Witch & Curse (43 page)

“I can't be patient. Jer might not have that long,” Holly said quietly.

She turned and left the room. There was no more sense in arguing.

Both had made up their minds.

“You can't leave me alone here!” Amanda yelled at her. “He'll kill us, Holly! He's just using you!”

Stricken, Holly hurried to her room, slammed the door, picked up a vase on her nightstand, and hurled it across the room.

Tommy
.

Amanda grabbed her purse and stomped out the front door, answering Holly's slam and her crash—
bitch probably broke that vase. That's okay; it was ugly any-way
—and had swung her leg into the station wagon when she realized that her father was still upstairs in his stupor or whatever.

Holly can deal with him
, she decided.

She had demon-dialed Tommy's number as she backed out of the driveway; it was ringing, and she flooded with relief when he picked up.

“Hello?”

“It's me,” she said, “and it's all so crazy.” She started to cry. “Tommy, I'm so scared and I hate this and she's talking about splitting on us and—”

“Half Caffe,” he cut in. “I'd suggest you come here, but the 'rents are having some kind of Democratic
fundraiser and there's no privacy. Rich knee-jerk liberals are laying their fur coats on my bed and telling me to vote for the Clean Water Bill.”

Despite her mood, she smiled. Tommy Nagai had been her best friend all her life. Through thickest and thinnest, he had watched her back. She felt bad that they had started to drift a bit, now that magic took up so much of their lives.

“I know it's dicey to show in public,” he continued, “but we've warded the Half Caffe pretty well, don't you think? And since Eli and Jer are both out of the picture, I'm thinking it's pretty safe. Michael's too old to know about it, unless the guys mentioned it. And my take on that family is they didn't sit around the dinner table saying, ‘Would you like to hear about my exciting and fun-packed day?' ”

It felt good, normal even, to listen to his banter and know that once again he was going to be a prince for her.

“I'll be there,” she told him.

“Can't wait, Amanda,” he replied.

Amanda
.

Tommy gave his hair a brush in the men's room of the Half Caffe. He looked okay . . . for him, and if you liked Asian Americans, he was way ahead. He had
excused himself from his parents' party by pointing out a window and observing to a clump of guests that since it had begun raining, there was plenty of clean water, at least for today, and his work there was done. The guests had chuckled appreciatively.

Tommy knew how to work a room.

And I think this room's clean
, he thought, as he meandered back into the din that was the main hangout of Seattle's young crowd. It was a coffeehouse, decorated with oversized marble statues, murals of forests, and a balcony from which he and Amanda had spied on many of their high school friends and enemies. Their first year of college was pretty much blown, thanks to Michael Deveraux; only Tommy had managed to keep his grades going, and that had been because it was easier to do that than to deal with the parental pressure that would have resulted if they had fallen off.

He climbed the stairs to the balcony and found a table
a deux
—a section of a plaster column topped by a glass circle. The rain had made the interior gloomy, so the staff had set votive candles in little pumpkins on each table. Nearly everyone in the place had on some little bit of Halloween gear—skeleton earrings, splatter T-shirts—and Tommy felt a pang for the old days, when he and Amanda were social outcasts, Nicole was
an insufferable snob, and he had wanted to shake Amanda and say to her, “I want you to be my honey, Amanda, not my best bud.”

Ah, youth
.

His waiter, costumed as Count Dracula, stalked him until he ordered stuff he knew Amanda would like: chai tea latte and a cinnamon roll. Then the waiter was happy, plopped down a couple of waters, and left Tommy to wait for Amanda.

And there she is
.

She rushed in, looking nervous, closing up her umbrella as she shook an errant raindrop or two from her curly, light brown hair. She hadn't been cutting it as much—no time, when warlocks are trying to kill you—and he liked the softness around her face.

She saw him, waved, and came up the stairs. They hugged, because they always did, but this time Tommy held her for a few beats longer.

She started sniffling against his shoulder. Alarmed, he drew away, then realized she wanted him to stay put; he put his arms around her, soothed her, saying, “Shh, shh, I bought you a roll.”

She giggled softly and went to her chair.

He was sorry about that, but he took his own and raised his brows, ready to listen.

“She wants to split. She had this dream. Jer's on an
island and she wants to go to him,” Amanda said in a rush.

“An island,” he repeated.

She rolled her eyes. “In England, or somewhere near England.”

“Ah.” He folded his arms. “Because there are so few there. Just the Orkneys, and, oh, tiny Britain itself, and—”

“And we've got warlocks trying to kill us and all she can think about is her one true love, who is also a warlock.”

“Movies these days,” he said smoothly, as the waiter brought over the tea chai latte's and the roll.

“Yeah,” she replied, getting it.

They waited while their things were placed on the table. Then Amanda sat back in her chair and sighed heavily.

“This dream,” he ventured.

“He's locked up. Or something. I don't know. She can't leave us here by ourselves. We'll be massacred.”

He agreed, but he didn't say anything. He just let her talk.

“It's not fair, it's not right, and I think we should tell her she can't go. She's our High Priestess, for god's sake!”

“In the same movie,” he continued, as the waiter
came by again to refill their water glasses.

To his surprise, Amanda guffawed. She pounced on his left hand, which was lying innocently on the table, and said, “Oh, Tommy, I just love you!”

His heart skipped a beat.
Oh, if only you did
, he told her silently.
Amanda, a truer heart has never pumped oxygenated blood cells
.. . .

He picked up his cup and said, “We should hold a circle. Talk to her. You're right; she can't act as if she's not part of a greater whole. We're already all pissed off at Nicole.”

She released his hand and he was very sorry about that. But her eyes had a new shiny quality to them, as if she were looking at him a little differently, and he dared hope . . .

... as he had been hoping for over ten years . . .

“You're right. We should hold a circle. Oh, Tommy, what would I do without you?” she chirruped.

He smiled gently at her. “Let's don't find out.”

Her lips bowed upward; her cheeks got rosy, and yes, there was definitely something new in her eyes.

“Let's don't,” she agreed.

Michael: Seattle, October

It was Samhain—Halloween—and upstairs the doorbell kept ringing. Michael knew the trick-or-treaters were
confused and disappointed; the Deveraux house was usually one of the best places to go. Intent upon maintaining good ties with the community, his treats were always very lavish.

This year, he had better things to do on the night of one of Coventry's major sabbats.

Now in the black heart of his home—the chamber of spells—he had donned his special Samhain robe, decorated with red leering pumpkins, green leaves, and blood droplets and brought out special ritual arcane: green-black candles in which swirled human blood; a ritual bowl cut from the skull of a witch hanged at Salem; even a special athame, presented to him by his father the first time he had raised one of the dead.

Observing the preparations, the imp sat and stared, as imps will—impishly—at Michael. Michael took a deep breath, forcing himself to be calm and centered before the ritual. Excitement was rippling through him though. Through throwing the runes and reading the entrails of several small sacrifices, he had verified the truth of the curse of the Cahors. Their loved ones usually died by drowning.

He had a wonderful new way to strike out at the Cahors.

Chanting in Latin, he reached into a tank of water and pulled a baby shark out by the tail. He held the
gasping creature above the altar and raised his knife in his other hand. “Oh, horned god, accept this my sacrifice. Raise up all the demons and creatures of the sea that they might aid me in destroying the Cahors family.”

He stabbed the squirming shark and let its blood drip onto some dried coriander and bitter root on the altar. When the creature at last stopped squirming he dropped the body upon the altar as well. He picked up a candle and set the herbs on fire; in moments the body of the shark ignited and began to burn.

Michael leaned forward to breathe in the smoke. The stench was terrible, but the feeling of power was almost overwhelming. He closed his eyes. “Let the creatures of the sea hear my voice and obey me. Kill the witches. Kill every last Cahors.

“Let all the demons harken to my cry. Today the Cahors witches must die.
Emergo, volito, perficio, meum, nutum!”

In the smoke above the altar, images slowly appeared, snapping into clarity . . . and into reality. Off the coast, sharks cast back and forth as though catching a scent of blood in the water. They worked themselves into a frenzy as they moved closer and closer toward the shore.

Farther out to sea the ocean began to boil. Dead
fish bobbed and floated to the surface, cooked completely through in an instant. The waters roiled, and slowly from the depths of the ocean something stirred, awakening.

It groped its way from its watery grave, hungry, searching. Blind from having lived so long in the blackness at the bottom of the ocean, it could still sense movement near it. Every living thing fled before it in terror. It opened its mouth to expose hideous teeth, jagged and each nearly a foot long.

Spiny scales covered its eel-like head as it cast this way and that searching for its prey. Slowly its serpent body unfurled itself and its powerful legs began to thrash. Long toes with wicked nails slashed through the water as it made its way to the surface, killing everything in its path.

Only the water sprites who sailed through the water like silent ghosts did not run from it. Instead they laughed soundlessly and spiraled around it.

“On this Halloween night, a killer whale has tipped over a small fishing boat. Witnesses who were on a nearby vessel saw the beast ram into the boat hard enough to flip it. The two men inside the boat disappeared and it is not known whether they drowned or were killed. In other news . . .”

Holly turned off the car radio.

She pulled up to the cliff from where she liked to stare out at the ocean and stopped the car. She got out, still squinting. Driving had been a trick with the enhanced vision, but she thought it was maybe starting to fade.

That would be a distinct relief
.

She sighed as she strode to the edge of the cliff and looked out at the waves. Something wasn't right. There was a dark spot not that far from shore; she frowned and strained her superpower eyes, trying to see what it was. A fin broke the surface of the water on the edge of the spot; then another and another until she saw ten of them: sharks.

They were diving in and out of the spot; with a shudder Holly realized that it must be blood. They had killed something, and from the looks of it, it was large. She watched the ocean predators circling and diving, and though she felt afraid and somewhat repulsed, she couldn't force herself to look away.

At last the activity began to die down and the sharks turned in a pack and begin swimming up the coast. The spot remained behind, not breaking up on the water, like a shadow.

Her cell phone rang and she jumped. Her hand was shaking slightly as she pulled the phone from her purse.

“Yeah?”

It was Amanda. Holly half-listened to her cousin as she watched the fins slowly disappear in the distance. The coven was meeting to discuss her desire to rescue Jer.

“All right,” she said coolly. She felt defensive.
They have no right to keep me from going if that's what I have to do
.

“We're going to meet on the Port Townsend ferry,” Amanda continued. Port Townsend was a beautiful enclave of old Victorian homes on an island across the bay.

“Ferry?” Holly asked, the word piercing through the thoughts in her head. “But, Amanda . . .”

“Tante Cecile has said protection spells. She also says it's the only place we can discuss this privately.
He
has spies everywhere.”

“But—”

“Just do it, Holly,” Amanda snapped.

Amanda hung up.

“It's not safe,” Holly murmured to the dial tone. “I know it's not safe.”

As Holly turned and walked back to her car, Michael stared into his scrying stone and smiled.

Seated beside him in Michael's chamber of spells, the imp's grin broadened. He opened his mouth and
spoke in a perfect imitation of Amanda's voice, “ ‘Just do it, Holly.' ”

Michael laughed. “Now do Tante Cecile.”

“ ‘You'll be safest on the ferry, Amanda,' ” he mimicked.

“That's great. That's perfect.” He patted the creature on its back.

Part Two
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