Jane Kindred - Waking The Serpent

“Oh.” Rafe ran a hand over the thick waves of his hair, kept manageable in a short tail at his nape. “Anyway, I wanted to apologize for what happened last night, and to make sure you were all right.”

Phoebe stared him down. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Rafe pocketed his hands. She wasn’t going to make this easy. “I should have stayed to see that you were. You were pretty shaky on your feet. And I think maybe I’m the reason things got so...weird.” Her cheeks flushed pink and he hurried on. “I think it was the invocations I used.”

“The invocations?”

“To the Aztec deities. The Lord and Lady of the Underworld. I think it may have created a double channeling—you channeling the shades and the shades channeling Mictlantecuhtli and Mictecacihuatl. They’re more chaotic, passionate gods than the usual pantheon invoked in the craft. A lot of practitioners stay away from them because of the darker history they became associated with, but I’ve always felt drawn to their primal archetypes. I never thought their history mattered. I assumed the symbolism invoked by the deeper mind was important, and not the specific energy it raised. At any rate, I feel responsible, and I just wanted to say that.” He reached into the back pocket of his khakis for his checkbook. “I still want to pay for your time last night. And don’t worry. I won’t be bothering you for any further help contacting the shades. I’ll figure something out. What’s your hourly rate?”

Phoebe’s eyes darkened from periwinkle to violet and she pushed the screen door wide. “Don’t write me a check standing on my porch.” Her smile seemed forced. “People will talk. Come in and sit down for a minute. I’ll get you a lemonade.”

Rafe hesitated but decided he’d seem like more of a jerk if he said no. He stepped inside, surveying the stained wood of the wax-encrusted coffee table as he sat on the couch while Phoebe went to the kitchen. “I should have put foil under the candles.”

Phoebe grabbed some glasses from her dish rack and took a pitcher out of the fridge. “I should have put them out instead letting them burn down into a soup.”

“You were in the bath. I should have put them out when I left.”

“I—” Phoebe came around the bar with two glasses of lemonade and cocked her head. “Wait, whose turn is it again? Does one of us win a prize if we manage to be the most self-effacing?”

“I wasn’t trying to be self-effacing—”

“Man, I don’t have the energy for ‘who’s more defensive.’ Besides, I think you’d win that one hands down.”

Rafe scowled. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

She smirked as if he’d proved her point. “You seem to be taking all of this personally, like your honor’s in question. It was an awkward night, and it wasn’t anyone’s fault. Let’s call it a learning experience and move on.”

This had definitely been a bad idea. Rafe stood, feeling large and awkward in her cozy living room. “You can mail me an invoice.”

“Jesus, Diamante. Just drink the damn lemonade. Fresh squeezed.” Phoebe shoved a glass at him. He was out of his element here. “It’s okay to be freaked out by what happened last night. It freaked me out a little, too. But let’s not make any hasty decisions just because it was uncomfortable. You’re facing a murder charge, and the evidence is stacked against you. If we set some ground rules for the shades next time we summon them, we can avoid any surprises.”

The condensation-damp glass nearly slipped from his hand. “Next time? You’d actually consider doing that again? Knowing the risk?”

“You said they wanted your help. It doesn’t seem like they’d be deliberately contrary if we make the rules clear and tell them they have to abide by them to get what they want.”

Perhaps the shades Phoebe was used to dealing with weren’t contrary, but he had a feeling she hadn’t dealt with any like these before. These shades had a history. That much, at least, Rafe could explain. As long as he could keep his mind off the soft slope of Phoebe’s skin where the moon tattoo nestled above the hip-hugging panties she’d been wearing last night. And everything beneath them.

Rafe took a swallow of lemonade and cleared his throat. “You need to understand where these shades are coming from. There’s been an increase lately in the number of shades who aren’t crossing on their own. That was the source of my falling out with the Covent. They felt they needed to address it and I, of course, disagreed. But they overruled me and decided to convene the Conclave.” He sat on the couch again and Phoebe sat beside him.

“To censure you.”

He gave her a wry smile. “Censuring me was just a convenient bonus. They actually came for the ritual.”

“What ritual?”

“A sort of wide-net snare—to cross every shade in the valley.”

Phoebe made a noise of outrage. “Every shade? Shades they hadn’t even encountered, who hadn’t bothered anyone—they were going to haul them all in?”

Rafe nodded. “Regardless of how recently they’d passed or whether they had any unfinished business.”

“That’s barbaric.”

“I don’t disagree.”

Phoebe’s eyes, darkening again to violet, held the same passionate intensity they’d had last night, though this time it was the passion of anger. She reminded him distinctly of a young Liz Taylor.

He realized he was staring. “They went ahead with the ritual, and I stood in the back of the temple refusing to be part of it.” Gabriel’s pleading had been fresh in his mind, and Rafe had been unwilling to leave, wanting to stop it from happening somehow, to keep his coven from doing to any other shades what he’d done to Gabriel. “You could feel the energy of the shades being drawn into the circle as the ritual began. It was palpable. I couldn’t see or hear any of them like I had with Gabriel, of course. When he came to me, I could see the apparition because we had a blood bond. I’m sure you’ve experienced that with people you’ve known who’ve passed.”

The terse shake of Phoebe’s head surprised him. “I’ve never had that kind of visitation. Just the step-ins.”

“Well, these shades weren’t visible or audible, but the energy was like a pulsing wave. It was heavy and oppressive and I couldn’t just stand there any longer and let it happen. As the rest of the coven began the crossing invocation, I raised my voice in objection.” He hadn’t meant to, but he’d called the shades to him, and he and Matthew had been surrounded. He didn’t feel like describing that peculiar moment when the psychic energy in the temple had nearly overwhelmed him. It had seemed for a moment as if the shades were waiting for him to command them.

“So what happened?”

“I must have disrupted the coven’s focus. The shade energy dispersed before they could cross them and the ritual was in chaos.” Rafe shrugged. “Most shades, new ones, anyway, aren’t aware there’s a self-appointed afterlife policing effort from the Covent. But they’d drawn in so many with this ritual the word is presumed to be out, and they’ve been having trouble raising any shades at all.”

“That must be why.” Phoebe looked thoughtful as she sipped her lemonade. “I drove by the temple yesterday. Something drew me there, the presence of a shade that seemed to want to make contact, except it didn’t step in—maybe couldn’t. And the air around the temple seemed full of shades, but none of them tried stepping in, either. Which, well...you probably can’t appreciate how unusual that is. But I got the feeling they were caught in some halfway state. It was unsettling.”

The idea was worse than unsettling. As much pain as it caused him to think about what he’d done to his brother, he’d hate to think of Gabriel’s spirit being trapped.