by Theda Vallee
“The trail leads here.” He pointed to a lone sticky note. All the other papers ended just under it.
I moved my eyes to where his finger pointed and saw it hovering over my name. I took a step back, a sliver of fear running through me. How could that be possible?
“Why?” I breathed out the word, barely able to look at him.
“Are you saying my sister has something to do with this? We’re back to that now?” Nerina said, raising her voice.
“What? No. Clara alluded to there being something we weren't seeing. I started going through all the victims one by one trying to figure out what we missed. I went through all the files again. I started putting these up and then I saw the pattern. It was like a damn neon light. How did we miss it?” He gestured at the wall wildly. “Each person ripples out in a circle around you, Etta. This is your fifth-grade teacher; Kayleigh is her granddaughter. This guy here, he’s your mailman. Every single one of these people can somehow be traced back to you. But obviously it’s not you. It’s a trail of breadcrumbs leading to you. Whoever did this wanted us to suspect you. They wanted this investigation to lead to you. I haven't figured why, but I’m certain that this was leading to you all along.”
I stood there, looking at all the names. In all the time I’d been working on this I’d never really stopped to read them. Holly Scott stood out like a beacon. She used to cut my hair until she had twins a few years ago. How had I stood in the hospital room not seeing her? Most of them would be easy to miss. I’d never met Mrs. Harrison’s granddaughter, so I would’ve had no idea who Kayleigh was. I was embarrassed to admit I had no idea we had the same mailman every day. But Holly? I should've seen her.
I knew how. I’d been so wrapped up in myself, and what was happening to me, I never really gave a shit about the people in a coma until it was my own family. Even after meeting Kayleigh, watching what had happened to her, I hadn’t been vested in really solving this. It was secondary to what I was going through.
Shame wrapped around my brain like a cloud blotting out the sun. People kept telling me I was a good person. Leander believed it. My sister believed it. Hell, even the creepy ass Clara thought there was a goodness in me that made me different from other strega. I wasn’t a good person. I was a survivalist. When things got hard I adapted to get through. Whether that meant shutting myself away from the world in the bakery or blocking out the possibility of people dying because I couldn't use my powers, I was able to believe whatever I needed to, to survive. I’d called Luc a coward, but I should’ve looked in the mirror.
“Luc, I usually follow you down any path you lead. This is a little hard to swallow though. I mean, why would someone do this just to get us to pay attention to Etta? I don’t see the point,” Brady asked.
Why would someone go through that much effort to hurt people around me? I’d never had enough contact with anyone to make enemies. I kept my head down and baked. Maybe someone had something against me because I was a witch? Who though? Everyone in the neighborhood came to us for help. We never turned anyone away. It didn't make sense.
“I don’t know. There’s no clear-cut motive that I can find. I’ll keep digging though.” Luc said, tracing his fingers along a trail of notes on the wall.
“So, is this a trap? Are we sending her off to something that is worse than we thought?” Brady asked, a hint of anger in his voice. “You’re just willing to risk it?”
“Do you think I’m just going to send the woman I love into a trap? You’ve known me my entire life. How could you think I’d do that? Especially to her.” He looked at Brady, his body tense with anger.
I held my breath, looking at my sister across the room. We had both stopped listening fully when he’d thrown out the L word. She shook her head, warning me to not say anything about it right now. I bit my tongue letting it go. For now. On top of my own steaming pile of self-revelation, I had to contend with a conspiracy against me, and my boss tossing around the word “love” after one night in the sack. Who would’ve known I’d be happy to have Charlotte knock on the door and drag me off for more training?
Chapter
25
For two days I worked like a dog. I barely ate or spoke to anyone. By the third day, I could drop into delta sleep within seconds of closing my eyes. I was able to bring myself up and out of it just as quick. Charlotte was a merciless taskmaster. She pushed me harder than anyone had my entire life. I equal parts hated and respected her for it.
At the end of the second day, I’d triumphantly walked into the dreamscape. My excitement had quickly dissipated as I looked out over the endless spiderweb of threads leading to the dreamers subconscious. Finding the right thread was a daunting task. There were no signs or markers. You had to rely on scent, sound, and feelings to know when you’d stumbled across the right path. I’d mastered dropping into the dreamscape but everything after that would be a guessing game.
Charlotte refused to let me enter anyone’s mind. It was too risky. I’d only been allowed to traverse the paths outside the dreams. We had no way of knowing if the succubus would show up. It would be disastrous to battle her before we had a plan. The only thing I knew about entering an actual dream, was to never skip the cycles when waking. If a person were to jump from delta to awake, it could disrupt the synapse sequences leading to cool things like aggression, insanity, and death. If I had to guess, there were a few Benandanti walking around that’d skipped that step.
More than anything we needed to figure out what we were going to do with my newly acquired skill. It’d been four days since we left home to find the Benandanti. There’d been no more reported victims. The ones in the hospital seemed to be at peace. Leander sent Nerina reports, and pictures of Nonna every few hours reassuring us he was fulfilling his oath. It was like being in the eye of a hurricane. You knew more was coming; it was just a matter of when.
“Cariad, come eat something. You’ve hardly touched anything in days. You’re going to waste away.” Luc sat on the bed next to me.
“It’ll take a lot longer than three days for me to waste away,” I said, snuggling down further under the blankets. One of the side effects of dropping in and out of the dreamscape was thundering headaches. Ibuprofen barely made a dent in the pain. Lying very still in a dark room seemed to be the only way to deal with them.
“Charlotte’s coming by soon to discuss leaving tomorrow. We have some ideas that we need to go over for drawing the succubus out. I know you don’t feel well but we need you for this.” He said rubbing my lower back tenderly.
“Fine. If I throw up, it’s your fault.”
“That’s my girl. I’ll meet you out there.”
I stumbled out to the living room in my drool coated tank top. My hair was a tangled thorn bush. I hadn’t showered since the first day of training. I wasn't here to look cute. If they wanted me to get out of bed this was what they were getting.
“You smell,” Nerina said, sitting next to me on the couch.
“Good.” I mumbled, keeping my eyes closed against the brightness of the room.
“Someone didn't come out of her cocoon as a happy butterfly. You’re more like a severely damaged moth with body odor. Do you want some soup my stinky little kitten?” Brady asked, stepping out of my smell radius.
“She needs to eat. Get her some soup, and a piece of that yummy garlic bread you made,” Nerina said to Brady.
“You’re not my mother,” I grumbled under my breath, but I still took the food that Brady brought over.
A curt knock startled me. Charlotte opened the door without waiting for a reply. Behind her trailed a man I’d seen guarding the door over the last few days. They both came into the room without being asked and sat down on the loveseat across from me.
“You know we could’ve been naked,” I snapped at her. My head made me hate the world at the moment.
“I live with people who turn into wolves. Nudity isn’t that exciting to me.” She crossed her legs primly. “Are we going to discuss detai
ls of our trip or what?”
Luc wheeled over a whiteboard that’d been hiding off to the side. It had boxes drawn on it, and in each box was Nerina’s neat handwriting. She’d been keeping busy helping Luc with whatever it was he’d been concocting over the last few days. After the first day of training, I’d kicked her out. There was no reason to have her breathing in the corner. I was glad Luc had found something to keep her occupied.
“The good news is, we know we’re hunting a succubus. The bad news is, succubi are powerful in their true forms. This one may be a little weaker if she’s residing in the physical world but, if someone has been summoning her from hell, she’ll be a lot stronger. Either way, they’re nearly impossible to kill. Our only hope is to banish her from this realm. That’s going to require us to know her true name,” Luc said.
“That leads to our plan. Phase one, Etta and the team will go into the dreamscape to find the succubus and learn her name,” Nerina said, pointing to the first box on the whiteboard. “To do that, we’ll create a black mirror and bind it with the spell to show someone’s true identity. We’ve confirmed with Charlotte that if you’re holding a physical item when you enter the dreamscape, it’ll come with you. However, the Benandanti can’t do spell work. They don’t have the mojo required. So, Etta will have to invoke it.”
“Once we have the succubus’ name we can do the summoning and banishment spells.” Luc pointed to the last three boxes.
“You needed a whiteboard and all those boxes to tell us that?” Brady yawned.
“When we wrote it out it seemed a lot more complicated,” Luc said, shoving the whiteboard to the side.
“Who’s going to do the spells?” I asked. “Are we bringing in some extra people for this?”
“I am,” Nerina said, refusing to look at me.
“Like hell you are!” I jumped up from the couch, my head pounding in time to the blood flow in my veins. “There’s way too much that could go wrong when you’re conjuring demons. No. This is not happening.”
“You don’t get to decide that for me. I know the spell. There will be two other spellcasters working with me. This is something I know how to do, Etta,” Nerina said calmly. “I held my own pretty well when we were attacked. I don’t have the magic you do, but I have some, and it’s useful.”
“Nerina, you did amazing, but this is beyond even what my magic should be dealing with. I can’t let you do this. I’m sorry,” I said, pleading with her to understand.
“This is my family too, and I’m doing this.” she said, her bottom lip trembling as she spoke.
“You’re going to let her do this? She’s not on the payroll. You have the authority to tell her no, so tell her no,” I said, appealing to Luc.
“We need her. None of the other spellcasters are familiar enough with the spell work needed for this. Your sister is actually one of the more talented casters I’ve seen,” Luc said. He walked over to me placing his arms on my shoulders. “I know this is hard. Nerina’s an adult. You don’t get to make this decision for her.”
If this had been a few weeks ago, he would’ve been magic slapped in the face. Lucky for him I’d learned how to keep my magic from reacting to my thoughts more often than not. Instead, I shrugged his hands off my shoulders and gave him a withering look.
“My sister and I will talk about this later, when we don’t have an audience.” I slammed myself back down onto the couch. So much for him being on my side. “So, what else do we need to know? Have we figured out if the succubus is doing this on her own, or if she is being commanded by someone?”
“We’re hoping we can bargain for that info. We couldn’t find a permanent banishment spell that had been tested successfully. The succubus doesn’t know that. We’ll offer her a hundred years banishment versus an eternity. Hopefully that’ll get her to talk,” Luc said, avoiding eye contact with me now.
“And what if she won’t talk?” Brady asked.
“The victims will be released from the coma once she’s gone. That’s our main goal. If we can’t get any more information, we keep the case open and we keep working it,” Luc replied.
“Do we have a plan on how we’re going to get the succubus to come out and play in dreamland?” I asked, leaning my head back as a sharp pain shot through my skull.
“We’ll need to draw her out into one of the victim’s heads. I think showing up with two Benandanti will be enough to taunt her into showing herself,” Charlotte said, finally joining the conversation.
“That sounds like it could be dangerous for whoever’s head we go into.” I hoped she was going to contradict me.
“There is a real possibility that the succubus could decide to teach us a lesson by harming that person,” Charlotte said grimly.
We had to choose someone’s head to do battle in. Even if the succubus didn’t torture them, who knew what kind of mindfuck having three people and a succubus duking it out inside your brain would be. How do you look at a room full of people and pick one to do that too?
“What about this one? He’s a fitness instructor. He’ll be strong and healthy,” Brady said, picking up a picture of a man in his late twenties. He had soft brown eyes that made him look gentle despite his ripped appearance.
“How the hell is a fitness instructor linked to Etta? She’s never even driven past a gym.” Nerina laughed at her own joke. “He’s her gynecologist’s son,” Luc said, his face twitching with restrained laughter.
“This isn’t funny. These are real people, and we have to fucking choose one. Show some respect please,” I said, trembling with rage. This was hard enough. I couldn’t deal with them making light of it.
“This one.” Charlotte threw a picture of a middle-aged woman on the table. Holly Scott. She had three kids. Someone had told her about my daughter being missing, and she’d always treated me with kid. Mother to mother, she knew the hole that I walked around with inside of me. For that alone I’d liked her, but she’d also been a damn good stylist.
“No. She has kids. We aren’t going to be responsible for taking someone’s mother from them.”
“That’s why she needs to be the one. I go into people’s heads for a living. Mothers survive. They have a strength comes from knowing you’re responsible for life. Birthing three children means she has a high tolerance for pain. She’s fit for having had three kids, which probably means she’s healthy. Everything we need in a candidate.” Charlotte said watching me closely for a reaction.
No one answered Charlotte. We all sat staring at the picture of Holly Scott. While I wanted to protest that women in general were strong, regardless of having had children or not, I understood her logic. A mother would fight for her life on a primal level, knowing her children needed her. It’d be hard to figure out who else in the group of victims might have those same instincts. It was almost a given with a mom. I stared at her picture, trying not to cry.
“It sounds logical. I’ll defer to Charlotte’s expertise on this subject and put my vote in for this candidate.” Luc was the first one to agree with Charlotte’s choice.
“Does anyone have any reason why we shouldn't pick her?” Brady asked looking around the room.
No one did.
“Holly Scott it is. Thank you for your input, Charlotte,” Luc said. “It sounds like we have a plan.”
It was not perfect by any means. Any plan that consisted of several unknowns and gaping holes was a recipe for disaster. Yet, it was the only shot we had. We needed to banish this soul stealing bitch back into the netherworld.
“The only question now is when we go?” Brady asked the question we all didn't want to ask.
“Should we travel home in the morning and then put the plan in motion tomorrow night? We can give ourselves the day to prepare. I don’t see the point in waiting.” Luc looked from person to person.
“Bastian and I will come along with you. We’ll be your escorts in the dreamscape when you go. We’ll stay no longer than a fortnight. If you haven’t successfully handled t
his within a fortnight, we'll leave, and you’ll be on your own. Understood?” Charlotte asked standing up. She was done with this conversation.
“I’ve had three days of training. I didn't get any training on combat in a brain. Shouldn't we have a little more practice before I go diving into this?” I asked the room.
“Are you going to make a career out of this?’ Charlotte sneered at me. “If not, you have enough training for this task.”
“Can someone tell me what the hell a fortnight is?” Nerina remarked.
“It’s a stupid way of saying two weeks,” I snapped. “No, Charlotte, this won’t be a career. I really hope this is the only time I ever have to go into the dreamscape. However, I’d like to survive the ordeal.”
“If you have doubts about your abilities, perhaps we should call this off. You can find another solution. You asked for our help. We’ve provided it. I taught you an ancient, highly guarded secret usually only reserved for our kind. To add to our generosity, my sister has seen fit to provide you with protection once you undertake this endeavor. That is unprecedented. Even more so when you consider that you’re our mortal enemy. I suggest you stop your whining and accept the gift that has been bestowed upon you.” Charlotte stood there her chest puffed out in anger.
“I don’t think Etta meant to sound ungrateful. She’s anxious about what’s to come.” Luc stepped forward speaking for me before I could say anything more.
“She should be. I’ll be here at five a.m. Be ready to depart,” Charlotte said.
She left the apartment without so much as a glance back, her lackey Bastion in tow. Stupid headache! I couldn’t think of a snarky comeback in time. Pompous cow! What was with her and five a.m. anyway? Normal people didn't wake up that early every day for no reason. In a few weeks when this was all over, I’d to sleep in until nine every day for a week.
So much was riding on me and Nerina. How was it that in an organization with hundreds of people, it’d come down to a baker and a crafter of love potions to save everyone? Something was rotten in Palermo Bay. Clara had alluded to something bigger happening, but what? What could anyone possibly want with me or my family? At the end of the day there was nothing special about us. There were families with our kind of magic all the world. We weren’t that interesting.
