Soothed by Magic Read online

  “I told you today is my sister’s birthday, there is something else you should know.” The words had trouble forming on his tongue. He’d never spoken them out loud.

  “My mother was an addict back then. Ivy, my sister, died of neglect. They found her in her crib. She starved to death.” That was all he could get out before anxiety battered him. A cold, dark room, full of trash and sharp things that hurt his tiny fingers. That was his only dim memory of life with his mother before social services took him away.

  Bobbi gripped his arm and he instinctively jerked away from the touch.

  “I’m so sorry.” Her face was pinched in anger but that was better than pity. He didn’t want platitudes. He smiled, took a deep breath and opened the door.

  Stacy Beal sat by a large, arched window. Her hair, once thick and black, hung in thin white wisps. At least it was clean. Tanya took good care of her.

  “Ma? I brought you a visitor.” Stacy didn’t turn. A blanket covered her thin lap and an open book lay on that, but she didn’t read. She stared out the window. She always stared. Her shoulders shuddered.

  “Are you cold?” Gavin took a shawl from the end of the bed and draped it over her shoulders. Stacy shrugged and let it fall to the floor.

  “He was here, you know.” Her thin voice was like ice scraping off a window. “He comes when no one sees. But I see. I see.”

  Once again Gavin was struck by Stacy’s resemblance to Siranda, the coven’s mad seer with her pale face, stringy hair and rambling nonsense. He looked at Bobbi, transmitting an apology with his eyes. She stood quietly by the door as if any movement might startle Stacy.

  “Ma, this is my friend, Bobbi. I thought we could take a walk outside.”

  Stacy turned her head to look at her son, but she didn’t really see him.

  “He can’t take me back there. He knows that. It’s not allowed. But he comes for me anyway.” Her cracked lips widened in a smile. Her right front canine was black and dead. “He still wants me.”

  “Maybe today isn’t a good day for a visit,” Bobbi said.

  Stacy turned sharply.

  “Hannah?” Her eyes narrowed, then widened. “You can’t be here! You can’t be here when he comes!”

  Gavin hadn’t seen his mother stand in over two years, but from some deep reserve, Stacy found strength. She rose, letting the book and blanket fall, and lunged at Bobbi.

  “You have to leave! Hannah! He’s so angry at you. Go! Before he finds you here. Go!” Her thin face creased with fear. Gavin froze. He didn’t want to touch Stacy, had never touched her, but panic gave her strength and she moved fast. She looked like a hollowed-out scarecrow with bony fingers clawing at Bobbi, who tried to fend her off. A swipe of her nails cut a red line across Bobbi’s chin.

  The bedroom door opened and Tanya came in, carrying a tea tray.

  “What is going on in here? Miss Stacy, you shouldn’t be up!” She dropped the tray on the bedside table and grabbed Stacy’s hands, prying Bobbi’s shirt from their grip. “Come on, now. Let’s get you back to bed.” Over her shoulder, she shot Gavin a dark look. “You should leave.”

  Bobbi grabbed him by the arm and shoved him through the door. For once, Gavin didn’t resist the touch. In the hallway, he leaned against the bedroom door. Stacy’s cries faded to a muffled whine, interrupted by Tanya’s placating words.

  “Who’s Hannah?” he asked.

  Bobbi’s face was pale. “My mother.”

  8

  Recollection

  MOLLY COULD TELL SOMETHING WAS WRONG.

  From her vantage at the store’s big front window, she watched Bobbi and Gavin approach the Woolery. They crossed the bridge, not stopping to take in the view of the Anneke River. The unseasonal wind grabbed at their clothes and hair. Bobbi looked like she’d witnessed a fatal car crash. And Gavin…well, that boy was hard to read, but even his spritely facade had cracks.

  She’d known it was a bad idea for Bobbi to visit Stacy, but she’d held her tongue. It was time. Time for secrets to be revealed. Time for the great wall of silence Jane had erected around them all to crumble. So she’d let the encounter happen and now she would pick up the pieces.

  She hurried to the back to make tea.

  The bell above the door jangled and she heard Bobbi and Gavin settle in the shop’s lounge area. The knitting bees were gone and Danielle had the day off. Molly locked the door and turned the sign that said “Be back in 15!” with a bright smiley face.

  “Do I look like my mother?” Bobbi asked. Molly took the time to sit and pour tea before answering.

  “Yes.”

  No need to tell Bobbi she was almost an exact replica of Hannah—same blue eyes, same curl to the blond hair. She even walked like Hannah. Sometimes, when Molly saw Bobbi from the corner of her eye, she could imagine her childhood friend hadn’t been dead these past twenty years.

  Bobbi stirred her tea. She’d been off lately. Not quite her normal, positive self. After an enlightening visit from Quinn last night, she understood that Bobbi’s behavior had much to do with William Fain’s sudden appearance in her life. Molly knew that punk was bad news the first time he awkwardly flirted with Bobbi in the shop. Buying wool for his aged aunt. Bah! No one believed that. William Fain had deceiver written all over him.

  But Molly had to tread carefully. Fain was not the issue. His presence in Bobbi’s life only complicated a story long overdue in telling.

  “Why would Gavin’s mother know my mother?” asked Bobbi.

  “We were all friends,” Molly said. “Jane, Hannah, Stacy and me.” She turned to Gavin. “Jane might have already told you that.” He nodded. “But she didn’t tell you everything.”

  “Well, you’d better tell us now.” Bobbi’s voice hardened. “I don’t like having things kept from me.”

  “The way you kept your magic from me?” snapped Molly. “Oh, don’t look like a sheep. For years, I wondered when you would recognize the power inside yourself. I’m sure Jane wondered too.”

  “Jane?” Bobbi looked confused. “She knew about me before this summer?”

  Molly nodded.

  “The High Priestess of the Hidden Coven knows about all witch activity in this area, even those witch wannabes who meet at the library and pretend to commune with the Great Mother. But you, Bobbi, you are special. As is Gavin.”

  “Gavin?” Bobbi glanced at him as if she’d never considered him before.

  “Yes.” Molly sighed. Jane wouldn’t thank her for this, but Molly didn’t give a rat’s fat ass what Jane wanted. Not anymore. Not in a long time. “Gavin is your half-brother.” She let that sink in. They stared at each other.

  Gavin spoke first. “But how?”

  That was a loaded question. Where to begin with the answer? Molly put her thoughts in order. Best to begin at the beginning.

  “We were young and foolish, fresh out of high school. Girls at that age can be reckless. We had a whole summer ahead of us before college. One last hurrah of youth. We spent our days working at minimum wage jobs and our nights fantasizing about the men we’d meet in college.” Molly could see them in her mind’s eye, four brave and beautiful women, oblivious to the world barreling down on them.

  “Hannah found the grimoire. We thought it was a joke, had a few laughs pretending to cast spells. I didn’t believe in magic.” Molly laughed roughly. “Who would, really? But Jane and Hannah insisted they felt something when we read the spells. Jane convinced us to call Kororaeth.”

  “Koro? You called him?” Gavin’s expression reflected the disgust Molly felt at the memory.

  “Yes. I’d like to say we were innocent, but really we were stupid and arrogant, thinking we knew all there was to know in the universe.”

  Molly closed her eyes and remembered their faces. Her friends, so young and happy. Stacy stole a bottle of sherry from her father’s liquor cabinet. They passed it around, along with a cigarette and watched Jane dip her brother’s hunting knife through the flame of a black candle three t
imes, invoking Koro’s true name with each pass.

  The noise began like an itch in Molly’s ears. Jane and Hannah intoned the words from the spell, written in some language none of them understood. Who knew if they even pronounced them right? The candle went out and Stacy screamed. Molly thought Jane was tricking them until the noise grew like a tornado in her head.

  And the ground fell away. Their world disappeared and they plunged through darkness that had texture. Hot, then cold. Viscous like oil, then sharp as cut glass. Molly landed with a bone crushing jolt on wet stone. Someone whimpered nearby. Her body hurt, stomach churned and she leaned over to vomit.

  “He kept us prisoner for months. At first, he left us alone in the dark. We were hungry, scared and hurt. Later, after he had his fun with us, we grew to relish alone time. But in the beginning it felt like hell.” They had been so naive. Hell was relative.

  “I don’t know how long we were there. Time has no meaning in his world.”

  “His world?” Bobbi asked.

  “Yes, I believe we were in another dimension,” Molly said. “I can’t prove it. But I feel it, here.” She pressed her hand against her heart. “He tortured us for months, but when we finally returned, only hours had passed. No one even knew we were gone. Two months later, we all discovered we were pregnant.”

  Gavin’s face turned to ash. Bobbi’s was unreadable.

  “I miscarried in the fifth month. Jane’s baby was stillborn.” Or so she said. Molly didn’t want to get into that age-old argument right now. “But Hannah and Stacy carried you both to term.”

  “Us?” Bobbi’s voice cracked. “You’re saying we’re the children of a demon?”

  Molly nodded. Nothing she could say would convince or comfort. Better to let them digest the news in their own time.

  “Stacy said ‘he’ came to see her,” Bobbi said. “She wanted us to leave before ‘he’ got there. Did she mean Koro? Is he here in Ashlet?”

  Gavin shook his head. “My mother is sick, Bobbi. She sees things that aren’t there.”

  “Koro can’t manifest on our plane,” Molly said. “He can only take foolish witches who open the door to his dimension or manipulate someone into being his agent in our world.”

  Silence hung in the room like oppressive weather.

  Slowly, Bobbi’s face turned livid red. “That’s what this is about. You’re all thinking it. You, Quinn, Jane and Abilene. You all think William is working for Koro and I’m just some dupe he’s manipulating.”

  “The truth is, we don’t know where Koro is or who’s working for him,” Molly said. “But I do know that he would do anything to cross worlds. And you two may be the key he’s been waiting for. Jane says…”

  “Get out,” Bobbi said. “Both of you. Just get out.”

  “You must listen to me…” Molly reached for Bobbi’s arm, but she pulled away.

  “You know what? Never mind. I’ll leave. You two can go on talking your nonsense. And when you talk to the High Mistress, you can tell her to butt out of my business too.” She stood and rushed out, leaving the front door wide and swaying in the wind.

  In the silence that followed, Molly gathered the tea tray.

  “I’ll call Danielle to cover the rest of her shift,” she said. Bobbi hadn’t even considered the store’s schedule before running out. It only highlighted the muddle in her mind.

  “Tell me about him. My father.” Gavin’s words stopped her and she sat back heavily in the chair.

  “He’s a demon, I know,” Gavin said. “Tell me what he wants with me and Bobbi.”

  “Demon is a loose term. Any being from a lower dimension can be called that. Some of those creatures are nothing more than vermin. Others are peace seekers who want to be left alone. Koro is a monster.”

  “Is he the reason you and Jane are no longer friends?”

  Molly considered her words carefully. She had no love for Jane, but once they had been as close as sisters. Jane saved Gavin from a brutal life. She might have had ulterior motives, but the fact remained; Jane took Gavin in when no one else would. And if her brand of love was a little twisted, how could Molly truly fault her for that?

  But she wouldn’t lie to Gavin.

  “How much about our time with Koro has Jane told you?”

  “Nothing. I only know that she faced him once. She won’t talk about it.” Gavin’s gaze reflected his eagerness. He was hungry for knowledge.

  “Do you want to know the truth? It’s not pretty.”

  Gavin nodded once, short but with no hesitation.

  Molly sighed, closed her eyes and mentally prepared to put herself in hell again.

  “Koro takes pleasure in pain.” She didn’t see any reason to sugarcoat things. “He raped each of us, taking turns like it was a game. If we fought back, he beat us. If we cried or looked away, he beat us.” She opened her eyes. Gavin watched her, his face gone white.

  “Once, he beat Stacy badly, broke her nose and arm. Right in front of us.” She never knew which was worse, having it happen to her, or watching him rape one her friends, knowing she couldn’t stop him. “Stacy’s eyes were swollen shut and blood poured down her face. He drank it. Licked it right off her cheek and…he smiled.”

  Panic washed up her spine in a wave of trembling. Even after all these years, that bastard had power over her. The power of fear.

  “Stacy was never the same after that. When Koro came for her again, she wasn’t even healed from his last visit. Jane intervened.”

  “She what?” Molly ignored Gavin’s outburst. She had to finish the story quickly now.

  “While Hannah and I cowered in the shadows, trying to make ourselves small and insignificant, Jane stood up to a demon. She told him to leave Stacy alone or she’d kill him. I think she meant it.” Molly could still hear Koro’s booming laughter filling their small prison cell as if amplified.

  “Koro nearly killed Jane, but I don’t think she ever forgot her vow. She will kill him one day.”

  “You think he’ll come after me?”

  “I think he’ll try to seduce you, with promises of power. He’ll shower you with affection, then sacrifice you for a drop of your blood.”

  “It’s always about blood.”

  Molly nodded. “Blood is life. Life is power. I can’t say how he will use you. But he had a plan when he impregnated us, one he has waited a long time to finish.”

  Outside, the sun was setting, but Molly couldn’t shake the feeling that speaking the demon’s name had the power to make the world go dim.

  9

  Zombification

  SHADOWS SPILLED LIKE INK BENEATH THE COTTONWOOD TREE.

  Quinn crouched inside the fence surrounding Bobbi’s property. The sun had barely set and he waited impatiently for full dark. The weather was still warm, more like July than October. Now the portentous warm wind blew in fitful gusts. It made a racket of crackling leaves, dust tossed against the fence, and clattering branches. Quinn worried he wouldn’t hear an approaching car above the noise.

  His phone vibrated and a text from Gavin appeared on the screen.

  B on her way. She’s upset. Talk later.

  Upset about what? He texted back, but Gavin didn’t answer. Damned him. Gavin couldn’t be trusted with one simple assignment. Spend time with Bobbi. That’s all he’d asked. What the hell had he said to her?

  He couldn’t wait for the cover of darkness any longer. He ran across the empty yard to the patio door. His legs shook with fatigue. When was the last time he’d slept? He couldn’t remember. He’d been watching Fain’s movements with the GPS tracker for two nights, in between hours of intense research on how to break a soothing spell and anything he could find about Koro and demons in general.

  He was exhausted, and a touch of the cockroach on the cord around his neck didn’t help. The bug talisman was dry.

  Damn. He should have taken time to replenish it. He waited for a bout of shaking hands to pass before trying the sliding glass door.

  It
was locked. He knew several spells to get inside, but with Bobbi’s keen sensate abilities he didn’t want to expend too much aether, not that he had any to spare.

  Thankfully, like most-home owners, Bobbi had no idea how easily those patio doors could be picked. He pressed his hands on the glass and jerked up sharply. The lock popped as the flimsy mechanism fell free. He slid the door open, and wiped his fingerprints off the glass.

  He’d really have to school her on home security when this was over.

  Inside, the house was dark and he didn’t dare use a flashlight or a vision spell. So, he headed through the kitchen in the dark, moving slowly until his eyes adjusted.

  Down the hall, he found her bedroom lit from outside by the light over the garage. The bed was neatly made. A robe hung over the rocking chair by the window. A jewelry box sat on her bureau along with a small lamp. Nothing else.

  He was looking for the red statue. If Fain expected to keep Bobbi under his sway, he needed some kind of talisman to continue soothing when he wasn’t around. Quinn suspected that odd demon statue was it. Breaking it might rupture Fain’s hold on her. Maybe. Or maybe the statue was only a catalyst for the spell and now that Fain’s claws were deeply embedded in her psyche, he no longer needed it. It was still worth a try.

  He opened drawers, checked under her pillow. Nothing.

  Inside the master bathroom, he opened the medicine cabinet. He didn’t expect to find the statue in here, but would he find a second toothbrush? A man’s razor?

  No. The bathroom was clean and seemed to be stocked only with Bobbi’s things. A tightness eased around his heart. She hadn’t welcomed Fain into her life that completely. Not yet.

  He should feel guilty for spying on her. He didn’t. She had no one to look out for her. No one who understood the real danger she faced. Jane wanted proof before they moved against William Fain.

  “He’s soothing her!” Quinn had said, ready to pull out his hair.

  He’d shown Jane the video, but she dismissed it with the wave of a hand.

  “Tell me you never used your power to get a pretty girl into bed,” she said, with her usual infuriating calm. “That doesn’t mean he’s working for Koro, only that he’s horny.”