Scryer

by West, Sinden

  “Good.” I spun around and retreated back to the bedroom. As he had said, several dresses hung there in colors other than red. I chose a pale green one and quickly dressed in front of a full- length mirror. The green went well with my hair and complexion, and for a brief instant, I looked normal.

  “It suits you.” I turned to face Lake standing in the doorway. He stepped closer, and I turned away from him to observe myself in the mirror again. He came up behind me, and I did my best not to move in reaction to his closeness. He rested one hand on my waist and unwillingly I lifted my eyes to meet his reflection. He bent his head down so I could feel his warm breath against my cheek. “I’m going to take you back to the mountain estate while we hunt them down. You’ll be safe there.”

  “No.”

  “Don’t do this, Ivy.”

  “Do what?” I asked his reflection.

  “Don’t fight everything that I do. Don’t make everything between us a battle. I’m not your enemy. You loved me once, you must remember that.”

  My cheeks flamed with shame at the admission. That truth brought out my claws. “You are my enemy, Lake, and that wasn’t love, that was just me falling for your deceit and manipulation.” I didn’t know why I said that. Now that he was out of danger, I still felt the need to hurt him and couldn’t stop myself.

  He was silent for a moment, before saying, “I’m sorry you feel that way. I had hoped that you would cooperate.”

  “Cooperate with what?”

  “This.” His hand moved swiftly to grab the back of my neck in a firm hold.

  I struggled. “What the hell are you doing?”

  In the reflection, I saw his other hand come up, the syringe that he held was clear as day.

  “No.” I tried to kick but missed as the needle plunged into my neck. I managed to tear free from his hold and stagger over to the bed. My hand reached up to find the syringe sticking out of me, but it felt too heavy, my fingers wouldn’t cooperate with what my brain was telling it. I fell down, grabbing onto the bedcovers for useless support and my knees collapsed. My mouth attempted to form every profanity that I could think of by nothing came forth but an animal like grunting sound.

  Lake’s legs appeared in front of me and he crouched down to pull the syringe from me. “Go to sleep, baby. It’ll all be just fine.” The last thing I remembered was his lips on my forehead as I willed him to burn. Nothing happened but darkness.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “Wake up, time, little witch.”

  A gas lamp burned in front of me as my groggy eyes managed to open to dancing light and shadow as Dorothea Corin stood above me in red killer heels that matched her lipstick. With the light moving and casting differing shadows over her face, she kept making a macabre change from beauty to ugliness.

  I managed to make a moaning sound as I struggled to sit. But chains rattled, and I couldn’t move far. I lay on some kind of hard pallet in a room made of stone. The cold hit me and I looked down to see that I was bare-chested with my nipples hard in response to the temperature. Below them, I wore the hated, red velvet ritual skirt.

  I looked up at Dorothea. “Get this fucking thing off of me.”

  She merely smiled and pulled her white fur closer to her body as if the cold were penetrating it. It was a different fur than the one she had been forced to give me. I imagined she had a whole row of them hanging in her closet—an armoire of death.

  “Now, now, Ivy. You’re in no position to give orders here, now are you darling?”

  I pulled at the chains again. “Where am I?”

  “You’re where we always meet for rituals. Only now you’re in the dungeon.”

  “Why?” I asked through gritted teeth.

  “Because of your misbehavior,” she clipped out like some kind of headmistress. “Michael isn’t very happy with the decisions that you’ve made lately. Taking a white witch for a lover, that was very foolish, and we all know how Michael holds grudges,” she said lightly, as if it were a joke that we shared between us.

  “Where’s Lake?” I snapped out, my head still groggy.

  “None of your business. Now, Michael will be down shortly and I’m here to let you know in no uncertain terms that you are to be on your best behavior. I’ll not have him being a bastard to me just because a stupid little slut like you upsets him.”

  Was it my imagination, or was that a bruise lining her cheek? It was hard to tell with the shadows dancing over her features.

  “Do you understand?”

  I lay my head back down and stared at the stone ceiling.

  She waited for a few moments and then, when it was clear that I wasn’t about to engage with her any further, she spoke. “Lake’s been sent away to hunt down the white witches so he won’t be coming to rescue you anytime soon.”

  I kept still and didn’t speak.

  I heard her breathing and then she said, “Did you know that I was Lake’s first lover? He was fifteen and already absolutely delicious. I was mad at Michael, so I took his nephew into my bed. Michael had banished me here for the entire winter, but I didn’t mind too much when I had Lake to keep me warm. I taught him everything that he knows. You should really thank me.”

  I felt bile rise in my throat at the thought of them together but managed not to let my distaste show on my exterior.

  “You’ll never be one of us, Ivy.” Her voice was serious now. “Did you see the look on his face as he drank my blood? You will never be able to give him that.”

  She tapped her heel impatiently, waiting for a reaction that she would never get. When she realized that, she gave a sigh and turned on her heel and walked out of the room, taking the lantern and pulling the heavy door closed behind her. I jumped as it clanged shut, and only then did I let the false bravado drop. I was cold and locked in this horrible, dark room that was probably underground. I had never been treated like this before and a spark of fear went through me that they could keep me locked up like this forever if they wanted to, just like they had done to my ancestors centuries ago under the guise of keeping them safe.

  Hours stretched on, or maybe it was mere minutes, but awful thoughts swirled in my head as I thought of the fate that lay ahead of me. The door finally opened and a figure stood there holding a lantern. It took a while for my eyes to adjust to the new light, and when they did, I realized that it was Michael who stood there holding it. I averted my eyes to look at the stone ceiling above me once more. I heard his footsteps as he walked over to me and placed the lantern on the ground. Sitting beside me on the pallet, he began to stroke at my hair.

  “This was what I always wanted to do to you, Ivy Scryer,” he murmured. “To have you locked away like something precious. You won’t be hurt by the awful, random things that you see each day in the futures and pasts of strangers. Your mind won’t decay and go crazy until you feel that the only option is to kill yourself to stop the torment.”

  To my horror, tears began to seep from my eyes. I tried to tell myself that it was the effects of the drug that Lake had given me to keep me down, but the truth was, it was a combination of the truth of his words, and the realization that he really believed the crap that he was saying. My tears fell down from my cheeks and onto my chest to travel to my breasts. Michael moved his mouth down there and began to lick my tears from my skin. His tongue moved over the silver cuts in my skin, almost like it was my blood that he desired rather than the warmth of being inside me. His tongue dragged down my body, past my naval and down to the scar that sat low on my stomach that contained a womb that would always be empty of a Corin child.

  Of course, it was hardly the first time that he had touched me in an intimate way, but this was the first time that I had been physically chained by him. I sucked in a breath sharply, and it made him raise his head to search me with his eyes. What did I look like to him in the dark? Did the shadows make me ugly as they had with Dorothea? Or did they make me mysterious; a secret locked away from reality. I imagined this dungeon as one of my boxes si
tting innocently on a shelf with no indication of what lay within.

  My boxes…

  A wave of homesickness came over me. Most people missed people; I missed cold inanimate objects.

  He lowered his mouth to mine. He tasted like the salt of my tears mixed in with scotch or whatever his drink of the day was. His kiss was tender and soft as he tried to coax my still lips into responding. I wouldn’t though. I would be as still and cold as the stone of these dungeon walls. No coaxing or cajoling by Michael would make me do his bidding so he could pretend that we were willing lovers. I had fire now. I could make his flesh melt and his bones turn to ash…

  As I endured his touch, my mind turned to channeling the flame. The rage began to build at thoughts of the injustice of it all. I concentrated on his hair, and a wisp of smoke escaped up into the dark…

  But then there was a scream.

  My rage subsided as Michael lifted his head from me in surprise at the sound and the smallest flame that had begun died out.

  “What the hell?” he muttered.

  “Hell indeed,” said a smooth voice behind him. Michael’s eyes widened in surprise as he twisted his head to see who the intruder was. Caleb stepped forward out of the darkness and into the light of the lamp. The silver blade caught that light just as Michael tried to rise, and then it disappeared as it sunk deep into his torso. He made a gurgling noise and managed to stay on his feet somehow as Caleb yanked the knife out before thrusting it deep within the other man, arching it up into his heart.

  Michael staggered then fell with a graceless thump to the ground and lay there unmoving as blood pumped from him. Caleb only cast his eyes over the man he had just killed for a second before stepping over the body to reach me. I stared up at him, unsure if I should be shrinking away in fear from that bloodied knife.

  But then he placed it down beside him as his hands went to my chains. “We have to get you out of here,” he said quickly, pulling on the heavy manacles. They didn’t move of course.

  “What are you doing?” I asked as he went back to Michael’s body and began to search for the key.

  “They’re coming after you, Ivy. They can track where you are.” He found what he was looking for in Michael’s pocket, and in an instant was setting me free. I sat up weakly and massaged my wrists.

  “Why are you helping me?”

  He grabbed my wrist and pulled me to my feet. “Come on, Ivy. We have to go.” He led me past the sickening sight of Michael’s dead body, and when I faltered, his grasp became firmer. “Ivy, they’re coming. We have to go. He doesn’t like to be thwarted, and right now, he’s pretty fucking pissed. Nothing’s going to stop him.”

  “Who?” I didn’t protest as he dragged me behind him.

  “My father.”

  We came to stone steps dimly lit by lanterns lining the walls at spaced intervals. I tripped and then nearly screamed as I saw the body on the stairs. Felix lay there with his eyes closed and a bloodied chest.

  “Ivy.”

  “Stop! I’m not going anywhere until you tell me what’s going on. You killed Felix and Michael?” I swallowed. “And Lake, what about Lake?”

  Caleb rolled his eyes. “Don’t worry. I haven’t hurt a hair on the head of your precious lover boy. Right now, he’s out hunting us, but unless he’s got a witch with our kind of power, he hasn’t got a hope in hell of finding my father. Now let’s go.”

  “Why are you helping me?” I repeated.

  He stared at me for a moment. “Call it rebelling against my family if you like. I’ve got my own reasons, and if you don’t leave here with me right now, it’ll be for nothing.”

  Breathing hard, a million thoughts ran through my head. I could stay and maybe die, or go with him and maybe die. “Let’s go,” I told him.

  Together we ran up the stone steps that led to a set of large, old wooden doors. Caleb pushed at them hard to open them, and they revealed a grey, twilight sky. The house loomed against the dismal landscape, its grey stone matching the sky. Suddenly a streak of light pushed through the grim surrounding us, bursting into something that looked like a sunburst with drops of light cascading down and leaving slivers of silver and blue behind them.

  “It’s beautiful,” I breathed.

  “No it isn’t,” snarled Caleb. “It’s your death warrant. They’ve found you. We need to find shelter.” He gripped on to my arm and pulled me along as we headed for the trees further down. We climbed down the rocky incline clumsily in our haste. My ankle still hurt in spite of Felix’s herbal tincture, and as I made the last jump down, I landed awkwardly, twisting it and crying out in pain.

  From his position ahead of me, Caleb stopped and turned. I managed to tear the look of pain from my face and hobble toward him. Sighing, he took two steps toward me and grabbed me around the waist so I was draped over his shoulder humiliatingly. He ran as best as he could over the uneven terrain until we reached the cover of the trees. Only when we were deep under the cover of the branches and leaves did he set me down, breathing heavily. The trees were beginning to shed their leaves with the beginning of autumn, but there was still enough coverage. I collapsed down to sit on the leafy ground and leaned against a tree trunk.

  He stared up through gaps in the trees to the sky, the look on his face as grim as the sky.

  “Why are you really helping me, Caleb?” I asked wearily.

  His shoulders sagged down and he sat next to me, his face spelling out his fatigue. “This isn’t the life I want. I want to disappear. Helping you means my father can never name me as his successor. Maybe they’ll forget about me.” But he didn’t sound convinced.

  “Or maybe they’ll kill you.”

  He mouth turned into a twisted, unhappy smile. “That’s far more likely, but at least…”

  “What?”

  He let out a breath. “I fell in love with a girl once. She wasn’t one of us. She was mortal and unaware of any of this. She knew nothing of scrying and magic. She didn’t know that the more polluted the earth became, the harder it was to access our magic. It was like being unable to breathe.”

  “What happened to her?”

  Caleb gave a sad smile. “My father got in the way, and she ended up with someone else.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He waited for a minute before saying, “I’m lying. That’s the story I like to tell myself. It makes it easier. The reality is that she’s dead and her flesh is rotting away somewhere, her bones becoming part of the land. He would never tell me where.” He ran a hand through his hair. “God, I wish that I had something to drink right now.”

  “Why did he kill her?”

  “To get what he wanted. I think he had in mind for me to marry Penzance and continue some kind of fucking witch dynasty or something. Kate got in his way and I was too weak to stand up to him. So now she’s dead and my weekends are spent murdering and desecrating bodies.” He let out a low whistle. “My dad hates weakness more than anything, yet he doesn’t see that I’m the weakest of them all. I can’t stand up to him. I never could.”

  “You’re letting me live now,” I said carefully. “That means something.”

  He shot a quick look at me. “I wish that I could promise that. I really do, but they’re close, I can feel them.” He lifted up the leg of jeans and pulled out the knife that had been strapped to his ankle. It was the same nasty blade that had killed Michael and his blood was not yet dry.

  “Then I should run.”

  Another burst of light showered the sky, and we both blocked our eyes from it.

  He shook his head. “It won’t make a difference, but there is something that I can do.”

  “What is it?”

  “The Circle has so many people to do their bidding. Powerful people, witches. My family won’t be able to trace your body once you’re dead, and the Circle could raise you up again provided your heart is still intact in your body.”

  It took me a moment to process his words. “Caleb, no.” I began to move away fro
m him, my hands sinking into the dirt and leaves to search for a weapon. “There will be another way. I’ll find another way.”

  A burst of blue and silver light cut through the sky again, showering us in falling light that seemed so concrete that I could reach out and touch it. There was another burst and my head went upwards. That was when he grabbed my hair and pulled me hard against him.

  “I’m sorry, Ivy. I wish that there were another way. I’ll make sure that the Circle finds you. Trust me, you’ll thank me later.”

  My mouth opened to protest but a hot pain seared through me with such intensity that I couldn’t cry out as the blade bit into my skin and slid across my neck. I felt it gush from me: my blood, my life. He released my hair but still held me close and a kiss was pressed to my forehead. “Shhh, Ivy. It will all be okay.”

  My head collapsed down and I saw the flow of red down me, sliding down my body to the ground below and taking my life with it. My eyes were open and they should have been closing forever. The leaves, the blood, the fucking red—that was all I saw as I waited for darkness to come.

  But it didn’t. Slowly, everything turned silver, and I felt relief. I was not cold, I was not scared, and there was no pain. The beauty of the silver light overcame everything and I wanted to tell Caleb how this beauty transcended everything. But I couldn’t feel his touch any longer.

  There was only light.

  Chapter Fourteen

  I saw myself when I awoke. The mirror above me showed only my face with the rest of my body covered up to my chin by the bed covers. My face was pale, shadows circled my eyes and my lips were bloodless and thin. Even my hair, normally so unruly and wild, appeared lifeless and limp.

  I didn’t need to be told where I was. It was the Corins’ ritual room.

  And then I remembered everything else and a disappointing feeling came over me. The light was gone and a depression collapsed down on me at that realization. Slowly, I dug my fingers into the fabric of the covers and pulled them from me as if pulling a scab from a wound. I lowered them enough just to reveal the red angry scar that lined my throat like a necklace. Gouging scar tissue twisted nastily from one side to the other and made me cringe at its grotesqueness.