Spun by Sorcery

by Barbara Bretton

  Janice ignored the edge in Chloe’s voice. “I’ve made a decision,” she said, neatly placing her empty crab shell in the waste bowl next to her. “You’re not going to like it, but I’ve decided to stay here with Elspeth and Samuel until Sugar Maple . . .” Her words trailed off.

  “Stay here?” Chloe leaped to her feet. “Why in the world would you want to stay here?”

  I placed a warning hand on Chloe’s arm but she jerked away. Janice’s family was gone and they might not be coming back. Elspeth was her blood. There was a place for her here. It was something even a human could understand.

  Janice’s eyes flashed but somehow she maintained her cool. “Elspeth is the finest healer I’ve ever encountered. There’s a lot I can learn from her.”

  “And she can help me with Himself,” Elspeth said, jerking her bright yellow head in Samuel’s direction. “He requires a lot, he does. An extra pair of hands would go nicely around here.”

  I had the feeling there was nothing Elspeth couldn’t handle on her own. Her unexpected act of kindness toward Janice surprised the hell out of me. Then I caught the look of concern in her eyes as she looked at Samuel, who was drooping slightly in his captain’s chair, and remembered her words from before.

  Samuel had commented that clan leadership would pass to Chloe when he pierced the veil and Elspeth, in high dudgeon, had said: “Which he would have done by now if not for you, missy!”

  I suddenly realized she hadn’t been lying. Samuel was hanging on by sheer force of will. Only his determination to bring Chloe closer to her destiny was keeping him in this dimension.

  I looked over at Chloe. Did she know how close Samuel was to leaving this dimension? I wasn’t sure. I also wasn’t sure how much she would care. Right now only Sugar Maple mattered.

  We finished eating and Elspeth magicked the dishes away with a flick of her apron. She took up her post next to Samuel and practically dared any one of us to question her right to be there. None of us was that crazy.

  “I’ll need your help finding my car,” Chloe said to Samuel. “I think it’s still in the parking garage near the visitor center.”

  “You won’t need your car,” Samuel said. “I have arranged for other means of transportation.”

  Her eyes widened. “I thought you lacked the power to effect a long-distance transport.”

  “But I don’t lack the resources to patch together an alternative,” he said. “You will be safely and swiftly carried to your destination.”

  “Both of us?” I asked, just wanting to make sure.

  Chloe met my eyes. “You’re staying here.”

  “The hell I am. I’m going with you.”

  “That’s not happening.”

  “Nonnegotiable,” I said. “We’re in this together.”

  “Talk some sense into him,” she said to Samuel. “He’s mortal. He doesn’t stand a chance against an army of Fae.”

  “Chloe is right,” Samuel said. “Entering the battle would be an act of suicide.”

  I turned to Chloe. “Would you let me go into battle alone?”

  Her expression softened. “That’s different.”

  “How?”

  “You know how.” She lowered her voice. “I’m magick, Luke. I understand what we’re facing. I have the tools to fight it. They would mow you down in the first ten seconds.”

  “Then they mow me down,” I said. “We’re in this together.”

  She looked at Janice for help. “Say something, Jan. You know what we’re going to be up against.” But Janice shook her head and said nothing. “Damn it, Luke! I don’t want to see you die.”

  “Your courage is admirable,” Samuel said, “but foolhardy. Is there nothing we can do to sway you from your course?”

  “You could kill me,” I said, “but I’m not sure that would stop me.”

  Samuel considered me for a long moment. “You feel strong hatred toward the Fae?”

  I held his gaze. “I feel strong love toward Chloe.”

  “Then I will give you the tools to even the playing field.”

  Even I knew this was no time for macho crap about not wanting any help. I needed all the help I could get.

  “What kind of tools?” Chloe asked. She didn’t sound too thrilled.

  “Magick,” said Samuel. “That’s the only thing that will save him.”

  Holy shit. I was picturing a superhero costume like the guy wore in Iron Man.

  But the old man’s plans were bigger than that. He proposed to give me temporary powers that would enable me to not just survive the battle at hand but to help win it.

  “Twenty-four hours at most,” he said. “That’s all you will have.”

  “No problem,” I said. “That’s all the time we’ll need.”

  The old man and I both knew the battle would never get that far.

  CHLOE

  “Do something,” I begged Janice. “Luke doesn’t know what he’s getting into.”

  “He knows,” Janice said. “That’s why he took Samuel up on his offer.”

  “Cast some type of spell on him. There has to be some way to keep him here where he’ll be safe.”

  “He’s your human,” Janice said with a shake of her head. “Haven’t you learned anything about him? Even I know that nothing short of a bomb will keep him from you.”

  “Then drop a bomb. He can’t go back with me, Janice. Something terrible will happen.”

  Or maybe it was happening already. Samuel had warned me about this. I felt my focus shifting away from Sugar Maple and zeroing in on Luke, which was a surefire path to losing my hometown and everyone in it forever.

  “He’s a grown man,” Janice said. “He knows what he wants. Let him make his own choices, Chloe. It’s his life.”

  Samuel had bestowed twenty-four hours of magick on Luke and given him a crash course in how to use it. Luke was crouched next to Samuel’s chair, taking in everything the old man had to say as if his life depended on it.

  Twenty-four hours of magick and maybe ten minutes to learn how to use it.

  I didn’t like the odds.

  Elspeth handed me a small pouch of herbs that she guaranteed would keep me focused on the job at hand.

  I hugged Janice tight. “Watch Penny for me,” I said. “Don’t let her try to follow me.”

  “With all the lobster around here, she won’t even notice you’re gone.”

  “And take good care of the Buick.”

  “I was thinking about letting high tide take it out to sea.” She grinned even though her eyes brimmed with tears. “After I saved your stash.”

  It felt good to laugh. I had the feeling I wouldn’t be doing much of it in the near future.

  Elspeth was watching me with a little less hostility. “You young ones know nothing about the old magick,” she said. “Beware the expected: that is where the true danger lies.”

  “Elspeth speaks the truth,” Samuel said as we joined him and Luke. “Old magick relies on your most basic fears. They won’t hesitate to tap into your memories. Strive to empty your mind of all but the battle at hand. Don’t let them lead you astray or they will weaken and then destroy you.”

  The room fell into silence. What more was there to say?

  “So how do we get back to Sugar Maple?” Luke asked.

  Okay. There was that.

  “You have magick now,” Samuel said. “We’ll use astral transport.”

  We were going to battle New England Fae for control of a magickal town. Taking a puddle jumper out of Logan just didn’t cut it. I wasn’t about to tell Luke but the thought of being beamed from Salem to northern Vermont made driving on ice sound like a walk in the park.

  And, considering what was waiting for us, that was pretty funny.

  Finally we were ready to go.

  I hugged Janice, kissed the top of Penny’s head, returned Elspeth’s grave nod, then went eye to eye with the man who had been Aerynn’s mate.

  “You understand what is needed?” he asked.


  “I understand.”

  “Full commitment,” he reiterated. “Anything less and they will find a way to destroy you.”

  “You need to work on your motivational speeches,” I said. “That one makes me want to jump out the window and swim to shore.”

  “In your world, those remarks are considered witty.”

  I shrugged. “Snarky might be a better word.”

  “I know that they provide cover for your emotions.”

  “I’m not sure you know anything at all about me, Samuel,” I replied calmly. “But I appreciate the help you’ve given us.”

  I refused to acknowledge the quaver in my voice. The fact that this man was my blood filled me with the kind of sadness that lies beyond words. How different my life would have been if he had reached out to me ten or twenty years ago. But it was too late now.

  “I wish you good speed,” he said, touching my hand with his and for an instant my bitterness fell away and acknowledgment took its place.

  We are one, I thought as I met his eyes. I know that.

  And I will be with you always.

  I started to smile. “You’re better than a ventriloquist,” I said and, to my surprise, he laughed.

  Out loud.

  In a way that touched the human side of my heart.

  And then, just like that, we were gone.

  29

  LUKE

  Samuel’s baritone was still ringing in my ears as I landed headfirst in the notch of a snow-covered maple tree.

  Guess I had my answer to “Are we there yet?”

  “Luke!” Chloe’s voice sounded from somewhere nearby. “Where are you?”

  “Up a tree,” I hollered. “Where are you?”

  “In a snowdrift.”

  “Are you okay?”

  “Freezing,” she said. “I think we did it.”

  I righted myself and let myself down to the snow-cushioned ground. “You’re right,” I said. I knew exactly where we were.

  I spotted Chloe some twenty feet away as she muscled her way out of the snowdrift. I pushed my way through and met her halfway.

  “You look like hell,” she said with a small laugh.

  “You don’t look so great yourself,” I shot back, laughing with her.

  We had just traveled hundreds of miles in the span of a breath. The fact that we weren’t splattered globs of protoplasm seemed pretty amazing. Nothing broken, not even a tree branch.

  “He’s good,” she said, glancing around.

  “Pinpoint accuracy.”

  “He didn’t have enough power to do it himself.” Her voice broke unexpectedly and she coughed to cover it. “Elspeth told me he called in favors from friends in other dimensions.”

  “He gave me his powers, didn’t he?”

  “And more,” she said. “Otherwise you probably wouldn’t have made it through in one piece.”

  “Let’s hear it for magick powers.”

  “Last chance to change your mind,” she said. “Why don’t you use those magick powers of yours and go somewhere safe like Afghanistan or Iraq.”

  “Because I love you,” I said, “and I’m in this for keeps.”

  The look in her beautiful golden eyes said it all.

  There was no way we could lose.

  We were standing at the edge of the clearing where we had stood the night we battled Isadora at the waterfall. In the waning moonlight we looked at the dense forest that stood in the place Sugar Maple used to be. Except for the mountains of melting snow, nothing had changed.

  “I think it’s still there,” Chloe said, “but we won’t know for sure until we get through that memory foam barrier the Salem Fae set up.”

  “Any idea how we can do that?”

  She outlined a simple plan that had at least one or two chances in hell of working.

  According to Samuel, this was the first time the talisman had executed the fail-safe plan so there were no historical references to help determine where it had taken Sugar Maple. The old man’s best guess was that the town was still in the same physical location but in a different dimension of time. That theory explained a couple of questions that had been nagging at me: Janice’s time-delayed appearance in the Buick and the untouched, almost primeval look of the forest.

  “Don’t overthink it,” Chloe warned me. “That’s what always screws me up. Samuel said they’ll be using old magick.”

  “Which means what?” Old magic, new magic. The difference wasn’t clear to me.

  “New magick transported us from Salem to Sugar Maple. Old magick trapped me in an empty rest stop.”

  “I don’t get it.”

  “Old magick is more personal. It preys on your fears, so do whatever you can to keep your mind clear. Don’t give them anything to grab hold of.”

  “Shouldn’t be a problem. I’ll be too busy trying to keep from turning myself into a basset hound.”

  She smiled but I could see the nerves behind it. “Let your powers be an extension of yourself and your abilities. That way you won’t get into trouble.”

  “When this is over—,” I began.

  She pressed a swift kiss to my mouth. “—We’ll still be together.”

  We started across the field toward the forest that dominated the place where Sugar Maple once thrived. One step . . . two steps . . . on the third I was walking across the top of the melting snow, not sinking into it. A loud laugh of surprise and wonder broke free and echoed around us. Chloe, eyes dancing, motioned for me to take it down a few notches. But hell, how many times in your life do you get to levitate?

  Because that was what I was doing. I was walking on air at least three inches above the snow. The last time I felt this pumped I’d just taken down two perps in a home invasion sting. And let me tell you this was a hell of a lot better.

  I took bigger steps, faster and faster, sure that I could take off and fly if I wanted to.

  “Luke.” Chloe sounded a warning. “You’ve got to pull it back.”

  She was right. Too bad there was no time to enjoy it.

  We reached the stand of maples in a handful of seconds and this time we gained a foothold and began scaling the invisible wall. I’d expected a straight vertical climb but instead it felt gently curved, almost domelike.

  When we were about twenty feet off the ground Chloe stopped climbing. “No point going any higher,” she said.

  She took a long slow breath, repositioned herself, then let go with her right hand. She flexed her fingers twice then pointed toward a spot about five feet away and closed her eyes.

  At first I sensed rather than saw the heat. A faint hissing sound was followed by a spray of sparks spilling from her fingertips. I watched, impressed, as her eyes opened and she focused in on the spray, refining it, focusing it, until the sparks burst into flames worthy of an industrial-strength blowtorch.

  A hole the size of a half dollar appeared. A faintly sulfurous smell wafted toward me. Chloe’s concentration didn’t waver. The flames grew hotter. The hole grew wider and wider still until it could accommodate a grown man.

  Which was a damn good thing since a second later we were both sucked through it and plunged straight into hell.

  CHLOE

  Nothing prepared me for the darkness as the opening we had been pulled through closed behind us. Moonless nights fell hard in northern Vermont. Far away from big-city lights, the deep velvety blackness absorbed everything it touched.

  But this was different. This darkness had weight and dimension. The silence was profound.

  “Don’t move,” I warned Luke and he grunted his assent. We could be standing above a river of piranha or poised at the edge of a cliff. It was anybody’s guess.

  Seconds passed. I had hoped that our eyes would adjust to the intense darkness but no such luck.

  “Maybe we’re in a cave,” Luke said.

  My stomach clenched at the thought of bats. I instantly pushed the image out of my head. No point giving our opponents extra ammunition.
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  “We’re not in a cave,” I said with more certainty than I felt. “Caves smell cool and damp.”

  And this was anything but cool. In fact, it was getting downright steamy.

  I wasn’t getting a good feeling.

  And neither was Luke. “Can you burn another opening for us? I’m starting to feel like a burger on a grill.”

  I tried but nothing happened. “Damn,” I whispered as waves of heat closed around us. “Nothing’s happening.”

  I tried again. Still nothing.

  “Did you hear that?” Luke asked.

  “You mean that sloshing sound?”

  “And what about the stench?”

  I sniffed the superheated air. “Rotten eggs and tar.” And something darker, more malevolent.

  “Shit,” Luke said. “I’m burning up.”

  “So am I.” Sweat stung my eyes and poured down my back. “It must be one hundred twenty degrees in here.”

  “This is worse than Phoenix in July,” he said.

  I wouldn’t know. I had never been anywhere but Sugar Maple in July.

  I tried to burn us a way out but whatever firepower I had was dwarfed by the heat bouncing off the walls. Even the soles of my feet were starting to burn.

  Imagination is a powerful tool. Most of the time what you imagined was far more frightening than anything reality could dish up.

  Not this time.

  The walls surrounding us began to glow a faint orange and with the light the details came clear. We were standing on an outcropping of rock overlooking a bubbling, steaming pool of golden red molten lava that overflowed the sides of its enclosure and spilled down into the bowels of the earth. Every few seconds a huge plume of lava erupted from the center of that pool and scalded our faces with its unbearable heat as it shot up past us in a shower of multicolored sparks.

  This wild sea of lava stretched as far as the eye could see and was punctuated by more than a dozen boulders of varying sizes that had yet to vanish beneath the molten flood.

  “I’ve seen this on Discovery Channel,” Luke said. “We’re inside an active volcano.”

  Which we both knew was impossible because we would have been turned into toast within the first nanosecond.

  “This isn’t real,” I reminded both of us. “This is an illusion.” Old magick specialized in illusions.