by Barb Taub
“Why don’t you say spells or chant or even wave a magic wand?”
“Peter, I’m human. I don’t have any magic of my own. My family’s gift is a connection with our goddess that lets us use her power. If I was a more experienced witch, I could channel her directly and do lots more. But for what we need here, the only things that matter are my belief and my intent. I’ve had a lot of experience in focusing those two tools, so I think it should be enough.”
And if it’s not? Neither of them said the obvious. We both die.
She closed a third circle and brought the bag to the pile of cushions. Already sitting, he spread his legs so she could lean back against his chest. He kissed her hair and pulled back to look at her serene face. She closed her eyes and smiled faintly. “Peter? Talk to me. I know it’s not all that likely, but tell me what you want for us. For our…” She paused, but when she spoke her voice was calm. “The future.”
She stiffened as the next wave hit. But he was ready for it and the three salt circles helped too. He wrapped arms around her and pressed her head to his chest as though he could physically shield her, and kept talking. “I’m old-fashioned, so even though witches don’t usually marry, I’m going to have to insist. I’ll find some romantic way to propose that you won’t be able to turn down. Suggestions are welcome here…” He paused to press a kiss to her hair and hand her a bottle of water. “We’ll have a lot of little witches. I’m thinking five, maybe six. They’ll all be as smart and beautiful as their mother, but they’ll drive us both crazy because they’ll be as stubborn as their father. You and I will have Warden’s commissions out of the Seattle office, and you’ll get mad at me because you think I’m leering at your ass at the office instead of working. Which, of course, I will be. We’ll live here, but I’ll have to add on more rooms just to give Bygul a place to get away from all our girls.”
She was shuddering, sweat pouring down her face. He raised his voice and continued. “I’ve always wanted a tree house. Our daughters will take it over eventually, but meanwhile we can put a mattress up there and start baking some little witches. I saw the perfect tree in the woods. I’m thinking I’ll invite my brothers up one weekend to help me build it. You’ll like my brothers—they’re like me only not as handsome or articulate. Or as sexy, of course.”
She wanted to remember every word, to focus on the picture he built of a life together filled with family and love. But the pressure in her head kept growing, the shrieks starting to separate into recognizable voices that battered the salt barriers, screamed over and around his voice, slashed her mind. No. Focus. Listen to Peter. Every word mattered. It was the only thing that did. “Six daughters? That’s…a lot of potty training.”
“Oh, that’s the best part of witches only having girls. Their mama gets to handle that aspect of things.”
“Pig.”
She felt his quiet laughter and looked up. His smile. She stared as he kept talking, memorizing his smile.
As the night crawled by, the unrelenting screaming clawed her brain with insatiable hunger. The salt circles denied them physical access to the house, but it was Peter’s arms and the iron control she’d practiced all her life that stood between sanity and the attempts to rape her brain of every memory. They battered her mind for control, for power, for her very identity. He reminded her to drink, wiped her face, and never stopped talking.
“What…time?”
“Almost midnight.”
“That’s all?” They weren’t going to make it through the night. She could now identify the voices battering her as separate entities, one stronger than the others. It was calling a Name, and part of her responded. No, that’s not right. He knows my mother’s Name, but not mine. It’s just Mom’s connection to me he can sense. But I still have my own Name and my own connection to Bygul. He called again, and she found herself sitting up, pulling away from Peter.
No. Fight. “Peter! It’s time. I can’t last much longer. There’s something you have to do for me. It’s important.” She pulled off her necklace. Her hand closed on the amber pendant in a white-knuckled grip before she handed it to him. “You have to take this outside of our property and smash the amber. It’s my connection to Bygul. If they can tap that power, there’s no telling what kind of destruction will be unleashed. Then you have to go to Jeffers. He’s been working on trying to find other witches, and he might have someone who can help.”
“I’m not leaving you.”
“If you don’t go now, I’ll die. And so will you.” Or worse. “It’s our only chance.” Your only chance.
She kissed him with every ounce of desperate need she could put into it. “Please. You took an oath as a Warden to protect innocents. If you don’t destroy the connection and they get to Bygul’s power, there’s no telling how many might die.”
“You don’t play fair.” His lips were just as desperate.
She pulled the amber pendant on its leather cord over his head and tucked it under his shirt. “No time. Go now.”
As she started to open the circles, his hand shot out. “Do you have enough salt to replace them when I’m gone?”
She nodded. She lied.
One more hard kiss and he was gone. No more smile.
With shaky hands, she shoved everything but the water to the outside and made a small circle with the last of the spelled salt. She listened for the sound of the Rover starting and driving off. Then she picked up a water bottle and sat down to wait. It shouldn’t be long.
But it was. An eternity of knives shredding every part of her mind. She was crying, calling for Nana, for Carey, for the mother she didn’t even remember. And most of all for Peter. Where was he? Oh, yeah. I sent him away. Good. Away was good. He’d be safe. So would she. All she had to do was stay in the circle. That wasn’t so hard. Just one little job. She could do it.
The door flew open, and she jerked to her feet. She had a brief glimpse of Peter’s face before he slid boneless to the floor. The gate! Too late, she remembered. Peter must have gotten out of the car to open the hinged fence section.
Behind him was another figure, slamming the door shut. “Hello, Claire. You remind me of your mother.” His voice was low, friendly.
She just looked at him.
“She had that frozen look too. Like nothing was ever going to bother her. I told her not to worry, that I didn’t want to hurt her. I just wanted one little favor from her goddess.”
His round face was smiling, bright blue eyes, and slightly grizzled mustache tilted up to show dimples in his cheeks. No, that couldn’t be right. Evil mind-raping monsters just don’t have dimples. With his khaki rain jacket open to show the plaid shirt stretched across a rounded belly, he looked like someone’s favorite uncle reaching into a pocket to pull out a shiny quarter.
Only he pulled out a knife.
“Peter.” Her voice was low, steady.
“Oh, he’s fine. And I’m sure with your help, he’ll stay that way.”
She just looked at him.
“I’m sorry. We haven’t been formally introduced. Well, we have actually, but you were just a baby so your memory might be a little fuzzy on the details. You can call me Alan.”
“Just Alan? Like Cher? Or RuPaul? Or… Apep? I’d call you cockroach, but that would be an insult to roaches everywhere. Maybe I should call you worm, like the Egyptians used to do.”
“Very impressive.” He clapped twice, slowly, but the dimples were gone. “You know how to use the internet. But right now, I’m a bit pressed for time, so let’s not worry about the details. You can just call me…”
Wait for it.
“Daddy.”
Chapter Five
The only sign she wasn’t a statue was the faint motion of her breath. In and out. A Danielsen witch must never lose control.
His mustache drooped above his sigh. “Don’t you have something that you want to say to me?”
“You owe twenty-one years back child support, you bottom crawling piece of slug vomit.
Under the circumstances, I don’t think I’ll take your check.”
He laughed, all jolly uncle again. “I like you. Your mother never had much of a sense of humor.” The mustache firmed into a straight line. “But time presses. This has already taken far longer than I expected. I wish we had more time to get to know each other, but we need to wrap things up here. Please break that circle and come out. Or…” He looked at Peter.
“Or you’ll kill Peter?”
He raised a chubby hand. It was, she noticed, bandaged where a ring finger would be. “Oh no, my dear. I never kill anyone.” Looking down at Peter, he pitched his voice lower, almost singing. “Peter, my boy. It’s time to stand up now.” There was something about the melodious voice that crawled along her skin, wrapped itself around her brain and stroked. She shuddered.
Peter stood up, eyes still closed. “Open your eyes, Peter, looking only at me.” Peter opened his eyes. She thought he must be hypnotized or drugged, but his eyes were completely aware, horrified and furious. The Worm smiled and kept crooning in that sing-song voice. “Peter, I have a job for you. I’d like you to take this knife.”
Peter took the knife, his eyes snapping to attention. “No, my boy, you can’t use it against me. That knife has only one purpose. Nod your head if you’d like to know what that purpose is. Nod now.”
His eyes flashing fury, Peter’s head jerked in a parody of a nod.
“Of course you want to know. I’ve invited Claire to join us. If she doesn’t step out of that circle by the time I count to five, you’re going to take that knife and cut your own throat. You may nod again.” Peter repeated that horrible head jerk. “Before I start our count, Peter, it would be a good idea, I think, for you to tell Claire how much you want her to come to you. To save you. Why don’t you look at her now and tell her that?”
Peter’s eyes met hers and she could see the furious fight behind them, and the way they glistened with tears as he realized he would lose. “Claire.” His voice was hoarse, wooden, his eyes disgusted at the words he couldn’t stop. “Save. Me.” A drop spilled a shining trail down one cheek.
“Very touching.” The Worm chuckled. “Well Claire? What will it be?”
When she didn’t move, he turned to Peter. “Peter, I’m starting that count. One. Raise the knife. Two. Move it to your neck. Three. Tilt the blade against your throat. Four. Press in ever so slightly.” Blood beaded along a thin scratch. “Now…”
Moving with the hunched shoulders and shuffling care of an old woman, Claire released the circle and crossed out.
“Peter, don’t move.” Peter remained frozen, knife to his own throat. “You made the right choice, Claire my dear.” The Worm’s voice was snakes writhing along her neck, twisting through her hair, and sinuously slithering around her brain. “Now come here and say hello to your father.”
She tried to turn her head, to call Peter. It was too hard, like pushing through foam hardening around her, squeezing her toward the monster whose voice kept crooning to her. “Oh, no Claire. You must look only at me. Come only to me.” The voice wrapped her, cut off her brain, left him in charge. She took a step toward him. “Keep coming. You’re doing so very well.”
Two more steps forward and she could no longer see Peter. She tried to resist, to look back at his face. But her feet took another step.
“I think you should stop right there. Hold your hands straight out from your sides and don’t move.”
She stood, arms outstretched. He moved into her field of vision, and circled around. She felt his hands on her body, running over her breasts, and she wanted to vomit. But his voice kept singing, crooning to her, holding her with snakes of his power slithering around her brain. “That’s my good girl. Stand very still. We wouldn’t want anything to happen to you the way it did your mother. You wouldn’t think it to look at the form I have now, but I was quite handsome when I met her. She was happy to exchange Names when we had sex because she wanted a child. I knew she wouldn’t channel her goddess for me, but I was willing to wait for a child who would be easier to control.”
His face returned to her field of vision. “Spread your legs apart, my dear.” He ran hands over her legs and around her waist. “No weapons. That’s my good girl. Now, where was I? Oh, yes. When your mother got pregnant, she wasn’t interested in having me stick around. I have to hand it to her—she was smart enough to figure it out later when I pretended to hire her to cast a curse. When I came to get you, she made it a death curse, even though she knew destroying me meant it would come back on her.” He sighed. “A shame, really. I had that form for thousands of years. It was exquisite and she destroyed it. It’s taken me all this time to get another one, and to be honest, I’m not too happy with it. Still, my old form didn’t have this very useful gift of persuasion, so I probably shouldn’t complain…” He grinned wider than ever, and for the first time she saw his fangs.
Fangs! He’s a fiend. He wanted to be called a god, but it was fiends who talked about adopting a human form. In one sense, that was good news. She didn’t think she could destroy a god, but if she could figure out his Name, she could bind a fiend.
He moved in front of her again. “You may put your hands down, but don’t move anything else. Now, here’s what we’re going to do. You’ll call your goddess, and I’ll hold all her beautiful power through your connection. Are you ready? Answer me, Claire.” His snakes hummed and twisted into a cage controlling her very breath. “Tell me you’re ready.”
He controlled her body, she realized. He could make her say whatever he wanted. But he can’t make that be the truth.
Her voice was flat, lifeless. “I am ready.”
“Very good.” His dimples flashed. “You may summon her now.”
A minute went by. The dimples disappeared. Another minute. “Why are you taking so long?”
She didn’t say anything. He hadn’t told her what to answer.
“Have you summoned her?” Frustration showed on his face. She felt the controls slithering around her brain draw back slightly. “You may answer yes or no.
“No.”
“Why not?”
Despite the habits of a lifetime, she wanted to smile at his fury. “Yes. No. Yes. No.”
“You know I’ll kill Peter.”
“Yes.”
“So you’ll summon?”
She hoped Peter would understand. Would remember she wasn’t actually capable of summoning Bygul. “No.”
He watched her for a moment. “Do you want to save Peter?”
“Yes.”
“But you won’t summon?”
“Yes. No. Yes-No.”
She could tell he knew what he would have to do. If he wanted answers from her, he’d have to pull back more of his control. The fingers of his uninjured hand drummed against his thigh. Then she felt the writhing snakes of his control pull back even further. She paid careful attention to where they’d been and what the retreat felt like.
“Before we move on, I think a few more precautions are in order. I’d like you to kneel, with your arms up, hands clasped on the back of your head.”
Dropping to her knees, she caught a glimpse of the pendant’s leather cord around Peter’s neck. He hadn’t had a chance to smash it. Sick with failure, she raised her arms, hands on the back of her head. Where they touched her remaining athame.
“Now, Peter, I’d like you on your knees in front of her. Both hands on that knife. If she tries to get up, you will kill her.” On his knees in front of her, Peter’s eyes, appalled, stared into hers even as his hands brought the knife from his still-bleeding throat down to point at her.
She noticed the Worm had moved to a chair. He was sweating, and his good hand was shaking slightly. It must be hard to control both of us. Is that why he keeps talking about being in a hurry?
“Now we’ll try this again, Claire. Do you intend to summon your goddess?”
Draw it out. Make him work for it. “No.”
His lips pressed the mustache into a
straight line. “Why not?”
“I can’t.”
“And why can’t you?”
She kept her voice to that same wooden cadence as when he controlled her. Maybe he would think he still had more control. “Because I’m too young. Most witches don’t summon until they’re middle-aged.”
She could see the Worm watching from behind Peter. But she kept her eyes focused on the tortured dark eyes in front of her. Do you know, Peter? Can you see it in my eyes? Love? The knife in Peter’s hands didn’t waver, but another drop streaked his cheek.
The Worm was reasoning out loud. “I’ve heard that you are able to do more than most witches your age… So there must be some way you can reach your goddess. How do you usually get her attention?”
Focus, Claire. You don’t have to give him the truth. He just has to think you did. “I call her and if she’s near, and if she feels like it, she comes. Or not. She’s a cat. And I told her to leave before you got here. I don’t know if she would even hear me now.”
“Well, we’ll just have to give it a try. I’m running out of…patience. And I don’t think my colleagues outside are going to wait much longer. You see, Claire, I made a deal with some very powerful beings. You would call them angels. But they aren’t allowed to interfere with humans’ free will. So they gave me this form, which lets me control you and all that delicious power from your goddess. And that means I can use you to give them what they want: control of Director Jeffers and the Accords Agency, the only thing standing between them and the destruction of Null City.”
She could see the sweat running down his face, his hands trembling. Was he running out of whatever he used to control them? Experimentally, she imagined a shield over the places he’d controlled earlier, before the power pulled back. She felt the snakes coming back, but concentrated. Think about Peter’s smile. She heard the Worm grunt, and the snakes pressed harder. Think about his mouth, how that smile softens his lips like a kiss. Peter’s eyes widened and she wondered if he felt the controls loosening too. Think about Peter’s arms around me, his lips on mine. The Worm sucked in a breath and came to his feet.