nancy werlock's diary s01 - episodes 1-7

by Julie Ann Dawson

“You knew it was a fraud the entire time,” says Isabel.

  “If she was the victim of a real possession, the exhaustion would have been more intense and lasted longer. She wouldn’t be holding a Bible study fifteen minutes afterwards.”

  “Is it wrong that I was hoping she was possessed?”

  “You didn’t want to believe she would do something like this. It’s always easier to blame something else. Point the finger at things that don’t exist instead of confronting the things that do.”

  “What do I do about Gina?”

  “That’s not my call. I think first and foremost, you have to think about what is best for you. When you confront her about this, it is going to get very ugly. She’s going to blame you. She’ll blame me. She’ll do whatever she can to shift responsibility for her actions elsewhere. People like her are very good at shifting blame.”

  “Nancy, I have to tell you something. About your practice. I—”

  “I know.”

  “You…know?”

  “I know what you did. I know Gina put you up to it. And I know that, at the time, you thought you were doing the right thing.”

  “Thank you, Nancy. I’m very sorry.”

  “Good luck with Gina.”

  We leave the Center and head back to the shop. Anastasia doesn’t shut up the entire trip. Apparently my great plan to convince her that magic was fake didn’t work. She’s just more convinced.

  “So, like, if somebody was really possessed, like for real possessed, they would be dehydrated a lot, right? So, what would you do then?”

  “Give them Gatorade,” says Houston.

  “Don’t encourage her,” I say.

  “But what would you have done if she was really for real possessed by a demon?”

  “Not taken you with me.”

  “No, you have to take me if there is a real for real possession!”

  “I think that would be a great idea,” says Houston. “She could distract the demon while you bound it by just talking to it.”

  “Don’t encourage her.”

  The New Normal

  August 15th

  “Where do you find these men?” asks my friend Janice.

  “They fall from the sky,” I reply. “You just have to be in the right place at the right time.”

  I’ve spent the last ten minutes trying to chase Janice into the shop so that Houston and Lee can work in peace. I bought a new sign for the shop. The lights in the old one were flickering too much and, at least according to Anastasia and her mother’s marketing seminars, the sign was dated. And Houston assured me he could save me money on the installation by doing it himself. Every time he or Lee shouts “whoa!” or “crap” I regret agreeing to this.

  Janice continues to watch the men work. “So who is the new guy?”

  “He works for Houston’s uncle. He’s just helping with the install.”

  “Is he single?”

  “Inside! Now!”

  “You have Houston. Let me have this one.”

  “I don’t have Houston. Houston is an employee.”

  “A sexy, live-in employee.”

  “I swear sometimes I think you’ve never seen a man.”

  “Damnit!” shouts Houston. He almost loses his footing but managed to not plummet to the sidewalk.

  “Shouldn’t you be wearing a harness or something?” I ask.

  “Too hot for that,” he shouts down.

  “It’s also too hot to have to rush you to the emergency room!”

  “We’re good, boss. We’re almost done. Just have to finish the wiring.”

  A screwdriver escapes Lee’s grasp and rolls off the roof.

  “Lee, are you alright?”

  “I’m fine, Mistress.”

  “Mistress?” says Janice. She leans toward me and semi-whispers, “You got a little Fifty Shades action going on? Is that what the harness is really for?”

  “Mrs! He meant Mrs!” I give Lee a stern look. “And it’s MS Werlock, Lee. Not Mrs.”

  “It sounded like he said mistress to me.”

  “You should have your hearing checked.” I grab Janice by the arm and lead her into the shop.

  “Hi, Ms. Medley!” says Anastasia as we enter. “I’ll have your stuff boxed up in a minute.” She finishes waiting on a customer and then resumes packaging up Janice’s order.

  “Look at you, with your employees and contractors and all that,” says Janice as we go into my office. “Must be nice to have money.”

  “Oh yes. Me and my hidden fortune. Just have to decide if I want to hide it all in the Caymans or Switzerland.”

  “Caymans have cabana boys. But then again you don’t need any because you have shirtless studs working on your roof.”

  “You are horrible.”

  “So, seriously, you and that Lee guy?”

  “There is nothing going on.”

  “And…why not? He’s attractive. He’s gainfully employed. He’s single. He is single, right?”

  “Yes. He doesn’t have time for a relationship. He helps take care of his mother.”

  “And he’s a good son! See. Why are you not trying to hook up with that?”

  You mean besides the fact that he is my demonic Servitor? I think. “It’s complicated.”

  “Is he gay?”

  “No! He’s not gay. He’s just had a lot of problems in his life that he needs to work through and I am not talking about his personal business with you anymore.”

  “You just seem to know a lot about this guy for someone you’re not in a relationship with. And you aren’t fooling me, by the way. He called you mistress.”

  She is just not going to let up. “Okay, we…went to the movies a couple of times. Nothing serious. And I would appreciate it if you could try to refrain from acting like you are in heat around both him and Houston? Please?”

  “That sounds like it isn’t serious yet but maybe…”

  No. No maybe. It…we’re just friends.”

  “Alright. If you say so.”

  Anastasia comes into the office with Janice’s order boxed up. After they leave, I put my head down on the desk. I’ve been trying very hard to not be Lee’s master. It wasn’t even my idea to have him help Houston with the sign. Houston asked him. I’ve told him just to go about his business. That I wasn’t going to order him around or make demands. I didn’t want a Servitor. This was all the Vice-Chancellor and Archmage’s bright idea to resolve the free-roaming lemure problem. And it isn’t like I don’t realize the risk of having continued to allow him to just wander freely. Skinwalkers can do a lot of damage if left unchecked.

  The thing is, I know he could have killed me. He could have killed both me and Houston. I’ve been over and over the binding. Lee was holding back because he had a pact with Houston. But he didn’t really need the pact to begin with. I was not ready to face him if he had gone all out to resist me. The Binding Circle was flawless, but he deliberately missed with the pitchfork. I walked through the barn later. Houston had been pretty sloppy about securing anything dangerous. I guess he had assumed he had a pact with Lee and therefore didn’t have to worry. But I have every reason to believe Lee could have brought the roof down on us if he had wanted to.

  But he didn’t. He let me bind him.

  Maybe it was a strategic decision. He knew there was a Justicar in the area and if he had killed us it would have made him a high priority. What are thirty or forty years of servitude when you have a “get out of jail free” card waiting for you when I die?

  He came over the other day with two tickets to see Elysium. He said he wanted to thank me for getting him the job with Houston’s uncle. That was really more Houston than me. He remembered that I had said the trailer looked good. I’ve always been a fan of Jodi Foster. He remembered an off-he-cuff comment and bought tickets.

  He didn’t kill me. Instead, he takes me to the movies.

  “All done!” says Houston triumphantly as he comes in the office. “And nobody died!”

 
“Not yet, anyway,” I say as I look up. “We’ll see what happens when the first major storm comes through and the sign gets blown off the roof.”

  “You wound me, Nancy.”

  “Is there anything else I can do for you, Mistress?” asks Lee.

  “Houston, could you give us a few minutes?” Houston backs out of the office and closes the door. “Lee, please stop calling me that. Particularly around other people.”

  “I’m sorry. I’m just showing respect.”

  “I know. I know. But it isn’t appropriate. ‘Mistress’ doesn’t have the same meaning to normal people as it has to us. Janice thinks I’m a dominatrix now.”

  “I don’t see the problem.”

  “That’s not funny.”

  “I didn’t mean to be insulting. I just meant that, whatever you chose to do with me is your right.”

  “Lee, you aren’t my slave.”

  “I am your Servitor. I’m compelled to obey. And no, I’m not complaining. I can think of worse fates. I’ve experienced a few in my time.”

  “Lee, back at the barn—”

  “I’m compelled to answer you honestly. Might I suggest not asking a question you really don’t want the answer to?”

  “Just do me a favor and don’t call me Mistress in public.”

  “It’s acceptable then that I continue to do so in private?” The corner of his mouth curls into an adorable, wicked grin.

  “If…it pleases you, sure.”

  “In that case, Mistress, I’ll be heading home.”

  * * *

  “Yellow envelope. That can only mean one thing?” I say as Houston waves the envelope in the air.

  “Weird they sent it to the house and not the shop, isn’t it?”

  “Probably some passive-aggressive reason for it. Nobody in the Colleges of High Magic would send formal correspondence to the home through the U.S. Post Office. Open it up. I’m sure it’s an approval.”

  He opens the envelope. “Surprise! It’s an approval!”

  I offer an exaggerated gasp of false shock. “Is there a date or location or anything?”

  “No, their form looks completely different from ours.” He hands me the form.

  “And people wonder why traditionalists still roll their eyes at the so-called Colleges of Advanced Studies.” Houston’s Rank Five Trials approval from the College of Evocation included a formal letter from the Chancellor, a formal letter from the Magus of the School of Demonology, a brochure that included a checklist of responsibilities and privileges for Rank Five members, a safety handbook, and a study guide. All Houston got from the College of Psionics is a form letter confirming his application and approval and a postcard-size announcement about a mixer for new applicants for next Thursday. “Looks like they don’t do a paper test for their Rank Five trials. You’ll have to give a demonstration of your powers.”

  “That sounds simple enough.”

  “I’m sure they will make you jump through hoops.”

  “I don’t know. The few people from the College of Psionics I talked to on WitchNet seem pretty mellow. I don’t think they have nearly the structure or rigidity of the Evocation College.”

  “Making friends already? Plan on leaving me?”

  “Never, my Great and Powerful Mistress of Demons.”

  “Don’t you start now.” I head toward the kitchen to start dinner.

  Houston follows me and grabs a Powerade from the fridge. “So, Lee. Turned out to be a pretty nice guy.”

  “He’s a lemure and a skinwalker,” I reply.

  “Still seems like a good guy.”

  I slam my hand against the countertop. “Houston, you’re stunt could have gotten us both killed.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “What, exactly, are the terms of your pact with Lee?”

  “I already told you.”

  “No, the exact verbiage.”

  “In exchange for his freedom, he agrees to follow the laws of society and not use his demonic abilities to gain an unfair advantage over mortals or witches.”

  “And?”

  “And what?”

  “I’m waiting for the part where he agreed to let me bind him as part of the pact.”

  “That wasn’t officially part of the pact because then that would have brought you into our pact, which would have required that he admit that when asked.”

  “Exactly.”

  “What?”

  “For whatever reason, he decided not to kill us. He could have. You left him all sorts of weapons to use. He could have easily killed us both. And your pact had no power over him.”

  “He promised me—”

  “Demons lie! How do you think they lure people into pacts to begin with? A demon will say and do anything to get what it wants. He told you exactly what you wanted to hear, and you let your guard down and put us both in danger. Anything not part of the pact he isn’t compelled to follow.”

  “It worked out in the end.” He walks out of the kitchen.

  “Did you bother to specify which society?” I scream after him. He doesn’t answer. I go after him. “Did you define the word ‘unfair’?”

  “What are you talking about? He knows what the word means.”

  “He knows from a demonic perspective. Do you think the word has the same meaning to a demon as it does a human? By the gods, the word doesn’t even mean the same thing to you and me.”

  “Now you are being ridiculous.”

  “Was it fair when you astrally projected into my house and went through my mail?”

  “That was different. I needed help and—”

  “Exactly. It was fine from your end because you needed help. But it was not fine from the perspective of a woman living alone and having some strange guy invade my privacy! What is fair and unfair is relative to people. It doesn’t mean what you think it means. I’ve sat across the table from people who thought it was fair to have affairs because their spouses couldn’t fill their sexual needs. I’ve had people think it was fair to hide money from their spouses. I’ve dealt with people who thought it was fair to turn children against their own parents because the ends justify the means. Fair is not a word that is used in pacts because if humans can’t grasp it you can sure as hell guarantee a demon won’t.”

  Houston sits down on the sofa and wraps his arms around himself. “I’m sorry.”

  “I think the only reason he didn’t kill us is because he knows there are Justicars in the area. My lifespan is a drop in the bucket for him to wait. You gave him a free pass.”

  “I’m sorry. I just was thinking about that Gatekeeper and then the Vice-Chancellor’s Naga you told me about and I thought I was helping.”

  “The Naga is a Servitor bound to the office. Gatekeeper’s pact was negotiated over the course of five years and involved the school’s legal department.”

  “There is a legal department for pacts?”

  “Do you see now why this is a problem?”

  He lies across the sofa and puts an arm over his face. “Can it be fixed?”

  “Probably not without telling people what you did. Not without getting Legal involved. And not without getting Justicars involved. And they can’t get involved now with everything else going on.”

  “I screwed up.”

  “Yep. I’m going to go make dinner.”

  Behind the Curtain

  August 18th

  “Mi scusi, please. I look for Nancy Werlock? She is here, sì?”

  I hear the man talking to Anastasia as I come out of my office. He’s well-dressed but has a scruffy beard and a wild mess of salt-and-pepper hair that looks like it hasn’t been near a comb for over a year.

  “I’m Nancy,” I say.

  “Ah, bene! I am Tommaso Mortellaro. We can speak elsewhere, sì?” He hands me a business card written in Italian with the seal of the College of Divinities emblazoned on it.

  “Right this way.” I lead him into my office after telling Anastasia not to disturb us. “Th
eomancer Mortellaro, you’ve come a long way. How can I help you? Would you like something to drink?”

  “Grazie. You are as kind as you are beautiful. Your profile image does you no justice.” He takes a seat across from my desk. “Your Latin? It is better maybe than my English?”

  “We can speak Latin if it is easier for you,” I say in Latin.

  “It is a blessing to speak with one who appreciates the majesty of magic’s cradle tongue. I fear our Colleges are the only ones that still make Latin required for higher Rank.”

  For the College of Evocation, and Demonologists in particular, Latin is an essential language. So much of what we do requires exacting instructions that few would trust a modern translation of a tested ritual when dealing with otherworldly forces. Particularly when negotiating with demons because the last thing you want is to use a language where the meaning of words changes between generations.

  You know how they say English is a ‘living language’ and is constantly evolving? That’s not a good thing when trying to construct pacts that are designed to last for centuries. Do you know that in the 14th century, the word nice actually meant foolish or ignorant? Now imagine the modern Demonologist trying to understand a ritual that tells a demon “act not nice toward your master.” The word abandon once meant to subjugate. But telling a demon today that “I abandon you” is not going to have the affect the demonologist intends.

  The beauty of a ‘dead’ language: it stopped changing meanings when it died.

  And, of course, a side benefit of speaking Latin is that I don’t need to worry about Anastasia eavesdropping on the conversation between taking care of customers.

  “I will get to the point, Madame Warlock. We have been investigating the circumstances surrounding the death of Grande Madame Vivika Marchan for over a decade. Her reappearance as of late has caused some concern among our researchers. We thought she was dead.”

  “I’m confused, Theomancer. She is dead.”

  “I mean spiritually dead. Like her mother and her mother before her. There is no trace of them in the afterlife.”

  “I thought you’re people were researching possible ascension?”