“I saw you fall. Are you hurt?”
I sat up, shook my head, and wiped away the tears. It was silly of me anyway. Desmond’s presence reminded me that we were in the middle of a war zone and I didn’t have time to get sentimental. So I wasn’t a witch. I’d been given a unique opportunity and I needed to gather my wits and not waste it.
“I’m fine,” I said, managing a forced smile. “I…” I hesitated, unsure if I was supposed to say anything. Despite everything the Creator told me about how the time I spent outside the Cycle took no actual time at all, no one had me go through any orientation and I didn’t know what the rules were. For that matter, I didn’t know if there were any rules since my situation was unique. So instead, I blurted out, “I know how to close the portal.”
“Oh?” Desmond’s voice held a note of curiosity, but his expression was pure skepticism. Not that I could blame him much. I wasn’t even sure why I’d said that. The truth was, I didn’t really know. I just knew that the spell was in the book.
“It’s uh…” I fumbled. “It’s in here. Help me though?” I held the book out in front of me. “I know the spell is in here, but I’m having a little trouble…”
“Donna, how on Earth am I supposed to help? You’re the witch after…” He trailed off and looked at me as if he’d never seen me before. “Oh. Oh!” His eyes widened in disbelief. “My goodness! You’re not a witch… You’re… But that’s…”
“I didn’t survive the fall,” I said. Yeah, it sounded weak, but I was still in shock over losing my identity and still unsure of protocol.
“But if you’re…” He cut off again, this time with a deep and shuddering sigh of his own. “Balance,” he said, shaking his head and letting out a small, shaky chuckle. “I get it. I don’t know how, but I get it. All right, let’s see the book then.”
As Desmond’s fingers closed around the book, I felt a shift that I hadn’t expected. From the look on his face, Desmond wasn’t expecting it either, but the book immediately took to his magical aura. I watched in awe as he held the tome in one hand, closed his eyes, and passed his other hand over the closed cover. There was a soft, harmonic vibration and the pages began to flutter. The expression of disbelief that had his jaw dragging on the ground would have had me in stitches under any other circumstances, but I was just as awed as he was.
“I… believe this is it,” he said, handing the open book back to me. I’m not quite sure why though, since it was pretty obvious from the way the magic dimmed with the passing that it was meant for him. Perhaps he wasn’t yet aware of what it meant to be chosen by the Goddess.
Of course, I now knew that there was a bit more to it than that, but I wasn’t yet ready to completely give up my previous line of thinking until we were in a better position, so I took the book and read the spell.
“That’s it!” I said with a smile as I read the ancient words. “Excellent work, Desmond! We need to get everyone over to the mill!” I reached for my phone and then remembered that it fell off the roof before I did and it was probably smashed into a million pieces. But no, right there in my left hip pocket was a familiar phone shaped lump.
“How the hell?”
There wasn’t even a scratch on the screen.
“Welcome to the Agency,” Desmond said with a small smile.
“How did you-” I began to ask, but cut off when I heard frantic footsteps. A second later, Seth dropped down next to Desmond.
“Donna, did you...?” he gasped. I wasn't sure if that was because he was out of breath or if, like Desmond, he figured something was off. Not that it mattered. We still had a war to win. There would be plenty of time to explain what happened later.
“Abbey.”
Or now was fine too.
“The great, great, great something or other grandmother that you all wiped out of my memories? Yeah, I can see the resemblance.” I paused, not sure how much I wanted to, or could say.
“How on Earth?”
“I got all that back. All of my memories… After I... after I came back,” I ended lamely.
It didn’t matter. Desmond had figured it out, so I assumed Seth would as well. I just had a gut feeling that they weren’t as up to speed as they thought they were. For that matter, I wasn’t entirely sure I understood myself.
Seth looked like he had a thousand questions, but I shook my head and pointed up at the clouds that had begun to swirl in an unnatural way.
“We need to get to the mill,” I said, but they weren’t listening.
“No one saw her die,” Desmond said, eyeballing me with a knowing look, as if he’d figured out some huge mystery. Okay, sure, he had, but now wasn’t the time to dwell on it.
“Guys! We need to get to the mill,” I said again, louder this time, and with a little more insistence. Maybe time worked differently for agents and this was something that I would learn to deal with later, but for me, the screech and howl that suddenly filled the air seemed like a hell of a lot more than the natural sounds of wind. It sounded to me like a million souls crying out in anguish and I had a bad feeling that it was more than simply an omen.
They heard me at least, the second time.
“Thanks guys,” I said sarcastically to the empty space where the agents had been. “You go on ahead. I’ll just walk. Not like I’m the chosen one who has to be there or anything.”
All right, I was being crabby and really, I was only a couple of blocks from the mill, but blipping out like that was still rude. On the off chance that being special meant I could blip out, I tried, but nothing happened. Apparently I was a totally different kind of snowflake from Desmond or even Nai. How was that fair? Whatever.
I got up and headed for the south side bridge just as the rain started. That certainly didn’t help my mood, but at least I had a hood on my jacket. Through the howling wind and crashing of thunder, I heard the familiar sound of a two point two liter engine being pushed beyond its physical limits. Even though I was dead, I still jumped out of the way as the squeal of hard braking stopped and the small Chevy jumped the curb.
“Oh honey!”
Mom was out of the car and hugging me with the quickness of a woman thirty years her junior.
“I’m fine, mom. I’m…”
“I felt it,” she said, pulling away from me with a choked sob. “Oh Donna, I felt it and I couldn’t believe it. Nothing, and I mean nothing I’d seen could have ever prepared me for what I felt. I thought… I thought… Oh honey, I don’t want to think about what I thought. You’re here and that’s all that matters. Although…” She eyed me for a moment as the full impact of what happened crept in beneath her emotional outburst. “I don’t quite understand. We are left now with a greater imbalance…”
“There’s no time to explain,” I said, just as the wind picked up again. I hurried to the passenger side of the car. “We need to get to the mill fast. Rose fast,” I added with a significant look.
“I’m on it,” said mom as she hopped back into the driver seat and gave me a devious look as the car jack-rabbited from the curb, leaving a streak of burnt tire and black smoke in our wake. “I don’t care if you’re supernatural now, dear, you’re probably going to want to strap in.”
We were across the bridge and outside the mill in less than a minute. For a moment there, I wasn’t even sure mom was going to use the bridge. It wouldn’t have surprised me to find that she had done enough modifying to give the little coupe takeoff capabilities.
Still, as we headed inside what should have been a heavily warded area, the storm seemed to grow ever more powerful. I had to worry if we’d even made it on time.
“Oh dear,” mom gasped. “Is that…?
The reason the storm was at its worst here was revealed. The violently circling clouds converged over the mill. The sound I’d heard earlier, the anguished souls, turned out to be thousands of Discordant trapped within the swirling vortex. Directly below, and over the portal, Jem and Nai stood, glowing with a light that shone as powerful as a su
n about to go supernova.
A moment later, that’s exactly what they did.
I stared in horror as the two joined hands and jumped into the fissure, taking not only their light, but the storm and all of the creatures of Chaos with them, plunging us into an unnaturally dark and quiet void. For an eternity, time seemed to stand still and I daresay, I felt something of a calm and realized this was indeed the proverbial calm before the storm.
And oh, what a storm it was about to be.
It was as if someone had turned up the volume suddenly on a muted television. Shouts from those who had witnessed the events echoed in cacophony with those who were just arriving and wanted to know what had happened. I ignored them all, moving to the edge of what had been the sinkhole. The ensuing storm had collapsed the debris in on itself, creating nothing more than a slight depression where the ten foot drop had previously been.
Though there was no longer a fracture in the earth, I knew that the current barrier between realms was weak and only temporary.
“We must get into position,” I said, taking stock of those who were present. I consulted the book of spells and hoped that I was right in my assumption of what had just happened. If I was wrong… well… I didn’t want to think about it, to be honest. Instead I turned to where Bogie stood, a few feet away, hand in hand with my former spiritual sister. Just looking at her caused a brief stab to my heart, and I knew she felt it too because as I approached, she turned with a gasp and the glimmer of unshed tears in her eyes.
“Bogie,” I said, ignoring the lump in my throat and Betty’s dawning realization. “I… we need a high priest if we are to effect a permanent closure.”
The former demon raised one eyebrow, feeling, no doubt, what it was that had his girlfriend on the edge of sadness. But being the standup guy that I’d come to rely on, he just nodded and said, “Sure thing, Red,” as he took the book of spells from my hands.
“Circle of seven,” I said, raising my voice to be heard by all. “It is time to end the war.”
I watched as several eyebrows raised in question, but no one said a word as they filed into place. Well, almost no one.
“Uh, Donna?” Louise cocked her head in question as she noted that I was not heading for the circle. I stifled my reaction, which was somewhere between a giggle and a sob. While Louise was a dear spiritual sister and a formidable coven leader, she could at times be slow on the magical uptake. It wasn’t until Betty took her by the arm that she again began moving toward the circle.
Admittedly, I had my own moment of perplexity as Eller, who had been following the witches, turned to command the stray mutt that had followed him in to stay put, adding, “He’s coming back. I promise.”
But it was Seth and Desmond, hands clasped in one another’s, approaching and joining the circle that elicited gasps from nearly all present. It was also then that those who were not around to witness the twins’ sacrifice were suddenly aware of their absence, causing a hushed murmur to go over the crowd.
Bogie found a mostly flat area north of the fissure and stepped up so that he could preside over the closure ceremony. I took position directly across from him, south of the fissure. He held up his hand and cleared his throat. A few moments later, the murmuring stopped. Holding the magical tome aloft, he read the introduction to the spell. Just as was the case with the binding spell used against my father, the wording was as cheesy as the spell was powerful.
“A world apart, beyond the veil,
Return at once from whence ye hail.
Go back, go back, through yonder door,
Go back, go back, forever more.
To close behind, we gather now,
To sever ties, we take this vow.”
I had to give Bogie credit for saying the words with a straight face. Fortunately, that was the worst of it, because some of the others, especially Eller, were already having a hard time keeping it together. Okay, so was I, but I bit my tongue because my part was coming up next.
“From the place of magic, we of Order bestow the magic. Our strength is your number. Our strength is seven. Call to me,” I hesitated, choked up slightly at what was to come next. “Sons and daughters, keepers of balance. Call to me and let it be heard by all within the Cycle and all beyond, through which catalyst of human comprehension the power of the Truth is upheld. We begin, with that which remains unshaken.”
I turned to my mother and bowed my head. Returning my greeting with a nod of her own, she lifted her arms skyward and spoke into the now calm night.
“Myrna Rose, psychic soul. Honor-bound to protect and uphold the tenets of Order.”
She lowered her arms and bowed to Harry, who raised his in turn.
“Harold Harris, Catholic caretaker. Honor-bound to protect and uphold the tenets of Order.”
Harry then nodded to Eller, who did as the others had.
“Eller Raglund, skeptical being. Honor-bound to protect and uphold the tenets of Order.”
Eller lowered his arms and turned to Louise, expecting to nod, but hesitated, noting as we all did, that the first phase of the spell was complete. Instead, I turned to Louise and managed to choke out, “Call to me, that which is in transition.”
Louise returned my nod and I saw a single tear escape her eye as she lifted her face and arms skyward.
“Louise Woods, earth witch of the Ro… um… Woods coven. Honor-bound to protect and uphold the tenets of Order.”
It was all I could do not to cry out as the last remaining vestiges of my living self were cast away. Louise’s words caused a physical pain for all of us, but it was necessary to acknowledge every change or the circle of seven would not have the power to close the fissure for good. Louise turned a shaky nod to Betty, who did not bother to hide her tears.
“B-betty Woods, earth witch of the W-woods coven. Honor-bound to protect and uphold the tenets of Order.”
And with that, Betty turned to me and I allowed myself a small gasp as the last thread was cut. No longer was I Donna Rose, earth witch of any coven. I was Donna Rose, Guardian of Blackbird. But I didn’t yet have time to dwell, brood, or come to terms with my changes. The second phase was complete, but there was yet a third step that had to be completed by the mystics.
“Call to me,” I said, turning my attention to Desmond, whose mortal form was no less intimidating than had he been as an agent. If anything, the blood that stained the front of his torn t-shirt gave him an even more formidable appearance. “Call to me, that which begins anew.”
Desmond gave me a tight smile, almost a grimace, before bowing his head and raising his arms.
“Desmond Hawthorne, dualist of earth and water magic. Honor-bound to protect and uphold the tenets of Order.”
Desmond looked almost as surprised as I’d been. I thought for sure, after feeling the surge of power when I gave over the book of spells, that he would be an earth warlock and take my place in the coven. Honestly, Hawthorne would have been close enough to fit the earth elemental theme. But like everything, this was not arbitrary, though I admit, I never would have guessed in a thousand years what was revealed when Desmond lowered his arms and bowed his head to Seth.
“Seth Callaghan, dualist of fire and air magic. Honor-bound to protect and uphold the tenets of Order.”
I think everyone was as awestruck as I was, which was good, because no one noticed that Bogie had to give me a mental nudge to get me back on track. I slipped inside the circle, over the chasm that now glowed with a golden light, and stood next to Bogie.
“Circle of seven, your protection is complete. Gather close and hold fast thy neighbor.”
The mystics all took a step forward, joining hands to close the circle around us. Immediately, there was a flare-up beneath my feet and for a moment, I worried that whatever was beating at the other side was going to get out.
“Strong is seven, but so is three,” Bogie called out, reading again from the book of spells. “Come forth, triad of Order, and close this portal for all eternity.”
Several eyebrows raised. Although I think everyone was over their shock enough to realize that I was now an agent of Order, it was hard to ignore that I was the only agent present. I didn’t fail to notice this either and hoped that my gut instincts were correct. Since the spell didn’t specify an order, I stepped into the center, directly over the remnants of the fissure, drew my knife from my pocket, and knelt on one knee.
“I, Donna Rose, Guardian of Order, sired by Chaos, vow to guide and keep safe the citizens of Blackbird.” With my knife, I drew in the ground a protective ward. As soon as the ward was complete, it began to glow and I felt a new thrum of power pulsing from the ground, through the knife, and into my hand. I smiled as I realized I was receiving new information from the spell itself. This was definitely new and unlike anything that I’d experienced as a witch. Even as a so-called powerful one. I closed the ward, lifted my blade, stabbed the center of the fissure, and spoke, “Be gone from our realm, harbingers of Discord. And return to us that upon which you have no claim.”
I took a step back just in time to avoid being engulfed in the white hot flame that shot up from where I’d penetrated the ground. The flames twisted, forming a human figure who glowed with a light that should have been blinding, yet I noticed that it bothered me not and no one turned away. At last, it was as if someone had flipped off the switch. The light blinked out completely, and Jem stood where the flaming pillar had been.
I had to give the kid credit. As he stood there, he truly looked the part of a supernatural protector and not so much like the good natured teen we all knew. He turned to me and drew a short dagger. I stepped back and nodded as he took center stage.
“I, Jem Hawthorne, Observer of Order, designed by Discord, vow to watch and keep safe the citizens of Blackbird.” As I’d done, Jem drew a protective ward over the top of mine, holding the blade in place for a moment as the energy and new instructions filled him. After a moment, he lifted the blade and drove it into the ground, repeating the invocation that I’d said. “Be gone from our realm, revelers of Chaos. And return to us that upon which you have no claim.”
Rise of the Discordant: The Complete Five Book Series Page 82