Awakening s-5 Page 10

  I remembered how much I had hated both Sky and Hunter when I'd first met them. With Sky it was mostly from jealousy—her beauty and poise were intimidating to me. But, I realized now, it was also that I'd sensed their suspicion. I could feel that Sky still didn't truly trust me; even though we'd served together, she continued to scrutinize me. Apparently Hunter was doing the same thing. The thought sent a sharp pain through me.

  Hunter looked up when I walked in with Sky. "Thanks," he said to her.

  "Ta," Sky said. She tossed her leather jacket on the sofa, then pointed to the phone. "Feel free," she said, then disappeared up the stairs.

  "How long can you stay?" Hunter asked me. "We've got a lot to talk about."

  "I'm not staying," I said. "Sorry Sky went to all that trouble, but I have work to do." I crossed to his phone. "If you won't drive me, I'll call a taxi."

  Hunter rubbed a hand across his chin. "What is the matter with you?" he asked mildly.

  "I don't appreciate you sending your cousin to practically kidnap me off the street." I snapped. "I told you I didn't have a ride, so I couldn't make it."

  "I'm sorry." To my astonishment, he actually sounded abashed. "I—well, I thought I was doing you a favor."

  "No, you didn't," I retorted. "You just wanted me to stick to your plan. What gives you the right to just waltz in out of nowhere and take charge? You think just because the International Council of Witches told you to keep an eye on me that gives you the right to run my life?"

  "They—" Hunter began, but I cut him off.

  "You know what? I'm really sick of being somebody's assignment." Tears filled my eyes. I blinked furiously, trying to keep them from falling. "No one seems to care about who I really am, or what I want! What about me in all of this?"

  "Morgan—" Hunter began, but I cut him off again.

  "No!" I cried. "Don't! It's my turn." My fingers curled into fists, and I felt pressure build in my chest. "You're so self-righteous about your mission and the council and all that crap, but really you want exactly the same thing as Cal and Selene did—to control me. To use me for your own purposes." To my humiliation, my voice broke. I turned my back on Hunter and stood there, biting down hard on my lower lip as I struggled to hold myself together.

  He didn't say anything at first, and silence stretched between us. At last he spoke in a curiously subdued voice.

  "You're not my assignment. The council didn't tell me to keep an eye on you, actually," he said.

  I fought to regain my normal pattern of breathing so that I would be able to understand what he was telling me. I wanted so much to understand, to be wrong.

  I heard Hunter take a deep breath, too. "I'm here of my own choice, Morgan. I did contact them about you, that's true. I told them you were a witch of exceptional power and that I wanted to see if I could help guide you. They said I could do that as long as it didn't interfere with my primary work as a Seeker—which is to track down Cal and Selene and others like them."

  He paused, and I heard him take a step toward me. Then I felt a feather light touch on my shoulder. "I don't want to control you, Morgan," he said. "That's the last thing I want."

  His hand left my shoulder, his fingers lightly stroking my long hair. He was just inches behind me; I could feel the warmth of his body, and I held my breath.

  "What I'm trying to do," he went on softly, "in my own clumsy way, is to give you the tools you need to understand the forces that you will inevitably come up against."

  I turned to face him, searching his eyes, wondering what It was that he wanted, what I wanted. His eyes are so green, I found myself thinking, so gentle. I could feel his breath on my cheek, warm everywhere except on the wet trail of tears.

  "I just want. .," he whispered, and trailed off.

  We stood there, our gazes locked, and it seemed to me that once again the universe suspended its motion around us and the only warm, living things in it were the two of us.

  Then Sky's voice called down from upstairs, "Hunter, did you remember to get cheese and biscuits?" and suddenly everything started moving again, and I stepped backward until the backs of my knees hit the worn ottoman and I sat down. I was trembling, and I found I couldn't look at Hunter.

  "Um—yes, I got them," Hunter replied, his voice raspy and a little breathless.

  "Right, then. I'm going to make a cheese-and-tomato omelet. I'm starved." I heard Sky's boots clattering down f the stairs. "Want some?"

  "Sounds great," Hunter said. "Morgan, how about you?"

  "Um—no thanks, my family will be expecting me for dinner at six-thirty," I said shakily. "In fact, I'd better give my mom a call right now and let her know where I am."

  "Tell her I'll run you home by six," he said. Then he added, "If that's all right with you, I mean. If you want to stay."

  "It's all right," I told him. I didn't feel ready to leave.

  By the time I hung up, I felt more normal. Hunter led me to the back of the house, where the wood-burning stove filled the long room with warmth. The windows were fogged with condensation, but I rubbed one with my sweater and looked outside. Another rickety porch lined the back of the house, and beyond it I could see trees growing from the sides of the ravine: oak, maple, birch, hemlock, and pine. The woods around Widow's Vale tended to have a well-trod, gentle feel to them. But the land behind Hunter and Sky's house felt raw, wild, as though floodwaters had just swept through and carved out something new and highly charged.

  "It feels different here," I said.

  "It is. It's a place of power." Hunter lit the candle and incense stick on the altar. He gestured to the floor where we'd held the circle. A worn oriental carpet now covered the center of the floor. "Have a seat."

  I settled myself on the carpet.

  He didn't sit. "There's something we need to discuss," he said.

  "What?" I asked, feeling wary again.

  "I did some checking on David's story, yesterday and today. That's why I couldn't come pick you up myself." Hunter paced toward the woodstove, then swung around to face me. "First of all, he lied about how he hurt his hand. I asked Alyce, and she told me he'd come in with it bandaged up two days before the party. He didn't do it trimming boughs for the party."

  My heart lurched. David had lied to me?

  Wait. I thought back. Not so fast. He never said he cut his hand trimming boughs for the party. He could have been trimming some other boughs. Couldn't he?

  "Second, Stuart Afton didn't make any money on stocks last week," Hunter said.

  I frowned. "I'm not following you."

  Hunter made an impatient gesture with his hand. "David said Afton forgave his debt because he'd made a killing on the stock market last week," he reminded me. "But I checked, and it never happened."

  "You checked? How?"

  "If you must know," Hunter said, looking uncharacteristically self-conscious, "I chatted up his secretary. No man has secrets from his secretary. She knew nothing about any sudden windfall."

  "And why is this your business?"

  "Because I'm a Seeker," Hunter said. "It's my job to investigate misuses of magick."

  "This doesn't have anything to do with magick," I said, standing up. "Maybe there was a stock split and Alton's secretary was at lunch when the call came in. Maybe he got the news by e-mail. Maybe there was no stock split but Afton forgave the debt anyway, out of the simple goodness of his heart. This isn't council business, Hunter."

  "Open your eyes," Hunter said flatly. "There's magick involved here. Dark magick. We both know that."

  I realized I had no choice. I had to tell him about seeing Cal.

  I took a deep breath. "There's something I have to tell you."

  I explained how I'd scryed for the truth two nights ago and how instead of seeing David, Cal had appeared. I didn't speak about the feelings seeing Cal's face had induced, nor did Hunter ask. But two white creases appeared on the out-sides of his nostrils.

  "The way I see it, this is the strongest proof we've had yet
that Cal is behind the dark magick we've detected," I said. "It isn't David at all."

  I could see Hunter weighing this new information. "You say you asked to see the truth?" he asked after a moment "Were those the words you used? Did you mention David's name?"

  "No," I answered, puzzled. "Why?"

  "You weren't very specific. And fire can be a capricious scrying tool," Hunter replied.

  "Are you trying to tell me the fire lied to me?" I asked. I was starting to get angry again.

  "No," Hunter said. "Fire doesn't lie. But it reveals the truths it wants to reveal, especially if you're not specific with your questions."

  I put my head in my hands, feeling suddenly weary. "I don't get it, Hunter," I said. "I keep giving you clues that point clearly to Cal and Selene, the witches you came here to investigate—the witches you're still trying to track down. I don't want it to be them—I don't want to even think about them. But it makes total sense that they're the ones whose presence I felt. Why do you keep trying to make this about David and Practical Magick?"

  Hunter was silent for a moment. At last he said, "It's a feeling I have. I've got an instinct for darkness. It's what makes me so good at my job." The words weren't a boast. His voice was quiet. For the first time I began to really wonder. Was it possible that he was right?

  "Enough of this," he said with a sigh. "We're not getting anywhere, and it's nearly six. I'd better run you home."

  We walked out to his car without talking. I noticed with a shock that it was the same gray rental sedan he'd had the week before. Selene had hidden it in an abandoned barn when she thought Cal and I had killed Hunter.

  "I tracked it down," Hunter remarked, eerily echoing what was on my mind. We climbed into the car, and he drove me home in silence, each lost in our own thoughts. He pulled into my driveway. Then, as I reached for the door handle, he put his hand on mine. "Morgan."

  A jolt of sensation ran up my arm, and I turned to face him.

  "Please think about what we discussed, about David. I'm almost certain Stuart Afton didn't forgive that debt out of kindness."

  "I just don't believe David would mess with dark magick," I said. As he began to reply, I cut him off. "I know, I know, you have a special sense for evil. But you're wrong this time. You have to be."

  I climbed out and hurried up the walk to my house, hoping I was right.

  14. Old Wounds

  Beltane, 1996

  We are in Vienna, where I have found work tutoring college students in English. Evenings, Fiona and I walk along the Danude or in the Stefansplatz. She had gained some much needed weight and is looking better. The other night we even went on the Ferris wheel in the Volksprater. But the amusement park made us think of the children. Have Beck and Shelagh ever taken them to such a place?

  Giomanach is now thirteen. Linden almost twelve, and Alwyn, nine. I wonder when they look like.

  — Maghach

  At dinner Mom reported that so far there had been no new incidents at Aunt Eileen and Paula's house. "They're hoping that those creeps saw the police show up at the house and have backed off."

  "I hope so," I said. I reminded myself to get to Practical Magick for those ingredients soon.

  Mom dished out some goulash and handed me the plate. "Will you be able to finish inputting our real estate listings this week?" she asked.

  "I'm getting Das Boot back tomorrow afternoon," I said. "So I can stop by your office around three-thirty, after I drop Mary K. at home."

  "I forgot to tell you. I'm not coming straight home tomorrow after school," said Mary K. "I'm going shopping with Olivia and Darcy."

  Shopping. I wasn't ordinarily a big fan of shopping, but suddenly I felt a sharp pang of envy. How long had it been since I'd gone shopping with my friends or just hung out after school, doing nothing in particular?

  Since you and Bree stopped being friends, I answered myself.

  After dinner I went upstairs and tried to do my math homework, but my brain was too overloaded with thoughts of Hunter, Cal, David. I sighed. With its connection to the harmony of nature, Wicca was about balance, something I sorely needed. I had to bring balance back into my life, and the only way I could think of doing that was with a healthy dose of non-Wicca normalcy.

  Surprising myself, I opened my door and padded out into the hall, where I picked up the phone. I took it back into my room and perched cross-legged on my bed.

  My heart pounded as I dialed Bree's number. It had been so long since I'd done this. Would she want to talk to me?

  Bree picked up on the third ring. "Hi, it's Morgan," I said quickly, before my nerve failed me.

  "Hi." She sounded uneasy. "What's up?"

  "Um—" I hadn't thought this through. "Not a whole lot. I just. . you know, wanted to say hi. Catch up."

  "Oh. Well, hi," she said.

  Then we had one of those long, awkward silences, and I wondered if maybe it was crazy of me to have called her. Maybe she didn't want to be friends with me anymore. Maybe there was just too much water under the bridge.

  I was about to mumble that I had to go when she spoke. "Morgan." She hesitated. "Some of things I did to you—I know they really hurt. I can't undo them. But I'm really sorry. I was a complete bitch."

  "I–I was, too," I admitted.

  Another silence. Clearly neither one of us wanted to go into the details. It was still too raw to bring all that up again.

  "So," she said, "what's been happening in your life? Robbie told me—well, he told me about your being adopted. About being a blood witch."

  "He did?" I tried to decide how I felt about Bree and Robbie discussing my personal life.

  "Yeah. I've been wanting to talk to you about it. If you want to," she said.

  "I've been wanting to talk to you about it, too," I confessed. "But when we're face-to-face. Not on the phone."

  "Okay," she said. "I'd like that."

  "Meanwhile Hunter's got me in a Wicca study intensive," I told her. "You know, he's taken over the leadership of Cirrus now that. ." I trailed off. Now that Cal's gone, I thought. Quickly changing the subject, I asked, "How's Kithic? How is it having Sky lead a coven?"

  "Challenging," Bree said in a thoughtful tone. "We've been doing visualization exercises. At our last circle we were outside under the moon, and Sky told us to visualize a pentagram. At first everyone was distracted by the cold and the noise of cars going by. Finally, though, we got it together. We all closed our eyes, visualizing away, and there was this moment of absolute silence, then Sky told us to open our eyes, and there was this perfect pentagram, etched in the snow. It was amazing."

  "Cool," I said enviously. It sounded like her coven was really growing. I leaned back against my pillows.

  Bree's voice went conspiratorial. "Sky and Raven are flirting, I think. Isn't that wild?"

  "Very wild." It was so easy to fall back into gossiping with Bree again. "I never figured Raven would turn out to be gay."

  "I don't think she really is. I think she just really likes Sky. It's an attraction of opposites," Bree said with a laugh. There was another pause, but this time it didn't feel awkward. It was just—natural.

  "Speaking of attractions," I ventured, "how's your love life?"

  "Robbie." I heard a guarded note in her voice.

  "Yeah," I said, hoping I hadn't shattered our new, fragile bond.

  But Bree just sighed. "Well, it's—it's kind of weird," she said slowly. "I don't know. . we've been buddies forever, and now all of a sudden we're making out. I guess I'm just sort of taking it as it comes and seeing what happens." She gave a little laugh. "I have to say, though, we really click physically. It's very hot."

  "Wow." I felt voyeuristic but also fascinated. It was strange to hear these two people I'd known since childhood talk about each other in these new, romantic terms.

  "Listen, I've got to go," Bree said. "I've got a history paper due tomorrow, and I'm still on page one."

  "You'll crank it out," I told her. "You always do.
"

  "Yeah, I do, don't I," she replied. "I'll talk to you later, okay? And—Morgan?"

  "What?"

  "Thanks for calling," she said softly. "I know it couldn't have been easy to do."

  "You're welcome," I said.

  We hung up, and I replaced the phone on the hall table. I was smiling as I went back into my room, feeling happier than I had for days.

  15. Threads

  Imbolc, 1997

  Imbolc is a day for light. Fiona reminds me that Imbolc means “in the belly.” in the womb of the Goddess, and celebrates the seeds hidden in the earth that are just beginning to stir. Even though it's dark and cold here in Helsinki, it's a day of hope, and we must light the sacred fire.

  In England, among the covens, there are great bonfires. Here we lit candles throughout out small rented house. Then the two of us did a quiet ceremony as we fed kindling into our woodstove.

  The cold is hard on Fiona. She is shivering and in pain. We can't live this far north for long. Where next, I wonder?

  — Maghach

  After my conversation with Bree the night before, I felt so much better able to face the next day. I knew she and I still had many, many fences to mend, but for the first time it actually seemed possible.

  "You're in a good mood," Mary K. commented as we were getting ready for school. "Is that because you were talking to Hunter on the phone last night?" she added, wiggling her eyebrows at me.

  She shrieked as I threw a damp dish towel at her.

  "It wasn't Hunter. If you must know," I said, grabbing my backpack, "I was talking to Bree."

  Mary K. beamed at me. "That's great!" She knew how much my friendship with Bree meant to me. "Maybe now things will get back to normal around here."

  Robbie honked outside. He was giving us another lift to school. I'd pick up Das Boot later, and then things really would get back to normal!

  Just as I was slipping into my coat, the phone rang. My witch senses tingled. What could Hunter want so early in the day? I picked up the phone. "Hi, Hunter."