Witching There's Another Way

by Constance Barker

  “That’s quite a feat, Avery,” she said as she fished around in her bag. “And very brave. Thank you.”

  “I still have two good fingers left,” he said. “We have to break the enchantment still.”

  “You let us deal with that,” Aria chided, and whispered something as she sprinkled a powder over his injuries.

  The pain did recede, but the injury wasn’t healed. Still, it was a great deal less distracting now. “Thank you,” he told her.

  She kissed his forehead, and rose with him to check on Thomas.

  Thomas stared at the sky, his face slack, his breath even. Already Orson’s Entrapment was beginning to weaken; sustaining spells like that was still beyond Avery’s ability. But it had done the job it needed to do. Frances and Chloe both muttered spells continuously.

  That left only Aria and Avery to deal with the enchantment. Whatever psychic magic was in play to bind Thomas was beyond Avery’s knowledge to replace.

  “I don’t know that we can do this,” Aria said quietly. “Do you have any ideas?”

  He looked at the various objects that were laid out. The pattern was similar to the one used by the crones when they opened the door to Faerie before; except it was based on a thirteen point pattern instead of an eight point pattern. Presumably each stone rooted the enchantment for one of the children affected, and they together represented one of the necessary dimensions of a spell to cross the divide between this world and Faerie.

  He did quick and dirty calculations in his head. “Maybe... part of Leiman’s Inverted Dispel, which worked on Thomas’ magic before... but with the opening for Ergi’s General Disruption...”

  Now that he had the freedom to think, though the time they had was certainly short, Avery began to get a feel for what sort of improvised spell might do the trick. The problem, though, was what Thomas had said before.

  “He might have been telling the truth,” he told Aria nervously. “What if Bailey and Aiden can’t get back without the ring open?”

  Aria bit her lip, and glanced at the two witches, who were still busy actively restraining Thomas. Chloe’s eyes, though, met Avery’s. They were pained. Frances’ were resolute when he looked at her.

  “How much time do we have?” Aria asked.

  Avery pulled his phone out of his pocket and held it up. The timer had run out, and was now blinking as it ran well over five minutes in the red. “I set the minimum time based on the calculations I ran. Every minute after this is borrowed. As much as... half an hour? Maybe?”

  “If we knew what was going on over there,” Aria muttered, “we’d know what to do. They could be anywhere, though. I... I hate to say this, Avery but...” She couldn’t bring herself to say it.

  She didn’t need to. And a moment later, as though it was a musical hammer driving the nail into Bailey, Aiden, and Isabelle’s Faerie coffin, the horn sounded again—this time closer than before.

  Two fingers left. What to do?

  “This ring would have to be mirrored in Faerie somewhere, right?” Aiden wondered out loud. “Like portal spells on this side—they have to have identical structures on both ends.”

  “I suppose so,” Aria ventured, “but we don’t know that. Faerie magic can work differently than ours. I can’t begin to understand how Thomas used whistles and wailing to do what he did.”

  “I’d guess it was only possible because of the presence of Faerie magic here,” Avery said. “I can’t buy us more time, but maybe I can... reach out to Bailey. Or Aiden...” He wracked his brain. It was worth a shot. But with what? Projections might get mangled in transit and he didn’t know enough about stabilizing them to know that wouldn’t happen.

  But, maybe he would need that. “Did Bailey tell you anything about how she and Aiden found the keystone before? When Gloria ran off with it?”

  Aria nodded, her face quickly shifting from confused to comprehending, and then to excited. “Yes. Well, she tried. She gave us as much as she could but I think I could probably recreate her part of it. Can you?”

  “Aiden was so fascinated by it, we’ve spent hours going over what he did... if we can sustain it for just ten minutes—”

  “Maybe they can see it from their end and take it as a signal,” Aria finished.

  “It’s a risk,” Avery said. “I don’t know if that horn is more than ten minutes away, or that we even have that long.”

  Aria glanced at Chloe, who looked momentarily torn with indecision. But, finally, she nodded once.

  “Alright,” Aria said, rummaging in her bag. “Let’s do it.”

  Chapter 23

  WHETHER IT WAS BY DESIGN or chance, the door through which Bailey and Aiden had entered Faerie hadn’t been, on this side, an actual door. They’d just popped up in an illusory Coven Grove that, for all they knew, had no geographic connection to the actual place. Certainly, the forest they now ran through was nothing like the real world.

  In short, they were hopelessly lost.

  Isabelle had grown heavy in Bailey’s arms, so now she clung to Aiden as he worked to keep up a pace that was beginning to wane to a slow jog. Behind them, and sometimes in front of them or to one side or the other, the horn of the Wild Hunt blared periodically, ever closer but with such a ghostly quality that determining just how far was impossible.

  With no reagents or materials, Bailey’s choices of magic that might be used to find an exit from this place were severely limited. None the less, she tried a minor incantation meant for sailors to find north while on the sea. It nearly drove her insane—there was no magnetic north on this side of the divide, so instead she momentarily felt herself pulled in all directions, lights and sounds going off in her mind until she jammed her magic down deep inside and cut the charm off.

  Aiden, likewise, attempted a wizard spell with a ridiculous name—wizards were, apparently, so proud of the new spells they devised that they named them after themselves for posterity—but the torrent of magic that resulted only served to make the ground briefly glow like burning magnesium until Aiden cut it off. They stumbled, light blinded, after that for some time. The spell had been meant to illuminate a path to his desired goal; something as vague as ‘a way home’ was apparently dangerous in Faerie.

  Neither of them spoke for fear of worrying Isabelle, who was already stunned into abject silence. No doubt she would need a great deal of therapy after this. Bailey wondered if anyone would believe her when she told the story—or if she ever would, for that matter. At her age, Bailey might have been inclined to keep it to herself.

  Instead, Bailey and Aiden shared occasional eye contact loaded with everything from frustration to worry to hopelessness. The fact was, they were in Faerie—someone else made the rules, and for all Bailey knew that meant that they would never find anything like a way home. Maybe this is what Esme had felt when she was trapped here. How long had she managed to elude the Hunt?

  Just as Bailey stopped thinking about how to get out and started to plan out how she might help fend off a pack of Faerie hounds and their sidhe masters without access to any spell components, Isabelle made a small sound of wonder, and pointed.

  Far ahead of them, twinkling in the dark, there was suddenly a light.

  “The hunt?” Bailey asked.

  Aiden shook his head. “No. They don’t use any lights; every Faerie involved can see in the dark, according to the stories. That doesn’t mean it’s safe, though. Could be a will-o-wisp.”

  The light stopped flickering, and became steady. It was familiar, somehow; a quality of light she knew she’d seen before. “I don’t think so,” she said. “Don’t those normally come close, lead you somewhere?”

  “Deeper into the woods, normally,” Aiden said. “But I think you’re right. Does it seem a bit... familiar, somehow?”

  Bailey stared at the light, and then smiled as she recalled where she’d seen it. “Oh my God... it’s the same kind of light that came from the keystone when we ran Gloria down. Aiden... it’s a signal. It has to be. But... ho
w are they doing it?”

  “We’ll ask them when we’re back home,” he said as he heaved Isabelle back up. “Hang on, little bit. We’re almost home.”

  With renewed stamina, they ran toward the light. It was farther away than it looked, and by the time they found the source of it they were both drenched in sweat again and heaving. Bailey’s lungs burned and she had the painful urge to bend over at the waist from the stitch in her side.

  The light came from a circle of stones, fist sized, about six feet or so across. A quick count revealed thirteen of them, glowing with warm incandescence that wavered only slightly.

  “A Faerie circle,” Aiden breathed. “But it shouldn’t be open. It could be a trap.”

  “If it is, we’re no worse off,” Bailey said. “If it isn’t, we could be home.”

  “Yes,” Aiden whispered. “I suppose it’s worth a shot.”

  Aiden’s face was screwed up in concentration. “Any idea how we get through it?” Bailey asked.

  “I have several ideas,” Aiden said. He took a breath, and pointed to the circle with his wand. He twitched it back and forth as he pronounced some kind of formula, until fine lines appeared in the air over and around the circle. They looked almost like cracks in the world, barely visible due to the glow of the stones themselves.

  He leaned in and examined them, drawing the tip of his wand along several as if testing for something. When he was satisfied with whatever it was he was looking for, he straightened. “It’s definitely a portal of some kind. I can’t tell where to, though.”

  It wasn’t as though they had much of a choice. “Can you make it work?”

  “I can give it my best shot,” he said. “Here, the two of you stand here...”

  Bailey did as she was instructed, and the three of them stood in the center of the circle, near a knot in the air where the cracks all convened. Aiden began to speak formulas in clipped syllables, sketching out something in the air with his wand.

  Bailey held Isabelle close to her, breathing rapidly through the pounding in her chest. No matter what she did, she couldn’t calm herself, and she could feel Isabelle’s little heart fluttering as well.

  Aiden’s eyes flickered to Bailey’s for just a split second.

  “Aiden,” she said, when she saw the look there. She reached for him.

  It was too late, though. Aiden stepped backwards, out of the circle, and gave a final flick of his wand.

  As if she’d blinked, the world was changed. She stood in a much thinner woods, and the strange, ambient changed to the pale illumination of a starlit sky. She still had one arm outstretched.

  “Bailey!”

  It was Avery. She yelped when he grabbed her from behind and hugged her. Aria was nearby as well, and when Bailey looked around, frantic, she saw Frances and Chloe and... “Is that Thomas?” She asked.

  Avery let her go, and frowned. “Where’s—”

  “I have to go back,” Bailey said. She gently but urgently shuffled Isabelle out of the circle. “Send me back.”

  “We can’t,” Avery said, “we didn’t bring you over, I was just hoping that—”

  “Aiden’s back there,” Bailey told him. “He’s right next to the circle, he sent us through but the Wild Hunt is closing in on us and I can’t leave him there, Avery; not so what happened to Esme can happen to him, you have to figure it out.”

  Avery held up his hands. Each and every finger except his left pinkie was burned and blistered, badly. Bailey’s mouth dropped open. “What happened...?”

  “I have one good finger left,” he said, “one spell. I have to use it to shut the enchantment down.”

  “What enchantment?” Bailey asked. “What’s been happening here?”

  “It’s a long story,” Aria said. “And we don’t have much time. I need your help to do our part of the spell and—”

  “I’m not leaving Aiden there,” Bailey snapped. She turned, and pointed at Avery. “If you can get me back over there and I can get Aiden back here, he can... do whatever it is you’re trying to do here.”

  “There’s a crack in the world, Bailey,” Avery said, pleading and apologizing at the same time. “If the Wild Hunt is coming, and it comes through... we can’t risk that; you have to understand.”

  “I understand that Aiden is an asset we can’t afford to lose,” Bailey said, glaring. “This won’t be the last fight we have. We need him. Avery—I need him.”

  His mouth worked, and Aria rested a gentle hand on Bailey’s shoulder. “Bailey we have to—”

  “Okay,” Avery said. “Okay. I think... he must have used Norin’s Phasic Transference—”

  “No,” Bailey said, “no he said something like... Locusts?”

  “Locutius?” Avery asked.

  “Right!” Bailey confirmed. “Does that mean anything?”

  Avery closed his eyes, his lips moving silently as he searched his memory. “It must have been Locutius’ Slipstream Transportation... but why? Maybe he was trying to account for the ongoing exchange of energies...” he rambled on quietly to himself for a moment more, making imaginary marks in the air with his fingers and occasionally pausing to count something until, after a few tense minutes he snapped his fingers and then gasped with the pain of it. “God, why did I do that?” He shuddered as the pain passed, and then pulled Bailey to the center of the circle.

  “I think I can do it,” he said. “It’ll be modified. You need to grab him, and pull him into the circle with you. You’ll have... call it three seconds. Maybe five, but count on three. Okay? I’m going to loop the spell so you’ll pop over and pop back and...”

  “What?” Bailey urged. “Talk, spit it out, time’s wasting.”

  “Well the spell needs a contagion element,” he said. “And the fastest way is... you know...”

  “Contagion,” Bailey repeated. Under other circumstances, she might have blushed. “Fine. Okay. Three seconds. Do it.”

  Avery bit his lip, and then hugged her tightly before he took a step back, out of the circle, and began to draw in the air with his pinkie.

  Chapter 24

  BAILEY AND ISABELLE disappeared with a burst of wind as the air filled in the spot they had just occupied. Magic crackled around the end of Aiden’s wand and over his nerves. The magic here was thick, volatile, and difficult to control. Once they were gone he sagged, and closed his eyes while he re-centered himself.

  It was done, then. Isabelle was back to her mother, Bailey was safe. All that was left was to close this crack.

  Aiden licked his lips, and very carefully drew magic from the area into his wand. Sparks leapt from it, vanishing into the air. His wand wasn’t made to handle this kind of power; probably he only had a few attempts before it cracked. That was all he likely needed though.

  He muttered formulas as he walked the edge of the circle, weaving the structures for containment and sealing in an attempt to cut off whatever magic on this side was maintaining the cracks. At each turn of phrase, though, something from the other side seemed to seep in and disrupt his spells. It very quickly became apparent that whatever closure was going to take place would have to do so from the other side.

  That changed things considerably. The horn of the Wild Hunt called out again, echoing through the woods, so close now that he felt the vibration of it in his bones.

  “Defense it is, then,” he said to no one in particular. He found himself wishing Bailey was with him. But her skill in battle magic was probably limited, if it even existed. Witches weren’t known for their interest in offensive magic.

  Aiden wasn’t either, personally—but it had been part of his curriculum, and like all his studies he had given it his full attention. His opponent was insurmountable in this instance. He knew that as he began to work Logrim’s Immaculate Barrier and Gerof’s Greater Warding, layering the two defensive perimeter spells in a circle just a few inches outside the circle of stones. There were undoubtedly people on the other side of the crack in the center of the circle working to
close it. He just had to trust that they’d be able to.

  Once the defensive magic was in place, he took several deep breaths. Magic had begun to make parts of his body numb from the jagged currents in his nerves. How long he could hold out, he wasn’t certain, but he could command considerable power before he fell.

  It wasn’t like his vision at all, he reflected. The future was indeed fluid. What part of his journey to this moment had been the turning point? Perhaps it was holding himself back from getting involved with Bailey. For once, he supposed, he’d made the right decision. Just one more correct choice, and perhaps that whole future would vanish into the mysterious currents of time, never to be born.

  Keeping thoughts like that in mind, he spread his feet just enough to keep himself stable, a battle casting stance he’d learned in Cambridge and never used outside of practice. He found himself wondering what professor Tull would say just now. “Bend your knees,” probably, or, “Hands up, Rivers! Ready to cast, not taking a walk in the park, boy...”

  Avery would like professor Tull, if he could get up the courage to leave Coven Grove. And Tull would like Avery, too. The truth was, Avery was brilliant. In the long run, he’d make a more talented wizard than Aiden ever had; maybe even better than Tull. They’d get on fine, if Tull could swallow his ego and Avery could keep himself humble over his growing skill. Avery was the sort of wizard who would make new spells, immortalizing his name in the wizard world forever with something like “Avery’s Miraculous Shelf Organizer” or some such. Hopefully, he’d have the luxury of developing utility spells, instead of battle magic. What kind of world had wizards like Logrim and Gerof lived in, that they’d produced two of the most effective defensive spells in the Codex?

  The horn came again, louder this time—and now, off in the distance between the trees, the dancing lights of sprinting hounds were just visible. Behind them would be the sidhe hunters and, ultimately, the man himself—Herne, the huntsman, consort to Mab.

  Aiden licked his lips again, relaxed his shoulders, and raised his arms. Spells filed into line in his mind, a series he could chain together... yes, that would be a good combo. He couldn’t stand against the Wild Hunt directly, so making distance and keeping them away from the barrier was best.