“Who is this spell for?” Paige asked as quietly as she possibly could while still being heard over the music.
“You’ll see,” Jasmine replied, smirking.
The rude girl from the bathroom emerged into the crowd, and Paige suddenly knew she was the victim. She had pale white hair that hung down her back, and it perfectly matched the hair Chloe had used.
“Stumble!” the four girls said in unison.
Instantly the girl tripped over her own two feet and grabbed a pillar to stop herself from falling. Paige’s eyes widened, alarmed.
“What did that girl do to you?” Paige asked, glancing at Jasmine.
“She was totally rude on the dance floor earlier. She kept elbowing me. I mean, come on. This is my dance space, this is your dance space, right? How hard can it be?” Jasmine glanced at her friends, and then they all looked at the blond girl again. She was sidling up next to a tall, handsome guy in full seductress mode.
“Sneeze!” the four girls said.
Suddenly the blond girl let out a huge sneeze all over the guy she was trying to impress. He grimaced and wiped his hand on his pants, then moved away. The blond girl looked mortified as Jasmine and her friends laughed it up.
“You guys, stop,” Paige said, feeling awful.
“Don’t be such a goody-goody,” Chloe snapped. “One more, girls.”
The blond girl was heading for the dance floor, apparently hoping to lose herself in the crowd. Just as she reached the center of the floor and a big group of swank-looking guys and girls, Jasmine and her friends struck again.
“Fall!” they all said together.
The blond girl tripped and fell flat on her face in the center of the group. It looked pretty painful to Paige, but everyone in a ten-yard radius cracked up laughing. The girl pushed herself to her feet and fled the club, pushing her way through packs of people. She was on the verge of tears.
“That’s it, I’m outta here,” Paige said, thoroughly disgusted.
She didn’t care how rude the girl was to her or to Jasmine. You didn’t use your powers to hurt innocent people. Not even the semi-innocent. Paige grabbed her purse, and ignoring Jasmine’s protests, she wove her way through the crowd and out the side door. The last thing she wanted to do was encounter the crying girl out front, knowing she may have been able to stop it from happening. All she could think about at that moment was getting back to the camp and forgetting this whole day ever happened.
Outside, Paige found herself in an alleyway. She glanced around, disoriented, and finally saw cars whizzing by at the end of the alley to her right. Deciding it had to be the Strip, she headed for the traffic. But she hadn’t taken one step when she heard a loud screech from behind her. A loud human screech.
Paige whirled around and saw two figures struggling at the other end of the alley. She rushed toward them, and as she approached she saw the flash of something metal. Paige’s heart hit her throat as everything came into full focus at once. A man was holding a girl from behind with a knife at her neck as he struggled to free her purse from her shoulder.
Without giving it a second thought, Paige thrust out her hand and said, “Knife!” The weapon disappeared in a swirl of white light and reappeared in Paige’s hand. Stunned, the assailant loosened his grip on the girl, and the victim took the opportunity to land a swift elbow to his gut. The mugger doubled over as the girl ran past Paige and out toward the Strip. She didn’t even seem to notice that Paige was standing there, which was probably best. Then there would be no questions. When the mugger regained his breath, he looked up at Paige, blinked once, and then scrambled out the other end of the alleyway.
“Well, at least the night wasn’t a total bust,” Paige said to herself.
She dropped the knife into a nearby Dumpster and slapped her hands together, proud of a job well done. Then she turned around and saw Jasmine standing at the side door, her mouth dropped open in awe. Paige froze.
“What the hell was that?” Jasmine asked.
“Any chance you’d believe a trick of light?” Paige asked with a pleading smile.
Jasmine shifted her weight from one leg to the other and crossed her arms over her chest, waiting. She even arched one eyebrow, something Paige had been trying to perfect for years.
“Yeah, didn’t think so,” Paige said. She was busted, but even worse, her sisters were going to kill her.
Chapter
8
“This is a nightmare,” Phoebe said morosely as she, Piper, and Paige dragged their feet along the deserted path to the dining hall the following morning.
After what had happened to each of them the night before, not one of them was in a particular rush to be seen in public. Fortunately the campground was so dead it hardly seemed like a public place. Not only had a lot of people vacated the premises, but the sisters had purposely left their tent late so that they wouldn’t bump into Christian or Jasmine on the way to breakfast. They would have to deal with Tessa and Taryn at the table, but they had decided they’d rather do damage control one freaked-out Wiccan at a time.
Phoebe was trying to keep her cool, but it was impossible in the dry heat. It wasn’t even ten o’clock, and already it had to be approaching ninety degrees. She was sweating from heat and anxiety and had to keep blotting her face with a tissue.
“It’s gonna be okay. I really think it’s gonna be okay,” Paige said, fiddling with the end of one of her two short braids. Aside from the fidgeting, she looked calm and collected, and Phoebe found herself wishing she’d put her own hair up, too.
“How?” Piper asked, turning to both of them as she paused outside the dining hall. “How it is going to be okay?”
There was a moment of silence, and then Paige sighed. “I have no idea,” she replied. “Maybe I can orb us to Alaska?!”
“Oooh! I like that plan!” Phoebe said with a hopeful grin.
Piper groaned and closed her eyes briefly, her hand on the door handle. They all knew that escape was not an option. “What I don’t get is how we could both be so stupid as to get caught using our powers on the same night,” she said to Paige.
“Yep. You are a couple of idiots,” Phoebe said, swinging her arms forward and clapping her hands together. Her sisters both gave her the patented Charmed glare. “Sorry. I was just trying to lighten the situation.” She cleared her throat, yanked down on the waist of her flowered capris, and slid by Piper.
“I’m going in. Cover me,” she said dramatically. Then she walked into the dining hall, head held high, even though she felt more like ducking along the wall.
Everyone in the room looked up when the Charmed Ones arrived, and Phoebe froze, waiting for the questions, the accusations, the awe and fear. But apparently they had looked up only out of run-of-the-mill curiosity, because they instantly went back to their food. That, at least, was a relief. It meant Jasmine, Christian, Tessa, and Taryn hadn’t run around the camp the night before spreading the news of the freaks with the crazy powers. Phoebe was actually kind of impressed.
The atmosphere in the dining hall was completely different than it had been the day before. Gone was the laughter; the loud, raucous conversation; the din worthy of a Super Bowl game. Half the tables were empty, and the other half were occupied by whispering groups of people bent over their plates. None of the covens were looking at anyone beyond their own tables, and the air was so thick with paranoia Phoebe could practically taste it.
Swallowing back her nervousness, Phoebe looked over at table 3 and found that Tessa and Taryn were waiting for them expectantly—along with Christian and Jasmine. They all exchanged looks after Phoebe noticed them, and it was perfectly clear that Jasmine had compared notes with the others. They knew that both Piper and Paige had powers and probably figured Phoebe did as well, by association.
“Looks like we have a couple of defectors at our table,” Phoebe said under her breath, running her hand along the back of her neck.
“Why don’t I just orb to McDonald’s, get us some
breakfast, and meet you back at the tent?” Paige suggested, bouncing on the balls of her feet. “Or better yet, what about those buffets we saw as we drove in? All you can eat?” she prodded, waggling her eyebrows.
“Come on, Paige, we’re gonna have to deal with them sometime,” Piper said, linking her arm with her sister’s and starting down the center aisle. “Remember what we talked about last night. We all just say as little as humanly possible.”
Phoebe fell into step behind Piper and Paige as they approached table 3. When they arrived at the end of the table, four pairs of eyes looked up at them expectantly. They looked like little kids at story time. Phoebe grinned her brightest grin.
“Hey, everyone!” she said. “Oh, good! Pancakes!”
She slipped by Christian and Jasmine, sat down, and started slapping food onto her plate. Piper and Paige followed Phoebe’s lead and did the same. Phoebe didn’t think for a minute that the other Wiccans were going to let them get away without saying anything, but she was hoping to put it off for as long as possible. After a couple of minutes of silence, however, Phoebe could no longer take the feeling of everyone staring at her. She finally made eye contact with Taryn across the table.
“So, what are you guys?” Taryn asked bluntly. Phoebe didn’t even know the girl had it in her to say something so tactlessly direct and almost mean. But the question had clearly taken a lot out of Taryn. Her face was all pink from the exertion, as if she’d been gathering her courage to say it for a long time.
“Taryn!” Tessa gasped, touching her sister’s arm. “What kind of question is that?”
“A legitimate one, I’d say,” Christian put in, turning to Phoebe with his big brown eyes. “Care to answer it?”
“Well, we’re Wiccans, just like you guys,” Phoebe said nonchalantly. She busied herself dousing her pancakes with syrup.
“Right, just like us,” Jasmine said, her black curls bouncing as she nodded sarcastically. “Even I don’t have powers like you guys do, and I’ve been practicing since, like, birth. My mother was a very powerful Wiccan,” she explained to the others matter-of-factly.
“Would you mind keeping your voice down?” Piper asked through her teeth, leaning in close to the table. “The last thing we need is for someone to overhear you talking about our powers,” she whispered.
“Why?” Christian asked. He sat up straight, resting his elbows on the table, and eyed Piper suspiciously. Phoebe couldn’t help noticing the fact that he was flexing his impressive biceps under his T-shirt, trying to be menacing. “Why wouldn’t you want everyone to know what you can do?” he added.
“Because we’d rather not have everyone in this place sitting at our table tomorrow morning looking at us like you are right now,” Piper shot back.
The others fell silent for a moment, and everyone looked down at their untouched breakfasts. Phoebe wracked her brain for something to say that would explain away what these people had witnessed, but they weren’t stupid. They knew that Piper’s freezing ability and Paige’s orbing ability weren’t normal Wiccan powers. The feats the Charmed Ones could perform went way beyond the voodoo-doll mojo Paige had watched Jasmine and her friends put on some girl last night.
“Look, you guys,” Paige said finally. Phoebe held her breath, just hoping her little sister wasn’t about to heedlessly spill every last bean. She loved Paige, but the girl did have a small issue with speaking before she thought.
“Let’s just say we’ve honed our power a little more, okay?” Paige said. “We’re very dedicated to our craft. It’s pretty much all we do.”
Everyone seemed to absorb this, and for a moment Phoebe thought they were just going to accept it. Score one for Paige. But then everyone spoke at once.
“But freezing time isn’t exactly a small—”
“I’m sorry, but I just can’t believe what I saw was—”
“You can’t just mess with people like—”
Phoebe’s head was about to hit the table in sheer desperation, when suddenly a loud male voice sliced through the conversation and everyone in the dining hall fell silent. Dead silent.
“Everyone! We found Craig.”
It was Damon, the African-American guy who had first made the announcement the morning before. But today he wasn’t so wild eyed. Today he was absolutely morose. And this time no one had heard him come in. Christian stood the moment the words were out of Damon’s mouth.
“He’s dead, Christian,” Damon said, looking him right in the eye from across the room. “Craig is dead.”
“I can’t believe this,” Piper said, glancing around the basement room she and half the population of the camp were gathered in. “All these people shouldn’t be here.”
“It wasn’t like we were going to be able to stop them,” Paige said. “They have a right to know what’s going on.”
“Yeah, but they’re compromising the crime scene,” Piper said through her teeth.
“Someone’s been spending too much time around Daryl,” Phoebe quipped.
Everyone hovered outside the door to the storage closet in which Craig’s body had been found—everyone who hadn’t been scared away by the finding of an actual corpse. Marcia Farina was in hysterics in the far corner, being comforted by a few women who apparently came to the Gathering every year. Ryan Treetop leaned against the wall next to her, his head bowed, his face turned away from Piper and her sisters.
Apparently Treetop had remembered the old storage closet this morning, housed in the basement under his office. He said that no one had been down there for years—a story that was supported by the fact that there was about an inch of dust and grime on everything in the room. He didn’t think that anyone else even new it existed. That morning he and Marcia had gone to check it out, just in case, hoping and assuming they would find nothing. Minutes later Treetop had arrived at the door to Damon’s tent, looking as grim as death itself.
Piper looked up as Christian emerged from the room. He appeared frail, as if he could barely hold himself up, and his soulful eyes had gone flat. Piper clutched her elbows. Whatever he’d seen in there had taken a lot out of him. He started past her and her sisters without even seeing them.
“Christian,” Piper whispered. He turned slowly and tried to focus on her. His skin looked green in the dim light of the basement. “Can we inspect the body before the police get here?”
“Sure,” he said, half dazed, lifting his hand toward the door. “I don’t know if you want to….” He practically fell into the arms of two of his brethren as he walked away, and they helped him up the rickety stairs. Piper’s heart went out to him, but she didn’t want to waste any time. She and her sisters turned and slipped into the storage room.
“Oh, my God,” Phoebe said as Paige closed the door behind them. Piper covered her nose and mouth to keep from retching. Craig’s body, lit by the light from a single swinging bulb overhead, was dressed in boxer shorts and a T-shirt. He was propped up against the wall in a seated position, but all his limbs were limp—more limp than they should have been. His skin sagged from his bones, and there was no color in his body at all. He was sheer white—as if he’d been frozen. Or scared out of his mind. Or…
“I think something took all his blood,” Paige said, crouching next to the body on the dirt-covered cement floor, but being careful not to touch Craig. “Vampire?” she asked, looking up at her sisters.
“I don’t think so,” Piper said, crouching across from Paige. She pointed at a nasty puncture wound in Craig’s arm, just at the bend of his elbow.
Paige looked down at the arm next to her and found another. “Eeeeehh,” she said, scrunching up her nose.
“You guys, there are two more above his knees,” Phoebe put in, kneeling next to Paige.
“Not a vampire, then,” Piper said, standing and slapping her dirty hands together. “They traditionally suck from the neck. They don’t systematically drain blood through the major veins like doctors.”
Phoebe started to stand, lost her balance
, and flung her hand out to steady herself. Instead of grabbing the floor, her hand hit Craig’s leg, and she froze, her eyes squeezing shut. At first Piper thought she was just freaked out over having touched the dead body, but then she realized her sister was having a vision. Paige pushed herself up and took a step toward Piper. They both watched Phoebe and waited.
“Ugh!” Phoebe said suddenly, jumping up and away from the body. She wiped her hands on her thighs and looked at her sisters shakily.
“What did you see?” Piper asked, almost afraid to know.
“They drained his blood with these long needles,” Phoebe said, swallowing with difficulty. “It was definitely those jackal things. And I saw them going back to some kind of ritual chamber, but guys…this is really weird…I swear they were in an elevator.”
“They’re staying in a hotel?” Paige asked.
“In the penthouse, I think,” Phoebe said skeptically. “The little P button was lit up in the elevator.”
“Well, if I ran a hotel, that’s where I’d put the bloodsucking demons. In the penthouse,” Piper said dryly.
“I know it sounds weird, but when was the last time my visions were wrong?” Phoebe said.
“Try never,” Paige replied. “We have to talk to Leo. Let’s go back to the tent and call him.”
The sisters left the room and found that most of the other Wiccans had already cleared out. As they went upstairs the police were coming down, asking if anyone had touched the body or compromised the scene. Piper, Paige, and Phoebe slipped by quickly and hurried back to their tent. The moment they were inside, they all called out together.
“Leo!”
He appeared instantly with Cole by his side. “We were just coming to see you,” Leo said. “I think Cole may have found your demons in the Book of Shadows.”
Phoebe rushed over to Cole and wrapped her arms around him, closing her eyes happily. He was wearing a dark blue suit with a lighter blue shirt and tie underneath, as if he’d just come from an interview, and he looked a bit worn out. His expression lightened considerably, however, when he found Phoebe in his arms.
Something Wiccan This Way Comes Page 9
