by Chloe Adler
“You could tell I was trying to hold my shit together?”
“Of course,” his eyes were smiling and I wanted to throw myself on him.
Chrys cleared her throat, no doubt to stop us from macking on each other.
“Why did he go back to the V?” she asked.
“I don’t know, maybe he thought that’s where Burgundy would be. Or maybe he felt safer being in a public place.” I shrugged. “They’re on their way.”
“Okay great, we need to get this done now.” Chrys pointed to the crystal.
Reining in my excitement, I drew a long breath. “Do you know how?”
Chrys nodded. “Iphi and I study the family’s grimoire whenever we can. Mom showed us some things but not a whole lot, so we started copying spells and incantations down ourselves, making our own book of shadows.”
My eyes widened and my mouth went dry. “Why didn’t you tell me that? Or show me?” Was I that despised? A complete outcast?
Chrys looked away quickly, her eyes darting to Ryder and then down to her cup of tea. Without answering, she asked, “Have you used your crystal before?”
I nodded. “Why are you helping me?”
“I’ll do whatever I can to save Iphi.”
That was as good an answer as any. I sat down at the table with Ryder, still holding the crystal ball.
“Close your eyes and focus on the question,” Chrys said.
I did as she instructed, closing my eyes and focusing all of my thoughts. What is Aurelia doing?
Nothing happened. I twisted my eyes tighter, took a long, deep breath in and held it, repeating the question.
Nothing. I opened my eyes. Both Ryder and Chrys were focused on me.
“Tell me exactly what you’re thinking so I can focus on it too,” said Chrys.
I told her and we both closed our eyes and thought of the question. Nothing.
“Let’s bind hands,” I suggested.
“Shouldn’t you cast a circle first?” Ryder asked.
“Not for scrying,” Chrys said. “We aren’t casting a spell.”
He nodded and Chrys stood up, moving closer to me. I stood up as well, placing the crystal in a naturally formed divot on the table’s wooden surface, and we held hands.
I took a deep breath in and Chrys did the same. I focused on the question, my eyes closed.
“Girls, look.” Ryder had jumped to his feet and was leaning over the crystal.
The inside of the ball was completely black.
“Is it broken?” I looked at Chrys.
“Shh, focus,” she hissed back at me.
Chrys telling me what to do was maddening but I listened anyway. For Iphi. Sucking down my ego and my pride.
The blackness swirled, turning into a dark gray mass that gradually lightened and coalesced. As it began to clear, Aurelia came into focus. She was on the phone. Weird, Aurelia rarely used a phone. She didn’t even own a cell, only a landline.
“Can we hear her?” I whispered to Chrys.
“Ryder, get some rue from the cupboard.” Chrys’s voice was an octave higher than normal.
“Rue?” Ryder asked.
“Ruda, ruta, surely your mother and sister—“
“Yes, yes of course.” Ryder bounded to the cabinet and opened it up, fishing around.
“You don’t have fresh herbs in here, just jars of spices.”
“Yes,” I said. “I don’t have a stocked witch’s kitchen. You may not have noticed but—“
“Silence,” Chrys spat.
Geez, she sure was drunk on power.
“Let me think for a minute,” she said, slightly calmer.
The front door opened. A second later, Burgundy and Jared rushed in.
Jared immediately scurried over, throwing his arms tightly around me. He held me from behind, not breaking my handhold with Chrys. She looked up briefly from the sphere.
“Here.” Ryder appeared at her side, holding a jar in his hand. “I couldn’t find any rue but this should work.”
Chrys glanced over and nodded. “Open the jar, rub some on your hands, and then sprinkle it over the ball.”
Ryder did as he was told and we all stood around it, watching. He kept darting nervous glances at Jared, who did not release his hold on me. I remembered that weird flash of emotion I saw in his eyes the first time we met. Another jealous lover? It sparked anger within me but also sadness. I shifted uncomfortably, which made Jared let go but I leaned back into him and he understood, positioning his arms around me again. Jutting out my chin and firming my jaw, I glanced back at Ryder. He winced and looked away. My breathing was labored, escaping noisily through my nose. Jared leaned his face into my neck, bending down to reach me.
“What’s wrong?” he breathed into my ear.
Not wanting to get into it at that moment, I shook my head briskly and angled toward him. “I’ll tell you later. More importantly, are you all right?” I wanted to clasp my hands over his but I couldn’t break the circle.
“I am now.” His voice was low and trembling a little. “I love you.”
I wanted to turn around, throw my arms around him and kiss him. That’s what I normally would have done but something, besides the circle, stopped me. Ryder. Why did I care what he thought? Was I worried about hurting him or about scaring him away? I glanced back at him. He was staring at me. His jaw was working, the muscles protruding from the sides as he clenched and then unclenched his teeth. I closed my eyes, took a deep breath and held it. Whatever hold this human had on me, it was real. Whether I wanted it to be or not didn’t seem to play into my emotional state.
Opening my eyes, I held Ryder’s gaze. I tapped into my feelings for him, the emotions that ran deeper than desire. Carefully, I licked my lips and then offered him an enormous smile that sprang straight from my heart. It felt too open and vulnerable and my first instinct was to clamp it back but I didn’t. I let it roar. A full-faced, open smile because the jealousy or insecurity he was feeling did hurt me and not for the selfish reasons I was used to. He bit his lip and looked away, causing my heart to seize a little bit in my chest. Then he looked back and smiled, tentatively. It was enough, for now. Maybe there was a chance. Or maybe not.
A faint sound emitted from the ball, pulling my attention back to our circle. The scent that filled the room was marjoram, the herb Ryder must have sprinkled over the ball. We all leaned in closer.
Aurelia’s voice bled choppily into the room. “You need to send . . . police. I don’t want my other two . . . getting anywhere near that thing . . . rescue . . . Iphigenia.”
Aurelia’s voice was fading in and out but at least we got the gist of her call.
“Do they even know where she is?” Burgundy asked.
Jared shuddered, then cleared his throat, the sound like a dog holding back a growl. He tightened his hold on me. “They won’t find her,” he croaked. His voice was ravaged and hoarse. “It’s somewhere underground. They’re in cages. Deep. A cave.”
“You can lead us there?” Chrys looked over at him, her eyebrows high.
“Doubtful.” Jared’s body went stiff at my back.
“What? Why?” Ryder asked.
“He was heavily drugged from the moment they caged him at the V Club.” Burgundy moved closer to him as he released his hold on me.
He cleared his throat again, tried to speak and then resorted to a whisper. “The drugs kept me from shifting forms and also from being able to track our way there.”
Burgundy threw her arms around him, supporting his weight. He held onto her like she was a life preserver and he was drowning in the crashing waves of a tumultuous sea.
“Didn’t you track a path back on your way back? Didn’t you escape?” Chrys said, seemingly oblivious to his discomfort.
He shook his head. “I was returned to the V Club, in my human form, by a zombie henchman.”
We all looked at him, our mouths open. “Why?” I asked the question no one else wanted to ask.
“The Scri
m has a message for you, Sadie.”
I cocked my head. “For me?”
“He wants you to exchange yourself for Iphi and your father.”
Chapter Thirteen
Burgundy insisted we all sit around the kitchen table in order to formulate a rescue plan.
“We can’t just run in there blindly,” she said and we all agreed. Plus we had no idea where “there” was.
“What does the Scrim want with Sadie?” Chrys asked the question that had been on my mind but I’d been too afraid to formulate.
“That thing doesn’t give reasons,” Jared said. “Just demands.”
“Yeah.” I nodded, stretching my arms above my head.
“I need to tell you all, because Sadie isn’t, that she’s gaining some powers. Maybe they can be used to help stop him,” Ryder offered.
“Except that I don’t know how to control them and they only show up sporadically.”
Chrys shifted in her seat.
“Chrys? Something you know about this? Care to share?” I looked up at Burgundy’s words. Sure enough, Chrys was looking down, readjusting her ponytail.
Chrys shook her head and crossed her arms over her chest. “I . . . Can’t.”
“Can’t or don’t want to?” I asked her.
“Can’t,” she repeated. “Not allowed.”
“So there’s something you want to say but are forbidden to say?” Burgundy clarified.
Chrys nodded her head hesitantly without speaking again.
“Do you want me to bite you and inject you with truth serum?” Burgundy asked.
Chrys shrugged without responding.
I knew Burgundy was waiting for permission. “Should we see what Aurelia is up to first?” she asked.
Chrys shifted her weight backwards, causing the front legs of her chair to leave the ground. It looked like she was going to fall over. We waited, exchanging glances. Then she righted her chair and leaned forward over the table.
We looked into the ball that still rested in the center of the table. It was crystal clear. I looked at Chrys. She shrugged. I passed my hand over the ball. Nothing.
“Hold it,” Chrys said.
Standing up, I leaned over the table to retrieve it. Once my hands were wrapped around the thing, it grew warm. Once more, I held it in one hand and passed my other hand over it. The insides swirled and shifted with a blue and white fog, then cleared. Aurelia stood over her cauldron in the kitchen, throwing in herbs. One at a time, she reached above her head to break off a piece from her arsenal, crumble it, throw it in the pot and then reach up for another herb.
Making sense of what she was using and why proved difficult. Her fingers were deft and moving quickly. I only recognized a few of them.
“Chrys?” I looked over at her. She was watching too but offered nothing.
“Ryder?”
He nodded, moving his chair closer to mine. “Clove to increase personal gain and banish negative energy. Comfrey, the most powerful herb for protection. And galangal?” A sound escaped from Chrys. Ryder looked at her, his brows scrunched, trying to connect in the middle of his handsome face. “Why would she use galangal? That’s used to break hexes and aid in psychic powers but it’s also used in sex magic.”
Chrys shook her head violently, her own face scrunching up, like that of a child’s who wasn’t getting their way.
I looked back at the ball and watched as my mother moved a smaller iron cauldron next to the larger one and dropped in a black candle. A moment later, she retrieved it. The wax had softened but had not turned completely to liquid yet. She reformed it into the shape of—a person?
“Chrys?” I looked at her with alarm.
She turned to Burgundy. “Bite me.” She offered her neck in compliance, stretching her head down to her shoulder.
In a flash, Burgundy was behind her, biting into the soft pink flesh. The vision in the crystal faded as all of my attention refocused on Burgundy and my sister.
Chrys went rigid and then limp, closing her eyes. The serum would take a few minutes to work. My thoughts turned back to Aurelia. I wanted to trust my mother but I never had. She’d always treated me differently. Could it be because she just didn’t like me? Aurelia was a complex and hard woman, but to hate her own daughter? That seemed far-fetched, even for her. Still, I couldn’t deny the disdain that broke her otherwise calm surface every time she had to deal with me directly.
Chrys’s head lifted and her eyes opened. A white film covered them, showing that the serum had taken effect. Burgundy released the hold on her shoulders and took a step back. “Go ahead. She’s under.”
“Chrys?”
Her head swung toward me slowly as though it was only loosely connected to her neck. Creepy. I’d never witnessed truth serum at work before, only heard stories.
“What is Aurelia trying to do?”
Chrys’s mouth opened and shut with a snap. She must have been spelled to resist.
“Answer her.” Burgundy used her Domme voice, deeply authoritative but with a hint of the vampire persuasion that could be used along with the serum.
“Mother . . .” Her voice came out slowly as though she couldn’t say it. “Trying. To bind. Sadie.”
“Why?” I asked. It had to be more than Aurelia not wanting me to approach the Scrim, although briefly I wondered if she cared that much. Enough to try and save me.
“From. What. You. Are.” Chrys’s words were thick and slow, as though she were speaking around a mouth full of pebbles.
“What is she?” Ryder asked.
“A ses—“ Chrys twisted her head, fighting whatever spell Aurelia had cast on her to keep her from answering. “A slut.” That part slipped out easily enough.
Ryder jumped up from the table. “A sesso? Is Sadie a sesso witch?”
“What’s that?” I asked before Jared placed a hand on my arm to shush me.
“Yes.” Chrys stuttered before looking directly at me, a tear winding its way down her cheek. “Now you know why you’re such a whore.”
She had no trouble spitting that sentence out. It was so loud that it reverberated off the walls, bouncing around, looking for a home. I glanced at Burgundy, who just shook her head. I had no idea what my sister was talking about, not really. But I did grok that she was saying there was a logical explanation for my heightened sex drive.
“How long have you known this?” I asked her.
“Years.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I wanted to. Mom wouldn’t let me. She thought if you didn’t know . . . you could deny it and live . . . a normal life.”
“Normal? Chrys, my life has been anything but. I’ve spent my adult life feeling guilty for who I was, trying to fight my instincts or hide them. Doesn’t that seem crazy?”
“I don’t see why you can’t control it. It’s not natural and it’s disgusting.”
“I’m sorry that who I am is inconvenient and uncomfortable for you. But how do you think I feel?”
“I don’t know if I care.” Chrys was crying now. “I need to lie down.”
“The serum is exhausting her,” Burgundy explained. “It has that effect.”
“So tired . . .” Chrys’s head slumped forward.
“I’ll take you to my bedroom. You can sleep there.” Burgundy didn’t wait for an answer. Chrys was crashing hard and just as her head was about to hit the table, Burg rushed to catch her. She placed her arms around my sister and lifted her up. “I’ll be right back.”
“But . . .” I opened my arms up wide, holding my hands to the ceiling and raising my eyebrows.
Understanding my gesture, she turned to the guys. “Can you two carry her to my room?”
The men moved to her side and lifted Chrys out of Burgundy’s arms. When they were out of earshot, I turned to her.
“What’s a sesso?”
Burgundy sat down at the table with me and took my hands in hers, eyes brimming red. Blood. Chrys’s blood.
“I shoul
d have guessed from your sexual appetite but it doesn’t make sense.”
“Burg. Cryptic much?”
She sighed deeply, dramatically. “ ‘Sesso’ means sex in Italian.”
I shook my head trying to wrap it around the new concept. “Sesso witch, Ryder called me. So, sex witch?”
Burgundy nodded, tightening her grip on my hands. “Yes, sweets. A sesso is a witch that uses sex magic, specifically. But it’s not just sex.”
I shrugged a shoulder at her.
“A sesso’s magic is released when . . .”
“She has a simultaneous orgasm with her true love,” Ryder finished, walking back into the kitchen with Jared.
“I was getting to that.” Burgundy shot him a look.
“Why do you both know so much about this?” I asked.
Burgundy huffed. “I’m a lot older than you are, remember? I’ve been around. Sessos are nothing new, but they’re rare.”
Ryder added, “When I first understood that I was adopted and not a witch, I begged my family for information, as much as they knew. My mom’s not as old as your mom but she’s a little over a hundred and knows Signum history.”
I tried to pull my hands away from my friend’s grasp but she wouldn’t let me. “So this is why I never had powers before now?”
“I suspect . . .” offered Jared, “that you did have some. Minor powers, that is.”
“Most witches do,” added Ryder.
“Aurelia must have been dampening yours with spells,” said Burgundy. “But now that you’ve met Ryder,” she glanced over at him, “you’re more difficult to control.”
“We haven’t had a simultaneous orgasm,” I said frankly.
Burgundy laughed. “I suspect we’d all know if you had.”
“What? Why?”
“Your powers would be even stronger than they are now,” Burgundy finished.
“They must be manifesting because of me,” Ryder said. “I unlocked something.” He looked toward Burgundy. “It doesn’t have to be hetero sex, does it?”
Jared snorted, “I hope not.”
Burgundy tossed her thick, dark hair. “Definitely not. I don’t know for sure but I suspect it’s because the attachment or feelings that Sadie has for you are different from the ones she has for us.”