by Shona Husk
He didn’t need that responsibility when he couldn’t be sure he could save himself. And he didn’t need the distraction or the intrigue that Mylla offered. That wasn’t why he was here. He had to find a way to stop Thomas and break the curse that the Morrigu had laid on the Quigley men.
If Mylla was a victim of Thomas’s magic, he couldn’t leave her. Damn it. His concentration wavered, the images rippled like a stone had been dropped in a pond and he almost tumbled back to his body. He stilled the surface and pressed on.
He spread further, seeking wards and sigils that witches usually placed on their houses to guard against burglars and misfortune. He found them, but they appeared like relics, old and unused. Instead there were darker points that throbbed like organs, sucking the life out of anyone that came too close.
How many thieves had died trying to get in? He was instantly out in the garden. Were there bodies beneath the garden beds or was that his imagination? There was something out here. Thick veins pulsed between the house—that was swathed in black—and the statues. He waited and let the information expand into something he could relate to.
An umbilical cord. But instead of giving life it was sucking it from the statues to the house. That was how Thomas was feeding himself and his magic. Oskar’s first thought had been right, there was life trapped in the stone. It was a perfect way to store what Thomas needed and yet draw no attention and risk no escape.
His stomach turned and the images collapsed as his consciousness shrunk back to his body in a vertigo-inducing rush. Oskar was back in his room. He dissolved the circle and swallowed, even though his stomach was still turning. It took a moment for him to get his body under control. What he’d seen wasn’t physical, but that didn’t make it less real. While severing the umbilical cord would instantly cut off Thomas’s power supply, Thomas wouldn’t die.
Oskar unfolded his legs and stretched. He’d spent hours drifting and absorbing what was around him and all he knew was that it was worse than he’d thought. How could he fight that much death magic when whole covens had tried and failed?
Chapter 5
Mylla’s hands fluttered to her throat, then fell away as she forgot what she was doing. Now that Oskar had told her she was wearing a necklace she could see it. A simple silver chain with a locket. It was cold against her skin. She stared harder at her reflection and reached for the necklace again; the moment before her fingers touched the metal it disappeared. What was she doing? She glanced down at the book she’d been reading in the bath. Written in the margin was today’s note.
I’m wearing a necklace that I forget about.
She picked up the pencil and added another line.
I can’t touch the necklace either.
If she couldn’t touch it, she couldn’t take it off.
I think it controls me.
Usually she liked these few hours before bed, but tonight her thoughts had been jumbled. She blamed Oskar. She’d made a note about him, too. But she couldn’t put a date there because she didn’t know what the date was. Instead she’d made a mark on her wall and added an ‘O’ so she would know how long he was here for. She would keep better track of things that happened.
Her reflection scowled. Then she made herself smile. Her face felt stiff and unused, as if it spent too long frozen in one expression. In the mirror, the scars on her arms were obvious. From well healed and white to the scabbed ones steal healing. She knew that he would cut her again. The marks on her wall told her that. She shivered.
She should get dressed, put away the book, and go to sleep.
Her fingers traced over the marks on her arms. They were definitely there, even if she did forget about them when she couldn’t see them. She forgot too much, and yet around Oskar her mind was freer. That moment when he’d touched her cheek she’d felt anticipation and desire ripple through her, and in that moment her thoughts had clarified for a heartbeat. Even now she could grasp things. Her notes made more sense. And she wanted to feel his touch and warmth again. She raised her hand to her face. She didn’t want to forget the look in his eyes, the heat and the way he saw her, not the face she was forced to wear. He saw beyond the…the magic.
She had written about magic in her book before, around the edges of Macbeth. Sometimes her notes read like the ramblings of a crazy woman who didn’t know her own mind. Those days she was lucky. The rest of the time it was as though she had no mind.
Mr. Quigley would speak to her tomorrow over breakfast, and she would forget most of this. He’d look at her and something would happen, like a door was clicking closed in her mind. She needed to find a way to keep it open—just a crack so he didn’t know. He couldn’t know.
But she needed to find the words to warn Oskar, and beg him to take her with him when he left. If he left.
She’d made one note about a man becoming a statue.
And she knew that would be Oskar’s fate if he stayed, as impossible as that sounded. She knew that was why she dreamed of blood and statues. Of screaming and crying. She gathered up her things and turned off the bathroom light, then padded down the corridor to her room. At the other end of the corridor was Mr. Quigley’s bedroom.
Images flickered but she squashed them. She didn’t want to think about him or his room and what happened in there. She wanted to dream of Oskar tonight. Maybe if she held onto thoughts of him she could hold onto her mind.
Bread and fruit had been left on the kitchen counter, so he’d eaten it assuming it was meant for him. Then he’d gone straight out into the garden. Not to look around, but to get started. He actually had to do some work or Thomas would wonder what he was up to. When Oskar opened the shed he hadn’t been disappointed. It was full of old things—saws and trimmers—and not a power tool in sight. After Thomas’s assertion that modern appliances were bad for humans, he’d figured he’d be doing actual manual labor.
Good thing he knew how to sharpen a blade. Admittedly, he was usually sharpening swords and knives, but the principle was the same. Considering everything looked as if it hadn’t been touched in about a decade—since the last gardener had joined the statues in the fruit tree grove—his first job would be seeing what was salvageable, what he could repair, and what he needed new.
He started by clearing the work bench of anything that he wasn’t going to use. His sole plan for the garden involved hacking back some of the overgrown bushes and pulling up what he thought were weeds. Fixing the pergola he could do, but he didn’t want to start out the back. He wanted more time to look at the magic before working near the statues.
But that hadn’t stopped him from having a quick look this morning, and doing a better count. There were fourteen. More than one a decade, but then Oskar’s records only went back to the sixties. Before then he had no idea what was going on. Maybe it had taken Thomas some time and experiments to work out what he was doing. Interestingly, there were no female statues. The only woman anywhere near the house was Mylla.
She’d been in his dreams, as had pulsing black hearts, rivers of blood, and the Morrigu reminding him that he owed Her a son. Yeah, he’d get right on that, after he’d gotten rid of the curse. She didn’t agree with his reasoning, and until he had a better offer or was desperate for help he wasn’t going to invoke Her again. The Quigleys weren’t Her favorites. But he’d expected more help since he was solving one of Her problems.
He’d heard there were worse Gods to serve and channel power through, but sometimes he wasn’t so sure. Not that he’d ever had a choice.
“You started early.”
It was all he could do not to jump and act startled at Thomas’s silent approach. This wasn’t the first time the man had snuck up on him, and Oskar couldn’t help but think it was a deliberate test. Was Thomas hoping to catch him doing something wrong or just trying to work out what Oskar’s limits were so Thomas would know how hard he’d have to fight and how much magic he’d need to trap him.
“I wanted to have a look at what you had, see if I needed to get
anything else.”
“And?” Thomas picked up a hack saw and examined the rusted blade.
Oskar’s heart did the dance of fear against his ribs as he projected calm and tried to look unrattled. A normal person wouldn’t be freaked out because they didn’t know about the tumor growing around the house and the living people encased in stone.
“As long as you have oil, a whetstone, and some files, I should be able to use most of this. No chance of a chainsaw?” He smiled and hoped it looked casual.
Thomas laughed. “I think my last gardener asked the same thing. No. Labor is good for the soul; modern tools have made the human mind and body lazy.” He ran the blade of the saw over the edge of the wooded workbench, almost absentmindedly. The blade grated and skipped over the wood, and Oskar noticed other notches along the edge. Perhaps this was part of Thomas’s routine and he did this every time, with every gardener. “Everything you need should be in the cupboard at the end. If you pile up all the cuttings down the back you can burn them.”
“I will.” That meant carting it all by wheelbarrow. Ordering a skip would be easier, but that would also mean having people come and drop it off and Thomas didn’t seem as though he liked people coming to his house. Oskar picked up a machete and examined the blade. He was hoping the dark stains were rust and not blood.
Thomas watched him and Oskar’s fingers loosened of their own accord. Shit. He tightened his grip on the handle and then placed the machete down as casually as he could. Thomas was playing with him, seeing how easily he was controlled. Like hypnotism, some people were more susceptible than others. Despite his training, he still felt the push. Thomas was a lot stronger than anyone thought. But then no one had imagined the statues constantly feeding him. Usually death magic was a quick sucking of life. Thomas had made it into something else far more terrifying. Just researching death magic and demon rituals was bad enough to give most witches nightmares—it had given him plenty over the years.
Even just seeing the after effects was bad. He didn’t want to see the actual spell casting or become part of it.
Thomas placed the hacksaw down. His face was unreadable. Was he disappointed or pleased Oskar wasn’t easily played? “Mylla will bring you morning tea; you may take lunch in the kitchen. I expect you to work until dusk. Again, dinner will be in the kitchen unless I invite you up upstairs.” He turned to go. “Good luck, Oskar.”
Oskar watched him leave, then glanced at the machete. He had no doubt that if he’d raised it against the witch it would have been him who ended up bleeding on the floor. That Thomas could influence him to any degree was a concern. He’d love to talk to Mason right now. He’d have some insight on what Oskar could do to strengthen his will without cluing Thomas into what he was.
He touched his wrist, missing the familiar jangle of raven bones. Neither his father nor grandfather had offered any hints on what to do, only piles of research on missing people, the house, and more questions about what was going on. Even the coven that had been wiped out had left nothing useful. Either they hadn’t written anything down or they hadn’t bothered to research. Oskar shook his head. He’d known what he was getting into, but there was a difference between dying for decades and dying fast and being welcomed by the Morrigu. He had a suspicion that She would let him become a statue as punishment for not giving Her a son.
Eighty-three days until his birthday. He needed a plan that wouldn’t fail. There would be no second chance with Thomas.
He slid into the easy rhythm of sharpening blades. Thomas hadn’t been lying when he’d said everything he’d need would be in the cupboard, but some of it looked new, put there for the next victim. He felt like he was sharpening the tools that would be used to kill him, but that was ridiculous as Thomas would use magic when the time came.
Footsteps made him look up from the saw he was working on, each tooth getting carefully sharpened. There was no point in making the manual labor harder than it had to be by having blunt tools. Not even Mylla carrying a tray of tea and cake could break through his dark thoughts.
The pulsing black web had become a tumor on his thoughts. The magic was living, spreading its fingers everywhere like blood vessels, only instead of supplying life it was taking it. When he looked at her, he saw the cocoon wrapped around her. Oskar almost dropped the file.
Thomas was feeding off Mylla.
That wasn’t paranoia or fear putting thoughts into his mind, that was his witch’s sense of magic and how it was being used. It took years of training to know the difference. How had he missed that? Because he’d been focusing on Thomas’s control of her and whether or not he could trust her, not looking at the bigger problem.
There was only one problem with that realization: it couldn’t work. Mylla was a living person; her soul was still in there even though it was smothered. If Thomas were truly draining her, she’d be dead. Oskar forced a smile. A new insight with no answers. He needed answers and the only person who could give them to him was magically mute. That was no coincidence.
Mylla walked in and placed the tray down. As soon as she’d done that, she lifted her gaze and looked around. Oskar watched her a little more closely. It was as though she’d completed the order and was free to do something else. Her gaze settled back on him and the flicker of life in her eyes was there for just a moment. Her lips curved and she inclined her head at the tea and cake.
“Thank you. I hadn’t realized so much time had passed.” It was easy to get lost in a maze with no exit, especially if he didn’t actually know what he was looking for. A key, a light and exit sign? A clue.
She smiled and bobbed her head again as if she wanted him to drink the tea.
“I’m not really into tea. Don’t suppose there’s any coffee?”
Mylla shook her head and frowned. Then she picked up the tea pot and poured him a cup of tea. The smile had left her lips and this time when she glanced around she was acting more like a nervous deer, as if she were afraid of getting caught.
“Are you going to get into trouble for talking to me while I have morning tea?”
This time she appeared to concentrate for a moment and then she mouthed no.
It was the first time he’d seen her even try to make a word. He looked around for paper but found none. She pulled some from her apron pocket and he grinned.
“So you can stay if I drink the tea…or you have to take the tray back?”
She wrote on the paper in small round letters like a child would make. You bring back at lunch.
“You aren’t supposed to be here.”
This time she just shook her head.
“If he knew you were communicating with me, you’d be in trouble.”
A nod. She was obviously only going to use the paper for big things. But if she would get into trouble, why was she taking the risk? As much as he wanted to listen to the fear that was warning him she was bait, something wasn’t right. She wasn’t an equal partner in the magic, she was bound up like a victim. A victim to be saved. How many others had tried to help her? Did she realize she was being used as lure?
“Will you tell him what we talk about?”
Her mouth opened and her eyes widened. Then she scribbled on the paper. You know I can talk?
Fuck, he’d let that slip, and he shouldn’t have. Yet he couldn’t lie, or could he? While he debated the implications, she pleaded silently. The look in her eyes was one of pure desperation to be understood. Ah, hell. He nodded.
She smiled and placed a hand over her heart, then put her arms around him for a second before stepping back. That was interesting. Either the living doll was an act or out here away from Thomas and the house she was freer.
But they weren’t questions he could ask her without giving away how much he did know. He picked up the teacup and took a sip, then saw the slip of paper on the tray. His heart gave a solid thump as he looked at it. She’d wanted him to find it while she was here. He reached out and picked it up, then unfolded the scrap. It had been torn out of
a book like the other piece she was writing on. The page number was at the top, and the occasional letter marked the ragged edge.
One word in her handwriting. Beware.
Oskar swallowed and put the cup of tea down on the workbench.
He didn’t know whether to read it as an honest warning or if Thomas was setting him up. He glanced up at Mylla. She watched him, waiting for him to react. He looked at the note, then folded it up and put it in his pocket.
“And what is it I should beware of?”
Mylla huffed out a breath and stared at him, how could he not get it? Did he not realize Mr. Quigley was up to something? Did he not feel the…the coldness of the house? If he knew she could talk, did he not wonder why she wasn’t talking and she writing on bits of paper she’d torn out of her book?
How did she put that down on paper?
Oskar looked at her, his stare unwavering. His brown eyes dark and clear. The clouding of her mind seemed to lift when he did that, and the warmth travelled through her body and all the way to her toes. She didn’t want to go back into the house; she didn’t have a choice. If she didn’t go soon, she’d feel the tug and Mr. Quigley would order her to return. If he thought she was wasting time out here, he’d give her a direct order not to spend time with Oskar—at least Mr. Quigley didn’t know she was talking to Oskar.
She wrote on the paper. I can’t stay. Mr. Q… She paused, what could she write? …expects me in the house. Be careful.
She wanted to write about witchcraft and devils. Of the blood and knives and statues that filled her dreams, but it would take more than a few stolen moments. And if he didn’t get the warning, there was nothing she could do. How many others had she warned? What if she’d warned them all and they’d all ignored her?
Mylla pressed the paper into his hand. Her hand against his for a moment. His touch was warm, but she hadn’t realized she’d been cold.