by Alicia Rades
Venn took a deep breath and stood. A curse slipped out under his breath.
“What’s wrong?” Fiona asked. She stood behind the chair across from me and looked into the box. “What’s with the box anyway?”
Venn raked his fingers through his hair. “It’s Cowen’s. We were hoping to use it to track him. What you saw… Rae agreed to it as a trade.” He shot me a look like he still wasn’t pleased about the whole thing.
“You should’ve called us,” she said. “When we went to check out the back, we didn’t see anything. Then we heard your voices at the front of the house, and we came to check it out. If we knew what was happening, Ryland never would’ve—”
“I know,” Venn cut her off. “I just saw the vamp, and I didn’t think we had time…”
Fiona shook her head like she’d never understand men. She stood on her toes and leaned over the box, shuffling through the random junk. “So, we can use any of this stuff to track Cowen?”
“Probably not,” I said. “Tracking spells work best with sentimental objects, but even then they’re tricky. We might’ve had a chance with something else, like a piece of clothing. But this stuff… I don’t think it’ll work.”
“What about the watch?” Fiona asked, holding it up.
I reached for it. “It’s worth a shot, but the real challenge is going to be coming up with the money for a tracking spell.”
Fiona and Venn both stared at me blankly.
“What?” I asked. “Any witch with a business sense is going to charge us double for asking to track a guy with a watch he abandoned years ago.”
“We… um… we don’t need to pay a witch, do we?” Fiona asked with hesitation. “I mean, what about you?”
Venn raised his eyebrows, like he agreed Fiona had a point.
“Me?” I asked in disbelief.
“You have a tracking spell, don’t you?” Venn pointed out.
“Well, yeah,” I said. “I have the spell, but I’m only a low witch.”
The corner of Venn’s lips turned down. “You know that’s not true. No low witch can heal like you do.”
“Okay,” I agreed, “so I’m on the low end of a mid-witch. I still don’t have enough magic to perform this type of spell.”
“I don’t think you give yourself enough credit,” Venn said.
Really? We were back to this again?
“I know what I’m capable of,” I snapped. “Witches have died trying to access power beyond their capabilities.”
“Yes,” Venn agreed, “but you can also improve your powers by testing those limits, by practicing magic.”
He thought I was being lazy? Like I hadn’t tried testing my limits before? Because apparently my notebook full of spells wasn’t proof that I at least had an interest in getting better at magic…
“Do you really think I’d be here right now if I could perform this kind of spell?” I asked. It wasn’t like I hadn’t tried. If I could do this, I would’ve found my sister ages ago.
“You can do it,” Venn promised. “You just don’t know you can.”
“Fine,” I said with determination in my voice. “I’ll prove it to you what my limits are. Get ready to write a big check, because when you turn to another witch for this, it’s not going to be cheap.”
“Hold on,” Venn protested, but I was already moving Cowen’s box off the table.
I pulled my spell book from my bag and flipped open to the tracking spell I’d copied from a book at work.
“You need to—”
“Hey, Fiona,” I interrupted without looking at Venn. “Can you get me some salt from the kitchen? Also, I’m going to need a few candles if you have them. Four, at least.”
Fiona nodded and hurried into the kitchen.
Venn sighed, like I was being ridiculous. “Rae, this isn’t going to work like this.”
My eyebrows shot up. “Oh, so you’re the spell expert now?”
“No,” Venn replied, “but remember what I said about Synchrony? You can’t do this just to prove me wrong.”
I opened my mouth to counter, but I hesitated. Maybe he was right and I was totally going about this the wrong way. I would’ve loved to prove him wrong, to show him he had no right to be making assumptions about me, but the truth was that I didn’t have time for this. None of us did.
Fiona returned and set a salt shaker in front of me on the table. She found four candles and a lighter in a nearby cabinet and returned to her seat with all of them in hand.
“Okay,” I caved. “You seem to know how I can do this. What do I have to do to make it work?”
Venn finally relaxed and sank back into his chair. “The first thing is that you have to let go of all that negative energy you’re holding.”
Yes, because telling me to do that will make it all magically disappear.
“How do you suggest I do that?” I asked.
Venn shrugged.
Great. He doesn’t even know.
“How do you normally relax?” he asked.
I kill criminal vampires.
“Ice cream,” I said instead, because even though I had no problem killing vampires, I didn’t want to come across sounding like an insane serial killer. Ice cream sounded like a safe bet, and I was hungry anyway. Plus, it might help cool the heat on my gums. “Do you have any?”
“I’ll get it,” Fiona offered.
I returned my attention to Venn. “Once I’m relaxed, then what?”
Venn leaned forward in his chair and laced his fingers together on the tabletop. “We talked about this earlier. You have to perform the spell without doubt. If you’re focusing all your attention on how the spell won’t work, it will fail every time.”
He said it like you could just switch your doubt off at the snap of a finger.
“Okay,” I agreed. “I won’t doubt myself.”
Venn shook his head. “You can’t just wish you won’t doubt yourself. You have to truly believe it.”
I gritted my teeth. He made it sound so easy when it wasn’t.
“Clearly, you know I don’t think this is going to work,” I pointed out. “Why are we even bothering?”
“Because,” Venn said, “I still think you can do it. I think, deep down inside, you have the power to become an amazing witch.”
The corners of my lips twitched involuntarily. “Keep talking…”
Venn smirked. With enough compliments, I might just believe in what he was trying to tell me.
He leaned even closer until he was just inches away from me. I could smell the scent of cinnamon on his skin and feel the rush of his breath across my arm. My breath hitched, and it took everything I had not to close the distance between us. All I wanted was to touch him.
“I think you’ve been on your own for too long,” he said softly. “And I think that without someone there to believe in you, you forgot how to believe in yourself.”
So much for the compliments.
“Wait.” Venn grabbed my hand before I could pull away. My skin tingled at the touch, sending warm vibes up and down my arm. “The thing is, it will never matter how much I tell you how beautiful or strong or smart I think you are if you don’t feel that way yourself. I can’t give you faith. That can only come from inside you. But I will tell you this…” Venn’s gaze dropped to my hand as he ran his thumbs over the back of it, sending my heart going haywire and making me forget all about the pain on my lips. “I absolutely believe that you can do this, that one day, you will embrace Synchrony and do amazing things with it.”
I scoffed lightly. “You say that like you can predict the future.” Which would’ve been strange, even in our effed-up world.
Venn shook his head. “I don’t know the future, but I know you’ve done amazing things with magic before. Your soul is powerful, Rae, and once you come to realize that, nothing will be able to stop you.”
I couldn’t help but smile. He was trying a little too hard. It was quite amusing.
“What?” Venn asked innocentl
y.
“You think I’m beautiful?” I teased.
Disappointment crossed Venn’s face. “That’s what you got out of that?”
“That, and you can’t tell the future.”
Venn sighed and dropped my hand. He leaned back in his chair. “All I’m saying is that I believe in you, and maybe that’s enough magic to make you see it, too.”
Oh, wow. He really meant it. He wasn’t just telling me what he thought I wanted to hear.
I narrowed my eyes. “I thought you weren’t a witch. You don’t have magic.”
He nodded in agreement. “Not like you do.”
“Here you go.” Fiona set a bowl of vanilla ice cream in front of me, then one in front of Venn.
“Thank you,” I said before digging in.
Fiona sat across from me and dipped her spoon into her ice cream. “Is there anything else you need? I mean, for the spell?”
I glanced at the notebook beside me. “Nope, that’s it. But according to Venn—” I shot him a glance “—I need to find a little confidence.”
“What?” he asked with a mouthful. “It’s true.”
I rolled my eyes. Okay, maybe he has a point. It’s not like it’ll hurt to be open-minded, about Synchrony, about everything. Just try it.
I sat quietly, letting the ice cream melt in my mouth and focusing on the cooling sensation and sweet flavor. I forced my shoulders to relax and pictured the negative energy in my body melting away with the ice cream. Fiona exchanged a skeptical glance with Venn, but neither of them said anything. I finished my ice cream far too soon, but I thought it would be rude to ask for another serving.
“So, here’s how the spell works.” I pushed my bowl aside and stood. I placed Cowen’s watch at the center of the table, then situated the four candles in a square around it. I popped the top off the salt shaker and emptied the entire contents in a thick circle around the candles. I took the lighter and lit each of the candles.
“Should I get the lights?” Fiona asked.
I shrugged. “It doesn’t say anything about lighting, but if you want to, go ahead.”
“Will it help you concentrate?” she asked.
I thought about it for a moment, then nodded.
Fiona rose from her chair and flipped off the light switch. In the darkness, it felt eerie to be sitting in a stranger’s home performing a spell.
“Now what?” Fiona asked curiously.
I didn’t have much to go off of, only my notes on the ingredients needed and the incantation I was supposed to mutter. Beyond that, I wasn’t sure how the spell actually worked to track someone down. I just hoped this wasn’t another one of Mrs. Carlyle’s shoddy spells.
Venn set his bowl aside. “Remember, Rae, you can do this.”
I nodded. I just needed to believe in myself, or so Venn said.
I shut my eyes and took a deep breath, letting out the remaining tension in my body on the exhale. This is going to work, I told myself. I did my best to shut out the second voice in my head telling me I was wrong. Just believe. It can’t be that easy, can it?
Finally, I opened my eyes. I spoke the incantation in my notebook, but the words hardly sounded like my own. They sounded strong and confident, and I had no idea if I was doing this just for show or if I truly felt it in my heart.
By the time I reached the end of the short incantation, nothing had happened. Further down the page, my notes read that the incantation needed to be repeated several times.
No giving up, Rachel. You’ve got this.
A light breeze passed through the room, rolling from the kitchen to the dining room windows and rustling their curtains.
Maybe I’m actually doing something, I thought.
The breeze grew stronger the longer I repeated the words in my spell book. A prideful smile swept across Venn’s face, and Fiona shifted in her chair in excitement.
Right in front of my eyes, granules of salt began to swirl together, rising up from the tabletop in a smooth, controlled manner, as if somehow my magic had created a tiny invisible twister on the table.
I held in my urge to cry out and rejoice, to gloat to Venn that I was actually doing it, but I couldn’t stop the incantation now. I continued, and my chest filled with a sense of victory. We were going to find Cowen. The thieving bastard was going to get what was coming to him, and I was going to finally get the answer to the question that had been burning inside of me for years.
The remaining granules of salt rose from the table until they all come together to form an orb in the middle of the candle square about a foot above Cowen’s watch.
Fiona leaned over to Venn and whispered, “Is that supposed to happen?”
Venn simply held and index finger to his lips, instructing her to stay quiet.
Then, in the blink of an eye, the salt orb exploded, blasting back into my eyes. I instinctively flinched and fell back into my chair, my heart racing.
It didn’t work. I failed.
I forced my breathing to slow and the heat to leave my eyes before I opened them. A knot twisted in my chest, but I did my best to hide it.
“Was that it?” Fiona asked, rubbing her eye. “Do you know where Cowen is?”
I gritted my teeth. “Did it look like it worked?”
“I—I,” Fiona stammered. “I’ve never seen this spell done before. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be.” Regret filled my voice. “It’s not your fault. It’s mine.”
I couldn’t keep my anger in any longer. I shot to my feet and raced out of the room.
11
The front door slammed behind me. By the time I was outside, I realized I really didn’t know what I was doing because I’d left my spell book, my purse, and my good pants behind. I couldn’t just leave right now. Well, I could, but then I’d have to come back to retrieve my things later.
Instead, I sank down onto the steps and covered my face with my hands. Where did I go wrong? I believed in myself like Venn said I should. Maybe he was wrong. Maybe I don’t have enough power for this. I’m only a low witch. I’m never going to find Jenna.
The door creaked open behind me. I really didn’t want company right now. But apparently whoever had followed me outside couldn’t read minds, because they sat on the step beside me. I thought it was Venn and was about to tell him to leave me alone, that I’d be back inside when I was ready, but then Fiona’s voice reached my ears.
“Hey, Rae,” she said softly. “It’s okay. It really is.”
I dropped my hands from my face and lifted my gaze to hers. It was dark out, but it was easy to make out her soft features with the light from a nearby street lamp.
“No,” I stated flatly. “It’s not okay. We need this to work. If I was a better witch, you’d be closer to rescuing Sondra, and I wouldn’t still be wondering if my sister is dead or alive.”
Fiona cocked her head. “Your sister? That’s what you’re doing this for?”
I nodded. I wasn’t sure why I opened up to Fiona. Maybe it was my emotions running high and the inherent need to talk to someone, or maybe it was because I thought she and her family could help me. Whatever the reason, I found myself telling her things I’d never talked to anyone about before.
“Two years ago, vampires raided our house,” I said. “They killed my parents and kidnapped my sister as a blood slave. I tried tracking spells on my own, but they never worked. I turned to a witch the first chance I got, after I saved up enough money, but she couldn’t do the spell. She said I’d already claimed ownership of everything I had left of my sister’s, so she couldn’t use any of that to track her.”
The sorrow on Fiona’s face deepened the longer I talked.
I dropped my gaze to my hands. “I’d pretty much given up hope trying to find her until… until I met Cowen.”
“You think he knows something about your sister?” Fiona asked.
I nodded, and a silent beat passed between us.
“The Soulless took her, didn’t they?” Her voice was s
o soft, so full of sorrow. “That’s why you need him?”
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “Yeah. I just wish I could do it on my own.”
“You’re the Ravenite,” Fiona said in admiration. “You can do practically anything.”
I rolled my eyes. “Don’t fool yourself. I’m not what they make me out to be. I’ve never been good at magic. I work at this magic shop downtown because I thought it would help me get better at magic, but the whole thing is a joke.”
Fiona scoffed. “Most of them are.”
“My boss is an idiot,” I complained. “For one, the shopfront is a bakery, but he’ll just leave charms and shit lying around by the donuts. And he basically has no protocols for when people come in the back where I work. He’s barely a low witch but sells charms he claims are enchanted with protection spells. He resells spells that barely work, at best. He’s a total con artist. I only stayed because I need the money.”
Fiona nodded like she understood. God, it felt good to finally talk to someone. And Fiona just sat there listening without judgement. For the first time in years, it felt like I could actually make a real friend. But I didn’t let myself entertain the idea. Now was not the time to get distracted.
“Anyway,” I said, changing the subject. “I’m really sorry that I can’t help you.”
“It’s not your fault,” Fiona replied. “Venn’s being too hard on you.”
“Thank you!”
Fiona giggled but quickly composed herself. “He can’t just expect you to jump into a complicated spell like that. He needs to realize that it takes small steps and a lot of practice.”
I frowned. “I have been practicing.”
“Right,” she said. “That’s why you can heal, because you’ve already done the spell before and know you can. Next, you need to try something just a little bigger, until you know you can do it, rather than jumping straight into something so different.”
Fiona made a lot more sense to me than Venn did. You don’t just become powerful by believing in it. It took practice.