Trial by Fire (Covencraft Book 1)

by Margarita Gakis

  Paris needed to go back and look at her spell-books. See if there was something, anything he had missed that could be helpful.

  He wasn’t sure if he was hoping to find something or not.

  *

  Jade found it hard not to be distracted by Callie.

  She sat at the computer next to Jade, her diminutive form in the corner of Jade’s eye. Jade was pretty sure she’d taken what was usually Callie’s spot, and her chair. She’d had to adjust it considerably so she could sit at the computer and work. Callie hadn’t said anything since she’d asked Jade if she could work next to her, doing some further research into the library. But she kept glancing at Jade, biting her lip and then going back to her own screen. She tensed like she was going to speak a few times and then would slump slightly, going back to what she was doing.

  By the fifth time, Jade had enough. She was tired, the coffee had been weak and too sweet and she’d only had the muffin to eat.

  “Jesus, if you have something to say, just fucking say it already!”

  Callie flinched and tucked a few errant strands of hair behind an ear before speaking. “I just… I wanted to apologize.”

  Jade turned back to her laptop, typing in some notes she wanted to remember into her text file. “For what?” she asked, disinterested.

  “I know you feel like we lied to you-”

  “You did lie to me,” Jade interrupted, turning back to look at Callie. Callie flushed slightly at the accusation and Jade felt vindicated.

  “We didn’t… I mean, we thought you’d want to join the Coven and it wouldn't be an issue. Everyone is happy here.”

  Jade snorted. “Yeah, someone’s so fucking happy they want to steal my power. Keep it for themselves. Happy, happy, happy.”

  “This is the first time something like this has happened!”

  “That you know about,” Jade said.

  “We’re good people. Good witches,” Callie said stubbornly with an affronted expression. “We want to help you. I want to help you. I don’t want you to use this to judge all of us.”

  Jade shrugged. “Too late.”

  The kicker was, she had liked Callie. She thought she was growing closer to Callie, Henri and even Paris in a weird, distanced and aloof way. She had warmed to the idea of being a witch and joining their coven.

  Now – she pushed those tainted thoughts from her mind. She had to focus. She was trying to get a feel for their database, for how it was structured, trying to figure out the kinds of books they had and if they could help her. She already had a list of ten. At some point, she was going to have to trust Callie, she supposed. She didn't know enough about magic yet to be able to judge if the books she was selecting were going to be helpful or not. She was trying to focus on defensive magic - anything that might help her protect herself. She likely wouldn’t be able to read every book she wanted so she’d have to rely on some help at some point.

  Jade was manipulative enough to realize that Callie would try harder to assist her if she thought Jade didn’t trust her. It wasn’t a pleasant thing to know about yourself - that you were good at manipulating people - but it wasn’t something Jade had the luxury of ignoring right now either. She’d set the stage by telling Callie flat out she didn’t trust her. Now she was going to offer Callie a chance to help.

  Jade turned her computer toward Callie.

  “If you really want to help, I want to look at these books.”

  Callie immediately leaned over, lips moving slightly as she read the titles. She frowned. “What are you looking for?”

  Jade hesitated, wondering how much of the truth she wanted to reveal. She didn’t want to lay all her cards on the table, but then she thought about how she’d felt when the demon was in her room, trapping her, holding her tightly, making her heart pound. Leaving marks on her body.

  “I want to be able to defend myself. I’m best with fire.”

  Callie nodded, still looking at Jade’s list. “Okay, well two of these are probably no good to you. They’re higher level magic and you won’t be able to learn them quick enough. I’ll grab them so you can take a look, but-” She made a seesaw motion with her hand. “Probably not helpful. I can pull the other ones and there’s another that’s not on your list that might be useful too. It has some protective charms and wards in it. We can see if we can fiddle with them to get something more.” Callie was already pushing herself out of her chair, pausing close to Jade. She put a hand on Jade’s shoulders and Jade tensed up.

  Callie immediately pulled her hand back. “I do want to help. We’ll figure this out, Jade.”

  She was doing the cow-eye thing again, her big brown eyes staring down at her, like some kind of fairytale heroine - earnest and heartfelt. This was probably a woman who’d had a loving mother, a father who told jokes at the dinner table, friends that had sleepovers with pillow fights, giggling and too much junk food. All things foreign and unknown to Jade.

  Callie had probably never known what it was like to be scared in her own home, of her own family, and overall disinterested in or invisible to the world at large; able to keep everyone at a distance while secretly resenting them for doing exactly what she wanted.

  Jade wanted to have Callie as a friend but also resented her for having all the things that Jade was denied. Jade managed a tight-lipped nod, jerking her head once as she looked away. Callie put her hand back on Jade’s shoulder as if the gesture had emboldened her, squeezing once in a reassuring manner.

  It was probably the most genuine gesture Jade had received in years and it made her eyes suddenly water.

  She blamed it on her fatigue and the bad coffee, nothing more.

  Chapter 10

  By the time evening rolled around, Jade felt like someone had taken sandpaper to both her eyeballs and then sprayed lemon juice in her face.

  She and Callie had moved to another area of the dungeon, the large wooden table strewn with books along with Jade’s computer and some notebooks for Callie. Jade assumed that, at some point, Callie had texted or called Henri because he arrived with lunch salads, snacks and beverages, and presented it all without fanfare - which she would bet was a first for him - and then sat down at the table and started to dig in.

  Jade ate some chicken Caesar salad, washing it down with three pieces of garlic bread and some carbonated drink. She hoped the sugar, caffeine and carbs would keep her going.

  Not surprisingly, she felt sloshy in the stomach, although that could have been the subject matter. Callie had dug up some older books on demons. And by dug up, Jade was nearly certain she’d actually put shovel to earth somewhere because the books were dank, ancient and had a grimy feel to them. They were difficult to decipher as they were written in Latin or Old World English with scrawling handwriting using formal and ancient vocabulary, accompanied by hand drawn illustrations which Jade really wished left more to the imagination.

  The first portrayal she came across took her a while to figure out. She had to turn the book sideways, then upside down, then sideways again to figure out what she was looking at and when the picture finally made sense, she dropped the book and scooted back a bit in surprise.

  Henri and Callie had drawn up chairs next to her, on either side, and started reading over her shoulder after that incident. She should have told them to go away, give her space, but the ick-factor of the book had her grateful for the warmth of both their bodies, flanking either side of her.

  She flipped another page over. The three of them each tilted their heads to the left, trying to make sense of the image that presented itself on the brittle paper.

  “That’s not even possible,” Callie said as she stared at the drawing, a portrait of a female demon with her male servant lover.

  Jade narrowed her eyes, studying the scene. “Well, I think she’s doing most of the bending, so I guess it depends on how flexible demons are.”

  “It doesn’t look like he’s enjoying it much.” Callie indicated the man in the drawing. His lips were pulled bac
k from his teeth in a skin-snapping grimace of pain.

  “Somehow, I kinda think that’s the point,” Henri said. “It’s not helpful, move on.” He made flappy motions with his hand and Jade got the impression he was eager for her to turn the page so they wouldn’t have to look at the unsettling image.

  The remainder of the book, while sexually disturbing and horrifically enlightening on the many ways the human body was breakable and bendable, wasn’t helpful to their cause. Jade wished she could take a shower after looking at it. She settled for finding a washroom and scrubbing her hands three times and then using a healthy dollop of hand sanitizer.

  Paris was absent for most of the day, disappearing a short time after Callie had sat down next to Jade. She definitely got the impression that while Callie and Henri were there to help, they were also keeping some kind of watch or vigil on her. Jade wasn’t sure exactly what they were supposed to do if she had another hellish visitor, since it didn’t seem like they knew a whole lot about demons.

  But the company was kind of… Nice.

  She needed to take a break from demons after that last book, so she flipped through one of the spell-tomes that Callie had brought over. Callie and Henri, still flanking her, began pointing out spells that would be good for Jade to start studying. Henri ran out and got them some coffee, bringing them all the biggest lattes with extra shots in each.

  She found it frustrating at first, casting spells where nothing happened. Henri and Callie kept at her, giving her unhelpful advice that consisted of ‘don’t force it’ and ‘you’re trying too hard.’

  What was she supposed to do, try less? How did anyone ever get anywhere by trying less?

  The spells weren’t like the ones she’d tried earlier. She hadn’t really even thought about those ones - she just read the instructions, imagined what she wanted and it happened. Callie tried to explain how beginner’s magic was like drawing with crayons. You grabbed a crayon and you scratched it across the page - you had a line. You made a blue bubble and called it a cloud. You drew a yellow circle with spikes and called it the sun.

  As you got deeper into magic, you started using finer tools - pencils, pastels, watercolors. You didn’t just draw a picture, you shaded it in, adding depth and perspective.

  Spells got harder, smarter, more intricate but their results also became stronger, woven into reality, more resilient. More able to stand up to other magic.

  It wasn’t until she got the first spell to work that she realized what they’d been trying to tell her. She’d been pushing at her power inside her - feeling it like a large rubber ball, pressing down against it, trying to force it to work, to move, to do something.

  But what she really needed to do was pull at it. Coax it toward her, beckon it out, like a rabbit in a hole.

  After that, it came a lot quicker. The fire spells she’d been working on before were easily extinguished by Henri and Callie which had made Jade sullen and angry. Now, Callie and Henri had to work a little harder to break Jade’s magic. They had to think about it more, take more time.

  But it was exhausting. She felt wrung out - like a thin, worn washcloth - twisted, frayed and left flapping in the wind.

  She dropped her head with a thunk on the table, needing to close her eyes for a moment.

  “What happened?” Callie asked.

  “I think her latte just ran out,” Henri said.

  Jade sat back up and stretched, reaching her arms behind her, feeling her spine crack and pop. She slouched down in her chair again, good posture be damned. She shook her paper coffee cup, hoping there was a little swallow left or something.

  Nothing. Godammit.

  “Let’s go eat,” whined Henri, sounding like a plaintive child. He slumped over the table. Callie closed the book she was researching, a waft of air smelling like pine and sage puffing up from the pages as she did.

  “Agreed.” Callie pushed back from the table and Henri stood up. They both looked expectantly down at their companion.

  Jade wasn’t sure what to do. She was hungry. She wanted to get something to eat but she didn’t entirely trust them either. They had been helping her all day with her magic but at the same time… She didn’t really know them.

  Her stomach rumbled. She did need to eat.

  “C’mon,” Henri wheeled around the table and jiggled Jade’s chair a bit. “You’ve got to eat. We’re not asking you to marry us or anything.”

  She fiddled with her pen, rolling it between her fingers. He was right but she was so tired and she didn’t want him to be right. It was stupid and childish.

  She couldn’t afford to be stupid and childish right now, she reminded herself.

  “Okay,” she breathed. “Let’s go eat.”

  *

  They ended up at a place called ‘The Chop Shop’ where Jade waved her hand and let Callie and Henri order whatever they recommended for her. Jade leaned back against the deep red velvet booth and tried to roll some of the kinks out of her neck. Hunching over her laptop and old books all day left her feeling like Quasimodo.

  There was a pinch in between her vertebrae, right at the point where her shoulder blades met. Jade tried to crack her back by opening and closing her wingspan to no avail. She rubbed at her neck, feeling a slight tingling sensation at the base of her skull where she probably had some kind of pinched nerve.

  If this kept up, she was going to start walking with a lurch.

  She glanced at Callie and Henri who were sipping their green tea and discussing a spell that neither one of them had been able to work today. They both appeared tired and worn - slightly red-rimmed eyes and fatigue-lined faces.

  Jade should thank them for helping her, for staying with her at the library, for being patient and teaching her some magic.

  But she still felt twisted up about them - unsure what their motives really were. They seemed genuine but she just couldn’t make herself believe it.

  In the end, she said nothing.

  The food arrived and they all dug in, scooping servings off the communal plates and then later on, snagging pieces with their chopsticks. Callie and Henri managed to keep the conversation going between themselves throughout, attempting to engage Jade but she kept her replies minimal, giving them enough so that she wasn't outright ignoring them but not adding anything substantial.

  Callie’s cell phone rang while she and Henri were in the middle of talking themselves into dessert. It was the ominous Imperial March from Star Wars and Jade wondered if that was always Callie’s ringtone or if it meant someone in particular was calling. Callie answered, her eyes flicking immediately over to Jade.

  “Yes, we’re with her, having dinner.” It’s Paris, she mouthed at Jade. Callie listened intently for a moment, eyes moving from Jade to Henri and then randomly around the table.

  Jade’s interest perked up but she continued her lazy perusal of the cashew chicken, searching for the last lonely cashews in the mix of vegetables. Their waiter came by, dropping off the check and a bunch of fortune cookies. Henri quickly snatched the bill up, sliding his credit card into the little slot. Callie said a few more things into the phone - some non-verbal ‘mmhmms’, one ‘yes, I know where that is’ and then a few more assents before she signed off with a quick goodbye.

  Jade tried not to look expectant as soon as Callie hung up the phone. The tingling feeling at the base of her skull was turning into a shard of pain. She wondered if she’d overdone the magic today at the dungeon. She hadn’t done anything nearly as powerful as when she’d first arrived, when Paris’ power had been pushing at her, but she still felt the beginnings of a headache creeping up into her grey matter and she couldn’t tell if it was from the tight muscles in her neck or from magic.

  Neither Henri nor Callie seemed affected, other than being tired, but Jade remembered Gellar saying she was having an atypical reaction to magic, so it’s likely that they wouldn’t be bothered using their powers.

  Maybe Jade should have agreed to more testing, maybe should h
ave pursued that line of knowledge but she hated being touched, poked and prodded. In her current situation, feeling vulnerable and out of her element, she just didn’t think she could do it.

  Callie tucked her phone back into her purse. “Obviously,” she said, rolling her eyes self-deprecatingly, “that was Paris. He just wanted to check on you, make sure you were still doing okay and to let you know he’s made arrangements for you to have somewhere else to sleep tonight. He figures your place is out of commission until we can-” Callie glanced around like someone might hear, “get that thing taken care of.”

  “You mean the demon portal that is my pantry?” Jade said dryly. The restaurant wasn’t exactly teeming with people, there wasn’t anyone around to hear.

  “Um. Yeah. That.” Callie winced. “Anyway, he’s going to swing by and meet us outside and then we can head on over to the place he’s got sorted. We can hang out, do some more research. Watch a movie. We’ll stay with you.” Callie tentatively reached a hand out over the table but when Jade didn't move to take it, she pulled it back, trying to smile a bit, reassuringly.

  Jade was grateful she wouldn’t be alone but at the same time, dreaded being surrounded all night. She’d never gotten used to being around others for long periods of time, and although she knew herself well enough to admit she was scared stiff about trying to fall asleep alone, she also didn’t want to be crowded by people who, while very nice, were essentially strangers.

  No matter how much she kind of liked them.

  Henri snagged a fortune cookie and snapped it open, reading his fortune.

  “You will be afforded a great opportunity,” he read, smirking. “You know, you’re supposed to add ‘in bed’ to the end of all fortune cookies.”

  “I’ve seen your boyfriend,” Callie said, latching on to the chance to break some of the tension. “And that is a great opportunity.” She winked at Henri and he grinned, nose crinkling in laughter.