“Shut up!” I heard Jeremy’s scream rip through the odd calm of the ocean and turned to see him hovering in the air about fifteen feet away from us, holding Jimmy in the air in front of him by the front of his shirt. “Just shut the hell up!” Jeremy screamed again. “You have to listen to me now! You arrogant, spoiled brat!” He spit in Jimmy’s face then and shook him violently. “Daddy’s perfect little prince. Star athlete, handsome, chip off the fucking block, aren’t you!” Jeremy screamed again and shook Jimmy roughly. “Let’s see how well you throw a baseball without your pitching arm!”
I watched in horror as he tossed Jimmy into the air like a rag doll and caught him by his right hand. Jimmy screamed as I’m sure Jeremy nearly ripped his arm out of the socket. My stomach churned as he pulled at Jimmy’s arm and grabbed it with his other hand just at the elbow, holding it at a right angle and brought all of his weight down on it with his knee and, even over the sound of the ocean, I heard it break in a sickening crack.
Jimmy screamed long and loud, drowning out Jeremy’s laughter as he tossed Jimmy in the air again and caught him around both upper arms. A look came over Jeremy’s face that contorted his features into something so ugly, so evil he didn’t even look like himself anymore. He nodded, as if answering someone we couldn’t hear, but I knew Jimmy was only crying in pain and not speaking. Jeremy’s left hand convulsed around Jimmy’s upper right arm and, with another loud crack, Jimmy screamed afresh in agony and Jeremy simply let him go, dropping him to the water below. “Can’t be daddy’s perfect little prince if you’re dead,” Jeremy said, softer than he had said anything else and was just suddenly gone.
I came back to myself in the hospital room, my hand still resting gently on Jimmy’s shoulder. Jimmy’s eyes were still unfocused and distant, not yet out of the trance. I leaned in close to his face and whispered, “You will forget this.” Jimmy nodded slowly. “Sleep now, Jimmy, sleep and wake feeling calm and rested.” I pushed calm, soothing emotions over him with my words, waiting until his slow blinks stopped and he drifted off to sleep before I broke contact with him and stepped away.
Once outside, I told Jodi and Steven what I had seen with Jimmy and, more importantly, that I didn’t know where Jeremy had gone off to, but at least we knew why we couldn’t find him again last night. We knew why he had gone after Jimmy and that he really was trying to kill him. Seventeen years of competition and jealously festering away at his self-esteem had borne a hatred that was nearly uncontrollable. Now we just had to get to Jeremy before he got to his father.
Chapter 13
In another ten minutes, I was pulling the car into a parking space outside of Nancy’s shop and hurrying inside. Deb was manning the front counter as usual and the handful of customers that came and went throughout the day were milling around the newly installed shelves, browsing the merchandise. I was glad to see Nancy had gone with wood shelving, giving up the extra glitter of glass for safety’s sake this time.
“Hey kids,” Deb said brightly, smiling with her whole face when she saw us come through the door.
“Hey, Deb, you got a sec?” I asked, lowering my voice so the nearby customers wouldn’t hear me. Deb furrowed her brow at me for a moment and then seemed to look past me, but not at anyone else and I felt a small pressure start just around my shoulders and I realized Deb was reading my aura, a trick she liked to use when assessing a situation. She nodded and beckoned over the part-time helper Tony to come around and take her place. She led us to the back room, closing the door behind us after turning the sign on the outside over to let people know a session was in progress and we were not to be disturbed.
“Okay, spill it,” Deb said without preamble and I did. We each took turns detailing the events of the last few days of Jeremy’s erratic behavior, trying to take extra time explaining the non-faerie creatures he had helping him and what I had seen in the memory Jimmy had shown me. Through it all Deb’s face remained calm, concerned, definitely, but calm, as if she wasn’t hearing the same bizarre story we were telling her. Once I finished my part of the tale, she stayed quiet for a few more moments, staring at me as if she expected me to continue.
“Well?” I finally said, breaking under the pressure of her stare and silence.
“Well what?” Deb asked and I nearly fell back with shock.
“‘Well what?’ Are you kidding, what do you mean, ‘Well what’?” I asked, my voice rising and I didn’t have the emotion to spare to care about it.
“What do you want me to do about this?” Deb asked and I realized I heard a tone in her voice I’d never heard before, impatience.
“Deb, you feeling okay?” Jodi asked, stepping forward to get a closer look at Deb’s face.
“Of course I feel okay,” she said a little waspishly. “You know, other than the fact that I have three teenagers coming to me for help after they’ve realized they’ve gotten too big for their britches and probably have accomplished nothing more than making the situation more difficult for those of us with real abilities!” Deb nearly screamed the last, her voice continuing to rise and become more and more angry. We three shrank back as one away from her anger and this strange display of emotion. Deb was always the kind of person to never show anger or impatience. If anything truly upset her to the point to make her angry, she usually just resorted to tears. She didn’t cry because she was weak, she cried because she cared too much, and if something made her angry, you could almost hear her heart break.
“Whoa, what the hell is this?” Steven asked, his face was mask of confusion.
“Yeah, Deb, this isn’t like you,” Jodi said carefully.
“What’s not like me? Telling you guys the truth about yourselves? Telling you that you take advantage of me?” Deb was taking steps towards us, trying to push us up against the wall. Jodi and Steven complied with her physical demands, but I stayed my ground. I remembered our last lesson before everything started going to hell and reached inside myself for that bit of magic, finding it folded neatly like a flower at dusk and pulled it out of me and into the palm of my hand. “You think you’re the damn Three Musketeers and you can handle anything, so in you go, charging to the rescue only to screw things up!” I was unfolding the layers of magic, opening it and letting it uncurl from my hand, reaching out towards Deb. I saw it swirling through the air, reaching for her, sliding over her shields until I found a break in their usually impenetrable barrier and waited for the smell and taste of cloves to fill my mouth. It didn’t. There was nothing alive and electric about her power today. She was a live wire that had been grounded to be controlled.
“It’s not Deb,” I said calmly and carefully, despite the icy lump I felt forming in the bottom of my stomach.
“What?” Steven and Jodi asked in unison, turning their attention from her to me.
“Something’s wrong, like she’s possessed or under a spell.” As I said the last word, I felt the air in the room shift, just as it had when I had broken the glamour outside my tree house and I felt my lips curling into a smile. Deb’s usually serene face was contorting into something made of rage and just before I knew she was going to lunge, I was pushing away from the floor and throwing my body on hers. I heard Jodi cry out in surprise and somehow knew that Steven was turning to lock the door behind him before anyone could investigate the commotion in the room.
“What do we do?” Jodi asked, a little frantic. She’d come down on all fours, putting her face next to mine as I braced myself to keep Deb on the ground. She was thrashing about and trying to claw at me. I had to straddle her stomach and pin her arms to the ground by her wrists.
“Steven! Get her legs!” I yelled over Deb’s animalistic cries. She was bucking under me, trying to throw me off balance. I heard Steven grunt and lose his breath. Deb must have kicked him, but the bucking stopped and she was just squirming beneath me.
“Got ‘em!” Steven said with a little more effort than should have been necessary.
“Okay, Jodi, you need to find what’s wrong,
” I said through gritted teeth.
“What do you mean?” Jodi asked a little frantically.
“Find something! There’s either a charm on her or a mark or something supernatural attached to her. Find it so we can get rid of it!” I was yelling again because Deb was yelling louder and Tony was banging on the door outside, yelling to be let in or told what was going on.
“Everything’s fine!” Steven yelled over his shoulder at the door. “We’re doing a reading!” But Tony continued to bang and try to jiggle the door handle. Luckily Deb had the key to the door in her pocket, so Tony couldn’t let himself in. I was biting my lip to keep from clenching my jaw as I held Deb down. I felt like she was gaining strength, rather than losing it, as she continued to fight both me and Steven. Jodi was scrambling around, checking Deb’s pockets, her necklace, her rings, bracelets.
“God, how much jewelry can one person wear!” Jodi’s cried in frustration. “I’m not even sure if I’m missing something or not!”
“Here, switch with me,” I said quickly, nodding my head towards Deb’s wrists. Jodi grabbed them under my hands, pressing her arms to the ground by her forearms and I slid off of Deb. She immediately started bucking away from the ground before Jodi could throw her leg over Deb’s torso. I didn’t wait for Jodi to get into position before I started looking over Deb’s trinkets and tattoos, recognizing them easier than Jodi or Steven ever would. Unfortunately, nothing as simple as a talisman or mark was out of place on her body. I even went so far as to tear off her shoes and check the bottoms of her feet, but there was nothing there to find. I swore under my breath and shook my head. “Okay, it’s something magical. I’m gonna have to find it and cleanse her.” I stood up and turned towards the door to open it.
“What are you doing?” Steven yelled, bracing his foot against the bottom of the door, holding it closed.
“I’m going to tell Tony to calm the hell down and get away from the damn door!” I yelled down at Steven, nudging his foot away as I turned the lock in the handle. Steven resisted moving his foot away for a moment, but finally let me open the door just a crack.
“What the hell is going on in there?” Tony asked, his voice quaking with fear, and he tried to look over my shoulder into the room, but I held the door pressed against me so he couldn’t see in.
“We’re doing a reading, it’s a little intense, but nonetheless private like any other reading, okay?” I said calmly and forcefully as I immediately started projecting towards him. I sent waves of reassurance into him and throughout the rest of the room, urging everyone to trust me; the people behind Tony nodded and went about their business, browsing the shelves. Tony stayed where he was, one hand still gripping the door handle, staring at me like he knew I was trying to do something to him. “Tony,” I said, pushing an extra wave of warmth over him and watched as his eyes closed for a moment against my reassurance. The smell of jasmine was suddenly strong and heady in the air between us.
“Everything is totally fine. Nothing is out of the ordinary in here,” I said, one more caress of reassurance and he began to nod in agreement with me, his eyes glazing over for a moment. “Good. Please try to keep people away from the door, okay?” I asked with a smile.
“Yeah, no problem, of course,” Tony said slowly, turning away from the door and telling the patrons who were no longer lingering by the door to please have some respect for other customers’ privacy. I shut the door and locked it again and traced my finger over the wood in a complicated pattern as I whispered an incantation to help bar the door and muffle any more sound from within. It wasn’t fool-proof, but, like the charm I put on the hospital room door, it should make people walk right by the door, forgetting their interest in it. I turned to find Jodi still straddling Deb’s stomach, one hand pinning her wrists to the floor and one hand clamped over her mouth to keep her from yelling while I was talking to Tony. Steven was lying across Deb’s legs, putting all of his weight on to them to keep her from bucking and kicking anymore.
“Okay, we need to bind her, I think,” I said, surveying the trio on the floor. Deb’s eyes went wide with shock for a brief moment before they narrowed, trying to pierce me with a glare I never wanted to see directed at me again.
“Is that necessary?” Steven asked, craning his neck to look at me.
“Yeah, I think so. We need to look for whatever is doing this to her and I don’t think she’s gonna sit still long enough for us to do it and I can’t do it with you two sitting on her.” I paused, thinking. “I mean, what if it’s on her back?”
“You’re probably right,” Jodi said as she moved her hand away from Deb’s mouth to get a better grip on her hands. Just as she uncovered Deb’s mouth, Deb started speaking in a language we didn’t recognize. I dropped to the floor and clamped my hand over Deb’s mouth as fast as I could move. I felt her trying to speak against my hand and a burning sensation began to sear the palm of my hand. I steeled myself and used my other hand to hold her chin to keep her mouth closed.
“Great!” I said angrily and thought furiously through my cache of spells in my memory, trying to remember a silencing spell, but for the life of me, I couldn’t remember one. The best I had was a sleep spell and I needed tea for that.
“What was that?” Steven asked, looking from Deb’s face to mine.
“I don’t know,” I said and I could hear the anger in my voice. “Nothing I want her to be able to finish. We’re just gonna have to do this a little more roughly than I would normally like.”
“Do what you have to do, Terra,” Jodi said and I could feel the fear intermingled with confidence radiating off of her and I took strength in that. I closed my eyes and concentrated on Deb’s aura, realizing now how thick and cold it felt, so poisoned that I felt it coating my hands where I touched her face. I pushed past the taste of bile in my mouth and opened the channel between us. Deb began struggling again full force against the three of us, but we were already tensed for her reaction and she was unable to throw us off. I began pushing healing, warm light, and love into her, flooding the dark, stagnate pollution that was poisoning her spirit and mind.
“Maiden, Mother, Crone, all three, from abuse Deborah is now free,” I whispered into the room, invoking The Fates to release Deb from the manipulation and back to her own course. “From pain and suffering Deborah is free, as I will it, so mote it be,” I began chanting the spell over and over again, louder and louder as Deb fought against us. Jodi and Steven joined me in the chant on the second time through, our three voices finding that practiced rhythm easily, intertwining until we sounded as though we spoke with one voice. I felt the ground start to tremble under me and the coffee cups on the counter by the teapot clinked together as they shook, the door rattled against the frame and Deb let out a howl of pain, muffled against my hand. We all held on, riding the wave of the spell breaking under our command, both Jodi and Steven had their eyes shut tight, trying to keep their concentration.
“By the power of three times three set her free, set her free,” I started the chant quickly, braced against Deb’s mouth. “By the power of three times three set her free, set her free.” Steven and Jodi started chanting with me again and the shaking grew in intensity, rocking the four of us on the ground and a small sprinkling of plaster broke from the ceiling, dusting us like powered sugar, but we never stopped the breaking spell. With one last violent shake, we were thrown forcefully away from Deb, knocking us into the walls and cabinets. Deb’s body shot up from the ground by three feet before she fell back with a thud, her eyes closed and her body limp, knocked out by the force of the banishing.
I got to my feet slowly, a little dizzy from the force of the spell, and walked over to the cabinet over the teapot and found some peppermint leaves. I crushed them to release the oil on to my fingers. I turned and knelt by Deb’s head and waved my fingers under her nose slowly, wafting the scent until she began to come to. Shaking her head slowly and her eyes fluttering open, she raised a hand to her head and moaned in pain. I nodd
ed towards Jodi and she jumped up and began making a tea to ease pain and settle a stomach, something Deb had made for us more than once.
We took Deb home after that, Steven driving her in her car following behind me and Jodi in my car. I’d called Nancy to let her know Deb wasn’t feeling well and had fainted during a reading so she couldn’t quibble about wanting Deb to finish out the day. The tea Jodi had made her helped to ease the headache and back ache she’d given herself when she fell to the floor, but she was still feeling the side effects of being casted on. I always laugh when I see those televised exorcisms and, when the miracle happens, the person is totally fine and ready to conquer the world, when in reality you’d be more ready to take a twelve hour nap after a half hour with your head hanging in the toilet.
We were sitting in Deb’s living room, giving her the time and space she needed to collect herself and change into pajamas. I don’t know what it is about the right set of pajamas, but after a hellish day, they can do wonders to make you feel better. I loved Deb’s living room; it was exactly what my living room would look like if I had access to the inventory at Nancy’s store. The furniture was all dark, rich earth tones and so overstuffed you felt like you were sitting on clouds. The tables were laden with crystals of all shapes, sizes, and colors; trinkets and magical tools scattered around them.
I had picked up an obsidian globe about the size of a softball and was rolling it around in my hands while we waited. Deb always encouraged people to pick up anything that called to them, knowing it was probably because they needed the help it offered. Obsidian was good for banishing and protecting against negative energies and the moment I took it in my hands, I felt lighter than I had all weekend.
Elemental Series Omnibus Edition Books 1-4 Page 45
