by Chloe Adler
“Tell her that,” I huffed.
“She may always get her way, but it doesn’t mean she’s right,” he answered. “Remember when we went on that rafting trip? Down the Kern River?”
“I do, of course I do.”
“How we all let her think the entire trip was her idea?”
“I always wondered why she went with us, she hates camping.”
“Sometimes you have to steer people in the direction they don’t want to go and once they get there . . .”
“They find it’s where they wanted to be all along,” I finished for him.
“Wise child.” His apparition wavered for a second like an interrupted Wi-Fi connection during a YouTube video.
“Instead, my sweet girl, I’m going to tell you to do what you need, for you. Follow that stubborn, wild, crazy heart of yours. You will have doubts and that’s okay because your inner compass will point you in the right direction. Don’t listen to your mother or your siblings or your friends. Do what you sense is right.”
I shook my head vigorously because he sounded like he’d gone newt-eyed crazy. No one in my family had ever told me to follow my own intuition before. They’d always told me what they wanted me to do. When my intuition agreed with them, I’d defy them anyway just to spite them. Maybe that’s why they were usually right.
“If you do what your heart tells you, you’ll all be safe.”
“What about you, Papa? I want you to come home.”
“Oh Sadie.” He reached out and touched my cheek with both hands, since they were still bound together. “I know you do, but sometimes we have to sacrifice one person we love in order to save another.”
“I don’t understand.”
My father looked over his shoulder and then back at me with wide eyes. “I have to go now.”
“No!” I reached out to grab him. My hand wrapped around the tie of his robe and I tried to hold him in place even though the knot was slipping. “Papa, no!”
“I love you, Sadie, I always have.”
I tried to reach for his arm.
“Wake up now, little one.” His pet name for me. The words were soft but spoken with force.
My eyes sprang open. I was lying in my bed with Ryder’s arms wrapped around me and the tie of my father’s blue robe still wrapped around my hand.
Chapter Ten
I tried to sneak out of bed without waking Ryder but he pulled me in tighter and nuzzled my neck. I didn’t know what my dad had meant exactly. Aurelia had shown me that Ryder was somehow mixed up with the Scrim. I didn’t want to believe her. My gut told me it wasn’t so simple, things are rarely black and white. And, there was no denying I was falling for the guy. Instead of moving away from him, I kissed the arms that held me. My same old heart beat in my chest but it felt different somehow, new. And the more I let myself feel anything at all for Ryder, the more my heartbeats felt different. Fuller. Faster. Stronger.
I turned over and kissed him. He wasn’t naked; he still had on a thin gray T-shirt. He moaned a little in his sleep before rolling over so I could spoon him in kind. I ran my hands along his broad shoulders and over his closely cropped, tight black curls. His dark skin was unblemished. I pressed my lips to his neck and he arched into me. I wanted to see more of him. I worked his T-shirt up his back, revealing ripples of muscle and the firm angles of his scapula. I didn’t know he had a tattoo. I pushed his shirt up higher to look at it. The familiar symbol leapt out at me on his right shoulder blade. Two black snakes intertwined, eating their tales—the ouroboros as an infinity symbol. A broken line slashed through it at a strange angle, almost like the number seven. Something ancient. A hieroglyph, maybe? I traced my finger over it, following the contours, but he roared and leapt out of bed as though I’d burned him.
“What did you do?” He looked at me but his eyes were frenzied and unfocused.
“Nothing, Ryder, it’s okay. I was just looking at your tattoo.”
He yanked his shirt down quickly and looked around my room, still wild.
“What’s wrong?” I asked him. My heart was starting to hurt a little and the beats had changed. It was like my blood had thinned and was now thickening again. There was no other way to describe it.
“You can’t touch my tattoo. You shouldn’t even look at it.”
“What?” I got off the bed and crossed to him, holding out my hands in a placating way. “It’s just a tattoo. I think it’s cool.”
He looked around again before focusing on me. “Yes, of course it’s just a tattoo. It’s new and it’s sore. Please don’t touch it again.”
I must have looked confused because he added, “At least not until it’s healed.”
“Of course, I’m sorry, I didn’t know. I’ve never had one myself so . . .”
He softened for an instant, then spotted what he was looking for and bent down to grab his pants off the floor.
“You’re leaving?” I did not like the way my voice sounded, high-pitched and frantic.
“It’s late, I gotta go home.”
I shrugged my shoulders and climbed back onto my bed. “Sure, whatever. See ya.”
“Sadie—“ He tried to reach for me.
“You know the way out.” I pointed to my bedroom door.
“Sadie, please, I’m sorry. You startled me and it’s late. I didn’t realize the time. I have to get home and feed my cat.”
“Yeah right, your other pussy. Later. It was fun.”
He tried to reach for me again but I batted his hand away and turned my back to him. He stood there for a second, so I crossed my arms in front of my chest. “I’m done with you, Ryder. Please leave now.”
His sigh was audible but he didn’t argue and his footsteps were long gone before I turned back toward my bedroom door. I don’t know what I was hoping for. That he’d been faking it and had stayed? But no. He was gone and I was alone. Again. Leaving me to question why I’d fallen back into bed with him before knowing who he truly was. Conflicted, my heart hurt. On the one hand, my father’s dream visitation told me I was doing the right thing. But then there were the warnings from Aurelia and Jared. Regardless, I had promised my friends I would try and uncover his true motivations. Instead, I’d spread my legs, letting myself be distracted by my need to be sexually dominated.
My head fell heavily into my hands and I scrubbed my face. What if I tried to find out what was going on with him through magic? My powers seemed to be manifesting in little ways. Dad had said they were getting stronger. It couldn’t hurt to try, at least.
Even getting out of bed and over to my walk-in closet felt like a chore. I moved slowly, my emotions swirling. Toward the back of the closet, I rummaged on a shelf behind my sweaters. There it was. The cool crystal globe, hard against my fingers, and then the vintage stand of edged brass it was supposed to rest upon.
I pulled out my crystal ball and the stand, placing the stand on my dresser before sitting on my bed with the ball. I’d always wondered why my grandmother had even bothered to give it to me but she’d said it was my birthright since one of my parents was a witch. Maybe I had latent powers, she’d told me when I cried late at night.
My crystal ball looked exactly the same as Chrys’s and Iphi’s and Aurelia’s, but I knew it wasn’t the same. One witch could never use another witch’s ball.
I took a deep breath in and held it. I tried to calm my jitters. It’d never worked for me before, all these years, why would it work now?
Still, I had to try. I put it in my right hand, feeling the weight of it. It was heavier than I remembered and so smooth. So clear. My hand was visible beneath it.
Biting my upper lip, I passed my left hand over it. No change. Why did I keep deluding myself?
I was about to stand up when a small inclusion appeared. Were my eyes tricking me? Narrowing them, I brought the crystal up toward my face. There was movement. A flutter. It was small, but . . . I pressed my eyes to the glass.
A black raven grew in a flash and dove straight for
my face.
Screaming, I dropped the ball, instinctively covering my eyes.
My door flew open for the second time that night.
“What are you doing?” Burgundy was looking around my room, no doubt trying to figure out what had fallen.
As I jumped off my bed, I thought about the crystal ball presenting itself to Burg. And then, at a leisurely pace, it actually rolled over to my best friend and came to rest at her feet.
Burgundy bent down and tried to pick it up but she couldn’t. It looked like it was stuck to the floor. She crouched and tried to lift it with both hands. Even with her vampire strength, she couldn’t pick it up. But then I realized why: according to the lore, only witches could touch a crystal ball once it had been activated. Even an army of vampires couldn’t pick up my sisters’ balls or Aurelia’s—or mine? Still, both Burgundy and Jared had held mine in the past. Unless . . .
She looked up at me, her face flushed with exertion, head tilted.
“Sadie, I think you’d better explain what’s going on. Now.”
My hands rose to the ceiling against my better judgment. “I have no clue, Burg, really.” I walked over to where she was standing in my doorway, flustered and adorable. Her luscious lips looked extra pouty and kissable but instead of acting on my instinct to change the subject with sex, I bent down and picked up my crystal ball with one hand.
Smiling, I tossed my flaming hair, crossed back to my sleek chrome dresser and placed my globe on its stand. The stand itself glowed bright white for an instant and then returned to its usual brass luster.
“Dish. Now.” Burgundy approached me with her hands on her hips, tapping her fingers in agitation.
I kept my back to her, facing my divination tool, looking at her in my mirror. Making sure to hold my head high in defiance, I refused to turn around.
She pushed her body against mine and wrapped her arms around me, holding me tightly. I was no match against her strength, never had been. But that was before and I decided to test the theory. I pushed my arms out against hers, reciting the incantation I knew for escape. At first nothing happened and she smiled, bringing her mouth down to my neck where she licked me tenderly, though I knew it was a warning.
Closing my eyes and sucking in my breath, I pushed my body back into hers, concentrating harder without saying a word. A burst of air exploded between us, the force emanating from within me. She lost her grip.
“Ouch!” Burgundy cried.
I turned around to face her then. She was rubbing her reddening forearms. With wide eyes, I stared at her, instantly regretful.
“Burg, I’m sorry.” I reached to caress her arms but she took a step back crossing them in front of her chest.
“Well, Ms. Witchy Sadie, it appears your powers are finally blooming.”
Nodding, I took another step toward her. “I don’t know what’s happening. I don’t know how to control it.”
Retreating another step, Burgundy dropped her gaze to the floor. “Maybe you should ask your mother.”
“My mother?” A sound escaped, something between a laugh and a snort. “Like she would ever tell me anything. She’ll probably insist it’s all in my head.”
That didn’t exactly make sense. Aurelia was the matriarch of all the witches in the Edge. She was the one I would naturally seek out, even if I weren’t her daughter, but there was a nagging deep inside. My instinct told me to keep this all a secret.
I reached for my friend, and this time, she let me touch her hand, which was still clasped over her body in protection. Pulling it free, I held it in both of mine. I stared into her dark eyes until she met mine. For the first time in our entire relationship, I felt like her equal. Almost.
“I’m not going to tell anyone for a while. That’s what feels right to me. Will you keep my secret?” I hadn’t meant to threaten her, but my words came out charged, forceful. She tried to pull her hand away. This time, I was stronger.
“You’re scaring me.”
I let go of her. That was another first. This self-possessed vampire had never been scared of anything, or if she had, she’d hidden it well.
“I’m sorry. Something is obviously happening to me. Some change. I need to figure out what’s going on first. I would never intentionally hurt you but I need you to promise me that you’ll hold my secret for now.”
She grabbed my hand back, nodding to let me know she remained on my side. “Where’s your ring?” She held my hand up toward my face.
I looked around a minute, then shook my head. I must have taken it off without thinking. “I don’t know. It’ll turn up.”
“I hope so. Hey, there’s something I need to show you. Maybe it has something to do with . . . This” She gestured with one hand, taking in the room and everything that’d happened in it the last few hours. Her tone was serious and strange. Her voice cracked, lilting higher than usual.
Without letting go of my hands, she turned and pulled me gently after her. She led me into our living room, pointing at the window next to our front door. It was shattered. The glass had been swept into a pile but it was still there, on the Oriental rug covering our wooden floor. In the center was a dead crow.
Letting go of her hand, I brought my own up to cover my mouth. “This is what I saw in my crystal ball,” I said, turning to Burgundy. “What does it mean?”
“I don’t know, but the symbolism of the crow . . .”
“The harbinger of death,” I finished.
“There are other meanings, Sadie, many other meanings.”
Unconsciously, my hand moved up to my amulet, idly fingering it.
“Maybe it’s your spirit animal,” Burgundy said helpfully.
I bent down to study the bird. There was something in its beak. Something yellow. As I reached toward it, Burgundy audibly sucked in a breath, but I couldn’t stop now. I crouched lower and eased myself up to the edge of the wreckage. My hand seemed to be moving on its own. I didn’t stop until I snagged the thing from its beak and then, like a broken spell, I jumped back, holding it out in front of me.
Burgundy was at my side, reaching for it. I let her take it from me because we both already knew what it was.
A lock of Iphi’s hair.
“You have to go to Aurelia now,” Burgundy said over a cup of tea as we sat at our kitchen table, trying to discuss things rationally.
“No way,” I countered. “Aurelia will only want to take over.”
“So?”
“So, she hates Dad for leaving her, so much so that she told us he was dead. She doesn’t trust Ryder. And she only marginally cares about Jared. I bet she’d rather see them all dead at the expense of saving Iphigenia.”
“And you?” She looked so tired, why hadn’t I noticed that before? There were dark circles underneath her beautiful violet eyes.
Flipping my hair, I said, “I want to save all of them,” not really answering her question.
“Even Ryder? Knowing he may be involved somehow.”
“What if he’s being coerced, like Dad? I may not be interested in him as a mate, but I don’t want to see him dead.” Why was I lying to her?
“Then we need a plan.” Burgundy leaned forward on her elbows. “This is going to be dangerous. We need another witch.”
I shook my head as vehemently as I could, but Burg had a point. I didn’t know how strong my magic was and worse, I barely knew how to use it.
I reached out to take a sip of my tea, not able to meet her eyes. “Fine. You go talk to Chrys and I’ll talk to Ryder.”
Chapter Eleven
I didn’t know which dock Ryder lived on but I wasn’t going to let that stop me. Sitting in front of my vanity, I looked at my crystal ball. For good measure I lit the white candles I had kept unlit for years, one on each side of the glass. Gingerly picking her up, I tested the heft in both of my hands before propping it up on the right one.
I sucked in a deep breath, then passed my left hand over the top and said, “Show me where Ryder lives.”
As with most things, in retrospect, I should have been more specific. There was a haze, the same one I’d seen when the crow had “flown” out, and I admit I was afraid for a moment. I didn’t think I could take another vision like that. When it cleared, there was a faint street sign I could barely read before it vanished: Harbor Way. Sitting there for another ten minutes, I asked for more clarification in as many ways as I could think of, but the crystal remained clear. Okay, a glimpse was better than nothing.
Without thinking too much, I ran to my closet and changed into black leather pants and a dark sweatshirt. If I was going to be crawling around the docks, especially the Gates at Harbor Way, I didn’t want to stand out. This was referred to as the bad part of town.
When my 1968 pink and white Vespa pulled up to Harbor Way, I cursed my false sense of confidence. The street leading up to the harbor looked like the photo of a deserted Old West town without the tumbleweeds. An involuntary shiver ran through my body like the rat scampering by my feet. Why hadn’t I asked for help? Always needing to prove my worth and independence. I wasn’t shaking in my boots—and yes, I was wearing my leather riding boots—but my new powers did not have me strutting confidently.
At the end of the street was a dirt pathway leading to the berths on Gate Three. All the gates were run-down but Gate Three, the only one that jutted out alone at the end of Harbor Way, was the worst. On a dilapidated telephone pole, a faded flyer flapping in the breeze caught my attention.
Planned demolition of Gate Three on January 15th, part of retrofitting and safety.
I rolled my eyes. The flyer was five months old and nothing had happened yet.
I rarely went down to the docks and never to the gates. There was no reason to. They weren’t lined with potted plants like the other docks. The houseboats here weren’t meticulously painted; they were rundown and dingy. What should have been a gorgeous and much-coveted part of our town had become a disparaging nest of homeless drug addicts and night creatures. Even the city was afraid to touch it, apparently.
