Vicious Circle

by Linda Robertson

  Since most of her cheek was covered by the gag, I smacked her temple, hard. “Don’t talk like that, even muffled, in front of my nana and Beverley. You understand me?”

  Vivian glared.

  “Do you understand me?” I asked again, this time with a handful of her hair pulled tight.

  She shut her eyes.

  “Where did you get the Codex?”

  Having previously forgotten, she remembered it now and foggily scrutinized the room until she spotted it on the table in front of Nana. She strained against the cords. I moved to stand behind her but didn’t release the handful of her hair. With one finger against her cheek, I pushed the gag free of her mouth. “Where did you say you got it?”

  “That book is mine.”

  “Not anymore.”

  She laughed. “You’re an idiot. He’ll take it from you, and he’ll kill you just for having seen it.”

  “Who?” I asked, but I thought I knew. I mean, she was stained, yet free, living a good life, working at a coffee shop—which still made no sense to me. “The one who marked you?” Her glare turned positively malicious. “It’s a good security blanket, huh?”

  “The best,” she said through gritted teeth. “And unless you’ve made good on my little contract, you-know-who will be coming for it.”

  “Little contract?” Celia asked.

  I tightened my fist in Vivian’s hair, a warning. I needed a minute to think of an answer that would avoid—

  “She didn’t tell you?” Vivian blurted. I jerked her head back, but before I could reach for the gag she said, “Not even after her friend’s little car accident?”

  I looked at Celia. She looked at me. A deer caught in car headlights must feel like I felt then.

  Johnny and Erik came in the front door. Both were breathing like marathon runners after a race. It gave me reason to pause and an instant to think. After they closed and locked the door, the men came quickly to the kitchen. “They got away. But more are sure to come.”

  “What are beholders, anyway?” I asked, hoping the diversion would make everyone else forget what they’d just heard.

  Johnny started to answer, but Vivian growled, “The beholders have been here already?”

  “You knew?” he asked.

  “Go to my car. Inside it is a wooden box—pray they haven’t taken it already. Bring it into the house. Now.” She barked orders as if she was going to be obeyed despite having been tied to a chair after breaking and entering. “Do it, or we’ll all be killed!”

  Johnny asked me, “What is she talking about?” His urgency and tone dropped as his attention flicked back and forth between me and Celia. He smelled the tension between us. “What did I miss?”

  I jerked the gag up and into Vivian’s mouth.

  Everyone was staring at me except Vivian. I glanced around the room. My friends, Nana, and Beverley were all waiting for me to say something, to explain. The wolves shifted closer to each other, a pack trait for certain. I felt like I was standing at the wrong end of a loaded gun. My heart pounded in my chest.

  They’d all put so much faith in me, come here to help me. Did I have enough faith in their friendship to tell them the truth?

  I thought of Nancy. She’d had enough faith in friendship to tell me and Olivia and Betsy her truth, enough love for us to want us to have what she’d found. And we had helped her right out of our lives for it. I didn’t want to lose the wærewolves—I realized then how much I valued them. And not for the money kenneling brought in either—I spent most of it on their treats anyway. They were the only outside connections I had to the world. I’d holed myself up, alone, in this saltbox farmhouse for two years. Just a computer and me, with me denying that I needed anyone or wanted anyone in my life. If not for the wærewolves, I’d have no one. Nana would be it. I didn’t want Nana to be “it” for me.

  I swallowed hard. The breath I took filled my lungs with the heaviest air.

  “All of you have trusted me. Trusted me with your secrets, trusted me not to betray you in your mainstream life. Trusted me to keep you safe during the full moon, and to let you out when it’s passed.” I stared at the floor and licked my lips. “It’s time I started trusting you back.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Vivian contacted me after”—I focused on Beverley—“after your mother’s murder. You see, last year someone was stalking Lorrie.” I looked around the room, meeting everyone’s eyes in turn. If I was going to say this, I had to do it right. “A real sleaze. I did a spell using dirt from your father’s grave, Beverley, a spell that’s supposed to enlist the aid of those who’ve passed. But this stalker jerk was an addict of some kind, and the subtle influences from the other side must have gone unnoticed. Anyway, after a Tarot reading I did for Lorrie, it was clear his intentions were malicious and it seemed that someone would have to physically confront him. So…I did.” I looked to Johnny last, and it seemed like I was making my confession to him. Somehow, that made it easier to continue.

  “You?” Erik asked. “She was wære. Why didn’t she just knock him around?”

  “Erik.” Celia took his hand. “Lorrie wasn’t like that. She was afraid of her strength. She wouldn’t hurt a fly before she was infected, and that didn’t change afterward.” She nodded at Beverley. “Your mom was the sweetest person I ever knew.”

  Beverley swallowed hard, fighting tears.

  “This guy always seemed to be around when Beverley was, and Lorrie was afraid he’d hurt her. When I confronted him, he pulled a knife. We struggled. He was on something, maybe PCP, I don’t know. It made him strong, but clumsy. We fell, and the knife went into him. He died.”

  Vivian started laughing through her gag.

  “Shut up,” Johnny said with such vehement sternness that she obeyed without hesitation. When he looked at me again, it was my cue to go on, but my boldness had seeped away.

  “It was an accident,” I said. “I didn’t go there to kill him, but apparently Lorrie must have thought I had. She told Vivian, who obviously thought I was keen on being some kind of assassin.” I felt so stupid and so ashamed I couldn’t meet their eyes. “Vivian said she knew who’d killed Lorrie and asked me to…to retaliate. To kill him.” I could feel my hands shaking, and I planted them firmly on my hips.

  “And you agreed?” Nana asked, incredulous.

  “I saved Lorrie’s life once, and it was taken from her anyway. I thought of Beverley and I knew the police wouldn’t pursue the case of a wære-victim.”

  So soft a whisper left my nana that I scarcely heard her. “But the Rede…”

  I had to look at her, but I couldn’t maintain eye contact. A heartbeat’s worth was all I could stand. “I know, Nana. I know.” I didn’t want to get into the things Amenemhab had told me. Nana might understand my talking with a totem-jackal, but the others wouldn’t.

  “Did you…fulfill the contract?” Johnny asked, his tone very careful.

  “No. I had a name. I asked Theo to check him out. She found out he was a vampire—and not just any regular bloodsucker either. He’s the abducted brother of the Reverend Samson D. Kline. He was trained and allowed to grow up before he was turned; now he’s at the right hand of a very dangerous master vampire, the one who took him. When I found that out, I called Vivian to tell her to forget the deal, but Beverley was there sobbing, and Vivian was treating her so badly.”

  “Are you saying that’s why Theo was run off the road? Why her home and her business were sacked?” Celia asked.

  Vivian nodded emphatically. I hated it that she was enjoying this so much.

  “Yeah,” I said. “In the truck ride to the doctor’s, Theo whispered to me that it had been him who ran her off the road. It was probably him, or maybe those beholders if they do that kind of thing, who sacked her apartment and office.” I forced my head up and met the eyes of everyone in turn. I’d done this, and I had to own it. “What happened to Theo is my fault.” I saw a mixture of horror and surprise on their faces. All except Beverley’s
.

  “Wait,” Beverley said. Her dark hair was now loose, a little wave where the pigtails had been. With those big blue eyes looking up at me, she seemed so grown up. “You took on a vampire for my mom?” she asked.

  She seemed impressed. But I didn’t deserve her admiration.

  “Beverley, I haven’t even seen him. I took Vivian’s money, asked questions, and ended up spending some on Theo’s hospital bill. I thought it would be helping everybody out all around. Get a killer off the streets, with justice served, and the money would help me take care of Nana.” I smiled at her. “I wanted everything to be good. To work out. But…I can’t do this. I can’t defeat a vampire, especially not one of his caliber.”

  “Why not?” Johnny asked. Everybody turned to him, as stunned as if he’d just proclaimed himself Elvis.

  “What do you mean ‘why not?’” Celia interjected. “Seph’s not an assassin.”

  He crossed his lean arms. “She’s got all she needs to be the Lustrata.”

  “A lust-what?” Celia asked.

  Despite my badly wanting to know what it was myself, lights had flashed in the hallway. “There’s a car coming up the drive,” I said.

  Vivian went hysterical, straining against the cords and shaking her head and blabbering on though we couldn’t understand any sound she made. But I remembered her saying we’d all get killed if we didn’t get the wooden box from her car. Taking a handful of her hair to make her be still, I pulled the gag down. “Who is it?”

  “It’s him, you idiots. He’ll rip through all of you and save me for last. You should’ve gotten it out of the car. I told you. I told you!” I jerked the gag back up.

  “Kill the lights,” Johnny said and started down the hall. Celia flipped the switch, and we fell into darkness again.

  Vivian mumbled. I thumped her in the head. “Shhhh.”

  “It’s cool,” Johnny announced. “It’s the doc.” Celia flipped the lights back on. I started to the door, then stopped and looked back at Vivian.

  “I’ll watch her,” Erik said, crossing his arms bouncer-style.

  “Thanks.” I glanced at Nana, who was turning pages in the Codex; then I joined Johnny at the door.

  “I’m gonna get that box from her car,” he said.

  “Wait. What is a lustra-whatever?” That seemed more important than finding out what beholders were.

  He turned and regarded me with a sly, approving smile. “Tell you later.”

  Dr. Lincoln stepped up onto the porch. “Sorry I didn’t make it out sooner,” he said. “I got called out to treat a mare that had gotten herself stuck in a deep, cold mud-hole. My cell phone showed your number so, it being a Saturday night, and knowing how nocturnal wæres are, I drove by. Saw the lights and stopped.”

  That he had gone to the trouble impressed me. “You should be in bed, Doc.”

  “Yeah. So should the lot of you, I bet. And none of you have been saving the life of a little girl’s pony, either. Being a hero like that makes me feel too good to sleep.” He yawned. “Or it did. I guess the long drive and late hour sucked the adrenaline right out of me. Anyway, I thought I’d check in on her.”

  “Please, come on in.”

  “Sure.” He paused. “Hey. I noticed the lights went out. If you’re having power fluctuations, the machinery won’t function properly and—”

  “Oh! We’re not having power fluctuations. We were just turning them out, then we noticed your lights in the drive.” I didn’t want to offer any more details, so I quickly herded him toward the steps, hoping he didn’t see Vivian tied up in the kitchen.

  “I’ll take him up,” Celia said, coming down the hall.

  I stopped. Didn’t she trust me with Theo anymore?

  She must’ve seen the question in my eyes. “Beverley needs to talk to you,” she whispered, and gestured toward the darkened living room.

  “Oh.”

  Beverley sat on my couch with her knees pulled up under her chin and her arms tight around them. “You okay?” I asked.

  “Yeah,” she said, even as she was shaking her head no.

  I sat beside her, close but not touching. “You know…my mom left me too.”

  Her head popped around, eyes wide in the dark.

  “She’s still alive; she just left me. I haven’t seen her since I was about your age.”

  “Why’d she leave?”

  “She kind of ran away to be with her boyfriend.”

  “What about your dad?”

  “I never knew him,” I said, knowing she could relate to that as well. Her dad had died trying to save Lorrie from the wærewolf that attacked them in a park after an anniversary dinner. Lorrie told me about it once. Beverley, six then, had been left with some close friends for the weekend. “We’re alike in that way, Beverley. Our parents are gone. I’m so sorry I couldn’t do a better job of protecting your mom. I know everything’s a mess right now, but I swear, if you want to stay here, I’ll make it legal and get custody of you. I’ll protect you and I’ll do the best I can for you.”

  Even in the dark, tears glistened in her eyes, but footsteps on the porch made me twist to glance out the window. Johnny’s shadow was unmistakable. He came inside carrying a box. I relaxed back into my place. “You don’t have to decide now,” I said to Beverley. “Think about it. For as long as you need to.”

  She launched herself at me, throwing her arms around me, crying. She’d cried so much lately, it was a wonder she had any tears left. I held her until she calmed. Nana’s silhouette shuffled through the dining room and into the living room. “Persephone?”

  “Yeah?”

  Beverley moved away from me.

  “You’d better come and have a look at this.” Nana blew smoke at the ceiling.

  I moved forward. “What is it? Contents of the box?”

  “No. I don’t think they’ve opened that. But I think I found something in the Codex. Something that might be useful.”

  When I entered the kitchen, the wooden box on my counter demanded my attention first. It was the box I’d seen in Vivian’s office at the coffee shop. “Just a second, Nana.” I went to Vivian. “You’re blackmailing the one who marked you. The threat of whatever’s in that box is your moneymaker, isn’t it?” I jerked down the gag.

  She smiled with false sweetness. “A security blanket lined in gold.”

  “Then explain why a witch with such a lucrative vampire connection takes a job managing a coffee shop?”

  She licked her gag-dried lips. “Because of the standards of the Elders Council. Every Elder selected in the last fifty years has been an active member of the community. Being a successful businesswoman is like gold.” I reached to replace the gag; she jerked away. “If you’re smart, you’ll let me go and let me take the book and box with me. Otherwise, you’re inviting the wrath of Menessos.”

  I knew that name: the master vampire who had made Goliath. I forced the gag back up. “What’d you find?” I asked Nana.

  “This.” She pointed to the open page. It was in Latin, the letters written in old-style script that was more art than anything. Being this close to something this old, something this precious and beautiful filled me with a sense of awe. I recognized some words here and there as I scanned down the page, but not many.

  “What is it?”

  “A ritual to harness moonlight and earth energy.”

  I wasn’t following. “For what purpose, Nana?”

  “We can use it to force your injured friend to change, to fully change.”

  “But that’s magic!” Erik said.

  “Nana you know what could—”

  “Of course I do! I’m not a novice, Persephone,” she croaked.

  Unwilling to scold her again, I waited with my expectant expression plastered to my face. We stared at each other, neither willing to give. Her expression was, well, weird. Her mouth formed its usual angry line, but her brows weren’t squished down tight together. Instead, they lifted as if in surprise. I wasn’t certain if
she was as pissed at me right now as I was at her or if she was going to vomit.

  “I don’t understand,” Erik said carefully. “If you know the dangers, then why suggest it?”

  “Magic stirs energies into action. It affects the energy field around wæres and causes a reaction, a change. But most magic doesn’t stir enough energy to cause a full-out reaction. Most witches couldn’t handle the amount needed. This spell has plenty, because it’s sorcery.”

  Silence.

  “Persephone, this can be done, if you are willing.”

  I took a breath and considered it. “I’m not unwilling. It’s just that we have all lived with knowing these dangers for so long, it’s not easy to just disregard them.”

  “Don’t disregard them; rethink them. If you’re hungry, a single bite of food won’t ease your hunger; it’ll make it worse. If a wære is sensitive to certain energy and is near it, it’s the same concept: it’s not enough, and it makes things worse.”

  I followed the logic, but—“What makes you think we can handle the energy?” I’d touched the ley for a smidgen, enough to power my wards. It had felt like touching boiling water. Drawing that much energy could be like dropping your entire body into a vat of boiling water. How could anyone maintain focus like that? If I lost my focus, it might cost Theo her life.

  “In this spell, you don’t have to be Superwoman and carry the energy to save the day; you’re the pilot of the plane that’s carrying the energy that saves the day.”

  Her analogies made sense to me. The partial-change instances I knew of had been connected to energy practitioners being in too-close proximity to a wære. If the difference was only in the volume of energy, then this could conceivably work. But I wasn’t going to leap without looking. “Okay, I’m following what you’re saying, but how do we call and harness that much energy? It’s sorcery. How do we control it and focus it and—”

  “You learn the spell, prepare, and practice.”

  So we had a hope of healing Theo. I imagined the Fates backing away from her thread with their scissors.

  Johnny cleared his throat. “That is great news—and I’m excited about it—but hey, I’m dying to open that.” He pointed at the wooden box from Vivian’s car.