He woke in the house by the sea and again tore away covers and sheets, heaving them to the floor and stumbling down from the high loft bed, landing funny on his right leg so that his ankle twisted and he cried out in pain. Confusion and exhaustion coursed through him and, for a time, he grasped it all--Claire, Abby, the coven of Ula, All Hallow's Eve, Adora and Rod--and then he opened the doorway of his room and stood, not in a hallway, but in a dense, black forest. The leering face of Tobias stared back at him, his mouth rimmed with blood and a twisted figure at his feet. The figure kept changing, long red curls became Claire's short black bob and then Abby's baseball cap the morning that she found Devin's body. He stared at his own body writhing on the earth, black snakes coiling around his arms and legs. Now dozens of Vepars surrounded him and they chanted into the night sky, their arms rising in worship to some invisible demon. He turned from the image and the woods were gone, replaced by a cliff of wildflowers, and Abby stood in the center, her long brown curls blowing in a lake breeze and her smile like the sweetest honey. He ran across the field but, as Abby turned, he saw that it was not Abby at all, but Dafne, her dark eyes looking angry and her face twisted into a grotesque and hateful grin. She lifted a finger and pointed.
Sebastian fell through a doorway and found he had somehow made it downstairs in the strange house he'd been brought to the day before. His hands and knees hit the cobblestone pathway outside of the front door and pain shot through his limbs. He crawled toward the water, sweat pouring down his face and dripping from his armpits. Dizziness and nausea wracked his body and he teetered to the side, landing in a barren thorny bush that clawed at his face. The bush held its shape, but the rest of the world shifted and now he lay on a soft blanket with surging lake water caressing the cliffs beneath him. He groaned with pleasure as Abby guided him inside her. She pressed her naked breasts against his chest and began to slide back and forth on top of him. He pulled her hips down and laughed as he came, but when he sought her sweet brown eyes, they'd been replaced by oozing black holes. Long flaxen hair flowed from the ghastly face of the monster than held him beneath her. He wrenched away from her and fell from the cliff edge, landing in a circle of fire. The Vepars again surrounded him. Their eyes held black glassy stares and their bloody lips moved in unison. Somewhere in the woods, a young boy cried, and then the cry became Claire's and he called out to her.
Julian watched Sebastian and carefully stirred the boiling liquid that he had placed on the stove when he first heard the young man crash from his bed upstairs. Julian had only used the Anamnesis twice, but twice was enough. The concoction would aid Sebastian in his shock, but also begin to repair the damage done. To remove an entire memory took ancient magic, the sort of magic that, if done poorly, left lasting damage.
Julian allowed Sebastian another half hour before he went to the beach to retrieve him. He did not intend cruelty by this delay, but understood the delicate mechanisms at work in Sebastian's mind. Julian knew that his own interjection would only prolong the process. He found Sebastian near the water, his body tucked into a ball and his face wracked with grief.
"Sebastian, come out. You're safe, you're safe," Julian told him, kneeling on the rocky shore and placing a warm water bottle against Sebastian's icy skin.
Sebastian heard a disembodied voice from the sky and then from the darkness as the forest too fell away. He followed it out and back into the present where he lay on the beach and Julian's face loomed before him.
He blinked wildly around, straining for breath, but struggling more to piece a lifetime back together. The blank mind afflicting him for the previous weeks had vanished. All of the pain and joy that had transpired to make him the man that he was slid back into place with the force of a hurricane. Tears poured from his eyes and he closed them and relished their salty taste. He had never been so grateful to remember the long tragic tale of his life.
Chapter Twenty-Four
That night, Abby and Oliver walked the streets of Chicago and talked about their findings. The city had already begun its relentless pursuit of holiday buyers and every storefront held dazzling Christmas displays with elaborate trees and red-cheeked mannequins. Garland-wrapped street lamps lined the sidewalks and passersby huddled close to their loved ones, hats tucked tightly over their ears and hands shoved into their pockets. Despite the cold, the city was romantic, and Abby felt a smile curve her lips when they passed a man playing a saxophone along the Grand River. Oliver dropped several bills into his open case and took Abby's hand in his own.
His warmth felt so good that she drifted in the fantasy of lovers strolling the haunted Chicago streets with no greater problem than whether to get cocoa or coffee that night.
He spoke and her momentary reverie dissipated with the cold halo of his breath.
"Do you feel like we're getting closer to this?"
Abby considered his question, flashing back on the day's discoveries.
"Maybe. I want to find Stephen Kramer. He's clearly hinting at something happening in Trager City. Of course that concerns me for his whereabouts..."
"Yeah, me too. I think he ran, though. The question is from what?"
"Exactly. I'm also curious about that fire in 1908. The reports were conflicting. I mean, you have witnesses saying that more than eight people died, but the paper only reported one. Not to mention the cities attempt to demolish those woods and build a parking lot. What's that all about?"
"I suspect," Oliver said, "that the person who wrote that Aubrey was the only fatality, also had a hand in lobbying for the destruction of the woods. Maybe they wanted to hide something?"
"Or," Abby interjected. "Maybe Alva was playing puppet master even then. I told you how he orchestrated the arrest of Devin's adopted brother. I think he either got into the heads of those working the case, or he just went in there and did it himself."
"Yeah, that sounds about right."
"Have you told anyone at Ula about all of this?" Abby asked.
"I haven't spoken with anyone at the coven in nearly five days."
"Not even Faustine?" Abby was surprised. She assumed that he still connected with Faustine telepathically.
"No. Our connection dissolved before I left, but since then, no communication from him at all. What's worse is that I feel so free and yet completely guilty at the same time."
Abby squeezed his hand.
"I understand that. When I left Nick and my family and went to Trager, I felt more liberated than I ever had, but beneath that lived this huge ball of shame just eating away at me. It's still there most days."
Oliver sighed and shook his head sadly.
"They have been so much more than a family to me, Abby. They saved my life. Before Helena found me, I was just...lost. I had even considered suicide. Can you believe that? Taking my own life because I just couldn't handle what was happening to me."
Abby stopped and hugged Oliver hard, wrapping her arms tightly behind his back and letting her breath warm his neck. He hugged her back and they stood that way, allowing the world to move around them as they comforted each other for things that they didn't even know.
When she finally pulled away, the heat abandoned them and they both grew cold.
"Let's go in there." Oliver pointed to a tiny pub, tucked between two glowing store fronts. Inside they slid into a small half-moon booth with cracked and faded red leather seats. Abby leaned her head back and took a long breath, not minding the musty, dank air. Only a few people occupied the other tables. Several of them laughed too loudly as they drank enormous glasses of beer. The bartender looked tired and Abby watched her eyes drift repeatedly to the clock. Her blonde hair showed gray roots and she wore a low-cut, black t-shirt that revealed sagging breasts and the edge of some rose-patterned tattoo.
"My lovely friend here and I will each have coffees, with Irish Cream," Oliver told the bartender when she shuffled over to the table, not bothering to pull out a pen and paper.
"I.D.s," she grumbled, again her eyes flickering t
oward the clock.
Absolutely," Oliver told her warmly, removing his and then taking her hand in his own as he pressed his driver's license into her palm.
Abby saw the slightest shift as warmth traveled from Oliver into the woman, lighting up her body from within. When the flush reached her face, she smiled brightly and her eyes grew wide and alive.
"What's your name, honey?" Oliver asked her, still holding her hand.
"Janis," she responded kindly. The depth of her smile took ten years from her face.
Abby marveled at the change and, even when Oliver took his hand away, the woman's cheery disposition held. She whistled as she walked away and playfully flicked the ear of one of her regulars as she returned to the bar. He laughed and threw a sugar packet at her.
"That's a gift," Abby said, feeling lighter herself.
"Yes, it is," Oliver agreed, and though he still smiled toward the woman, his eyes looked sad. "A gift that I rarely use. You know what? Victor is right. I don't want him to be right, but we're wasted at Ula. I have these powers and what do I do with them? I hunt Vepars. I use Helena's magical tinctures when I have a headache or when my past feels too heavy a load to bear. I could count on one hand how many times I've done that in the last year."
Abby continued to watch the bartender as she flitted behind the counter, now like a tiny hummingbird. The weight of the world had vanished, not only from her shoulders, but from the energy around her. She delivered their drinks with a flourish, sliding Oliver's across the table so it just touched the edge, laughing merrily when he leaned down and took a sip.
"Delicious, best I've ever had," he told her with a wink.
"Thank you," Abby added, and the woman floated away, stopping at another table with three men who all whistled as she took a chair.
"I agree with you," Abby said, "but I also think we need time at the coven to learn. It's like you said, they saved you. We shouldn't take that for granted."
She spoke the words, but just barely believed them. After all, she'd felt stifled at Ula and angry at the way the witches seemed to shut out Sebastian. In her heart, she could never truly give herself to any group who cut out the people that she loved for being different.
"Lydie too," Oliver continued. "She's brilliant and, when she gets a little bit older, she will be able to do the most amazing things. If she stays at Ula, I'm so afraid that she'll become like Dafne, this bitter angry woman who lives in a constant state of fear and agitation."
"Do you think Ula did that to her?"
"No, but it hasn't helped. The coven is supposed to support and help you grow. It's not meant to be a hideaway where witches avoid and escape from the problems of the world. Even Buddha spoke about how enlightenment is not avoiding life, but finding peace within life. I never wanted to be a monk tucked away in a mountain cave. I want to bring my light into the world."
Abby took his hand and kissed it, moved by his words.
"Me, too. I've always felt so damn simple, so not extraordinary and now I am. I can do crazy things that no one can do. I want to make a real difference with these powers, with this life."
"That's what they're doing, Victor and Kendra and the others. They're like hippie witches, they're revolutionaries. The coven's are the past and they are creating the future."
Oliver's words frightened Abby, but they also excited her. She didn't necessarily want to live Victor's life, but she wanted her own version and something about the coven seemed to warn against such things.
"What would Elda say if you told her that? And Faustine? Would they try to stop you?"
Oliver thought about it, slowly draining his glass and signaling to Janis for another.
"I honestly have no idea. I really don't. This is the first time in years that I've even thought about leaving Ula. When Julian left, I almost followed him. He told me the same thing as Victor--in his own way, of course. He felt that the witches of Ula had retreated and were no longer living a creative life. They punished him by forcing him out of the coven."
"Really?" Despite Abby's apprehensions, she found it hard to believe that Elda and Faustine would throw anyone out of the coven.
****
Sebastian held his head in his hands and crinkled his nose at the bitter smelling mug that Julian had placed before him.
"I know," Julian said kindly. "It's pretty ripe, especially when you're feeling like that."
Sebastian nodded and took a sip, studying Julian, and for the first time realized that he knew him from somewhere.
"Have I met you?" Sebastian asked, not totally hating the muddy tea once its warmth spread through his chest.
"No," Julian told him without hesitation. "I would remember."
Sebastian continued to stare at him, perplexed, and then he remembered a photo from the library at Ula. Eight people dressed in formal attire stood in front of a painting. The men wore tuxedos and the women ball gowns, but of an era long past. Julian had been in that photograph, his hair long, nearly past his shoulders, and darker. His arm had been draped along the shoulders of a beautiful woman with large oval eyes and a pile of light-colored hair twisted on top of her head.
"It was a picture at Ula," Sebastian told him, "on the fireplace mantel in the library."
Julian smiled sadly.
"I see. Then, yes, I guess that I am familiar to you."
"Did you live at Ula?"
Julian sighed and refilled Sebastian's cup.
"Yes, for many years."
"How about Adora? How is it that she's here? She helped my sister Claire, but I thought maybe she had died...she just disappeared."
"And she feels extremely guilty about that," Julian replied. "She had an emergency and left abruptly. She did not intend to abandon your sister and had she known what would befall her, she never would have left. In her haste, she even left a Book of Shadows, which she fears may have fallen into the hands of the Vepars and caused the death of the witch Devin."
"No, I had the book. First Claire and then, after Claire died, me. They killed Devin, but they didn't use the book to find her."
Julian looked thoughtful.
"Hmmm, that's interesting and will be welcome information to Adora. She suffers daily with the burden that she inadvertently caused the death of two witches and perhaps more. Who has the Astral Book of Shadows now?"
"Elda. I gave it to her, along with Claire's journals when Abby and I first arrived at the island. Right before the All Hallow's Ball, I went into the dungeons and found some of the journals. I suddenly felt like I had to avenge Claire, as if she called out to me to even the score. What's strange is that I don't feel any of that anger now."
Julian shook his head.
"Witches are not vengeful creatures, Sebastian. I believe that your Claire rests peacefully."
"How can you possibly know that?"
"Because agitated spirits are easy to detect, especially when you've been around as long as I have..."
"It felt so real. She came to me in my dreams and she asked me to find her. She wanted me to kill Tobias."
"I know that you believed it to be real," Julian conceded. "But I also think that some other entity hoped to poison you with such thoughts."
"Have you told them that you found me? Abby must be freaking out." Sebastian asked, realizing how terrifying his disappearance must have been for the witches at Ula.
Julian paced to the window and looked into the night.
"She is, I'm sure," Julian told him. "But no, I have not been in contact with the witches of Ula for more than ten years."
"What? Why? We have to tell them." Sebastian stood up, faltered and sat back down.
Julian turned back to Sebastian and looked at him seriously.
"First you need to understand what's happening."
"Okay, tell me then."
"Let me begin by saying that I don't have the whole picture yet and that is why I have not reached out to Elda or Faustine. What I do know is that Dafne has masterminded this entire mess--your disap
pearance from the All Hallow's Ball, your memory loss and, if I'm right, the misconception that you have died."
"Died?" Sebastian spat and then quickly lowered his voice, not wanting to wake the others. "Abby thinks I'm dead?"
"I believe so, though on that point I'm not positive. However, this information comes to me from a very reliable source."
"Dafne," Sebastian frowned as he spoke her name. "She has hated me since day one, but why would she do this?"
"The answer to that is very complex and, again, I have only pieces of this much larger picture. Dafne was part of what appears to be a horrible curse that originated in Trager City. This curse occurs only once every century. You and Abigail arrived at the coven of Ula just days after the one hundred year mark. It is a strange curse, one that I still do not fully comprehend, but I have experienced first-hand the path of its destruction, as has Dafne. She believed that she could prevent the return of the curse by removing you from Ula."
"A curse on what?" Sebastian asked. He took another drink of the tea and shuddered as the house moaned in the strong shifting winds.
Sorciére Page 21
