by L. J. Smith
And about the very bad things. Her witch heritage. The spell she’d put on Tanya. The Night World. All the way up to the accident last night.
When she was done, she sat back and looked at him.
“Well?”
“Well, I probably ought to think you’re crazy. But I don’t. Maybe I’m crazy, too. Or maybe it’s because I died once, myself….”
“You started to tell me that, that first night—and then the car skidded. What happened?”
“When I was seven my appendix burst. I died on the operating table—and I went to a place like that meadow. I’ll tell you the funny thing, though. I felt that rushing thing come at me, too—that huge thing you said came at you in the end. Only it actually reached me. And it wasn’t dark or scary. It was white—beautiful light—and it had wonderful wings.”
Gillian was staring. “Then what?”
“It sent me back. I didn’t have any choice. It loved me, but I had to go back anyway. So—zoom—back down the tunnel, and pop, back into the body. I’ve never forgotten it. And, it’s hard to explain, but I know it was real. I guess that’s why I believe you.”
“Then maybe you understand what I’ve got to do. I don’t know what Angel really is…. I think he may be some kind of demon. But I’ve got to stop him. Exorcize him or whatever.”
David took her by the arms. “You can’t. You don’t know how.”
“But maybe Melusine does. It’s either her or that guy Ash at the club. He seemed all right. The only down side is that I think he was a vampire.”
David had stiffened. “I vote for the witch—”
“Me, too.”
“—but I want you to wait for me. They’ll let me out later this afternoon.”
“I can’t. David, it’s for Tanya and Kim, too. Melusine might know how to cure them. Anyway, I’m certainly going to ask her. And I can’t let anymore time go by.”
David pulled at his hair with the hand that wasn’t hooked to the IV. “Okay. All right, give me five minutes, and we’ll go together now.”
“No.”
He was looking at the IV as if figuring out how to undo it. “Yes. Just wait for me—”
Gillian blew him a kiss from the door and ran before he looked up.
He couldn’t help her. You couldn’t fight Angel in ordinary ways. All David would be was leverage in Angel’s hands—a hostage—something to threaten to harm.
Gillian jogged out of the hospital and through the parking lot. She found the Geo.
Okay, now if Melusine would just be at the store….
(You don’t really want to do this, you know.)
Gillian slammed the car door closed. She sat up very straight, looking at nothing, as she fastened her seat belt and started the car.
(Listen, kid. You ain’t never had a friend like me.)
Gillian pulled out of the parking lot.
(Come on, give me a break. We can at least talk about this, can’t we? There are some things you don’t understand.)
She couldn’t listen to him. She didn’t dare answer him. The last time, he’d hypnotized her somehow, made her relax and give up control to him. That couldn’t happen again.
But she couldn’t shut his voice out. She couldn’t get away from it.
(And you can’t love him. There are rules against it. I’m serious. You belong to the Night World now—you’re not allowed to love a human. If they find out, they’ll kill you both.)
(And what were you trying to do to us?) Damn, she’d answered him back. She wouldn’t do that again.
(Not hurt you. It was only him I wanted. I could have slipped in as he slipped out….)
Don’t listen, Gillian told herself. There must be some way of blocking him, of keeping him out of her mind….
She began to sing.
“DECK the halls with boughs of HOL-ly! Fa la la la la…”
He hadn’t been able to hear her thoughts when she hummed before. It seemed to work, now, as long as she kept her mind on the lyrics. She sang Christmas carols. Loudly. The fast ones, like “God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen” and “Joy to the World,” were best.
“The Twelve Days of Christmas” got her the last few miles to Woodbridge.
Please be there….
“FIVE gold-en rings,” she caroled, hurrying into the Wood-bridge Five and Ten with the shoe box under her arm. She didn’t care who thought she was crazy. “FOUR calling birds, THREE French hens…”
She was at the door to the back room.
“TWO turtle doves…”
A very startled Melusine looked up from behind the counter.
“And a… please, you’ve got to help me! I’ve got this Angel who’s trying to kill people!” She broke off the song and rushed to Melusine.
“You’ve… what?”
“I’ve got this—angel thing. And I can’t stop him from talking to me….” Gillian suddenly realized that Angel had stopped talking. “Maybe he got scared when I came in here. But I still need your help. Please.” Suddenly her eyes were stinging with tears again.
Melusine leaned both elbows on the counter and rested her chin on her hands. She looked surprised, but willing. “Why don’t you tell me about it?”
For the second time that day, Gillian told her story. All of it. She hoped that by telling everything, she could make Melusine understand her urgency. And her lack of experience.
“So I’m not even a real witch,” she said at the end.
“Oh, you’re a witch, all right,” Melusine said. There was color in her cheeks and a look of fascination in her dark eyes. “He told you the truth about that. Everybody knows about the lost Harman babies. Little Elspeth—the records say that she died in England. But obviously she didn’t. And you’re her descendant.”
“Which means it’s okay for me to do spells?”
Melusine laughed. “It’s okay for anyone to do spells who can do spells. In my opinion. Some people don’t feel the same way—”
“But can you help me take the spells off?” Gillian opened the shoe box. She felt ashamed to show the dolls to Melusine—even though she’d bought them here. “I wouldn’t have done it if I’d known,” she murmured feebly, as Melusine looked at the dolls.
“I know.” Melusine gestured at her to be quiet. Gillian watched tensely and waited for the verdict.
“Okay, it looks as if you’ve started the process already. But I think… maybe some healing salve… and blessed thistle…”
She bustled around, almost flying in her chair. She applied things to the dolls. She asked Gillian to concentrate with her, and she said words Gillian didn’t recognize.
Finally, she wrapped the wax dolls in what looked like white silk, and put them back in the box.
“Is that all? It’s done?”
“Well, I think it’s a good idea to keep the dolls, just in case we need to do more healing. Then, after that, we can unname them and get rid of them.”
“But now Tanya and Kim will be okay?” Gillian was anxious for reassurance, and she couldn’t help the quick glance of doubt she cast—at Melusine’s missing leg.
Melusine was direct. “If they’ve had anything amputated, it won’t cure them. We can’t grow new limbs.” She touched her leg. “This happened in a boating accident. But otherwise, yes, they should get better.”
Gillian let out a breath she seemed to have been holding for hours. She shut her eyes. “Thanks. Thank you, Melusine. You don’t know how good it feels to not feel like you’re maiming somebody.”
Then she opened her eyes. “But the hard part’s still to come.”
“‘Angel.’”
“Yes.”
“Well, I think you’re right about it being hard.” She looked Gillian straight in the eye. “And dangerous.”
“I know that already.” Gillian turned and took a quick pace around the room. “He can get into my mind and make me do things—”
“Not just your mind. Anyone’s.”
“And I’m pretty sure he can move obje
cts by himself. Make cars skid. And he sees everything.” She came back to the counter. “Melusine—what is he? And why’s he doing all this? And why to me?”
“Well, the last question’s the easiest. Because you died.” Melusine wheeled quickly to a bookshelf at the end of the counter. She pulled down a volume.
“He must have caught you in the between-place, the place between earth and the Other Side. The place where he was,” she said, wheeling back. “He pretended to be the welcomer, the one who guides you to the Other Side. That thing rushing at you at the end—that was probably the real welcomer. But this ‘Angel’ got you out of the between-place before it could reach you.”
Gillian spoke flatly. “He’s not a real angel, is he?”
“No.”
Gillian braced herself. “Is he a devil?”
“I don’t think so.” Melusine’s voice was gentle. She opened the book, flipping pages. “From the way you brought him back with you, I think he must be a spirit. There are two ways of getting spirits from the between-place: you can summon them or you can go fetch them yourself. You did it the hard way.”
“Wait a minute. You’re saying I brought him?”
“Well, not consciously. I’m sure you didn’t mean to. It sounds like he just sort of grabbed on and whooshed down the tunnel—what we call the narrow path—right along with you. Spirits in the between-place can watch us, sometimes talk to us, but they can’t really interact with us. When you brought him to earth, you set him free to interact.”
“Oh, wonderful,” Gillian whispered. “So on top of everything, it’s my fault from the beginning.” She looked around dazedly, then back at Melusine. “But what is a spirit, really? A dead person?”
“An unhappy dead person.” Melusine turned pages. “‘An earthbound spirit is a damaged soul….’” She shut the book. “Look, it’s actually simple. When a spirit is really unhappy—when they’ve done something awful, or they’ve died with unfinished business—then they don’t go on to the Other Side. They get stuck in—well, the book calls it ‘the astral planes near earth.’ We call it the between-place.”
“Stuck.”
“They won’t go on. They’re too angry and hopeless to even want to be healed. And they can do awful things to living people if they get down here, just out of general miserableness.”
“But how do you get rid of them?”
Melusine drew a breath. “Well, that’s the hard part. You can send them back to the between-place—if you have some blood and hair from their physical body. And if you have all sorts of special ingredients, which I can’t get. And if you have the right spell, which I don’t know.”
“I see.”
“And in any case, that only traps him in the between-place again. It doesn’t heal him. But, Gillian, there’s something I’ve got to tell you.” Melusine’s face was very serious, and she spoke almost formally. “You may not need to rely on me.”
“What do you mean?”
“Gillian… I don’t think you really understand who you are. Did he—this spirit—explain to you just how important the Harmans are?”
“He said Elspeth’s sister was some big witch leader.”
“The biggest. She’s the Crone, the leader of all the witches. And the Harmans are—well, they’re sort of like the royal family to us.”
Gillian smiled bleakly. “So I’m a witch princess?”
“You told me that Elspeth is your mother’s mother’s mother. You’re descended entirely through the female line from her. But that’s—extraordinary. There are almost no Harman girls left. There were only two in the world—and now there’s you. Don’t you see, if you let the Night World know about this, they’ll flock to help you. They’ll take care of Angel.”
Gillian was unimpressed. “And how long will that take?”
“For them to gather and everything… check out your family, make all the preparations… I don’t know. It could probably be done in a matter of weeks.”
“Too long. Way too long. You don’t know what Angel can do in a few weeks.”
“Then you can try to do it yourself.”
“But how?”
“Well, you’d have to find out who he was as a person and what business he left unfinished. Then you’d have to finish it. And finally, you’d have to convince him to go on. To be willing to leave the between-place for the Other Side.” She glanced wryly at Gillian. “I told you it would be hard.”
“And I don’t think he’d be very cooperative. He wouldn’t like it.”
“No. He could hurt you, Gillian.”
Gillian nodded. “It doesn’t matter. It’s what I’ve got to do.”
CHAPTER 15
Melusine was watching her. “You’re strong. I think you can do it, daughter of Hellewise.”
“I’m not strong. I’m scared.”
“I think it may be possible to be both,” Melusine said wryly. “But, Gillian? If you do get through it, please come back. I want to talk to you about some things. About the Night World—and about something called Circle Daybreak.”
The way she said it alarmed Gillian. “Is it important?”
“It could be very important to you, a witch with human ancestors and surrounded by humans.”
“Okay. I’ll come back—if.” Gillian glanced once around the shop. Maybe there was some sort of talisman or something she should take….
But she knew she was just stalling. If there were anything helpful, Melusine would have already given it to her.
There was nothing left to do now but go.
“Good luck,” Melusine said, and Gillian marched to the door. Not that she had any particular idea where she was going.
She was almost at the creaky front door of the Five and Ten when she heard Melusine calling.
“I forgot to mention one thing. Whoever your ‘Angel’ was, he was probably from this general area. Earthbound spirits usually hang around the place they died. Although that’s probably not much help.”
Gillian stood still, blinking. “No… no, it is helpful. It’s great. It’s given me an idea.”
She turned and went through the door without really seeing it, stepped out into the square without really hearing the piped-in Christmas music.
At least I’ve got a place to go now, she thought.
She drove south, back toward Somerset, then took a winding road eastward into the hills. As she rounded a gentle curve she saw the cemetery spread out beneath her.
It was a very old graveyard, but still popular. Steeped in tradition, but with plenty of room. Grandpa Trevor was buried in the newer section, but there were ancient tombstones on the wooded hill.
If she had a chance of finding Angel, it might be here.
The only way to the older section was up a wooden staircase held in place by railway ties. Gillian climbed it cautiously, holding the handrail. Then she stood at the top and looked around, trying not to shiver.
She was among tall sycamores and oaks, which seemed to stretch black bony fingers in every direction. The sun was falling lower in the sky and long shadows tinged with lavender were reaching out from the trees.
Gillian braced herself. And then, as loudly as she could, she yelled.
“Come on, you! You know what I want!”
Silence.
Gillian refused to feel foolish. Gloved hands tucked under her arms, she shouted into the stillness.
“I know you can hear me! I know you’re out there! The question is, are you in here?” She kicked a foot toward a snow-covered sandstone marker.
Because of course there was nothing she could do here on her own. The only way to get the information she needed, about who Angel had been in his earthly life and what he’d done or left undone, was from Angel himself.
Nobody else could tell her.
“Is this you?” Gillian scraped snow from a granite gravestone and read the words. “‘Thomas Ewing, 1775, Who bled and Dy’d for Liberty.’ Were you Thomas Ewing?”
The ice-coated twigs of th
e tree above her clashed together in the rising wind. It made a sound like a crystal chandelier.
“No, he sounds too brave. And you’re obviously just a coward.” She scraped some other stones. “Hey, maybe you were William Case. ‘Cut down in the flower of Youth by falling from the Stagecoach.’ That sounds more like you. Were you William Case?”
(Are you all finished singing?)
Gillian froze.
(Because I’ve got one for you.) The voice in her head began to sing raucously. Eerily. (The Pha-a-antom of the Opera is here, inside your mind….)
“Oh, come on, Angel. You can do better than that. And why aren’t you letting me see you? Too scared to meet me face to face?”
A light shimmered over the snow—a beautiful pale golden light that rippled like silk. It grew, it took on a shape.
And then Angel was standing there. Not floating. His feet actually seemed to touch the snow.
He looked—terrific. Haunting and beautiful in the gathering twilight. But his beauty was only frightening now. Gillian knew what was underneath it.
“Hi there,” she almost whispered. “I guess you know what I’m here to talk about.”
“Don’t know and don’t care. Should you be out here alone, anyway? Does anybody know where you are?”
Gillian positioned herself in front of him. She looked directly into eyes that were as violet and darkly luminous as the sky.
“I know what you are,” she said, holding those eyes, giving every word equal weight. “Not an angel. Not a devil. You’re just a person. Just like me.”
“Wrong.”
“You’ve got the same feelings as any other person. And you can’t be happy being where you are. Nobody could. You can’t want to be stuck there. If I were dead, I’d hate it.”
The last words came out with a force that surprised even Gillian. Angel looked away.
An advantage. Gillian leapt in. “Hate it,” she repeated. “Just hanging around, getting stagnant, watching other people living their lives. Being nothing, doing nothing—unless it’s to make a little trouble for people on earth. What kind of a life is tha—” She broke off, realizing her mistake.