Reckoning

  "I was just going to get something to drink," Charlie said, standing up. "Would anyone like anything?"

  He ended up getting orders from almost everyone in the room, so I immediately sprang up and offered to help, praying that I didn't look too obvious and scheming. However, I did notice Brigid slipping me a steely glare as I left.

  I followed Charlie into the kitchen. He was at the counter, setting down the glasses. He looked so good, just simply dressed in a dark blue button-down shirt and jeans. He seemed extra tall, so much more adult looking than me. There was no way I could have kissed him. I must have been delusional.

  "Hi," I finally said. That was the best I could do. Words were failing me.

  "Hey," he said, giving me a little smile---not his usual light-up-the-room beam. "How are you? Are you okay?" I thought I saw his hand moving, as if he was going to reach out to me, but he pulled it back and moved the glasses around instead. "I'm fine." I nodded. "Thanks for coming last night, I felt a lot safer knowing that you protected the house. Sorry I was, um... unconscious." "Don't worry about it," he said. "I guess it was that whole getting hit-on-the-head-with-everything-in-the-kitchen thing." "Something like that," I agreed.

  I could see the coppery freckles under his eyes in the warm glow of the kitchen light. I felt warmth coming from him but also something else---pain, maybe. Definitely stress. It made me want to... I don't know, give him a big hug or something. He wasn't himself. "Maybe we could talk?" I said.

  "This really isn't a good time," he said, opening the refrigerator and pulling out some drinks. His smooth brow furrowed, as if he really, really had to concentrate on sorting out the beverages. "Is everything okay?" I asked.

  "Everything's fine."

  That wasn't true. I could see that. "You're not supposed to lie to witches," I said. "Remember? You're not even supposed to tell half-truths to half witches." "Right." He sighed, putting the drinks on the counter and leaned against the refrigerator. "Good point. Sorry."

  "So," I said, "what's up?"

  "Look," he said, as if he was searching for the words, "I can't talk right now." "Okay," I said uncertainly. "Do you want to give me a call later?" "I'm going to be busy tonight." He sighed again. "Maybe tomorrow, okay?" With Brigid. That's what he wasn't saying. He was going to be talking to Brigid. His girlfriend. The person he was supposed to be talking to. "Oh, sure," I said. Though I tried to keep smiling, I felt my face fall. I was rapidly coming to my senses. Why had I followed him? What had I been expecting him to say? Did I think he was going to jump up and down with joy and tell me that he'd ditched Brigid? At best, our kiss had caused major problems. At worst, he was regretting he ever met me. Although who could say? Maybe there was something even worse than that. I turned and started filling glasses quickly. "Alisa...," he said. Again I saw his hand moving, as if he wanted to take hold of me. Again he held himself back. There was a rush of frustration coming from him. "It's okay," I told him, fixing the limp smile back on my face. "Tomorrow or whenever you get a chance. Just give me a call."

  I saw that he was about to reply, but I scooped up some of the glasses and headed out. One more word and I knew I would be bawling, I couldn't risk it. Back in the living room, I passed around the drinks and sat down next to Sam, who gave me a strange look. I knew he must have realized I was upset about something, but he probably assumed that it was related to Evelyn. He inched closer to me, and I felt a little better having him by my side. Charlie followed a moment later and gave out the other cups. "It's a little chilly in here," Ruth observed, pulling her sweater around her uncasted arm. Since Charlie was next to the fireplace, he reached down and put another log on the fire. I was sitting next to the fireplace, and he glanced up and caught my eye for a moment. I couldn't meet his gaze, so I threw my attention across the room. Of course, I looked right up at Evelyn. She was staring at me. The room was cold. Very cold. And the force of her stare made it even colder.

  Suddenly Ruth screamed, and I felt a rush of extreme heat cutting the chill. As if it had been stirred by some unnatural breeze, the dire in the fireplace leapt out, blue with heat. It reached for Charlie, licking at his clothes, his skin. I felt a fear rising up through me. Charlie was going to be hurt---badly.

  No, I couldn't let this happen.

  Water... I thought, my body standing itself up and my hand raising without my willing either to

  do so. I pointed at the caldron, and it lifted itself from its resting place. Time was slow now---I

  was unaffected by it. The water would do what I needed it to do; I had to ask it. Once again words came to me from the recesses of my mind, in an echo of a woman's voice, a voice I couldn't quite place.

  "Cuir as a srad," I said, moving my pointed finger to indicate Charlie. "Doirt air." The caldron sailed through the room, past Charlie, and smashed itself against the smoky brick of the fireplace, spilling all of the flowers and water onto him. He stumbled back as it thundered to the floor and rolled back and forth before the fire. The crash brought me back in step with everything else, and I lurched forward, as if I was in a car that had skidded to a halt. Charlie quickly rolled away from the fireplace and looked down at himself in shock. He was soaking wet and covered in soggy flower pieces. His hands were singed, but the water had protected him somewhat, keeping his clothing from igniting. "I'm okay," he said, patting his body down and checking for injuries. "I'm okay," Brigid and Ruth descended on him, dragging him off to the kitchen to attend to the burns. The whole thing had happened in less than a minute.

  "Goddess," said Kate once they had gone, "did everyone just see that?" I became aware of the fact that everyone left in the room was staring at me. My hand was still outstretched. I jammed it behind my back. Charlie's father was next to me. All traces of cosmic goofiness were gone from his face. "Thank you," he said, reaching out to squeeze my arm. His face was pale with shock. "I've never seen anyone do a deflection that quickly before." "You're welcome," I mumbled. "I mean... I just did it." Sometimes I just blow myself away with fancy talk. "You do know," he said seriously, "that you moved the cauldron almost simultaneously with the flame, killing its progress---don't you?" "I did?" I said, feeling very dull-witted. "You gave a command spell," Charlie's father said. "Very simple. The energy was channeled through the water. The Gaelic charge was basic. But it was very, very fast, and you brought up a lot of energy within a moment."

  I wobbled, and Sam gently helped me to sit down. Evelyn, I noticed, had returned and was looking at me up, down, and sideways.

  "You have powers," she said.

  She didn't sound happy, or amazed, or impressed, or grateful. She sounded suspicious. "She not only has powers," Charlie's father added, "she's strong. Quite strong. And fast. And she has a rather shocking command of spell language." "Have you been studying with someone?" Kate asked, pulling up an ottoman and sitting close to me.

  "A Seeker," I said, looking around nervously. "A Seeker?" she said. "Goddess. For how long?" "A few weeks. On and off over the last few months." "A few weeks?" she repeated me again. "That's it?" "So," Evelyn said, "you have powers---somehow---and you've been studying with someone from the council."

  Evelyn hadn't exactly been sending valentines to the council. I realized that I'd just made another huge mistake in her eyes.

  "He's from the council," I said, trying to defend myself, "but he's not teaching me as a representative of the council. I mean, he's just my coven leader..." Ruth looked through the doorway.

  "Charlie is fine," she said. "The burns on his hands are minor. I treated him with some aloe, We'll add a preparation of calendula and cantharis. Brigid is mixing it up now." There was a murmur of relief from everyone. I felt like I needed air. I was in emotional overdrive. I tugged on Sam's sleeve, hoping he would understand the can-we-go-message. Fortunately, Sam is perceptive.

  "I think," he said, standing and pulling his keys from his pocket, "that we should call it a night. Alisa's still kind of worn out from last night, and this has been a long day."

>   I nodded in conformation. It was an awkward and hasty exit, but then, this was the House of

  Strange Happenings. Sam said nothing---just took me home and let me spend some time with my thoughts. I certainly had enough of those. After Sam had gone to bed, I found that I was still wide awake. I stared at the phone for a while, trying to will it to ring. I thought about calling Charlie, even though he'd indicated pretty clearly that he didn't want to talk to me tonight. Bad idea. I was going to go crazy if I didn't think of something to do. First I tried scrying again, but I was even less successful than I'd been the night before. Giving that up, I went for my bag and pulled out Máirin's book. I set it down next to the scrying bowl and started to read. As I did so, Astrophe jumped into my lap, causing me to flinch. My elbow struck the bowl, causing it to splash water on the pages,

  The ink began to run. I almost screamed. I scrambled around, grabbing for paper towels, anything to blot the water. I couldn't find anything. Everything must have been used up in the cleanup the night before. Frantic, I ran back to the book to try to brush the water from the page with my hands, only to make an amazing discovery: Something was there that hadn't been there before. It came into clearer focus as the water ran over it. There was writing there, scribbled all over the margins, squeezed into every available inch of space. There were combinations of runes, symbolsm bits of Gaelic, and words in English---uncontrollable magick---Rowanwand----stabilization of energies, provided that the...

  The water was bringing it out. If I wanted to fill out the passage, my only choice would be to drip on more. Using a spoon, I tried this very carefully, working drop by drop. By doing this, one passage became clear enough to read:

  ...this plague of uncontrollable magick, the roots of which are all too human, forged by the dark spell of our poor tortured ancestor. Being Rowanwand, we pride ourselves on our ability to

  master knowledge and control our destiny. Pride, of course, is well known to be one of the

  deadliest vices. Fear is another. Both were at work when I destroyed the pages in a fit of rage.

  I was fifteen years old at the time. I hope now to rectify my mistakes and add to our store of

  knowledge...

  It went on in Gaelic and symbols. I saw the occasional word in English here or there, but no passage was entirely clear, and I was worried about actually destroying the book in my attempts to extract the information.

  Even though I felt guilty about making a long-distance call without asking Sam first, I knew I had to tell someone about this right away. This was huge. Besides, it was after nine. The rates were cheaper. I called Hunter. Much to my irritation, thought, he wasn't home, and neither was his father. I left a garbled message for him, frantically trying to explain what I had seen. Now what? I knew this was important. Someone had to see this. Maybe even... Evelyn? Sam kept a bike on the side of the house. If I used that, I could be to Evelyn's and back in no time. The hills would be a pain to go up, but I'd get back really quickly. Since this seemed to be my big week for impulse behavior, I decided to go for it. Compared to what I'd done so far, taking a bike for a midnight ride was nothing. I put the book in my messenger bag and let myself out.

  The town was beautiful at night. I rode along the water. There was plenty of light from the ships and reflections of the moon on the harbor. The breeze was moist and heavy, cold but not biting. I couldn't help but notice that the view looked a lot like my last dream, with the dark, calm sea and the waxing moon hanging in the sky. Of course, there was no mermaid. The last hill up to Evelyn's was horrible---I would feel it in the morning---but I needed the exercise, anyway. The house was completely dark. I walked the bike up to the porch, looking above me for falling branches or tiles or posts. I carefully put the book between the screen and the door and hurried back to the bike and rode away, trying to get back as quickly as possible. I woke up at eight in the morning to the sound of the phone ringing. Sam called down from his room to tell me that the call was for me. There was a strange note in his voice. Cautiously I picked up the phone.

  "Alisa."

  It was Evelyn. Yikes.

  "Yes?"

  "I want to talk to you. This morning, can you be here at ten?" "Sure," I said, quaking.

  "Fine. Good-bye."

  And that was that. I was left staring at the phone. 16. Bloodline

  OCtber 3, There was an incident today in the kitchen. Sorcha came to me, extremely upset. She was speaking wildly about the craft, saying that it was dangerous and that we shouldn't be allowed to wield as much power as we do. I attributed the remarks to an emotional reaction to the storm. Both Somhairle and Sorcha seem to have been very affected by it.

  As we were speaking, one of the drawers pulled itself out and flew across the room, right at Sorcha. She stepped aside, and it fell to the ground. In the same moment, the cabinets started to open up and the dishes came at us. We had to throw ourselves to the ground. This can only mean one thing----Oona has returned. I have already called Claire Findgoll and Patience Stamp. They are coming to help me cast spells of protection this afternoon. Patience has no one to watch her little daughter Kate, so I will be able to distract Somhairle and Sorcha with babysitting. My mind is racing, though. Will I be forced to reopen the dearc? And how is it possible that Oona would come back after so long, and why after this horrible storm? I have a terrible feeling in the pit of my stomach. ---Aoibheann

  Sam was quiet as he drove me to Evelyn's. I could see that he was baffled by this sudden morning visit, and my brain was too addled for me to be able to explain. Evelyn met me at the door and took me directly to her study without saying a word. She indicated that I should sit. "You left something very interesting for me to read," she said. "We need to discuss it." I nodded stiffly. I wasn't even going to ask how she knew it was me. She crossed around to her desk and picked up Máirin's Book of Shadow's and her athame. She ran the athame over the cover and spine of the book, and it took on a faint fluorescent quality. "I've examined this closely through the morning," she said, turning it over in her hands, covered every inch with the athama. "I see that there are quite a number of spells on this book. One of then is an attraction spell, designed to help those of us looking for an answer to our family difficulty find it. I'm sure it helped you. Where was it?" "In your library," I said sheepishly. She didn't seem surprised that I'd been there, even though it mean that I'd broken into her house and snooped around. She nodded thoughtfully. "Was it hidden?" she asked.

  "Well"---I shook my head---"sort of. It was misfiled and mislabeled. That's all." I looked at the spine. The German writing was gone. "It had German on the spine," I said, confused. "It would appear and disappear."

  That didn't seem to surprise her, either. "There are quite a few glamour's on this book," she said. I was waiting for her to start explaining the green writing, but she kept examining the cover, as if it was the most interesting thing imaginable. "I found this book when I was a girl," she said, a trace of a strange smile appearing on her thin lips. "It vanished from my room before I had a chance to look over it thoroughly."

  "What happened?" I asked.

  "In all likelihood," she said, "my mother took it. She could see how agitated it had made me, so she decided it was best for me not to read it. But aside from Oona's story, which is very tragic there's nothing worth hiding. The fact that someone has torn out some pages, however, suggests a very serious problem. No Rowanwand destroys a book---especially not the Book of Shadows of an ancestor."

  "Who do you think tore out the pages?" I said. "I don't know," Evelyn replied. "The pages were torn when I located the book. It seems to be the same witch who wrote the spell in secret writing, but I don't know her identity I see that the ink is smudged now. It wasn't when I first found it. Someone else was trying to make the book unreadable."

  "No." I shook my head. "That was me, and it was an accident. Couldn't you see it?" Her eyes narrowed in on me.

  "See what?" she asked.

  "The writing," I said. "The green wri
ting." She looked like I'd just giver her a shock of static electricity. "What green writing?"

  I got up and took the book from her, quickly flipping through the pages. "It's gone," I said, speeding through. "It was here, and now it's gone." She looked at me, demanding further explanation, and I told her about the water spilling onto the book and the mysterious writing that blossomed like creeping vines all over the page. "I saw it," I promised her. "It's gone now." "The spell could be old," she said, her eyes flashing. "It could be fragile. Or the spells may be counteracting one another. That could account for the fading. I'd say we should try dampening it again, but we might destroy it."

  "That's what I was afraid of." I nodded. "Did you get a good look at the pages?" she asked. "Pretty good. But I didn't understand all of the words. Some of them were written in a different language."

  "Then I have an idea. Have you ever heard of a ritual called a tàth meànma?" "I've done one of those," I said. "I did a tàth meànma brach." Evelyn looked up with knitted brows.

  "Somehow I doubt that," she said. From Charlie's reaction, I knew that this probably did seem unlikely. Bit I guessed she would find out that I was telling the truth soon enough. "It's a very intense connection spell that can only be performed by..." "I know what it is," I said, starting to feel a little annoyed. "I did one." She looked a bit surprised, but she seemed to like the fact that I showed I actually had bits and pieces of spine every once in a while.

  "All right," she replied, still skeptical, "how do you feel about doing a regular tàth meànma so that I can have a look at the pages?"