“Maybe. It could’ve been a statue. Maybe it’s only an altar and no one’s been here for a while.” A soft yellow light flared to life in her palm and she held it up to the wall for another look at the lines she’d seen.
He chuckled. “I’m having flashbacks to the basement of a burned-down house in Colorado and finding hidden messages in the walls.”
She moved her hand slowly over the wall’s surface and illuminated the silver characters one by one before she moved to the next. “That message was for a few very specific people—Melissa Bore’s customers. This one, I think, is meant for anyone who bothers to look a little closer.” Once she’d illuminated all three lines of the magical writing on the temple wall, she sat back on her heels and tilted her head. “And it doesn’t come with a phone number that I thought was another secret code.”
The werewolf leaned down to peer at the writing, then removed his hands from his pockets and squatted beside her. “Does that mean anything to you?”
Lily read the three lines one more time and narrowed her eyes. “Not yet. You know, there’s as much magic in the sound of it being cast as there is in the spell itself. I used to think that witches who cast their spells out loud used the actual words only as a crutch, right? Like they needed to actually say it in order for the spells to work at all for them.”
“A magical handicap.”
She smiled and shook her head. “If that’s what you wanna call it. But I met a witch once who could change the intensity and scope of his spells merely by speaking the words differently.”
“Like in an accent, or—” Romeo laughed and leaned away from her playful swat, which almost made him fall over.
“No. Like slower or faster or in different pitches. He even played around with putting emphasis on different words of the spell, and it changed the entire intention behind the spell and its effects.”
“That’s a neat trick.”
“It’s a powerful trick. I had a feeling that the way he used the sound of his magic made all the difference in the world. That it took a different kind of concentration, you know? I never had the chance to talk to him and ask him myself ʼcause he got herded off onto the stage after that to give his speech, and then was all business and—”
“Wait, what?” He smirked. “The way you started that story made me think he already was on stage.”
“Nope. This was Alexander Brast showing off before his opening speech at the Magicals with Medicine gala in Boston.”
“Lily.”
“Yeah.”
“You went to a gala with a Massachusetts’ Council member?”
Her mouth dropped open in playful surprise, and she looked him with a faint trace of good-natured mockery. “You do know your Council of Magic trivia.”
Romeo cleared his throat and looked away from her to stare at the glowing silver writing on the wall. “I looked it up, actually. As much as non-magicals aren’t supposed to know, there’s a wealth of information on the Internet about our part of this world. It’s weirdly accessible.”
“And you’ve thought about what’s gonna happen once we rescue my mom and bring her home, huh?” Lily took a deep breath. “You’ve thought about fighting that fight I promised to drop until we find her.”
“All right, don’t get too ahead of yourself.” He shook his head and tried to wipe the smile off his lips. “The wolfsbane makes a good case. And after all this Black Heron stuff is at least out in the open, if not cleaned up, then yeah.” He shot her a sideways glance. “Maybe I’ll start working on rearranging the way people think about werewolves. That’s not gonna happen anytime soon if we don’t get this Varelos for the Royal, though.”
She grinned at him and studied his profile for a few more seconds before she nodded and took a deep breath. “You’re totally right. So, let’s try it out, then. I think a message as totally mundane as that has to have a different meaning when it’s said out loud.” She narrowed her eyes at the shimmering silver words. “The only trick now is to make sure I don’t say it the wrong way.”
“Oh, yeah. That’s reassuring.”
Ten
“‘They walked all the way to the top of the hill, and there they saw it, standing still. A pool without a drop to spill. The sound of the dream. They dreamed. This place had everything. From one wish to another’s desire, they discovered it.’” Lily tilted her head and stared at the silver words magically etched into the temple wall.
“Yeah, it doesn’t make any more sense when you read it out loud.” Romeo rubbed his hand over his chin and lowered himself out of the squat beside her. “And judging by the way you’re staring at it like it actually blew another hole in Winnie, I assume you’re out of ideas.”
“Only immediate ideas.” She sighed and lowered her hands to her lap as she looked at the vaulted ceiling of the temple. “I have a feeling that the change in the dedication of this temple and the actual meaning of these lines have something to do with each other. Maybe even with the Varelos being here if it even is.”
“Okay. That’s something we can start with, right?” He stretched his legs out in front of him until his boots almost touched the wall, then leaned back on his hands. “Right now, this is a temple for Pasithea.” He looked at the empty platform on the other side of her and frowned. “You said the goddess of rest and relaxation, right?”
“As far as I know. But if it was a temple for Oneiroi first, like the author of that article and his family have said for generations, that would make some sense, at least. Oneiroi is the god of dreams. Or multiple gods, I think. If we’re looking at a main god of dreams, that would be Morpheus, whose most common form is a winged demon. It’s kind of the complete opposite.”
He shrugged. “Okay, hidden in plain sight is a good option, but actually hiding something out of sight works better, right? Change the name of the place and the reason people come here, and that’s generations of magicals who don’t know the Varelos is here. If it’s even here.”
“There’s something here. That’s for sure.” With a nod and one more glance at the words etched into the wall, Lily pushed herself to her feet and dusted her hands off. “I merely need to think about it. That may or may not be easier than trying to solve a puzzle when my hand’s about to melt onto a doorknob.”
Romeo snorted. “You did work quickly on that one. I still can’t believe your mom would set up a ward like that, knowing it would hurt you that much if you took too long.” They stepped out of the temple and into the open clearing again. A breeze rustled through the trees around them and brought with it the scent of saltwater and an undertone of olives.
She glanced at the sky and the one cloud she could see before the tall trees blocked everything else from view. “That’s probably my fault. I never really learned anything unless it really hurt.”
That made him laugh, and he walked across the clearing, shaking his head. He made a massive yawn and growled. “Man. The hike up here took way more out of me than I thought. We got good sleep last night too, didn’t we?”
“I definitely did. But yeah, I feel it too.” She took a deep breath. “Maybe it’s the air up here.”
“Maybe constantly moving finally caught up to us.” He lowered himself in front of a little mound of dirt just inside the temple clearing, leaned back against it, and sighed. “This is actually really comfortable. Come here.”
When she saw him pat the ground next to him, she couldn’t stifle her own yawn. “Yeah, that looks good.” She went to him, lowered herself to the ground, and snuggled against his side as he slid his arm around her shoulder. They both leaned against the little mound covered in long, wispy grasses studded with tiny white flowers. “Maybe a power nap is exactly what we need to find the answers.” She felt his chest rise against her as he took a deep breath, and when she looked at him, his eyes were already closed.
“I was thinking the same…” Romeo’s head dropped fully onto the mound of earth, and a snore escaped him.
“Good. Only a little nap.” S
he snuggled closer, pressed her cheek against his chest, and felt it rise and fall beneath her. Her eyes fluttered closed, and she was vaguely aware of a raw, burning itch on both her wrists. That’s not right. She forced her eyes open, and the first thing she saw was a pair of glowing yellow eyes staring at her from behind the trees at the edge of the clearing. It was also the last thing she saw before her eyes closed all on their own and she had absolutely no control.
Lily sat up with a jolt, startling Romeo where he’d been sleeping beside her. He snorted, uttered a little groan, and lifted his head from the mound of earth behind them. Immediately, he froze. “What’s going on?”
They both gaped at the hazy, grayscale fog that slowly filled the clearing. It didn’t move like actual fog but more like static on an old TV with a bad signal. Crackling gray lines blinked through the breezeless air, on and off. She rubbed her eyes and could barely feel the pressure of her fingers pressed against her eyelids. It was an incredibly unsatisfying sensation, and she realized the blurriness at the edges of her vision wasn’t from sleep. It was simply there and made everything in her peripheral vision fuzzy and smeared-looking.
“I have no idea,” she muttered. Then, she remembered the yellow eyes and whipped her head toward the trees on the other side of Romeo. “Did you see anyone follow us? Or maybe smell them?”
“I would’ve told you if I had.” He pushed himself up to sit straight and shook his head a few times. “I think I have something in my eyes.”
“There’s nothing wrong with your eyes.” A woman stepped from the trees dressed in a long white toga pinned on the shoulder with a copper olive branch. She was barefoot and tall and pitch-black hair fell over her shoulders in waves. “Only with what you choose not to see.” She stepped toward them again and the white cloth swirled around her feet and across the overgrown weeds like smoke.
Lily stared at her, not thrown off very much by the odd gray coloring of the woman’s skin. She was more focused on her glowing yellow eyes. When she remembered herself and what they were doing at the temple, she took a deep breath and pushed herself to her feet. “Who are you?”
“I am a keeper of the lost things here.” The woman spread her arms. “You may call me Morpheus if you need me to have a name.”
Romeo realized his mouth had fallen open and he quickly clamped it shut before he stood beside Lily. He stumbled a little under a barrage of dizziness but righted himself and stared at the woman.
“Sorry, Lil,” he muttered, leaned toward her, and trying to rub the blurriness out of his eyes again. “I totally didn’t even hear her. I should have. I guess I fell asleep first.” He shook his head and frowned, wondering why he tried to explain himself when there was another magical standing in front of them. A magical they didn’t know and who had snuck up on them and hadn’t said anything about what she wanted or why.
“You are still asleep,” Morpheus said and her voice echoed a little in the clearing. “And you are also more awake than you may ever be on the other side.”
“Okay, I still feel a little foggy.” The werewolf shook his head vigorously and gave his cheeks a slightly harder than gentle slap. “But that still didn’t make any sense.”
“It has been so long since anyone has come to pay tribute to the spirit of this mountain.” The woman gestured with a long, slender hand toward the temple across the clearing. “I had to come and see for myself and to know those who would appear wanting something I do not recognize. So I brought you here.”
Lily’s gaze jerked away toward one of those static gray lines that streaked through the air again. Focus, Lily. None of this is normal. “You can see what people want?”
Morpheus’ eyes glowed a little brighter, and the smile she gave the young witch was tinged with mournful curiosity. “Most people, yes. Why they climb the mountain. Why they pray at the temple or lay offerings upon the altar. For thousands of years, I’ve seen what drives them here to this place. And for the last few hundred, none of them have come for me.”
“You’re…” Lily swallowed. “You’re Oneiroi?”
Morpheus merely smiled again and inclined her head. “I would very much like to see what brought you here, Lily.”
“Great,” Romeo grumbled as he rolled his shoulders, still completely disoriented. “She knows your name.”
“A name is a powerful thing.” The woman nodded at the unsettled werewolf before she returned her eerily glowing gaze to Lily. “But that is all I see about you. Come.” She gestured toward the temple and floated effortlessly toward it, her bare feet silent and fluid over the soil.
Lily definitely noticed that the woman who called herself a god didn’t leave any footprints, and the grass beneath her barely moved at all. But she shared a glance with Romeo and nodded toward the temple. “We might as well.”
“Sure. It sounds like loads of fun.” He grimaced and wrinkled his nose. “I have no idea what I’m saying.” They followed Morpheus anyway, despite his gloomy comment.
This time when they approached the temple, the back wall was covered from floor to ceiling with the glowing silver etchings. A mural spanned across the entire surface depicting scenes of sleeping people and flying creatures. Every time Lily tried to focus on a particular figure, it moved. Deer and rabbits darted across the wall. Silver clouds swept in over the mural to hide figures from view. The characters who slept woke when she looked away and closed their eyes again, lying still, when her attention returned to them.
“Do not mind the histories,” Morpheus said and stopped in front of the structure. “I am far more interested in yours.” She pointed at the stone pool of stagnant water beside the temple, and Lily drifted closer toward it. While she couldn’t remember making the decision to walk that way, it seemed she had no choice.
The young witch stood at the edge of the pool and looked at her own reflection. The murky water was now clean and crystal-clear, the bottom of the pool a white so bright it hurt her eyes. But her own reflection shimmered at her on the surface and rippled and distorted her features despite the fact that the water itself never moved.
The woman came to stand on the other side of the pool and caught her gaze reflected in the water. “Perhaps you will show me what brings you.”
She heard the words and knew there was something off about them, but she couldn’t stop looking at her own reflection. Everything about herself looked fuzzy—off, somehow—and in the next moment, the image that had never quite been of herself changed enough to reflect the image of the one person she’d hoped to see. “Mom…” The word was a whisper through her lips, and she felt Morpheus look up from the pool and at her.
“That is what you see?”
Lily stared at the image of Greta Antony looking back at her, her mom as she had last seen her—smiling, her blonde hair freshly brushed and braided, her cheeks pink and healthy, and the dark circles under her eyes completely gone. In the pool’s reflection, her mom raised her arm and pointed at the temple again. ‘Read the words.’ That was what Greta’s image mouthed silently to her daughter. Lily nodded slowly and said, “Yes. I see my mom.”
Romeo stopped beside her and gazed into the pool with her. His eyes widened, and his voice was hoarse with fatigue and confusion when he muttered, “How’d the water get so clean?”
Morpheus looked sharply at him, and Lily turned away from the pool to face the temple.
“What do you see?” the woman asked.
The werewolf grimaced awkwardly. “Nothing now.”
The self-proclaimed god of dreams looked away from the pool and grinned at him. “What you want is considerably easier, isn’t it?”
Lily barely heard them as she drifted toward the temple and all the moving images that fluttered, floated, and fell into stillness again on the far wall. Her gaze fell to the three lines etched in the same silver glow—the words she’d revealed with her own magic and that the image of her mom had told her to read one more time.
Slowly, the young witch lowered herself to her knees
and sat on her heels again. It took her a few seconds to focus on the letters. The gray, staticky streaks constantly interrupted her sight in this strange version of the clearing. But finally, she made them out. “That is completely different,” she muttered.
“Huh?” Romeo looked away from the pool and turned toward her. “Oh. Yep. Those are—” He thrust his head forward and widened his eyes. “Are you playin’ a movie on that wall or something?” Stepping slowly toward the temple and Lily, his own words echoed to him and pulled him from his daze for a moment. “What am I talking about?”
Lily raised a finger to draw it under the lines of the silver message on the wall and she read it out loud again. “‘They walked all the way to the top of the hill, and there they saw it standing. Still a pool without a drop. To drink, to spill the sound of the dream, they dreamed. This place had everything from one wish to another’s. Desire. They discovered it.’”
High, tinkling laughter filled the clearing, and a chill ran up her spine. “Wonderful!” Morpheus clapped and grinned. “I have not heard the story spoken as it was meant to be in longer than I care to remember. And I remember everything.” Lily looked over her shoulder and thought the woman’s smile made her look crazed now rather than from some otherworldly plane.
Still a pool without a drop. She stood quickly and headed directly to the stone pool, passing Romeo but not having the time to explain what she knew that message now meant.
“I’m missing something,” he mumbled behind her.
She dropped to her knees again and felt the god’s gaze upon her the whole time as she dipped her hand into the still, crystal-clear water. She raised her cupped hand to her lips and took a small sip she didn’t even taste. The pool rippled and vanished, and the god of dreams beside her witch hummed in appreciation.
“It’s here,” Lily whispered and felt it in her bones because her mom had told her to read the words again. And the words said she would find it. “Where is it?” She took a few steps toward the temple and turned again to scan the clearing. “Where’s the Varelos?”
Return Of The Witch (The Witch Next Door Book 6) Page 7
