It was a haunting, beautiful, otherworldly-sounding song, and I felt weirdly emotional and thankful for everything I had. I’d lost so much, and after losing my father I hadn’t been able to imagine ever feeling close to whole again. But now with Clio and Petra, I had a family again. And even more than that—I had a connection to this deep magick within me. It had terrified me at first, but now… now that I was finally feeling close to it, close to myself, it was like a door had opened to another entire part of my life.
Suddenly I began to feel a strong thread twisting through the woven song. I realized the energy of the circle felt off balance, discordant. There was anger in the thread, and it was coloring our magick dark. I opened my eyes and looked at Petra, who was facing straight ahead, her chin firm as she sang. She felt it too. Glancing at Clio, I saw that she looked puzzled, concerned. I kept singing, not knowing what else to do or what was going on.
I realized I was caught up in magick—it was overwhelming, stronger than me, stronger than anything I had felt before. I looked from face to face, but everything was a blur, a dizzying swirl of light and color and sound. I saw Clio staring at Luc, then turning away. I saw Ouida nod at Petra. Richard, next to me, was watching Daedalus, frowning, and when I looked at Daedalus, I recognized the source of the dark magick.
Daedalus was using our energy to work some other spell. I wanted to break out of the circle but didn’t know how, didn’t think I could. I was hot, burning up, damp with heat, and my throat was dry and sore.
I closed my eyes for a second, starting to feel sick, and when I opened them, I saw Petra nod at Ouida and Luc. Suddenly she wrenched her hand out of mine. The three of them threw their hands up, shouting words I didn’t recognize, and it was like the world had been pulled out from under us. Jules and I, still holding hands, stumbled and started to fall, and then with no warning the big glass flutes shielding the candles burst.
“Oh!” I cried, feeling my cheek and shoulder sting, and then I fell hard to the ground and felt the world sway beneath me.
Other people fell around me, crying out. Daedalus’s voice was choked with rage, and then all was still and quiet. I felt terrible, nauseated. My head throbbed and my forehead stung, maybe from getting hit by flying glass. My eyes filled with tears.
“Thais.” Painfully I turned my head to see that Clio had crawled over to me. Her face was unnaturally white, with greenish edges. Her shoulders were scratched and bleeding. “Are you okay?” she asked, and then she simply collapsed on the ground next to me. I reached out and felt her hand, her fingers closing around mine.
“I’m gonna barf,” I croaked, starting to cry.”What happened? Did I do that?”
“No, no,” she said weakly. “Nan and Ouida ended the circle unnaturally. You always have to bring a circle down slowly, the way it began, and finish it properly. If you don’t, you feel like this.”
“It feels horrible,” I said, sounding like a baby. “Why did they do it?”
“I think Daedalus was doing something,” she said.
I put my hand to my cheek. Blood trickled down the side of my face to the ground. My arms were cut in several places.
“I think he was working dark magick, using the circle,” Clio went on, her voice breaking. “Nan and Ouida broke it to stop him.”
My face crumpled and tears slid down my cheeks. “Was he trying to hurt us, you and me?”
She held my hand more tightly. “I don’t know. But it’s okay,” she said. “We’re fine. I’m here, and Nan is here.”
“Girls?” Petra leaned over us, her face ashen. “Are you all right?”
“No,” I said, starting to cry more. I remembered how excited I’d been to start the circle, how thrilling it had been, feeling the magick rise. Now I felt naive and stupid, duped. “I never want to do this again.”
“I’m sorry, darling,” said Petra, sitting by us. She reached out and put a hand on each of us. “I’m so sorry. It really isn’t usually like this. Ouida, Luc, and I had to try to stop Daedalus.”
“But you didn’t, you know,” said Daedalus, sounding wheezy but triumphant. Like I’d felt him before. “It succeeded.”
“What were you doing?” Jules sounded furious.
With difficulty, I propped myself up enough to see that the others were in various stages of recovery. Manon was crying also, and Sophie was holding her, kissing her face. Axelle was leaning over into some bushes, being sick. Luc and Richard got up, and they both looked as furious as Jules sounded. Luc was pale and clammy, his deep green bouvre dark with sweat. Like the rest of us, Luc was cut all over from when the glass burst. Thin ribbons of blood trailed down his face and arms.
“A forceful summoning.” Daedalus sounded so pleased with himself that I wanted to kick him. “For Marcel and Claire. There’s no way they can resist coming now. I’ll have my Treize.”
“You fricking jerk!” Clio choked out, sitting up. “How dare you—?”
He turned to her, his eyes like ice. “I dare much, little girl,” he said. “And you’ll thank me before this is through.”
“Get up.” Luc glared down at Daedalus.
“Oh, Luc, really,” Daedalus said. He got to his feet a little shakily, and as soon as he was up, Luc swung back and punched him so hard it knocked Daedalus off his feet.
Daedalus lay still on his back, his mouth gasping like a fish.
“Get up,” Luc said again, and spit blood onto the ground.
Ouida came over, moving stiffly. “Please, Luc, don’t,” she said, putting a hand on his arm. He ignored her for a moment, then turned to her. His chest was heaving and his eyes gleamed with anger. “I’m asking you,” she said more softly. “Please.”
After several long moments, Luc swallowed and stepped back but glared down at Daedalus.
Richard came over, his upper lip cut, his robe sliced in several blood-rimmed places. He looked down at Daedalus.
“Try it again, old man,” he said, his voice still and deadly. “Try using me again like that against my will and I’ll find a way to kill you. I promise.”
Daedalus looked shocked. “Riche—” he began, but Richard had already turned and walked away, heading to the food tables.
I lay back down, feeling better as soon as I was touching the earth from head to foot. I looked up at Petra.
“Can we get out of here?”
“Yes,” she said firmly. “As soon as you two can walk.”
Hurricane Force
What was this guy’s name? Pak? Pakpao? Whatever. Claire lifted her hair off her neck and fell over sideways on the bed.
The guy said something to her, but the only word Claire caught was beautiful.
She smiled and patted his arm sleepily. “Yeah, yeah.”
In the next instant, the finely carved wooden screens on her windows blew inward with hurricane force. Empty bottles fell and smashed on the ground. The single lightbulb overhead burst, showering Claire with hot, fine pieces of glass.
The magick hit Claire in the chest like a fist, and she bolted upright, gasping.
Daedalus! That bastard! Claire sprang out of bed, swearing furiously. Pak was frightened, chattering in Thai, something about a storm. She ignored him, stomping around her room. Her feet were cut by the broken glass, but she ignored that too. Damn Daedalus! Picking up a heavy brass incense holder, Claire hurled it against the wall. It knocked a chip out of the plaster and fell to the floor with a crunching sound. She would kill him—somehow she would find a way. She would absolutely cut out his beating heart. Had anyone ever tried that?
Finally Claire sank back down on the bed. Pak put his hand on her shoulder, concerned. She shrugged him off, told him to leave now. At least she’d learned that much Thai. Very useful. While the guy, completely bewildered, got dressed, Claire hung her head, so angry she could hardly breathe. A liquor bottle had broken near her foot, and the sticky puddle touched her bare foot. The alcohol burned her cuts, but none of it mattered.
Pak tried to talk to her once agai
n, but she waved him away. She wouldn’t cry—Claire never cried, but she almost wished she could right now. In a few moments she had to get up, throw some things together, and grab a taxi to the airport. She was going to New Orleans. And once she was there, she was going to make sure that Daedalus understood he was never, ever to mess with her again.
A Spell of Forceful Summoning
Marcel was dreaming. In his dream, he was tending a garden by a river, back in Louisiana. There was water everywhere in Louisiana, rivers everywhere, like the canals in Amsterdam. When he was young, people had used the rivers much more than the rutted, muddy roads.
There were two kinds of rivers. One kind was opaque and green, with warm, slow-moving water. The other kind was clear and red-tinged, with cold water that moved fast. They were both good to swim in, drink from, catch fish in. Here in Ireland, despite the very different climate, Marcel had lots of seafood, like back home. Crabs and shrimp, all different kinds of fish. He loved that about Ireland, the greenness, the water. Like home.
In his dream, Marcel was tending a garden. Looking up, he saw a lone pirogue moving slowly down the river. It must have broken loose from somewhere. Marcel made his way down the slippery clay bank, avoiding the knobby cypress knees poking up through the water. He grabbed a long branch and hooked it on one end of the little flat-bottomed boat. He would pull it to shore and tie it up, find out whose it was.
The pirogue bumped against roots, its bottom scraping the shore. Marcel leaned down to grab its trailing rope, then stopped, frozen. Inside the boat was a body. His breath caught in his throat as he pulled the boat closer. It was a girl, not yet twenty. She lay peacefully on the boat’s floor, eyes closed, arms crossed over her chest. She looked like she was sleeping except for the unnatural pallor of her skin, her blue-tinged lips and fingertips.
Now he saw that she was wet, her dress sodden and clinging to her, her black hair streaming back. Cerise’s birthmark burned on her cheekbone, bright red.
Cerise? No—of course not. Cerise had been blond. But this girl looked just like Cerise, if Cerise had had black hair. And this girl had drowned. Cerise had died in childbirth.
Who was she? Marcel reached out one shaking hand—and then the small, high window of his monk’s cell burst inward, the shards of glass streaking across his face and hands, leaving fine red lines.
Marcel shot up, cold sweat breaking out instantly. His room was pitch dark; his window was shattered. Icy air rolled in through the small opening, pooling and settling all around him. His heart was pounding, and then it hit him: the knowledge of what this was, what Daedalus had done.
“Oh God.” Marcel moaned and pressed his hands against his face, feeling the warm stickiness of his blood. Bits of glass stung him, but it didn’t matter. Daedalus had thrown a thick velvet rope around his neck, all the way from America. Now he was going to pull it in, and there was nothing Marcel could do about it. Everything in him was urging him to America. He felt like if he didn’t get there as soon as possible, his skin would erupt and spiders would swarm all over his body. He had to get there fast, fast, fast.
That was what a spell of forceful summoning felt like. It made you panic, made every second’s delay feel like torture. He would feel like he had the plague until he set foot in Louisiana again.
Marcel hung his head, biting back bitter tears. He wasn’t strong enough to resist this spell. If he was truly worthy, he would be able to reject it, to pray his way out of it, work harder against it.
But he wasn’t worthy. He’d always known that.
Stifling a sob in his throat, Marcel began to review what needed to be done. Not much. Just getting up, telling Father Jonah that he must leave, and making his way to the Shannon airport. Oh God. He would see them all again. Daedalus, who had done this to him. Petra, whom he loved but also feared. Richard, his mortal enemy, who had killed Cerise. Manon, with whom he shared a terrible secret. And so on. All of them.
He didn’t need to know why Daedalus had summoned him to New Orleans. He already knew what awaited him there: pain and destruction. And the absolute end of any hope he had of his salvation.
Cate Tiernan, A Circle of Ashes
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