No. I will not let you. They aren’t yours to play with. They aren’t mine to make over in my own image. They’re people-they belong to themselves, and what they choose to do is their own business, even if what they do makes me unhappy. Leave them alone. I do not give you permission to act in my name!
The power raged through her; she was flame, within and without, surrendering even her name. The only thing she clung to was that she would have her own way—what she wanted was what would happen, and anything that lived in her, or worked through her, would learn to understand that.
But it was a long hard fight.
WINTER AWOKE as dawn was coming in through the open curtains. She was lying on the floor of her hotel room. Her gray flannel skirt was rumpled and her pantyhose were run; every muscle was stiff and she felt sick and light-boned as if she’d been on the mother of all benders. When she sat up, a bolt of pain behind her eyes made her cry out in protest.
What was I drinking—furniture polish?
She managed to make it all the way to the bathroom before she threw up what was left of last night’s dinner, retching until her entire torso ached with the spasms and her throat felt raw and scoured. There were bruises on her forearms as if she’d been grappling with something—or, more likely, had banged into the hotel furniture while she was on the floor. The marks were black with angry red centers; severe and painful. Bruises that would take a long time to heal.
Bruises like the ones on Janelle’s arms.
Winter repressed a reflexive pang of hatred for Denny, letting it sweep away in the dawning realization of what she’d done. She’d gotten her own way. She’d won, even if it’d almost killed her. The serpent had not struck—all her instincts said so.
Before—in Glastonbury and at the Bidney Institute—she’d panicked and been too weak. Her unconscious mind had been able to seize control and throw its angry tantrum, acting out a rage that Winter could not fathom the source of. But now she was stronger. And she’d stay stronger—and be ready for it the next time it decided to coil up out of its lair.
A poltergeist, eh? Well, we’ll see who’s going to haunt whom!
She tried to stand then and found she couldn’t, no matter how great a victory she’d won the night before. On hands and knees Winter crawled out of the bathroom—ruining her clothes further—and dragged her purse down off the bed where she’d carelessly slung it. She dug through its considerable contents with dogged desperation until she found Tabitha Whitfield’s battered little pamphlet, tucked in between two fresh packets of Centering Tea. Slumped on the floor, holding her eyes open with an effort of will, Winter began at last to read.
HALF AN HOUR later, the raging hunger that hammered her body was so great that Winter realized it would be impossible to concentrate until she’d done something about it. Cudgeling her brains to remember what Truth and Dylan had said about first aid for psychics, she scrambled awkwardly over to the built-in bar. With a reckless disregard for the charges that would appear on her room bill later, she opened the small refrigerator and crammed her mouth full of chocolate, then slugged down a can of Coke Classic. The quick sugar fix cleared her brain; sipping a second Coke more slowly, she placed a call to Room Service—
“I’d like some waffles or pancakes or something—whatever’s fastest. Hot water for tea. And lots and lots and lots of maple syrup.”
—and then retreated to the bathroom to finish cleaning up.
Two more cans of Coke and a couple of candy bars later—the sugar seemed to vaporize as it hit her bloodstream—her breakfast arrived. Winter dumped Centering Tea into a carafe of hot water to steep, and tucked into scrambled eggs and French toast with a morning appetite she hadn’t felt in longer than she could remember.
As she ate, Winter read through the pamphlet a second time. The “centering” (centering what? Winter wondered) exercises started out very simply—timing and counting breaths—and then went on to what Tabitha called directed visualization. First Winter was to imagine a white square, and when she could do that, she was to go on to a blue circle. Finally, when she had also mastered holding the image of a red triangle in her mind’s eye without distraction, she was to attempt to see all three at once, superimposed one on the other, while she breathed slowly and regularly and sensed her body’s energy flowing in a regular circuit from the top of her head through the soles of her feet and back to the top of her head again.
Sounds loony, Winter declared, but at this point what have I got to lose?
She almost wished she could call the Institute and ask Truth’s opinion of the practice—she’d formed a stronger bond with the young researcher than she yet wanted to admit—but realized that to do that would simply be to entangle herself further with Truth Jourdemayne and Dylan Palmer. And this particular quest was something she had to accomplish alone.
Only, if the point is to outrun the thing that tried to kill Truth and seems to be fixated on me, I’m not doing a very good job of it. It seems to be here ahead of me, at Janelle’s house.
Everything Janelle had mentioned—the vandalism, the dead animals—pointed to the artificial Elemental rather than to Winter’s poltergeist, but Winter somehow felt she was being offered a stalking horse. As if, even if the creature were here before her, its true motive in tormenting Janelle was to force Winter to surrender to it.
Well, I won’t, Winter vowed simply. Now, who’s next on the list?
The next name that Nina Fowler had given her was Ramsey Miller, and Janelle had also mentioned being recently in touch with him. Winter took out the copy of the 1982 Taghkanic yearbook that she’d bought in Glastonbury and stared at the picture of a youthful Ramsey Miller wearing long sideburns and a soup-strainer mustache. His hair curled over the edge of his dark turtleneck in an oddly antique fashion. She wondered what he looked like now.
So Ramsey’s next, but do I really want to go on with this? Ramsey might be—oh, anything. I can call—I really ought to call today—but that won’t tell me what he’s going to be like. Janelle sounded all right on the phone yesterday, but then look what happened. What if he and Cassie—and even Grey, if I find him—are the same way? All … changed?
It would be a two- or three-day drive to Ramsey’s home in Dayton, Ohio—closer to four, Winter told herself with brutal frankness, if she considered how tired she was likely to get and how many stops she’d have to make along the way. She could drive to Newark Airport, though, and be in Ohio within a couple of hours by plane.
And if the plane’s electrical system blows on the way? Not that it was really likely—the serpent fed on her emotions, and, at least so far, it had never managed an appearance when she was completely calm. But while the need to reach Ramsey was imperative, now that she’d seen Janelle, Winter felt strangely reluctant to see what cruel tricks Time had played on her other college friends. A few days by car wouldn’t make a lot of difference, she told herself, and that way she’d still have her car with her when she arrived in Dayton and wouldn’t need to rent one.
As Janelle had said, places were different distances depending on who was going there. Winter thought that for her, the distance between Rappahoag, New Jersey, and Dayton, Ohio, would be short enough to drive.
BUT GOING ANYWHERE at all today would be foolish. Winter spent the morning in a hot bath—much to the annoyance of the maids, who wanted to turn out the room—and in the afternoon she called Janelle again. She had to be completely sure that something terrible hadn’t happened to her—or to Denny—last night.
“Hello?” Janelle’s voice was slurred and slow as she answered the phone, although it was well after one in the afternoon.
“Janelle?” A sudden pang of terror made everything go faint and cold. “Is Denny all right?”
“He’s at work,” Janelle said dully. “He’s fine.” There was a ghost of resentment in Janelle’s voice, and it was all too easy for Winter to imagine the reason her friend sounded that way. A sudden fierce prayer filled her heart.
Grey Angels
, whatever you are, come down from the Hudson and look into Denny’s heart. And Janelle’s, too. But make something right happen in her life … .
“It’s Winter, Jannie. How are you?”
“Oh … hi, Winter. I didn’t … I thought you had to get an early start?” Janelle’s voice was leaden, her interest forced.
“My plans changed. Look. We didn’t get a lot of chance to talk yesterday, why don’t I come out, and—”
“I’m busy.” There was life in Janelle’s voice now—life, and fear. “I’ve got a lot of things to do today, and—”
“Jannie!” Winter cried.
“Go away,” Janelle whispered. “Just—go away.” The line went dead.
WINTER STARED at the phone in her hand until the strident warble of the off-hook sound dragged her attention back to the present. Slowly she hung up the line.
There were people she could call about what was happening to Janelle, agencies she could notify. She could even call the police. But if Janelle refused to acknowledge what was going on, refused to admit what was happening, there was so little anyone could do for her. The transformation had to come from within. Winter couldn’t accomplish it for her.
Winter stared at the Taghkanic yearbook on the bed. It was open now to Janelle’s picture. She could still see the ghost of that girl in the woman she’d visited yesterday, but that girl had been fearless.
Or had seemed to be …
Winter turned the page in the yearbook, and looked at the smiling, dark-haired young man in the turtleneck and dark jacket. Time had not yet written its book on the pages of his face; it was an innocent face, lacking, in 1981 when the yearbook picture had been taken, the ingrained stamp of personality. Her flickering memories of Ramsey were all sunny, with never a cloud.
But how much had changed for him in fourteen years?
“Don’t give up now.”
The words and the tone were Grey’s, dredged up out of some sinkhole of traitorous memory. If she turned the page of the yearbook Winter could see his frozen image—but if she closed her eyes, she could see him leaning against the wall of the hotel room, wearing cowboy boots and blue jeans tighter than sin, arms crossed over a snugly fitting Taghkanic College T-shirt, regarding her mockingly through lowered lashes.
“Don’t give up now. Work yourself up to the verge of success and quit then. Be a big failure.”
She opened her eyes, but of course there was no one there. There never had been. The wisp of memory remained, however: Hunter Greyson, perverse overachiever. She turned to his page in the yearbook and stared at his portrait. The face that looked back at her was unfinished. So … young. Innocent in a way, although of course they’d all thought themselves the height of sophistication at the time.
Winter felt a faint smile tug at the corners of her mouth. She could feel the pull on the muscles with the unaccustomed use; she hadn’t had any reason to smile in a long time. But Grey had always had the knack for turning disaster inside out like a paper bag; things still were just as important, but somehow they managed not to hurt as much.
She could use a little of that knack now.
Where was Grey, and could she find him? With money and private detectives almost anyone could be unearthed from anywhere, from Elvis to your birth-mother, but private detectives took time—sometimes years—to find a person, and even though Winter had a lot of money and an investment portfolio that brought in a tidy sum each year, if she went on spending like Ivana Trump, there’d be a piper to be paid sometime. She closed the yearbook and slipped it into her suitcase again. Going on as she had been still seemed to be the best choice—at least until something changed.
Or until the creature stalking her lost its patience.
IT TOOK WINTER the rest of the afternoon to work up the nerve to call Ramsey. She’d dialed the number several times and hung up before the fourth ring, and in between she’d even called Cassie in Berkeley, although Cassie’s number just rang and rang until Winter had hung up in disgust. How could Cassie not be there when Winter was actually feeling brave enough to talk to her?
At 8:00—7:00 Ohio time—Ramsey finally picked up the phone.
“Hello?”
For a moment Winter sat paralyzed on the edge of the hotel bed, listening to the half-remembered voice across the miles.
“Hello?” Ramsey said again.
“Ramsey Miller?” Her voice was a dry croak.
“Who is this?” There was a thread of suspicion in the pleasant masculine tenor now, as if he might be about to hang up—and if he did, Winter wasn’t sure she had the courage to call him back.
“I don’t think you remember me; my name is Winter Musgrave; we went to school together? College?”
“Winter!” The warmth that filled his voice made her giddy with relief. “Of course I remember you—where are you? Are you in town?”
“I’m in New Jersey, Ramsey, but I was thinking of coming out to Dayton and seeing you, if that would be okay?”
She suddenly realized that she and Janelle had done almost no talking yesterday about their shared past and their college days—the one thing you’d expect old friends meeting after a long separation to do. Yesterday had challenged none of the blanks in Winter’s memory. She had to make sure things would be different with Ramsey.
“Okay? It’d be great! You’re calling at a good time; things are pretty quiet here—”
With a sinking heart she heard the change in Ramsey’s voice; the tension that meant there was something he didn’t want to say—something bad. Winter resolved to go anyway. At least I won’t find him being beaten by his husband. I hope.
“—so I can meet your plane. When is it coming in?” Ramsey finished, and Winter realized she’d lost a few sentences out of the conversation.
“I’m going to be driving, Ramsey; I’ve got a new car and I’m dying to break it in,” Winter said with spurious cheer. “Is there a good hotel in the area?”
In Ohio? a part of her mind asked in mocking disbelief.
“Hotel, nothing. You’re staying out at my place, and I don’t want to hear any arguments. Look, I’ll give you directions—”
There was nothing to do but accept gracefully, though Winter privately assured herself that she was more than capable of finding a hotel and checking into it before she met with Ramsey. For some reason it seemed important to have a secure line of retreat available, just as if Ramsey Miller had ever been capable of hurting anyone in his entire life.
But did she really remember what Ramsey had been like, or was this just another layer of smoke and mirrors?
They chatted for a few minutes more, with Ramsey giving her directions to his place from I-80, the interstate that had replaced old Route 66 as the preferred means of automobile travel from coast to coast. Winter promised to give him a call the day after tomorrow to let him know how far away she was, and after a few more half-empty pleasantries, Winter hung up.
She stared at the telephone pensively. Would meeting Ramsey again be of any more use to her than seeing Janelle had? There was no reason to do it, otherwise.
Then don’t do it, the inner serpent-voice suggested. Janelle’s a loser, Ramsey’s a loser—you’re the only one who played it smart, who got into the game. And you won big, too—don’t forget that. One look at you and good old Ramsey’s probably going to hit you up for a loan. He probably just wants to see you to ask you for money, anyway. Who needs the aggravation? Don’t go.
Winter rose to her feet and crossed the carpet. She’d drawn the curtains earlier, but now she pulled back both the printed room-darkening shade and the sheer liner to look out.
There wasn’t much to see; just New Jersey and a scrap of the New York skyline in the distance beckoning like the towers of Camelot. Winter spread her fingers against the glass, pushing gently at the cold slickness with her palms. The bridges connecting the two states, lit for night, looked like expensive diamond necklaces, so tiny that Winter could imagine lifting one up and clasping it about her throat,
there to burn like captive stars.
She could be home in her apartment in an hour. Chuck it all, get back to her life—maybe two weeks in Saint Barts to round things off, and then see if Arkham Miskatonic King was interested in hiring her back. Not this … shadowboxing.
The serpent-coils shifted beneath her skin, the serpent wondering if it had won.
No. Even if she surrendered to the serpent and let it take over her life once more, there would still be the other thing—the creature that Truth had summoned into her magic circle at the Bidney Institute, the thing that killed squirrels and rabbits and deer and left their bloodless corpses for Winter to find. The thing that Truth said was a magician’s servant, an artificial Elemental sent to seek Winter out.
Why?
It always came back to “why,” and the answer was hidden in the place Winter could not reach—her past. She could not stop now. She had to go on. If Ramsey kept in touch with Janelle, he might be in touch with Cassie—and Grey.
When it was that Winter had developed the notion that Grey could help her—never mind “would”—she wasn’t sure. Dr. Luty would have pegged it as wishful thinking, one more defense against personal responsibility. Make someone else a talisman, and you absolved yourself of all need to do anything yourself. In Dr. Luty’s cosmology, everyone was completely and personally responsible for everything that happened to them.
A comforting idea, but what if it’s wrong? Winter watched the cars crawl by like glowing insects on the streets below. What about all the times that it is wrong?
Still, the notion that she was only searching until she found somebody who could fix her life grated on Winter’s sense of fitness. She wasn’t doing that—was she? The poltergeist was her problem, and she was handling it herself, as was right.
But the other … to think she could handle the other alone was true madness.
Witchlight Page 16
