Anna Dressed in Blood

by Kendare Blake

  Upstairs, Morfran is whispering and turning slowly in a counterclockwise circle. Thomas takes up something that looks like a wooden hand with stretched-out fingers, and sweeps along the top of the steps with it, then lays it down. Morfran has finished his chant; he nods to Thomas, who lights a match and drops it. A line of blue flame surges up along the top floor and then smokes out.

  “Smells like a Bob Marley concert in here,” I say as Thomas comes downstairs.

  “That’s the patchouli,” he replies.

  “What about the wooden finger broom?”

  “Comfrey root. For a safe house.” He looks around. I can see the mental checklist running behind his stare.

  “What were you guys doing up there, anyway?”

  “That’s where we’ll do the binding from,” he says, nodding toward the second level. “And it’s our line of defense. We’re going to seal the entire upper floor. Worse comes to worst, we regroup there. He won’t be able to get near us.” He sighs. “So I suppose I’d better go start pentagram-ing windows.”

  The second front is making a clatter in the kitchen. That would be my mom, Carmel, and Anna. Anna’s helping Mom find her way around a wood stove as she tries to brew protection potions. I also catch a whiff of rosemary and lavender healing waters. My mother is a “prepare for the worst, hope for the best” type person. It’s up to her to cast something to lure him here—aside from my rope-a-dope, that is.

  I don’t know why I’m thinking in code. All of this “rope-a-dope” business. Even I’m starting to wonder what I’m referring to. A rope-a-dope is a fake-out. It’s a boxing strategy made famous by Ali. Make them think you’re losing. Get them where you want them. And take them out.

  So what’s my rope-a-dope? Killing Anna.

  I suppose I should go tell her.

  In the kitchen, my mother is chopping some kind of leafy herb. There’s an open jar of green liquid on the counter that smells like a mixture of pickles and tree bark. Anna is stirring a pot on the stove. Carmel is poking around near the basement door.

  “What’s down here?” she asks, and opens it up.

  Anna tenses and looks at me. What would Carmel find down there, if she went? Confused, shuffling corpses?

  Probably not. The haunting seems to be a manifestation of Anna’s own guilt. If Carmel encountered anything, it would probably be some weak cold spots and the occasional mysterious door shutting.

  “Nothing we need to worry about,” I say, walking over to close it. “Things are going pretty well upstairs. How are they in here?”

  Carmel shrugs. “I’m not much use. It’s sort of like cooking, and I can’t cook. But they seem to be doing okay.” She crinkles her nose. “It’s kinda slow.”

  “Never rush a good potion.” My mother smiles. “It’ll go all wonky on you. And you’ve been a big help, Carmel. She cleaned the crystals.”

  Carmel smiles at her, but gives me the eye. “I think I’ll go help Thomas and Morfran.”

  After she goes, I wish she hadn’t left. With just me, Anna, and my mom in here, the room feels strangely stuffed. There are things that need to be said, but not in front of my mother.

  Anna clears her throat. “I think this is coming together, Mrs. Lowood,” she says. “Do you need me to do anything else?”

  My mom glances at me. “Not just now, dear. Thank you.”

  As we walk through the living room toward the foyer, Anna tilts her head upward to catch a glimpse of the happenings upstairs.

  “You have no idea how strange it is,” she says. “Having people in my house, and not wanting to break them into tiny little pieces.”

  “But that’s an improvement, right?”

  She crinkles her nose. “You’re … what was it Carmel said earlier?” She looks down, then back at me. “An ass.”

  I laugh. “You’re catching on.”

  We walk out onto the porch. I pull my jacket closed. I never took it off; the house hasn’t seen heat in half a century.

  “I like Carmel,” says Anna. “I didn’t at first.”

  “Why not?”

  She shrugs. “I thought she was your girlfriend.” She smiles. “But that’s a silly reason to dislike someone.”

  “Yeah, well. I think Carmel and Thomas are on a collision course.” We lean against the house, and I feel the rot in the boards behind me. They don’t feel secure; the minute I lean back it’s like I’m the one holding them up instead of the other way around.

  The pain in my head is more insistent. I’m getting what feels like the start of a runner’s side ache. I should see if anybody has any Advil. But that’s dumb. If this is mystical, what the heck is Advil going to do about it?

  “It’s starting to hurt, isn’t it?”

  She’s looking at me with concern. I guess I didn’t realize I was rubbing my eyes.

  “I’m okay.”

  “We have to get him here, and soon.” She paces to the railing and comes back. “How are you going to get him here? Tell me.”

  “I’m going to do what you’ve always wanted,” I say.

  It takes her a moment. If it’s possible for a person to look hurt and grateful at once, that’s the face she makes.

  “Don’t get so excited. I’m only going to kill you a little bit. It’ll be more like a ritual bloodletting.”

  She frowns. “Will that work?”

  “With all of the extra summoning spells going on in that kitchen, I think so. He should be like a cartoon dog floating after the scent of a hot-dog truck.”

  “It will weaken me.”

  “How much?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Dammit. The truth is, I don’t know either. I don’t want to hurt her. But the blood is the key. The flow of energy moving through my blade to where-the-heck-ever should draw him like an alpha wolf’s howl. I close my eyes. A million things could go wrong, but it’s too late to think of anything else.

  The pain between my eyes is making me blink a lot. It’s sapping my focus. I don’t even know if I’ll be well enough to make the cuts if the preparation takes much longer.

  “Cassio. I’m afraid for you.”

  I chuckle. “That’s probably wise.” I squeeze my eyes shut. It isn’t even a stabbing pain. That would be better, something with ebbs and flows so I could recover in between. This is constant and maddening. There’s no relief.

  Something cool touches my cheek. Soft fingers slide into the hair at my temples, pushing it back. Then I feel her brush against my mouth, so carefully, and when I open my eyes I’m staring into her eyes. I close them again and kiss her.

  When it’s over—and it isn’t over for a while—we rest against the house with our foreheads together. My hands are on the small of her back. She’s still stroking my temples.

  “I never thought I’d get to do that,” she whispers.

  “Me neither. I thought I was going to kill you.”

  Anna smirks. She thinks that nothing’s changed. She’s wrong. Everything’s changed. Everything, since I came to this town. And I know now that I was supposed to come here. That the moment I heard her story—that connection I felt, that interest—it had a purpose.

  I’m not afraid. Despite the searing between my eyes and the knowledge that something is coming for me, something that could easily rip out my spleen and pop it like a water balloon, I am not afraid. She’s with me. She’s my purpose and we’re going to save each other. We’re going to save everyone. And then I’m going to convince her that she’s supposed to stay here. With me.

  Inside, there’s a small clatter. I think my mom must’ve dropped something in the kitchen. No big deal, but it makes Anna jump and pull back. I flex my side and wince. I think the Obeahman might have started work tenderizing that spleen early. Just where is your spleen, anyway?

  “Cas,” Anna exclaims. She comes back to let me lean on her.

  “Don’t go,” I say.

  “I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Don’t go, ever,” I tease, and she makes
a face like she thinks I need a throttling. She kisses me again, and I don’t let go of her mouth; I make her squirm and start to laugh and try to stay serious.

  “Let’s just focus on tonight,” she says.

  Focus on tonight. But the fact that she kissed me again speaks much more loudly.

  * * *

  Preparations have been made. I’m lying on my back on the dust-sheeted sofa, pressing a lukewarm bottle of Dasani against my forehead. My eyes are shut. The world feels a whole lot nicer in the dark.

  Morfran tried to do another clearing or counteracting or whatever, but it didn’t work nearly as well as the first. He muttered chants and struck flint, sending up nice little pyrotechnics, then smudged my face and chest with something black and ashy that smelled like sulfur. The pain in my side lessened and stopped trying to reach up into my ribcage. The pain in my head was reduced to a moderate throb, but it still sucks. Morfran seemed worried, and disappointed with the results. He said it would’ve worked better if he’d had fresh chicken’s blood. Even though I hurt, I’m still glad he didn’t have access to a live chicken. What a spectacle that would have been.

  I’m remembering the words of the Obeahman: that my mind would bleed out my ears or something. I hope that wasn’t literal.

  My mom sits on the couch near my feet. Her hand is on my shin and she’s rubbing it absently. She still wants to run. Every one of her mom-instincts says to swaddle me up and take off. But she’s not just any mom. She’s my mom. So she sits, and gets ready to fight alongside.

  “I’m sorry about your cat,” I say.

  “He was our cat,” she replies. “I’m sorry too.”

  “He tried to warn us,” I say. “I should have listened to the little hairball.” I put down the water bottle. “I really am sorry, Mom. I’m going to miss him.”

  She nods.

  “I want you to go upstairs before anything starts,” I say. She nods again. She knows I can’t focus if I’m worried about her.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” she asks. “That you were searching him out all these years? That you were planning to go after him?”

  “I didn’t want you to worry,” I say. I feel sort of stupid. “See how well it all turned out?”

  She brushes my hair out of my eyes. She hates it that I let it hang in my face all the time. A concerned tension comes into her face and she looks at me closer.

  “What?” I ask.

  “Your eyes are yellow.” I think she’s going to cry again. From another room, I hear Morfran swear. “It’s your liver,” my mom says softly. “And maybe your kidneys. They’re failing.”

  Well, that explains the liquefying feeling in my side.

  We’re alone in the living room. Everyone else has sort of scattered off to their respective corners. I suppose everyone’s doing some thinking, maybe saying some prayers. Hopefully Thomas and Carmel are making out in a closet. Outside, a flash of electricity catches my eye.

  “Isn’t it a little late in the season for lightning?” I ask.

  Morfran answers from where he’s hovering in the door of the kitchen. “It isn’t just lightning. I think our boy is working up some energy.”

  “We should do the summoning spell,” my mom says.

  “I’ll go find Thomas.” I heave myself off the sofa and make my way upstairs quietly. At the top, Carmel’s voice is coming from inside one of the old guest rooms.

  “I don’t know what I’m doing here,” she says, and her voice is scared, but also kind of snarky.

  “What do you mean?” Thomas answers.

  “Come on. I’m the freaking Prom Queen. Cas is like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, you, your grandpa, and his mom are all witches or wizards or whatever, and Anna is … Anna. What am I doing here? What use am I?”

  “Don’t you remember?” Thomas asks. “You’re the voice of reason. You think of the things we forget about.”

  “Yeah. And I think I’m going to get myself killed. Just me and my aluminum bat.”

  “You’re not. You won’t. Nothing’s going to happen to you, Carmel.”

  Their voices drop lower. I feel like some pervert eavesdropper. I’m not going to interrupt them. Mom and Morfran can do the spells on their own. Let Thomas have this moment. So I back softly down the stairs and head outside.

  I wonder what things will be like after this is over. Assuming we all make it through, what’s going to happen? Will everything go back to the way it was? Will Carmel eventually forget about this adventurous time with us? Will she shun Thomas and go back to being the center of SWC? She wouldn’t do that, would she? I mean, she did just compare me to Buffy the Vampire Slayer. My opinion of her isn’t the highest right now.

  When I step out onto the porch, tugging my jacket tighter, I see Anna sitting on the railing with one leg up. She’s watching the sky, and her face lit by the lightning is equal parts awe and worry.

  “Strange weather,” she says.

  “Morfran says it’s not just weather,” I reply, and she makes an I thought as much expression.

  “You look a little better.”

  “Thanks.” I don’t know why, but I feel shy. Now’s not really the time for it. I walk over to her and put my arms around her waist.

  There’s no warmth to her body. When I put my nose into her dark hair, there’s no scent. But I can touch her, and I’ve come to know her. And, for whatever reason, she can say the same things about me.

  I catch a whiff of something spicy. We look up. Coming from one of the upstairs bedrooms are thin tendrils of scented smoke, smoke that doesn’t break up with the wind, but instead stretches out in ethereal fingers to call something forward. The summoning spells have started.

  “Are you ready?” I ask.

  “Always and never,” she says softly. “Isn’t that what they say?”

  “Yes,” I reply into her neck. “That’s what they say.”

  * * *

  “Where should I do it?”

  “Somewhere that’s at least going to look like a mortal wound.”

  “Why not the inside of the wrist? It’s a classic for a reason.”

  Anna sits in the middle of the floor. The underside of her pale arm swims before my compromised vision. We’re both nervous, and the suggestions issuing from the upper level aren’t helping.

  “I don’t want to hurt you,” I whisper.

  “You won’t. Not really.”

  It’s full-on dark, and the dry electrical storm is moving ever closer to our house on the hill. My blade, normally so sure and steady, quivers and tremors as I draw it across Anna’s arm. Her black blood runs out in a thick line, staining her skin and dripping onto the dusty floorboards in heavy spatters.

  My head is killing me. I need to stay clear. As we both watch the blood pool, we can feel it, a sort of quickening in the air, some intangible force that makes the hair on our arms and necks tighten and stand up.

  “He’s coming,” I say, loudly enough that they’ll be able to hear me where they all stand on the second level, watching over the railing. “Mom, get into one of the back rooms. Your work is done.” She doesn’t want to go, but she goes, and without a word, even though she’s got a novel’s worth of worries and encouragement sitting on her tongue.

  “I feel sick,” Anna whispers. “And it’s pulling me, like before. Did you cut too deep?”

  I reach for her arm. “I don’t think so. I don’t know.” The blood is leaking, which is what we intended, but there’s so much of it. How much blood does a dead girl have?

  “Cas,” Carmel says. There’s alarm in her voice. I don’t look at her. I look at the door.

  Mist is coming in off of the porch, seeping in through the cracks, moving like a seeking snake across the floor. I don’t know what I expected, but it wasn’t this. I think I expected him to blow the door off its hinges and stand silhouetted against the moonlight, some badass eyeless specter.

  The mist circles around us. In all our rope-a-dope glory, we kneel, exhausted, looking defeated. Exce
pt that Anna really does look more dead than usual. This plan could backfire.

  And then the mist comes together and I’m once again staring at the Obeahman, who stares back with his stitched-over eyes.

  I hate it when they don’t have eyes. Empty sockets or cloudy eyeballs or eyes that just aren’t where they should be—I hate all of it. It freaks me out, and that pisses me off.

  Overhead, I hear chants starting, and the Obeahman laughs.

  “Bind me all you want,” he says. “I get what I came for.”

  “Seal the house,” I call to them upstairs. I heave myself to my feet. “I hope you came for my knife in your gut.”

  “You are becoming inconvenient,” he says, but I’m not thinking. I’m fighting, lunging, and trying to keep my balance through the throbbing in my head. I’m slashing and spinning against the stiffness in my side and chest.

  He’s quick, and ridiculously agile for something with no eyes, but I finally get through. My whole body tenses like a bow when I feel the edge of my knife slide into his side.

  He feints back and puts a dead hand to the wound. My triumph is short lived. Before I know what’s happened, he’s come forward and smacked me into a wall. I don’t realize I’ve hit it until I’m sliding down.

  “Bind him! Weaken him!” I shout, but as I do, he skitters forward like some god-awful spider and lifts the sofa like it’s inflatable, then hurls it into my team of magic-casters on the second level. They cry out at the impact, but there isn’t any time to wonder if they’re all right. He grabs me by the shoulder and lifts me up, then punches me into the wall. When I hear what sounds like twigs snapping, I know that it’s actually a whole bunch of my ribs. Maybe the whole effing cage.