by Ким Харрисон
The wave of demon smut rose from my work. Hell, I could see it looking like a black haze. Bowing my head, I took it—I didn't fight it, I took it—accepting it with a feeling of inevitability. It was as if a part of me had died, accepting that I couldn't be who I wanted, so I had to work at making who I was someone I could live with. My pulse jumped, then settled.
The air pressure shifted, and I felt Ceri's bubbles go down. From above us came the hint of a bell resonating in the belfry. The unheard vibrations pressed against my skin, and it was as if I could feel the curse imprinting itself on me in smaller, gentler waves, pushed by sound waves so low they could only be felt. And then it was done, and the sensation was gone.
Inhaling, I focused on the wine-damp mirror in my hands. A glistening drop of red hung, then fell to echo in the salted wine inside the bucket. The mirror now reflected the world in a dark, wine-red hue, but that paled next to the double-circled pentagram before me, etched in a stunning crystalline perfection. It was absolutely beautiful, catching and reflecting the light in shades of crimson and silver, all glittery and faceted. "I did this?" I said in surprise, and looked up.
I blanched. Ceri was staring at me with her hands on her lap, Jenks on her shoulder. It wasn't that she looked scared, just really, really worried. I shifted my shoulders, feeling a light connection from my mind to my aura that hadn't been there before. Or perhaps I was more sensitive to it. "Does it get better?" I said, concerned by Ceri's lack of response.
"What?" she asked, and Jenks's wings blurred, sending a strand of her hair flying.
I glanced at the bucket of salted wine next to me—hardly remembering pouring it on the mirror—then set the glass on the table. My fingers parted from it, but it was as if I still felt it with me. "The feeling of connection?" I said uncomfortably.
"You can feel it?" Jenks squeaked, and Ceri shushed him, her eyebrows knitting together.
"I shouldn't?" I asked as I wiped my hands on a napkin, and Ceri looked away.
"I don't know," she said softly, clearly thinking of something else. "Al never said."
I was starting to feel more like myself. Jenks came forward, and I kept wiping my hands, dabbing the damp off. "You okay?" he asked, and I nodded, discarding the napkin and pulling my legs up to sit cross-legged. I tugged the mirror to sit atop my lap. It made me feel like I was in high school, playing with a Ouija board in someone's basement.
"I'm fine," I said, trying to ignore the fact that I thought the white crystalline pattern I had made on the glass was absolutely beautiful. "Let's do this. I want to be able to sleep tonight."
Ceri stirred, drawing my attention to her. Her angular features were drawn, and she looked frightened by a sudden thought. "Ah, Rachel," she stammered, standing up. "Would you mind if we waited? Just until tomorrow?"
Oh, God. I did it wrong. "What did I do?" I blurted, reddening.
"Nothing," she rushed, reaching out but not touching me. "You're fine. But you just readjusted your aura, and you probably ought to go through an entire sun cycle to settle yourself before trying to use it. The calling circle, I mean."
I looked at the mirror, then her. Ceri's face was unreadable. She was hiding her emotions, and doing a damn fine job of it. I'd done it wrong, and she was mad. She hadn't expected all my aura to slid off, but it had. "Crap," I said, disgusted. "I did it wrong, didn't I?"
She shook her head, but she was gathering her stuff up to leave. "You did it correctly. I have to go. I have to check on something."
I hurried to get up, knocking the table and almost spilling my glass of white wine when I set the mirror down. "Ceri, I'll do better next time. Really, I'm getting better at this. You've helped me so much already," I said, but she stepped out of my reach, disguising it as swooping forward for her slippers. I froze, scared. She didn't want me to touch her. "What did I do?"
Slowly she halted, still not looking at me. Jenks hovered between us. Outside, I could hear the neighbors yelling friendly good-byes and a horn beeping. Reluctantly her eyes met mine. "Nothing," she said. "I'm sure the reason your aura all spilled out was because your blood invoked it and not another demon's, as was in my case when I was bound to Al's account to field his calls for him. You need to let your aura settle in firmly before using the curse, is all. A day at least. Tomorrow night."
I took in Jenks's worry. He had heard the lie in her voice, too. Either she was making up the reason my aura pooled out or she was lying about the need to wait to call Minias. One scared the crap out of me, and the other was just bewildering. She doesn't want to touch me?
She turned to go, and I glanced at the calling circle, beautiful and innocent-looking on my coffee table, reflecting the world in a wine-stained hue. "Wait, Ceri. What if he calls tonight?"
Ceri stopped. Head bowed, she came back, put her hand atop the middle figure with fingers spread wide, and murmured a word of Latin. "There," she said, glancing hesitantly at me. "I've put a 'do not disturb' notation on it. It will expire at sunup." She took a deep breath, seeming to make a decision. "This was necessary," she said, as if convincing herself, but when I nodded agreement, her features pinched in what looked like fear.
"Thank you, Ceri," I said, bewildered, and she slipped out the front door and closed it without a sound. I heard her feet slap the wet pavement as she ran, then nothing. I turned to Jenks, still hovering. "What was that all about?" I asked, feeling very unsure.
"Maybe she can't admit she doesn't know why your aura pooled out," he said, coming to sit on my knee when I flopped back into the couch and propped my arches on the edge of the table. "Or maybe she's mad at herself for almost exposing you without your aura." He hesitated, then said, "You didn't get a hug good-bye."
I reached for my glass and took a sip, feeling a tingling rise up through my wine-stained aura, almost as if responding to what I'd just drank. Slowly the sensation faded. I thought back to Ceri's circle dropping and the feeling of the bell resonating through me when the curse had invoked. It had felt good. Satisfying. That was okay, wasn't it?
"Jenks," I said wearily, "I wish someone would tell me what in hell is going on."
Seven
The afternoon sun was warm on my shoulders, bare but for the straps of my chemise. Last night's rain had left the ground soft, and the moist heat hovering an inch or so over the disturbed earth was comforting. I was taking advantage of it by tending my yew plant, having an idea that I might make up some forget potions in case Newt showed again. All I needed now was the fermented lilac pressings. It wasn't illegal to make forget charms, just use them, and who would fault me for using one on a demon?
The soft plunk of a cut tip dropping into one of my smaller spell pots was loud, and with my face turned to the earth, I knelt before the tombstone it was growing out of and sent my fingers lightly among the branches, harvesting the ones growing inward to the center of the plant.
Ceri's reaction to my aura's pooling out last night had left me very uneasy, but the sun felt good, and I took strength from that. I might have made a strong connection to the ever-after, but nothing had changed. And Ceri was right. I needed a way for Minias to contact me without having to show up. This was safer. Easier.
A grimace crossed my face, and I turned my attention from pruning to pulling weeds to widen the circle of cleared earth. Easy like a wish. And wishes always came back to bite you.
Glancing at the angle of the sun, I decided I ought to call it good and get cleaned up before Kisten came over to take me to my driver's-ed class. I stood, slapping the dirt from my jeans and gathering my tools. My gaze expanded from the singular vision of the pollution-stained grave marker to the wider expanse of my walled graveyard, the domestic Hollows beyond that, and, even farther, the tallest buildings of Cincinnati across the river. I loved it here, a spot of stillness surrounded by life, humming like a thousand bees.
I headed for the church, smiling and touching the stones as I passed, recognizing them like old friends and wondering what the people they guarded had been
like. There was a small flurry of pixies by the back door to the church, and I picked my way to it, curious as to what was up. My faint smile widened when the snap of dragonfly wings turned into Jenks. The pixy circled me, looking good in his casual gardening clothes.
"Hey, Rachel, are you done over there?" he said by way of greeting. "My kids are dying to check out your gardening."
Skirting the circle of blasphemed ground encompassing the grave marker of a weeping angel, I squinted at him. "Sure. Just tell them to watch the oozing tips. That stuff is toxic."
He nodded, his wings a gossamer blur as he went to my other side so I wasn't looking into the sun. "They know." He hesitated, then with a quickness that said he was embarrassed, blurted, "Are you going to need me today?"
I looked up from my uneven footing, then back down. "No. What's up?"
A smile full of parental pride came over him, and a faint sparkle of gold fell as he let some dust slip. "It's Jih," he said in satisfaction.
My pace faltered. Jih was his eldest daughter, now living across the street with Ceri to build up a garden to support her and a future family. Seeing my worry, Jenks laughed. "She's fine! But she's got three pixy bucks circling her and her garden and wants me to build something with them so she can see how they work, then make her decision from that."
"Three!" I adjusted my grip on my spell pot. "Good Lord. Matalina must be tickled."
Jenks dropped to my shoulder. "I suppose," he grumbled. "Jih is beside herself. She likes them all. I just stole Matalina and didn't bother with the traditional, season-long supervised courtship. Jih wants to make a dragonfly hut. Poor guy who wins is going to need it."
I wanted to look at him, but he was too close. "You stole Matalina? "
"Yup. If we had jumped through all the hoops, we never would have gotten the front entry way gardens or the flower boxes."
My eyes went to my feet, and I picked my path so I wouldn't jar him. He had dropped tradition to gain a six-by-eight swath of garden and some flower boxes. Now he had a walled garden of four city lots. Jenks was doing well. Well enough that his children could take time from their life for the rituals that marked it. "It's nice that Jih has you to help her," I said.
"I suppose," he muttered, but I could tell he was eager for the chance to guide his daughter in making a good decision in whom to spend her life with. Maybe that's why I keep making such stellar decisions in my own love life, I thought, smirking at the idea of Jenks coming out on a first date with me and grilling the poor guy. Then I blinked. He had warned Kisten to behave himself when I went out with him that first time. Damn, had Kisten gotten Jenks's stamp of approval?
The gust from Jenks's wings cooled the sweat on my neck. "Hey, I gotta go. She's waiting. I'll see you tonight."
"Sure," I said, and he rose up. "Tell her I said Congrats!"
He gave me a salute and darted off. I watched him for a moment, then continued to the back door, imaging the grief he was going to put the three young pixy bucks through. The heavenly scent of baking muffins was slipping out the kitchen window, and, breathing deeply, I climbed up the few stairs. I checked the bottoms of my sneakers, stomped my feet, and entered the torn-apart living room. Three Guys and a Toolbox had yet to show up, and the smell of splintered wood mixed with the scent of baking. My stomach rumbled, so I headed into the kitchen. It was empty but for the muffins cooling on the stove, and after dropping my cuttings by the sink, I washed my hands and eyed the cooling bread. Apparently Ivy was up and in the mood to bake. Unusual, but I was going to take advantage of it.
Juggling a muffin and the fish food, I fed myself and Mr. Fish both, then pulled a dark green T-shirt on over my chemise and collapsed into my chair, happy with the world. I startled at the sudden skittering of claws, and an orange ball of feline terror streaked into the kitchen and under my chair. Pixies spilled in, a swirling storm of high-pitched screeching and whistles that made my skull hurt.
"Out!" I shouted, standing. "Get out! The church is her safe place, so get out!"
Pixy dust thickened to make my eyes water, but after the loud complaints and muttered disappointment, the Disney nightmare subsided as quickly as it had come. Smirking, I peered under my chair. Rex was huddled, her eyes black and her tail fluffed, the picture of fear incarnate. Jenks must already be at Jih's, since his kids knew he'd bend their wings backward till they slipped dust if he caught them teasing his cat.
"What's the matter, sweet pea?" I crooned, knowing better than to try to pet her. "Did those nasty pixies bother you?"
Eyes averted, she hunched down, content to stay where she was. Snorting, I carefully settled back, feeling like the great protector. Rex never sought me out for attention, but when danger threatened, I was where she ended up. Ivy said it was a cat thing. Whatever.
I reached for my nail polish, taking careful bites of breakfast between touch-up swipes. A soft scuffing in the hallway brought my attention up as Ivy came in, and I smiled. She was dressed in her exercise tights and had a light sheen of sweat on her. "What was all that about?" she asked, going to the stove and wedging a muffin out of the tin.
Mouth full, I pointed under my chair.
"Oh, poor kitty," she said, sitting in her spot and dropping her hand to the floor.
Disgust puckered my brow when the stupid cat padded to her, head up and tail smoothed. My annoyance deepened when Rex jumped into her lap, settling down to stare at me. The cat suddenly turned to the hallway, and a sharp rapping of heels grew loud. Eyes wide, I looked at Ivy, but my question was answered when Skimmer breezed in, brushed, tidied, and looking as perfect as an uncut wedding cake in her stark white shirt and black slacks.
When did she get here? I thought, then flushed. She never left last night. I glanced at Ivy, deciding I was right when my roommate dumped Rex out of her lap and found great interest in her e-mails, opening them up and throwing out the spam—avoiding me. Hell, I didn't care what they did together. But apparently Ivy did.
"Hi, Rachel," the slight vampire said. Then, before I could answer, she bent to give Ivy a kiss. Ivy stiffened in surprise, and I blinked when Ivy pulled away before it could turn passionate—which was clearly where Skimmer had intended it to go. Recovering smoothly, Skimmer headed for the muffins. "I'll be done with work about ten tonight," she said, putting one on a plate and sitting carefully between us. "Do you want to meet for an early dinner? "
Ivy's face was creased in annoyance at the attempted kiss. Skimmer was doing it to bother me, maybe scare me off, and Ivy knew it. "No," she said, not looking from her monitor. "I've got something planned."
Like what? I thought, deciding that Skimmer's and my relationship was probably going to nosedive like a brick with wings. This was really, really not anything I was prepared for.
Skimmer carefully broke her muffin in two, then got to her feet to find a knife and the butter. Leaving them by her plate, she moseyed to the coffeemaker, her steps carrying the presence and power of the courtroom. Damn. I'm in trouble.
"Coffee, Ivy?" she asked, the sun blinding on her shirt, crisp and pressed for the office.
"Sure. Thanks."
Feeling the tension, Rex slunk out. Wish I could.
"Here you go, sweets," the vamp said, bringing Ivy a cup. It wasn't the oversize mug with our Vampiric Charms logo on it that Ivy liked, but maybe she used them because I did.
Ivy jerked back when Skimmer tried to steal another kiss. Instead of being upset, the woman confidently sat down again to meticulously butter her muffin. She was pulling both Ivy's and my strings, fully in charge though Ivy was the more dominant of the two.
I wasn't going to leave because she was trying to make me uncomfortable. Feeling my blood pressure rise, I settled myself firmly in my chair. It was my kitchen, damn it.
"You're up early," the blond, blue-eyed vamp said to me as if it meant something.
I fought to keep my eyes from narrowing. "Did you make these?" I asked, raising what was left of my muffin.
Skimmer smiled to s
how her sharp canine teeth. "Yes, I did."
"They're good."
"You're welcome."
"I didn't say thank you," I shot back, and Ivy's hand on her mouse paused.
Skimmer ate her muffin, watching me with unblinking eyes and slowly widening pupils. My scar started tingling, and I stood. "I'm going to shower," I said, irate that she was giving me the creeps, but I did need to get cleaned up.
"I'll alert the media," Skimmer said, licking the butter suggestively from her finger.
I went to tell her to shove it up her ass and lay an egg with it, but the front doorbell rang, and my manners stayed intact. "That's Kisten," I said, then grabbed my shoulder bag. I was clean enough, and the last thing I wanted was three vampires in my kitchen and me naked in the shower. "I'm outta here."
Ivy broke from her computer, clearly surprised. "Where are you going?"
I glanced at Skimmer, feeling a blush rise. "Driver's ed. Kisten's taking me."
"Oh, how sweet!" Skimmer said, and I gritted my teeth. Refusing to respond, I headed for the hallway and the door, dirty knees or not. A sharp snap jerked me to a stop, and I turned, catching a blur of motion. Skimmer was red, clearly shocked and chagrined, but Ivy was smug. Something had happened, and Ivy arched an eyebrow at me in a dry amusement.
The front doorbell clanked again, but I wasn't a good enough person to walk out of here now without saying something. "You going to be around tonight for dinner, Ivy?" I asked, cocking my hip. Maybe it was mean, but I was mean.
Ivy took a bite of her muffin, crossing her legs and leaning forward. "I'll be in and out," she said, wiping the corner of her mouth with a pinkie. "But I'll be here about midnight."
"Okay," I said lightly. "I'll see you later." I beamed at Skimmer, now sitting primly but obviously torn between seething and sulking. " 'Bye, Skimmer. Thanks for breakfast."
"You're welcome."
Translation: Choke on it, bitch.