The commercial cut in, the volume jarring me as I sat on the couch. Sighing, I pulled my knees to my chin and hugged my legs. It was early, just after two in the morning, and I was trying to find the gumption to go make something to eat. Ivy was still on her run, and even with the awkward conversation in the car, I was hoping she'd be home early enough so we could go out. Warming up a potpie and eating alone had all the appeal of pulling the skin off my shins.
Grabbing the remote, I muted the TV. This was depressing. I was sitting on the couch on a Friday night watching Die Hard, alone. Nick should have been there with me. I missed him. I think I missed him. I missed something. Maybe I just missed being held. Was I that shallow?
Tossing the remote down, I realized a voice was coming from the front of the church. I sat up; it was a man's voice. Alarmed, I tapped the line out back. Between one breath and the next, my center filled. With the force of the line running through me, I gathered myself to rise, only to sink down when Jenks flew into the room at head height. The soft hum of his wings told me in an instant that whatever was up front wasn't going to kill me or put money in my pocket.
Eyes wide, he landed on the lampshade. The dust sifting from him floated upward with the rising heat of the bulb. He was usually tucked in my desk asleep at this hour, which was why I was having my pity party now so I could sulk without interference. "Hey, Jenks," I said as I let go of the line and the unfocused magic left me. "Who's here?"
His face became worried. "Rachel, we might have a problem."
I eyed him sourly. I was sitting alone watching Die Hard. That was a problem, not whatever had come waltzing in our door. "Who is it?" I said flatly. "I already ran off the Jehovah Witnesses. You would think living in a church, they might get the idea, but no-o-o-o."
Jenks frowned. "Some Were in a cowboy hat. He wants me to sign a paper saying I ate that fish we stole for the Howlers."
"David?" I jerked out of the chair and headed for the sanctuary.
Jenks's wings were a harsh buzz as he flew beside me. "Who's David?"
"An insurance adjustor." My brow furrowed. "I met him yesterday."
Sure enough, David was sanding in the middle of the empty room, looking uncomfortable in his long coat and hat pulled down over his eyes. Pixy children were watching from under the crack of the rolltop desk, their pretty faces all lined up in a row. He was on a cell phone, and upon seeing me, he muttered a few words, closed the cover, and tucked it away.
"Hello, Rachel," he said, cringing as his voice echoed. His eyes ran over my casual jeans and red sweater, and then went to the ceiling as he shifted from foot to foot. It was obvious he wasn't comfortable in the church, like most Weres, but it was psychological not biological.
"I'm sorry to bother you," he said as he took off his hat and crushed it in a tight grip. "But hearsay won't stand up in this case. I need your partner to verify he ate that wishing fish."
"Holy crap! It was a wishing fish!" There was a chorus of shrill cries from the desk. Jenks made a harsh sound, and the faces lining the crack scattered back into the shadows.
David took a trifolded paper from a pocket of his duster and unfolded it atop Ivy's piano. "If you could sign here?" he said, then straightened, his eyes suspicious. "You did eat it?"
Jenks looked scared, his wings a blue so dark they were almost purple. "Yeah. We ate it. Are we going to be all right?"
I tried to hide my smile, but David grinned, his teeth looking white in the dim light of the sanctuary. "I think you'll be fine, Mr. Jenks," he said, clicking open a pen and holding it out.
My eyebrows rose. David hesitated, looking from the pen to the pixy. The pen was the larger of the two. "Ummm," he said, shifting on his feet.
"I've got it." Jenks zipped to the desk, returning with a pencil lead. I watched him carefully write his name, the ultrasonic chatter from the desk making my eyes hurt. Jenks rose, pixy dust sifting from him. "Hey, uh, we aren't in any trouble, are we?"
The pungent scent of ink assailed me, and David looked up from notarizing it. "Not from our end of things. Thank you, Mr. Jenks." He looked at me. "Rachel."
A soft rattling of the windows from an air-pressure shift brought both our heads up. Someone had opened the back door to the church. "Rachel?" came a high voice, and I blinked.
It was my mom? Bewildered, I looked at David. "Ah, it's my mom. Maybe you ought to go. Unless you want her to bully you into taking me on a date."
David's face went startled as he tucked the paper away. "No. I'm done. Thanks. I probably should have called first, but it is normal business hours."
My face warmed. I had just added ten thousand to my bank account, courtesy of Quen and his "little problem." I could sit on my butt and sulk for one night if I wanted. And I wasn't going to prep the charms I'd be using on said run tonight. Spelling after midnight under a waning moon was asking for trouble. Besides, how I arranged my day was not his business.
Bothered, I looked at the back of the church, not wanting to be rude but not wanting my mom to play twenty questions with David, either. "I'll be right there, Mom!" I shouted, then turned to Jenks. "Will you see him out for me?"
"Sure thing, Rache." Jenks rose up to head height to accompany David into the foyer.
"'Bye, David," I said, and he gave me a raised-hand good-bye and put his hat on.
Why does it all happen at once? I thought, hustling to the kitchen. My mom visiting unannounced would top off an already perfect day. Tired, I entered the kitchen to find her with her head in my fridge. From the sanctuary came the boom of the front door closing.
"Mom," I said, trying to keep my voice pleasant. "It's great to see you. But it's business hours." My thoughts went to my bathroom, wondering if my undies were still atop the dryer.
Smiling, she straightened, peeking at me from around the door of the fridge. She was wearing sunglasses, and they looked really odd with her straw hat and sundress. Sundress? She was in a sundress? It was below twenty out there.
"Rachel!" Smiling, she shut the door and opened her arms. "Give me a hug, honey."
Thoughts whirling, I absently returned her embrace. Maybe I should call her psychologist and make sure she was still making her appointments. An odd smell clung to her, and as I pulled away, I said, "What is that you're wearing? It smells like burnt amber."
"That's because it is, love."
Shocked, my eyes went to her face. Her voice had dropped several octaves. Adrenaline shook me. I jerked back, only to find a white-gloved hand gripping my shoulder. I froze, unable to move as a ripple of ever-after cascaded over her, revealing Algaliarept. Oh, crap. I was dead.
"Good evening, familiar," the demon said, smiling to show me flat blocky teeth. "Let's find a ley line and get you home, hmm?"
"Jenks!" I shrieked, hearing my voice harsh with terror. Leaning back, I swung my foot up, kicking him square in the 'nads.
Al grunted, his red, goat-slitted eyes widening. "Bitch," he said, reaching down and grabbing my ankle.
Gasping, I went down as he yanked me onto my butt. I hit with a thump, panicking. As I kicked ineffectively at him, he dragged me out of the kitchen and into the hall.
"Rachel!" Jenks shrilled, black pixy dust sifting from him.
"Get me a charm!" I shouted as I grabbed the archway and hung on. Oh God. He had me. If he got me to a line, he could physically drag me to the ever-after, me saying no or not.
Arms tensing, I fought to hold onto the wall long enough for Jenks to open my charm cupboard and grab one. I didn't need a finger stick; my lip was already bleeding from the fall.
"Here," Jenks cried, hovering at ankle height to look me right in the eye. He had the cord to a sleep charm in his grip. His eyes were frightened and his wings were red.
"Don't think so, witch," Al said, giving me a jerk.
Pain sliced through my shoulder, and my grip was torn away. "Rachel!" Jenks exclaimed as my fingernails scraped the hardwood floor and then the carpet in the living room.
Al muttered Latin, and I cried out as an explosion blew the back door off its hinges.
"Jenks! Get out! Get your kids safe!" I shouted when cold air raced in to replace the air the explosion had blown out. Dogs barked as I slid down the stairs on my stomach. Snow, ice, and rock salt scraped my middle and my chin. I stared up at the shattered doorframe as David's silhouette showed black against the light. I held my hand out for the charm Jenks had dropped. "The charm!" I screamed when he clearly had no idea what I wanted. "Throw me the charm!"
Al came to a halt. His English riding boots making prints on the unshoveled walk, he turned. "Detrudo," he said, clearly a trigger word for a curse imprinted on his memory.
I gasped as a black and red shadow of ever-after struck David, throwing him into the far wall and out of my sight. "David!" I called as Al started dragging me again.
Wiggling, I twisted so I was on my butt and not my stomach. I cut a small swath through the snow behind Al as he pulled me kicking to the wooden gate at the front of the garden that led to the street. Al couldn't use the ley line in the graveyard to drag me into the ever-after, as it was entirely encircled by holy ground that he couldn't cross. The nearest ley line I knew about was eight blocks away. I had a chance, I thought, the cold snow soaking my jeans.
"Let go!" I demanded, kicking the back of Al's knees with my one free foot.
His leg buckled and he stopped, his irate look clear in the light from the streetlamp. He couldn't turn misty to avoid the strikes since I would be able to slip his grip. "What a canicula you are," he said, taking both ankles with one hand and continuing.
"I don't want to go!" I shouted, grabbing onto the edges of the gate as we passed through it. We jerked to a stop, and Al sighed.
"Let go of the fence," he said, sounding tired.
"No!" My muscles started to shake as I fought to keep unmoving while Al pulled. I had only one ley line charm imprinted on my subconscious, but trapping Al and me in a circle would get me nowhere. He could break it as easily as I, now that his aura would be tainting it.
A cry slipped from me when Al gave up trying to drag me through the gate and he picked me up and threw me over his shoulder. My breath exploded out of me as his muscle-hard shoulder cut into my middle. He stank of burnt amber, and I fought to get free.
"This would be a lot easier," he said as I jabbed my elbows between his shoulder blades to no effect, "if you would accept that I have you. Just say you'll come willingly, and I can pop us into a line from here and it will save you a lot of embarrassment."
"I'm not worried about embarrassment!" I stretched to reach a passing limb of a tree, my breath coming out in relief as I snagged one. Al jerked back, pulled off balance.
"Oh, look," he said as he yanked me free and my palms came away scraped and bleeding. "Your wolfie friend wants to play."
David, I thought, twisting to see past Al's shoulder. As I struggled to breathe, I saw a huge shadow standing at the center of the lamp-lit, snow-packed street. My mouth dropped. He had Wered. He had Wered in less than three minutes. God, that must have hurt.
And he was huge, having retained his entire human mass. His head would come to my shoulder, I'd guess. Black silky fur, more like hair, shifted in the cold wind. His ears were flat against his head, and an impossibly low warning growl came from him. Feet the size of my spread hands dug into the snow as he barred our way. He gave an indescribably deep warning bark, and Al chuckled. Lights were coming on in adjacent houses and curtains were being peeked around. "She's legally mine," Al said lightly. "I'm carting her home. Don't even try."
Al started down the street, leaving me torn between screaming for help and admitting I was a gonner. A car was coming, its lights throwing everything into stark relief. "Good, doggie," Al muttered as we passed David with a good ten feet between us. Looking harsh in the light from the headlamps, David bowed his head, and I wondered if he had given up, knowing he could do nothing. But then his head came up and he started after us.
"David, there's nothing you can do! David, no!" I shrieked when his slow lope shifted into a full run. Eyes lost in a killing frenzy, he barreled right for me. Sure, I didn't want to be pulled into the ever-after, but I didn't want to be dead, either.
Swearing, Al turned around. "Vacuefacio," he said, his white-gloved hand outstretched.
I twisted on his shoulder to see. A black ball of force shot from him, meeting David's silent attack two feet in front of us. David's huge feet skidded, but he ran right into it. Yelping, he rolled, tumbling into a snow pile. The scent of singed hair rose and was gone.
"David!" I cried, not feeling the cold that pinched me. "Are you all right?"
I yelped as Al dumped me on the ground, a blocky hand squeezing my shoulder until I cried out in pain. The thick sheet of compressed snow on the pavement melted up through me, and my rear went numb with hurt and cold. "Idiot," Al grumbled to himself. "You've got a familiar, why by your mother's ashes aren't you using her?"
He smiled at me, thick eyebrows high in anticipation. "Ready to work, Rachel, love?"
My breath froze in me. Panicking, I stared up at him, feeling my face go pale and my eyes go wide. "Please don't," I whispered.
He grinned all the wider. "Hold this for me," he said.
A scream of pain ripped from me as Al tapped a line, sending its strength thundering into me. My muscles jerked and a spasm shook me until my face hit the pavement. I was on fire, and I clenched into a fetal position, hands over my ears. Scream upon scream beat upon me. I couldn't block them out. They hammered at me, the only thing that was real besides the agony in my head. Like an explosion, the force of the line ran through me, settling into my center, spilling over to set my limbs on fire. My brain felt as if it had been dipped in acid, and all the time, that awful screaming racked my ears. I was on fire. I was burning.
I suddenly realized the screaming was coming from me. Huge, racking sobs took their place as I managed to stop. An eerie, keening wail rose, and I managed to stop that, too. Panting, I opened my eyes. My hands were pale and shaking in the light from the car. They weren't charred. The scent of burnt amber wasn't my skin peeling away. It was all in my head.
Oh God. My head felt like it was three places at once. I was hearing everything twice, smelling everything twice, and having no thoughts that weren't my own. Al knew everything I was feeling, everything I was thinking. I could only pray that I hadn't done this to Nick.
"Better?" Al said, and I jerked as if whipped, hearing his voice in my head as well as my ears. "Not bad," he said, yanking me unresisting to my feet. "Ceri passed out with only half that much, and it took her three months to stop making that awful noise."
Numb, I felt spittle slip from me. I couldn't remember how to wipe it away. My throat hurt and the cold air I sucked into me seemed to burn. I could hear dogs barking and a car engine. The light from its headlamps wasn't moving, and the snow sparkled. I hung loose in Al's grip, feet trying to move as he began walking again. He dragged me out from in front of the car, and in a slippery squeak of snow and ice, it sped away.
"Come along, Rachel, love," Al said in the new darkness, clearly in a good mood as he pulled me over a snowplowed hill and onto the shoveled walk. "Your wolf has given up, and unless you submit to me, we have a good bit of city to walk before I can get you to a ley line."
Stumbling, I lurched after Al, my feet in my socks long cold and unresponsive. His hand gripped my wrist in a shackle stronger than any metal. Al's shadow stretched behind us to where David panted, shaking his head as if to clear it. I could do nothing, feeling nothing as David's lips pulled back from his muzzle. Silently, he lunged. Numb and uncaring, I watched as if from a distance. Al, though, was very much aware.
"Celero fervefacio!" he exclaimed, angry, and I screamed as the curse burned through me. The force of Al's magic exploded from his outstretched hand and struck David. In a flash, the snow melted underneath the Were, and he writhed on the black circle of pavement. I screamed from the agony, catching it - smothering it - hearing it trail into the keen of a banshee.
"Please...no more," I whispered, spit falling from me to melt a spot of snow. I stared at the dirty white, thinking it was my soul, pitted and sullied, paying for Al's black magic. I couldn't think. The pain burned through me still, becoming a familiar hurt.
The sound of frightened people pulled my bleary gaze up. The neighborhood was watching from doors and windows. I'd probably make the news. A sharp bang drew my attention to the house we had passed, an elegant snow castle with turrets and towers gracing one corner of the yard. The light from the open door spilled over the trampled snow, falling almost to Al and me. I caught my breath at Ceri standing in the threshold, Ivy's crucifix about her neck. Her nightgown flowed to the porch, white and billowy. Her unbound hair floated about her, coming almost to her waist. Her posture was stiff with anger. "You," she said, her voice ringing clear over the snow.
From behind me came a warning yip, and I felt a tug of a pull. Through Al's knowledge, I instinctively knew that Ceri had set a circle around Al and me. A futile sob escaped me, but I fastened on the feeling like a hungry cur on trash. I had felt something that wasn't from Al. The demon's own emotion of annoyance was quick behind my depression, covering it up until I forgot what I felt like. From Al, I knew the circle was useless. You can make a circle without drawing it first, but only a drawn circle is strong enough to hold a demon.
Al didn't even bother to slow down, dragging me into the sheet of ever-after.
My breath hissed in as the force Ceri had put in the circle flowed into me. I screamed as a new wave of fire coated my skin. It ran from where I first touched the field, flowing like liquid to cover me. Pain searched for my center. It found it, and I screamed again, twisting out of Al's grip as it found my chi full and bursting. The ever-after rebounded, scouring through me to settle in the only place it could force room: my head. Sooner or later it would be too much and I'd go insane.
I clenched into myself. The rough sidewalk scraped my thigh and shoulder as I convulsed. Slowly it became bearable, and I was able to stop screaming. The last one trailed off into a moan that silenced the dogs. Oh God, I was dying. I was dying from the inside out.
"Please," I begged Ceri, knowing she couldn't hear me. "Don't do that again."
Al yanked me upright. "You're an excellent familiar," he encouraged, his face split in a wide grin. "I'm so proud of you. You managed to stop screaming again. I think I'll make you a cup of tea when we get home and let you nap before I show you off to my friends."
"No..." I whispered, and Al chuckled at my defiance even before the word escaped me. I could have no thoughts without him knowing them first. Now I realized why Ceri had numbed her emotion, preferring to have none rather than share them with Al.
"Wait," Ceri said, her voice ringing clear over the snow as she ran down the porch steps, past the chain-link fence, and into the yard before us.
I sagged in Al's grip as he stopped to look at her. Her voice flowed over me, soothing my skin and mind alike. My eyes warmed at the hint of respite from the pain, and I almost sobbed in relief. She looked like a goddess. She granted release from pain.
"Ceri," Al said warmly, his attention only half on David as he circled us, his hackles raised and a frightening savagery in his eyes. "You're looking well, love." His eyes traveled over the elaborate castle of snow behind her. "Miss your homeland?"
"I am Ceridwen Merriam Dulciate," she said, the command in her voice like a whip. "I'm not your familiar. I have a soul. Give me the respect that calls for."
Al snickered. "I see you found your ego. How does it feel to be growing old again?"
I saw her stiffen. She came to stand before us, and I could see her guilt. "I don't fear it anymore," she said softy, and I wondered if an unaging life was what Al had lured her into being his familiar with. "It's the way of the world. Let Rachel Mariana Morgan go."
Al threw his head back and laughed, showing his thick, flat teeth to the cloudy sky. "She is mine. You're looking well. Care to come back? You could be sisters. How nice is that?"
Her mouth twitched. "She has a soul. You can't force her."
Panting, I hung from where Al held me. If he got me into a line, whether I had a soul or not wouldn't matter. "Yes, I can," Al said, cementing it into fact. His brow furrowed, and he jerked his attention to David. I had seen him circling us in a wide path, trying to make a physical circle with his footsteps with which he could bind Al. The demon's eyes narrowed. "Detrudo," he said, gesturing.
I gasped, jerking as a thread of ever-after flowed from me to work Al's charm. Head erect, I choked back whatever awful sound was going to come out of my raw throat. I managed to keep silent as it raced from me, but all my efforts to stay quiet did no good when a wave of ever-after surged in from a line to replace what Al had used. Again fire immolated my center, overflowing and making my skin burn, finally settling in my thoughts. I couldn't think. There was nothing but hurt in me. I was burning. My very thoughts, my soul, were burning.
Shocked, I fell to my knees, the pain from the icy sidewalk going almost unnoticed as a cry of misery escaped me. My eyes were open, and Ceri cringed, standing barefoot before us in the snow. A shared pain was mirrored in her eyes, and I fastened on them, finding peace in their green depths. She had survived this. I could survive this. I would survive this. God, help me find a way to survive this.
Al laughed as he felt my resolve. "Good," he encouraged. "I appreciate your effort to be silent. You'll get there. Your god can't help you, but call for him anyway. I'd like to meet him."
I took a shuddering breath. David was a shaking puddle of silky fur in the snow some distance from where he had been. I was screaming when the spell hit him and didn't see him knocked aside. Ceri went to him when he rose, grasping his muzzle in both hands and peering into his eyes. She looked dwarfed beside him, his absolute blackness looking dangerous and somehow right beside her frailty, dressed in flowing white. "Give this to me," she whispered as she gazed unafraid into his eyes, and David's ears pricked.
Dropping his face, she paced forward until she was standing where David's footprints left off. Keasley joined her, buttoning his thick fabric coat as he moved from my right to halt beside her. He took her hand, murmuring, "It's yours," before letting go, and they both stepped back.
I wanted to weep but didn't have the strength. They couldn't help me. I admired Ceri's confidence, her proud and impassioned stance, but it was misplaced. I might as well be dead.
"Demon," she said, her voice chiming thorough the still air like a bell. "I bind you."
Al jerked as a sheet of smokey blue ever-after blossomed over us, and his face reddened. "Es scortum obscenus impurua!" he shouted, letting me go. I stayed where I fell, knowing he wouldn't have released me if I could escape. "How dare you use what I taught you to bind me!"
Panting, I pulled my head up, only now realizing why she had touched David and then Keasley. David had started the circle, Ceri had made a second portion of it, and Keasley had made the third. They had given her permission to bind their paths together as one. The circle had been made; he was caught. And as I watched him pace to the edge of the bubble and a victorious Ceri, I thought it wouldn't take much for him to decide to kill me out of spite.
"Moecha putida!" he shouted, hammering on the force between them. "Ceri, I will tear your soul from you again, I swear it!"
"Et de," she said, her narrow chin high and her eyes glinting, "acervus excerementum. You can jump to a line from here. Leave now before the sun rises so we can all go back to bed."
Algaliarept took a slow breath, and I shuddered at the bound anger in the movement. "No," he said. "I'm going to widen Rachel's horizons, and you will listen to her scream as she learns to take the full capacity of what I demand."
He could draw more through me? I thought, feeling my lungs press together as I temporarily lost the will to breathe. There was worse than this?
Ceri's confidence faltered. "No," she said. "She doesn't know how to store it properly. Any more, and her mind will bend. She'll be insane before you teach her how to make your tea."
"You don't need to be sane to make tea or do my toast upon one side," he snarled. Snatching my arm, he jerked me unresisting to my feet.
Ceri shook her head, standing in the snow as if it were summer. "You're being petty. You've lost her. She outsmarted you. You're a sore loser."
Al pinched my shoulder, and I gritted my teeth, refusing to cry out. It was only pain. It was nothing compared to the steady burning of the ever-after he was forcing me to hold for him. "Sore loser!" he shouted, and I heard the cries of fear from the people in the shadows. "She can't hide on holy ground forever. If she tries, I'll find a way to use her through the lines."
Ceri glanced at David, and I closed my eyes in despair. She thought he could do it. God help me. It was only a matter of time before he figured out how. My gamble to save my soul was going to fail. "Go away," she said, pulling her attention from David. "Go back to the ever-after and leave Rachel Mariana Morgan in peace. No one here has called you."
"You can't banish me, Ceri!" he raged, jerking me upright until I fell into him. "My familiar opened a summoning path for me to follow when she tapped a line. Break this circle and let me take her as is my right!"
Ceri took an exultant breath. "Rachel! He acknowledged you called him. Banish him!"
My eyes widened.
"No!" Algaliarept shouted, sending a flow of ever-after into me. I nearly passed out, the waves of pain washing through me building upon themselves until there was nothing left but agony. But I took a breath, smelling the stink of my burned soul.
"Algaliarept," I choked out, my voice a ragged gasp. "Return to the ever-after."
"You little bitch!" he snarled, backhanding me. The force of the blow picked me up, throwing me into Ceri's wall. I landed in a crumpled heap, unable to think. My head hurt and my throat was raw. The snow under me was cold. I snuggled into it, burning.
"Go away. Go away now," I whispered.
The overwhelming ever-after energy humming through my brain vanished in a clock-tick. I moaned at its absence. I heard my heart beat, pause, and beat again. It was all I could do to keep breathing, empty with just my own thoughts in my head. It was gone. The fire was gone.
"Get her out of the snow," I heard Ceri say urgently, her voice easing into me like ice water. I tried to open my eyes, failing. Someone picked me up, and there was the warmth of body heat. It was Keasley, a small part of me decided, as I recognized the smell of redwood and cheap coffee. My head thumped into him and my chin dropped to my chest. I felt small cool hands upon my forehead, and with Ceri singing to me, I felt myself shift into movement.