by Renee George
Jared set me down in a small clearing near the impenetrable foliage. He reached out touched a vine. It slithered away. He touched another and another until a window formed. Curious, I reached up and lightly pressing my index finger to one, and ten vines from other areas of the wall slipped around it for reinforcement.
“I guess that answers that question,” I said. “I’d say we found the old woman’s place.”
Jared worked through two or three vines at a time until there was a space big enough in the mess he could fit his broad shoulders through. “You go first,” he said. “In case it closes behind me.”
“Smart.”
“I’m not just a pretty face.” He winked. His charm made it difficult to remember why I couldn’t be with him.
“I never said you were,” I said a little peevishly. I sighed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you.”
He nodded then gestured to the hole. “After you.”
Soon as I stepped in, the vines whipped around me. I screamed as they wrapped my legs, waist, and chest, until one of them snaked down my throat, gagging me as it punched through my lungs. My vision dimmed into inky blackness. The next thing I knew, Jared was breathing into my mouth and pushing on my chest. I coughed, my throat scratchy as all get out, and my chest burning like it was full of gas and someone had lit a match.
“Oh, my gosh,” I rasped.
Jared was smoothing my hair back and kissing my cheeks. His forehead was beaded with sweat and his expression full of worry.
“I’m okay,” I told him when I could manage.
“I thought I lost you.” He hugged me hard against his chest.
Once again, I reminded him, “Minion.” But I didn’t pull away.
I looked past his shoulder and saw a small cabin, the roof covered in moss, smoke curling from a stone chimney. “Are you sure you’re not Hansel, and I’m not Gretel? ‘Cause I do believe the witch is fixing to cook us.”
“My skin feels like it’s curled up with a mess of buzzing bees.”
“Well, are you all just going to lay about all day or are you coming inside?” a woman asked as she came around the side of the house.
“Are you Temperance?” Jared asked.
She nodded. “I am.”
Well, Ray had gotten a lot right. But he’d also gotten a lot wrong. Temperance wasn’t a hundred-year-old crone. On the contrary, she looked younger than me, her skin dark and unlined, and her black hair, long enough to brush the upper curves of her hips, was shiny and lush.
“There’s something off about you, girl,” she said to me. “You’re no ashshaph, not like your man there. How did you survive the man-eaters?”
I didn’t correct her about Jared being my man, which made me feel guilty. I couldn’t have him, but that didn’t mean I wanted someone else stepping into my place. Especially not someone who was infinitely more beautiful than me. “Well, lucky I’m not a man then,” I said. I smiled politely. “I’m Charlotte. This is Jared. We’ve got a magic problem, and we’re hoping you might have the solution.”
She smiled as if she could read the jealousy on me. “I’m no threat to your love. I could tell by the way Jared fought to save you that he has no heart left for anyone but you.” She beckoned to both of us. “Come. Let me have a closer look.”
Nervously, I took Jared’s hand as we closed the distance. Temperance leaned forward, sniffing Jared and me, and then she used her hands to traced an invisible line around us. Finally, she nodded, as if solving a problem only she knew existed.
“I think we should be alone for this conversation.” She curled her fingers in front of Jared’s chest. He bellowed as she twisted and pulled at an invisible thread. He bent backward as if trying to move away, but she just kept reeling whatever she’d captured toward her.
“You’re hurting him!”
“I’m freeing him,” she countered. “At least for a while.” She wrapped her fist around something and shoved it into a green glass bottle she wore on a rope belt. She finished the task by putting a cork in it. “There. You have a nasty ghost attached to you, Jared. I’ve trapped him in this bottle. And there he’ll remain as long as you’re in my hollow.”
Jared, still panting, nodded. “I feel…lighter. Thank you.”
She smiled and turned her attention to me. “And you, Charlotte. No wonder Jared finds you irresistible. You are newly risen and a virgin. That makes you very powerful juju for a necromancer. If you weren’t already taken, I would bargain to keep you for my own.”
Chapter 11
The interior of the cabin looked a lot like I’d expected. Rustic with accents of chic beauty. The scents were a combination of wood smoke, cinnamon, and vanilla. Four lard burning lamps and several tallow candles lit the room. In one corner was a bed, smaller than a standard twin with a quilt fashioned from fabric scraps. Near the fireplace was a round table, no more than two feet wide with two chairs fashioned from gnarled wood and the seats were thatched with young vines. A pitcher of water with a basin was on the far side of the fireplace, and the only other furniture was a hand-carved, well-worn rocking chair. Dried herbs hung around the smokestack, and I knew they were practical, not decorative. I lived in a time before electricity, and I remember picking wild onions, garlic, another other such edible plants to season our meals. She had a shelf stacked with canning jars. Some were pickled meats, some vegetables, and even more were fruits, like peaches, pears, and strawberries.
Temperance kept with the old ways, and I couldn’t help but admire her for the effort. “How long have you been here?” I asked.
“Oh, I don’t know,” she said, leaning forward to stir something in a cauldron hanging over the fire. “Too long, I suppose. I arrived in the hollow in 1910. I was seventeen years old at the time.”
“With your daughter?”
The woman raised her eyes to me and stared flatly. “What do you know of my daughter?”
I steadied my nerves. Minion and immortal or not, this woman had an intimidating presence, maybe even more than Kobal. “I mean no disrespect, ma’am. We’d heard stories before we sought you out. I didn’t know how much of it was true.”
“I know what they say, even after all these years.” She took the spoon from the cauldron and tasted the thick liquid then nodded her approval before putting it back in. “There is always a grain of truth to a fairytale. That’s what makes them so frightening.”
“And what part is true?” Jared asked. “The part where the town turned on your daughter and killed her, or the part where you steal children?”
An amused smiled played on her lips. “You want to know if I’m fixing stewed babies for dinner?” She cackled. “I did nothing to them town folk, not even when they deserved it.”
“But they did murder your daughter,” I said.
She stared at the rocking chair then nodded. “I nursed her right over there. I was a free woman then. And when a white boy got me with child, I ran as far as I could in my state. This land is where I birthed my girl. I built this cabin with my own hands, right over the spot. That chair, I made from the tree where I first put my baby to my breast. This would be our little spot in heaven, her and I. By the time she was five, I knew she had been born without the gift. It’s a rare thing even in families such as mine. She needed folk. Or so I thought. Since she was beautiful and could pass, I thought she’d be safe, but I forget the things some men will do when they covet. My poor child.” She closed her eyes for a moment, and her reflection on the past haunted me.
I felt suddenly chilled and moved closer to the fire. “But you didn’t take revenge on their children.”
“Of course not. I wouldn’t nary harm a hair on a child’s head, let alone punish one for the sins of a parent.”
“Then what happened to the missing children?” Jared asked.
“I saved them.” She cackled again. “Oh, I know what you’re thinking. But, no, I didn’t take them without permission. A disease found its way to Blue Eye, and it killed off a fair p
ortion of town folk, including many children. A mother and father brought their son to me, a boy of maybe eight or nine years, on the brink of death. They’d heard about my gift, the ability to bring creatures back from death’s door. They begged me to save their son. I told them it was dangerous to try. Our kind of magic has a price. Sometimes so small, as to make it worth it, but sometimes the price is high. Higher than most people are willing to pay. The father offered me a bag of gold, their entire savings.”
She took the cauldron from the fire and placed it on the table before continuing. “I took their gold, but I told them that it wasn’t enough. ‘What else?’ the poor mamma had asked me. ‘Are you willing to give up your life so that your son can live?’ I asked. The father shrank from the question, but the woman, she was strong with love for her babe. I told them to go back to town and leave the boy with me. I applied herbs to him for two days, hoping to turn his illness around, but I have no magic for the living.” She smiled sadly. “He died in my arms. And at the precise second, before his soul could leave his body, I drew all my magic to me, powered by a mother’s love, and forced it into the small corpse. Within a few seconds, the boy inhaled the first breath of his new life. His mother died shortly after. I’m sad about that, but she was willing, as I would have done the same given a choice. The father was not so grateful to me. He told the town folk that I had stolen his child and murdered his wife. They came for me. I defended myself and this hollow.”
She gave me a quick nod. “The vines you crossed made quick work of those men.”
“I know what it’s like to defend my property against those who would try and take what’s yours.”
“And the child?” Jared asked. “What happened to him?”
“I took him to a nice couple who had sheltered me for a couple of months on my journey here. They couldn’t have children of their own and had hinted at wanting to take on my burden if I were willing. I was not. But this boy, he needed parents who would love him, not a father who would always blame him for the death of his wife. I gave them the bag of coins and asked them to give them to him when he was old enough to strike out on his own. They knew of my oddities, and I warned them that I might have passed some of my gifts to him when I brought him back.” She walked up to Jared and placed her hand on his face. “That boy with not my blood, but the moment I shoved my magic into him, he became my child.” She patted his cheek. “Just as you are my child.”
Jared blinked. “I don’t understand.”
“You are a descendant of the boy. His given name was Walter Comfrey, and when the couple adopted him, they gave him the last name of Jackson. I have felt you in the world, child. I hoped one day you would find me.”
“I did not see this coming,” I said.
Neither did I, Kobal said. His voice in my head was strained. Worried.
“You are not welcome here, demon,” Temperance said. “I adjure you.” She waved her hand, and I felt the shift as Kobal’s presence disappeared.
“How did you do that? And can you teach me?” I asked.
The woman chuckled. “This land has been sanctified by me with my blood, magic, and sacrifices. I can control what happens within this domain. Outside of it, I’m afraid, my ability is much less powerful. And while Jared here carries my gift, he would have to give up more than anyone should in order to cast out a demon.”
“What about a ghost?” Jared asked. “How do I get rid of the guy who tricked me into binding my soul to his?”
Temperance placed the amulet in the palm of her hand, turning it over as she studied and evaluated every little piece of it. “I’ve never seen this kind of talisman before. The marks are unfamiliar.”
“It’s old Hebrew and Aramaic,” I said. “Along with a few hieroglyphs. We’re told it’s one of seventy-two artifacts that King Solomon had made into order to capture demons and harness their power. But Aloysius used it to free himself from a bargain he made with Kobal by binding with Jared.”
Temperance tapped the glass bottle hanging from her skirt. “Clever, binding with a magus. Especially a necromancer. We are the most powerful of all our kind.”
“Can you help me break the spell?” Jared asked.
“I can point the way,” she said. “Was there any other part of the binding that involved objects other than the amulet? A man clever enough to trick a magus is a man clever enough to put assurances in place to keep the binding intact.”
“Just the wand.”
“A wand is a very powerful talisman,” Temperance said. “It is symbolic of a sorcerer’s strength and power. What did you do with it?”
“I broke it into two pieces. I kept one for myself, and the other piece was buried with him.” Jared put his hand in his pocket and rocked up on his toes. “He wanted me to break it into fourths and give two pieces to two of his Vegas’ buddies, but neither magician showed up to the funeral.”
“Lucky for you,” Temperance said. “You must dig up the corpse, retrieve the wand pieces, reverse the seal binding chant, and force his soul from the amulet to his body.”
“How in the world am I supposed to force his soul out?”
“A sacrifice,” Temperance said.
“Something the size of a bug or bigger, like a chicken?” I asked.
“Think bigger,” Temperance said ominously. “Your power is active in you, my child. I can’t tell you how to use it. It is different for all of us, and the only way to know just how powerful you are is to test your magic. Just be careful and remember the cost.” She gestured to the two seats at the table. “Now, sit a spell, partake of my food, and tell me of the world before you leave.”
I wasn’t sure I wanted whatever that thick gooey liquid was in the pot. It was peridot green and slightly chunky. But neither Jared nor I protested as she spread the slime onto home baked bread. She handed me a slice. I sniffed it. It smelled fruity and a bit sour. Tentatively, I took a bite. The sweetly tart flavors burst in my mouth. “Oh my gosh, this is good,” I said. “I haven’t had gooseberry jam in ages.” And by ages, I meant one-hundred and sixty years. “I’ve never had it right out of the pot before canning.”
Jared, seeing my enjoyment of the treat, bit into his slice, and reacted with an “Mmm mmm.”
I reached into my bag and took out the fabric Jared had cut off the bottom of my skirt, folded it up, and presented it to Temperance.
“That is lovely,” she said. “For me?”
I nodded to the threadbare quilt on her bed. “I hope you will find some uses for it.”
Temperance looked well pleased as she examined the material. “You are always welcome here, Charlotte,” she said. And the hostility I’d felt from the hollow instantly eased, and I knew the next time we visited, the vines would welcome me.
Chapter 12
I called Olivia to let her know we were on our way back as soon as we had cell phone reception again. I had imagined Kobal would show up to punish me the moment we left Temperance Hollow, but to my surprise, he did not. Aloysius, we assumed, was back with Jared, but the ghost hadn’t bothered to make an appearance either. Temperance had warned us not to talk about spell breaking outside her “dominion” as she put it because if Aloysius knew what we were up to, the ghost might stop at nothing to prevent us from completing the task.
So, instead, Jared and I kept to small talk. “How does it feel meeting your great, great, grandmother?”
Jared shrugged. “She’s not. You heard her. My grandmother was the woman who gave her life to save my grandfather.”
“But you did inherit your gift from her.”
He made a “hah” sound. “If you want to call it that.” He gripped the wheel tight enough to turn his knuckles white. “I am descended from someone who died and was brought back to life with magic. That’s so crazy.”
I pursed my lips in annoyance. “Yeah. Crazy.”
“I’m sorry, Charlotte. I didn’t mean—”
“She looked really good for a woman her age. Heck, for a woman of any age.�
��
“I don’t know,” Jared said. “I prefer my women a little older than her.” He gave me a teasing nudge with his elbow, and I couldn’t stop my lips from turning up in a smile.
I couldn’t help but think about what Temperance had said, though. That Jared was attracted to me because I’d risen from the dead. Is that the reason he thought he loved me? Was it the magic of my resurrection that made him want me?
“Eliza brought your bags to my place this morning. You want to stop there first for a quick shower and a change of clothes?”
I looked down at my bare knees. The scratches and scrapes I’d gotten on the way out of he woods had not started to heal, yet, which struck me as unusual. It was probably because of the magic surrounding Temperance Hollow. “I really would like to clean up a bit and change into a skirt that isn’t tattered.” I texted Olivia with the slight shift in plans. She texted back that she and David would meet us in two hours at Jared’s place. “That’s settled then.”
A long silence stretched between us, both of us keeping our thoughts close, I supposed, as Jared turned onto MO-13 North toward Kimberling City instead of going back to 65 Highway.
At his house, Jared retrieved a clean towel from a closet in the hallway. “Thank you,” I said, suddenly shy. Being alone with him made me nervous. All I could think about was his mouth on my breasts and his hips between my thighs. I could feel the color in my face rise as he gave me a “what’s on your mind” look. Quickly, I escaped into the safety of the bathroom and shut the door between us. I pressed my back against it as if I could lock out my desire along with Jared.
“Everything all right?” he asked through the door.
“Yep,” I said. “Fine and dandy.”
“Do you need any help finding stuff?”
“I took a shower here earlier. I’m sure I can manage without a tour guide.”
“If you change your mind, my rates are cheap, and I know all the best spots to maximize the enjoyment of your tour.”
