by Lila Dubois
“You remember.”
“So, Kim, you know about magic and you kidnapped me.” As soon as he said it, another possible explanation for what was going on occurred to him. He softened his voice. “Magic isn’t, well, magic. I can’t make you rich or cure cancer. I’m sorry if that’s what you were hoping for.”
“I know you can’t cure cancer, but you can cure my crops.”
That got his attention. “Your crops?”
“Yes. There’s a blight attacking them. I’ve done everything I can, but nothing is working. It’s spreading.”
“Diseased crops need to be tilled.”
“That’s not an option. I don’t have time.” Her voice was firm.
Harris loved talking about plants. They were his passion and his job. He went into lecture mode. “If it’s a naturally occurring disease, there’s a reason for it. Most times nature has a reason.” Harris’s family had, a generation ago, fought to stop park rangers from putting out small, naturally occurring fires in the redwood forests. The park service hadn’t understood that the fire was necessary to the growth of new redwoods. The fires cleared the forest floors and let the saplings get light.
“This isn’t naturally occurring, Harris.”
It was a bit startling to hear her use his name. “How do you know?”
“I know.” Though parts of the last few days were fuzzy, he now remembered most of the kidnapping, including a little spark when he’d touched her.
Maybe she’d used a Taser on him, and that was the spark he was remembering, though from the YouTube videos he’d seen, Tasers weren’t exactly a little spark.
There was another possibility. A far more dangerous one.
He closed his eyes and felt the air, trying to sense the presence of another practitioner. There was a tingle of what might have been magic, but it didn’t feel the way he was used to, when sensing another witch’s passive field of magic.
Maybe he was wrong.
But there was another damning piece of evidence—her insistence that she’d kidnapped him for both their sakes.
Harris put his empty tray on the floor. “Any chance I could get some coffee?”
There was a pause before she said, “Oh, sure, hold on.”
He listened to her footsteps, then raced to the door, sticking his arm out through the four-by-four-inch hatch she’d left open. He felt around for the door handle, and encountered a padlock. He pulled his arm back through, leaving a bit of skin in its wake, and retreated. It had been a long shot, but worth a try.
He positioned himself by the door, heart starting to pound as he thought about that spark and her words. Both pointed to the same conclusion, but surely he was wrong. No one would be so insane or reckless.
“Here you go.” Kim held a large white mug halfway through the open hatch.
Time to test his theory.
Harris took a breath, then moved fast. He grabbed the mug with his left hand and pulled hard. As he’d hoped, she instinctively kept ahold of the handle for a moment, and her hand was drawn through into the cell. He grabbed hold of her wrist with his right hand.
The earth shook. Not in a metaphorical sense. An earthquake made the ground buck and roll, strong enough to knock Harris to his knees. Kim screamed at him to let go, but he was blinded and nearly deaf from the pulsing magic that accompanied the quake. It was a wave of colorless light and soundless noise.
Kim wrenched her wrist from his hand. The light and sounds quieted, though it took a moment for the earth to settle. There were cracks in the concrete walls of his cell, and water was spraying in the bathroom, probably from a broken pipe.
“You idiot,” Kim snapped.
Harris looked at the door, outraged. “I’m an idiot? You’re a practitioner.”
“Yes.”
“From an earth coven?” His voice rose to a yelp at the end of the question.
“Yes,” she snarled.
“You’re a member of the Salachar cabal!” he yelled.
It hadn’t been a question, but she answered as if it had been. “Yep.”
“Are you crazy?”
“I’m desperate.”
That stopped Harris’s next words. The earth rumbled with an aftershock. He forced himself to calm down.
“We shouldn’t be anywhere near each other.”
It was forbidden for two practitioners from different cabals to be within a mile of one another. Her statement that she’d kidnapped him for both their sakes had been what got him thinking about the possibility that she was from a different Saol coven, a coven who couldn’t publicly hire him, or ask for his help. It had never occurred to him that she was from a different cabal.
“I have a dampening belt.” She was panting a little, and cursed once or twice.
Harris carefully braced his hands on the door, then peered out the hatch. Kim knelt on the floor in the concrete hall. The earthquake hadn’t been the only reaction to their touch. Wild roses had sprouted through a crack in the wall opposite his cell door. Where there had once been nothing, there was now a briar of pale pink roses. Kim knelt among them, bound in place by the thick, thorny stems, which had wrapped around her like ropes.
She was held in a position that was a near mirror of his own. Her right hand was about two inches from the door, while her left was bound to her side. She was on her knees, her head tipped back so she was looking up at the ceiling. A thick rose stalk had wound around her neck and a two-inch-long thorn protruded from it, the tip pressed into the underside of her jaw. A thin line of blood ran down her neck.
“Uh…” Harris looked at her. “Well, it could be worse.”
“It could?” The words were a bit garbled, since she was speaking through clenched teeth.
She had long dark hair as he’d remembered, and a copper skin tone. He couldn’t see much of her face, but from what he could see, and what he remembered, she seemed young. Roses had wound through and bloomed in her hair, so she seemed to have a crown of pale pink flowers. She wore all black—leggings and a long tunic.
“It could,” he assured her.
“But I’m wearing a dampening belt.”
That made him pause. “An earthquake and a briar from one touch, and that’s with your magic muted?”
“Goddess.” She breathed the word, a prayer, a plea. “I thought we’d be safe with the dampening belt.”
Harris swallowed. “There shouldn’t have been a reaction. Maybe it’s not working.”
He lived in rural Montana, so bumping into people wasn’t something he worried about, but in larger cities that weren’t held by a particular cabal, there were plenty of practitioners who lived together peacefully. No one used magic, and nothing blew up. Usually practitioners could feel one another’s passive magic, and could therefore avoid one another.
Surely if a simple touch could cause this kind of reaction, the cabals would have put other restrictions in place. What happened if practitioners from different cabals shook hands? Before now Harris would have said there would be a small spark of magic, similar to what he’d felt that first night.
“I’m going to reach through and try to get the thorn out from under your chin,” he told her.
“Don’t touch me,” she warned.
“I won’t. I have no desire to repeat that.”
He shoved his arm through. It would have been simpler, and more satisfying, to call on his power and coax the plant into easing away from her, but using magic was out of the question.
He managed to wrap one finger around the thorn under her chin without touching her bare neck, and with a small apology to the plant, he broke it off. He pulled his arm back through the hatch.
Kim sighed in relief and lowered her chin.
Their gazes met.
Goddess, she was beautiful. He hadn’t remembered that. Or hadn’t seen her well enough to notice. She had high cheekbones, a narrow jaw, and the most kissable lips he’d ever seen. Her eyes were, as he’d remembered, a lovely silver, rimmed with dark lashes. They
seemed startlingly pale in the darker skin of her face.
Maybe he had Stockholm Syndrome, and that’s why he was thinking about kissing her.
“How do you want to play this?” he asked.
Kim pursed her lips. “I can get out of here on my own.”
“You could,” he agreed.
“It will take some time.”
“Yes.”
“And it will hurt.”
“Probably.”
She sighed. “I’ve been poked full of more holes since I met you…”
“Met me?”
“Okay, fine, kidnapped you.”
For some stupid reason he smiled. “You dampening your power right now?”
“I am.”
That meant that he should be able to use his own power, as long as he didn’t touch her. “The other option is for me to help you, but if I do, you have to let me out.”
“I’m not letting you out until you agree to help me.”
Harris reached back through the hatch and lightly stroked the rose vine closest to him. Kim cried out in pain.
Damn, he hadn’t meant to hurt her that badly. But the lack of reaction meant he’d been right. He could use his magic without causing a reaction, as long as she was dampening her own, and he didn’t have skin-to-skin contact with her.
“Don’t do that,” she gasped. “I might not be able to stop myself if it hurts any more.”
“I thought you had a dampener.”
“It’s not a perfect system,” she snapped.
“A few little thorn pricks won’t—”
“There’s a thorn stabbing into my left calf, another in my right thigh, and one that may or may not be jabbed into my kidney.”
“Oh.”
Kim sighed. “It hurts, but not enough to make me let you go.”
Harris regarded her through the small hole in the door. “I could make your current situation worse.”
Her lips formed a thin, flat line. “You could. But if you do I might use my magic, and then we’re both fucked.”
“True, but I’m a captive. Maybe it’s worth it to me, in order to get free.” Harris found himself enjoying the conversation far more than he should have.
Kim made a frustrated noise, and he noticed something: she was scared. It was there in her eyes. Scared of him?
“Yes, I’ve totally abused you,” she snarked.
“You can’t kidnap someone and then give them nice sheets and pretend that makes kidnapping okay.”
“Those are thousand thread-count sheets,” she shot back.
“Still kidnapped.”
Now she looked irritated, which made him want to smile. But the fear was still there, in her eyes. She wasn’t afraid of him—she was afraid of something else.
“What do you want from me?” he asked.
“I told you, I want your help with my crops.”
“And that was worth risking all this? Either you plan to kill me after I help you and cover your tracks so they never figure out what happened to me, or you’re going to do what you said and let me go. If you do that, there will be hell to pay for you and your coven.”
“Not my coven. Just me. They don’t know anything about this. You have to tell the High Magus that.”
Harris raised his brows. “So you are planning to let me go?”
“Of course. I’m desperate, but not a murderer.”
“Why are you so desperate to save these plants?”
“They’re my family’s livelihood.”
Now that he understood, but it didn’t quite add up. “You caused that earthquake. That means you’re a Salachar witch…and you make your living off agriculture?” That was, as far as he knew, exclusively the domain of the covens of Saol with an affinity for plants.
“Yes, but it’s not a crop your coven grows, and I grow it on Saol land.”
Harris considered her. “You know you’ll be held accountable for this. My coven will notice I’m gone.”
She nodded, though very lightly, since her hair was still tangled in roses. “I’d hoped to have you back before anyone noticed, but I knew it was a long shot. I’m prepared to pay for my crimes, as long as you help my plants.”
“And what’s in it for me?” he asked.
Now she arched a brow. “Freedom?”
He shook his head. “Now that there’s something living near me, I could get free. It might take me a while, but I could do it.”
“A deep desire to help a fellow practitioner?”
“Yeah, no. The kidnapping.”
“Still hung up on that?” she asked with mock exasperation.
That startled a laugh out of Harris. He was enjoying this conversation, and this situation, far more than he should be.
“The plants,” she said. “Do it for the plants. Something is eating at them, something I can’t stop. They’re suffering.”
“Low blow, Kim.”
“Did it work?”
“Damn you, it did. I’ll help you.”
Her eyes closed in such obvious relief that he felt bad for not agreeing sooner.
“Can you control your magic long enough for me to use power and pull the roses back?” he asked. He’d used a bit of power moments ago, but nothing like what he’d need to free her.
“I’m not sure. My dampening belt wasn’t on very tight. I think that’s why there was a reaction. I wouldn’t bet on it. Can you reach my necklace?”
He looked at the gold chain around her neck. The pendant hanging from it was a long dagger-like piece of jagged rock nearly as dark as the black tunic it rested on.
“Yes.”
“Take it and pierce my skin with it. It’s an emergency dampener.”
“How do I keep it in place?”
“Can you hold it?”
“One way to find out.” Harris pulled the cuff of his shirt down over his hand.
She was far enough back from the door that he had to stick his arm through past the elbow, which meant he couldn’t also look out. Plus, his arm was jammed in the door hard enough that he was a little worried about getting it out again.
He tried grabbing for the pendant with his shirt-covered fingers.
“Stop trying to cop a feel.” Her words were wry.
He gave up on covering his hand, and settled for hoping he didn’t accidentally brush her skin. Once his fingertips were bare he was able to run his hand across the front of her shirt—he was not copping a feel, at least not on purpose—until he felt the chain. He grabbed the pendant. The rock felt heavy and dead.
“What the hell is this?”
“It’s a piece of meteorite.”
“Not of this earth.”
“Exactly.”
He trailed the rock up the front of her shirt until he felt the change. The rock was no longer snagging on cloth, but gliding against skin. He was careful to hold the pendant by the gold mounting at the top.
“You have to pierce my skin with it.”
“It’s not very sharp.”
She sighed, as if resigned. “Sharp enough.”
“Damn it, I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Your roses have me pinned like a butterfly to a board. I’m still covered in punctures from the wheat-missiles. Another hole isn’t going to make a difference.”
Harris stiffened. He’d hurt her that much? “Kim, I didn’t mean…”
“I know you didn’t.” Her voice lowered to a whisper. “And I’m so sorry that I did this to you. I know it’s not an excuse, but I’m desperate.”
Harris wanted to look this woman in the eye without the barrier of the door. He wanted to hold her and kiss her.
First of all, clearly he had Stockholm Syndrome. Second, he could never hold her or kiss her. It was forbidden, and for a damned good reason, as they’d just proven.
Harris pulled his hand back and then slashed the pendant against her skin, holding it in place once he heard her cry out.
He felt it the moment the dampening took effect. Some of the elect
ric charge in the air faded, and she made a small, helpless noise.
He closed his eyes, though he couldn’t see her anyway, and reached out for the roses with his magic. It would have been easier if he could touch them, but he was strong enough to work by proximity. He could have forced them forward in their own life cycle, or forced them to go dormant and wither, but instead he took the more difficult route. He coaxed them to move, to shy away from Kim. He made her a dark, sunless spot, full of aphids. A place they didn’t want to be.
He heard the rustle of leaves, and soft sounds coming from Kim. The roses recoiled, and he kept the pressure up until he heard the rustling stop. Then he released the pendant, careful to keep his hand away from Kim.
“Thank you,” she gasped.
It took him a minute, but he was able to pull his arm back through the hatch.
Curious and anxious, he looked through the opening in the door. The roses had pulled away from Kim and now clung to the walls and ceiling. The effort of moving them had caused the main stalk to thicken, widening the crack in the wall.
Kim knelt on the floor, hunched over. Her hair hung about her face, tangled and messy after having been occupied by roses, and a few pink petals stood out sharply against the dark strands. There was blood on her collarbone—that’s where he must have jabbed her with the stone. There were other trickles of blood he could see, the one under her jaw from the large thorn, and a few smears on the floor that must have been from where thorns punctured her legs.
He watched her slowly gather herself, rising to her feet and then straightening. Once she was standing he could no longer see her face, but he was able to watch her turn and walk away.
He snarled and banged his hand against the door. He was an idiot. He should have let the roses hold her. A cataclysmic event would have been noticed. They might not have survived it, but at least his coven would know where to look for him, and her coven would be held responsible.
That reminded him of what she’d said—that her coven knew nothing about it. That she alone should be held responsible. Why wasn’t she scared of the repercussions, of the punishment that would be coming her way?
The sound of footsteps had him looking out through the door. She was coming back, and she held a small silver key in one hand.
There was the click of a padlock opening, and then the sound of metal slapping against metal as she undid the fastening that held the door closed.