Hexes and Hemlines

by Juliet Blackwell

  I mumbled my spell as I wrapped the figure in red thread, for the life force, and black thread, for the death shroud. I bathed him in Tabasco sauce, letting the capsicum of the peppers begin its magic. The murderer was in the hot seat, so to speak.

  What is evil and death is nigh, take

  this poppet through and through

  As serpents twist on high, so the

  snakes shall live in you

  I dropped the poppet into the cauldron. There was a great bubbling up, and a burst of steam that filled the space just below the ceiling as though it were a cloud.

  But it didn’t connect. I could tell. My helping spirit did not come to me. I looked at Oscar, who stared back at me. It was just like what happened in Aidan’s place. Had I lost something? Or was this the effect of the curse Renna told me about, the dirt in the walnut shell?

  I thought I might know where the shell was. And I realized, also, that the brew would most likely work if I could place it where Malachi Zazi lost his life, to mingle with the energy of the victim. What there was of it. Was this why the place had been cleansed, so no one could piggyback on the energy?

  My conscience nagged me. I had promised Carlos Romero I would call him if I needed to get into Malachi Zazi’s apartment again. I called and got his infernal voice mail. I told him where I was headed, confessing ahead of time to breaking into an active crime scene. Sometimes it’s better to ask forgiveness than permission.

  I decanted the still-hot brew into a special, widemouthed, heat-tolerant mason jar. Oscar helped me to pack up my white cloth, the athame, the Sorcerer’s Violet, and the blessed rope in a hemp bag. I brought my satchel already full of a variety of oils and herbs, the Hand of Glory, and a small can of sterno to heat the brew.

  And as an afterthought, I stuck the Serpentarius stone into my large pocket. Just in case.

  Oscar was angry with me, once again, for refusing to let him come up to Malachi’s apartment. But this time, my refusal had more to do with his safety than any worries about polite company. I wasn’t sure what I would find up there, and I had a premonition it wouldn’t go all that smoothly. A witch’s familiar is usually her best ally in such circumstances, but the truth was that other than his helpful energy while brewing, Oscar wasn’t very good at being a familiar. He was about as helpful in most things as the black cat. Speaking of which, what was I going to do with the poor feline?

  The doorman was not at his post, so I brought out my Hand of Glory and unlocked the front doors. I let myself in and rode the clanky elevator up to the penthouse, on the thirteenth floor. Crime scene tape hung limply on either side of the door. Once again the Hand of Glory worked its magic, opened the lock, and lit the way.

  I crept in carefully, but the place seemed empty.

  I made my way through the kitchen, to the back door that led upstairs. To the little roof garden that Malachi Zazi had made for himself at the foot of Serpentarius. God of eternal life, eternal youth. I dropped my bags and extracted the items necessary for the spell.

  After opening the jar of brew, I set it on a wire grill over the little sterno can on the tile surrounding the little raised planter.

  I started to dig into the soft dirt. After several minutes I unearthed a walnut shell. This was the hex; I could feel its sinister hum. I split it open, spit on the contents, and applied a drop each of rosemary, orange, and cinnamon oils. I murmured an incantation to reflect the hex back on the sender, though I could feel that my enemy was strong, and protected. Finally, I mumbled a quick cleansing spell, let the soil spill back into the garden patch, and dug it in with the rest of the earth.

  The jar of brew started to boil, the steam ascending to a point about six feet over my head, where it stayed in a cloudlike puff. I started to chant, invoking the spirits of the witches that had gone before me, my ancestors, and my spirit guide. With a flash of light, I finally saw the amorphous, barely-there face in the steam. My guardian spirit. I could feel that the spell had taken. It was done.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” said a woman’s high-pitched voice. It was Doura.

  I fell back on my butt. “Just casting a quick spell,” I said. My eyes went past her to see Tracy. Behind her, looking befuddled, as though under a spell, was Claudia.

  What was she doing here?

  I took a deep breath, trying to keep my calm. If my anger cast about without control, I could end up making the situation worse. At this point I wasn’t entirely sure what I was dealing with, but I knew one thing: Doura was trouble, with a capital T.

  Her blue sunken eyes moved past me to the planter box. She smiled. “Found the walnut?”

  I nodded.

  “Told you we should have kept watch,” Tracy muttered.

  “This is between us, Doura. Why is Claudia here? What have you done to her?”

  “She’s okay—we saw her at your shop the first time we were there, remember? She mentioned she lived in Malachi’s building. I figured she might be useful to have along. You go after me, she gets hurt. Like your buddy Bronwyn.”

  I felt rage surge through me, but I clamped down on it with everything I had. I breathed deeply, trying to remember—and channel—the feeling of Aidan’s power wrapping around me in the cloister, helping me to focus on seeing the unseeable. This was no time for my powers to cast about, uncontrolled. I needed to figure things out, come up with a solid approach. Keeping Doura talking seemed like the best plan for the moment; I imagined she’d love to brag about her own abilities.

  “What would Prince High think of all this?” I asked her.

  “The High Prince of Hell? He’s a putz. He works for us, not the other way around.”

  “Oh?”

  “He used to bring in good money with those books of his. But lately he’s back to playing the Wurlitzer. He’s still useful as a cover, but not for much else.”

  “How could the Church of the Devil act as your cover?”

  “They all thought he was nuts, that we were just the background. No one pays us any attention—once they figured out he was just for show, they didn’t worry too much about him. Besides, it keeps your darling Aidan out of our hair. If he wants to respect the pact he has to leave us alone, go through the Prince for everything.”

  “So you still act according to the pact?”

  “Oh, sure, we did. But you’re the one who broke the pact, sister.” She chuckled, low and sexy. “Hands off each other, remember? Then you went and got messed up in this whole Malachi Zazi deal.”

  “I wasn’t the one who killed him.”

  “Of course not. Heaven knows who did the actual deed, but it was useful in any case. We were just as glad he was dead, frankly, weren’t we, Tracy? He was starting to drive Nichol nuts, wouldn’t leave her alone. I guess he really fell for her.”

  “What does Nichol have to do with any of this?”

  “She’s in training. She’s surprisingly gifted, and malleable. Quite the little actress. And she has marvelous connections.”

  I thought of Atticus “saving” Nichol from the ceremony in the woods. Had she been there of her own free will? Was it an indoctrination ritual?

  “But the Prince flipped out when Malachi died. Who knew he even liked his son that much? He started running around town imitating his son, of all things. People started asking questions, snooping around, not least of all, you.”

  “But why would you even care about Malachi’s death?”

  “There’s the ironic thing: Malachi actually had some talents. Must have gotten them from his mother’s side of the family, is all I’m saying. So I thought I might as well tap into some of his energy, since I was already having such fun with his dinner companions.”

  “What about them?”

  “The Serpentarius Society, and ‘bad luck’? Please. They were the perfect power source for our research over at Perkins Laboratories. Leaching just a bit of vitality each time. Turns out they were a bunch of superstitious folks after all. They never figured it out—felt like garbage, got
jittery, and created their own messes.”

  I looked over at the mannequin-like Claudia. She swayed slightly on her feet, but seemed unharmed. Tracy kept one hand on her upper arm.

  “Anyway,” Doura continued. “Malachi’s death turned out to be useful because it’s a legitimate reason to dissolve the pact. That way Aidan can’t come down on me for working with Perkins, and it’s not even my fault. So we cleansed the place, snatched the poor guy’s body so we could pretend to bring it back to life. I’m telling you, the Prince doesn’t have much sense of what does and doesn’t work. But now for the fun part: Since we’ve come this far, we might as well righteously avenge the dissolution of the pact.”

  She smiled and came to stand very close to me. I had to force myself not to back away. She picked up a lock of my hair, as though feeling it for softness.

  “You’ll do nicely.”

  “For what, exactly?”

  “Eternal life, youth. We’re not quite there yet, but Perkins’s scientists are getting closer all the time. Only problem is that apparently, the only way to attain eternal youth is to drain the energy from others. And the only way to do that is through the Craft.”

  I felt Tracy come up behind me. I thought of how much she reminded me of an elf the first time we met. If only she were an elf, maybe I’d have a shot. I haven’t known all that many witches in my life, but there was always a part of me that hoped there might be more of a natural sisterhood. Apparently, I was wrong.

  With Tracy behind me and Doura in front, I could feel their energies connecting, challenging and weakening my own.

  “So what’s next?” I asked, making a play for more time.

  Our intense face-off was interrupted as a man burst through the door from the stairs, out onto the roof. Atticus . I couldn’t believe he arrived to save me a second time.

  But then he cried out. He yanked his tie off his neck and frantically reached into his clothing, all the while making a high-pitched squealing noise, as though there were a hornet down his shirt.

  “What is your problem?” Doura asked, aggravated. “Whatever you’re on, you should consider rehab. Seriously. Is Nichol with you?”

  “There’s something in me!” he yelled.“Something . . . ! Aaaaaah!”

  Tracy laughed.

  While their attention was distracted, I fled.

  Unfortunately, there was nowhere to run. Everyone stood in between me and the door, temptingly ajar, that led to the stairs. And there was Claudia to consider—I couldn’t leave her here on the roof with these two. But I had to put some distance between me and Doura in order to concentrate, to find my center. Otherwise, I would be useless to anyone.

  I ran toward the corner, where one grand spire rose high above the roofline. The moldings acted like thin makeshift steps. Hugging the main part of the spire, I edged out on one of the lips, a shallow stone overhang.

  Doura just arched one tweezed eyebrow and curled her lip. “Just where do you think you’re going?”

  “Not sure yet,” I said. “I’m sort of thinking on my feet.”

  “Tracy,” Doura barked, gesturing with a quick nod of the head.

  Time slowed again, and I felt that strange, nightmarish sensation of moving through water, or worse, molasses. When Doura and Tracy spoke and moved, it was almost normal speed, but Atticus’s laments became drawn-out, eerie, slow-motion cries.

  A black cat meandered by the nearby rooftop crest. Was that Beowulf ? All I could see was the black silhouette against the sky. When the breeze blew over the feline and toward me, I sneezed.

  “Gesundheit,” came a whisper.

  I froze. That was Oscar’s gravelly voice.

  Frantic, but trying to appear nonchalant, I cast my gaze around the gargoyles. Until I finally spotted a small one I hadn’t seen before. Big, batlike ears. Clawed feet. Funny grimace on his face. Oscar. I closed my eyes in gratitude. Never had I been so happy to see a gargoyle.

  Speaking of gargoyles, the big hulking one nearest me shifted. I was sure of it this time. Then another, the funny smiling one from halfway down the main roof. And the one atop the spire I was hugging.

  They moved slowly, so slowly it was almost imperceptible. But with Tracy’s time spell, even normal conversation seemed warped and laborious. If the gargoyles’ movement was barely perceptible before, now with the slowing of time it was nearly impossible to detect.

  The gargoyle seemed to hold its arm out. I sensed more than saw it move. But one thing was sure: There used to be no place to go, but now there was.

  I grabbed the arm. It was cold and hard, stonelike, under my palm. Just like one would expect from a gargoyle. The only odd part is that it had moved—unusual behavior in a stone object.

  I inched my way over, pulling myself onto its shoulder. Just putting more distance between me and Doura felt comforting, allowed me to breathe more deeply and channel my energies.

  “C’mon now,” said Doura. “Don’t be difficult. Thanks to you I still have to find out who killed Malachi in order to calm the Prince down. Or maybe I’ll just tell him you did it, and we got revenge for him. Poor guy, I feel kind of bad for him.”

  “I can tell you who killed Malachi,” I said.

  “How do you know?”

  “I cast a spell. To determine who might have done it.”

  “Liar. You’re saying you saw someone while scrying?”

  “No. I brewed. And then I cast from afar.”

  She looked at me silently for a long moment. When she spoke her voice was skeptical, but intrigued. “You can do that?”

  Atticus quite literally threw himself at Doura, falling to his knees in front of her.

  “I’ll do anything you ask. Just make it stop!”

  “Get up, for the love of—Tracy! Take care of this!”

  Tracy looked miffed, but she did as she was told, coming to grab Atticus from behind. She hooked her hands under his arms and drew him up and toward her with remarkable strength.

  The slowdown ended.

  “And just where is Nichol?” demanded Doura of Tracy. “Does she have to be late to every damned thing? Wasn’t she with Atticus? We need the three of us to complete this.”

  The gargoyles shifted again. I didn’t know what they were capable of, for better or for worse, but I was certain that Oscar would intervene. I didn’t know how much he could do, and I didn’t want him to get hurt, but it was heartening just to know that I wasn’t all alone. I could feel their elemental stone energy; it helped center me, calm me.

  I looked over just as a snake slithered through the open stairwell door. It came toward me, still unnoticed by any but Oscar and me.

  As it passed Doura, I met its flat reptilian eyes. Concentrated.

  It paused. It coiled. It struck.

  Chapter 28

  Doura cried out.

  Tracy ran to her side.

  “It bit me! It bit my leg!” Doura cried, falling to the tar-and-gravel rooftop. The snake was still attached by its fangs, still pumping its venom into her leg.

  Tracy grabbed the snake with her bare hands and ripped its head off. Blood spewed on her. The energy of death tingled along my extremities when I cast out my senses.

  Doura fell over, crying and holding her leg.

  Tracy was gearing up for something big; I could feel her rage.

  “I can save her!” I yelled at Tracy. “I have the Serpentarius talisman to heal poisonous bites. I can save her.”

  Tracy’s freckles showed red against her pale skin. She looked around, clearly at a loss. She was powerful, this much was clear, but I had the sense that, like me, she had not had the best upbringing or education. She had latched on to Doura as her friend and ally, and would go to great lengths to protect her. Doura was the brains of the operation. Now, on her own, Tracy was at a loss.

  “Doura! Talk to Tracy, tell her to let Claudia go, and I’ll help you. Do it now, or it might be too late.”

  Still sprawled in the gravel of the rooftop, holding her leg and gasp
ing, Doura met my eyes. Her blue ones showed pain, but I barely twinged. She had hexed Bronwyn. Lord knows what she had planned for me, and for Claudia. No, I spared no love for Doura.

  Still, I don’t hold with taking human life, no matter the crime. It was in my power to save her, and I intended to do so. Just as soon as I got what I wanted.

  “Do it, Tracy, let Claudia go,” Doura said. “Now!”

  Tracy mumbled an incantation, and Claudia awoke, looking around her, fearful and confused.

  “Claudia, run back to your place and call 911,” I said. “And tell them there’s been a rattlesnake bite. They’ll need to have serum on hand. Now!”

  I climbed off the spire, my arms shaking from the fear and effort of holding on. Using one of the old beer cans, I dunked it in the rain barrel and rinsed it out as well I could. Then I began to wash the Serpentarius stone in the barrel, invoking while I did so, scraping the stone with my fingernail, mumbling and chanting.

  I scooped water into the beer can and brought it to Doura.

  “Drink.”

  “That’s disgusting,” she said, pushing it away. I could hear a hitch in her breathing, as though it was becoming labored. Her lower leg was swelling, the area around the bite showing bruising even in the dim light. “That can’s dirty.”

  “I rinsed it out,” I said with a shrug. “Anyway, it’s your funeral. I won’t be losing any sleep over it.”

  She glared at me, but grudgingly accepted the can and held it to her lips. Grimacing, she took a ladylike sip.

  “Drink all of it,” I said, knowing full well that it wasn’t necessary for her to drink the entire can. I was being mean. I would do my best to save her life, but I was nowhere near in a forgiving mood.

  I knelt by her side and brought the talisman to the site of the wound, and held the cool wet stone to the fang marks. Doura jumped and tensed when I touched her, crying out again.

  This time my heart did go out to her. Humans were so fragile, so fallible. I had no idea what her story was, but once upon a time Doura had been an innocent. Like all of us.