WITCHES' MARK
Adventurotica
by
Amanda Gannon
and
Paul D. Batteiger
SMASHWORDS EDITION
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PUBLISHED BY
Adventurotica on Smashwords
Witches' Mark
Copyright © 2011 by Adventurotica Publishing
Cover by Amanda Gannon
Smashwords Edition License Notes:
This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of these authors.
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Witches' Mark
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Chapter 01: Winter at the Gates
Chapter 03: What Dreams May Come
Chapter 04: The Secrets of the Moon
Chapter 11: Taste of Sacrifice
Chapter 13: Seizing the Moment
Chapter 15: The House of Despair
Chapter 20: Serpent in the Garden
Chapter 21: Dickweeds of the Apocalypse
Chapter 24: The Fiend in His Own Shape
Chapter 25: What the Moon Brings
Chapter 30: The Temptation of Thalia Shandy
Chapter 31: That Old Sex Magic
Chapter 33: You Don't Know the Power
Chapter 34: Strange Bedfellows
Chapter 39: If You Will Not Be Turned
Chapter 40: Ghost of the Seasons
Chapter 45: The Dark Night of the Soul
Chapter 46: What the Heart Demands
Chapter 47: The Gathering Wilderness
Bonus Novella: How I Met Your Master
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Prelude: The Calling
Melisande stepped into the deep blue evening and let the great doors of Willowsong Hall swing closed behind her. It was cool, now, as the sun faded behind the forested hills, the sky clear and limitless. On this, what she believed to be the last night of her life, everything seemed so peaceful. From the splashing of the fountain at the center of the circular drive to the dark green shade of the trees all around, rising to the forest that surrounded her home; everything seemed to hold its breath. She took in her own breath and let it out, settling her spirit as best she could.
She walked down the steps and onto the cobbled drive, stopping when she crossed the house wards to put her hand over her heart. The Mark burned, as sharp and fierce as when it had been laid upon her nearly seventy years ago. Melisande walked upright, with her back straight and a grave and unassailable dignity in her face, but she was far older than she appeared, and tonight she felt it in every bone.
She heard the distant thump of a car door, then the revving of Richard's truck as he threw it in gear and backed away from the trailer crouched in the trees south of the house. Good. She wasn't too late to catch him. He pulled out onto the drive and saw her wave, stopped. When he cut the engine off it was quiet again, cicadas keening as the sky darkened. He climbed out of the cab long legs first, frowning with concern.
Richard. Groundskeeper, caretaker, friend. Her lifelong penchant for strays had summoned this last one, the only one who would outlive her. He was rough-hewn and often rude, a man from a hard past he wanted to forget, but he tended the grounds and the house faithfully and well, and she knew his loyalty to this place would not end with her. She watched him push his fingers through his unruly dark hair and smiled. If she had been even fifty years younger, their relationship would have taken an entirely different direction.
"You all right, ma'am?" he asked, respectful with her as he was with no-one else. "I was heading to the Buck for a couple of beers, but if you need me for something, I can stay."
Melisande made herself keep her hand off the burning Mark and forced a smile. "No, take the night off. Just—" Her throat caught. She'd probably never see him again. She almost broke, almost told him everything.
"Ma'am?" he took step towards her, brow furrowed, and she made herself smile again.
"Sorry. Woolgathering." She hesitated, looking down at the small hexagonal box she held in her hands, then held it out to him. "Could you deliver this to Eldarra? If stopping by the bookstore won't cut too deeply into your manly carousing." She raised an eyebrow.
"No, no. Sure." He took it, ran his fingers over the elaborately painted wood with the silver moon on the top. "Pretty. What's in it?"
Melisande smiled fondly. "Never you mind, Richard Shackleton. Just see you deliver it safe to her, and tell her she'll know what it is and who it's for when the time comes for her to know."
Long accustomed to the mysteries of his employer, Richard only snorted. "Sure, fine. Witch business." He looked for a moment like he might say something else, then just nodded and waved the box. "I'll take care of it. Won't pass up a chance to see Eldarra." He smiled, that disarming, roguish grin.
"You be civil to that lady, you handsome beast." She reached up and ruffled his hair, glad the darkness concealed her grimace as another flare of pain blazed through the Mark. It hurt so much, so very much, it took her every skein of will to not show how it was unraveling her at the edges.
Richard nodded. "Yes ma'am." He climbed back into the ugly old truck with the effortless ease of youth, started it in a blue cloud of smoke, and drove slowly around the circle and onto the stone-paved drive that led down to the road. Melisande watched him go like a castaway watching the last sail slipping over the horizon, closed her eyes so she didn't have to see the moment when he disappeared.
She rubbed her forehead and turned to look up at her house, her fine old house that she loved so well. I may not be coming home tonight, she thought. For weeks now the foreboding, the encroaching darkness when she tried to scry, and now the Mark alive again after so long. Her hand felt naked without the charm, and she would miss it sorely later. But if this was to be her end, she would not give over her keenest weapon to her enemy.
She brushed white hair from her face and went back to the house. She was alone now, and there was work that must be done, and which only she could do. The night waited.
o0o
She left the house by the back door and hiked down the hill under a rising moon, past the garden with its statuary, its heavy marble benches covered with moss, through the great circle of trees where she had once held rites under the open sky. She summoned a witchlight like a will o' the wisp and followed it toward the bramble-covered back fence.
In jeans and hiking boots, she looked nothing like a witch girded for battle. She carried her power all around her like a veil, invisible. Only the lack of her moon charm gave her pause. If she really believed she could prevail, she would never have put aside her most trusted weapon. The stark truth of that haunted her.
She bore nothing of much power with her, nothing that could be turned against her or drained of their power. A wristlet of silver links and wolf's hair hung on her left wrist to guard the heart. Nine tarnished coins threaded on a knotted red cord jingled against river-pebbles and sea glass in her pocket. Salt in a silver box. A sprig of hawthorn in her left hand for a wand, and an old ceremonial dagger thrust into her belt. A few other bottles and packets of supplies rattled and clinked in her pockets. Ingredients for minor workings at best, probably of no practical use, but they made her feel better, and she'd take that.
She let herself out through the tiny back gate and felt all the warmth and comfort and security of the grounds fall away as she left the wards completely. The pain in her breast burned, terrible and hard, as it had the night she had allowed it to be burned into her skin, her oldest and deepest mistake. It grew worse with every protective boundary she passed.
She leaned against the gate's stonework, the open path before her. She wanted to turn around and go back to the house, but that would solve nothing. It would only postpone the inevitable, and bring greater pain. It wasn't fear, just an unwillingness to part with what she had built here. Richard, Eldarra, little Lia, her library, her collection of statuary, her lovely old '57 Bel Air with essence of mercury mixed into its silver paint. She sighed deeply. After more than a hundred years of living, she'd seen so much, done so much, gathered so much. It was a heavy price, but one she had to pay. Postponing the inevitable confrontation just so she could enjoy those things would do nothing but endanger them.
She yanked the gate closed with a final clang of iron. Someone else would come, and all of it would be theirs. This burden as well, but she had left Stormy a message in the mirror that explained everything. She hoped she had judged the girl correctly. She wasn't trained, but she was brave, and sometimes that mattered more.
And she was a Willowsong. That mattered most of all. Blood called out to blood, and tonight her blood burned.
The woods behind the house belonged to no one, and parts of them did not reside, strictly speaking, in the real world. These woods were not evil, nor even opposed to human presence; they were wild, indifferent. Tonight they seemed very still, their power quiet, but not benign. This was the stillness of a place where something terrible had passed. She could sense the path it had taken, feel its alien presence like a scent in the air.
A path wound through the woods, a thread of ancient power deeply worn into the fabric of this place. It was a most ancient form of magic: do not stray from the path, and be protected. She followed as far as she could, the sound of cicadas dying behind her, but this could end in only one place, and the path did not go there. No path did. The thread of alien magic led away, deep into the trees, and far, far from the path. She turned after it and walked into the trees, and staggered as the power of the Mark bore down upon her full force. All of its weight dragged at her, pulling her toward the earth, toward surrender. How much easier it would be to just lay down and stop struggling. How much easier it would be to just give up, give herself over to it, and let what had to be done, be done.
She caught herself against a tree. The bark under her hands should have felt like the skin of an ancient animal. She should have been able to feel it breathing, feel the life surging through it, slow and strong. These woods were alive, should feel alive. They didn't. Even the earth under her feet felt dead, drained of power. It was like being numb.
The dragging weight of the Mark had distracted her so that she had not noticed how wrong it was, but now she did. There was nothing here to draw upon. She was not safe here. The idea of dying surrounded by the uncaring energies of stars and trees and cold, deep earth was a lonely one, but not frightening. Dying cut off from everything living, in a place devoid of life, was terrible.
Calming herself, she took salt from the small box and rubbed it on her hands, sprinkled it on her feet. Hedge magic, but it worked a little. She made passes with the hawthorn, side to side, to the four corners. The forest stirred dimly around her, seeming to remember itself, looming less inimically as she invoked it with its own ancient names.
Now the way rose up, toward the hilltop crowned with stones. The trace she followed, the power and the numbness it left in its wake like a scar, led that way, to the center of the woodland. It could lead nowhere else. The empty forest rose all around her, and she could not feel the presence of the path, the house, behind her. Now there was only the hill before her, and the darkness, and the quiet.
She climbed slowly, each step more difficult. The weight was on her again, the power of the brand clawing at her spirit, like a hot nail driven into her chest. No hedge magic would cast it off, and she would not use her own power – she must save that until the last, when she would need it.
Up the hill, out of the trees to the bald summit, loomed a circle of stones, bathed in moonlight. The stars that wheeled above had not looked down on the earth for an age. It was not a good place, or an evil place, it was a place where power had worn the stuff of the world nearly through. To one with knowledge of how to use it, such places were powerful, yet no magic eddied here this night. It was like going to a river to drink only to find it dry.
There beside the long heel-stone she found him. A dark shape outlined against the night by its own power, the power that pulled inside her and made her grit her teeth at the pain. Whether she lived or no, she would pay this back in kind as best she could.
She stepped inside the circle with him and he turned. Clouds hid the moon, and when she saw his face all the strength went out of her and she was filled up instead with a terrible cold. Of all the faces her enemy could have chosen, this was the one she never thought to see.
"That is not your face to wear," she said, pointing. "You will not wear masks in this place."
"Mask?" He laughed his gentle laugh, that had once been boyish. "Mask indeed." His eyes were so blue, bright as stars, and it seemed the night breathed with him. "I wear my own face. I have nothing to hide from you. Not now."
Melisande's voice trembled a little, and she hated it. "Thomas?" She shook her head. "No, you are not him."
"But I am, Mel. I am myself, come back at last." He touched the heel stone, and power sang through the earth below them both. "And you know how."
Things made sense now, things that never had before. "His grimoire, his books and formulas, they didn't burn. You took them." She watched him coldly, still not sure, inner and outer eye alert for any trick. A creature like this could commit any treachery, all the worse for that it had once been a man.
"Took them and used them," he said, his smile awful in the starlight. "I couldn't stay with you. You would have tried to stop me, deny me what I wanted."
"It was not in my power to give," she said. "It was—"
"No," he said. "No not in your power to give, but you would never have let me do what I had to do." He curled his fingers into a fist.
"Let you do this to yourself? Let you become a creature, like that—"
"He was a fool! He did not understand, he did not grasp what was at stake!" Now she saw some human anger in him, that ember of resentment that had always been there, now fanned to a smoldering, cold flame.
His voice became soft with a pity she didn't want. "You've become so old, Mel. So much less than you were. I never thought I would see you like this."
"Everything fades," she said. "Everything dies."
"I do not," he said. He trailed his fingers along the stone and little stars of frost jumped like sparks from beneath his fingertips. "I will not." Now the full force of his terrible, youthful gaze fell upon her, ancient eyes in that smooth face, exactly as she remembered him from so long ago.
"You know what I have come for, Melisande. Give it to me. I need it. Let me take it and I will go." His breath turned to snow in the air, his words so cold they burned.
She drew in a deep breath. "No."
"You will give it to me, or I will take it." He said, eyes glimmering cold.
Melisande drew the ceremonial knife from her belt and held it before her with the hawthorn like a sword and shield. "You will not."
She had only a moment of warning, of the feel of his power gathering behind him like a wind, and then he struck at her with a cold force that blasted and tore, seeking to pry her open and leave her naked. Her own power formed a barrier, fanning out from the point where dagger and hawthorn crossed, a silver mote against his black power. She forced it back, the mark burning on her chest, weakening her.
There was no power she commanded which could destroy him, not as he was; but by attacking her directly, he revealed that his hold here was weaker than he might pretend. If she could push through what he had done here, the deadness, the cold, if she could call upon the power of this place to banish him, to shut him out, then she might have a chance.
She cried out the nine names of the forest, invoked the moon and saw the stones around them flame with silver power drawn up from below. It coursed into her and she spoke a word of ancient evocation, an abjuration to cast him away, back into the void he stepped from. "Melutu-i atussa!" she called out. "I deny you this place! You have not power to remain here. I cast you out!"
The words cracked like thunder, echoing off the stars and shaking the trees. It staggered him back, snarling as he warded it off. Mist billowed out around Melisande like ripples in a pond, and the flames crowned upon the standing stones stretched up toward the sky.
His fingers stabbed out in a theatrical, unnecessary gesture, curled into a fist, and she clutched at her chest, fell to her knees as his power reached through the Mark and squeezed her heart like a vise.
Her guard dropped and he pulled her gathered power through the rift in her defenses, took it for himself. Power arced into him from the stone circle like lightning, devoured in his darkness. All went to feed the endless hunger within him.
Desperate, Melisande thrust the hawthorn wand into the earth and then slashed it in half with the knife, cutting off her link to the power of the circle, and his with it. She saw him stagger in the sudden backlash and she cried to the moon, her old ally. "Nin alu bether! You shall be blinded. Your eyes shall not find the way!" She turned the blade and shone the light into his face, seeking his eyes, where dark powers were often weakest.
He recovered with such speed that she knew his momentary weakness had been a deception. He caught the light and ate it, devoured it utterly. She knew this power, knew the taste of it, had last felt it more than sixty years gone. The hunger, the depthless devouring cold. She had known demon fire and the battering power of the world's own elemental forces, but the blackness in this magic was the blackness of the void. The force that takes and takes and can never be sated. It was not of this place, or from any place at all, for anywhere it had been was no longer.
Pain flared from the Mark and she fell onto her belly, clawing at it uselessly. The Mark gave him a path through any defense she could make, a link straight into her power that she could not break. He ground pain into her like salt into a wound and she screamed, rolled across the grass, pushed by the force of his wrath.
She fetched against a stone and lay gasping, hollowed out by the agony that still rang like an echo. A deeper shadow fell over her, blotting out moon and sky, and he was there, so young and so beautiful. He caught her face between his cold hands, drew her to her knees. "Give it to me, Melisande. Let me have it and I will spare your life." He stared down into her eyes. "I always loved you, Mel. Don't make me do this to you."
"Never."
At her whisper, pain slammed through her again, a jolt of blinding agony. Her witchlight flickered out. She felt her hold on ward after ward loosen, vanish. When he let go of her and she fell to the ground, she barely felt the impact. The pain went on, and on, and on. And always his touch, gentle, his voice, patient, urging her to give in . . . she would be safe . . . she could trust him. They would be together again.
No, she would not go like this. She let power flow into the knife, still clutched in her hand, and stabbed it against his chest. The energy flared and the knife shattered into pieces, but the momentary diversion gave her a breath, and a breath was all she had left.
Melisande spoke the most terrible word of power she knew – a word of unmaking – and the force of it cracked the stone behind her and scorched the grass beneath her. It was a sound too large to be heard, and it sent him reeling away, smoke coiling from him. The echo dashed leaves from branches halfway down the hill and shouted like thunder on the hilltops. Green witchfire blazed on the tops of the standing stones like a corona.
She fell heavily to the grass, the pain of the Mark now suffused with true mortal pain. Her chest locked tight and wrenched as if it might split in two and she gasped for air, fingers clawing deep into the dark earth. She saw him straighten and come for her with darkening vision, saw his cold eyes flame in the darkness with his thwarted fury, and she smiled. She could stop the uprising in her heart with a word, but she would not speak it. Let this be her victory – to take his from him.
A jolt traveled through her, and she tried to breathe but couldn't tell if she did. The moon blazed through the fangs of the trees and she reached up for it even as her vision darkened and her ancient heart failed within her.
He knelt beside her, touched her face with his cold fingers. "Oh, Mel. I missed you," he said. Her hand fell, and he caught it, held it as she died. One more breath, and then the river of darkness swept her away. Melisande relinquished her place, knowing another would come to take it.
* * * * *
Chapter 01: Winter at the Gates
Angel Falls was only an hour from Seattle on the highway, but it felt like a different world. Cold rivers of shade poured through the wooded valleys and here and there rare streaks of northwestern sun broke through the shifting afternoon clouds to light the flanks of the hills above; white streams poured from rocky overhangs around every turn. Even prettier than Scotland, Stormy thought as she steered the little rented Geo around the turns and through the trees on her way to a new life.
Her old life – her third-story walkup East End flat and a shit job in a bookstore life – was stuffed into three oversized bags in the back seat. She hadn't packed very carefully, and was sure she'd forgotten something important. She'd just thrown things into her bags with a feeling like she was escaping – as if the opportunity would vanish if she didn't hurry – and things hadn't seemed terribly important.
She watched carefully for the turnoff. It had been years since she'd been here, and she'd been just a girl. She remembered the hills as gloomier, and the trees taller, but the brooding, secluded feel of the place was the same. The air was so clear up here compared with London, but the gentle overcast and misting rain was pretty much the same.
She came around a curve and found it, a smoothly-paved cobblestone drive that turned sharply leftwards up the side of the hill, marked only by a low bronze sign with the house number on it and a crescent moon above. She followed the curve of the drive, saw the old iron fence running alongside the road, and knew she was in the right place.
The main gate loomed up out of the trees, every bit as marvelous as she remembered it. It was a masterpiece of ironwork, so lovely that as a child she had been convinced that it had been made by magic in some other place, a fairy tale kingdom. The twisted spars coiled all over with iron vines and hammered bronze leaves, long spearlike tips rising from an arch of interlocked curves reminiscent of bent willow branches. She remembered Mel telling her that the gate was a powerful ward all on its own, and now, with more learned eyes, she picked out the lines of a powerful protective seal worked into the elaborate central boss.
Parked beside it, half on the shoulder, was a gleaming black sedan. A man stood with his hand on the car's frame, staring up the hill towards the house. Stormy scowled. If her parents had sent another solicitor to try to wrangle the inheritance away, she was going to hex him until his eyeballs bled, bad karma be damned.
He turned as she pulled up and cut the engine. She caught a glimpse of a chiseled profile and neatly-trimmed black whiskers. Just-below-shoulder-length hair was tied firmly at the nape of his neck. Nice she thought, as she climbed out of the car. Really nice. But who is he? His suit was tailored to a perfect fit, and she peeked at his shoes – fine leather gleaming warmly.
"Good afternoon," she said, pushing the door closed with her hip. "May I help you, Mister. . . ."
He stepped around his car with an easy stride, greeted her with a smile that cut straight through her. "Winter, Thomas Winter. You must be Miss Willowsong. Silver, isn't it?"
She didn't frown, but she narrowed her eyes. She didn't much like it when people used her real first name. It tended to precede smirks or teasing. He did neither, just regarded her with those blue, blue eyes.
"Silver Storm. Call me Stormy. Everyone does." She didn't recognize his name, but her grandmother had made many friends in her long life, and Stormy's side of the family had only kept in contact in hopes of winning part of the estate, should the venerable Melisande finally shuffle off. Stormy privately thought that Mel's longevity – which seemed unnatural to anyone who denied the existence of witches – was the source of much of her family's antipathy, as though the old woman had lived on just to spite them. But she was gone, and now Stormy was here, an unlikely heir appointed by name to take up where Mel had left off.
She took the stranger's hand without hesitation when he offered it, expecting him to shake it, but he closed it in a two-handed grip.
"I was so terribly sorry to hear about Melisande. We all miss her. She was very wise and very dear." He slid one of those neatly-groomed hands up her arm in a gesture of gentle comfort, and she felt a thrill through her blouse. She really ought to protest his familiarity, but it was kind of nice to have the human contact after the overlong flight and lonely road trip.
"Oh! You're a friend? I thought you were a solicitor, sharking after the house." Stormy tried to put a little edge in her voice, but failed completely. His fingers stroked up the back of her arm, just lightly, and she felt prickles of pleasure ripple up to the back of her neck. What the hell? She wasn't this hard up, was she?
Her breathing quickened when he flashed another sharp smile. "Actually, all I'm sharking after are some books." Oh, he was very handsome. She felt her face flush, very aware that he still had that hand on her arm. This is ridiculous, she thought, but she could feel herself flushing like a schoolgirl.
"We traded books back and forth sometimes – rare works, obscure translations – that sort of thing." He said. "Anyway, I'd loaned her a copy of The Astral Parallax. Melisande is quite a devotee of—oh, dear. I'm sorry. Was." He moved in closer, slipped his hand to the small of her back, his eyes deeply apologetic.
"I don't think I've heard of it," she lied, extracting her hand from his grip almost reluctantly. "It sounds awfully . . . scientific." He smelled good, all spice and leather.
"Quite technical. At any rate, I loaned her that one, along with a few others and, well, I hate to put too fine a point on it, but I do really need them back." He still had his hand on her back, leaned in closer.
She smiled, flustered. "Well, of course if Grandmother had things of yours, I'll be glad to return them as soon as I've found them." She stepped away from him, out of his shadow, as it were.
"I'm terribly sorry," he said insistently. "I really am, but I am afraid I need those books as soon as possible. It's rather urgent." He didn't seem to move forward, but again he was looming right over her.
"Oh, dear," Stormy said. "I'm sure she must have had hundreds of books. I'd hardly know where to look, or what to look for. If you could give me titles and descriptions, that would be a place to start." She sidled away again, bumped up against his car with a start.
"Actually," he said, leaning forward. The weight of his presence bent her back. "I helped arrange her library, I know exactly where they are. If we could just go inside, I can go straight to them." He had a voice, such a voice. Listening to it was like being stroked by a velvet paw.
She met his stare, intense, almost frightening. She felt dizzy, suddenly. Was it was the flood of memory at being here again, or just disorientation caused by the rich forest air after so many hours spent in the dead metal mundanity of airplane and car? "I'd very much like to, Mr. Winter, but I've just had what felt like a forty-eight hour flight, and as you can see, I'm quite tired."
"Of course you are. I'll just be in and out, and you can rest. I hate to impose, but my need is quite . . . urgent." He held her gaze in a way that was creepy, actually.
Yes, Stormy thought. Apparently it is. "I'm afraid that this isn't really the time for business or pleasantries," she said, firmly. "I would be happy to discuss it another time. Perhaps in a few days." If he thought to find her a pushover for a handsome man, he'd reckoned dead wrong. She had no time for this sort of nonsense right now, no matter how good he smelled.
"Stormy," he said, gently reproachful. He took her hands again, and stared into her eyes again. Hard to look away. "Please? It would be so much easier if you only let me in."
And then she felt it hit her like a wave, a torrent of sensation beginning and ending with lust. It was so sudden, so complete and overwhelming, that for a moment she couldn't even summon the strength to resist. She swayed on her feet, and then he was on her, bearing her back against the rear bumper of his car. His mouth nuzzled at her chin, her neck, and then closed over her own.
Her hands found no purchase on the slick metal as he kissed her, and she found herself momentarily slack as his tongue rolled against hers, tasting her. She blushed, her legs already spread for him, trembling with desire that already seemed ready to burst. She wanted him to taste her . . . pry her open with his fingers, eat her like a peach. . . .
"No," she murmured against his mouth. "No!" She tried to push him back, real fear rushing through her. Her hand slid over hard-muscled ribs. Goddess, just the feel of him, solid and lean, and he was right there, just as eager, she could have him. . . . His hand squeezed a full handful of flesh above her knee, slid up her thigh. Her sex suddenly ached, a keen, stabbing pleasure that made her tremble as she imagined being forced open by his fingers, his tongue, his cock. She was close already, so near losing control that it would only take a touch to send her over the edge. If she just opened himself up to her, let him in. . . .
It was a trick. A charm, a glamour, an enchantment. Summoning all her will, she turned her face aside and gasped out the words to Draconis' Pleiadeian ward, felt the rush of power leave her, but she was either weaker than she thought, or he was much, much stronger, because though the force abated, she still felt the yearning pull between her thighs. His power still wound tight around her.
He blinked in surprise at her resistance, then laughed without mirth or mercy in his eyes, only a hunger. "Ah, so you are a witch. I suppose I might have suspected. Why else would she choose someone so inexperienced? Doesn't matter, I'll soon have you in hand."
Stormy didn't intend to give him the chance. He was a sorcerer, and a good one, too, or the Veil of the Pleiades would have worked. She didn't want to see what else he knew. Stormy had not trained in magical combat, but she could still raise a nasty surge of power.
In her fear, she drew recklessly on her own energies and the ambient energy of the earth and trees around them. It built in her hands, under her tongue, and at one word it burst out as she tried to force him away. The power came out as a shimmering, green reflection, like sun on water. He tangled it in the net of his own strength and it dissipated into nothingness, into a cold splash of air. The tail end of it backlashed, leaving her breath stolen and her hands aching as though she'd caught herself falling.
Stunned, she groped for another spell, but he was too quick. "No, I'll have only silence from you, Willowsong." Her defenses wavered, and the psychic command slid home like a sliver under her skin. "Be silent." The command fell upon her like a physical blow, not only silencing her, but momentarily stunning her with its force.
She tried to speak, to protest, then to simply cry out, and could not. It was as though some terrible hand had simply crushed the voice from her throat, and even trying was painful. Without words, she wasn't much of a witch at all. She tried to keep her cool, tried to calm herself, but she felt herself slipping into absolute panic at the weight of another body against hers, the alien throb of power beating at her aura. He had her, he held her, his power, the sense of him, enfolding her.
Her efforts to push him away were met with raw strength. He simply seized her wrists in one hand and pinned her to the car's hard metal, thrust his body between her knees. Her loose skirt rucked up against his hips. There was nothing between them but her grey silk panties and his exquisite suit. She could feel him there, hard through the fabric. Ready and eager to take her. She could feel herself throbbing to take him, her body as eager as her mind was afraid.
His free hand skimmed under her blouse and pressed against the smooth flesh over her heart. Her thigh came up of its own accord, pressed tight to his side. He was hard, all muscle and lust and his will overwhelming her. She could feel his power grinding against her. She couldn't speak to tell him to stop, or even to moan in unwilling pleasure. Her throat ached as though holding back tears.
"Yes," he murmured. "Now you will obey. You will take me inside and give me what I require. Not before I have a little amusement, I think." Then he bent to kiss her, and under his hands she felt the pins-and-needles heat of energy building. Something pricking at her flesh like electricity, just along the edge of pain.
She fought as though through taffy. She couldn't release power – no voice to speak – but she could build power, focus it. Every ounce of strength she had she put into her aura, strengthening it against whatever he was trying to force upon her. Her effort must have yielded something, because he snarled in fury and the tingle in her breastbone doubled to a stabbing pain.
His power twisted like a crushing vise about her ribs, demanding that she succumb, give up, give in. And with every moment the treachery of her body increased, urging her toward him. If she admitted him into her body, past all of her guards, there'd be no keeping him out of the house. He'd have a hold on her, and she wasn't sure she'd be strong enough to evict it. She could resist the new spell he was trying to force upon her or she could resist the magnetic pull of his power, the hook he'd set in her lust. Not both.
Not both.
If she could just get her hands free. . . .
She firmed her power against the spell blazing from the hand pressed to her breast, felt her body slipping further under his control. She clasped her legs tight around him, pulled him close, close enough to feel how his hardness pressed against her, and how pleasure keened through her at the nearness of him. She couldn't help working her hips against him, seeking just a little more, the perfect angle, the perfect bit of friction.
He kissed her, meltingly, and she answered it, breathing raggedly though she could not speak. His tongue was hot, clever. She caught it, sucked it, just to have part of him inside her. He murmured in surprise, pulled back and looked at her, cold eyes kindling with delight at the combination of pleading and lust on her face.
"Still you fight me? Give in," he purred. "You're just exhausting yourself. You can't resist much longer. Your body will yield, or your spirit. I will have you. Give in to me. It won't hurt, if you give in."
She shook her head, panting, ground her teeth. He arched against her, sparking an urgent squeezing within her, so close to coming, and she moaned without sound, the painful lump in her throat tormenting her. She let tears spill from the corners of her eyes – not difficult – and met his gaze again.
Please let this work, she prayed. "Yes," she mouthed, silently pleading. "Fuck me."
To get those perfectly-tailored trousers out of the way, he had to either let go of her hands, or stop the spell he was trying to lay on her. One or the other. And either way. . . .
His grip on her wrists slipped. He reached down between them, his other hand still on her chest, the spell like a spike nailing her to the sedan. She brought her hands up to his face, holding it as if to draw him down for a kiss, and just as he smiled in arrogant triumph she jabbed her thumbs painfully into those piercing eyes.
She would have gouged them out entirely, but her hands were shaking and weak. Nonetheless, he lurched back with a cry, taking his weight from her and clapping his hands over his face. When he lowered them, his gaze was pure murder.
She still couldn't speak, but the other spell was gone. She clutched her chest, gasping, met his furious stare and wondered what to do next.
Winter opened his mouth to speak, but before he could say anything a hand closed on his shoulder and hauled him around to face a scruffy man in battered jeans and a grass-stained Dos Equis shirt holding a hedge trimmer. Stormy clearly saw the blue glow still lingering around Winter's right hand, glimpsed a mark outlined on his palm, limned with blue light – some kind of crooked brand – already fading. Was that what he'd been trying to force on her?
This new man either didn't notice the spell Mr. Winter had readied or didn't care. He still had hold of Winter's jacket, shoved him hard so that he staggered to catch his balance. Winter regained his balance as the other man swung the hedge trimmer up to hold it in both hands, calm but obviously ready to fight. The two men stared at one another. Winter sneered at the sweaty, dirty newcomer, straightening his jacket with angry jerks. "Oh, come now, Shackleton. Can't you wait your turn?"
Shackleton spat on the earth a few inches from Winter's polished, expensive shoes. "Sorry, Buddy. You're not my type."
* * * * *
Chapter 02: Willowsong Hall
Winter raised his fingers and Stormy finally gathered her faculties enough to spit three words and raise a barrier of flickering gold and silver motes between the two men, like a swarm of gnats in a sunbeam. Fighting Winter off had drained her reserves and the effort left her dizzy and nauseated, but Mr. Winter stepped back, the glow fading from his fingers. His eyes flicked to her as she straightened and slid off the back of his car, her legs wobbling under her.
The second man – Mr. Shackleton? – caught Stormy's arm with one gloved hand and hauled her away from the car and away from Winter. Still weak, she staggered over the cobbles and almost fell. He pulled her up and she wrenched her arm from his grasp. The words of another spell tangled on her tongue. She couldn't get it out properly. Blood of Isis! What was wrong with her?
Shackleton pointed down the road with his hedge trimmer. "Get your overdressed ass off this property. Now. And don't come back again."
Mr. Winter calmly adjusted his jacket, watching Stormy struggle to her feet. "We will discuss this again, little witch," he said. Just looking at him . . . Stormy shook her head, trying to slough off the lingering tendrils of desire.
"I don't believe the road belongs to you, Mister Shackleton." Winter regarded him with the airless glare of a snake.
Shackleton tapped his work boot on the smoothed cobbles of the drive. "See this? This ain't asphalt. You step on this, you are on Willowsong property. You aren't invited. Leave. Now." Shackleton's voice was flat and hard. He stepped forward threateningly.
Winter glared for a moment, then seemed to relax, all menace going out of him. He smiled gently. "So sorry, no need for unpleasantness. Just a misunderstanding." He nodded politely at Stormy. "Miss Willowsong." She stepped aside as he walked past her, not wanting to be within arm's reach. He got in his car, and she moved well out of the way as he started it up, backed off the shoulder, and drove down the hill away from the gate.
Shackleton turned to face her with a puzzled frown. "Miss Willowsong?" His eyes widened. "Stormy Willowsong?"
Stormy winced. "Oh, for – who else would I be?" She brushed at her hair, trying to smooth it out. "I didn't mean to snap. I apologize. Call me Stormy." She very badly wanted to tell him to go away and come back when she had sorted herself out, but that seemed a poor way to reward someone for stepping in to help her. Not that she wasn't annoyed about that, too.
She straightened her clothes while he pretended not to notice. Her stocking was torn, and she'd scraped a palm. Beneath her skirt, her thighs were slick, and even she could smell the thick musk of sex. Heru, was she not to be left any dignity? "The executor mentioned you. Her . . . groundskeeper?"
"Yeah, Rick Shackleton. Groundskeeper, handyman, mechanic. Jack of all, master of none, yadda yadda. You all right? Want me to call someone?"
"Who? I don't know what the police would do about a rogue wizard. Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's." She brushed a helpful hand away. "No, thank you. Really. I'm all right."
He looked uncertain He was somewhere around thirty, maybe, with shaggy, dark hair that looked like it'd been cut with that hedge trimmer and scruffy stubble that could've doubled as sandpaper. His skin was work-tanned, and she caught glimpses of a couple of tattoos snaking out from under the shirt. She must've caught him at yard work, because he smelled of sweat and sunshine. Rough, grubby, and a normal guy down to his worn old jeans. Not her type at all, but at the moment, normal was reassuring.
"C'mon," he said, resting the hedge trimmer on his shoulder. "Let's at least get you up to the house."
o0o
"Tiamat's tits," Stormy sighed as she steered around another curve and more of the grounds came into view. Massive old pines, hemlocks and willows marched away across the rolling lawn, thickening to woods toward the north edge of the property. The circular drive was wide and cobbled, looping around an ornate fountain in the center.
The house itself was a gorgeous faux-Tudor styled manse with a peaked roof over the central portico and long, two-story wings sweeping back to either side. The front was a breathtaking fantasy of frosted glass and oriel windows surmounted by an elaborate tile roof festooned with decorative chimneys – a distressing number of chimneys. Stormy tried to grasp how many fireplaces might be inside and gave up.
She pulled over and just sat there, looking at it, shaking her head. Just like I remembered, she thought. I was sure I was making it up. She glanced back and saw the caretaker pulling up in his battered red and white pickup. Stormy noticed with distaste that the truck was not only filthy, but the bed itself was apparently so rusted out that plywood had been laid over it. There was, needless to say, no tailgate, only some rope, and the thing belched a black cloud of exhaust when he shut it off.
She got out of the car, tried to ignore Shackleton as she looked over the house. She was more than a little annoyed at being seen in Winter's grasp, and it occurred to her that the groundskeeper might feel like he had rescued her. The thought that he actually might have was even more irritating, though she couldn't understand why a sorcerer like this Winter had backed off in the face of a . . . hedge trimmer. Or a hedge witch, for that matter. It didn't make sense, and that worried her.
Shackleton came around the front end of the truck, looked her up and down a little more lingeringly than necessary. Stormy tried to ignore it, then decided she'd better make sure he understood how things were going to work from here out.
"I don't know who that man was," Stormy said, "but you should not have come between us." She ought to feel grateful, she knew that, but she just felt angry. As coping mechanisms went, it wasn't too bad. Beat crying.
"Shouldn't have – Lady, that man was about to fuck you into a cocked hat right there in the drive. Would you rather I'd left you to him?"
"What you saw was a wizard duel, Mr. Shackleton," Stormy said, according her poor show of resistance a dignity it did not deserve. "By gaining control of my body, he was attempting to gain control of my mind, and he very nearly succeeded. For a few moments I had absolutely no control over my actions." Even now, the memory of it had her swallowing back nausea. And had her trying not to squirm. Not an agreeable combination. "After years of service to my great grandmother I do hope you recognize that no self-respecting Willowsong would behave in such an unspeakable fashion. We are better women than that."
"I know. Melisande would never have put herself in that position." He seemed to realize what he'd said the moment he'd said it, ran a dirty hand through his hair. "Shit. Sorry. I just mean—"
"I know very well what you mean, Mr. Shackleton. And I hope you know what I mean. That was a man of power, and you are not. The Goddess alone knows why he backed off when you told him to, but we're both extremely lucky he did. That's luck you might not have again, and I don't want to be responsible for anyone's demise, so in future I'd appreciate it if you'd try not to get involved." Some of her strength had come back.
"I'm already involved, ma'am. This isn't the first time I've run him off." He yanked his gloves off, stuffed them into his back pocket, grabbed her bags from the rear seat before she could get to them. "And I'll do it again – as many times as I have to. I'm not afraid of him."
"You ought to be," she said. "I take it he wasn't a friend of Grandmother's?" She smoothed herself again, aware of how her ample flesh was pressing and straining against her rumpled clothes, feeling a little sick – not just because of what Winter had done, but because her body, treacherously, still longed for it. She could still smell him, taste him on her lips. Still feel him between her thighs, the weight of him, the hardness. "Had . . . had you ever seen him before?"
"Nope. Not until after she. . . ." He broke off, cleared his throat. "He started sniffing around, trying to bullshit his way inside, but would never come out and say what he wanted. Fishy."
"And you chased him off?" Stormy turned and started walking across the drive, the fresh air already making her feel better. The front door was enormous, and standing before it she felt like a child. Dark wood with deep-set little windows and elaborate moldings. It looked solid as iron.
"Damn right I chased him off. I'm the goddamn steward of this property."
"I'm . . . I'm pleased that you take your duties seriously, Mr. Shackleton." Would he, still, now that he was working for someone younger? She had no idea how much Nana Mel had trusted him to do or how much leeway he was accustomed to, but she also had no desire to try to replace him. She didn't need anything else to worry about.
She briefly considered letting him go entirely, since the idea of having hired help really rubbed her the wrong way, but she thought of the size of the house and the grounds and knew that she needed him, needed someone, to help her tend the place, help her keep an eye on it. Especially with eerie people like that Winter slinking around. Shackleton would at least know who was welcome on Willowsong property and who was not.
Stormy shivered, and put one hand on the silver moon set into the great door. "Open." It didn't budge. She tried again, with mounting concern and no better results.
"Hang on," Richard said. "Key's on my belt."
He started setting her luggage down, but Stormy simply unclipped the keychain from his belt loop. She ignored his sputter of protest and jingled through them.
"It's the silver one," he said, rude enough to put her bags down with an exasperated grunt, but not quite rude enough to take the keys back from her. "No, go back. There."
An elegant little round-barreled key, brightly shining. She twisted it free and put the ring between Richard's teeth. "Hush, Mr. Shackleton. I'm quite sure the Hall knows its own," she said, pushing the key into the tiny hole. "You will have to show me to a – to my room. I need a shower, and rest."
The key twisted with a little click, and the lunar circle glowed brightly blue. Then the door swung open soundlessly, and the last of the spring day's sun fell through in a wedge, illuminating the great atrium of Willowsong Hall.
This was nothing like her dingy single-room in London, which boasted a leaky ceiling, peeling wallpaper, and a four-star view of a cat-infested dead-end alley. Here there was space, and light, and a sense of magic that permeated the very air. Spells had been laid into the foundation, chanted over every brick. The house practically sang with it, and from the moment she set foot inside it, Stormy felt it in her bones.
Some part of her had always thought she'd imagined it. She'd loved this place as a girl because it had seemed impossibly magical. Now she knew that it had all been true. The place was magical. She'd joked about it, but this really was more of a palace than a house. Just the part she could see from here in the entryway was way too much house for just her. How can I really live in a place like this? she thought. It will swallow me up!
They swept through the entry hall – Stormy remembered playing on the floor here. The green marble squares had been pastures for her toy horses, the blue staircase runner doubled as the ascent to Mount Olympus. She climbed the steps now, wishing she still had that child's knack of belonging wherever she happened to be, because she felt profoundly out of place. Her clothes smelled like the airplane, her stockings squeezed, and she still felt a bit queasy after her close call. She wanted something safe and familiar.
Richard's rough figure seemed just as misplaced among Willowsong Hall's fine polish and delicate sculpture. A rough-hewn wooden knight on a marble chessboard. He knew his way around, though, and showed her down the central second-floor hallway to the master bedroom. She hesitated at the verge. It might be disturbing, she suddenly thought, to sleep in rooms so recently vacated by her great-grandmother. Would it be disrespectful?
"Mr. Shackleton, I've . . . changed my mind. I think I'd best sleep in a guest roo–oh."
The door opened. She'd never actually seen the master suite, Nana Mel had kept that to herself, and could barely believe what she was seeing now.
It was one huge room, split into two levels. Crowded shelves overflowing with knickknacks and books lined the lower area, which was furnished with a writing desk, several chairs, a wide couch, a small table . . . a place of comfort. A small meditation fountain bubbled pleasantly down the right hand wall, with golden fish circling in the basin among waving green plants. On the left, a stair wound up to the second level where she saw a canopied bed, a wardrobe, a little breakfast table. Thick blue curtains hung where they could be drawn across the balcony.
A domed ceiling arched over it all, and Stormy realized she was staring at the underside of the house's bronze cupola, painted to look like a sky. No, it was the sky: twilight scattered with stars, seen through the finest crystalline glass. And under this light a fierce profusion of roses climbed up from decorative urns, twining up the stairs and along the balcony rail. Their scent filled the room.
"You have got to be shitting me." Too good to be true flashed through her mind, along with: Got to be a catch somewhere. Still, she was tired, rattled, and in need of a bath, so she'd just have to look in this gift horse's mouth some other time. Besides, she'd probably already run into the catch outside. Lovely Tudor Revival mansion in rural Washington. Fully furnished inside with library and alchemical laboratory, landscaped outdoors with statuary and pasture. Scenic view. Comes with stalker.
"Bath's upstairs," Richard offered. "Through there."
Stormy sighed at the thought. She just wanted to put the day behind her. "Nan didn't happen to hire a cook since I was here last, did she? Or a valet?"