Kim Harrison - The Witch with No Name

A gentle warmth from the line tingled through me, my fingers no longer cold and slow. With a sudden shock, I recognized the faint feeling of lassitude slipping into me and I jerked from it. My smooth motion pouring salt bobbled. A tiny slip of sand marred my perfect pattern, and I froze. Felix jerked as my fear hit him. I didn’t need the Goddess’s help for this, and alarm that I might fall under her sway this easily was a shock.

“Rachel,” Trent pleaded, and I shook my head.

“I’m fine,” I said as I finished my pattern, not knowing why Jenks was hovering so close. He’d seen me spell worse charms than this. Besides, I was entirely hidden from the Goddess, even if I should stand on the highest tower and shout for her. I was alone, and it hurt after being a part of something so much bigger than myself.

Trent’s hand found mine, and I gave it a quick squeeze to tell him I was okay. He always seemed to know when I thought of the mystics. They’d let me see around corners and almost through time. Giving them up had bought Newt’s silence, so I knew they were real, my blackmail going both ways as my silence protected her as well.

I exhaled as the last of the salt went hissing down. The lines of the pentagram took on a faint glow in the glare of the overhead light. Satisfied, I reached for the aspen sap. The grinding feel of the glass stopper was familiar, and I didn’t set the stopper down as I touched the stylus to it. The thin rod had cost almost as much as the sap itself and was guaranteed to be from the same Colorado field the sap had been taken from: a thousand trees, but one genetic organism. It was a potent symbol. Souls were as unique as trees, but they all sprang from the same source, the same beginning.

Trent whispered for Jenks to back off as I anointed the two feet of the pentagram. His dust burned, and I looked up at the jolt of connection to the rising spell, blinking at Felix’s shiny dress shoes parked on the arm of the short couch.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, my spellbound voice coming out almost as a croak. “Can you take off his shoes and socks, please?”

Young face drawn up in affront, Felix wiggled until he sat up. “You forgot?” He looked at Cormel. “Cormel, her skills are inadequate. She failed to fix it to me in the ever-after, and she will fail now.”

Cormel was already moving to Felix’s feet since Trent was obviously not going to do it. “Dear Felix,” he soothed. “Your soul was unable to bind to you because you were in Nina. Morgan will do this, or she and Ivy are forfeit. Lie back down.”

The drums seemed to fade at Felix’s voice, and I took a cleansing breath. The stylus in my hand glistened at the tip. “Shoes? Socks?”

Cormel was untying them even as Felix protested. “It’s my soul. This demon witchery is unnecessary. Make her let it out of the bottle. It won’t harm me. It won’t harm anyone!”

One shoe was gently removed, but as Cormel slipped his sock from him, Felix’s expression became nasty. “You stole it!” he shouted, erratic, as if Cormel were taking his defenses from him, not just his socks. “You took it from me. Give it back!”

“She found it for you, Felix.” Cormel unlaced Felix’s other shoe, keeping his ankles tied with knots made secure from long knowledge. “It would be Nina who would have your soul otherwise.” His other sock was pulled from him, and Felix whimpered. “Remember?” Cormel said as he put a hand on his chest and forced him down. “You were in Nina in the everafter. Sit back. Don’t take the scarf from your eyes when she puts it there.”

Damn it, if Felix didn’t cooperate, it wasn’t going to work and I’d be left with nothing. My gaze went to the covered windows. Sunrise was eight hours off, too short a period of time to do much of anything if this should fail.

But Felix had gone still in waiting, his feet pale next to the stark blackness of the hem of his pants. They looked cold and too soft for all the people he’d trod upon. They reminded me of Al’s hands outside his gloves, vulnerable and revealing, always hidden.

“Keep him still,” I warned as I leaned across the space to touch the rod to the underside of his arches and made him jump. I wondered if he’d have any regret when his soul returned. I knew lots of people who felt no regret for the people they’d hurt, and they had souls.

Leaning back, I caught sight of Trent’s tense worry. He regretted. He had guilt. I’d seen him more than once in the early hours of a sunless morning, sitting beside the bed, waiting for me to wake and tell him with a smile that he wasn’t a bad person.

The choices we make, I thought as I cracked the hummingbird egg with my thumbnail before dropping it into a ceramic dish. Landon hadn’t said what to use, and ceramic was as neutral as glass. Damn it, I didn’t even know if I was doing this right. Jaw clenched, I used the sap-soiled stylus to dab the egg white of binding on the black scarf.

Immediately the line I was holding seemed to refine itself, the energy feeling more potent as it narrowed to my desires. I was doing it right, and that scared me even more. The phantom drums in my head pounded, and I shivered, wishing to remain hidden even as the chant called attention to me.

“Is it supposed to be glowing like that?” Jenks whispered, shushed by Trent.

“Show me your palms, please,” I whispered, head down as the spell wavered over my skin as if looking for someone to soak into.

“Is that my soul?” Felix said, voice high as he wiggled.

“Soon,” I breathed. The magic filled me, slowed my muscles. “Show me your hands.”

He did, and I dabbed them, my heart pounding in time with the drums. Ta na shay rose through me, even as I desperately wanted to hide.

Blood, I thought, fear slicing through the drum-borne lethargy. I needed a drop of undead blood. My head snapped up, and Jenks darted back, shocked at my worried expression. “Ah, I need a drop of his blood,” I said, flicking a look at Felix.

“My blood?” Felix snarled, and I drew back as Cormel moved to get between us.

“Felix,” he coaxed, his thick fingers looking odd against Felix’s young body as he forced him to stay down. “It’s for your soul. Just a drop so it can find you. Let me. From your thumb,” he suggested, and I nodded. I didn’t want to risk contaminating the connection on his palms, but his thumb should be okay. I guess. God help me do this right, I thought as I rummaged in my bag for a finger stick. I didn’t know what was on that knife Cormel had used to cut Felix’s gag. One by one, Felix was losing his bonds.

I pushed the finger stick across the glass table to Cormel. He picked it up, clearly already knowing how it worked. The snap of it opening was familiar, and Felix held out his bound hands, never taking his mistrustful gaze from Cormel as he pricked his thumb. Felix hissed as the master vampire retreated, careful to not get any blood on himself.

Buddy began to snore, immune to everything now that he was home and his stomach was full. Bis was creeping down the wall beside the door, and Cormel frowned, noticing him when a nail scraped.

This is for Ivy, I thought as I got to my feet. Reaching across the distance, I touched the wand to Felix’s thumb before pressing it to the top of the silk pentagram. My knees wobbled as the energy flow sharpened to a crystalline hum. The spell was ready. I only had to finish it.

But the beauty of the lines, clouded until I found this very moment, was hard to look past, and I blinked a tear away, shaken. I hadn’t seen them like this since losing the mystics. The reminder hurt. I could see evidence of their passage all around me, but they couldn’t see me. Perhaps the punishment was fitting.