by Faith Hunter
“I’m not your servant.”
“A little girl and a toddler are in trouble. You gonna let ’em die?”
“Like I said before, you are my most interesting client. Profit-making, too.”
“Yeah, whatever. This is on my tab. I need you to look up the numbers of the Everhart sisters, dial the numbers, one by one, and when someone answers, put me through. Start with Boadacia and Elizabeth. I think they live together.”
“Secretary. I’m playing secretary,” he grumbled. But I heard keys clacking and a moment later, an automated answering message invited me to leave a number. Several clicks later, another message answered, this time with Elizabeth’s voice. “Leave a number and I’ll get back to you.” Crap. Why weren’t they at home? Unless they were there and spelled. The fear sucked at me, pulling me down, drowning.
“Try Carmen Miranda Everhart Newton,” I said.
Following more clacking and more silence, Reach said, “No answer, no message. Just rings.”
“Regan and Amelia Everhart.”
Regan answered on the second ring, sounding groggy, as if waked from deep dreams. Relief slammed through me, almost painful. “Regan, this is Jane Yellowrock. Wake up. Your sisters are in trouble.”
Regan didn’t want to believe me when I told her that her witch sisters had been spelled by Evangelina, insisting that it was probably a group working gone wrong, but she and her sister did get out of bed and start the drive up the mountain to Molly’s. The girls had no power of their own, but they had been raised among witches and the manipulation of energy, so I was hopeful that they could guide me in freeing Molly and Evan. Unfortunately, I beat them to the refurbished house on the top of the mountain.
The peak was shrouded in dense fog, no outside lights were on, and the house was darker than the armpit of hell. I didn’t reweapon. If there was danger here, it wasn’t something I could kill with stakes, blades, or even my M4. Beast padded just under my skin, lending me her night vision, her strength and speed tingling just under my skin like her pelt rising. A snarl lifted my lips and my jaw ached, as Beast’s killing teeth strained to break free. I slid from the SUV.
My leg was cold where the blood was cooling, and the wound felt like fire, a burning throb of pain. I limped to the house, moving slowly, silently, trying to see the ward before I ran nose first into it. Bumping into Molly’s wards tended to result in a siren loud enough to deafen. But the siren didn’t sound, not even when my palm bumped something dark. The thud sounded dull, hollow in the encasing cloud. My fingertips touched metal, cold and wet beneath the fog. Molly’s van. Hope detonated through me like mini fireworks and I found the passenger door by feel. It opened easily, and mist puffed in. The interior light came on, too bright, making a halo around the vehicle.
Angelina and Little Evan were cuddled on the seat, wrapped in a blanket, asleep. I picked them up in my arms and jogged back to my SUV, the grass and ground crunching beneath me. I crawled in to the front seat and closed the door, settling them on my lap to wait. I pulled Angie Baby close, nuzzling her head, her hair soft as angel wings against my face, breathing in her scent. Her hair smelled of baby shampoo, sleep, and warmth. Little Evan smelled of dirty diapers and milk. The throbbing in my leg eased, even as my blood wicked into their blanket.
Kits, Beast murmured deep inside. Safe.
But I had put them in danger. Again. As usual, when I was dealing with the children, tears came easily; one scalded its way down my face.
“Aunt Jane? Am I a big girl? My angel said I was a big girl.”
A sob escaped before I could catch it. My words stuttered through the tears. “Ye-yes, Angie Baby.” I hugged the children closer, careful not to use Beast’s strength that still stalked just beneath my skin. “You are a very big, wise, strong, good girl, and I am very proud of you.” Headlights cut through the night, illuminating little more than the fog. A tiny four-wheel drive car pulled up behind me. The lights went out and two car doors slammed, the sound muffled. My SUV’s back doors opened and closed, Amelia on one side, Regan on the other. They leaned into the front seat, heads close, whispering together.
“The wards aren’t up.”
“Are the kids okay?”
“What’s happening? I called around and nobody’s answering.”
“This is bad. I can’t even get Mom to answer.”
There wasn’t time to reply or to fill them in. I said, “One of you has to stay with the children.” I gathered up the kids and drew my injured knee into the seat, ignoring the agony that shocked through my system. Pushing off with my other foot, I straightened up and over the seat, holding the children. The sisters’ eyes widened, and I knew I had given away something of my nature with the movement.
Too strong for human Jane, Beast thought at me. Beast-strong. Something else I could worry about later. At this rate, my later-list was going to need its own filing cabinet.
The girls’ eyes fell on the blanket. “Why are they bleeding?” Amelia asked.
“My blood. Not theirs,” I said. Amelia held out her arms. I stretched over the seat and settled the children in her lap. “See if you can keep Angie awake. Regan, you come with me. I need you to figure out how to remove Molly’s earrings. Evangelina gave her a gift and Angie said there was a spell on them.”
“I still don’t believe it.” Regan said.
Rather than answer, I stroked my fingers down Angie’s cheek, softer than any rose petal, and got out of the vehicle. The slamming door was tinny, the sound soaked up by the fog. I looked at Regan. “I don’t know anything about witch magic. The little bit Molly tried to explain just sounded like gobbledygook. But I do know we can’t just pull the earrings out of Molly’s ears.”
Regan looked grim and pulled the lapels of her jacket together, an action that looked more nervous than cold. “No. We have to stab her first.”
A totally inappropriate laugh puffed out of my mouth. “Aw righty then.” I indicated the dark house. “After you.”
Regan led the way through the fog, seeming to drift in and out of the dense, wet cloud, a ghostly form explaining as she went. “It’s not so weird. Only with the receiver’s permission can another witch make a spell and set a charm on her. She has to accept it, which is why gifts work so well. If you give a witch a pair of gloves or a scarf, then the spell tied to the gift is activated the moment the witch puts it on. For it to be strong enough to work long term, it has to be keyed to her blood, meaning that the practitioner has to have some genetic material to work with, like a hair with the root still on, or a fingernail clipping with some cells caught underneath.
That made sense. Spells against witches needed the snake in the heart of all animals, the double helix of DNA, the same material I used when I changed into another animal. “Okay. So how are you going to stop the spell?”
Regan looked back over one shoulder, her face mostly shadow. “I’m not.” I was confused, but I figured Regan knew that. I also had to assume that she knew what she was doing.
The door in the former garage was unlocked and Regan preceded me inside, turning on lights. The house looked cheery and homey, not like two people were under a black-magic spell in the master suite. There was a pile of blankets in front of the TV in the great room, as if this was where Angelina had nested, holing up to wait through the long hours when I hadn’t bothered to call her back. Because my life was so much more important and my problems so much more urgent than hers. Guilt stabbed me again, poking another hole in my soul.
I hunched my shoulders and followed Regan into the new room at the back of the house. She turned on the light and stood in the doorway, studying the scene. Big Evan was wearing a T-shirt and oversized boxers, lying on his back, one hairy leg and a strip of belly exposed, snoring loudly, one arm out toward Molly. The knuckles of his closed hand grazed her cheek. Molly was curled on her side, facing Evan, most of the covers pulled to her side of the bed, her feet drawn up, hugging a pillow.
Regan stepped to the side of the bed. “
Help me turn Mol to her back.” She threw back the covers, exposing Molly’s pale blue nightgown and sock-covered feet. The smell of sleeping bodies, sweaty and too long unmoved, fluffed into the air. Regan turned Molly’s shoulders and head; I straightened her legs. I lifted her hips and positioned them in alignment. It was like moving a freshly dead body. The thought made my chest ache and I slid my hand around Mol’s foot, just to be making some small contact. I stared at the garnet earrings in her ears. They were the same pair Molly had been wearing all week. Regan said, “Now I have to stab her.”
“You were serious?”
“Yeah. If you’re right about Evangelina, then she used blood magic on Molly and only blood will undo it.” She looked me over, her brows going up, and her tone wry. “I see I don’t have to go looking for a knife.” She held out a hand.
“Every blade I have is silver-plated,” I said, placing a short, narrow-bladed throwing knife into her hand. “Only the edge is steel.”
Regan shrugged. “I’m not a witch, so I can’t tell you if there’s a difference, or which metal I should use. I just know I have to use the pointy part.” She uncurled Molly’s fingers and extended her index finger. Regan adjusted her grip on the handle and stabbed down, one quick prick. Molly didn’t wake. She didn’t even flinch. Blood rose in a shimmering button at the tip of her finger. Regan raised the finger and smeared Mol’s blood all over the earrings front and back, leaving blood smears on her sister’s lobes and several fresh drops on the musty-smelling pillowcase. Then Regan removed the earrings. She dumped a glass of water into an orchid blooming on the bedside table, and squeezed more of Molly’s blood into the glass where it thinned in contact with the remaining water. Regan dropped the bloody earrings with a soft clink of stone-on-glass and carried them from the room.
I pulled a small, delicate chair over and sat gingerly on the pillow-top seat, afraid my weight might break it. Molly’s finger was still bleeding and I wrapped it in a corner of the sheet, applying pressure. She looked exposed, vulnerable, and I pulled the linens back up, covering her. Holding her hand, I looked around the room. The new bedroom was painted a soft blue-green, the color of the water around the keys in Florida. The comforter was deep teal with peacock-toned shams, and throw pillows in shades of aqua, mint, and teal. The room was pretty without being frilly, the kind of room a woman decorates when a man shares it. Orchids were in the windows, all blooming, as if she kept the best for this room.
Molly murmured and rolled over. I let her hand go. A moment later she groaned. And sat up. Blinked. And looked at me. “Son of a witch on a stick,” she said, her voice rough.
Beside her, Big Evan rolled over and got to his feet, lumbered to the bathroom, moving stiffly, mumbling something about needing to, “. . . piss like a racehorse.”
“Jane,” Molly whispered, her eyes on me, going wide. “Regan?”
“Get dressed. Meet me in the great room,” I said, and I moved quickly out of the room. Which sounded much nicer than to say I scurried like a rat. Big Evan hadn’t closed the door to the bath and there were some things I simply did not need to share.
I went out to the SUV and carried the children to the house. Amelia took Little Evan to his room offering to change his diaper, thank God. I went to the guest bath and added a pad of washcloths beneath the strap over my wound before settling with Angie on the oversized couch, holding her to me, rocking back and forth. Thinking. The motion caused me a good deal of pain, but it seemed an appropriate price to pay—a penance of sorts. Though I had been raised nondenominational protestant, not Catholic, guilt is something all Christians understand.
I felt Angie waken, a slight change in her breathing, a speeding of her heart rate. “You came,” she whispered.
I wanted to kick myself. I said, “When I agreed to be your godparent, I made a lot of promises to your parents, and I made you some too. I promised to take care of you if something happened to your mom and dad, to raise you the way they wanted, and I promised to be there if you needed me. I promised to keep you safe. Yesterday and tonight, I wasn’t there for you. I broke my promises.” Angie took my fingers in hers. There was blood under my nails; I hadn’t noticed it in the bathroom. “I’m sorry, Angie Baby.” My voice was breathless, weak with unshed tears. I took both of her small hands into mine. “I promise on my honor, that will never happen again. From now on, I’ll take your calls no matter what. If I miss a call, I’ll call you back the moment I hear the message. I’ll be there for you. I’ll do a better job of being your godmother.”
“It’s okay, Aunt Jane.” My heart did a twisting backflip of shame. It wasn’t okay. Angelina stood on the couch seat and put her arms around my neck, leaning her small body against mine. “I love you.”
I hugged her to me.
“Here. Watch this one too,” Amelia said, dropping Little Evan on my lap.
I couldn’t help my gasp and her eyes were drawn to my thigh. “You’re bleeding all over Big Evan’s couch,” she said, taking the toddler back. “You are dead meat.”
I looked up as a shadow darkened the doorway to the kitchen, Big Evan standing there, filling the opening, scowling. Thankfully wearing pants. “I tried to find Evangelina to make her take the hex off Molly, but she’s gone to ground, like she vanished off the face of the earth.” His voice dropped in pitch, “Did she spell my whole family?”
I nodded once, slowly. His glower darkened. Likely trying to find a way to make me responsible.
Regan said, “You mean she spelled the whole family? Siphoning your power and using your gifts against your wishes?”
“That’s against witch law,” Amelia said. “Against every protocol witches have.”
I shrugged and Angie’s fingers tightened around my neck.
“Tell them everything,” Evan said, nodding to the sisters, “from the beginning.”
I started with the hedge of thorns-like spell and the werewolves trapped in Evangelina’s basement. Leaving Regan to take mental notes, Amelia took the children to bed as I talked, rightly thinking that they were too young to hear all this. I finished just as Molly joined us, her hair wet and braided down her back. “And there’s something dark, a shadow with wings, trapped in the hedge.”
Molly drew in a horrified breath. Evan’s face darkened. “My sister-in-law is consorting with demons.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Bloody, Damaged Jeans
and Nefarious Intentions
“Can you take photographs of the spell in Evangelina’s basement?” Molly asked. “That will tell us what kind of spell—”
“And what kind of demon,” Evan interrupted.
“—she’s using,” Molly finished. “And yeah, that too. You should be safe enough from the demon as long as you don’t set it free.” My eyebrows went up.
“Just keep back from the ward containing it,” Evan said.
“Uh huh. Ducky,” I agreed and headed out, having learned one important thing before I drove away from the Trueblood house—never kick a hornet’s nest. The witches and their human sisters were making battle plans, gearing up to rescue the other members of their witch family. Once everyone was safe from the power-draw, they would meet to discuss what to do about Evangelina. Battle by committee. It would take forever. The girls still didn’t want to believe that their elder sister was the cause of the sleeping spell, but with Big Evan on my side (and hating every moment of knowing I was right) and the other witch sisters not answering their phones, they were coming around.
First I had to shift and heal the wound in my thigh. The pain was now a constant throb, and I was feeling light-headed from blood loss. I needed to shift and heal, hunt, shift back, get some food into me, and check in on Grégoire, Rick, Kem, and Derek—a lot to do in the few hours left to me before dawn. I didn’t like it when my personal life and my work life overlapped; it just complicated everything. But there it was, a perfect description of my life—complicated—and Evil Evie was using my job of guarding the parley to make i
t worse.
I pulled my vehicle off the road onto an overgrown track I had spotted several times while making the run from Asheville to Hot Springs. The fog was more dense than before, sending down splatters as rain condensed out of the clouds. I stripped in the front seat and slid naked from the SUV to the ground, my body instantly wet and chilled, as the mist curled cold fingers around me. I found rock easily and lay out on it, shivering, blood loss making me feel the cold with an unaccustomed intensity. I didn’t have my fetish necklace, but I had my emergency cat tooth. I lay my head on my arms, closed my eyes, and thought about Beast. The pain hit.
I shook pain away. Growled low. Jane did not leave cold dead cow meat. I hungered. I sat up, front paws together, head high, and listened/smelled/looked, tasted the soggy, white air, felt it wet my pelt. Night was silent. Empty of prey. Heard only mice moving in grasses. I tilted ear tabs from side to side. Far away, heard dogs moving in night, loud, chasing away prey, following a female who was in heat, too focused on mating to hunt.
I lay on stone, hungry, angry at Jane. Licked at healed wound. No blood on pelt. No scar on Beast-leg. With head bent back, heard faint sound of chewing down mountain, away from dogs. Rabbit? Mouth watered, stomach gripped in claws of hunger, hurting. Empty. Many rabbits. More-than-five rabbits. Rabbits are good food. Silent, following sound, I moved down mountain, pawpawpaw. Angled into slow breeze to keep big-cat smell from rabbits. Beast is good hunter.
Later, I sat in grassy field, parts of three dead rabbits at my paws. I licked hot blood from my jaw and muzzle. Good taste after good hunt, chasing, killing rabbits. With killing teeth, picked rabbit paw up from ground. Crunched hard and swallowed. Good hunt. Belly full. I put a paw on rabbit ribs and licked, rough tongue pulling bits of flesh from bones. Good hunt.
Yeah, and the gardener will be happy you ate his pests, Jane thought at me. Can we shift back now? I have work to do.