Always a Witch (16 page)

Isobel makes a startled sound of protest, but he only repeats, "Bury me here and build the altar over me. Perhaps we will come here." Then he smiles at me. "Again."

Twenty-Three

THE SOUND OF SILVIUS'S
howling seems to ring through the Greenes' house even though Isobel and her wolf have fled to the woods. An hour ago gabriel, Isobel, and I Traveled back. But before doing that, in my time we buried Thom in the meadow behind the ruined hulk of what had once been my family's house. It had taken the better part of three hours to finally hack a deep enough hole in the semi-frozen ground and place Thom's body in it. And all the while, Isobel hadn't made a single sound, but the tears had run freely down her cheeks as the three of us stood over the makeshift grave. Finally, she joined hands with the both of us and led us in the traditional prayer for a soul's release, and if the harmony of our three voices seemed weak and thin under the rising wind, she didn't protest. Then, with our hands still locked, gabriel had taken us back to 1887 to Isobel's home. In that front room where we first met Cera, her brothers, and Thom, we explained what had happened at the Knight house to Cera, Philben, and Phineaus. And then with a single glance between them, Philben and Phineaus had gone to summon the rest of the Greene family home to keep them safe. Isobel had left the room abruptly, her fingers wound tightly in Silvius's fur, while Cera, Gabriel, and I sat in silence as the firelight shifted and dimmed into darkness.

Finally, Cera stirs, crosses to the side table, and begins to fiddle with the wick on an oil lamp. Under her fingers, the light from the lamp begins to grow and cast golden shadows across the plain white walls. Only then does she turn to face us again, and it's then that I can see her eyes are swollen. With a pang, I recall Thom's Talent to bring light or darkness to any room.

Another mournful howl echoes from the woods. Right about now I feel like pressing my hands over my ears and screaming, too.

But instead I pick and choose among the hundred questions that are jostling for first place. "Do you believe us now?" I whisper.

Cera seems to be holding herself very still, as if she's afraid she's going to break into a hundred pieces. But she manages to nod. "It was never a question of believing you or not believing you," Cera says finally. The flames in the oil lamp seem to quiver in response.

Could have fooled me.
But I decide not to say this out loud, and Cera continues.

"It was a question of how to respond to your warning."

I take a breath. All at once her eyes flood with tears and guilt twists across her face, so I bite down on whatever I was going to say.

"He knew what was coming and he still let it happen. In fact, he went out and met it deliberately." Her mouth twists downward. "What's the good of being able to read the future if you can't prevent anything like this?" she whispers, her words stirring the still air of the room.

Hesitantly, I say, "He told me that dying is never a choice."

Cera removes her hand, blinks at me. I can't tell if this is any comfort to her or not. She shakes her head, then says in a stronger voice, "Now we have to make sure that he didn't die in vain. And that he's not buried ... there ... alone. Forever."

I nod. "We need to make the Domani. We need ... needed the clock that I told you about. The one hanging in the Knight house. But Alistair, I think he already had them destroy it."

I turn to Gabriel. "Can you find it at all?"

He closes his eyes briefly, then shakes his head. "It's gone."

I shiver. The skin under his eyes has taken on a darker tinge. It's the night of the second day. He doesn't have much time left.
Think, think, think.
"The Domani," I repeat doggedly, hoping some flash of an idea will come to me. "We need to make sure that it's done differently this time. Last time it was ... an imperfect solution, as my grandmother put it."

"Blood," says a voice, and all three of us jump. Isobel is standing in the door. In the lantern light, her face is all hard planes and angles. Silvius stands at her side, watching all of us with narrow golden eyes.

"We'll make certain it's done right. The Knights are not the only ones who understand the power of blood spells."

"Isobel," Cera murmurs, but the younger woman's face is resolute.

"
I don't care.
After what that man did ... to Grandfather. I don't care how much of their blood we spill." She buries long white fingers in the fur at Silvius's neck.

"We are not going to spill blood," Cera says sharply. "That is not what we—"

"Oh, but we will," Isobel says softly. Then she straightens up, opens her mouth, and says in a singsong, eerie voice, "One stood for North and one stood for South. One stood for East, and one stood for West. And one stood Center. North summoned Air, and South carried Water, East called Fire, and West brought Earth." She pauses. "And the Center offered blood. And all bound together."

I feel a chill break out across my arms as the words of the Domani spell spill forth from her lips.

"I read it," Isobel says. "For the first time tonight, it appeared in the book." White lines bracket her mouth as if she's clenching her back teeth to keep from screaming. "The fifth element. It's the only way."

Alarm bells are clanging through me. "It's not," I whisper. "It doesn't work. In my time, the Knights rise again.
An imperfect solution at best,
" I remind her, as if my grandmother's words will carry weight. But Isobel doesn't even look at me.

Cera's face is troubled. "We have never, never taken our Talents into that realm," she whispers.

"We have never had a need to.
Before,
" Isobel says.

"Let's say we do need this clock, then," Cera begins. "Just how are we going to get it? It's gone. Are you proposing that we just walk in there and ask for it nicely?"

Gabriel shifts, clears his throat. "I've been thinking about that. In our time, Alistair said something about losing it in a card game. What if I Traveled back to an even earlier time and—"

"It won't work," I say instantly. "Liam knows who you are anyway."

Gabriel pauses, raises one eyebrow at me, then continues. "As I just said, I could Travel back
before
this all happened and somehow—"

"No! Don't you see? Liam got you once already. That's how he was able to come to the future, to our time. Don't you remember when he said, 'Don't be angry with your young man. He put up a good fight'?"

Gabriel snorts, but I speak over him. "And please don't say something stupid about how you could take him in a fight and—"

"Well, it's so obvious, so I don't need to say it—"

"Don't be such an idiot. How much more can you Travel anyway, Gabriel?
You're dying.
"

Gabriel opens his mouth once, then closes it again. He locks his hands together and stares down at them.

"It's not a clock, anyway," Isobel breaks in. "It's a small timepiece. Nothing like a wall clock as far as I can understand. The gift of time freely given. That's what the book said."

"Given freely?" Gabriel interjects. He frowns. "That would have been good to know before we tried to
steal
the damn clock."

But Isobel ignores him. Her gaze sharpens like a knife on me. "And according to the book, you have it."

I blink at her. "Me? I don't have anything like that. I—" I shift in my seat and it's only then that I feel a small pinprick against my thigh.

Jessica's cameo pin. That happens to be a little watch. That she gave me. Freely. Slowly, I reach into my pocket and curl my fingers around the watch. Its steady ticking is like a heartbeat.

Isobel's stare is bright and burning with triumph.

"Okay, so you have the timepiece, but how are you going to get one of the Knights? La Spider and Liam will be on their guard, and—"

"It's not La Spider or Liam," Isobel interjects, stroking Silvius's fur. "It's Jessica. I read that much in the book.
The daughter's blood sacrifice will bind the spell.
"

My fingers clench around the cameo pin. "No. Not Jessica. She's the only one who..."

"Who what?" Cera asks curiously. Her face is troubled.

"Who seems to have a heart," I finish, even though I don't know if that's true. She did let Livie die, after all. Still, I try again. "Making Jessica the sacrifice isn't going to work—"

Isobel turns her head. "Enough. We're doing what you wanted us to do."

"But you're not," I say, trying not to let my voice quaver. "This isn't what's supposed to happen at all. Or actually, it
is
what's supposed to happen and then it all unravels somehow in the future."

"Then what's the right answer?" Cera asks quietly, turning to face me.

"It has to be her. And it has to be tomorrow night. Samhain." Isobel's voice is flinty hard. Cera draws in a breath, nods slowly.

"Tomorrow night? How are you going to get Jessica then? You know La Spider won't let her leave the house, and—" My words grind to a halt.

"What is it?" Isobel asks, and the way she turns her face so sharply and regards me with those unblinking eyes makes me shiver. "You know a way to get her out of the house, don't you? Don't you?"

I shake my head.

"You said yourself that he's dying," Isobel explodes suddenly, flinging out one arm toward Gabriel. Silvius whimpers once, sits, then comes to his feet again. He bumps his nose against Isobel's hand, but she ignores him. "We're all going to die soon enough if you don't act. If you know a way to get her out of the house, then say it."

A terrible choice, Thom told me. Either help to kill someone or do nothing and know that everyone you love will die. Glancing once at Gabriel, I realize it's not a choice at all.

"Her music tutor. Before Gabriel. She's in love with him. If you send a message to her saying that he needs to see her, she'll sneak out of the house. She'll come for him."

I close my eyes so I don't have to see the triumph blazing across Isobel's face.

"Nothing yet?"

Gabriel looks at me, the firelight flickering over his wan features.

"I'm sorry," I murmur, lacing my fingers through his. His hand feels cold. "Don't try again."

But he's shaking his head. "It's okay," he whispers. "I just did. Nothing. I still can't find anyone." He closes his eyes again and seems to go into a half-sleeping trance. I swallow, refrain from asking any more questions. I had spent the previous night awake, watching him sleep, reassuring myself that as long as I could hear him still breathing, everything would be okay. That there was still a chance to get him out of this mess alive.

Now I pull my knees in tight to my chest. It's the night of Samhain. A full moon presides over a clear sky filled with thousands of stars. A little over an hour ago, Philben and Phineaus had driven off together in the family carriage to the meeting point where they planned to steal Jessica. I refused to go. Not that anyone had asked me to.

The library door creaks open and Isobel emerges, followed by Cera. The older woman's face is pale, and the lines bracketing her mouth deepen as I stare at her. But it's Isobel who speaks. "The spell is ready. All it needs is the blood of a Knight."

Cera draws in a breath and I steal a sideways glance at her, but she remains silent.

"I'll go ahead," Isobel says to Cera. "To prepare the altar." And she slips away without looking at me. Motioning toward Gabriel, who still has his eyes closed, I rise from the leather chair where I've been sitting and cross the room toward Cera and the fireplace. Fixing my eyes on a bunch of herbs drying over the mantelpiece, I whisper, "Tell me again how this is supposed to work."

Cera sighs, holds out her hands to the blaze, and rubs them together slowly. "You really don't understand spells, do you?"

I shrug. "I wasn't exactly taught them when I was growing up." I had explained as much of my history to her as I was able to.

"Yes, well, I imagine when you and your young man go back, you'll find that all that will have changed."

This is a sidetracking thought, but I let myself go there. Everything will be different. I'll have always known about my Talent. No one will have kept it from me. Maybe I'll never feel the need to escape Hedgerow and go to boarding school in Manhattan. Maybe I'll never get to meet Agatha. Then I shake my head—as of right now, there's nothing to go back to.

"As you do know, our power comes from the elements."

"Earth, Air, Water, Fire," I quote.

"Yes," Cera agrees. "But Blood and Time are also considered elements. Those we rarely touch or call upon. They can be ... dangerous. They can so easily spiral out of control."

"But the Knights aren't afraid of that."

Her mouth twists downward. "Clearly not." Reaching up, she tugs the bunch of herbs free and begins shredding them between her fingers. A spicy-sweet smell rises from the torn leaves. "If we call all six elements down at once with the blood of one of their own, we think we can ... change or seal their power away." With a flick of her fingers she tosses some of the leaves into the fire. The flames burn green for a few seconds.

"With the blood of one of their own..." I echo softly.

"It has to be," Cera says quietly. "Their blood will bind the spell. Blood calls to blood. Everyone who shares the sacrifice's blood will be affected. Their Talents will be bound up in the Domani and they will never be able to use them again." She hands me a branch of the herb. "Heartsease," she murmurs. "Good for a troubled mind."

Shivering, I trace my finger through the green sap that oozes from the torn leaves. So, they'll be ordinary. Just like ... Talentless people. Something I've assumed about myself for so many years. Only the Knights wouldn't have years to get used to that reality. They'll have mere seconds. "Would you have done something like this if Thom hadn't died?" I ask.

Cera shrugs, rubbing her fingers down her dress as if to clean them of the sap. "It's not likely," she says at last.

I try to keep my voice even. "Even though they're killing people? People without Talents, but people all the same—"

"I know that," Cera says flatly. "But those people have nothing to do with us."

"But, why? They're still—"