by Cate Tiernan
I stared at him. “What... what...” What he was saying sounded like the plot of a Bruce Willis movie—not something that could happen in Widow’s Vale. But at the same time, I felt in my bones that he was telling the truth. I didn’t understand it, but I did suddenly believe that something bad was coming. Something very bad. “Is this why you and Morgan are sick?”
Hunter nodded. “I would guess your headache is caused by it, too, but since you’re half and half, it’s not wrecking you as much.” He went on to explain what he and Morgan had figured out and also what his father was trying to do, how he was trying to come up with a spell to disperse a dark wave. And he told me that the witch who cast this spell would probably die and that his father was going to be the one who cast it. I felt shocked. Hunter looked really grim, and I couldn’t imagine what he was feeling.
“I guess you guys are pretty sure about all this,” I said faintly.
He nodded. “It’s a situation that’s been developing for a while.”
“Are you sure your dad—”
“Yes. I’d like for someone else to do it, obviously. But any blood witch is likely to die, and he won’t let that happen to someone else.”
“And a nonwitch can’t cast it?”
“No. They have to be able to summon power. But if they’re strong enough to summon power, then they’re strong enough to be decimated by the dark wave.” He looked frustrated. I felt so sorry for him. If only there was some alternative—a way for a witch to cast the spell yet not be susceptible to the powers of the dark wave. Like if a person were...
I frowned as an awful, horrifying thought seeped into my brain. Immediately I shut it down.
“I have to go,” I said quickly. “My stepmonster-to-be is waiting for me.”
Hunter nodded and opened the door for me.
“The rest of Kithic doesn’t know about this,” he reminded me. “They wouldn’t be able to help, and there’s no use in terrifying them.”
“Okay.” I looked back at him, framed in his doorway. Then I turned and ran down the stairs, to where Hilary was waiting in the car. I was actually really happy to see her.
I had always thought people exaggerated when they talked about sleepless nights. But that night I had one. Every time I felt myself drifting off, I thought, Great, great, I’m going to sleep. And of course as soon as I thought that, I was wide awake again. I heard my dad come home after I had gone to bed. I heard Hilary ask him if he wanted something to eat. I remembered how, before Hilary came, I used to leave him something for his dinner when he had late meetings. For twelve years it had been me and him and a succession of housekeepers. By the time I was ten, I’d been able to make dinner by myself, do laundry, and plan a week’s worth of meals. I’d thought I was doing pretty damn well, but now I’d been replaced.
After they went to bed, the house was still but not quiet. I listened to the heat cycle on and off, the wind outside pressing against the windows, the creak of the wooden floorboards. Don’t think about it, I told myself. Don’t think about it. Just go to sleep. But again and again my mind teased the idea out of me: I was half witch. I might be able to call on the power, enough to cast the spell against the dark wave. And I was half not witch. So I might very well be able to survive the dark wave itself.
Don’t think about it. Just go to sleep.
I thought about Hunter’s weird dad, about his dying right in front of Hunter.
I thought about my mother, whose powers had scared her so much that she had stripped herself of them so that she couldn’t cast any kind of spell good or bad. Had that been the right thing to do? Would I want to do that?
I couldn’t control my powers. Sometimes I broke things and made freaky stuff happen. I’d only just found out about being half witch—I didn’t even know how I felt about it yet. It scared me; it pissed me off. Then I remembered some of the things I’d seen Morgan do. Now that I knew that I was the one who in fact had been causing the scary stuff to happen, I tried to separate out what had been Morgan. She had turned a ball of blue witch fire into flowers, real flowers, raining down on us. Mary K. thought she had saved their aunt’s girlfriend from dying after she’d fallen and hit her head. She had come to visit me in the hospital when I had been sick. And I’d gotten better, right away. Those were good things, right?
I hadn’t asked to be half witch. I didn’t want to be. But since I was, I needed to decide what to do with myself. Was I going to strip myself of my powers, like my mom, and just keep being a regular human, not tuned in to the magick that existed all around me? Or was I going to try to be a Morgan, learning all I could, deciding what to do with it, maybe deciding to be a healer? Or was I going to be a total weenie and pretend none of this was happening?
Hunter was about to lose his dad, to watch him die. He didn’t have the luxury of pretending none of this was happening.
My brain wound in circles all night, and when I realized that my room was growing lighter with the early dawn, I still didn’t have any answers.
“Alisa.” Hunter looked surprised to see me on his front porch, and frankly, I felt surprised to be there again. I’d taken a bus most of the way, then walked the rest, the cold wind whipping through my ski jacket. The school day had been endless, and after my sleepless night it had been especially painful to do laps around the gym.
“Come on in,” he said. “It’s nasty out there.”
Inside, my hands twisted together nervously. “I could do it,” I said fast, getting the words out before I lost my nerve.
Hunter looked at me blankly. “Do what?”
“I could cast the dark wave spell.” I licked my lips. “I’m half and half. Witch enough to cast the spell. Unwitch enough to survive it. I’m your best hope.”
I had never seen Hunter speechless—usually he seemed unflappable. Behind him, I saw Mr. Niall come out from the circle room. He saw Hunter and me standing there and came over. Hunter still hadn’t said anything. I repeated my offer, talking to Mr. Niall this time.
“You’ll die if you cast the dark wave spell. I probably won’t. I don’t know how strong I am, but I can shatter small appliances from twenty feet,” I said, trying for some lame humor. “All of you guys are sick—you look terrible and you can hardly move. All I have is a headache. You need me.”
“Nonsense,” said Mr. Niall gruffly. “It’s out of the question.”
“There’s no way, Alisa,” Hunter said finally. “You’re completely untrained, uninitiated. There’s no way of knowing if you could do it or not. There’s no way we could risk it.”
“You can’t risk not using me,” I said. “What if your dad is overcome by the dark wave before he finishes the spell? What happens then? Do you guys even have a backup plan?”
From the quick glances they exchanged, I figured they didn’t.
“But Alisa,” said Hunter, “you’ve never even cast a spell.
part in this, but it won’t hurt anything to have you know some of it. As you said, the fact that you’re only half witch works in your favor here.”
I nodded. Now that they had agreed, a whole new set of fears crossed my mind. But I wasn’t able to back out now. My mother had been afraid of her powers and in the end had destroyed them. I wasn’t there—not yet. I needed more information; I needed to explore their possibilities first. If I did have real powers and I could somehow learn to harness them, use them for good—well, that would be better than not having any powers at all.
9. Morgan
“There can be great power in darkness. There can be great ecstasy in power.”
— Selene Belltower, New York, 1999
Wednesday Today sucked. I feel like I have the flu, but nothing I take makes any difference. I’ve tried every type of sinus medicine I could find—nothing touches how I feel. Mom has noticed how yucky I look, even for me, and keeps feeling my forehead. But I have no fever. Just this horrible, ill feeling that seems to be eating at me from inside out. I am so tried of feeling this way—I keep bursting into te
ars. Our situarion is so dire that I can’t even fully wrap my head around it. I’m trying to go to school, to eat dinner with my family, to go on as normal, and all the time I'm trying not to think about the fact I and everyone I love might be dead in a week.
In terms of my studies, I worked on some of the correspondence that Bethany assigned. I am studying the different structures of crystals and how their individual molecule patterns can aid or deter their powers when used in actual spells. I like this kind of stuff. It’s sciency. I’m just finding it hard to think.
On Thursday, I opened my Book of Shadows to write the day’s entry. I’d been trying to write a little every day, at least a few sentences about what I was doing, Wicca-wise, what I was focusing on. I realized my brain just wasn’t functioning. I needed a Diet Coke. Downstairs, I heard the TV on in the family room. I got my soda from the fridge and poked my head in on my way back upstairs. Dad was working on the computer, Mary K. was on the floor, an open textbook in front of her, and Mom was on the couch, going over new real estate listings while she watched TV. My whole family might be dead in a week; this house might no longer exist; these three people who had been the only family I’d known, who had taken care of me and gotten mad at me and loved me—they might be killed. Because of Ciaran. Because of me. Through no fault of their own. Their only crime being to have adopted and loved me.
Feeling wretched, guilty, and sick, I went upstairs. I wanted to cry but knew that would only make me feel worse. It wasn’t just my family. It was Hunter, the person I loved as much as my family. The person I felt so close to, so in love with, whom I wanted so desperately. The thought of him dead, lifeless and charred on the ground, made me feel like I was going to throw up.
And if by some miracle Mr. Niall managed to avert the dark wave, then what? He would still be dead. We would all be alive, but I would have indirectly caused the death of my boyfriend’s father. Would Hunter ever be able to forgive me for that? Knowing him, probably. But would I ever be able to forgive myself?
I sat down at my desk, my head in my hands. My birth father was going to take Hunter’s father away, just as Hunter had found him again. What could I do? A series of crazy thoughts went through my head. Could I shape-shift into a wolf and kill Ciaran? I didn’t think so—I didn’t know how to shape-shift by myself. The last time Ciaran had told me what to say and do. Plus, I never wanted to shape-shift again—it had been too scary. Plus, I didn’t think I could really kill anyone, even Ciaran. Could I somehow warn Kithic and their families so they would leave the area? Again, I didn’t think so. It would be virtually impossible to convince anyone, and it would only delay the dark wave, not dismantle it. I wondered if I could put a binding spell on Mr. Niall so he couldn’t do the spell. Well, if he didn’t do the spell, we would all die. On the other hand, since we would all be dead, Hunter wouldn’t have to face his father’s death.
Then it came to me—an idea that had been fluttering around my mind. I had been ignoring it, but it would be ignored no longer. I could confront Ciaran again. I could tell him that I would join him. A cold feeling settled over me like a mantle. No—it would be lying, and he would see through it. But maybe... maybe I could confront him again and then somehow use his true name against him? Maybe I could bind him, shut him down so he couldn’t do the final part of the dark wave spell? Ciaran was impossibly strong, but I knew that I had an unusual strength myself. For the most part, I was untrained and uneducated, but I had always been able to call on the power when I needed to. And I had Ciaran’s true name. I had discovered it in the middle of our shape-shifting spell. A witch’s true name is made of song and color and rune and symbol, all at once. Everything has a true name—rock and tree and wind and bird. Animal, flower, star, river. Witch. To know something’s true name is to have ultimate power over it—it can deny you nothing.
And I knew Ciaran’s. Of course, he knew I knew it and would be on his guard. But it was a risk I felt I should take.
Looking up, my glance fell on my open textbook. I had a plan.
I waited until I sensed that everyone in the house was asleep. I could feel Mary K. in her room, sleeping deeply and innocently. My dad was sleeping more lightly, but I knew that soon he would go deeper and start snoring. Mom slept as she always did, or at least always had since I’d started noticing—with the efficient, light sleep of a mom who manages to get her rest while at the same time being poised for action in case she hears the unmistakable sound of a child crying or throwing up. Mary K. and I were in high school, but Mom would probably sleep that way until we left for college.
I crept out of bed and shut myself in my walk-in closet. In there I drew a small circle on the floor with chalk. I closed myself into the circle, then sat cross-legged and meditated. This circle would increase my powers and give me an added layer of protection. I had no idea where Ciaran was, but I had a feeling he was still nearby. I summoned as much power as I could and sent a concentrated message: Father—I need you. Power sink.
I felt a pang of guilt over calling him Father—especially when my real father was sleeping across the hall. I found Ciaran extremely compelling and charismatic, and the idea that he was a blood relation still confused me. For him, I was the child most like him, the one he wanted most to teach. Yet we both despised aspects of each other, and we had never really trusted each other.
I dismantled the circle, feeling sick and tired and close to tears. What was I doing? This had seemed like a good idea an hour ago, but now the whole concept frightened me. I didn’t know which outcome would scare me more: that he wouldn’t answer my message or that he would. I crawled back into bed, every muscle aching, and lay there in a tense half sleep for I don’t know how long. Then it came to me, Ciaran’s voice in my mind: One hour.
An hour can fly by (when I’m with Hunter) or crawl by (when I’m at school). After I got Ciaran’s message, each second seemed to take an entire minute to tick past. After lying stiffly in bed for twenty minutes as if I had rigor mortis, I couldn’t stand any longer. I pulled on some jeans and a hoodie sweatshirt, whisked my hair into a long braid, and, holding my shoes, crept downstairs.
Outside, I buttoned up my coat and pulled on a knit watch cap. Everything felt tight, surreal as I crunched over the spring frost to Das Boot. I felt like I had infrared vision: I could see every tiny movement of every twig on every tree. The moonlight as it filtered through the tree branches was pale and fragile. I opened the car door, put it in neutral, then took off the parking brake. My Valiant began to roll heavily backward toward the street, and soon we bumped almost silently over the curb. I cut the wheel sharply to the left. When I was facing forward, I eased up on the brake again and let myself roll slowly downhill about thirty yards. Then I started the engine, flipped on the headlights and the heater, and headed for the power sink.
When I was younger, I was afraid of the dark. At seventeen, I was more afraid of things like becoming irreversibly evil or having my soul taken from me by force. The dark didn’t seem that bad.
Since I had first started realizing I had witch powers, my magesight had developed, and now I could see quite easily with no light. I parked my car on the road’s shoulder and left it unlocked. Every detail stood out as my boots crunched over frost-rimed pine needles, decaying leaves, and water-logged twigs. I was more than twenty minutes early. Casting my senses out, I felt only sleeping animals and birds and the occasional owl or bat. No witch, no Ciaran.
The power sink was in the middle of the graveyard, and to me it felt like every age-worn headstone had something or someone hiding behind it. Ruthlessly I clamped down on my fear, relying on my senses instead of my emotions. I was cold, whipped by a wet, icy wind, but more than that, I was chilled through with fear. No, the dark didn’t bother me, but the worst things that had happened in my life had all happened in the last four months, and they had mostly been caused by the man I was waiting to meet. My birth father.
I paced back and forth, and slowly I became aware of tendrils of power beneath
me in the earth, tingling energy lines of the power leys that had been there since the beginning of time. They were beneath my feet; they had fed this place for centuries. Their power was in the trees, in the dirt, in the stones, in everything around me.
“Morgan.”
I spun around, my heart stopping cold. Ciaran had appeared with no warning: my senses hadn’t picked up on even a ripple in the energy around me.
“I was surprised to get your call,” he said in that lilting Scottish accent. His hazel eyes seemed to glow at me in the darkness. Slowly I felt the heavy thudding of my heart start up again. “I hope you called me here to make me happy—to tell me that we’re going to be the most remarkable witches the world has ever seen.”
I felt so many things, looking at him. Anger, regret, fear, confusion, and even, I was ashamed to admit it—love? Almost admiration? He was so powerful, so focused. He had no uncertainty in his life: his path was clear. I envied that.
I didn’t have an exact plan—first I needed to know for sure what his plans were.
“I’ve been feeling awful,” I told him. “Is it from the dark wave?”
“Aye, daughter,” he said, sounding regretful. “If you know far enough in advance, you can protect yourself from the illness. But if you don’t...” Which explained why he looked bright eyed and bushy tailed, but I felt like I was going to throw up or collapse. “I can do a lot to help your symptoms,” he went on. “And then the next time you’ll be protected before it starts.”
“I’m not joining you,” I said, drawing cold air into my lungs.
“Then why did you call me here?” There was a chill underlying his tone that was far worse than that of the night air.
“My way isn’t your way,” I said. “It isn’t a path I can choose. Why can’t you just let me be? I’m a nobody. Kithic is nothing. You don’t need to destroy us. We can’t do anything to hurt you.”