn’t tell them about the torture. Now, he was so grateful he had left that part out.
“Well, in my vision, she’s alive too. But that’s about all I know. It does mean there is still hope. I’ll pay attention. Keep looking for new visions,” Patrick said. “But right now, there’s nothing new. Like I said, everything around her is darkness. I didn’t see anything useful about where she is or who might have taken her. That’s the truth.”
Dad nodded solemnly. He had been right, of course. What once happened to strangers now happened to them. No longer a curious mystery to fill their summer boredom, this was their story now. But it had been personal to Patrick for a while now. Patrick’s powers had limits. He couldn’t foresee a deadly earthquake in China or the results of a Presidential election, no matter how much of a “mark” those things might have on the fate of the world. When he said he saw things that left a mark on fate, he meant things that left a mark on his fate. Due to selfishness or the limitations of his magic, Patrick had never foreseen anything that wouldn’t occur right in front of his face.
avid didn’t know how he would have made it through the next few days without Carson’s advice. “Just be a man.” Whenever David felt he might fade away, he repeated those words to himself. Be a man. And when David said this to himself, he didn’t mean it in the gender specific way. He really meant, be a person. Be a human being. Do what people do. Breathe in. Breathe out. Feed your children. Feed yourself. Do the dishes. Sleep at night. Wake up in the morning. Shower. If your wife is sick, you take care of her. If your children are scared, you tell them everything will be okay, even if you don’t know if it will. You pray to a God you’re not sure is there. Do what people do.
This basic sentiment kept him together. As Carson said, sometimes the simplest magic was the most powerful. And as a dark wizard on the brink of losing his mind, the chance to actually be a person—be a husband, be a father, was the most beautiful and unattainable magic he could imagine.
However, although this kept him sane from moment to moment, he knew he would need more in order to save his wife and daughter. He needed to be a wizard. The root of his problems was magical, and would need a magical solution.
When Mom came home from the hospital, she looked really sick. Emmy had never thought of Mom as a happy, upbeat person, but she must have smiled and laughed more than Emmy had realized. Because now she didn’t and Emmy noticed the absence. Mom stayed in bed most of the time. And next week she had to start chemotherapy, which would probably make her sicker. As soon as she got the chance, Emmy showed Mom the bracelet, too. And told her where she had found it. Mom’s normally bright blue eyes had turned grayer. Cloudier. She stared at the bracelet a long time before answering, not even sitting up in bed.
“In the truck?” she asked.
“Yes. Do you know how it got there?” Emmy asked again, trying her best to be patient.
Mom used the tip of her fingernail to touch one of the charms—an ancient symbol for the sun—a circle with a dot inside.
“I don’t understand,” Mom said.
“Yeah, no one understands.”
“This is why you cared so much. Why you kept sneaking out. You thought Julie had some link to our family, and that scared you. If it hadn’t been for the bracelet, would you have gone to that forest? Would you have taken Evangeline there?”
Emmy considered it for a moment. “No, probably not.”
Mom nodded. Her skin looked gray too. “I wish I had a good answer for you, Emmy. But I think the bracelet found its way there as part of a spell. Probably the same spell that affected your father. Maybe it wanted Evangeline all along, and that’s how the spell bent fate to make it happen.”
“That’s not how magic works. A bracelet cannot materialize in the truck.”
“I know. I’m sure it didn’t,” Mom said. “Perhaps I tracked it into the truck on my shoe or in the folds of my clothes.”
“Okay…so where were you where you might have just happened to get the bracelet stuck to you?”
Mom stared at the ceiling. They both must have had the same thought, because Mom said, “Not your brother’s apartment.”
“How do you know?”
“I’ve been skipping out on work, visiting him almost every day to work on my spell. It’s complicated. Takes time. I was with him when Julie disappeared.”
Emmy thought Mom would lie to be Jude’s alibi, but she had this weakness in her voice. She sounded too tired, too unfocused, to come up with a proper lie. As if she talked in her sleep.
Emmy collected the bracelet in her hands. She had grown used to it now. The jarring energy of the bracelet had grown comforting. As her own talisman provided a source of protection and strength she could touch and hold, Julie’s talisman served as all of Emmy’s fear and weakness bundled up in an object she could touch and hold, that she controlled, that she could break if she wanted. But she had no interest in breaking it. She put the fear right back in her pocket.
Evangeline had gone missing three days ago, which in missing person time, meant bringing out the corpse-hunting dogs. Of course, Julie had gone missing weeks ago. Long enough that the news had grown stale, at least until Evangeline’s disappearance. Now the news believed a serial kidnapper was preying on the local teens, and everyone needed to feel afraid all the time.
Emmy’s family could use magic to keep annoying people away. The press. Curious neighbors. Even detectives had trouble finding them. They would ring the doorbell and then immediately turn around and go back to their car, as if they had waited there for ten minutes instead of three seconds.
Emmy didn’t like this. The Vandergraffs got what they wanted. They had become invisible to the world, but that meant Evangeline had become invisible too. The news people rarely mentioned her name and called her “the second victim.” As much as she doubted the abilities of the Mundane police, she didn’t want them to forget about Evangeline altogether and stop looking for her. Everyone would cry for Julie, but this “second victim” would fade out of their memories.
She wondered if the spell worked on their own family too. Uncle Carson and Au
nt Jess didn’t come back after they had visited Mom at the hospital. Uncle James didn’t notice or care his niece had gone missing. And Me-Maw and Pa-Pa, Mom’s own parents, hadn’t come to see their daughter at all. If the spell wasn’t working on them, this proved dark wizards who didn’t practice magic were exponentially more evil than those who did. How could they think practicing magic was more evil than abandoning their family?
Dad drove out to the forest alone every single day, and spent most of the day there. Emmy assured him she would look after Mom while he looked for Evangeline. Patrick helped too, but he also picked up a few more guard shifts at the pool to help with money…or just to escape. Emmy thought they should pay him more than ten dollars an hour, since he could prevent accidents before they even occurred.
This left Emmy alone in the house with Mom and Xavier a lot. She didn’t know which of them depressed her more. At least she understood Mom’s problem. Xavier scared her. He had stopped going through the motions of watching television or playing video games and did nothing. Nothing. A combination of sleeping and staring into space.
Emmy had to take care of Xavier too, because if she didn’t make him sandwiches and bring him water, he would die. She had tested this by refusing to bring him breakfast and lunch. Finally, at 3pm, she gave in. She barged into his room without knocking. He sat at his desk tapping his fingers. When he didn’t acknowledge her, she dropped the peanut butter and jelly and plate in front of him with a loud clatter. He looked at it, but his reaction was still miniscule, so she kicked him in the shin as hard as she could.
He gasped and finally looked at her, clutching his shin. Still not satisfied with his response, she pushed him hard enough that he had to catch himself from falling out of his chair. That time, he pulled back like he prepared to strike back.
“Good,” Emmy said. “Hit me. Curse me. Do something.”
“Why do want me to hit you?”
“I don’t.” Emmy felt her eyes burning with tears yet again. “I just want you to stay. I’m not asking you to be happy, or normal, or not a psycho. I just want you to stay.”
Xavier continued rubbing his shin, but the anger in his eyes faded again. Emmy had to stop herself from attacking him again. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ll try.”
“I need to go somewhere,” she said, still wiping away tears and hating herself for it. “Can you keep an eye on my mom?”
“What do I do?”
“Nothing. Just pay attention enough so if she needs help or something, you actually notice.”
Emmy found it unbelievable and aggravating that, despite their identical predicaments, the Vandergraffs and Prescotts continued to ignore each other. Emmy believed this was stupid and arrogant on both sides. Julie and Evangeline didn’t fall down the same rabbit hole by coincidence. They had some link to each other. There had to be a reason why someone wanted them and not Emmy. Or Nathan, for that matter. Julie and Evangeline had to have something in common. However, she had no idea what. She couldn’t imagine any two witches so different. And she could not imagine any plausible circumstance where they would have come into contact with each other, or anything else that tied them together.
However, she knew whom to ask. She may have just wanted to see him again, but she didn’t care. When Emmy asked Nathan to pick her up from the grocery store, he agreed right away. He checked several times that she didn’t have any of her family members with her. And she said, several times, yes, she had ridden her bike there to pick up some prescriptions, milk, and coffee.
When she saw his truck pull into the parking lot, she felt so nervous her tongue swelled. She had asked him to come pick her up, but hadn’t given any specific reason, which made it feel like a date.
When she climbed in, she still felt nervous at first. And felt very aware of the bulky bag of groceries she had with her. Their time together had an expiration date, because she had brought unrefrigerated milk with her. Not brilliant. But she felt better quickly. He had a reassuring presence about him. He kept his brow and lips in a firm serious line, but radiated a warm glow despite himself. She felt her cheeks grow warm too.
“Is everything okay?” he asked.
“I guess it’s not any less okay than it was before.”
“Fair enough.”
“Are you okay?”
“Same. Not any less okay. I worried that since you called me, something might be wrong.”
“No. Nothing specific. Is it still okay I called you?”
“Yeah. You want to go somewhere?”
“Sure.”
“Anywhere in particular?”
“I don’t care.”
He started driving and Emmy felt relieved. She didn’t care where he took her. She wanted to get away. And away with him was even better. And she liked his truck. It didn’t smell like Jude. It smelled of sunscreen and cinnamon gum.
“I wanted to talk to you, anyway,” he said. “I wanted to finish the conversation we started in the ambulance about your sister. There are things you should know. Things I should have told you in the first place. I didn’t realize you needed to know. And you know, wizards don’t spill their guts to everyone they meet. Especially not a dark witch…no offense.”
Emmy felt like she was about to be given a present. Or had scratched off a winning lotto card. She was right. He did have the key. He would tell her everything.
“Tell me.”
“Well, I don’t know anything for sure. But my family has a theory about why Julie was taken. And Evangeline may be able to help us confirm that theory.”
“Okay.”
“Julie isn’t an ordinary witch. She’s special. You know how every wizard falls somewhere on the solar calendar?”
“Every wizard has their moment.”
“Yes. Some wizards claim to be able to narrow it down to the minute, or even the second, although they might be full of it. In any case, we know we can narrow it down to the day. And some days are more important than others. Julie’s date is June 21st. She’s a summer solstice witch. And that’s rare and special.”
“So, what does that mean?”
“She’s more powerful than most, pretty much all, other wizards. At least when it comes to summer magic. There may be some powerful spells that only she can cast. And some believe she has even more importance and power. In any case, we tried to keep it quiet. We always knew that her being a solstice witch would lead to unwanted attention at best, and at worst, something like this.”
“But she’s the one with the power. What use would she be to another wizard? Do they think they can get her to cast spells for them?”
“Well, you know, there are ways to take someone’s power. I don’t know much about it, of course. I don’t know if that’s what happening or not. I hope not.” His voice got softer and softer as he spoke, and “I hope not” was barely audible.
He had said “you know” as if he assumed she did know about that kind magic, probably because it was some kind of dark magic.
Emmy waited for him to continue, but he didn’t. He pulled into the parking lot of a small park.
“It’s too hot for any kids to play here. All the slides are burning up and the fountain is off and grills closed because of the drought. So no one will be around.”
Emmy smiled to herself. Her family had visited a different park on the Fourth of July, but had the same reason. They went at night so no one would be around. Nathan had the exact same idea, but he chose the middle of the day in the summer.
Emmy followed behind Nathan, the air so hot she thought her skin might cook. The drought caused Nathan to track dust and pieces of dead grass into the air as he walked. The dust burned her eyes. She wanted to point out that everyone else in the world had the right idea by avoiding the park today, but she wanted to be with him. And she wanted to know what he had to say.
They found a well-shaded picnic table, so the heat and humidity still made it hard to breathe, but at least the sun wouldn’t cook them alive. The walk from his truck
to the picnic table took about thirty seconds, but sweat and dirt coated her skin as if she’d wandered the desert for hours.
“Does the heat not bother you?” Emmy asked.
“I don’t mind it too much. But it’s not like I can’t feel it. We can go somewhere else if you want. I just thought Mundanes wouldn’t be around.”
“No, this is fine,” she said, as she wiped a droplet of sweat from her temple. “So, you were talking about spells that can take someone else’s magic.”
“Yeah,” he said.
“For that kind of magic, would Julie and Evangeline have to die?” Emmy asked. She knew many bad things could happen before death. But she assumed that any other trauma could eventually heal. Some hope existed. Only death was irreversible.
“I don’t know if that’s part of the plan. It could be. Sometimes. There are dark spells that require human sacrifice. As I said, I don’t know much about prax portentia. But I know it’s not always about death. I know Julie isn’t dead. I can feel her presence. As a solstice witch, she has a strong presence. And if that light went out, I’d know it.”
“So, there’s still hope. Like you said.”
“Yes. I think so.”
“Prax portentia. What does that mean?”
He looked up at her. Previously, he had kept his eyes on the ants crawling across the surface of the table. “You’ve never heard that term?”
“No.”
He raised his eyebrows. Perhaps he didn’t understand how he could know about a dark spell and she didn’t. But he didn’t know she barely knew anything about magic. She definitely didn’t know any fancy names for spells.
“Well, that’s good, I guess,” he said. “I’m glad you don’t know.”
“So, what is it?”
Nathan picked at his cuticles and made a face, as if the explanation tasted bad in his mouth.
“It’s hard to explain,” he said.
She could tell he meant, I don’t want to explain. And she didn’t ask him again. For most people, she wouldn’t give up until they told her what she wanted to know. But she felt different about him. She didn’t want to make him say things he didn’t want to say. She didn’t like seeing him struggling.
Watch Me Burn: The December People, Book Two Page 12