Jade wanted to tell him to stop, that she didn't like it and to push him away, but she could feel it was working. Paris' power surged over hers, fanned outward and found the edges of her spell easily. He reeled in her magic like a ruler-bearing schoolteacher corralling a truant student. The force of his magic pulling her own power back towards them made her knees want to buckle, but at the same time, raised her up on her toes, curling her body toward him in a harsh arc. Her circle was like an invisible barrier between them. He could reach through it, but she could sense he couldn't actually cross into it, and it didn't seem like he could pull her out. Her feet simply refused to step forward, no matter how much she thought it might be a good idea.
Jade's magic was coming back to her, the wind on its back, bringing a shrill sucking sound to her ears. She winced at the pressure and pain, knowing her face must be contorting in an odd rictus, whereas Paris' remained still - his eyes burning bright blue and hard to look at directly. She turned her head away, needing to gasp at the swelling force in her chest as her magic funneled back into her. The pain wasn't excruciating, but Jade had a fear welling up inside her that if Paris continued, it would be. She wondered if this was how Matthew, the witch who tried to kill her, felt when Paris broke his magic. A sharp coil of fear tightened in her gut and without thought, she pushed her power back outward. There was a loud crack and she and Paris were thrown backward from each other.
She slid across the wet ground - grass scuffing up her hands and mud sliding down the back of her jeans. Jade swiped at the rain in her eyes and saw Paris about five feet away, similarly sprawled on the ground, panting a bit from exertion.
As Jade moved to roll over to push herself to her hands and feet, her body protested, all of her joints locking up. Her ribcage groaned in pain. She lay down on the ground blinking up at the cloudy, but rain free sky, her arms and legs akimbo, star-fished out around her.
"Are you all right?" Paris called out, and she could see him pushing himself to his feet. She gave him her best, 'are you fucking kidding me?' look, but then felt bad about the pained expression on face, so she managed a 'thumbs up' before her arm flopped back down in the mud with a 'thwack.'
Circle Casting 101. She was sure she either aced it or totally flunked out.
CHAPTER NINE
The ground was slick under Paris' feet as he picked his way carefully over to where Jade was stretched out on the ground.
Other than giving him the thumbs-up signal a moment ago, indicating she was okay, she hadn't moved. He stood over her and she squinted up at him. They were both soaking wet and he tried not to loom over her, both to not crowd her and to not drip on her.
"Can you not get up?" he asked, brow furrowing at her motionlessness.
"I'm just gonna..." she waved a hand haphazardly. "I need a minute."
"Are you certain you're all right?"
Jade nodded, closing her eyes for a moment. "Tired."
Paris didn't doubt it. He was quite relieved to see that she didn't seem to be suffering any other ill effects that he could see other than fatigue. She'd used quite a bit of magic and he wasn't sure she realized it.
When she'd started using too much power, when he'd touched her, he'd immediately felt the difference between her magic and his. While his had been getting more discordant over the last couple days, hers rang true and in that moment he felt his power shift back into proper tune with hers. He'd felt relief - like a long, lingering ache you'd gotten used to finally easing up. Her power had been different than what he'd been expecting. Paris had thought given Jade's proficiency with magic and with how powerful she was, that her power would be sharp and quick but it wasn't. He still felt Jade's power and her magic was intense, but also oddly muffled. Paris had the impression that it should be so much more than it was, but somehow, it didn't quite meet its potential. Looking down at Jade now, as she gathered her wits, he recalled how she'd seemed to burn herself out when using large quantities of magic. Dr. Gellar had said it was akin to running too much electricity through a circuit and Paris felt he better understood it now. He'd felt it when their magic merged. Jade's magic was strong, ready to be called forth, but somehow she wasn't quite in sync with it. Somehow, it wasn't as clear as it could be.
For all his feelings on her magic being muted, he'd still known in that moment, by instinct he supposed, that if he removed his hand from her arm, his power would fall back out of tune and be damaged like the rest of the Coven's magic. Paris had managed to channel his power along with Jade's, through Jade herself, and pull back the massive storm she'd created. He wasn't sure what she meant when she talked about her feelings toward water - Jade had seemed lost and very troubled by the element. Somehow her apprehension or problem with the element had led to her losing control of her spell work and she'd called far too much power and it needed to be reigned back in. He'd done the best he could, but when he pushed out one last little bit to call the last vestiges of her magic back and funnel it into her, something seemed to snap inside Jade and her power had lashed out at him, stronger than it ever had before. It pushed him away from her and threw her right out of her own circle.
Paris glanced around the clearing, at a loss for what to do while Jade gathered herself. His eyes narrowed and he turned in a circle slowly. Every tree surrounding the clearing had a scorch mark etched horizontally across the trunk, a remnant from the power Jade exerted pushing him back.
"Okay, I'm getting up," Jade said with a groan, pulling Paris' attention from the trees. She sat up and then pushed herself slowly to her feet. He hovered somewhat uselessly while she righted herself. He wanted to reach out and assist her, but had realized early on that she was quite sensitive to being touched and having her space invaded. Paris tried to maintain a discrete distance as she got up and wobbled for a moment.
"Still all right?"
Jade pushed back some errant strands that had loosened themselves from her ponytail and nodded slowly. "Yeah." She looked up to the sky, taking in the grey overcast clouds. It wasn't raining, but it wasn't sunny either.
"Still cloudy," she said, looking back at him with a question in her eyes.
"You pushed me back before I was done."
She grimaced slightly. "Oops." She made another face - comically twisted and disgusted and then turned slightly at the waist. "Oh yuck, there's mud all down my pants. I hate nature."
Paris huffed at her tone. "I know a spell that could clean you off and dry you as well, but I dare not use any magic while I'm still affected by the problems of the Coven. Unless I filter it through you."
She took a step backward quickly, holding up a hand. "Uh, no thanks. It's just some mud and water. I'm okay."
He frowned at her immediate reluctance. "Was it unpleasant? Did it hurt you?"
Jade shuffled awkwardly on her feet and he took that to mean 'yes,' but she didn't want to say. "Um. Kinda? Not at first. It was like... You know when your funny bone gets hit, it's not quite pain, but you really don't like it? Or when your foot falls asleep and then wakes up?" Jade waited for him to nod before she continued. "It was sort of like that. It didn't hurt really, but I didn't like it." She shook her head distastefully.
"I apologize. I didn't realize it would feel like that."
"S'okay," she said with a shrug. "My water spell got away from me and you were trying to clean up my mess. I get it."
Paris nodded for lack of anything to say. Jade shivered slightly and he realized she must be cold. "Well," he said finally. "We should head back. I'm sure you're cold."
She smirked. "If the next words out of your mouth are 'let's get you out of those wet things...'" she said, tone teasing. She stepped past him, heading back the way they came.
She teetered a bit on her feet, but managed a steady pace, seeming to know the way back without him leading her. He could see the mud, sloppy on her back, trailing down into her jeans and he winced in sympathy both for her and for his car, which would be covered as soon as they both got in.
Life with
out magic was certainly messy.
"Jade," he began as he followed her down the pathway. "What did you mean? You said the water wanted you to belong to it."
Paris could see her shoulders stiffen, the wingspan of her scapula tightening.
"I don't know. It was just a dumb feeling."
He got the impression from her posture it was anything but. He paused and then switched to another thing she said that caught his attention. "What about the sound that didn't belong?"
Jade stopped in front of him and he worried that he'd pushed too far and she was going to snap at him. Instead, she just looked pensive and thoughtful.
"I don't know," she said, but unlike a moment ago when she used the words to push him away, this time he could see she was honestly considering his question. "You know how power hums? Like Callie said she could hear me humming when we first met and I could hear the same thing with you."
Paris nodded, giving her time to think, to continue.
"I hear that with some witches. Not everyone and not all the time. I hear you most of the time. I guess because you're powerful, or maybe 'cause you're Coven Leader. Sometimes if Callie or Henri is using magic I can hear them too. But out there," she gestured with her hand to the expanse of the forest, "I could hear something the same, but not. Like it should have been the same but it wasn't." She frowned and he could tell she was struggling with her words. "I don't know."
"Was it the lake area? As I said, many witches feel something amiss there. It wouldn't just be you."
Jade started shaking her head before he was done talking. "No. That was... It wasn't that." She seemed resolute that the two things were separate and he wanted to press her more on the lake only because she seemed so reluctant to discuss it and that troubled him.
She pursed her lips. "I thought if I could just get closer to it, the weird hum," she clarified, "I could figure it out. But then everything else just went to shit."
Paris barked out a sharp laugh before could stop himself at the rawness in her tone. She had been so thoughtful in her words, so careful about choosing them and then it just unraveled. He supposed she was right, it had all just gone to shit.
Jade shrugged and then started on back down the path and Paris gathered their conversation was over. She was silent the rest of the walk down, the only sound the squelching of their feet in their shoes.
The woods got drier the closer they got to the car and Paris wished he could say the same for Jade and himself. By the time they reached the car, a chill had settled into his bones and he was sorely missing his magic. Jade didn't complain about being cold, but he knew she must be from her pale skin and tightly pressed lips. The heater only blew cold air while the car warmed up and they were well on their way back to the Coven by the time it produced air hot enough to warm them. Jade flipped all the vents on her side of the car toward her, pressing her fingertips, white and stark, against the grills, trying to warm her hands up.
"What a bust."
"I wouldn't say that entirely," Paris replied. "You may have found us something about the Coven's magic problem. I'm going to see what Hannah thinks. Would you be amenable to coming back out?"
Jade paused for a moment and he spared a glance her way. She was worrying her bottom lip between her teeth, still pressing her fingers tightly to the slats of the vents. "We can skip the lake part, right?"
Paris made a note to ask Hannah about that as well. While some witches got a bad feeling about the area, Jade's reaction seemed stronger than most.
"I see no reason why we can't avoid it. Was the strange feeling you got from there?"
"Not the weird hum, no."
"Then it shouldn't be a problem."
Jade made a sort of 'hmph' sound and then rubbed her hands together briskly, probably to warm them. "Ugh, I'm cold, I'm wet, and there's mud in my underwear, which is probably too much information, but it's so hideous it needs to be shared so we both feel as uncomfortable as I do."
"Well, it didn't go exactly as I hoped, but still, it wasn't a total loss."
"Yeah." She stared out the window, her face turned away from him as he drove. He thought about perhaps engaging her in a discussion, but found he couldn't think of anything to say that didn't sound inane or ridiculous. Though they weren't having a conversation, when he finally pulled the car up in front of her little cottage, he was still reluctant to let her go.
She was already tugging on the handle and stepping out before he could think of anything.
"Jade," he started quickly, leaning over to ward the passenger side. She was already out of the car and had to bend over to look back in at him.
"What?"
"You did well today. Despite the way it all turned out."
"Uh, thanks." She said it like she wasn't really sure why he was telling her that, but was grateful nonetheless.
"But you do need to work on your control." Paris winced at his words, not sure why he couldn't have just let sleeping dogs lie.
Jade crinkled her nose at him. "Way to ruin the moment, English." She rolled her eyes at him and he got the sense she wasn't really angry or upset, just amused by him. She closed the car door, tapping twice on the roof by way of goodbye. She didn't turn around as she made her way up the steps of her front walk and then inside, shutting the door firmly behind her. It was only when the car transmission cycled down, changing the white background noise that he realized he'd been sitting there staring at her door long after she'd gone in.
#
Jade left little bits of mud as she walked into her cottage and she contemplated taking off her pants in the hallway before heading upstairs, but figured it would just make more of a mess. She trudged up the stairs carefully, doing a strange sort of shuffle where she was trying to move fast and at the same time not trying to move much of her body.
Bruce was at the top of the stairs, his lizard eyes shining in the light, judging her.
"Hey, I found you in a sewer. Lizards that live in glass houses should get undressed in the dark."
Her metaphor didn't even make sense to herself and Bruce's long pink tongue came out, like he was using it to scent the air around her. It made its customary 'pffftt' sound and then he waddled away, back into her room.
"Drama queen," she muttered.
Getting undressed in the shower was the best idea she could come up with and she used the opportunity to rinse most of the mud out of her jeans. Twenty minutes later the wet clothes were in the hamper and she was in warm, dry yoga pants and a hoodie, padding downstairs. She used her wet top to clean up stray bits of mud before tossing the whole lot in the washing machine. Bruce toddled along behind her, his sharp, long claws ticky-tacking on the floor.
With the machine started, she turned to face him, hands on her hips. "Right. Coffee time." He blinked at her with owlish eyes, flapping his Elizabethan lizard collar once. "You want some? Maybe in a saucer?" she asked as he followed her to the kitchen.
"Possum."
Jade stopped short at Seth's drawl, Bruce hissing loudly at her feet. Seth was leaning against the jamb of her pantry, feigning casualness. Bruce trotted over, Elizabethan collar fully up and flared out, like a fan. She supposed it was the equivalent of his hackles being up.
"Ugh." Jade tossed her head back and rolled her eyes a bit at Seth. "Seriously creepy. Are you just hanging out in there waiting for me to show up?" She stalked over to the coffee machine and started brewing a pot.
Seth sighed. "Oh, possum. Time was you were deliciously afraid of me. I miss the good old days." He took a deep sniff and then looked at her pointedly. "Oh good, it's still there. You do well at hiding the look of it, but fear has its own perfume."
Jade tried not to let her spine stiffen too much. She wasn't stupid enough to not be afraid of him, but dammit. She was tired and she still had a strange unsettled feeling in her gut from being out in the forest. The combination of the weird sound she'd tried to chase and the sick tugging feeling she felt from the lake sat in her stomach like a ball of wet yarn
- cold, clammy and gross.
"Maybe I would be more afraid of you if you didn't show up so much."
"Touché, possum, touché. Always the most clever of my witches. I came by to see how you were fairing."
"With what?" Although she wished she could do it, she simply couldn't bring herself to turn her back on him even as she made her coffee. It would certainly prove to him that she wasn't afraid, but the truth was, she was afraid. Turning her back on Seth would be like lying down next to a lion and saying, 'nice kitty, here you go!'.
"I believe I mentioned the last time I was here that there's trickery afoot."
"Yep." Jade leaned against the counter, crossing her arms over her chest.
Seth smiled, his teeth shiny and white. "That's what I love about you, possum. You're quite adept at this back and forth. You'd be amazed at how people often spill their guts at only a few words from me, but not you." He winked at her, his dark eyes glinting. "Bare minimum."
He narrowed his eyes a little and leaned forward slightly, as though daring her to speak a little more. Jade had to admit, it was tempting to ask him questions or just give out information so he would leave quicker. She took a fortifying breath and focused on the sound of the coffee dripping into the pot behind her. Lowly, so quiet she almost didn't hear it, Bruce was making a deep rumbling sound. Lizard growl, she supposed.
Counter-Hex (Covencraft Book 2) Page 16
