Part 10 (1/2)

I nodded. ”Mostly, I just want to deflect the energy.”

”I don't know,” William said. ”I've been doing my reading, you know, and this seems like bad juju to me. ” William was voluntarily studying Wicca for a year and a day. He said he didn't quite feel qualified to be in the coven and proclaimed himself a novice. ”Every time you cast a spell against someone, you bind your energy to them.”

”But the woman has to protect herself,” Griffin said.

”d.a.m.n straight,” agreed Xylia.

”I'm not sure it's precisely the same when used in defense,” Blythe said. ”I mean, after all, the person who cursed Garnet already bound them together. Garnet is trying to break that bond and free herself.”

As if I really could. I looked over at Sebastian, who was silent through this entire discussion. He seemed lost in his own thoughts, studying the pattern of the Persian rug.

”What do you think, Sebastian?” I asked.

Barney wandered into the room. She made a beeline for the empty chili bowls on the table. Putting her front paws on the edge of the table, she put her nose into one of them. Sebastian edged her away with a gentle nudge from his toe.

”If Tereza hasn't cursed you, then all this energy we're raising tonight most certainly will bind you to her,” Sebastian said. I opened my mouth to protest, when he continued, ”But it seems obvious she has. I'm not sure how much more can go wrong with our wedding plans.”

I made a mental note to tell Sebastian about my mother's meltdown and the missing application later.

”You've convinced me. Let's do this,” William said.

It was nearly midnight once we had everything planned and ready. We'd brainstormed and consulted several of the spell books that Sebastian and I had in our library. Plus William used his BlackBerry to Google hex-breaking. Nearly every source we found agreed that curse-breaking spells needed to be performed at a crossroads. We all piled into Robert's van in search of a suitable site.

Sebastian called shotgun, since he had a road atlas and a pen flashlight. William, Xylia, Blythe, and I piled into the next row.

The others filled in behind us. Robert's van rumbled to a start, and we all bounced down the county roads. In my bag I had four oversized black votive candles, a compa.s.s, several boxes of matches, a charcoal brick, a strip of paper, and a pen. I also had a plastic bag full of homemade incense that the coven had whipped up in the kitchen. It consisted of frankincense, myrrh, pine needles, and dragon's blood.

Sebastian and Robert argued good-naturedly about the directions in the front. Meanwhile, William tried to convince Griffin that ”real men” used a mortar and pestle to grind their herbs, not a Cuisinart. Someone in the backseat hummed ”O Tannenbaum.”

With everyone in full arctic gear, we were packed in tightly. My hips tended toward ample anyway, but add in a layer of cotton long underwear and a fluffy parka, and I felt like a stuffed hippo. It didn't help that Blythe sat next to me in her fas.h.i.+onable knee- high boots and slim tweed jacket. Her mittens, scarf, and hat all matched.

The windows fogged up from the heat of all the bodies wedged together in the van, but through the haze I could see the twinkle of stars in an inky black sky. Snow-covered hills rolled past the window. The dark shapes of bare, twisted oak branches and bramble patches slashed the crystalline landscape. Highway lights lengthened shadows cast by fence posts and wire.

Lilith stirred in my belly. I felt her tingle along my nerves.

”Deer!” someone in the back shouted, and Robert hit the brakes just in time. A buck sprang onto the road. The deer stopped in front of the van for a second and stared at us with big, glossy black eyes. His ears flicked, and he turned his head, as if sensing something in the wind. With a single bound he cleared the road and darted up over the hill. We all watched breathlessly as his retreating white tail reflected the light of the headlights.

No one said anything for a long moment.

”Wow,” William breathed.

”Better than wow,” Sebastian said. ”We're at a crossroads.”

We tumbled out of the van, our boots crunching the snow. The air was cold and crisp and clear. The hairs in my nose stuck together with my first breath. A crescent moon shone faintly over a line of pine trees on the eastbound side of the road. On the opposite side, I could see cattails dusted with snow bent low in a brown pool of frozen marsh water. A short distance up the road, a small, log cabin-style mom-and-pop bait shop was illuminated by a yard light. The plastic letters on the portable marquee spelled out, ”Closed for the Season. See U in April.”

Given Lilith's sudden presence earlier, I wasn't at all surprised when the compa.s.s revealed that not only had we arrived at a crossroads but that it was perfectly aligned to the cardinal directions. Green street signs informed us that we were at the junction of County Highway L and road number 107.

Robert pulled the van into the parking lot of the bait shop next to a semi trailer that clearly hadn 't moved in decades. We huddled around each other in a tight circle, working out the last bit of logistics. ”We're going to need a sentry,” I said, looking at everyone in turn. ”Someone willing to skip out of the spell in order to alert us if someone's coming.”

”I'll do it,” Sebastian said.

I frowned. As a vampire made from magic, Sebastian was the second most powerful witch in the coven. I only trumped him because I harbored a G.o.ddess.

Sebastian could sense my hesitation, so he added, ”I'm the only one who can handle Tereza if she shows.”

I was going to say something about how far she'd have to travel on foot to catch up with us, when I remembered she could pop up wherever she wanted to. ”Oh, all right,” I said. ”It makes sense.”

I set everyone else on task. We placed our candles in the center of each arm of the crossroads. A member of the coven stood by each with a box of matches. The rest of us took handfuls of snow from the ditch to make a little mound of snow in the middle of the intersection. I made a little depression in the snow with my fist and then dumped in half of the bag of herbs. Then I lit a corner of the charcoal brick and set it on top of the heap. In a moment, scented smoke began to rise. The herbs burned dully, casting an eerie, shadowy light in the almost completely darkened intersection.

Griffin, who stood in the north arm, bent down and lit his candle. It took a couple of tries before the wick caught, but soon it was flickering in the slight breeze. In the east, Xylia lit her candle, followed by William in the south and Blythe in the west.

Once the candles were going, we began to hum. We'd been working together as a group for several months now, and we'd discovered that we all centered quickly when we sang or hummed the ”Circle Song.” It had a very simple tune and a repet.i.tive chorus of ”We are a circle, within a circle, with no beginning and never ending.” As we sang, I took pinches of herbs and tossed them onto the charcoal. Their impact made a dramatic puff of aromatic smoke.

I let Lilith rise slowly. The tangy scent of frankincense mingled with the sharper odor of pine sap, putting me in mind of all the times I'd practiced magic and smelled such smells. Above, the blackness of the sky seemed immense and as endless as the circle in our song. The cold air kissed my exposed cheeks, focusing me on this moment.

When I felt that Lilith and I were together, I took the sheet of paper and black felt marker out of my bag. On one side I wrote, ”Return to Sender,” on the other, ”Break this curse.” I held it up for the coven to see and for them to add their energy to. Once they had, I tossed it onto the smoldering pile of herbs. The paper caught quickly and soon burned to ashes. I visualized the smoke taking the hex back to the one who originally cast it.

The last step in our spell was to raise the energy of protection and then, finally, those of us in the center would stomp on the remains of the incense pyre and thus fully break up the curse.

Someone started singing the words to the circle song again to begin our traditional way of raising energy. One by one, each person joined in. Xylia's bright soprano, William's baritone, Griffin's gruff base, Blythe's warble, and finally . . .

A car horn let out a wailing honk. Headlights blinded me as a vehicle came barreling around the curve. Xylia dove for cover.

I raised my hand. My only thought was, Stop the car! Lilith's energy shot out of me like a hammer. I heard the engine stall. The truck plowed over a candle, and the brakes hissed. Lilith continued to push against the oncoming force. The vehicle skidded on the ice but stopped less than a foot from my outstretched palm.

Lilith retreated. My hand trembled, and I dropped it to my side, feeling spent. All the energy we 'd raised had dissipated into stopping the truck. Suddenly I felt a bit like that deer, staring into the battered grill of a Chevy pickup truck. I could see the startled expression of a man in a cap through the winds.h.i.+eld. He slammed his fists on the steering wheel and said something I couldn't hear. When the door opened, he was still cursing. He stumbled awkwardly out of the vehicle. His words were slurred.

”What the h.e.l.l you kids doing out here in the middle of the road? ” His eyes narrowed in on the plastic bag in my hand. ”Is this some sort of drug party? Are you people crazy or something?”

The guy had the uniform of a Midwestern farmer down pat: work boots, faded jeans, and a plaid s.h.i.+rt with a parka vest over it.

Sandy brown hair stubbled his head and merged with a slightly grayer five o'clock shadow. I totally expected him to have a gun rack in the cab of his truck, but instead I thought I saw a Feingold for President b.u.t.ton on the collar of his vest.

I continued to stare at the interloper with my caught-in-the-headlights look. Where the h.e.l.l was Sebastian? He was supposed to be our lookout! Had he gotten into some trouble?

”Hey,” the farmer guy said, his eyes darting from the candles to the smoldering herbs. He swayed unsteadily on his feet and gripped the handle of his truck door to steady himself. ”What's going on? What are you doing in the middle of the road?”

Griffin swaggered over, his shoulders squared. ”Practicing magic. What are you doing? It's the middle of the night. This is the middle of nowhere.”

Farmer-guy was taken aback. He blinked rapidly. I thought he might have a heart attack. Instead he stammered, ”I was going home. It's bar close. Did you say magic? Are you a cult or something?”

Griffin shook his head, his long hair bright in the headlights. ”Wiccans.”